Sacred Fire

by Tanai Walker

  “And is not this child the last of your line?” she asked. “Is it not true that she has known nothing of the Sisterhood until a few days ago when you gave her the rites?”

  A wave of disapproving murmurs passed through the dining room.

  Juliette’s hand covered mine, and I noticed that I had been trembling. I looked to her and she pulled her lips into a flat line. At that moment, I would have done anything for her. I glanced back at Quinn.

  “So we have factions now?” she was asking.

  “Factions you started,” someone shouted.

  Sophie stood with Quinn. “Who are you to argue with the Sister of Ash, a descendant of Alexandrine herself?”

  My aunt’s gaze fell on me, then she quickly turned away. She went to the dining room doors and slid them closed as she spoke to the serving crew outside. She calmly walked to the other side of the room and closed the other doors. On her way back to her spot at the table, she retrieved a wooden box. She brought it back to the table and handed it to me.

  “Open it,” she whispered. “I pray you know what to do.”

  With trembling fingers, I opened the box. The face that stared up at me from a bed of red silk startled me. It was the horned face from the ballroom. I nearly backed away from the table, until I remembered that it was only a mask. I lifted it from the box. A collective gasp rushed through the room. I turned the mask over in my hands, ran my fingers over the stiff hairs that lined the inside. The feel of it disgusted me.

  “Tinsley, you must,” Quinn said, having sensed my hesitation.

  I put the mask in front of my face and held it there, as there was no strap or ribbon to hold it in place. Through the eyeholes, my eyes passed over the women gathered in the room staring at me, and I nearly laughed. They looked as terrified as I felt that night, drunk on Quinn’s wine.

  The bristly hairs moved against my skin, a sickening ripple. I felt faint, nauseous, but also energized, as if I wanted to run howling from the room at full tilt. A ripple of blackness passed over my vision, and I was moving right over the table. I saw the astonished faces of the women, and I could vaguely hear the clatter of china and silver.

  Then my hands were touching the chandelier. One of my shoes floated down and crashed onto someone’s place setting. I noticed Juliette grinning as she looked up at me. I wanted to be with her, and suddenly was there next to her, my hands in her hair.

  Juliette showed no fear. She touched my—no—the horned one’s face as two tears escaped her eyes. She whispered my name, a slight grin on her face.

  The black wave returned like a tide, and I was back in my chair. The dining room table was a mess, the tablecloth twisted, the settings turned over or broken, candles leaking wax on the fine dark wood. The women were on their feet and looking at me as dots and tiny shards of white light danced over their faces.

  I tilted my head up, saw the chandelier swaying back and forth.

  “The beast has chosen its vessel,” my aunt announced triumphantly.

  No one argued with her.

  I decided to speak up. “I know what you all think of me,” I said. “Most of it is true. My father would not approve of this, and I realize now that he was instrumental in keeping me from my mother’s family.”

  I looked to Quinn and saw that her eyes watered as if she would cry, Sophie touched her shoulder and the two held hands, the most intimate gesture I had seen between them so far.

  “That doesn’t mean I cannot learn what it means to be part of the Sisterhood, that I cannot keep your secret wisdom. I like it here at Salacia, and I care for Aunt Quinn.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I could feel Juliette beaming at me. I took my seat and felt her arms around me as the women in the room weakly applauded my words. At the head of the table, Aunt Quinn bowed her head to me.

  Suddenly, a pain rippled through my back; the muscles there seemed to be at war. I fell forward onto my place setting, shaking so hard my teeth chattered. The bones in my feet felt as if they had been shattered. I screamed as the edges of my sight darkened. I heard fabric tear, watched black claws curl from the ends of my fingertips. I smelled blood.

  I fell from the table to the floor, saw Aunt Quinn dragging Juliette away as she reached out her hands to me, red blood cloaked the left side of her face, and still she called my name. One of her arms glowed with red rivulets of blood. The darkness took over and swallowed me whole.

  Chapter Ten

  Sandra held tight to my hand as we sat on the porch in silence. A mild breeze floated our way, and I could smell the Gulf on it.

