my heart thudded with excitement.
A feeling of adventure
washed over me
as I walked past spirits
telling each other tales
of lives long gone.
I breathed in the comfort
of the cold mist
that I had come to know so well.
Asphodel felt like home,
where I had spent a strange childhood
surrounded by kind, ghostly
women who raised me
with their stories and
never questioned why
an immortal child visited them.
Now, as I reached
the cobalt mountain to the right,
I hesitated at the doorway to the unknown.
I knew once I crossed that threshold
there would be no turning back.
But I thought of the madness.
The promise I had made
that I would free my father.
All that I was seeking
that could not be found
in those palace walls.
My mind sharpened with
determination. Then
I laid my fingers on the ancient
