The road gradually changed, and after maybe a half hour of walking it had become a dirt path at the base of a cliff overlooking a dark and motionless sea. The path tilted up, and soon we were climbing back and forth along outcroppings of the cliff until we came to a dark cave far above the water. I looked up, but was unable to see anywhere the cliff ended. Hecate later told me this was the base of Mount Olympus itself, and there was no path that high available to mortals.

The cave was long and winding, digging deep into the mountain. There was a fork in the road, one path leading deeper down and the other curving back up. We took the latter, and finally emerged into a chamber bustling with activity. Three women worked quickly here; one spinning thread, another measuring out its length, and a third cutting it. The Fates, the Greek pseudodeities who were believed by their culture to determine the destiny and duration of every life, glanced up and smiled as if expecting me. And, of course, I suppose they were. It didn’t seem to much matter whether or not I held to the religion of the ancient Greeks. The Fates exist, whether as a distinct set of people or as but one manifestation of a deeper concept, and by existing they must have at least some insight into the destinies of individuals.

It made me wonder, as I revisited the topic later, about the nature of Hecate herself. She is Hecate, and she is also the Mistress of Magic, and the Queen of the Crossroads, and the Goddess of Liminal Spaces. But are those titles for a single being called Hecate, or is Hecate a title for a single being who is fundamentally the Goddess of Liminal Spaces? The name is easier to work with, and a recognizable form, but that doesn’t mean that is her true identity. I may have to revisit Sergei’s ideas about the many faces of Hecate through the ages. This idea was bolstered later by the Fates themselves, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

I was brought before the Fates, and Hecate informed them that I was interested in learning the secrets of time. Clotho, the first woman, explained that theirs was not the whole of time, but the allotment of an individual’s portion of time. Atropos, the third, pointed out that this gave them insight into the past and future, and therefore could teach me to use that insight, but it would only be part of the whole if I wished to truly master the flow of time itself. I explained that it was my desire to understand, and therefore insight seems the most natural place for me to begin.

“She will see how it all began,” answered Lachesis, the woman measuring the thread. “Her destiny includes sight of the past and future, and witnessing the rise and fall of the eternal.” Hecate rested her hand on my shoulder, and when I turned back to look, she was smiling.

“Very well,” she said to the three, “I leave her in your hands. The Hound will wait outside and see her home when you are done with her.” With that, she left, and the Hound made its way outside the cave.

“Thought she’d never leave,” Clotho grumbled.

“No you didn’t,” Atropos said, and they all laughed.

“Come come, sit down,” Lachesis said, waving a hand to me without turning her focus away from the thread. “There is much work to be done.”

“What did you mean, that I would see how it all began?” I asked, moving forward and sitting on a large, smooth rock. “Am I really going to see that far back?”

“Back?!” Clotho shouted with a laugh. I must have shown my confusion, because Atropos gave me a comforting smile.

​“The beginning has not happened yet, dear,” she said, calmly. “You will find time to be more complicated than you realize.”

It had been a long day, and I was ready to crash for the night. I got up to my bedroom a little after 11, and as soon as I closed the door I saw the Hound sitting next to my bed.

“Don’t you usually wait til I’m asleep?” I asked. It cocked its head, then stood and turned around. The wall behind my bed folded out into a forest path overlooking the sea, and the Hound began walking. I yawned, stretched, and followed.

I wasn’t sure whether it was simply because I was going to the Crossroads physically for the first time, or if I had really changed so much that my experience of the Crossroads had to be completely redesigned, but the path seemed much more real than it ever had before. It was partly the senses; the smell of Central American flowers and ocean air, the feel of the ground under my feet, the sound of birds lilting through the trees. But there was something else, something that felt much more surprising: the path no longer looked magical. Before, it had always had an air of mystery to it, a sense that it couldn’t possibly exist in the real world, and of course it couldn’t, not with the ocean hovering overhead and the path forming and disappearing in response to my steps. But this, this felt like home, a home of which I only had very sparse, fleeting memories, from so many years ago.

