Whispers Beneath the Canopy

Chapter 5- Part 1 Law & Order

Apr 02, 2025

Previously, when news of a brutal string of murders reaches the goddess Ananke, Lady of Chains, she finds herself questioning the limits of her divine authority. Though the crimes, whole families slaughtered and left to rot, offend her domain of bonds and justice, their scale lies beyond her judgment alone.

Seeking wisdom and clarity, Ananke reaches out to her sister, Despoina, the Lady of Mysteries. Together, they travel to the hearth-kitchen of Chantico, the ancient fire-mother whose wrath and reverence for family are legendary. Over tortillas and warmth, the goddesses weigh the gravity of the crimes. Chantico, fiery and direct, calls for death and desecration. But Ananke seeks more than vengeance. She seeks to sunder the murderers’ souls from the Wheel of Rebirth, casting them into the outer dark where no spirit returns.

To do so, they must appeal to an even older power: Astinmah, the Forest Goddess, daughter of Eru. With Despoina at her side and her resolve tempered in the heat of the hearth, Ananke prepares to journey into the sacred forest, determined to win justice not just for the dead but for the world itself.

Last scene

From the Begining.

“Have you given any thought to starting a church?”

Saldren’s voice broke the quiet of the forest path as the half-drache walked alongside Iktomi. For every three steps Iktomi took, Saldren took one. His scaled wings stayed folded close to his back, lest they snag on low branches, and every so often, he ducked to keep his horns from catching in the foliage.

Iktomi turned slightly, his black eyes glinting with quiet amusement as he watched the half-dragon maneuver. The wild forest didn’t resist him the same way; it welcomed him.

“I am a trickster, Saldren,” he said, his voice low and dry. “A church wouldn’t be a good place for me.”

The tiny spider mark between his eyes shimmered, its legs twitching in silent laughter.

“Then where do your followers gather to pray? What would a sacred space even look like for you?”

Saldren’s question was earnest. Iktomi could tell he was still thinking in mortal terms: shrines, temples, altars of stone.

With a shake of his head, the trickster tried to explain. “Place is secondary to intent. My followers might meet at the site of my first emergence into this world, or in a clearing, by water, or during the chaos of a storm. What matters is the moment, not the structure.”

Saldren frowned, trying to grasp the concept.

Iktomi touched his arm gently, grounding the thought. “You wanted a being capable of disrupting the world without drawing notice. That’s what I am.”

Saldren stepped back and leaned against the gnarled trunk of an old tree. “That was the idea,” he admitted.

“Then understand this: I don’t need thousands chanting in cathedrals. I need a few thousand acting in silence, spreading subtle chaos, wherever the mood strikes them.”

A realization dawned in Saldren’s golden eyes. “Sacred spaces could be anywhere.”

“Indeed,” Iktomi said, nodding. “They could be… everywhere.”

He paused a beat. “At some point, my priestess and her assassin will return to their guild. Perhaps that will be their place.”

Saldren nodded slowly, and the two continued on toward the pond, their footsteps quiet beneath the leaves.

~ ~ ~ ~

Before seeking the forest goddess, Ananke and Despoina stopped at the goddess of chains’ residence to change.

Ananke pulled a woolen cloak from its peg, dyed in deep green and brown, and draped it over her shoulders, fastening it with a gold pin. She stepped into a pair of worn moccasins, comfortable and silent. Her walking staff, taller than she was, had a dagger hidden in its top half.

At her side, Despoina dressed similarly: her cloak was darker, streaked in blacks and umber, pinned with silver. She strapped a dagger to her hip and slung a short bow and quiver over her shoulder. Her moccasins matched Ananke’s.

Once her hood was drawn up, she looked to her companion. “Shall we?”

Ananke nodded and led the way into the shifting star-pattern of the portal, vanishing beyond.

~ ~ ~ ~

The two goddesses emerged into an ancient woodland. Towering trees stretched skyward, their limbs weaving a canopy that let down shafts of dancing light.

They paused. The forest breathed around them, birds called overhead, and soft rustles whispered of animals nearby.

Ananke shook her head slowly. “I’ve never seen anything so… alive.”

The forest floor was almost too clean—no brush, no dead branches. It was as if the woods themselves refused to let fire or rot take hold.

“Only in my vaguest memories,” Despoina murmured. She brushed her fingers against the smooth bark of a tree. “Who tends to this?”

Light steps darted overhead. Ananke looked up. Three dryads peered down at them from the branches; two were cat-kin, tails twitching lazily. Their ears flicked toward the strangers. The third stepped from behind a trunk: a fox-kin, cloaked in deep red fur.

Her tail curled in slow circles as she raised a paw. “Why have you come here?”

Despoina arched a brow at the question, not who they were, but why they’d come.

Ananke stepped forward and inclined her head. “We seek the forest goddess. Daughter of Eru. The Lady Astinmah.”

The fox-kin sniffed the air. “What’s so important that you come where even the Ciad-Fhir do not tread?”

At the mention of the first men, Despoina’s senses went sharp, scanning the quiet woods.

“You know us?” Ananke asked, her voice carefully neutral.

A purring laugh came from the first cat-kin. “Of course we do. You’re the goddess of chains, and she’s the Lady of Mysteries.”

“It must be serious,” said the second cat-kin, leaning forward. “To disturb the forest mother in her retreat.”

“It is,” Ananke said. “May we proceed?”

The fox-kin tilted her head, ears flicking. After a moment, she nodded. “The Mother will see you. We will guide you.”

~ ~ ~ ~

The path they followed seemed to loop and twist, never quite the same from one moment to the next. Still, they reached a clearing, fifty feet wide, a serene pond at its heart.

Astinmah knelt beside the water, planting small flowers in the soft earth. Her hair shimmered with moss and gold. Her eyes, deep and green, lifted to meet the goddesses as they entered.

Ananke and Despoina dropped to their knees before her.

“What brings you here, daughters of power?” she asked, dusting off her hands.

Despoina glanced at Ananke, then crossed her legs and sat in silence.

Ananke mirrored the motion, then spoke. “My Ridere is tracking a group of murderers, men who have slaughtered nearly fifty souls. Entire families. They’ve left children to rot in fields.”

Astinmah’s gaze remained steady, listening.

“They made the women watch,” Despoina said, voice tight, “before… violating and butchering them.” Her face paled with memory.

The forest goddess reached out, laying a gentle hand on Despoina’s arm. “Such cruelty demands consequence. But death alone is not the justice you seek.”

Ananke bowed her head. “No, Mitere Astinmah. We ask that when they are judged, they be sundered from the wheel, cast into the outer dark, beyond rebirth.”

Astinmah’s eyes closed. She searched inward, consulting the ancient part of herself and the memory of her father’s voice. Casting souls from the wheel was no small thing. It was a severance from eternity.

Silence stretched long between them. When she opened her eyes again, sorrow rimmed their edges.

“When they stand before me,” she said softly, “I will look into their souls. And I will pass judgment.”

The goddesses bowed, surprised but grateful. Wordlessly, they turned and followed the twisting path back out of the forest, leaving the ancient peace undisturbed once more.

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Crann na beatha

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