Summoning Ancient Help

By Anastasia
Once upon a time, there lived Corinthia, the daughter of a courtier whose maidservant secretly taught her the Old Religion, a nature religion that honored the Mother Goddess. Immersed in a warlike culture that only honored a male god, she, Corinthia, secretly carried on the traditions that her servant taught her. Several times a year, she escaped the frivolous court to a grove of oak trees a mile away from the palace, and there she meditated and chanted and spoke to the Goddess.

When the old king died, the kingdom held a great somber funeral, with a carriage in a procession that trailed from the castle on the mountain and on for several miles.
Corinthia walked in this procession and grieved not only for the king but for the kingdom, for she did not like the king’s younger brother, Mallimoot, a horrible, disagreeable warlike man from all accounts. Whenever she saw him, he behaved in a disagreeable manner, sneering at ladies to their faces and boasting about the stupidest and most violent things.

She felt reluctant to express her opinions to those around her, for oddly nobody else seemed to have her misgivings, unless she coincidentally only overheard the wrong conversations. The courtiers around her seemed to have hope for the new king and appreciated the fact that he was ten years younger than his deceased brother and even had a son, an heir. They were curious to see how he would lead the kingdom, whether he would do well or poorly, while Corinthia sensed that he could definitely do nothing good and it would be best if someone assassinated him as soon as possible. She only faintly regretted such violent thoughts, and amended them by wishing that somehow he would not remain king for long.

Within a year after Mallimoot gained the crown, a king in a neighboring land attacked the country, and everyone except Corinthia thought it was unprovoked. The other courtiers strangely overlooked the fact that their new king had been sending threats and boasts to the neighbors ever since he was crowned, possibly even before that, and that the neighbors had every reason to feel threatened, to fear that this monster would take over their country. Suddenly, to Corinthia’s horror, war-mongering, bloodthirsty people surrounded her.

Corinthia listened in confusion, dismay, and disgust to the opinions of everyone around her. They spoke as though they seriously thought King – was a hero, and they spoke as though they actually supported him in his warmongering attitudes. Was she the only one in this world who had the sense to know better? She whispered to the Mother Goddess Gaia each night, beseeching her to pay attention to this world that had ignored her for so long. Gaia no doubt had other, more ethereal worlds to attend to, but Corinthia considered this an emergency.

Corinthia listened and observed in disgust as the two Kings quite obviously fought in the names of their male gods. She did not perceive any difference between the two—they were both male war gods, really the same one under a different name. During the first battle, she stood by a tower window and looked below. Over the battlefield, she could see a reddish black cloud split in half. The two halves formed men-like forms that swung swords much like the brutal men below, and the two smoky forms fought each other. This, Corinthia thought, was what came of a society that ignored Gaia. Shuddering, she turned away from the window, ran down the tower stairs, down a corridor, and out a little used back exit.

In the sacred grove, where ancient oak trees still lived, Corinthia concentrated and concentrated to the best of her ability on calling the spirits of previous priestesses of the Old Religion to come and help. She circled, chanting, around an altar upon which she had arranged incense and candles and white lilies. As she circled, chanting more quickly and circling more quickly, she realized that she was no longer alone. Around her circled translucent, grayish priestesses in flowing robes and long, flowing hair. Three appeared first, then two more, and in a matter of very few minutes, a circle of twenty such spirits circled around, chanting with Corinthia, and they all joined hands. She backed into the circle and joined hands with them.

No longer was the chant for the spirits of priestesses: now all the priestesses chanted for the Mother Goddess, Gaia, to return, to help them in this hour of desperate need. The Goddess had been ignored for far too long, and it was as though she were in hibernation. This chant, composed mostly of disembodied spirits, was her summoning. As they circled, a great wind shook the trees and blew Corinthia’s hair in her face, but she continued to circle and chant with the spirits and did not lose her concentration. The wind circled above and she thought she could see the faintest outline of a woman above, in the whirlwind, circling and circling higher and higher.

The windy manifestation of Gaia moved away from the grove and toward the battlefield. There she created such a great billowing wind, that the two sinister, smoky figures above the battlefield dissipated into bits of smoke, and then into nothing, and the same happened to the two fighting kings below, in the center of the battlefield. Both kings vanished into nothing. When the soldiers saw this, that their kings were both gone, they stopped fighting and looked around in utter amazement. The inexplicable event left them so astonished, and they knew that something awesome had happened. Intuitively they knew it was for the good, and they all went home in peace at last.