“Always respect cats, for they are the children of Bast.”

“Foxes from the east are cunning, but always unmasked by their tails.”

“The sirens’ song is beautiful; the sirens are not.”

I repeated these mantras to the gray city skies as I briskly walked down the cobblestone alley, my lover trailing behind. The day had been rainy and wet, leaving glistening puddles of cool water in the dips in the road, which I did not hesitate to jump in with wanton glee. I laughed to the cold city walls, and my lover only sighed,

“I do not know why,” she said, “you repeat those childish sayings all the time when there is no truth in them.”

I turned around to face my lover, and I took her delicate hands in mine, and I turned her soft body to the obscured sun.

“My dear!” I exclaimed, “is the world not lovelier when the wells are populated by fairies and the woods by nymphs? Why should we deny the magic that pulses through our world?”

And then I kissed her, my lips pressed firmly to hers, and she said no more of my childishness.

Mew.

I turned away from the arms of my lover, and I pricked my ears up to the faint sound. Mew. There it was again, and the twin pipers Fate and Curiosity led me to a soggy cardboard box; the source of this mew-ing.

Inside, a cat, seemingly made of nothing more than a shock of black fur and dinner plate ears. The creature looked up at me with huge yellow-green eyes, and produced another piteous mew. My heart melted, and remembering my own advice about kindness to cats, I picked the little creature up from his water-logged den.

“Look, love,” I said, showing him to my dear lover, “this poor thing must not have a soul on the green Earth that cares for him! Can’t we please help him out; let him stay with us?” And the heartbreaking look in my eyes sealed a home for the little cat.

My lover did relent, and the black cat came to stay with us; rechristened Franz after a man I very much admire. Franz found a comfortable life in our apartment, where the fat grew back on his bones and the knots were brushed from his fur. And on some nights, when the moon cast her silvery light on my lover’s pale, sleeping body, Franz would creep into bed with us, and I would tell him the half-forgotten wisdom of long ago.

“When traveling by the river,” I told Franz one night, “throw a tribute of cucumbers to the kappa, to avoid their wrath.”

“If you meet a raven in a graveyard, do not look into the hole in his wing, lest you seek your death.”

“Sphinxes that lurk on mountain paths will always ask you a riddle, and the answer is always ‘man.’”

“It is most unfortunate that the daughters of the Strangler could never learn anything new, no?” Franz noted drolly.

I startled. I gaped. I was at a loss for words.

“A ‘cat got your tongue’ joke could be made here, but my humor is not that low,” Franz purred.

“I’m sorry, it is just I did not know that you could talk.”

“Why not?” Franz laughed (well, he made a sound close enough to laughter); “after all, by your reckoning I am the child of a goddess!”

“Does that mean,” I spoke on baited breath, “that I am right? About everything?”

“Almost everything,” the cat responded, “in my experience, the kappa do not always follow the cucumber rule.”

I sat there, dumbfounded. Something broke inside my mind. I did not know how to feel about this. Franz looked up at me with glowing, moon-lit eyes.

“I can prove it to you,” he said, “just, please, for the love of Min, put on some clothing first!”

We stood on the apartment building’s stoop, and the bitter north wind bit my flesh through the trench coat which covered my nakedness. Franz seemed unfazed by the cold, and simply commanded “follow me” as he slinked off down the cobblestone road, his black body disappearing and reappearing in the play of shadows and streetlights.

I followed the cat through the winding streets that bent themselves into impossible shapes, and soon I found myself lost in an unfamiliar world. The buildings were older here, and populated by somber specters and silhouettes, playing out forgotten lives like clockwork figurines. But I continued on behind Franz, safe in the knowledge that he knew the way, and I did not question the scenery as the city gave way to forest.

The stars and planets wheeled above us, brighter than they had ever been while cloaked in the city’s industrial fog. Celestial beings smiled down on the woodland before us; a grassy causeway leading to a gate lined with encroaching trees and brush. Franz beckoned me to follow him, and so I did, and as we walked through the cool grass I felt the uncomfortable weight of a thousand unfamiliar eyes on my body.

