The Hollow

When I opened the iron grid and climbed out, Swan’s eyes were already awaiting me. The Hollow roamed absently, coming and disappearing through the sides of the chamber. The only sounds were their footsteps, and a hiss they made with their throats. As if they tried to expel something from their very selves. They hissed endlessly, encumbering the cavern with a mosaic of grief. The lake was still, rippling calmly. Small waves fondled the sandy rocks of the shore.

The pedestal that stood in the water wasn’t empty anymore. Swan was on the top, even bigger than before, even more darksome, reigning over the others, watching over them. A sorrowful father to a million sons. He shone with an obscure glow. The same shade of indescribable light blue that filtered into the cell block. It was a shattering view, one of a martyr, an unsung angel with wings that can’t raise flight. He spoke to me without opening, or even moving his mouth, from far apart.

- You can do it.
- How should I?
- Use the heat inside you. Hold her.
- Hold her?
- Yes – he looked at his dreary Hollow – Just hold her. You’ll know the rest.

I walked around until I was on the other side of the water ring, where I’d come from. I knew I was to walk toward the north of the room now, apart from the center of the circle, but the dark was too thick from here, and I couldn’t do it blindly. The only thing I had to do was think, and he did it. Swan’s hand was into the air again, as if to wave goodbye, and the golden spear of his ring flew out into the eternal night again.

I walked, not without obstacles, towards the end of the beam, about 30 feet from the coastline. I ran into some Hollow, which I had to dodge carefully, so as not to knock them into the ground. They kept on hissing in my ears, lamenting the loss of themselves. Of the world they had forgotten. The one I was about to go back to, this time with a mission.

When I got to the nook of the entrance, and made the turn into the secret tunnel, the light followed me, even though Swan was clearly not doing so. I crawled my way down the path I’d followed, recalling all of its intricacies, until Swan’s light merged with a bigger one, which seemed like the sun, only somehow purer. Like the sun that would shine in heaven. I ran into the crescent whiteness looking back only once.

And then the light ate me. It was much too strong, and I might have been there a century for all I know, just floating in its bliss. I thought my dreams had somehow led me to darkness, yet it was only the inside of my eyelids, and the reeds were gentle against my skin. I was wide awake, in the middle of a grassy knoll. On the desolate passage of birch trees that led to the suburbs.