What was Hecate playing at?

She didn’t behave as if she noticed the difference in the realm when we reached her, and she certainly didn’t present herself any differently in reaction to context. It was strange, looking upon a Greek goddess standing tall in a wilderness half a world away from the mountain her kind called home, carrying herself as if this was her own personal temple. And, well, it was. Whatever the Crossroads looked like to me, it remained the Crossroads, and that made it hers. But the effect was jarring, and my new doubts about her intentions after negotiating with my life prevented me from simply dismissing that incongruity.

“Jacqueline,” she said, her voice dripping with honey. I bowed.

“Mistress.”

“I’ve been thinking about you, you know.” She sat on her throne, which hadn’t existed before and looked like black marble carved by Aegean sculptors. I stood upright. “About your skill for magic and desire for knowledge. You, my dear, did not stop developing and studying when I stopped calling on you.”

“I don’t see why I would have.”

“You’d be surprised, child. Everyone has their own goals, and those whose goals truly center on me lose their way quickly when I give them space. But others, they truly believe in something. They truly desire something, something I am happy to give in exchange for their service. I think it only right to offer you new knowledge, in honor of your development so far and as a sign of good faith as we continue.” The Hound was sitting by her side by now, and she gracefully slipped her hand down to scratch at the back of its neck. I stood silent for a moment, processing.

“What new knowledge did you have in mind?” She smiled broadly then, baring teeth that seemed to be just a bit more sharp than I remembered.

“What would you like, dear?” My breath caught for a second. I could choose? Would she accept anything I chose? I briefly considered my options, before a common trait of all of them came to mind. I straightened my posture and met her gaze.

“I want knowledge of time magic,” I said, firmly. “I want to know how to see the past and future, and ultimately, how to travel between them.” She chuckled and leaned back into her seat.

“Are you sure? Time is a complicated thing.”

“I’m sure.” She considered me for a moment, then clapped her hands together and stood.

​“Very well! Come, come, let me show you the way.” She turned toward one of the other roads leading away from the Crossroads, and it suddenly seemed like there were hundreds of them. As she walked, the Hound rose to join her, and I began to follow.

Work was progressing in Columbia Theatre, and today we were working on updating and expanding the fly system. I was standing on a scaffolding, running lines through the system in the ceiling and trying not to look down. Backstage, Marz was testing the lines that had already been finished and helping determine what we needed for counterweights and if we would need to order more. Neither of us was here when the pulleys were mapped out and installed, so it was also taking extra time for us to figure out where everything was supposed to be. We had been warned that some of it was not actually ready for our work yet, and we had taken some guesses about which parts of the system were affected based on the notes left for us. The possibility that we had been mistaken on some of those guesses suddenly occurred to me when I heard a crack, and then a snap, from my right.

Before I could react to the noise, a fly passing in front of me stopped in the air, its wings stuck mid-stroke. I breathed heavy and looked around, and found a heavy metal pulley that had broken off the ceiling and stopped in place about a foot away from my neck. I knew, immediately, that if it had continued on its arc either I would have died; either from the initial impact, or from the unavoidable fall that would have followed it. I swallowed hard and tried to step aside, but found that I could only move my head. I turned to my left again, and saw the Hound sitting on the scaffolding and watching me. I opened my mouth to speak, but a flicker of movement in the corner of my eye drew my attention away again. As I turned to look forward, I found Hecate. She was standing on the stage, but so tall that her eyes were level with my face. I took a deep breath. Why now, after all this time?

“Mistress,” I whispered, my voice unsteady. She smiled.

“Am I, still?” I furrowed my brow and tried to formulate a question about that, but nothing coherent came out before she smiled and continued. “I saw how you handled that ghost, and cleaning up the park afterward. You seemed confident in your ability to proceed without invoking me.” She looked to my left, and I followed her gaze to the pulley. “Yet you do not seem so confident now.”

“I had not heard from you in a year, Mistress. I didn’t know anymore if you were even listening.”