  “I saw Juliette the next day, when the other Sisters burned the seven-sided star into our chests,” I said. “She wanted to complete her initiation. She wanted to dance before the sacred fire. Her eyes were hazy, and she was bandaged. That night, I became the beast, and I woke a week later, chained in that awful chapel.”

  I jerked my head toward the house and caught a glimpse of Juliette standing in the doorway. I turned to see her fully and saw the wooden box tucked under arm.

  “That was an unfortunate accident. An anomaly, I was told,” Juliette said.

  “Why did you stay?” I asked her.

  She shook her head and stepped out into the daylight. “It was my duty because it was in my blood, even if that blood was spilled. I had to grow up fast, Tinsley. I couldn’t be a teenager in love.”

  She extended her arms, the box cradled on her forearms and palms. “Quinn hoped that one day you would be ready to join the Sisterhood. She didn’t know that the Lost Goddess was one step ahead of us.”

  I stood, but I did not go near the box. “I’m ready to go,” I told Sandra.

  “Tinsley,” she whispered. “You can’t walk away.”

  “I will,” I said.

  Juliette used one hand to flip open the lid of the box. It clattered to the floor of the porch, causing both Sandra and me to jump. I saw the contents on a bed of velvet and turned my face away.

  “This is your legacy,” Juliette told me.

  “Get it the fuck away from me.” I stumbled backward off the porch.

  Sandra stepped forward. A curious expression on her face. She reached in, removed the old horned mask with one hand and that horrible gold handled crop with the other.

  “No,” I shouted as if she were handling uranium. “Put that down.”

  I remembered how disgusting the lining of it felt on my face, those bristling hairs, and how they had moved against my skin. The thought of that hideous thing touching my lovely Sandra alarmed me to no end.

  She held the objects with a familiarity that was equally startling. She held on to the crop’s handle loosely, and the mask she balanced on the fingertips of her opposite hand. Slowly, she raised it to her face. Unafraid. She looked at me through the eyeholes, and I knew.

  I staggered backward, my heart seizing in this cold revelation.

  “You’re one of them,” I said. “You’re one of the Sisterhood.”

  Sandra returned the mask to the box, the crop as well. “Tinsley,” she said. Her voice was soft, like those mornings when we woke together. She had known everything, the entire time. She had known to come into the ladies’ room and exactly what she would find.

  “You shouldn’t blame her,” Juliette said. “She only wanted to reach out to you.”

  I ignored her. My eyes were glued on Sandra. “How could you do this to me?”

  “Tinsley,” she said calmly. “I’m sorry.”

  “You lied,” I said.

  She stepped forward, her eyes wide and watery. “The part where I cared for you was no lie. What you felt for me, I felt it right back.”

  My heart shuddered, and my ribs began to convulse. The beast. I fell into the grass on my hand and knees, fighting the change.

  “Stay back,” I said, my voice now a growl.

  Juliette and Sandra exchanged glances but made no move to help. As if I would want either of them near me. I roared at them. My entire body froze in one huge spasm, as if my e
ntire self threatened to course out of me. My hands sprouted hair and my fingers extended into curved black claws, tearing away the grass to the black soil beneath. Sandra’s string of Milagros snapped and the charms fell into the grass. Whatever miracles I thought she had brought me were all deceits. I heard my shirt rip.

  Behind me came the sound of an engine and tires on the loose gravel. I whipped my head around to see a large burgundy-colored van charging toward the house. It halted and the rocks under the tires popped in different directions. The side door slid open. Pearl, the girl from Little Foxes, stuck her head out.

  “Tinsley,” she called. “Come on.”

  I looked back to the front door of Salacia. Juliette had a hand in front of Sandra, who took a tentative step forward. She called my name as well.

  Pearl spoke again. “We’ve come to get you.”

  I lurched to my feet, limped toward the van, and climbed inside. Pearl slid the door closed, shutting out the sunlight.

  “Shit,” she said, kneeling next to me.

  I saw Claudio’s massive head in the driver’s seat. “I didn’t know you were so popular with the ladies.”

