" I know you need my help, your mother failed to tell me why."

"Hades wanted to come, but the presence of the god of the dead among the living would be problematic, at best. also, mother barred him from entering her temples. he would have just stood at the door." she gave with a sad smile.

"so I take it that the myths I once knew are true, you are Persephone, daughter of Demeter and wife of Hades?" everyone present knew I still held the memories of wherever I had come from before. so I wasn't revealing anything new.

"Mother told me where she found you, some of the myths of that place and time were somewhat skewed. where all myths have some basis in fact, some are just so outlandish that they are pure entertainment." she said with the first honest smile I had seen on her in the past two hours since she came into the temple. "But yes, in this your myths are true, Hades is my husband, and Demeter is my mother, but that is the extent of the truth of your myth. we are not the only overseers of the dead." she looked at me fairly intently. "The one your memories call 'The Morning-star' also oversees our domain." My body went still with shock as she continued, "and unlike with my family, the myth you held of him in your past, is very much the case with him down there. it takes everything Hades and I have to keep him from passing his 'Divine Judgement' on all those souls who have wronged others. when his creator, I believe you refuse to use his name, made him, he didn't make things easy for us."

When the people around me saw how tense I was at the mention of 'The Morning-star' they seemed to know that I definitely feared this particular being."

"You don't need to worry yourself with him anymore. because you voluntarily became the champion of a different pantheon, that one no longer holds sway over you."

This time it was Oracle Daren that spoke up; "There are more gods and goddesses? that are outside of the Pantheon?"

"Oracle of My Mother, " she said it as a title, "you are a worldly voice for my mother, and her wishes. you know about this pantheon. but I can tell you that in Tasha's previous life, she was a follower, albeit a bad one, of the religion followed in Archangel, and even now, follows some of its precepts. have you ever noticed that she bows her head before eating? what follower of me or Mother does this? or the fact that she reads only the doctrinal books on the evening of every seventh day, where most priestesses will only pick up those books during their training, and never read them again."

"She may not have been a devout follower, or believer, in her previous life, but she was definitely ingrained in how to behave by their doctrine. its one of the reasons why she was given the opportunity to do this."

"But things have changed, Persephone. Demeter made it very clear to me when she spoke to me today, the second time in a year I might add."

"Demeter speaks to you each year?" Oracle Daren looked at me with awe, "Most oracles only hear from their benefactor three or four times in their lifetime." he finished when I questioned him with a look.

"Demeter told me, when I volunteered, that she could contact me no more than once a year, and only then if I was in a temple. since I was born here, she has spoken with me for about a half an hour on each birthday. then today, she speaks to me again, telling me that rule was revoked for the foreseeable future, and that this woman will know, and explain why." I rebuked. then when I realized how I had said it, I got mad at myself. "Damn it, now you made me loose my tact, and I might have just pissed off the goddess of the dead."

"The artifacts for opening Mundus are all in the hands of necromancers. it has been four eons since the last time it was open. opening it will do two things. first it will give the necromancers direct control of souls, not just the soul flow you can use; second it can potentially give eternal life to everything. but not in the way some of you are thinking, its a pseudo-half life. you are half dead, and half alive all the time. eventually children will cease to be born, but by that time the entire planet's resources will be consumed. even if the atmosphere collapses, you would forever feel suffocation, and starvation, and be unable to die." Persephone then looks at me. " the last time this was attempted, this planet became a burning husk. and everything your old faith taught about hell, was real. but the people didn't have to die to go there, they couldn't die. it was just as Revelations had predicted."

well, now I know that her little slip up earlier about me being from a different time was no mere slip up. and Mundus being open, sounds worse than anything I read about in hell.

"Tasha, there is a reason that Necromancy is named only once in the Torah, or Old Testament. In your old faith, in the book of Deuteronomy, it is one of three things your old faith abhorrently prohibited of its original believers, being led by Moshe, or Moses. And its the only thing, that even Mother prohibits, Hades and I also prohibit our followers from dabbling in it. not because it diminishes their power, but because it can potentially cause huge problems."

I paused her for a moment, then pointed at Natalie, " So you are telling me that if Priestess Natalie, over there, wanted to dabble in Necromancy, along with her affinity for air, she could potentially send a Soul through time, and destroy natural order."

