“I found the key to the grove of Goddess Hecate!!!” exclaimed Anita, ” I haven’t touched it yet. There seems to be a puzzled seal on it and I thought as Divya is the best at puzzles. I should let her give it a shot.”
Divya examined the peculiar puzzle box and said, “I have never seen anything like this. I would need some time to work on this. Would it be okay if I take it home, professor?”
Professor Joanelle looked up from her laptop’s screen and said, “We only have 2 days before our trip to Cape Matapan. Many believe that place to be an entryway into the underworld. With the key, we can finally find out everything about Goddess Hecate. So I want the puzzle solved as soon as possible. Take it home and be ready with the key when you board the flight.”
Anabeth asked, “Hey Anita, how did you find the key?”
“It was clear from the professor’s research paper, the key was in the city graveyard. The last descendants of the gatekeepers were buried in our graveyard and I found the key in one of their graves.”
“Maybe we should go through the gatekeeper’s history to find clues on how to open this sealed box?” suggested Anabeth.
“Great Idea!!” all grad students exclaimed.
Anabeth ran to Joanelle’s library and pulled out all books needed for the research. The girls shared a basement close by so they took all the material back home.
Cracking the Puzzle Box
While Divya was examining the puzzle box, Anita and Anabeth were busy researching the gatekeepers and Hecate. The books were very inconsistent when it came to Goddess Hecate.
Some said that the Greek Goddess was Perses’ and Asteria’s only child while some mentioned her as Zeus’ daughter. The commonality that they could find was that she was the goddess of witchcraft, ghosts, magic, moon, the night and necromancy. Her usual depiction was a woman holding two torches.
Anita realized that the puzzle box has an inscription of two torches but they weren’t lit. “I have an idea,” she said, “let’s use fire on the box!”
“Are you crazy?” said Divya. “The box is really old, what if we burn the contents inside?”
“Goddess Hecate was always depicted with two torches. The box has two torches. Maybe if we light them up, we might get somewhere.”
“Actually, I think she makes sense”, said Anabeth, “I have matches, we can use them so that the heat doesn’t damage the box.”
“Okay! If both of you think it is a good idea, we should try it.”
Anabeth lit a match and brought it close to the box. To Divya’s surprise, the unlit torches started lighting up. the tip must have been a special metal which was sensitive to heat. The heat converged to the middle area and a new Greek inscription just became visible.
Η φεγγάρι αποκαλύπτει
“What does this mean now?” asked Anita.
“I know how to open the box!” Divya’s face lit up as she knew she had figured it out.
Secret Key of Goddess Hecate
She ran out of the house with the box. The other girls were completely confused but followed Divya outside. The puzzle box’s key hole area was spherical shaped. Divya raised the box so that the moonlight shined directly on the spherical area. The spherical area started glowing with the full moon’s light. A few seconds later, the sphere started emitting moonlight. As soon as that happened, the sphere started rotating and the puzzle box slowly started opening. With each rotation of the mini-moon, the lid of the box lifted a little. As the lid lifted, the girls could see something shiny rising from the box. After a couple of minutes, the lid was completely open and the shiny object fell to the ground.
Divya quickly grabbed the object and removed the box from the moonlight. The puzzle box immediately closed up.
Transference
The object was still shining. Suddenly the object became extremely bright. Both Anita and Anabeth averted their eyes but Divya kept staring at the object. It didn’t look like a key but Divya was sure that it was. The brightness didn’t hurt her eyes.
In a split second, the object’s brightness faded and Divya fainted.
The other girls quickly went to check up on their friend.
“Divya, are you okay?” said Anabeth while Anita started shaking her. She regained consciousness after sometime and asked, “What happened? Where’s the key?”
“The key is in your hands. It started shining brightly and you fainted! Are you okay?” said Anita.
“I’m fine,” said Divya. She didn’t feel fine but she kept it to herself.
“How did you know moonlight would open the box?” asked Anita.
“The Greek inscription means Moon Shine Reveals. So I thought that’s what they meant!”
“Oh! I forgot you could read ancient Greek.”
The research dig for Goddess Hecate’s grove was in two days and with the key, they would finally be able to find the long lost power of the two torches.
Continued in second chapter, Goddess Hecate’s Curse – The Passage of Perpetual Darkness .