“I suppose I can understand such fickleness from mortals, a year must seem like such a long time to you. But you must know better than to believe that about me. Besides,” she blinked, and her eyes were replaced by the sight of me in Chicago, laying on that couch in John’s arms. “You clearly wanted some space from me. Am I not free to give my mortal instruments what they desire?”

“I’m sorry. I was recovering from a moment of weakness and just…” I sighed and lowered my head. “I’m sorry.”

“Will you show me?” Her eyes returned to normal, or what passed for normal from her.

“What?”

“I want to see that you are sorry, not simply hear it.”

“How?”

“I have a job for you to do. But not yet. For now, it will be enough for you to swear to me that you will do it. And your continued usefulness, of course, is a great encouragement to keep you around.” My eyes widened as I realized why I couldn’t move the rest of my body. I was being given a choice between power and death.

“I swear, Mistress.”

“Very good. I shall call on you when I am ready.” I felt my body unfreeze as she and the Hound vanished, and I quickly shifted around the pulley to stand behind it. As soon as I was in the clear, the pulley snapped back into motion and crashed against the wall, sending scraps of wood and drywall flying. I was breathing heavy, and the noise of the impact had left my ears ringing for a moment before I heard Marz calling to me. I pressed my hand to my heart, exhaled hard, then peeked down.

​“I’m okay. But I think we should take a break.” They gave a few quick nods, and I began to climb down.

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There is a division between the physical and the metaphysical realms, though the exact nature of it seems to vary. I've only had to interact with it in Chicago, where it is thick and dark. But Abuela said that back in Honduras it was thin and airy, bright and covered in flowers. She told me stories from before the Europeans arrived, when the division between realms was like the surface of water, when the only thing really keeping a mage from diving too deep or dwelling too long was not the difficulty of crossing, but of staying.

This claim raised a number of questions for me, so I began to study other concepts of the division from around the world. Sometimes called a wall, or a veil, or any of a number of other such concepts, I have come to understand it as a hedge. This is partly because it was the manner in which I had always known it through Abuela's descriptions, but I was also convinced that no other title adequately described the variety of its experience or the fact that it seems to be alive in its own way. The living, changing nature of it is part of what I think explains the history I was taught. My best guess is that the Victorians are to blame.

The first thing to note is that the metaphysical realm itself is not static. Whatever else may be true of it, it is a dynamic realm where the thoughts or emotions of human beings seems to leave a direct impact. Nan's study of auras suggests there is something more to them than a revelation of what people are feeling, and Abuela said that our dreams and fears and memories walk alongside us on the other side of the hedge. Hecate taught me that seeing what was really happening in the metaphysical realm requires a still and disciplined mind, as any fluctuations I bring with me will change both my perception of the realm and the realm itself; but she also taught that strong connection to one's own emotions aids in accessing the power of the realm for other forms of magic.

The only conclusion I can draw from these notes and my own studies and experiences is that the metaphysical realm is fundamentally reactive, that its very nature is to reflect what is poured into it. It is the astral plane where minds meet, and the realm of dreams, and the great pool of human memory and desire and terror, and the abode of spirits. Are minds inherently connected? Did we create the realm? Was it created alongside us? Is it possible that there was a time before the realm, and that something bound all of mankind to it? Is it any more, or any less, possible that it existed before us and that somehow we either connected to it or arose from it? If there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, is it connected to the realm, or to their own version of it, or not at all?

Nan told me some months ago that it was probably not worth the effort to dig much into the two beings that appeared to me when I was tracking down Alethea. But something about them seemed important, and the lack of solid information on them in the lore we knew kept nagging at me. I had to see if I could find anything.

The first lead we had was the idea that they might be Odin's ravens, who were tasked with traveling around the world and reporting what they saw to their king. But the description given of them was vague at best, and they did not strike me as beings who answered to a Norse deity that would have no reason to interact with me. Their behavior did not strike me as passive observers. And when I sat down to think about it, I began to suspect I had heard something of them from Hecate.

