A member of the Oxford Inklings 'trilogy' that included C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams was a master at portraying the sometimes terrifying, or at the very least disruptive reality of transcendent spiritual energies and their fateful impact on the human soul. His characters’ responses to these sacred powers range from divine rapture and adoration, through to profound personal transformation, to horrific descents into the utter banality of hellish self-isolation. Recall the upheaval caused by the Platonic Forms breaking through into spacetime in his 'spiritual thriller' The Place of the Lion - the Sacred Eagle, the prowling Lion, the enormous Butterfly who draws back into itself hordes of smaller butterflies - and the Great Serpent who absorbs a hissing, ‘venomous’ woman. My own homage to Williams features such an Archetypal Serpent drawing back into itself a rioting horde of snakes that have been unleashed on the hapless citizens of an underground city . . .
The serpents were intent solely on coiling, undulating and twining about one another, their eyes beyond hostility or friendliness, their dark instincts seeking ways to return to their habitats aboveground. The riot of life threading through the underground city was like a myriad vines growing madly out of control. Asps there were, as well as taipans, vipers, mambas, pythons, cobras, and the odd funnel-web spider.
Selevrian, standing like the eye of a storm amid the chaos, was like the shamans able to step into the Dreaming through an altered state of awareness. She did so now with the aim of calling forth the archetypal Form of the Great Serpent, whose enormous body soon faded into view with serene majesty. Gazing coolly from side to side, the magnificent, raised Serpent, after calmly assessing the turmoil, proceeded to draw to itself the many unleashed snakes that were slithering among the fleeing, or cornered masses. Its gorgeous hues shone with opaline subtlety as it basked in the flicker of subterranean light and hovered regally, while masses of smaller serpents were folded back into its glorious, hexagonal scales. Then fading back into the depths of the Dreaming, the great Serpent left behind a wild scent of damp earth mingled with aromatic smoke and cold, astringent dew.
c. 2026 MBR, An Era in Anddemar [Vandrassian Press]