SOUL GUIDE

Sometimes we need to die a little to be born anew and good. P.S. You don't need to be born a half-blood to find your destiny. Hopefully my story brings back your fondest memories of Percy Jackson.

Yellowish-green meadow rolled between the crescent shaped valley, as the stuffy summer wind gave way to anchor gray sky in the blink of an eye. In front of me, stood the ruined remains of the temple surrounded by misty fog thick enough to scare the daylight out of tourists. The Temple of Hades, once stood mighty and glorious, was now covered in soot and ashes, its columns crumbled to leveled ground. During ancient Greece, Greeks came to this very spot to commune with their dead ancestors. Or so it was believed. Supposedly, they went through levels of corridors leaving offerings behind until the dead decided to show up. Many lost their sanity trying to get guidance from the ghosts, but hey, considering all the troubles I’ve been through in my life, getting help from ghosts might be my only choice. 

“Finding your way into the Necromanteion, eh,” said a hollow voice behind me. Startled, I turned around, finding myself staring face to face at an old hippie. He had the features of a blacksmith, tattered clothes, calloused hands and a grim expression. “Must be pretty desperate if you want to meet Death at a young age. You’re what, sixteen?”

Desperate was one word for it. Abandoned as a kid, nightmares haunting every night, going to jail, well, it can do pretty harsh things to a teenager. Even though the House of Hades was believed to be a legend, I needed some answers. 

“Danger paves your path,” whispered the hippie, like he’d just read my mind.

“What?” I asked, but the old man was nowhere to be found. It was like he vanished into thin air.

I slowly made my way to the shimmering entrance, and down the spiral staircase. The cavern was dimly lit and shadowy mist filled the room. Somewhere in the distance, the air smelled of honeysuckle and primrose. To either side of me, the walls reverberated like a faint heartbeat thumping. All around pictures of Greek mythology were carved into the walls. One showed Hades and Persephone wreathed in laurels, worshiped by skeleton warriors. Another showed the three brothers: Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades, in what looked like the throne room of Olympus. Greek inscriptions filled the ceiling, like they were spells or chants to summon the ghosts. Pretty intimidating. As I reached the last step, something streaked past me. It was a hazy blue light, but I could feel a cold presence in the new room I had entered. The room branched into three corridors leading to who knows where. 

“A kid,” seethed a voice. In the center corridor stood a see-through figure. The figure hissed with a female voice, floating through mid-air towards me.

“Micah…” her voice echoed.

“How do you know my name?” I trembled, as I realized that what stood in front of me was a ghost. 

“Ghosts know everything. We know everyone’s secrets,” the voice taunted.

Secrets. At that word, my mind betrayed me and took me back to a painful memory that I’ve re-lived every night. The same nightmare for a year now. I stood in a deserted forest in the middle of the night next to two other people. The woman had beautiful brown eyes, dark hair, a sleeveless blue dress, and the perfect smile, holding hands with a handsome young man in a black suit, who looked like her husband. The couple ran through the pine trees, beckoning me to follow them. Next thing I saw, they stumbled and fell down a fifty feet chasm, blood splattering at the bottom. After that, I woke up shivering just like all the times I’ve had the same nightmare.

“Sweet dream, mmm. Although, that’s not quite what happened to mommy and daddy.”

A jolt passed down my spine. The next thing I saw, I was back at the police station from last year. I looked at myself feeling ashamed for getting caught by the cops for stealing their car. My foster parents apologized for me and begged the cops to leave it as a warning. Images blurred after that, and more painful memories overtook me �" getting into fights at school, lying to everyone, betraying my foster family. No, control your emotions, I yelled at myself. After a gasp for breath, I suddenly realized that I wasn’t thinking about them. Someone was forcing me to see those things.

“Stop,” I yelled at the ghost.

“Make me then, Micah,” chided the voice.

I closed my fingers around the pendant of my necklace like I do everytime I’m scared out of my pants. I held it very precious. It was the only thing remaining of my parents that was always close around my neck. Precious, I realized. I remembered that offerings and sacrifices were made to the ghosts of the House of Hades. Kissing the pendant for one final time, I removed it from the necklace and laid it down. There was complete silence until it was broken up by a gust of wind as the ghost disappeared. 

