by Joey W. Hill
"Here," Agnes rasped. "My hand. Look."
Grace clasped her wrist and pried the contents out of her closed palm. A walnut. Where on earth had Agnes gotten it in the dead of winter? It must be a dried-up souvenir from the harvest season. But even Grace, with her lack of magical abilities, could feel the power pulsing off of it. It glowed in Agnes's grasp.
Mother of God... Looking around, she saw a mortar and pestle on the table with a complement of dried herbs. Crockery was on the floor where it had been knocked askew by fumbling fingers, Agnes had been out of bed doing this. Grace was torn between wanting to shake the woman until her teeth rattled and wanting to weep.
Don't be mad...had to be done. Crack it and eat the contents before you start the ritual. It will fill you...with our sins. With our regrets, our guilt...our grief and loss of hope. You will offer them all to the Lord, and then see if He will be...merciful. The curve of Agnes's abraded lips, the simmering glow in her hazel eyes, were tinged with mystery. It reminded Grace of another Agnes, the healthy one. The priestess who stood proud and strong during past rituals, a warrior defending her village with the magic they wove around it. Her mother's power shone through her. "If you represent His Lady...for Her, He will always show mercy."
"You're an idiot." Grace was afraid, and that made her brusque. She took the nut from Agnes and shoved it in her apron pocket, then lifted her in her arms. Agnes's head dropped onto her shoulder and she continued mumbling, the words incoherent, inside and out. She'd delivered her message clearly enough, but that missive delivered, her mind tipped off the edge of exhaustion and relinquished consciousness, a mercy for her poor, suffering body.
Grace cleaned her up once more and tucked her back into the cot. She pushed her hands through her own hair, dislodging the blonde strands from the randomly stuck pins. Putting her hand into her pocket, she felt the heat of the walnut. When she ate it, the magic would invade her mind and take from her. She could feel that. But Agnes had dared Death's Door to provide her its power, so she would not shrink from it.
Hell's curses, was there any effort more useless than trying to hold onto control? If anything, the past few weeks had proven it was an illusion of a deluded mind. For this to work, she was going to have trust Agnes, and throw herself on the mercy of gods Grace didn't believe had any mercy to give.
A good trick, when she was so angry she wanted to obliterate the whole worthless legion of them. She paused at the doorway of the hovel and looked back at the unconscious shape on the bed, the far too diminutive curve of Agnes’s body. Though it was selfish, Grace wished Agnes was awake so she could speak to her once more. She didn't know what she was doing.
Yes, Agnes was right. She knew the ritual. But feeling it enough to raise the energy was an entirely different matter. She had no doubt the spirits were out there. Her problem was with their intent: good, evil, indifferent. She could accept the first two; it was the last one that made her hate them so much. Being indifferent to suffering and loss while having the capacity to change it--could there be a worse sin? In her current circumstances, she didn't think any crime a living soul could commit could be any worse than that.
Hostile and aggressive were not the best emotions to carry into the Great Rite. Putting her hand to her hair again, she realized that wasn't the only thing that needed to change. When the women used ritual to observe the holidays or full moons they were bathed and more well-groomed than at any other time. Hauling bath water in winter was a hard chore, and using precious wood fuel to heat it was a costly indulgence, but the Lord and Lady must be honored. She'd helped them at those times, hauling large buckets of water on a yoke heavier than the largest man in the village could tote. But it had been easy enough for her. In warmer seasons, they simply bathed in the large nearby creek. Unfortunately that was all she had time to do now.
"Talk about penance," she muttered. She built up Agnes's small vented fire with a few pieces of kindling, then stripped off her clothes. She was the only one who'd be up and about around the village, and she intended to move more swiftly than the human eye could follow, regardless. Seizing a cake of the fragrant soap Agnes made, she braced herself for the freezing ordeal to come. Then she darted out the door.
"Fucking holy dog shite," she snarled a moment later as she plunged into the icy water. She was thorough, though, washing herself fully clean, though she didn't stint on her ability to do it as fast as her vampire speed allowed, a dervish of motion that probably looked like a water spout to any watching wildlife. She shot back to the hovel, a pale blur against the snow. Inside, she moved close to the fire, finding a reasonably clean cloth to dry herself and towel her hair. It was past her shoulder blades now, in need of a trim. She usually kept it shoulder-length, but Agnes liked brushing her hair. When Dan and the other men had gone on hunts or harvest trips that took them away overnight, they'd spent many nights sitting by this fire, laughing and talking womanly talk, while Agnes brushed it.
