"Oh gosh, what a sight it is, Merlin," Vivien mocked. "When will you cease to show me all these 'wonders?' You have already taught me everything that you know," she said.
"Just bear with me a little longer, my love," I replied in response. After responding I moved the rock that hid the entrance to an underground cave. I walked down into the cave before Vivien and when I looked up, she had used her magic powers to roll the rock back into place above me. Even though I knew that she would do this to me, I could not stop myself from showing her this magnificent place.
I attempted to move the massive boulder and I would have been able to if were not for my broken heart. The only woman that I ever truly loved had betrayed me and this caused me to lose my will to live. I laid down, closed my eyes, and allowed myself to enter the eternal darkness.
I woke up to someone or something screaming in the distance. I rose to my feet with surprising vigor that I had not had since the days of my youth. "Who's there?!" I shouted. As soon as I asked that question, I came to the realization that I must be dead, because I no longer had the foresight that I did in the living realm.
A voice came back. "Good Merlin! It is me, Arthur!" He said.
"Arthur? It can't be, I died before you...," I said in response.
"It seems time works differently down here. I actually just got here right before you did," Arthur said. "You look great by the way!" He said.
Reaching up to stroke my beard, I noticed that it was no longer there, and neither were my wrinkles from my old age. "Wow! It seems that I've come back in my prime in the afterlife!" I exclaimed.
Arthur said, "Either way, I'm glad to have you by my side again, Merlin! Do I have a lot of stories to tell you! Gosh, after Vivien trapped you-"
"Vivien!" I cried. "Where is Vivien? Is she here? I must find her!" I exclaimed frantically.
"I'm sorry I mentioned her," Arthur said. "For what she did to you, she got sent to the lower depths of Hell," he said.
I paused, then looked at Arthur and said, "We have to rescue her."
"I was afraid you'd say that," Arthur said.
"I hope you still have that sword, Excalibur. I imagine we'll need it," I stated. We proceeded to search out our surroundings and found that we were in a place called Limbo on the outer edges of Hell. After more searching we discovered that Vivien was in the eighth circle of Hell being kept there by the Giants. However, finding this information out did not deter us from our mission. We set out on our journey to the lower depths of Hell, sword and staff in hand.
As we reached the gate to the second circle of Hell, we heard a voice yell to us. "Merlin! Arthur! I come to join you on your quest! It is me, Hercules!" Hercules yelled.
Arthur replied excitedly, "Good Hercules! We're glad to have your company."
"It is not an easy quest that you two have set out on, but I would be amiss if I didn't offer my help. I have ventured through the underworld before and I know some shortcuts through the place," Hercules said.
"Let us proceed, then," I said. With Hercules as our guide, the three of us moved through the second circle of Hell without any problems until we came to the third circle of Hell.
"Cerberus, a three-headed devil dog, guards the entrance to the fourth circle of Hell. We must sneak past him or slay him to continue on," Hercules whispered to us. But as Hercules was talking, Cerberus raised his three heads in alert and began to charge our location.
"Looks like our decision has been made for us!" Arthur shouted as he drew Excalibur from its sheath. In perfect synchronization, Hercules charged Cerberus to stop him in his tracks with his godly strength while I cast a hasty spell to enlarge Arthur. While Arthur grew, he swung Excalibur above his head ready to bring his sword down on Cerberus. In a lightning fast strike, Arthur cut clean through all three heads of Cerberus. "Now that the dog is taken care of, make me normal size again, Merlin," Arthur said.
"No, wait," Hercules said. "We can use this to our advantage. Arthur, pick us up and then climb down to the eighth circle," he said. Arthur agreed, then picked the two of us up and climbed down the circles of Hell. As we neared the eighth circle, I saw Vivien surrounded by multiple Giants and they saw us too.
"I'll distract them while you two get Vivien!" Arthur shouted as he began to run away from us. Before we could argue the point, he already took off. Hercules and I quickly made our way to Vivien and I was horrified by what I saw.
She was disfigured beyond words can describe but even in her torture she managed to say, "Merlin, no! Even in the afterlife you plague me with you presence!" Hearing that, I realized the whole quest was a complete waste.
Then Hercules shouted, "We're out of time! We've got to leave now!" Gathering all my power to myself and taking some of Vivien's as well, I created a new spell that I hoped would work.
I shouted the last magic word of the incantation, "Alakazam!" And just like that, the three of us were back on the outer edges of Hell.
Author's Note: I took my inspiration for this story mash up from the King Arthur unit and the Dante's Inferno unit. I was originally going to my story over a young Merlin, but after reading the Dante's Inferno unit, I decided to do a story about Merlin in the afterlife, inspired by Dante's Inferno. In the King Arthur unit, Merlin dies because of his affection for Vivien, which I kept the same in the beginning of my story. From there, my story drew upon Dante's depiction of Hell. It would have taken too long to go through all the circles of Hell, so I hit my favorite parts in this story. I also added in Hercules, because he's had experiences in Hades before, so it made sense to use him as the guide. Finally, I was going to have Vivien be happy to see Merlin, but she never did enjoy Merlin's company, so I decided even Hell wouldn't change her mind.
Bibliography: Dante's Divine Comedy as translated by Tony Kline (2002) & King Arthur by Andrew Lang
Image 1: Cerberus by William Blake
Image 2: The Giants by Gustave Dore
This story is so cool! I really like the way you took inspiration from two different literary worlds and found a way to link them together. Usually, I'd be skeptical about a crossover between Arthurian characters and the Inferno, but you convinced me in the paragraph where Arthur met Merlin just as he popped up in the afterlife. And I liked Vivian's line to Merlin when he found her--she's terrible, even when he's trying to rescue her.
ReplyDeleteHi John! I'm so glad that I have the opportunity to come back and comment on this story since I had the opportunity to comment on you story planning with it last week. I really enjoyed the story, especially the great use of dialogue. Dialogue really gave your characters so much more depth and meaning over what I read in your planning post.
ReplyDeleteI thought your story mash up was such a fun idea. It was so cool to read about so many different characters in one location. I read Dante’s Inferno in high school so I am vaguely familiar with it, but it was fun to see you adapt it and combine it with other stories to make it into something totally new.
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