The Temple of Time is the hidden home of the Fates and resting place of the Loom Chamber where all of the threads of fate for man and immortal alike are spun and cut when the time is right or when something happens that fate sees fit to intervene on.
Even the immortal Fates have in them the basic and primal survival instincts that all other living beings have. Even in their great and terrible power and their egotistical natures the Fates are in their most basic form magical creatures. And if true magic should fail in the world of mortals then so to would they, becoming the obsolete guides and judges of bygone days just like the Gods themselves.
Because of this the Fates would sometimes weave hidden nudges, nearly insignificant and easily overseen pivot points in the lives of mortals that would guide them to history rather than to the future. These anomalies in the threads manifested themselves in various forms of emotions and dreamlike connections to the ancient world giving rise to the belief of past lives, past powers, and past beliefs. This was the Fates way for writing their own history into the delicate strands of mortal life and so, they and all that they held true would be passed down through time and appear over and over again in spite of mankind's habit of moving forward as rapidly as they possibly could.
Tales of the past such as the great Iliad have been written and interpreted over and over again by such musings. The same immortals and creatures that appeared in those epic tales have appeared in others. And like the morals who achieved immortality by having their names remembered in the chronicles of human history so too have the gods and beings who serve them held some ground in the modern world. Still, this was not enough for the fate of the Fates or the Gods. So it was, on certain threads, that the glory and power of the pagan world was woven. Great guides would be born that would lead mortals back to the once ways and the thought of "what was will be" was planted into spiritual and philosophical thought.
But time itself proved to be weathering to the threads of fate. Great wars ad mass executions invoked the same primal instincts of survival in mortals that it did in the elder gods. Millions of people throughout mortal history were murdered in the name of a new god. A god and a temple that happened to be very beneficial to the power of governments and their need to control the masses. But in their lust for power and control their new god and new ways failed to lead them anywhere. And the once great pagan empires have all fallen because of it. Yet, the church seemed to hold the same power of fear over the pagan people as it had when the war against the pagans and the old beliefs began. A fear paid for in blood and hard to overcome.
The pagan answer to the social status and old fears was to attempt to walk back into mortal history completely unarmed and passive. They adopted philosophies and beliefs so contradictive and antithetical to the old ways, while claiming to be bound to them, that decades were spent with all of their new leaders setting in dark corners preaching of love and light while the seeds of their nature was anything but. Time had nulled and mutated the threads and what the Fates had intended for the pagan people continued to fail to fully manifest.
The neo-pagan leaders that arose opened the door into the modern social structure with colorful propaganda. Everything now written about the old gods and old beliefs was watered down and written to gently appease the masses who still held to the new god, church beliefs. Because they appeared to be weak and unarmed the church who once set upon them with war ignored them. These people were not a threat by any standard. And they could be stamped out at any time the church saw fit. But the church saw no need to act. These pagans were still infected by fear. It appeared in almost everything they tried to do, everything the wrote and taught. Their beliefs were viewed as a fad and nothing more. A view that held some truth to it because of the habit of those seeking out the old ways to appear and practice as "part time pagans". They sheltered and tried to hide all they claimed to be from the eyes of the world. They met in secret, many of them not even allowing their own family members to know. The church still had full control over the pagan mind.
The pagans of old where on the opposite end of the spectrum from the pagans of the modern age. The were warriors who obsessed over their own tales and wanted ever ear near and far to hear of them and their exploits with the Gods and creatures that the world now denies.
Paganism is now the cul-de-sac of the weak, the shunned, and the broken. A safe haven where nearly everything is acceptable no matter how foolish. And the notion of a warrior class that was once so glorified is all but forgotten. Even the self proclaimed elders and wise ones of the social class do not want the warriors to re-emerge, less, as in times and tales past, the warriors become more glorified by their deeds than the title bearers by their boasts. And this is the new power play. The internal struggle of pagan society where hollow words are given weight without deed. The pagan heart longs to be great without anything great to sustain it. Anything to the contrary is viewed as defiance. And the warriors who are fated to bring forth the once pagan glory are made to be the outcasts by their own people. Another philological handicap implanted by unfounded fear and the influences of the church.
The leaders who arose to open the creaking door of the old world, did so in a manner that would suppress their own. And sadly, the neo-pagans love it and hold to it simply because no one has emerged to show them a different way. Those souls who are will be fated to be the outcasts because that is what the pagan world needs. Relentlessness, ruthlessness, pride, ego, and savage weapons that would heal the broken backbone of the ancient world.
In the Temple of Time the Fates weave quickly. Trying to counter the fraying threads. Trying to survive in a world that had forgotten what it means to be pagan.
Angel Snowden - 2011
