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The Sorcerer and the Evergreen Secret
A Primordial Myth of the Western Mystery Tradition

Copyright © 2008 by Robin Artisson

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This is a story about things which happened before people began keeping time. The world would grow bright and warm at times, or dark and cold at others, but this had no name like "summer" or "winter". People sheltered from the cold, and celebrated in the warmth, and they knew that the cold time was very dangerous- malevolent spirits came around in the cold, some in the shapes of monsters that dragged people away in the night, and others invisibly, which attacked people from the unseen, and wounded their souls so that they became weak and died.

When the sun was strong, most of these evil powers vanished away or died because only the most powerful evil spirits could resist the stare of the supreme golden power in the sky. Such powerful spirits seldom came to the human world; they much preferred the darkness of caverns and bogs. People knew that the sun was a Goddess, and that she reported all that she saw to her mother, the Grandmother of all things who caused everything to happen by braiding her endlessly long hair.

People celebrated in the bright time because they knew that anyone could be dead before another bright time dawned. Joy and togetherness was to be celebrated, for it was fleeting. In one village of those ancient times, a man lived who was a sorcerer; he could talk to spirits and was very brave. His village of men and women was on the edge of an ancient forest, which was its own sort of community- a community of tree and plant spirits, and the spirits of the beasts that sheltered among them. The old sorcerer had looked all his life for the secret that the trees in the forest knew: how to survive the worst predations of the evil spirits of the dark time.

In the dark time, the world was covered with ice; the unseen threads of power that connected everything- slender strands of the World-Grandmother's hair- became rigid and frozen for a time. The knots in her hair became knots of death. Life could not radiate its warm power far, and so it retreated into the body, and the body shook and became weaker. Ice covered the ground, and fell in flakes from the sky- this was a magical power that had the hidden power to create things, but which was deadly to those who could not learn its secret. Those who had to stand below it were turned white like the dead. It slowly drained the warmth from a person's limbs and brought death to them, leaving them frozen stiff like fallen branches.

The most men and women could do was build shelters and fires, and with the magic of the fire, create warm, golden circles of light that held the cold back. Then, brave people had to risk the snow-filled forests and the monsters there to take fallen branches and ice-coated sticks to feed the fires. The fires had to be kept going long enough to last out the dark times. It was a constant struggle, for animals fled or went into hiding, or they were consumed themselves by the deadly cold and the monsters. Food was always in short supply.

But the tree spirits in the nearby forest seemed immune to all this; though covered thickly with snow, they kept their green power and stayed vividly alive. In the melt, under the golden eye of the Sun Goddess, they shook off ice and snow and went on living. They had the evergreen power, the power to resist the ice, and the old sorcerer wished he knew their secret. If he could learn it, his people could last through the snow and ice as though they were in a perpetual time of warmth and brightness.

So many men and women's lives were cut short by the dark cold; if men and women were invulnerable to cold and to evil spirits, they could live for centuries like the trees, or perhaps longer. He reasoned that the things that finally killed trees might not affect humans, so perhaps humans might live forever.

The old sorcerer knew his death was coming soon, and so he went into the forest late one night, and sat among the tree spirits who knew him well. They came to him and, sensing his end was near, asked him if there was something they could do for him before he parted ways with them.

He asked them to teach him the power that some of them had to resist the cold and live through the worst of the darkness. The tree spirits were sad, for they knew that this could never be; their own natures prevented them from sharing such secrets with men and women. They could not say why they would not share this secret, only that they knew they should not teach such things.

The sorcerer told them that he would prove himself worthy of this knowledge by becoming a tree spirit himself; he would use his magic to transform into a tree spirit like them at his death. Then, after he lived and died as a tall evergreen tree, he would transform into a man again, taking with him the secret knowledge won from his life as a tree. He could then share it with men and women.

The tree spirits told him that they didn't think this would work, but they loved him and would welcome him into their number, if his magic succeeded. The old man left the forest then, taking with him a cone from the forest center, which the trees often dropped.

A few days later, the old man knew his day had come to die, and as his family and friends gathered around him, he told them to crack open his skull after he was dead and insert the cone into his head. He told them to bury him naked near the forest center, in an open place where the light of the sun and stars could reach. His family was sorrowful, for they hoped that he would use his magic to remain near them after death and help them by driving away evil spirits with his sorcery, but he assured them that he was doing a stronger magic to help them in a greater way.

