The Vows of Gaia

The clouds enveloped the skies above the city. It was like a dome of gloom that reigned all over London, making sure the sunlight lingered back just the right amount of time for the people to forget what happiness even meant.

He heard a lot of stories about how murky London was, but it was a relief to realize that mist did not cover the streets of the city and devoured your feet where you stood. Even as he walked through the dim streets and looked around to see people in suits going about their business and others opening up shop early in the morning, the entire scene was far from demotivating. At times he even preferred it this way rather than melting under a scorching sun on a hot summer day. Not that it was a summer day and indeed the weather was anything but humid. A few drops started trickling from above and he remembered another thing he heard a lot about before coming to this city; the rain rarely stopped.

The boy continued down the streets though and towards the River Thames. He had plenty of time before to grab something to eat in a nearby bakery, a savory cheese croissant, but little time to go sightseeing around. One of the things he loved most was walking aimlessly and looking around, without a specific destination to cloud his mind. When you just walk and let your feet take initiative rather than your mind, you’ll notice that your eyes have more time spotting the beauty of streets, the magic of old structures and buildings and how sweet or horrid the people actually were. Random plans sometimes lead him to the top of mountain sides, into the deep oceans above coral reefs as he swam with sea turtles, or even under the stars on a silent meadow.

This wasn’t his first trip across the world and he knew it wouldn’t be his last. Now though things proved different as a specific destination, a specific goal even, waited for him somewhere around the tallest river that spanned all across the whole of England.

“I’m sorry, but may I ask if this is the correct way towards the River Thames?” The boy asked a man nearby who sat enjoying his cup of coffee on a wooden bench.

“Shouldn’t you be in school, boy?” The man seemed a bit displeased at the boy’s sight. Without even giving him a second look he pointed straight down the street not even waiting for an answer to his question. The boy smiled and thanked the man, even told him to enjoy his coffee and have a wonderful day.

“A school boy… well that’s the youngest someone has guessed for me in a while,” The boy thought, chuckling. He pulled the crumpled train ticket in his pocket and placed it in his gray backpack, not that he needed it later, but he still enjoyed keeping these things as momentos. “Rever Woods” read at the top of the ticket, the boy’s name no less and of course you would be wondering now, who would even call their child Rever? It’s not a popular name, heck maybe it isn’t a name to begin with, but it was the name his mother cherished most and so they chose it the day he was born.

Rever flaid the bag back behind him and held back his messy dark brown hair from his forehead. It came as no surprise why the old man thought he was a high schooler, or Rever at least hoped he didn’t seem younger than a high schooler. His hairdo resembled a daily jackpot. Every morning proved to be a new adventure and Rever didn’t make an effort to fix or even look at his hair before leaving. Baggy shirts and hoodies were always his go to choice, preferably the color gray or navy, and you’d never find him in a pair of pants, only jeans. Jeans are the most flexible choice of all, trust me. Rever would always tell anyone he met that commented on his clothes. He preferred black shoes over anything else, because he always fiddled around if he noticed a spot of dirt on the tip or if someone mistakenly stomped on one of his feet. And finally of course, his face was much younger than his actual age. His wide brown eyes were his mother’s and his face almost a barren wasteland of facial hair except for the few weeds that he shaved monthly. A small black piercing hung from the lobe of his left ear and although people couldn’t see them on his arms, the boy marked three tattoos there a few years ago.

“Maybe it’s the height as well,” the 26 year old thought as he continued down the street and spotted the river running in the distance. The mist thickened across the river banks and the farther Rever walked towards the water, the more he believed his feet were gone for good. The moment he made his way close enough, he pulled back his bag and pulled out a small piece of well preserved paper. It was old in age, almost wethered to dust and brown around the edges, but Rever took great care in reading the contents of the map and searching for his destination.

The map led somewhere under Tower Bridge that stood proudly to his right, with the two pointy structures in the middle, the entire bridge opening its way for boats that swam beneath its surface. Rever continued down the river bank, walking across the countless people that sat there for coffee or took their morning walks. It was a short distance before he reached the bridge, but along the way he noticed a few women slyly slithering between random people.

Tall and silver misty hair trickled from their heads, covering the faint image of their bodies. Most of the women’s faces were vague, unclear with no certain expressions, but some of them harbored shrewd smiles and hollow gray pupils as they raised their extremely thin hands and scratched their claws across the air.

