Chapter Eight: The Axis of the World

by Carl E. Mullin ©2020

DELPHI, GREECE

The Aegean Confederacy

Delphi, the axis of the world.

The hot and bright June sun sank.

It sank between the two neighboring peaks of dark blue that pressed hard up against each other. As it sank, a small and very ancient complex of marble and gold glowed a golden sandstone color.

It sat on a golden pasture on a steep southern cliff of the formidable twin-headed Mount Parnassus where once only a nimble-footed goat could climb. The famed Delphi sat between the Shining Rocks, high above the compressed valley full of oaks and cypress trees. It overlooked the almost unnoticeable serpentine road traveling east to west. About the valley stood the army of stone-gray humpbacked mountains in tight formation. Their craggy faces kept their reverent silence for the God’s throne within the temple, rumbling their forms once in a while with a great trembling.

From the small harbor of Itea, from the rock-surrounded Krisa, on the Gulf of Corinth beyond the south range, for six miles a pilgrim would spend hours of a hard hike climbing through the path and then ascending the holy mountain. When he reached his end, outside the outlying temple of Lady Athena Pronaia, he would look down with an awed gasp. Beyond, the aloof majesty of stone and dark greenery. Above, the blue expanse peopled by the pure-white clouds and a haughty eagle hovering. Here you can witness the endless path of the welcomed sun as it rise from the east ‘til it descends to its red death in the west. Everywhere you go on this holy land you cannot escape the golden eye that daily warms the blood of beast and man alike. Here you feel apart, separated, sacrificed from the world of men and all his daily cares. Here your heart, your soul, your mind become aloof. Here the far-sighted Archer golden fills your very being and all your yesteryears’ troubles drain away in his golden light.

Then you cast your eyes north up the old man Parnassus. High upon the cobbled zip-zagging sacred road, past the holy springs made wholesome by Grandmother Gaia’s underworld power, was the walled temple of Apollo, the shepherd of the sun.

Long ago, a village built a shrine over the mysterious crossed cracks in the flat expanse of rock after a bright-eyed boy spied his sheep becoming dazed near it. They built it over the twined wounds of rock to better access the generative power of Grandmother Gaia’s womb underground. Gaia then marked her place with a sacred egg of stone called the Omphalos and set her favorite dragon, her son named Pytho over it. In time, he was gifted to her daughter, the Titan Rhea, along with the shrine. From here the great dragon gave the womb’s prophecy to the pilgrims.

Centuries passed.

Then Lord Apollo came, seeking to claim the holy site for his own. Pytho had dreaded this day, for his mother had warned him of his death at the hand of the bright-eyed God. But Apollo desired to bury their enmity over his treatment of his pregnant mother. If he would accept his friendship and overlordship, he promised to make him greater and immortal and blessed with endless fame. This the dragon was glad to do. By Apollo’s will, the dragon shucked off his mortal coil of scales. By his thought, the dragon became a being of scented spirit to be housed forevermore within the rocky cleat. By this means, Apollo destroyed him not with a plague-arrow but with his warm friendship. By his command, a temple was built over the earth’s crossed wounds. By his command, a bride married to his will so that he may reveal the will of his father Zeus the Thunderer through her ruby lips in the womb-room of his house. In the dragon’s honor, she was named the Pythian. Then her lord invited his brother Dionysus to reside in the winter months.

To the four corners of the world Delphi’s fame spread. From a lowly fisherman to a highborn Caesar, they came with gifts dear-brought and sacrifices spotless. From costly art to blood-stained war booty did they bring to the most beloved God in a hope of a blessing and a secret knowledge from her ruby lips in a deep trance.

Because Delphi was built over the seismic lines, it risked devastation and it did. Fires, landslides and quakes destroyed the temple time to time. Again and again, it was rebuilt larger and grander than before. Then a quake destroyed it again in 469.4 Olympiad year just as the Delian Confederation was fighting a long and brutal war against the brown-skinned Turkomen invading Lydia, a member of the Confederation. Against an intractable enemy for centuries, the Greeks fell into deep debt, unable to raise funds for rebuilding.

