The Song of Ceber
Argument: Taking instruction from Essa, the Goddess of the World, Ceber enters the spirit realm where Takara's fortress is. Before she can cross the plane, she encounters one of Takara's machines.
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The Lion
Striding out of the palace Ceber flew into the sky
Up to heaven’s roof that high place
Where she crawled on sky’s ceiling
Until she found the crack and climbed through!
Honorable Ceber came into the spirit world
As the blind do so bright its brilliance
But that faded and she found herself in a field.
Helkenes Field, a heath of heaven,
That ranges right to the red-brick wall
That separates the spirits from the void.
Beyond is untamed chaos
Vast and broiling bubbling black.
Here the sky was the worms’ web
But Ceber found no flying for
The air currents were too strong.
Yet faraway a faint ladder stood
Nearly a fortnight further on foot.
“I’ve stepped more,” she said.
“What’s a few feet?”
No trouble for her, if she had been alone,
But the geared goddess sent great trouble.
A clockwork lion lay in ambush
Striking at Ceber as soon as she stepped close.
Suicide for a real lion,
Not for a metal one.
Ceber’s sting struck and bounced.
The beast’s claws churned her face
Into yellow pulp yielding pus.
She saved herself, but barely.
Retreating, as the monster roared,
To a treetop.
She was stuck Sunset never came
To that realm,
But she slept a short space.
The beast pawed around the base
Growling and shaking its filament mane.
Upon waking she said,
“Now, these sharp winds
Are high up, hardly bothering the ground.
If I fly fast and low no lion could follow.”
Taking flight she skimmed the grass.
The lion chased, light leaping from its hide.
No mortal cat could keep pace with a wasp.
But this beast broke the wind!
Strong-armed Ceber saw it following
Below in great leaps.
No brush nor water nor mud
Slowed the machine’s silent stride.
Ceber pushed herself to her limit
Until she thought her wings would snap,
But the god-given wings would not give.
Reaching the ladder, she found it was silk,
But she could not slow down.
Leaping up between the rungs,
A look below saw the lion climbing after.
Six legs are better than four, they say,
But the lion gained grinding its gears.
Forever those legs would run
At the same speed straight for Ceber.
Seeing her problem, Ceber, smart-thinking
Severed the strands below with her claws.
The lion fell two hundred feet
Smashing into thousands of separate shards.
Much-enduring Ceber climbed the web.
The Song of Ceber
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