Taking a deep breath I closed my eyes, blindly making my way to the back of the room. After the noises inside my head had died, I dared to open my eyelids, still pretty shaken from earlier.  I stepped into what looked like a courtyard, surrounded by pedestals upholding the stygian iron statues of Hades, as the silver moonlight glinted through the open ceiling. Withered meadow covered the floor as the River Acheron flowed through the nearby trench. Two big white poplars stood at the center of the courtyard, between which stood a yellow goblet on a stoned rubble. All of a sudden, the bustling of leaves stopped followed by cracking sounds from beneath the ground. I stood dazed as piles of bones cracked the ground open, hundreds of them, and started to form the figures of skeleton warriors in full armor and spathas. Their void eyes seemed to suck in the air around me. In a split second, they raised their spathas and charged.

If I had the nerve to steal a cop car and act like a total criminal, you should also know that I know a thing or two about sword fights. Taking a broken plank lying next to me, I started to defend myself. I parried the skeletons’ attacks �" about a dozen of them surrounded me �" dodging their fatal blows by the hair. I knew I couldn’t defeat them by sheer force, considering all I had was a mere piece of wood, so I had to use my wits. Is it too late to suggest now that the ghosts were actually better than these zombies? Nowhere to hide exactly and no other exits as far as I could tell. Maybe this was the final level. I kept eyeing the weird goblet from time to time, and it seemed to be bothering me vigorously.  Maybe…

I rolled past and deflected the attacks as I crawled towards the goblet. It gave off a foul odor from a green, slimy liquid inside. Covering my nose, I garbled the liquid hurriedly. It tasted like chemicals and barbed wire. When the dark spots from my eyes cleared, I was all alone except for two flickering white auras that solidified into a beautiful couple as I stared in awe. My mouth hung open as I found their attractive eyes and their calm facial features familiar. It was from the only real memory I had of my parents.

“Mom, Dad?” anger swelled inside me and my eyes became bloodshot. 

“The anger you have towards us is, uh, expected, dear. But we have dreamt of you every second of our lives,” mom’s voice was surprisingly like honey to my soul as it calmed my nerves. “You’ve grown a lot,” she chuckled.

I was speechless. Mixed emotions of pain, guilt, and joy burdened my heart.

“I’ve really missed you both,” tears trickled down my cheeks. I went forward to hug them, but my hands passed right through them.

“Mom, dad, I really want to ask you guys something. What happened that night? The night you died?” my tone expressed pain and alarm. “ I don’t remember, and nobody knows. How did I survive while you didn’t?”. My mouth tasted like ash, and it took me a second to realize that it must be a side effect from the rotten liquid.

“Is that what you really want? To know what happened that night?”  dad’s voice showed concern.

“I need to know what my past was, where I come from. And honestly, it has been troubling me for so many years, I-I need to know it wasn’t my fault…” I faltered to a whimper. I need to avenge you, I thought to myself. “I-I�",” suddenly my insides felt like they were twisting into a knot, and I coughed hard. It felt like acid was churning inside, making its way up the food pipe. 

“Honey, you took the poison. We’ve only got a little time before our connection is severed,” her voice was soothing. 

“What poison? How the heck am I still alive?” I questioned aloud.

“It won’t kill you,” explained dad. “It obscures your vision so that your mortal eyes can adjust when you stand on the plane separating the living and the dead. But its effect is wearing and soon our talk will end.”

I fell to my knees and sobbed, hugging myself. Seeing my parents now hurts more than not seeing them. Nothing could change my life, I’m stuck like this, without a real family. 

“Whatever happened was not your fault, Micah,” mom put her hand on my shoulder. 

“How would you know?” I yelled. “I’ve done things. Bad things. I love nobody and nobody can help me. I can’t have a good future after all the terrible things I've done.”

“Well, you’re right about one thing,” mom hushed her voice to comfort. “Nobody could help you, but you. You can set yourself free Micah, forget your past. The road ahead of you, is what you’ve chosen and paved for yourself. You have to let go of your past and learn to forgive yourself.”

I rolled on the ground from the throbbing pain of the poison. Hades was the God of the Underworld and the Dead. Sometimes you need to die to be reborn again.

“I want to be happy, feel peace at last,” I said with a final gasp before I started losing consciousness. Through my blurry vision, I saw dad taking hold of my hand, and mom kissing my forehead. Then my eyes closed. 

When I opened my eyes again, I was laying on the grounds of the ruined Temple of Hades, with my back to the itchy mossy ground. Wow. I just survived the House of Hades and came back in one piece. Hopefully, still with my sanity in check. I felt different now than when I first started the journey. It didn’t matter how I’d lived my life before, I know who I am now, and that’s the start of my new life.