Then the King of West Frankia, Louis VII, joined other knights and nobles to aid the Greeks in their war in Anatolia. In 470.2 Olympiad, he and his queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, made a pilgrimage to Delphi to offer a sacrifice to Apollo for a future victory against the Turkomens. So moved by the beauty and the hallow nature of the place, the king vowed to Delphi’s guardians, the Amphictyonic Council, that he would rebuild the temple on a vaster plan. The officials’ hearts were made glad by his great gift and they glorified their master for this happy turn.

The king imported many Frank artisans who worked with the Greeks in clearing the ruins for a larger walled temenos. With their pioneering Frank style, the Franks built a new temple of soaring height, the better to be nearing the lord’s daily path. They erected a four-part rib vault on the east-west axis atop the soaring pillars with thinner walls. The vault received additional support from the stone forest of flying buttresses, enabling them to raise many tall and pointed windows of stained glass on the north and south side. These colored glass celebrated many stories of Apollo’s loves and deeds. On the east and west ends of the rectangle plan were placed the rose-patterned oculi that both welcome and celebrate his glorious light penetrating the interior. Breaking up the sacred interior was the stone forest of multiple columns that seemed to twist up. They seemed dressed in serpentine patterns of ivies and crowned with capitals full of beasts and fauns in a riotous pattern of organic life. To be within these walls was to be transported to some sacred hunting ground of the Archer golden and the thudding ground of the Lord of Indestructible Life. This blend of colored Apollonian light and Dionysian stone forest became known as the Louisan High Style.

His queen returned to the incomplete temple in 474.1 with a rich gift of many laurel trees to line the Sacred Way. Too did she plant a tree that grew to a massive size in front of the Eastern Portal. Gold and war booty from the Turkomen wars did she bring for the greater glory of the Archer golden.

From this day on, when the pilgrims lifted their eyes to the mountain, their hearts would be made glad by many trees of cooling shades lining the ascending Sacred Way completed with marble altars and statues of grace and heroic spirit. At the end of the road stood the shimmering white walls of the temple with her flying buttresses that towered over the walled district decked full of smaller treasuries full of millions of the nations’ offerings. The temple seemed to glow white, especially in the dawn-light. This sight stirred many a soul with awe as he sought his audience on the day of prophecy as prescribed by the sacred law and by the sacred lots. Every month, on the seventh day which was the Lord’s birthday upon the rootless isle of Delos, the doors would be opened and the lots drawn. Thousands have come, thousands would walk away in disappointment that the Lord had not selected them through the lots. But they would walk away uplifted by his reflected glory in this holy place and this was a reward enough for most, a tale to regale the awed faces back home. The lucky few, the very few, would then be purified in the sacred springs and make their sacrifices before entering the dark womb-room.

Today was not that day.

Inside the naos of the temple, the choral music and its stringed accompaniment fell like snow. The melodious voices rose in hymn about the far-sighted Archer golden, gentle and entrancing. Their music was as direct and piecing as their Lord’s unerring arrow. It soothed all hearts. It uplifted all souls. It exalted the very beings of all who heard it as it exalted the youthful God. To be in the Archer’s presence was to know a healing peace, the confident peace of a skillful Master to whom nothing was impossible. It may be the day of training, of practice, but all within knew that to practice, however imperfect their tune, would bring their hearts ever nearer their Beloved who would be pleased to bless them with an uncanny perfection fit for the flawless Lord.

Far to the rear on the western end of this darkening temple and under the red-glowed oculus was a marble floor marked by a complex geometric pattern in different colors and lines and diamonds. In its center was a cut circle exposing the subterranean chamber called the Adyton, the “innermost sanctuary” or the womb-room among the English pilgrims. Below, the womb-room was a small chamber made of bare earth surrounding the crossed fissures, giving rise to the temple’s most sacred symbol, the epsilon which is a cross with two crescents radiating away from its center in opposite directions. From Gaia’s womb emitted the fumes of a sweet-scent that filled the small room.