Near the end of the causeway, before the gate, sat a sentry-man on a weather worn boulder. My established knowledge told me he was a satyr, the half-goat men of ancient Greek legends. But there was something unnatural about him; maybe it was the way his left eye glowed a sickly, mechanical green, or the way the cigarette he smoked smelled like pastoral fantasies and old wine.

The unorthodox satyr looked keenly at Franz, took a drag from his cigarette, and addressed the cat.

“You are aware,” he said in a voice that was like the wind brushing against a far-off mountain side, “That it has been many years since humans have entered the gates.”

“This human,” Franz replied with offbeat snobbishness, “Believes in what lies beyond.”

The gatekeeper sat back on his goat-like haunches and allowed us to pass through the threshold. Before us, unobstructed by man or beast, stood the gate—what a terrible thing it was! The archway wormed and writhed with the essence of nightmares; the text “ABANDON ALL HOPE, YE WHO ENTER HERE” making itself known within the ghastly forms.

I was able to take some comfort in the fact that Dante was right.

Franz walked through the gate. I followed in silence. As the path we traveled wound onwards, I glanced backwards, and I saw the distant light of a lit cigarette and I heard a melodious voice reciting, “Et in Arcadia ego…”

We journeyed into the belly of what I could only assume was Hell, along a dark path lit only by a faint, unspecified light. Along the passageway were little representations of the road-gods, the dosojin, hewn from living rock. They looked up at me with carved faces, and their stone bodies seemed to pulse with the metronome of breath. Franz said nothing of this, so I turned my attention to the dark, shifting trees beyond the dosojin. I tried to touch a low-hanging branch, but the wood dissolved away at my fingertips, like smoke or reason. I pursued the tree, my hands outstretched in front of me, my fingers groping for the familiar texture of bark; but always the trees were out of reach, like shadows, and I chased them further into the enveloping darkness.

“Do not go in there!”

I turned around and saw Franz, who had spoken for the first time since our entrance to this other-world, staring angrily at me. I returned to the road in shame, and walked silently behind the cat for what seemed an unfathomable eternity.

The eerie path we walked on opened up, after what may have been miles or months, to a rotunda framed by the shadow-smoke trees. Here they shifted with more violence, opening up new passages like fiery wounds. My eyes settled on one of the exposed worlds, a land of shining fairy magic, cauldrons of plenty and streams of knowledge, populated by the kingly Tuatha Dé Danann. As soon as that reality shifted away another took its place; a kingdom of yokai where the ittan momen flew in a rain of cherry blossoms above a stately processional of cow-headed spiders and split-tail cats.

Before my eyes could drink their fill of these fleeting sights, Franz interrupted my adorations.

“Those worlds of bright light and happy fantasies you are admiring are out of your reach. Come with me if you want to see why you were brought here, or do not, and content yourself to worship the heavens from afar. It does not bother me.” He told me this, and padded off to the other side of the ethereal clearing. All I could do was follow.

Franz approached the edge of the dark trees and their shadowy forms ripped apart like the opening of a great mouth to reveal a womblike corridor of sandy limestone. The cat maneuvered his lithe body into the hall without a second thought.

“Are you familiar with a piece of Egyptian literature concerning the trails of the newly deceased? I believe people in your time call it The Book of the Dead, or the Papyrus of Ani. We called it The Book of Coming Forth by Day.”

“Yes,” I murmured, as I joined Franz at the threshold.

“Well,” he said, baring his sharp teeth, “you are about to live it.”

As if on command the opening of the hall was stitched shut by the shadow-forms, and I was left alone in the darkness with Franz. I had no choice but to venture on and face whatever myriad fate awaited me.

The corridor’s sides expanded rapidly away from us as we walked, and soon gave way to a cavernous room whose boundaries were obscured by encroaching darkness. In the distance stood a lighted pylon, and Franz told me that is what we should travel towards, and so we did.

