The Descent...

The flickering light of the fire caused the shadows to jump and dance. I could hear hear waves crashing against the shore off to my left. My guide stood on the other side of the flames, the shadowy substance that the Shade was composed of shifting in the light.

“We should move on. Night is when a child of Pluto should travel.” It was an old argument, one that I had thought he had abandoned.

“I told you that I will not travel by night but by day. It is not your job to dispute my decisions.” I stretched out the sand strewn ground, using my pack as a pillow. “Wake me before dawn.”

There was no reply, but I didn’t expect one. The Shade Father had sent to guide me may grumble a bit, but he was good at following orders.

As I closed my eyes I grasped the spear the Shade had given me, a curious weapon, made of a curious material; at the moment it was no longer than the hunting knife my zio  kept in his room, but at  a mental command it would grow to up to six feet. The head was wickedly sharp and leaf shaped, and both shaft and head seemed to be made of a single piece of strange, light weight metal with gold and bronze swirls, a metal that glowed when night fell.

As my breathing slowed and I drifted off into the realm of dreams the fire began to die.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

A hand on my shoulder, feather light, woke me in the pre-dawn light. The fire was long dead - even the embers were cold. I made a quick breakfast of cold chicken, and after washing my hands and face in a nearby stream we set off, the Shade leading.

<span style="font-size:15px;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);white-space:pre-wrap;">The sun glared down from a cloudless sky, and my pale skin seemed to attract the heat. The sea lay to my left, the waves glinting in the light. Ahead of us lay a large outcropping of rock, towering above us, with a cave at it’s base, into which the light seemed afraid to venture. It was  to this cave that the Shade led me, and I hesitated at the mouth, looking up at the sky; I didn’t know how long I would be in the Underworld, and when I emerged the sky I saw wouldn’t be the sky of my home. “Addio, Italia.” I looked back at the cave, and stepped into the darkness.