At this late hour on the closed day, there were only four people inside this most hallow of the holy spaces. Three cross-legged priests of various ages sat in a circle humming with their prayer beads in their robes as they faced a young maid dressed in a simple robe from waist down. She was sitting on a tall tripod of polished rosewood with sensuous lines that curved into lion’s paws. Crowned with her Master’s laurel leaves over her long snow-white veil, she breathed deep and easy the slow-rising ethylene vapors from under her bare feet resting on the bracing ring of rosewood. Her teeth chewed the leaves of laurel and bay, sanctifying her lips for her Master’s uttering. The compressed vapors continued to rise with a gentle flow from its opening and past her locked knees up to her closed face. Her veil-covered breasts rose and recessed with a relaxed rhythm. In her hands were held a long shoot of fresh-cut laurel leaves and a bowl of sacred water from the springs. The priests breathed in with her, their hearts becoming as one with the holy bride of Apollo as they eased her into her fated role as the ark of her Lord’s power. The men counted their beads as they recited their prayer chant,

“Lady Artemis, blessed be thee, nurse and destroyer of life wild, keeper of maids unwedded, mentor of boys wild, hear our prayers.

Lord Poseidon, blessed be thee, overlord of waters mighty and quiet, both over and under land, shaker of earth, facilitator of world’s intercourse, hear our prayers…

One priest on her right was of a high rank, a Hierophant, under mighty Apollo. He was old with a goatee turning salt and pepper. Here he was in a place he would have never predicted decades ago as a boy in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. He had other plans, other dreams, but here he was. A doctor of a different science now. Fate.

They continued to breathe easy. The vapors weren’t as strong as in the very center of this womb-room, their heads felt light and lifted out of this mortal plane, he knew. This will help them keep their focus on their duty as the guides and guardians of the Oracle’s sacred person as required by the law. No man must be permitted alone with her least some powerful passion might overmaster his good sense and attempt rape, not even a priest, for so strong was the desire to unite with such holiness. These laws he learned by heart and his devotion had led him to assume this honored post. So he listened to the aural wave as he continued his chant:

Zeus, Father of Gods and Me, blessed be thee, the fruit of thy mother Rhea born in the Cretan Cave. Commander of the Olympian hosts, let thy thunderbolt strike with justice and power, casting fear into the evildoer and hope into the innocent. Son of Kronos the Mad Titan, primogenitor of heroes renown, let thy power fill the fallow fields and mortal loins so that they may produce with great power and irrepressible life. Hear our prayers.

A moan.

He opened his eye with anxiety for his charge. Perhaps she was being trained too hard, after all she was young and lush.

She seemed well. Those sweet fumes from Gaia’s dark womb seemed to be not too much. He would moan too, taking in all those fumes. Lord Apollo wasn’t expected back for a while so now was a good time for her conditioning. He closed his eyes.

Another bead:

 Hera, the cow-eyed maker of kings and the tester of men, blessed be thy Peacock Throne. Queen of oaths firm, bless our wedded beds and remove the child-stopper from the chamber door so that our names old and good may not perish but be carried forth. Keeper of the kingly sword, fill the thrones with worthy hearts and manly hands. Hea—

She gasped a small gasp.

He peeked again. Her bare shoulders relaxed and rolled forward as her swan-neck lifted her head high with a deep sigh. She breathed a little deeper.

He frowned. Perhaps she wasn’t used to the fumes? Impossible. Young she was, she has been the adapt for the past two years under the watchful eyes of the two matrons, former oracles for the God. She should be used to the effects by now. A woman’s issue? He’ll have to speak with the matrons later.

He shut his eyes and felt his beads again. In silence, he recounted his mantra until he found his place again.

Keeper of the kingly sword, fill the thrones with worthy hearts and manly hands. Hear our prayers and accept our sacrifices.

