Free Radiant Darkness by Emily Whitman Page B

weaving patterns. But step in all the way, dunk your head under, and you come out dripping, sleek, sopping, and gone.
       I hum a little more. That doesn't sound so bad right now: forgetting. Maybe I could wade in just a little, up to my ankles, and make yesterday go away.
       But as I fasten a girdle around my waist, waves of pictures sweep over me, and I realize there's so much I don't want to forget. Hades' hands lifting me into the chariot. And my friends—maybe the only friends I'll ever have, since everyone here is too busy bowing at my feet to get to know me. And the vale: dark green leaves on gnarled branches, purple drifts of irises by the lake, my courtyard (how small it was!), and the lemon tree near the overhang shading my loom . . .
       That's it! The loom I passed yesterday on my way to the throne: it's already strung and waiting just for me. My name is carved on it, after all, and that silver yarn basket isn't something a servant would use.
       My mother never taught me to rule, but she did make me weave for so many hours, my hands take over and I don't need to think, or analyze, or worry as long as the shuttle is moving.
       It's too bad the Lethe can't be measured out to my liking. As it is, I'm stuck being me, no matter how much I mess up, and I might as well figure out how to make this my home. I'll start by weaving some new covers for this bed, something with a cheerful pattern, not so regal.
    I tie my hair back and throw open the door.

Statues

    T he hallways rear up like a hydra waving serpentine heads. I've already forgotten my path from yesterday morning.
       What's more, all the servants I heard bustling about earlier have disappeared, leaving me alone with a jumble of rooms and hallways. Against all the spirals and frescoes, the only figures I can see are statues, stiff with perfection. Every corner seems to shelter someone brandishing a sword or stepping from a chariot.
       Then it occurs to me—the doorways all look the same, but each statue has some distinguishing characteristic. I'll use them to keep track of where I've been, and eventually, when I have a map in my head, I'll find my way downstairs.
       A fellow with a traveler's hat and winged sandals must be Hermes. He raises his staff, preparing to guide mortal spirits away from their earthly bodies. What a handsome face he has: boyish and a little playful.
       I walk down the hall toward a towering statue of Hades, confident, bold, and totally regal. In fact, there are statues of Hades just about everywhere. Hades, reins in hand, leading eight horses across a frieze. Hades in a gesture of welcome, standing near a staircase.
       These may not be the stairs I took yesterday, but they go down, don't they?
       With every step I hear a rhythmic tapping. The lower I go, the louder the sound gets until it saturates the air around me. Where there's banging, there's bound to be a person to ask for directions.
       I follow the noise through a door into a courtyard, except it's like I've walked into a cloud, because white dust is swirling everywhere. Craggy shapes loom up like stones scattered on a hillside in the mist. I cover my mouth with my hand and try to wend my way toward the banging noise.
       I round one of the rocks and suddenly a gigantic shoulder is writhing toward me out of the stone. I lurch back, preparing to flee; then I realize the muscled, surging shoulder is nothing but marble. A statue in the making, that's what it is.
       As I come among more finished work, I start to recognize some of the statues. Right in front of me there's a white marble man with wings raised above broad shoulders. Even though the stone isn't painted yet, his face looks familiar, and so do the greaves etched on muscular calves. Then I remember a smile on that face, and those wings folded back, and that hand helping me up from the throne room floor.
       Now the hammering is almost deafening. I can see an arm going up