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A Hero's Journey
Act V - Temple of Tangled Roots
Cataract Trail, Mount Tamalapais State Park
The ancient temple stood half-hidden beneath the forest, its weathered stone walls wrapped in roots and vines. Great trees rose around it, their branches stretching over the broken roof, while a narrow stream flowed beside the entrance and disappeared beneath the foundations.
The father and son stood at the bottom of the worn stone steps.
“Do you think anyone still lives here?” the boy asked.
“I doubt it.”
“Good.”
His father glanced down at him.
“Good?”
“I don't think I'd want to meet someone who enjoys living in a place like this.”
His father smiled.
“Perhaps it was a little more welcoming once.”
They climbed the steps and entered.
Inside, the air was cool and damp. Sunlight filtered through cracks in the ceiling, illuminating carvings of trees, animals, and figures gathered around a great circle of light.
The boy stopped beside one of the carvings.
“Look. It's like the sun on our shields.”
His father studied the stone. The circle was surrounded by seven smaller shapes, each carefully cut into the wall.
“Perhaps the people who built this place understood something about light.”
“Like Grandfather?”
“Perhaps.”
“Did Grandfather know about this temple?”
His father considered the question.
“He knew a great many things he never got around to telling me.”
“That doesn't seem very helpful.”
“No,” his father said with a small laugh. “Sometimes it wasn't.”
They continued through a long corridor until they reached a chamber whose ceiling had collapsed.
Enormous roots had grown through the floor, lifting sections of stone and blocking several passageways.
At the center stood a shallow pool.
The boy knelt beside it.
“Father, look.”
Reflected in the water was a doorway on the opposite wall.
But when they looked up, there was only solid stone.
“How can there be a door in the water that isn't there?”
His father remembered the Oracle's words.
Sometimes you need only change the way you look at it.
He removed the amulet from beneath his shirt and turned its outer ring while looking through the dark glass.
The reflection faded.
As the glare disappeared, he noticed a narrow opening concealed behind a curtain of hanging roots.
“There.”
The boy followed his gaze.
“Was that there the whole time?”
“Apparently.”
“That's a very strange way to build a door.”
“Perhaps they didn't want everyone finding it.”
They pushed through the roots and followed a narrow passage beneath the temple.
The sound of running water grew louder.
Soon they emerged into the forest again.
A stream wound between moss-covered rocks and enormous trees. Stone steps crossed the water, disappearing beneath an archway on the opposite bank.
The boy looked back toward the passage.
“So the temple goes outside?”
“It seems the forest is part of the temple.”
“Then how do we know when we've left it?”
His father looked at the old stone steps continuing into the trees.
“I suppose we'll know when we stop finding ruins.”
“That doesn't sound very convincing.”
They followed the stream, occasionally passing through ancient doorways built into the hillside before emerging among the trees again.
The forest was beautiful, but strangely quiet.
No birds sang overhead. No squirrels hurried along the branches. Even the insects seemed to have disappeared.
Instead, thin silver threads stretched between the trees, catching the sunlight whenever the leaves moved.
The boy pointed to one.
“Is that a spiderweb?”
His father examined it.
“I believe so.”
“That's a lot of spiderweb.”
“Yes.”
“An uncomfortable amount of spiderweb.”
His father almost smiled.
One of the strands stretched from a branch high above the stream to a stone pillar on the opposite bank. It was unusually thick, and when he touched it with the tip of his sword, it stretched without breaking.
He drew the blade back.
“Don't touch any of these.”
The boy immediately put his hands behind his back.
“I wasn't planning to.”
They came to a narrow stone bridge where the stream flowed into a deep pool. The boy stopped to watch a small fish dart between the rocks.
“There's still something living here!”
His father crouched beside him.
The fish emerged briefly, then vanished beneath a stone.
“Perhaps everything else is hiding.”
“Hiding from what?”
His father looked toward the trees.
“That,” he said quietly, “is what worries me.”
Something rustled overhead.
Both looked up.
A branch shifted on the far side of the stream.
Then another.