The barren lands fell away after our feet, and the pylon loomed over us like a stone titan. I stared in awe at the grandly carved hieroglyphics and reliefs of hundreds of arcane gods, but I did notice the lone gatekeeper. She was a pale, wispy thing torn from the rock carvings above her with dead eyes and dark lips.

“The cat,” she said in a thin voice, “may pass. The human may not.”

“Why is that?” I asked her.

“The human,” she repeated emotionlessly, “must answer a question.”

“And what is this question?”

“Who inspecteth the swathing of the helpless one?”

I looked at Franz, who merely shrugged. I knew I was on my own, so I racked the very foundation of my brain for the answer to the gatekeeper’s question. And then the epiphany.

“Is the answer,” I hazarded, “the Lady?”

“The Lady of what?” The specter cooed.

“The Lady,” I said, “who consumes fiends by fire. The lady clothed with green feldspar from the south. The lady of the great house. The cutter off of heads. Invoker of thy Two Lands. The mistress of every pylon. She is the lady you speak of.”

The gatekeeper stepped aside. “Great one!” She spoke in adoration, “pass on from my gates with the blessings of Osiris!”

Franz and I walked under the pylon, and when we were out of earshot I addressed him boastfully.

“Aren’t you proud of me, I knew the answer to the gatekeeper’s question!”

“Neruit,” he said in monotone, “is the least of your worries. I guarantee the next gatekeeper, Mes-Ptah, will hold a greater challenge for you.”

My pride was quelled, and I quickened my pace to reach the next pylon before I embarrassed myself again.

The second pylon lumbered into view; it was much like the one I had first encountered—bedecked with lavish carvings on a godly scale. In front of it stood a gatekeeper, similar to the wispy Neruit, but this one had a more fiendish mouth and a more crazed air about her.

“The cat may pass; the human may not,” she proclaimed, her fangs flashing and tongue lolling.

“I beseech you, how may I pass?” I asked with utmost reverence.

“You must defeat Apep.” The gatekeeper, Mes-Ptah, declared, and then she touched a panel on the pylon showing a snake in many Ouroboros-like twists. The panel fell back and spread across the floor in a flash of watery light, revealing a dark, square pit filled to the brim with the writhing of twisted snake’s coils.

“This,” Mes-Ptah taunted, “is the serpent Apep. You must conquer him—without the help of any cat.” She picked up Franz and clasped her bony fingers across his mouth.

I walked up to the pylon and, wondering if I shared the disdainful gatekeeper’s power, I gently touched a stone representation of a spear, held aloft by some nameless pharaoh from eons ago.

The spear slid gently into my outstretched palms.

Weighing the newly-formed weapon in my hands, I thought about many things. I remembered the old stories about dragons, which were slain by a knight trusting a spear down their throat. I pondered what would happen to me if I died down here. I wondered what my lover would make of all this.

Almost mechanically I turned back to the wall, and I ran my fingers along the length of an elaborate carving of a boat. It, too, decanted itself from the pylon’s stone and stood in front of me in painted glory.

I laid my spear in the bottom of the boat, and I pushed it to the edge of Apep’s pit. I jumped into the boat, shifted my weight to the front, and plunged into the sea of snake.

The squirming mass of Apep’s body acted upon the boat like violent waves; tossing it into the air on living crests. With one hand I clutched the side of the boat, with my other; the spear. I waited with gritted teeth for the serpent to reveal his head.

As I rode the tide of scales, Apep answered my silent request and reared up his monstrous head, an appalling thing cast in flint with a gaping mouth so terrible it could menace the very sun!

The villainous serpent threatened me with his stinking maw, and I drew back my spear and drove it deep within the beast.

The spear hit a wall of wet flesh, and a stream of warm, gurgling blood poured out. A flash of light engulfed us, and I was standing in front of the pylon; and the spear, boat and snake were returned to the stone walls.