It took a great deal of digging before I realized that the only places where I found references that may have described this pair were on the fringes. They were background entities, present for a great many first-hand accounts but rarely active enough to be remembered in later tales based on the events. Other spirits seem to know of them, though my experience and what I've heard from Nan suggests they are not a comfortable topic of discussion. But a few universal facts arose; they alternate between human and raven forms, they are always seen together, and they possess great power but are rarely seen using it. Then I began to put the words used to describe them into columns and that was when I noticed that the descriptions of the woman always seemed chaotic, wild, and active, while the descriptions of the man always seemed ordered, reserved, and cryptic.

When Hecate told me about Anchors and Warlocks, she claimed that they represented the same forces that 'The Two' represented; Anchors brought physical order to the metaphysical realm, while Warlocks brought metaphysical chaos to the physical realm. By association, then, perhaps the man (who is always described as clean dressed as human or solid black as a raven) is Order and the woman (who is always described as composed of swirling energy) is Chaos.

But what are they? Do they influence both realms? Do they influence only one? Or are they simply beings who operate in the domains of order and chaos and do not themselves control it? Hecate deeply hates ravens; is it possible that these beings claim some dominion over Anchors and Warlocks (who she also claims dominion over), and if so, are they rivals to her? Are they rebellious servants of hers, originally tasked as intermediaries between her and the humans under her domain?

There is something to this connection between her and them, and I cannot help but feel it is the reason they arrived in my life when they did. I cannot let this go now. I have to learn more.

There is a significant gap in my knowledge of Hecate's history. What I can say for certain is that she is the real goddess from ancient Greece, that she did not originate in Greece, and that she was also revered in Rome under the name Trivia. The former and latter facts are well-attested, and a host of epithets for her existed in both Grecian and Roman practice. ​Of her origin, however, little is known for certain. Historians with an eye toward mythology debate a Greek, Anatolian, or Egyptian source for her cult. I am inclined to believe she is of Anatolian origin, as the Egyptian theory seems circumstantial and her personal disdain for the other Greek deities as thieves and upstarts suggests to me that she was incorporated into that pantheon some time after both she and they formed. This is difficult to argue without pointing to personal contact with her, however, so it it a matter I can only share with a limited audience.

Sergei is a member of that audience, and remains convinced that she can be traced much farther through history. He notes that some Christian sects associated her with the spirit of salvation and gave her limited dominion over the world; I have not yet managed to help him understand the limited respect Wikipedia has in the academic world, and neither of us has searched for more information on this particular claim yet. But using that, he claims that she shares traits with various minor goddesses, demons, and folklore entities around the world for centuries afterward. His certainty of each of these claims varies, but there is one he is absolutely convinced about: that Hecate is the Devil at the Crossroads that appears in folklore surrounding blues musicians. His case is well-made in this instance, and it does seem difficult for me to believe that she would allow anyone else to claim dominion over the Crossroads, even just as a term for a deal. Many of these accounts do, admittedly, view the Devil at the Crossroads as male; but I have seen her present as male before. I'm not fully convinced that she is this devil, but I also can't assume she isn't.

What I do know is that, by the time I met her, she had begun selecting witches from around the world for direct training. Her exact standards are unknown, as are her goals. I don't know how many witches she has selected or even if she is teaching us all similar material. I have met a couple others at the Crossroads, on rare events when she decided to have us there at the same time. Through these interactions and her own off-handed comments I have pieced together that she has not selected any male witches for her training. She seems to show no preference regarding trans or cis women, and at least two witches I've met at the Crossroads over the years have been nonbinary.

Her demands on me, at least, are high. She has made it very clear that she expects me to become highly skilled at seeing and passing through the metaphysical realm. The latter is a skill I have yet to learn, but she promises that under her tutelage I will be able to open portals between realms and across space, maybe even across time. I don't know why I was selected for this specific set of skills, but I am deeply curious about what I can learn of magic and the metaphysical realm by traveling in this way.