The boy watched the leaves settle.
“Was that the wind?”
His father studied the still canopy.
“There isn't any wind.”
They crossed the bridge and continued upstream, where the forest opened into a broad clearing. Towering trees stood on either side of the water, their exposed roots gripping the rocky banks. Several fallen trunks formed natural bridges across the stream.
Silver threads hung between the branches like curtains.
The boy stopped suddenly.
“Father…”
High above the water, something pale hung between two trees.
It was a deer, completely wrapped in thick white silk.
A little farther upstream hung another shape.
And another.
His father slowly drew his sword.
“Stay close.”
A faint clicking sound came from the branches overhead.
The boy gripped his father's sleeve.
“What was that?”
His father didn't answer.
Something enormous moved among the trees.
At first, it appeared to be a dark branch reaching from one trunk toward another.
But then the branch bent.
A long, jointed leg gripped the bark.
Another followed.
Then another.
The boy stepped backward.
A massive spider emerged from the shadows.
Its enormous body hung between the trees, supported by eight powerful legs. Coarse dark hairs covered its joints, and its swollen abdomen pulsed with an unnatural green and violet light.
Clusters of black eyes reflected the sunlight.
Its jaws opened and closed with a terrible clicking sound.
The boy stared.
“Father…”
“I see it.”
“That's not a normal spider.”
“No,” his father replied, raising his sword. “It certainly isn't.”
The creature moved.
With frightening speed, it leaped between two trees, sending leaves and broken branches raining into the stream.
“Get behind me!”
The father pushed his son toward a cluster of rocks as one enormous leg struck the riverbank.
He ducked beneath it and swung his sword.
Steel struck the creature's leg.
The spider recoiled with a piercing shriek and scrambled up the nearest tree.
The boy watched as it moved high among the branches, its legs reaching from trunk to trunk.
“How can something that big move so fast?”
“I don't know,” his father said. “But keep your eyes on it.”
The spider circled overhead.
Then a thick strand of silk shot from its abdomen and struck the ground beside them.
“Move!”
His father grabbed the boy and pulled him away just as another strand slammed into the rocks.
They scrambled into the shallow stream, water splashing around their boots.
Above them, the creature raced between the trees, moving as easily through the branches as a bird through the sky.
Its enormous shadow crossed the water.
The father turned and raised his sword.
The spider dropped toward him.
He stepped aside and struck at its exposed abdomen.
The creature twisted away, but for an instant he saw something beneath its dark shell.
A strange mark pulsed with the same unnatural light that had distorted the forest paths.
He remembered the Oracle's warning about the seven disturbances.
This must be one of them.
“Father!” the boy shouted.
The spider was moving again.
He raised his blade just in time to deflect one of its legs. The impact sent him stumbling backward into the stream.
He regained his footing and glanced toward his son.
“Get to the other bank!”
The boy scrambled over the rocks.
The spider climbed higher, disappearing among the dense branches. For several seconds, everything was still. His father stood in the water, sword raised, listening. A drop of water fell from a branch.
Then another.
He looked upward.
Too late.
A thick strand of silk struck his chest.
Before he could cut it, another wrapped around his sword arm.
He was pulled violently off his feet.
“Father!”
The boy rushed toward the stream as the creature climbed higher, dragging his father into the branches.
His sword was still in his hand, but the webbing had bound his arm tightly against his body.
He struggled.
The strands only tightened.
“Stay back!” he shouted.
The boy stopped at the water's edge.
High above him, the spider moved between the trees, its enormous body silhouetted against the afternoon sunlight.
It drew its helpless captive closer.
The father twisted against the webbing, trying desperately to free his sword arm.
He couldn't move it.
“Run!” he shouted.
The boy stared up at him.
“Go! Get away from here!”
But the boy remained on the bank.
He looked at his father suspended above the rushing stream.
Then at the enormous creature moving slowly toward him.
The spider's jaws opened.
Its terrible clicking filled the clearing.
And for the first time since leaving Diablo, the boy understood that his father might not be able to protect him.
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