  I moved to sit up, but another form in the darkened interior of the van placed a hand on my chest. A light glowed beneath her hand, and I was calm.

  “Leda,” I said.

  “Poor Tinsley,” she whispered. She cradled my head in her lap.

  “Sandra,” I said and realized I was back to my normal human woman’s body. “She’s one of the Sisterhood. All this time.”

  “Just chill,” she said and I knew she was smiling.

  I sighed. “I heard your voice that night in the pyre.”

  “It’s much different this time around,” Leda said. “I felt it the moment I woke. I knew you were close by, waiting.”

  Lulled by her voice and the swaying of the van, I closed my eyes.

  The day after the dinner party, I did not wake until well past noon. My first thought was of Juliette. She was not there in the room with me, so I went to the room previously designated for her, to find it empty. I didn’t bother to change out of my pajamas. I searched the house and only found those strange women, the Sisterhood, staring at me wordlessly. I went to the library to find it empty as well. I began to call out frantically forJuliette. I felt feverishly hot and nauseous.

  I staggered out to the yard. A crew of men labored to stack tall lengths of wood in a cone shape. I went farther out and found Quinn at the stables trotting the Walker, Nonios, in a tight circle. She smiled when she saw me and dismounted. She guided me away from the horses, and I was grateful, as their smell was maddeningly strong.

  “What happened last night, and that other night in the ballroom?” I asked.

  “Your birthright,” Quinn said. “The transformation is one of the greatest secrets of the Sisterhood.”

  “Transformation into what? That mask thing?”

  “We all make great sacrifices,” she said. “Don’t you think I would love to have a child of my own?” She reached out and touched my face longingly.

  “Where is Juliette?”

  “She’s at a hotel in town,” Quinn said. “Resting for tonight, as you should be.”

  “A hotel?” I asked. “Why?”

  Quinn looked sympathetic. “The poor thing was overwhelmed last night at what she saw. There are still things that are secret to her, you know.”

  I felt of wave of nausea pass through me, and I promptly threw up in the grass. Quinn rubbed my back and spoke softly. I wanted Juliette there instead.

  “Can’t she come back?” I asked.

  “You’ll see her tonight,” Quinn told me as she led me back to the house. She chuckled. “She’s got her claws deep, hasn’t she?”

  At the word claws a new wave of nausea passed through me. I remembered black claws at the ends of my fingers, the agonizing pain, and how it was soothed when they pierced flesh and drew blood.

  I retched again. This time I fought Quinn’s comforting touch. When I was done, I straightened as best I could. She stood over me in the light of the high Texas sun, her red hair like stylized flame.

  “You’ve made me into a monster,” I sobbed. “I hurt Juliette.”

  Quinn took a step forward and I moved away. “Tinsley, the silly girl will be fine. Her scars are a blessing.”

  “Scars?” I asked.

  Quinn sighed. “Every seven years the stars of this world and the underworld align the exact same way. The barriers in between weaken and we light the sacred fire to keep this world safe. Every seven years you will turn, and that is how you will stay for seven days and seven nights. I will keep you safe—”

  “You put that mask on me and made me into this thing?”

  “The beast,” Quinn said. “The familiar to the Lost Goddess. We do all of this to protect the gateway between the worlds.”

  “I didn’t want this,” I said, edging away when she moved forward.

  “You’ve already agreed, Tinsley, that night when you put on the mask.”

  “I didn’t put on shit,” I shouted. “You tricked me.”

  She grabbed my arm. “You agreed because deep down, you know that this is your legacy.”

  “Let go of me,” I stammered, nearly in tears. “I’m going back to Houston, and I’m going to tell my father about those horrid women and what you did to me.”

  Quinn slapped me. I held my stinging cheek, shocked.

  “The world of men is not your sanctuary.” She pointed at the house. “These women would have lost their wealth generations ago. They certainly wouldn’t have become venerated in their fields. Every seven years, we gather to bathe in the glow of the sacred fire, and every seventy years, the Lost Goddess imbues us with her light.”

  Quinn shoved me away roughly. I tripped over my own feet and fell to the grass. “Go to your father if you feel he will ever pass on any type of enlightenment to his pitiful girl child.”

