☕️ Alice’s Mad Tea Party Presents:
♤
Orpheus: The Song of Lost Souls
Alice taps her tea cup, the clink of the spoon against porcelain echoing through the room. Her eyes glint with a feverish curiosity, as if she’s about to open a forbidden door. She stirs her cup, her voice low and laced with mischief.
“Ah, Orpheus - now there's a tale that twists and writhes in the most deliciously tragic way. The original story? Such a melodramatic little thing. You’ve heard of him, haven’t you? The legendary musician, who with a lyre so sweet, could make even the trees weep. Poor, lovesick Orpheus, who played a song so beautiful that even the gods took notice. They all loved him, darling. But love? Love can be such a tricky thing, don't you think?”
Alice leans in, her voice dropping to a whisper as she looks around conspiratorially.
“Here’s how it goes, dear. Orpheus fell for Eurydice - the perfect, sweet love story. She’s a nymph, you know. But tragedy strikes on their wedding day. Eurydice is bitten by a snake and, poof - gone to the underworld. Now, what does Orpheus do? He’s heartbroken, of course. But he’s not just any sad sack, no no. He’s a musician. And not just any musician. He’s a god-level one, capable of stirring the hearts of anyone - or anything, really - with his lyre. So, he decides, “I’ll go get her back from the underworld. Because why not?””
Alice chuckles darkly, swirling her tea in exaggerated circles, her fingers barely touching the rim.
“So, off he goes. Through the gates of Hell, darling! He strums his way past Cerberus, charms the souls of the dead, and gets all the way to Hades and Persephone. Oh, they’re so charmed by his song, they almost forget their own damn names.
They say to him, ‘Alright, Orpheus, we’ll let her go. But, oh - there’s a catch. You must lead her out of the underworld, and you’re not allowed to look back at her until you reach the land of the living. If you do, she will stay in the underworld for good.’”
Alice stops, her finger trailing along the rim of her cup, eyes narrowing.
“Now, let’s take a moment here, shall we? What kind of person does that? Tells you to not look at your loved one when they’re right behind you, only steps away from freedom? Sounds like a sick joke to me.”
She shakes her head and laughs, a wicked grin creeping across her face.
“But Orpheus -- the poor fool - he can’t resist. He’s so desperate, so consumed by that all-encompassing need to see her, to make sure she’s really there, really following him. And guess what?
Just as they reach the final step, he looks back. And like a terrible curse, Eurydice vanishes - poof - into the depths of Hell, never to return. Just like that. Foolish Orpheus. He lost her because he couldn’t wait. And the gods - oh, the gods, darling - they must have had a laugh at that one.”
Alice taps the side of her teacup, her expression turning more sinister as she leans forward.
“But here's where my version begins, sweetling. What if Orpheus didn’t just lose her? What if the underworld was calling to him? What if Eurydice wasn’t the only one with a secret?
Imagine - what if Orpheus had made a deal with the underworld from the very beginning? What if his music wasn’t just beautiful, but it enslaved them all?
What if he knew - from the very start - that he could never have Eurydice again, because he was meant to stay? What if he only went down to claim her because he needed to feed that obsession? To feed his power?”
Her smile widens, teeth flashing.
“Orpheus, darling. A man who thought he could conquer everything. But sometimes, the underworld doesn’t give things back. Sometimes, it keeps you.”
Alice leans back with a sigh, looking down at her empty teacup with a dark gleam in her eyes.
“Maybe Orpheus got what he deserved. After all, sometimes a love so perfect can be a curse all on its own. You want to be careful with that, darling.”
Alice gives you one final look, the air around her thick with secrets, and the cup is refilled - this time, with a deep red liquid.
“But enough about love. Let’s spill some more tea, shall we?”
Alice leans in even closer now, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur, her eyes wide and intense as though she’s letting you in on a twisted secret that only the bravest would dare to hear.
"Oh, darling, you think the Orpheus story ended there? That sweet little 'tragic' love story with the haunting music? Oh no, not even close. What happened after he lost Eurydice - well, let's just say it’s a bit too much for polite company. You see, it wasn't just the gods that turned their back on him. No, no... Orpheus had to pay a much darker price. Much darker."
She pauses, letting the tension hang in the air, swirling her teacup slowly, making sure you’re hanging on every word.
“After Orpheus lost her, he... well, let’s say he wasn’t exactly the picture of sanity. The grief, darling, the madness, it consumed him. He shut himself off from the world, shunned by everyone.
But what’s truly disturbing, what you don’t hear in the sugar-coated version, is what he did after that. The poor fool. See, after Eurydice’s final disappearance, Orpheus vowed never to love again, not even the gods. He rejected everything - humanity, immortality, love itself. And that, my dear, is when the real horror begins.”
Alice’s eyes flicker with excitement as she leans even closer, her voice now barely above a whisper.
“Do you know what happened next? The followers of Dionysus - those wild, twisted creatures of madness and excess - came for him. They were furious, see, because Orpheus had rejected them.
The fury that rose from their drunken, frenzied state was unlike anything anyone had ever seen. And in that madness, they... well, let's just say they did things to him - things that are too gruesome to speak of, too vile for even my tongue to utter.”
She shudders dramatically, as if the memory itself is too much to bear, but she continues.
“His death was brutal, a cruel twist of fate. And the saddest part? His last song wasn’t even a plea for Eurydice anymore. It was a song of hatred, a song of rejection of everything he had once loved. It became a battle cry, a twisted symphony that only the maddened could hear.
Those same followers of Dionysus, fueled by their frenzied worship of chaos, tore him apart, piece by piece. And the worst part? His music, the very thing that made him great, was what ultimately led to his demise. *And that, darling, was how Orpheus - the great, tragic Orpheus - met his end.
The gods did nothing to stop it. No one came to his rescue. His lyre? It was shattered. A symbol of his own destruction.”
Alice pulls back, a strange, satisfied look on her face as she stirs her tea one final time.
“Sometimes, the old stories, the ones that we think are just tragic or romantic? They’re darker, more twisted than we ever imagined. So much darker than we care to admit.
Alice's grin widens, her eyes sparkling as she taps her finger against her teacup, her voice dropping to a teasing whisper.
"But isn’t that what makes them so delicious?"
She leans in, her lips curling into a playful smirk.
"Stories, I mean. The madness... the twist... the chaos. You see, darling, once you’ve tasted this kind of madness, you’ll never go back to the boring old world again."
She chuckles, sipping her tea, her eyes twinkling with wicked delight.
With that, Alice finishes her tea with a satisfied smile, her eyes glinting with the secrets of a thousand forgotten tales.
“Now, darling, don’t you feel just a little bit closer to the real story? I do so enjoy sharing these little truths with you... But don't you worry, there’s always more tea to spill."
Alice, Queen of Ink & Lore
Weaver of Truth, Lies, and Stories