After his death, it was done as he asked, and soon, a young sapling was growing over his gravesite. He was able to easily transform into a tree spirit and inhabit the tree that grew from his head. He was a strong sorcerer, and he was able to keep his memories of being a human being, even as he was a kingly tree spirit. By becoming a tree spirit, he walked among the other tree-spirits in the forest, and learned much. He learned that it was the female tree spirits that kept the secret of how to resist the cold and to live evergreen; they gave this power to the male spirits of the trees through their will, though only they knew how it was done.

The sorcerer had become a lord among the trees, a virile male, so his plan was partly thwarted, but he found himself falling in love quickly with the most beautiful of the tree spirit women. He loved her and was very happy in the forest world, but always remembered that he had to help his former friends and family among the villages of men and women. He secretly intended to gain the secret of the evergreen power from his love and share it one day with men and women.

It came to pass that he indeed married the queenliest of tree spirits, and they lived in that ancient forest, quite in love. In the power of love, she did impart to him, on his greatest oath of secrecy, what power made the trees evergreen.

They lived for many, many dark times and bright times, and the cold and its monsters had no power to harm them. For ages, perhaps, the sorcerer lived like this, a tree spirit, but who can know? Men and women did not yet keep track of years or ages. Even though the evergreen spirits could live for ages without worry about the winter spirits, even they had to die, eventually, when their tree homes came to death. And the sorcerer's death time came, as it comes to all. But for the sorcerer, this was merely the end of his spell- he knew now that he would transform back into a man, being born anew as an infant and growing up again, maturing with the knowledge of the evergreen power, and soon he knew he would be able to share it with other men and women.

As he sat in the forest one night, withering away to his death as a tree spirit, he was surprised to see a pack of wolves come darting through the forest and stop and gather around him. Behind them came the Moon-Goddess herself, lithely running through the snow-covered trails, her savage bow held in her hands and her body decorated with strange markings.

She told him that she knew what he intended to do; she honored him for having the magical power to accomplish his feat of living and dying and taking rebirth with his new knowledge, but she told him should could not allow him to finish his quest.

She told him that the evergreen power whose secret he knew was not for mankind; once, she said, mankind had lived free of death, but death had to come upon them now because the earlier arrangement had its own hidden troubles. She explained to him that what he was about to do was forbidden, to extend human lives to such a length, and possibly win for them immortality, for her Mother- the Grandmother of all- had woven death for men and women, and to finish his task would be to cause great disaster to befall human beings. She was trying to be kind when she told him that mortals were better off enjoying the things they had in the short time they had them, and that the fate of death made joy and beauty all the more precious. She warned him that humans that could live for so long would not appreciate what they had as much as those who lived only a short time.

Now, the sorcerer was powerful, but no mortal could be as powerful as the Moon-Daughter, who was a great sorceress herself. Her magic was stronger than his, so he had to submit to her, but he was resentful. The Moon Goddess told him that his spell would finish; he would die as a tree and be born a human man again, but she would not allow him to remember the evergreen mystery.

The sorcerer was wise in the ways of magic, so he told her that nothing she could do was able to break his love for his wife, the tree-spirit he had joined with in this forest, nor could she break his love for his human family. This being so, he said, his love would lead him back to his tree-bride, and him to her, and he would always find a way to know the evergreen secret.

He did die, and not long afterwards, a child was born to the people on the forest's edge, which grew up to look very much like the old sorcerer from many generations ago. He was raised among the people of his village, who were no longer quite the same people; a new tribe had come into the area, married into the older people and brought with them their new ways. His mother was a great singer and musician. These people worshipped the Godly spirit who was the great teacher of many wonders and magic, and his holy women were all singers of great skill. He grew up hearing their sacred songs, and learned to play the stringed instruments that made a haunting, delicate noise in the wind. He was beautiful and talented, and everyone grew to love him.

The boy dreamed often of strange times and of a distant life among his ancestors, and even of a life lived among the trees, until one day he remembered that he was the sorcerer that had departed long ago to live among the trees as a spirit. He remembered his encounter with the moon-Goddess and realized that he had returned to the human world, though many bright and dark times had come and gone, such that no one here remembered who he was so long ago.