  I entered the house and headed for the steps, but several of the Sisterhood blocked my way. One of them held a leather strap, the other a red sack. I backed away, toward the door. Casting a glance over my shoulder, I saw that even more of them blocked the way. Weakened by fear and exhaustion, my body collapsed.

  They surged forward as one and caught hold of me. They tore away my pajama top.

  “Let go of me,” I shouted at them.

  Aunt Quinn stepped forward. Sunlight streamed in through the open door behind her, illuminating the red in her hair, transforming it into a halo of fire.

  “You are the familiar now, Tinsley, and soon you will understand everything.”

  One of the Sisterhood handed her a wooden box. Quinn opened it to reveal a small pile of smoldering ashes, their glow strong in the light of day.

  “Every year, we call upon the Sacred Fire,” Quinn said. “These are some of the ashes from the previous pyre.”

  I found myself transfixed by the contents of the box and quickly forgot my struggle with the Sisterhood. One of them stepped next to Quinn, holding what looked to be a cattle brand with a silver medal etched with a seven-sided star symbol, like the one tattooed on my aunt’s chest.

  Sophie appeared with a small torch. She held it while the other woman touched the brand into the flame. The realization of what they were doing crept into my brain, and I began to struggle again.

  After a minute, the brand was dipped into the box and covered with the glowing embers. Sophie took hold of it and pressed the hot metal above my barely budded breast. I screamed at the pain that radiated through the layers of my skin and down to the muscle. Sophie pulled the brand away. I could smell burning skin.

  My knees buckled and I fell fast. They caught me and forced the bag over my head. My breath caught in my lungs, and I had to force myself to breathe. When I did, I smelled a sickening sweetness. Under the darkness of the hood, swirling colors sparked in front of my eyes.

  When I heard the strain of metal hinges, I knew we were going into the ballroom.

  I felt t
hem all immediately, their eyes upon me. They sat me on one of the cushioned wooden stools. They took my shoes. I wondered if Juliette was there and called out her name weakly. Someone I identified as Sophie told me to hush. I smelled dusky smoke through the hood, and it mingled with the sweetness.

  I felt my body relax, though my mind continued to go a million miles a minute. I saw stars, deep space like the artistic renderings of nebulae I was fond of looking at in my school’s library. I felt as if I simultaneously spun helplessly out in the universe while still being there in the ballroom, my butt on a cushion, my feet on the warm wooden floor.

  Someone began to speak, a sort of prayer I half heard as the winds of creation blew a cold wind about my head.

  “She who is the fire. She who is destruction. She who hunts the night with the great beast.”

  A supernova exploded in slow motion, and I felt my face burn as if I had been out in the sun too long. I must have fallen over, because I felt strong hands sit me back up onto the stool.

  “She who is the Phoenix. The reborn.”

  A bright light flashed behind my eyes, and I saw through unfocused eyes my mother. I heard her singing to me in the distance. I felt her kiss on my face as well as streams of tears.

  “She brought us the great wisdom, and we made her our captive.”

  I saw the great fire from my dream and the woman inside. She regarded me with violet eyes. She spoke in a whispery rush, and at first, I couldn’t understand what she said.

  “Give me what is mine, foolish girl, and I will spare you my vengeance.”

  Light, suddenly, and hands on my face. Aunt Quinn stood before me in her blood-red kimono. Behind her roared a great fire. I expected to see a woman among the flames. Instead, I saw the silhouettes of the other sisters, some in orange and black, others in yellow and brown.

  I blinked. We were out in the yard, and the woodpile I saw being stacked earlier was ablaze. Someone began to pound a drum, and someone started to play a high-pitched flute.

  I saw Juliette clothed in nothing but strategically placed gauzy scraps of fabric. Her arm and the side of her face were bandaged. She began to dance, a slow sway. She untied one of the swaths and tossed it aside. The primitive music picked up, and she dashed to one side of the fire and pirouetted on one foot before falling to the ground, only to gracefully rise again. She removed another piece, revealing her breasts. It was only then that I noticed my own nakedness.