"That's the least of the problems that could occur, Which is why when we deities do that very thing, the cost is measured over and over and over again before we do it, and are very cautious of our selection. but mortals cant fathom the complexities of everything that goes into it. and even we aren't omnipotent. And even though mother could send you back to when and where you came, I've been told the circumstances, as well as can read them in your soul, I'm not restricted from telling you things as mother is, so I will say this: if the option ever comes up, to return to your old life, refuse flatly. please do not attempt it." I nodded at her plea, and wondered why her tone had shifted to one of sadness.

"Since you can read souls like that, are you able to tell if there is anyone in this temple I can not trust with these secrets about me?"

"I looked at everyone here, and there is only one you shouldn't trust. I would say two," she looked at Natalie, "But the former Sister is willing to kill to keep you safe. the honors my mother more than her old, shall I say 'family'."

"I may no longer consider myself a Sister, but I still hold the three oaths. and I will use my abilities to protect the Chosen of Demeter."

"Well said Natalie, any other answer and I would have taken you tonight like I will take the other." we all knew what this meant, we would loose a friend tonight."

I decided to get the conversation back on track, "I'll help you, but I am taking Demeter's advice with it. I need something in return for my help. and its something that I know you can give."

"I figured as much, I'm guessing the knowledge of your creation pathway?" I shook my head no to her answer.

"Not just knowledge, but the wisdom to use it. there is only one thing wrong with having power, and that is not having the wisdom to know when not to use it. That's what I want from you.."

she nodded like she was deciding something and then looked back to me.

"It seems your sleeping curse is going to be useful to you. I will start it when you go to sleep. otherwise this whole city will be awake with your screams. what you are asking, is going to hurt a lot. as a deep sleeper, you will neither wake nor feel a thing." she stood to leave then turned back. "The assault on the Necromancers will take place when you are ten, they wont figure out what they have until then anyway. you have this time to get your body ready, and learn how to use your Zeon. Good luck."

With that, the goddess of the dead bowed to me, actually bowed her head to me, and then disappeared in the exact moment my eyes were closed from blinking.

"With that, I am going to bed." as I leave the room I am grabbed by Mom and Natalie. "Yes?"

"Not in your bed tonight, daughter." Mom said, purposefully not using my name, Natalie had the same look in her eyes and moving her head back and forth, then the two of them together drug me to the cellar.

"You are going to make a lot of noise tonight. this is the best we can do. we don't want to wake everyone."

a few hours, and a bathroom break, later, my bed had been moved to the cellar, and I had drifted off to sleep. when I woke up the next day, only Natalie looked like she had gotten any rest.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I knew it would be a harrowing night for Tasha. To see my daughter not even phased by hearing a goddess, the goddess of the dead no less, by hearing that she will be subjected to such pain as to keep the city awake frightened me. what had this poor girl been through to not care about pain?

the things I heard Persephone say about the last time Mundus was opened scared me to the point that since the first time since my induction here, I prayed to Demeter, and since I knew she couldn't directly interfere, I also prayed to Persephone to ease my daughter's pain.

an hour before high-night, the screaming began. from two places, not one. the cellar, all of us expected. the Paladin quarters we had not. This must have been the one deemed untrustworthy. I walked into the Paladin's room and saw a very handsome man with Persephone.

"Hello Michelle, you may not want to be in here. This is 'The Dragon of the Morning' or as Tasha knows him: 'The Morning-star. I would recommend you not be here for this, its not often I invite Lucifer to punish one of our domain, and I would rather you not witness it."

"When the mention of this man, who makes my daughter who does not fear pain, brings the look of utter terror to my daughter's face, I want to know why. even if its to understand her just a little bit. I want to know."

"Very well. but please remember, she has seen worse than what you are about to. Lucifer cant extract everything he wants to, because we aren't in his domain, she lived for 23 years, before." her pause was contemplative, and not entirely deliberate. "Well, lets just say before Mother found her, she got really used to the dragon's full abilities, even if she doesn't remember it."

she nodded to the man again, and I forced myself to watch this beautiful man torture a woman I had called friend over my last 30 years, a woman who I knew since childhood, and one who wished ill will toward my daughter. Nobody, except Tasha, and Natalie, got any sleep.

it was years later when we started hearing that particular night being called Harrow's Eve. Thank Demeter that nobody figured out the sounds were coming from her temple.