His fingers rolled onto another bead.

Lord Apollo, blessed be thee, vicar of Zeus Father and archer of unerring arrow, Shepherd of mighty sun, bless us with the healing twang of thy golden harp bargained. Golden youth, reknit our wounds and still our minds and restore the order natural. Serene speaker of truth hidden in riddle, blaze away the mind-fog to reveal the world suffused with Gods bright, the beasts marvelous and the wonders unspeakable. Hear our pray—

“Oh!”

The priest opened his wary eyes. Something’s wrong. The Oracle was panting now, her breaths shallow and rapid. She was trying to hold herself like a proper priestess and failing. “Oh!” she cried louder. Her sacred accouterments fell. Her inverted bowl landed hard but didn’t break. It rattled with an intense urgency.

With a sudden force she fell backward, her hands grasping her seat behind her, her eyes closed. Her robe dropped to her knees that seems to be spread by another persistent will. The vapors thickened at her sprayed feet. Then to the priest’s astonished eyes, the white vapors seemed to be congesting into a serpentine form as it rose over her panting form.

He blinked hard. It must be a dream he was sure of it. He had vivid visions before but this felt…concrete. The wispy daemon of the post-metamorphosis serpent still towered over the nude girl, ready to swallow her whole.

It slithered about her three times but the panting girl seemed to not feel anything. Then to his astonishment, the misty thing begins to lift her off her tripod. As she rose, her robe fell off to the lion’s paws. Her limp arms spread out at her side, her face enraptured, she whispered without a breath, “My Lord! My Lord!”

If it was not a dream, it was an incredible experience, the one the priests will be pouring over for centuries to come, the witnesses’ documentation will fill them with awe and wonder at Apollo’s greatness. Books will be writ—

The documentation! His clumsy fingers searched for his tablet of paper and pencil he always kept at his side. The priests and priestesses were required to record everything that happens here, no matter how humble. Tradition. Dr. Kaninsky shot a look at his young assistant sitting behind the oracle. He was sitting cross-legged, his eyes and mouth opened wide like a frog. He waved at the boy with frenzied gestures. His hisses attracted his attention but he remained blank-faced. “The tape! The tape!” he hissed. The boy blinked hard twice and recovered himself. He hit the recording lever again and again. Then he realized the tape was sitting next to the recorder. His hurried fingers snapped the cover open and shoved the tape with much rattling force. The cover wouldn’t shut at first. It snapped shut well the second time and he clicked the recorder lever.

“Gtupek!” the priest muttered. There was no time. He must write everything down. He wished for the first time that they had a camera to record video evidence but the priesthood had voted against this three times in the past, his including. They had wished to protect her dignity and to focus on where it belongs: Apollo’s words. Tradition. He felt like a hoary stiffback for agreeing now. A video would prove it a dream or reality to everyone’s satisfaction. He eyed another older priest who proved his presence of mind by writing down his own impressions. He still wished for a camera and he wished that damn bowl would stop rattling. It would mess up the tape.

Suspended in the rose-tinted shaft of light from above, the Oracle closed her eyes as she breathed deep the milky vapors of the serpent in relaxation. Then her chest shot up as she hissed in a long and languishing movement as some spirit had penetrated her defenses. She was reveling in it. Her slightly toothsome smile showed an almost erotic delight in her being mastered by a great power. Then she threw her head back with a groan of a fearsome desire. She feared to surrender to another power. She desired to submit to the selfsame power, desiring to be made whole in her sex, to complete her form’s purpose. Then she jerked back hard with a gasp.

Kaninsky stopped scribbling.

She decompressed with a sigh and the small of her back rested back on her tripod. Her head rolled a bit to the side, facing him as if dead.

His eyes narrowed.

Then her eyes opened and his hairs stood on their end.

Her white eyes stared at him and she spoke in a voice, deep and commanding, “Hear me, O man, and know that I Apollo, the vicar of Father Zeus, speak!”

The fallen bowl still rattled on the stone floor.