“Ah, great mortal,” the gatekeeper said, releasing Franz, “you may pass with the blessings of Ra!”

She bowed, and I journeyed on with Franz close behind, and I knew this time not to boast of my accomplishments.

We came to the next pylon, and the next gatekeeper; another wispy creature that seemed more queenly than the others.

“Cat—and human—may pass,” she said in a soft undertone, and stood aside to show us what lay beyond the pylon—a dark, endless gash in the world.

“If you fall, you fall forever,” she reminded us, and positioned herself further back to watch what we would do next.

“Pick me up.” Franz demanded of me, and I cradled his furry body close to my heart as he whispered in my ear, “Sebqa is a bitch, but I want you to think of birds. Swallows, hawks, falcons—just think of birds.”

I thought of birds. I thought of great birds, and little birds, and birds of flight and the flightless and the broad-winged…

Then I felt an odd, tingling sensation in my back that spread across my entire body. I felt my feet leave the ground, my eyes blinded by stars, my flesh caressed by downy feathers. My feet touched the ground again.

I slowly opened my eyes and looked behind me, to see the chasm I had inexplicitly crossed.

“What just happened?” I asked Franz, still supported in my arms.

“You became a bird,” the black cat responded, “try not to think about it too much.”

“Oh great one!” The gatekeeper, Sebqa, interrupted from across the abyss, “you have passed with the blessings of Horus!”

I placed Franz on terra firma and he told me, “You’ve done a good job for yourself; I’ve seen many mortals lose themselves at the pylons,” he mused on his words, “but now I shall take you to a place where your cleverness shall not help you.”

Franz led me away from the pylons to a distant large hall with a grand scaling; the “Hall of Two Truths” I believe he called it. Inside was a majestic scene that stole my breathe—on the middle floor was a god with a black jackal’s head, holding a set of scales weighed with a dancing feather. He was accompanied by another god, ibis-headed with writing utensils in hand, and a she-demon made up of the cut-up parts of the crocodile, the hippopotamus, and the lion. A gallery of seats rose around this central scene, populated by many diverse deities watching the proceedings below. A queue of souls was lined up before the scale-bearing god; translucent figures that looked like the representations of ancient Egyptians from museum walls.

“Franz,” I whispered, “I thought the satyr said human souls no longer come to this realm?”

“You see, my friend,” Franz replied, “these are the souls of the lost Egyptians that have wandered in the desert sands for millennia that have finally found their way to the afterlife. Also, I advise you not to put all your trust in that satyr; he sometimes does not realize his gate is not the only entrance to this world.”

I mulled over his words while another frail soul approached the scales.

“Hail to you, great God, Lord of Justice!” the soul began, “I have come to you, my lord, that you may bring me so that I may see your beauty, for I know you and I know your name, and I know the names of the forty-two gods of those who are with you in this Hall of Justice, who live on those who cherish evil and who gulp down their blood…”

“Oh, SHUT UP ALREADY!” The Jackal-headed scale bearer, who I identified as Anubis, bellowed. “I’m sick of hearing that every time someone comes here! Now, give me your heart quietly or I’ll feed your soul to Ammit without a second thought.” The she-demon stalking behind him licked her crocodile lips in approval.

The soul sheepishly allowed Anubis to remove his heart from his breast, and to put it on the scales opposite the dancing feather. The heart did not weight the scales in the least.
“Thoth,” Anubis said, “please record that the owner of this heart is free to pass on to Aaru, for his heart is not heavier than Maàt.” The ibis-headed god wrote this all down, and took the now-relieved soul away to be rewarded with eternal paradise.

Franz motioned for me to follow him, and he pushed his way to the front of the line of souls to stand before Anubis’ heart-weighing operation.

“The Lady of the Flame,” Franz declared, “has requested that you judge the worthiness of this human to meet her.”

Anubis looked down at Franz along the line of his muzzle, “but your charge is not even dead.”