Her claims that she has authority over individual Anchors and Warlocks is of some concern. John didn't seem to have any knowledge of her, and she seemed ignorant of his presence in my apartment until I mentioned him. If she rightfully has the dominion she claims, shouldn't she know them? Shouldn't she at least be aware of them? If she doesn't have that dominion, what happens if and when she tries to assert it? I've decided to do more research on her, at least partly to find out if any previous Anchors or Warlocks appear alongside her. As much as I may doubt some of Sergei's attempts to connect her to history, it is the only list of places to look that I can access. It may be educational to explore those claims, even if only to rule them out.

She is served directly by a dog, a great hound usually with jet black fur and red eyes. She has a deep animosity for ravens and reacts strongly when they are suggested as a symbol of any of her domains. I have seen other animals in the Crossroads, but do not know how many serve her directly. She has other symbols that appear frequently in the Crossroads and our training sessions, most commonly the key and the torch.

She has three faces, or possibly three selves, that never seem to face the same direction. I have seen at least a dozen different forms that she may take; she is gorgeous in every form, and most of them retain her threefold form, her distinct musculature, and her eastern Mediterranean complexion. She is sexually active to some degree with at least some of her followers, though personal experience on the matter is limited to very few incidents. Her variety of forms prevents me from making any statement on common aspects of these incidents.

​I have not seen her since the night I asked John to shield me from her call, and at this point I'm beginning to worry that I will not see her again.

I'm running. I'm jumping. I can hear the large stone sword crack the street behind me. I take a sharp left and feel my foot go out from under me; rather than fall flat, I push out with the other foot so I can roll. Pieces of asphalt fly around me and I shield my face with one hand as I use the other to push off the ground and scramble. I know She's telling me to focus. I can't hear her, but I feel myself trying to process her words. She wants me to know where the statue is, to think through my actions, to begin fighting back. I need to fight back.

I'm four years old and running through the trees with the roar of death behind me. I need to get away but I feel Her, even here, nudging me. Know your enemy.

I'm six years old in the desert with Abuela. She's tired and thirsty and trying to find words in a new language. I see a military uniform and try to run. She isn't as fast as she used to be and uses magic to catch me. I want to know why she didn't use it to save them. I scream.

The ground buckles under my feet. I jump. I can see it, now. The statue is staring right at me and I meet its gaze. She is beyond it, watching. Waiting. I know she isn't going to save me. I need to see the path myself.

Abuela teaches me to open my eyes and see the way. I'm afraid of the Hedge. The thorns only bite if you push against the Hedge. Let them guide you, learn to move with them instead of against them.

The world is breaking apart. I have trouble finding my footing. The flowing energy of the Realm is like a strong wind that refuses to slow down and be caught in the lungs. It bites to push against it. I'm not listening.

I take a deep breath and reach out with tiny hands and run my palm slowly along a thorn. I know which way it goes. I look at the other thorns and begin to see a path between them.

The statue is full of energy but not life. It moves without knowing how to move. I'm moving without remembering how to move. I see it struggle to turn the wrong way. I know what to do.

Abuela rests her hand on my shoulder and points. I see the path. I see the house in the clearing away from the soldiers. I see the way the world flows. I throw myself along the path. I reach out with adult hands and run my palm through the wind. The statue spins when I'm not where it expects. It raises its sword but not this time. This time I bring the storm with me. The roar of death follows me but I know this time it does not come for me.

I exhale, and close my eyes to feel the way. I know my enemy. I know what force I bring with me. I scream.

Nan looks at me in silence for a few minutes, then smiles.

"Saying it out loud helps, doesn't it?" I nod. "Do you know what you need to do?" I sit up, when did I start leaning forward? I sit up and look her in the eyes.

"I think I do. Thank you."

"The problem," I said, laying the book down on the counter, "is that I have no idea what I'm looking for." Sergei was standing on the other side of the counter, looking through a newspaper while Nan counted the money for the day in the back. The shop had closed twenty minutes earlier, but she had invited me to come by and work on 'our project,' as they called it. We were still trying to find Alethea.

"And this girl, she is for sure problem?" he asked.