He knew why his quest had failed, but he knew what he had to do, if he was to complete it. He began to go into the forest and play music for the tree-spirits, enchanting them and searching for his love among the trees. He found her, though she no longer remembered who he was. He sang a song of his ancient love for the queenly tree maiden that he had married once, when he lived as a tree, and she easily fell in love with him. The song made the lost memories in her stir, and there was a love there that she could not place, but which guided her to him.

They were to be married and live together- the first marriage of a man and a tree spirit, and the joining of the two worlds. This was possible for the tree spirits could assume a human shape, at least in those days. Together they walked to their wedding feast in the ancient forest center, but before the rites could be completed, a dark tragedy struck- a snake rose up and bit his bride on the ankle, and she sank to the ground dead. Her dead body vanished, becoming a withering and dying tree, and before long, it was a dried husk, evergreen no longer.

The sorcerer knew that this was no accident- it was the work of the spiritual powers that were intent on thwarting his quest. In his great grief, he began wandering the forest and singing out his sadness in majestic music. He was followed by countless spirits and beasts that were enchanted by his singing and playing. The spirits of the rivers in the forest were especially moved, and they assembled and decided to show this young and powerful man their great secret: the way into the Underworld where the dead all came to dwell. It was not in them to withhold the secret way to this man’s fallen love.

He went down at the source of all rivers, braving the dark passages that were below, always singing his songs which had become magical- they had the power to move him beyond this world and into another world, because these sounds were merged with his great love. The terrible spirits that hid in the underworld to escape the sun could not harm him, such was his power; eventually, he came to the great wolf-monster that guarded the final boundary between life and death, but even it had to yield to the power of his love.

Beyond those dark tunnels there were wide and green fields, plentiful beasts and animal spirits whose lives had ended above, and the spirits of the ancestors of all living beings, living out their existence in the deep. This was the realm under ground, under ice, under snow, under the roots of trees, where the seeds of life were hidden until their own season. Many of those who dwelled there had no idea of their former lives, though some did. Over this great kingdom of life and death ruled the great Father of things, and daily and nightly the sun and moon passed across the sky in this hidden world.

The sorcerer found his love in the green fields below; again with his songs he helped her to remember who he was and their great love for one another. She remembered everything and tried to embrace him, but she could not, for he was still alive as those above lived, and she now belonged to the underworld. So he walked with her, singing, to the great lodge and hall where the Kingly Spirit of life dwelled. He asked that this love of his be allowed to leave with him.

This could not be, but upon hearing the songs of lament for his lost love, the Great One relented and said that he would send a spirit of the wind to guide them out- but the sorcerer had to lead, and for no reason could he stop singing, or look back. If he did, the permission he had given would be lost and there could be no more chances.

Away across the green fields he went singing, his love trailing behind him, and the souls of all the beings below gathered to watch mournfully as he left, for his songs made them feel alive and made them remember all that they had known above. As the couple ascended the dark passages to the above-world, the ravens of the Sun Goddess tried to shriek in the sorcerer's ear to throw off his singing, and the wolves of the Moon Goddess snapped at his heels, trying to make him lose his song in pain. He resisted and kept singing, but as the light of the above world came into view, the spirits that resisted him tried a cunning ploy: they went silent and left him alone.

He began to fear that they had carried off his love, and were contentedly feasting on her, and this was the explanation for their silence. He strained to hear her footsteps over his song, but even singing softly, her ghostly feet would make no noise. He could no longer bear it and he cast a glance over his shoulder, only to see her shocked face as she began to vanish away.

He ran after her, but could only hear her whispering something to him as she faded. He awoke to find himself on the forest floor, covered in frost, and with a broken heart.

He returned to his people with a great sadness that would never leave him. His music from that day became the most mournful music the world had ever heard, but it was no less beautiful.

He sang the last thing his love had told him- which was only a tiny bit of the evergreen secret that he desired to give to mankind so much. That secret was this: love resists the darkest and coldest things in life, and to let yourself love others would bestow upon you a life that lasted longer than those who could not or would not love.

The sorcerer sang until he was very old, for he never stopped loving his bride. He always sat in the forest center at the dawning of every time of brightness, and watched the births of new trees, singing to them as though each of them were his one and only love. When he died, he was buried there, and they say he remains there still, among those evergreens.



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All of the beautiful images in this site are from "The Greenwood Tarot"
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All text is copyright © 2006, 2007, and 2008 by Robin Artisson