kajsa ㅇㅅㅇ

Orpheus dropped to his knees. 

Gone.

She was gone.

His hands sank down onto the ground, grabbing handfuls of dirt, clutching at the soil as if it would somehow bring her back. As if somehow, it carried a piece of her, some part of her to grab onto. To bring her back to him.

Eurydice.

He could still taste her name on his tongue, still see her standing there, even through the flood swelling in his eyes.

He’d failed her for the last time.

The lyre on his back was a heavy weight, a reminder of the price he’d paid for his lover. 

I have to finish the song, he’d told her. A song… to bring the world back into tune.

And finish it he had. And now spring would come again. But at such a price… was it worth the cost? 

She was dead, and he was alive. And it was his fault.

The long grass rustled as Hermes knelt beside him, trailed by the scent of warm jasmine and old parchment. 

“Aight,” he whispered. 

Orpheus sank lower into the dirt. Take me with you. 

He’d never been so aimless. So helpless. So stupid.

But how was he to know? How was he to know that Hades spoke the truth? 

“They’ll be waitin’ for you,” Hermes said gently, laying a careful hand on Orpheus’ shoulder.

“Then they’ll be disappointed,” he choked. He tried to swallow back the lump in his throat, tried to force it to fill the chasm in his chest, but it wouldn’t move. A tear streaked down his face and fell to the dirt, where a small red carnation rose from the soil.

All of the breath left his body. He reached out to touch the petals. They were soft, like her skin, and bright, like her eyes. 

He let his hand drop again, and he plucked the flower gently from the ground.

“On the road to hell, there was a railroad line,” Hermes sang softly. “And a boy with music in his soul…  he lost his lover before her time. He wrote a song of love for her, and this is how it goes:”

Orpheus knew what came next. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He sat back on his heels and held the sacred flower gingerly between his fingers.

“Singing la, la la la, la la la,” Hermes prompted. And somehow, Orpheus found the strength to join in. 

“La, la la la, la la la.

La, la la la, la la la.

La, la la la la la…”

His voice broke. Hermes gently squeezed his shoulder, lifting him to his feet.

“Come on, son.”

“Wait,” he blurted. He looked out, with wavering vision, over the plain. He could see the path they’d walked.

His heartbeat thumped out her name as he held up the carnation for her, took a deep breath, and sang:

“Wait for me, I’m coming. Wait, I’m coming with you. Wait for me, I’m coming, too; I’m coming too.”

His voice seemed to rouse a breeze, plucking loose the petals of the flower born from his tears. Even when his voice faltered and died out, leaving silence in its wake, the breeze carried the petals onward, back down the path they’d come.

Orpheus stood watching a long time after the petals had disappeared.

But eventually, Hermes’ hand reappeared on Orpheus’ shoulder, and he looked up at the old, lined face, as if for approval. Hermes gave him a small nod, then steered him away down the slope.