"I don't know! I mean, maybe? She certainly was when she was trapped at the apartment. But I mean, I still feel like I owe it to her to help, you know?"

"Is good of you. But how long do we give?"

"She waited fifty years for John to turn up. I don't think we can assume she's in a rush now."

"And you are looking where he is?"

"He says he is, but I don't know what he's doing about that." Sergei gave a concerned hum and turned the page of his newspaper. "To be honest, though, I suspect she's still in Chicago. Or nearby."

"Why?"

"It's like...it's almost like a gut feeling, you know? That she's not too far away."

"This is real sense, or worry?"

"I don't know yet."

"And your Mistress? Would she know?"

"She...I haven't seen her all month."

"This is odd?"

​"Yes. I don't know what's going on with that, usually I'd see her at least a few times a week."

"She is busy, maybe?" I gave him a tired look and he laughed.

"I'm concerned it's about John."

"Your little night together?" I nodded. "Is she..." He waved his hand, as if trying to remember the word.

"Jealous?" He nodded and pointed at me. "She hasn't been in the past, but...I don't think she much likes him, personally. But I mean, I had just had a terrible day! I was dealing with some shit, you know? I just...I couldn't do another of her games, not that night. I had to try to get a break, just for one night. Sometimes I wonder if the gods really understand what they're doing to us."

"You trust her, though."

"Well, yeah. Yeah, I do."

"Ever since that statue."

"You know, I've been dreaming about that lately. Probably trying to deal with not getting any summons."

"Maybe. Nan!" She peeked out of the office.

"What?" He yelled back something in Russian and she held up a finger and then went back into the office. He nodded at me, then turned back to watch for her. When she emerged, she had her binder for dream interpretation, and walked straight for the counter.

"Oh, no, that's not necessary," I started, but she waved me off as she set the binder on the counter. Sergei rested his hand on her shoulder as he leaned in and kissed her cheek, then headed off to the office.

"Your magic attunes you to the universe, Jackie; and sometimes when it speaks, only our subconscious can hear it. It's worth the little bit of effort to interrogate our dreams a bit when we're wrestling with a big problem." I sighed, and hesitantly nodded. She was right, I just didn't really want to admit it. She gave a single definitive nod and opened her binder. "Now, darling. Tell me all about it."

I gasped for air as she pushed the sphere into me, the world spinning wildly around. I couldn't concentrate on where I was or what was happening, and could barely make out anything but swirling colors and blinding light. I felt the ground under my hands, and as my vision began to clear I realized I had fallen to my hands and knees and was barely holding myself that far up. I felt Hecate's hand lightly grasp my chin and raise my face to look at her. I could, for the first time, clearly see her three faces. The crone, the mother, and the maiden all looked at me from one place, and it felt natural. She seemed to be the night sky given life, deep and dark and illuminated by the soft light of an invisible moon. Flecks of light, like stars, seemed to pass through her, but it was nearly impossible to identify them individually. I felt like I could fall into her, and somewhere in the great void of her being find my way anywhere I would ever want to go. I knew in that moment that the Crossroads was not where she lived, but a true expression of her self, a form that was both within and outside of her, where all things meet within a darkness that makes all visitors equal beneath her.

"What do you see, child?"

"I think, if I could see deeper, I could see everything," I answered in a near whisper, staring at her. She smiled, then turned my head slightly until I could see the statue. I realized that it looked as much like stone as it ever had, the only thing here that looked the same, but beneath it flowed two great streams of energy. I inhaled sharply and rose to my feet. The movement of the energy was almost intoxicating, and as I walked closer I could see that they met under the place where the statue had been built.

"Do you see them?"

"Are those...ley lines? Is this statue a nexus?"

"Very good." I felt her hand rest on my shoulder. "It was one, once. Look closer." I knelt and examined the base of the statue, and realized that there was a wellspring of energy rising from the intersection of the lines that was being blocked by something within the statue itself.

"What's this blocking it?"

