Meeting the Sylphs in the Mountains of Magh Ildathach

January 7, 2004

Tonight was a full moon and I decided to go journeying to Magh Ildathach to learn what lessons there were to be learned.  I decided to start this journey from my tree and I climbed up the 21 branches to enter the upper world.  Only this time I was told to keep going.  My stop was at the top on the 33rd branch. 

When I reached my destination I could feel the wind dancing around me and my only point of stability was clinging to the tree as it swayed.  Paralda came to meet me and told me that he would provide my lesson tonight, as soon as he got me down off the top of the tree.

"Shall I carry you or would you like the gift of flight for yourself?" her asked as he slipped his arms around me.

Not really knowing what to expect I answered that I'd chose flying.  After all I could fly in the hall of the winds, and I could fly when I was in owl or dragon form.  Why not try it here with him, I asked myself.

With one arm he pinioned me to his body and used his other hand to support the back of my head as he kissed me deeply.  The kiss was like no other I've ever experience.  I literally became filled with his essence.  With the kiss came not only the power of elemental air but also snippets of knowledge about the Sylphs.  The Sylphs give their gift of power by entering the body (usually through a kiss). and in ages past many of the alchemists became sexually enamored of them.

A few minutes later we came to rest on a snow covered mountain peek and I asked Paralda what lessons he had to teach. 

"Look around you.  What do you see?"

"Snow, ice and cold... that I'm thankfully not experiencing."  I answered wryly.

He told me to look at the snow and the ice and to know that one of the powers of air is to bring something into form.  The ice is water made solid.  It can be shaped, and cut (igloos and ice sculptures).  The ice also represents the slowing of time (which is one of the powers of the Sylphs). 

Paralda explained to me that one of the uses of the 4 of swords card is to bring things into a tangible form.  The embodiment of the metaphysical teaching that "thoughts are things".  He also shared with me that the 7 of swords held a hidden teaching.  The Sylphs can steal warmth from the salamanders and bring warm winds where they are needed.  The winds can also be hot and destructive as well.

From there we explored the mountain area with Paralda pointing out the Cave of the Winds that I had visited with Cardea a few years ago. What struck me was that I had never realized how vast the central range of mountains was.  I could now understand why some attribute the element of air to the North.  It makes a certain logical sense to put air in the land of the cold and barren.  It also explains why so many of my personal images and totems are Snow animals.  Paralda answered my unspoken thought by sharing that for some followers of air, the primal roots are still strong and that they still carry soul memories of a time when all of air was contained within just these mountains.

I asked Paralda if he had else to share and he told me that there were other hidden teachings in the 4 of swords that would take me to the Land of Cron.and would give me a better understanding of earthbound spirits.