Page 7 of Song of Memories

“Eurydice,” Makaria was whispering softly in her ear, “Orpheus is here.”

Eurydice found a sudden burst of courage and opened her eyes without thinking, ignoring the swathes of people all around them. She pushed out and ignored everything that reminded her that they were not alone, and her eyes settled on Orpheus.

He’s perfect.

It was Eurydice’s first thought, and everything else melted away. The man who stood before her on the opposite bank of the Styx was smiling at her with an expression that she had seen a thousand times before. A collection of memories came rushing to the surface, and each tender moment Eurydice had ever had with Orpheus played in her mind. A great sense of loss and love surged through her veins, the strength of it sending Eurydice to her knees.

The crowd cheered, obviously pleased at the sight of Eurydice overcome, because this was the reaction they had hoped for.

Eurydice couldn’t take her eyes off Orpheus. She could see his lips moving as his smile widened even further, mouthing her name over and over again. Eurydice couldn’t even find the strength to respond, her hands shaking at her sides as she tried to comprehend the barrage of sensations inside of her.

Orpheus looked the same as he did in her memories. His golden hair was curling at his temples, and his long tunic was richly embroidered. There was a lyre looped over his shoulder, his opposite hand extended out to Eurydice as if he could reach her over the Styx. She retraced his features with her eyes and viscerally remembered how they felt. Orpheus’s strong jaw and aquiline features were the things that sculptors themselves would envy.

Eurydice was so completely overwhelmed that she didn’t even realize she was crying, unable to move while her knees sunk into the sand of the riverbank.

A great, booming voice cut through the cheers and tears and rocked the foundations of the Underworld.

“That’s enough!” Hades himself emerged from the crowd. He had a white-knuckle grip on his bident and looked enraged.

“This is not Olympus, nor is the Underworld a colosseum,” Hades growled, the echo of his voice causing the ground to shake. “The arrival of a new soul in the Underworld, regardless of whatever mortal status they achieved, is not a spectator sport. Depart!” Hades slammed the end of his bident into the earth, and a small shockwave rippled through the crowd. Within seconds, they all turned and started running back to wherever they had come from. Eurydice was still blinking in a mild state of shock as the banks of the Styx cleared out in under a minute.

“My deepest apologies.” Hades’s voice was suddenly much closer to Eurydice. She tried to clear her vision and realized she was staring at the hem of a black tunic with one extended hand at her eye level.

“Oh, thank you,” she whispered, accepting Hades’s hand as he helped her to her feet. She could barely keep her focus on the god as her eyes kept crossing the river, staring at Orpheus as he eagerly awaited his turn across the water.

“It’s not my wish that you’d be the victim of such a spectacle today,” Hades continued. “I would have arranged for a more…subtle meeting had I got wind of Orpheus’s arrival in time.”

“No need for apologies, my lord.” Eurydice offered Hades a short bow. “You have always been kind to me and governed well during my time here.”

“I should hope that your opinion remains unchanged,” Hades replied before disappearing as quickly as he had come.

Eurydice looked back across the river and saw Thanatos greet Charon, who helped Orpheus step down into his boat. Thanatos laughed at something his brother said and then reappeared next to Makaria.

“You know where to find me if you need me,” Makaria said by way of goodbye. Thanatos smiled warmly at Eurydice and grabbed hold of his consort and Telodice, vanishing on the winds as they cleared out the valley for Eurydice’s reunion.

She could barely nod, her heart stuck in her throat, as she watched as Charon’s boat hit the halfway point. Orpheus was still smiling wildly at her, saying things that she couldn’t hear, beckoning for her with outstretched arms. He was stretched so far over the side that Eurydice worried he might fall.

Everything was happening to Eurydice in slow motion. Charon docked his boat, and Orpheus flew off it, running down the long pier towards Eurydice. The finer details of his features came into view, and Eurydice remembered how she’d traced each freckle on his cheeks in the summertime. The sweet warmth of a summer sun and memories of soft breezes and flowers flooded her memory. That was everything Orpheus was—he was springtime incarnated in a mortal man.

As Orpheus reached her, he stopped, his expression faltering when he realized that Eurydice had yet to move.

Eurydice was screaming inside of her head, telling her body to move, move, move. Go to him! Yet, something held her back.

Orpheus’s smile softened but did not disappear as he held out his hand towards her.

“Hello, Eurydice.”

4

40 years earlier

Eurydice stretched her limbs out like a cat, enjoying the warm sensation of the sun on her skin. Her body buzzed with the smell of wildflowers and the sound of bees. The weather was perfect; it produced that kind of euphoric feeling that could only come from sunlight and a cool breeze.

Eurydice had taken Orpheus deep into the woods to one of her favorite glens, covered in wildflowers and far away from the prying eyes of other mortals or nymphs alike. It was a rarity for Orpheus and Eurydice to find any time alone together. Whether it was other wood folk trying to get a glimpse of the infamous poet that had tamed a nymph or other mortals trying to hear Orpheus practice, they attracted a crowd wherever they went. But not here, deep between the cypress trees, where Eurydice could close her eyes and listen to the quiet noises of Orpheus attempting to wrestle the creative process into submission.

Orpheus was murmuring something in her ear, lyrics and poems that she’d never remember, but he’d later write down all the words to.

His fingers weaved through her hair. He chuckled with amusement every time he pulled an errant blossom from the strands. It amused him to no end, regardless of how many times Eurydice explained that she was a nymph, which meant sprouting petals was a constant occurrence.

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