Couples and groups of people walked by with smiles and laughter, unbeknownst to the creatures that tried to gain their attention. Some people even walked right past the faint images of the women as their bodies disintegrated into the mist below. Rever saw them as clear as day and finally noticed an older man sitting by the bank all alone wearing a dispirited face. One of the misty women floated over his left ear and hissed words of malevolence in his heart. The more she spoke, the more tired the man seemed and the more her grin grew in size. Before the man looked over to the top of the bridge, Rever approached him and walked right through the misty creature, spreading pieces of her image all around through the mist and placing a hand on the man’s right shoulder.

“Thank you for everything you are doing lately. I know it must be hard, but you got this and I’m sure you can overcome whatever you are facing now.”

The man’s eyes gleamed with hope, standing up straight and shaking Rever’s hands. His smile was genuine, as was Rever’s and the two talked for a few more minutes before Rever went back on his way. He made sure to look back and see if the misty creature latched back to the man’s shoulder, but it was nowhere to be seen. The other women hissed at Rever when he walked by, but all he had to welcome them with was his confident smirk.

“Witte Wieven,” Rever whispered, “I read about them online, but I never expected to see them here.”

Although believed to be the soul of witches, ghosts or simple spiteful midwives, Witte Wieven are creatures of the dark, born from the negativity of men and women alike. They feed on people’s sadness and drive them to death, feasting on their souls.

Recently Rever read about them, before visiting Denmark. They were believed to be Danish Folklore, but he knew there was no particular folklore for a specific country or region. It all depended on who saw the phenomena first in the world and who carried a pen to document them quickly and claim it as their own. Rever, on the other hand, saw a lot and experienced countless frights from a young age. Looking back at it, he wondered when it was when he first saw something deemed as fiction, a creature that resides only in movies or books.

“That time in the forest,” His mind told him, recovering a distant memory that never actually left his side. A memory he wanted to keep in the past and maybe just forget. Still, his entire life after that proved nothing less than a magical adventure. It was during his 9th birthday when he spotted a creature with the body of a horse, coated with gray feathers all around and standing proudly with an eagle’s head, its beak pointed right at the young Rever. Its talons were sharp and after every few steps circling around, it would unleash its enormous wings into the air to stretch them about, secretly trying to garnish the hikers’ attention. They walked by the magnificent creature though, giving it no recognition or thought and focused on the beauty of nature all around instead.

It was during the family vacation in Poland, one of Rever’s very first hikes actually, at Tatra National Park. Rever stood there baffled once he spotted the creature from a distance. His bafflement only increased when he remarked how no one saw it or believed him when he pointed straight at it. The creature rested there, offended at Rever’s finger yet proud that someone had finally witnessed its radiance.

His mother humored him that day, but he came back that night and snuck into the park to find the creature once more. It couldn’t be an illusion, it wasn’t the heat stroke and he wasn’t just making things up for the sake of it. He planned on taking a picture and forcing others to believe him, but most importantly, he wanted to believe in himself. True enough, the creature resided at the same spot, now bent down between its forelegs and fast asleep. Rever made his way closer to the creature, making sure not to wake it up, and once he stood about two meters away pulled out the small digital camera and pointed it towards it.

A twig suddenly shattered beneath his leg and the sound was enough to wake the creature up. It rose with a frenzy and slashed Rever’s arm with its talons, forcing him to the ground with a deep cut that bled on the grass and tears that flooded his face. Rever ran as fast as he could, but the creature did not follow. Instead it stood there watching its assailant flee and bent down to go back to sleep. Of course, his mother yelled and scolded, but they tended to his wound quickly without even believing his tale.

“You must have tripped over the edge and imagined everything up,” His father explained that night.

The scar remained as visible as ever on his arm till this day. It was a clear reminder that no matter what anyone said, these creatures existed in our world and Rever was as sane as everyone else; maybe even saner.

He later learned that the creature is called a Hippogriff, a legendary creature in fact supposedly the offspring of a Griffin and a mare. But the research didn’t stop there. As Rever grew, so did his adventures and the tales along the way. Soon, he stopped telling his family and friends, who would never believe him no matter what, and just focused on seeing everything himself. He read about everything and anything he could find, from old folklore to magical and mystical beings alike. Some were true as the sun that sets each day and the moon that rises each night, but some, of which I won’t share for the dignity of the creators, were total baloney.

When he was old enough, Rever left his family and began his own adventure in life. He knew the world was much more walloping than anyone could ever imagine and he planned to find all the answers his soul and spirit needed; beginning with the secret behind the people’s obliviousness.

It was 5 years ago when he started his adventure, but this day was his most promising. This lead proved to be substantial and his heart fluttered with anticipation at the answers he knew he would find right around the corner.

It all started here, with the secret under-city beneath London’s great River Thames.