“I follow the wishes of my Lady.”

“Cats. All the same,” muttered jackal Anubis, as he reached his hand deep inside by breast, and drew forth in a rush of sensation my shining soul-heart, “annoying creatures,” he put my heart on the scale, “don’t have any respect for anyone else, even the dead!” My heart wriggled on the balances, and came to rest just above the feather’s weight.

“She may pass to the Perfumed Protector’s chambers, I am sure you know the way,” Anubis said, returning my heart. “Eh Thoth!” He then called out over his shoulder, “Write down I weighted the soul of a living human from the twenty-first century, and she can now go consort with cats!”

Franz led me away to the back of the hall, now filled with the screams of a more unfortunate soul having his heart slurped down by Ammit, into a dark passageway. He walked in utmost solemnity, like a priest approaching the effigy of his god. I followed his example, and I was soon shown why.

The hall ended in a splendid chamber, furnished with fineries to shame any pharaoh’s tomb, and filled with cats. The felines were everywhere, and they amassed around the throne of their queen, a beautiful woman wearing the finest linens and jewelry, crowned with a squirming Uraeus-cobra and a cat’s head.

Franz lowered himself to the ground in an opulent bow, and approached the goddess with reverence while I shadowed him. “Mother!” He cried, “oh, good mother Bast, I have returned!”

“How wonderful it is to see you again, my son Ani,” Bast said as she picked up the cat, “or as some would call you—“ she smiled at me, “Franz.”

“This human,” Franz, or Ani protested from the goddess’ lap, “has been nothing but wonderful to me.”

“I know,” cooed Bast, “so I shall reward the dear human.” She then took an ankh pendant from around her neck, and placed it around mine with the words, “For being kind to my children, and for acknowledging the old ways, I give you this gift, and may you spread the news of our world to your contemporaries, and may they take heed to it like you have.” And she kissed my cheek, or maybe she licked it with her rough cat-tongue; I am not sure.

“The door to your world is to your right.” Bast said to me, in closing, and took her nimble fingers from Franz’s fur. The black cat took one fleeting look back at me, and joined the group of cats prowling about the room; blending in so perfectly I could not pick him out again. I left.

The tunnel I traveled in now was pitch-black, and much lonelier without an accompaniment of padded feet. My brooding did not last.

“YOU SMELL OF DEATH.”

Before were the three drooling heads of Cerberus, Hades’ watchdog.

“YOU SMELL OF DEATH,” the heads repeated in unison, “GO BACK. THIS IS THE LAND OF THE LIVING.”

“But I am alive,” I protested.

“YOU SMELL OF DEATH.”  

“But...but…Bast, the cat-goddesses, gave me this necklace and told me to go here.”

The middle head of Cerberus leaned out to my chest to sniff the ankh, and I felt his hot breath full of rot on my face.

“THIS SMELLS OF CAT,” the three heads declared, “GO.”

I went running past the monster, into the light beyond, wanting to avoid any other trials the Fates may have set for me.

The winter’s air blasted cold upon my face, what a wonderful feeling! I found myself standing in an alleyway, an alleyway I recognized, for it was in my city, and I knew that these were my streets, and only a short walk from here was my apartment, where my lover waited for me. I took off into the night with a quick glance behind me, lest an otherworldly demon followed in my shadow.

When I reached my home the sun was still down, the early morning hours barely born. I brewed a pot of coffee as my mind wandered into deep thought. While my thoughts raced, a door creaked behind me, and out stepped my lover. Her pale, curvy body was covered in naught but a small nightgown and she wore a sleepy smile on her face.

“Where have you been?” She asked as she wrapped her slender fingers around my arm, “I missed you.”

“Walking.” I flatly replied.

“Is that where you got the necklace?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Where is Franz?”

“With his mother.”

“Who is his mother?”

My mouth could not resist breaking out in a wry half-smile.

“You must remember, my love, that you should respect cats; for cats are the children of Bast.”