"That is the remnant of a great work of unbelief," she explained. "There are things in this world that work against us, Jacqueline. The forces that erected the walls between worlds have not died out, they've only changed. If you are not careful, you will find yourself opposed by enemies who would see all the magic left in this world die. One such enemy was here, years ago, and what should have been a source of magic for everyone in this area has instead become a burden on those sensitive to what it was meant to be."

"What can we do?"

"I am here to observe. You are here to do." I turned and looked at her, concerned.

"I...are you sure I'm ready for this?"

"You're no ordinary beginner, my dear. You've been dealing with magic all your life, you've seen the true nature of the world, and you have power available to you right now that even an experienced mage would struggle to muster on one of the nights when the worlds are primed to collide. I have stacked the deck in your favor as much as I can without doing the work for you. This is your test. Free the energy, let it flow into the statue, then use that statue to share the magic with your world."

For a couple weeks Hecate summoned me, four nights a week, sending her hound to rouse me from my sleep and travel to the Crossroads. She showed me an entirely new perspective on magic, methods and avenues I never would have encountered on the track I was already on. The first thing she taught me was a brief spell, something simple with low cost, that would allow me to see over the hedge that divided the worlds. She told me the walls between worlds used to be thinner, and in most of the world didn't exist at all, until certain European notions pushed old ideas aside and enforced their will around the world. The hedge, she insisted, was a development of that sensibility, and so many of the old ways had failed to adapt to its presence that they were growing unreliable.

On the other side I was able to see so much of what I had always known to be true. The world of spirits, as Abuela had described it, was still intact; just farther away, less accessible, than she had been taught. Hecate condemned the Greeks who had stolen her from her people, and the cultures they inspired who ripped the world in two. She encouraged me to continue with the ways I knew, and to use what she taught to supplement the old ways or help them find their way through the hedge.

The more I learned, the more the statue bothered me. It was becoming obvious to me that whatever was wrong with it was something I was growing more sensitive to. It was on this night, when the hound came for me, that I finally had some answers.

We walked the same path to the Crossroads, but my mentor was not there. When I stopped to ask why, the hound continued down a different path, and I had to run to catch up. After another long walk, we emerged in the square under a full moon in a clear sky, the sharp lines of Hecate's features glowing in the silver light as she stood looking at the statue. For a moment, it was hard to believe she wasn't one herself.

"You've been spending a great deal of time considering this monument," she said, not turning away from it but lowering her hand to scratch behind the hound's ears as it sat down at her side.

"Yes, mistress. It's...wrong, somehow." She nodded, then raised her hand until it was open, her palm a few inches from her face, her fingers cupped toward her. She breathed out a line of shimmering energy, which pooled into a rough sphere in her hand. When it was about the size of my fist, she stopped and began rolling the ball around in her hand until it was perfectly round and glowing bright. She turned, finally, and looked down to me.

"Open your eyes, child. Tell me what you see."

I took a deep breath and went to check my pockets, to find I was holding a sewing needle in my hand despite never seeing it before. I clutched the needle, began muttering the ritual she had taught me, and as I neared the end I dug it into my left arm to draw enough blood to power the sight. When I opened my eyes, I could see the statue, cold stone with almost a complete absence of magic hanging on it. Most things have something, some trace of spirits interacting or magic that was stored in it some time in the past. This, however, was like it had been drained, completely dry in a way I couldn't quite explain. I tried, I fumbled over my words and pointed out the contrast with the rest of the square, but nothing I said seemed to hold the full power of how devoid of power the statue was. She stepped forward, kneeling down in front of me.

"The realm of spirits has a depth," she explained, when her face was at the same level as mine. It was the closest we'd ever been, and I could feel my pulse quicken. "There is the border between the worlds, but there's also a distance away from it to each. There are things in your world, things so physically real that even we gods may have trouble discerning them. And there are things in my world, so ethereal that they look nothing like what you know and cannot be accessed without a source of true power. Do you understand?" I nodded, keeping my eyes locked on her. "Good." She brought her hand forward and slowly pushed the ball of energy into my chest.