Beautiful.
Grace turned to see Agnes looking at her out of half-closed eyes. "Like a fallen angel," the sick woman said. "Come to tempt me."
Grace managed a smile. Agnes's hand extended from beneath the covers, a trembling bird claw with dark tips at the end of pale fingers. "Come to me," Agnes said. "Please. I know I'm hideous, but..."
"You're not. Never say that." Grace came to her and knelt, taking the hand and putting it on her cheek. Agnes stroked her, hand curving so her knuckles grazed Grace's jaw and moved down to her throat. Grace lifted her chin as Agnes caressed her. It had been a long time since she'd been touched in the way Agnes was touching her--with sexual awareness, despite her condition. Agnes's gaze slipped down to Grace's naked breasts, cold from the water's touch, the nipples tight points. Agnes made a noise in her throat and touched one curve. It was a jerky, uncertain movement, but Grace cupped the woman's hand and molded it to her breast, giving her the strength to feel its weight and shape.
Agnes sighed, her eyes falling shut, her mouth in a tired half-smile. "I will not take from what belongs to the Lord tonight. But I thought a touch might remind you...that you are Woman. You are the Goddess, Grace. He will desire and want you, because he is Man and the Great Lord. What you do, it will be hard, it will be painful, but if he accepts your sacrifice, you will also find hope and pleasure yourself. You need that. You are as overcome by desolation and loss as any of us. Maybe more so."
She started to cough again, and Grace grabbed one of the cloths she'd been keeping next to the cot. She held Agnes's fragile body until the spasm subsided. If tears fell on the crown of Agnes's head, it was Grace's secret, for when she eased the woman back, Agnes's eyes were still closed, her breathing evening out once again as unconsciousness claimed her.
Grace glanced down and saw that some of the sputum had spattered her chest. She wiped it clean, though a vicious part of her wanted to leave it. She wanted this "Lord" of Agnes's to see it. She didn't want to come to him clean. She wanted to be covered with the sores, vomit and shit of a village of sick and dying men, women and children. She would come to him as Plague, as the Black Death. As a challenger, not as a fucking supplicant. She would toss bitter words of rage at him: "I will offer you this body. You can fuck it until you sicken and die as well, until you suffer as you allow them to suffer. And I will laugh until I break into a thousand bloodied thorns."
She was kneeling by the fire, her head in her hands, her hair curtaining her face. She was weeping openly. Agnes was going to die. Grace could feel it. Either Agnes had known it first and made the magic as a result, or the magic had taken her last reservoirs of strength, but it would not be long now before Grace would feel that second mark connection wink out like a dawn star. It was the least pleasurable of all vampire abilities, knowing when someone's condition was beyond hope. Agnes had said this Rite might be their last hope, though there was no hope for those already dead. If the Lord and Lady could not change Agnes's outcome, Grace had no use for them.
But this was not Their demand. It wa
s Agnes's request. If she wanted to serve Agnes's request honorably, she had to believe it would achieve the results Agnes hoped. How did one convince the mind to believe what it wouldn't? How did she give herself hope, when that reservoir was empty? She'd learned hope and joy from Agnes, from the people of Sanctity.
"Take my robe..."
Was it the agony in Grace's own mind that kept rousing Agnes, when she was obviously so beyond strength she should be nearly comatose? Grace didn't know if that meant she was the tether holding Agnes to life, or the stress pulling her closer to death. But when she raised her head in response to Agnes's whisper, she saw her pointing to the wall, where her ritual cloak hung. It had been Mary's. Over the years, Agnes had added to it. She had a deft hand for needlecraft, so the embroidery on it was breathtaking. The shoulders and back of the cloak were like a tapestry, arcane symbols hidden cleverly amid nimble unicorns, prancing deer and dancing women with long hair. Their hands were clasped so their bodies formed a zigzag pattern across the robe's fabric, the hems and sleeve points of their lovely dresses tapering off into blooming vines. The needlework was as good as anything Grace had seen in fine halls on her many travels.
Agnes lifted her arms, their shaking and the look in her eyes piercing Grace's soul. This was good-bye. It was time to go. Grace went into Agnes's embrace, holding her tight. "Don't you die on me," she said into her ear. "That is a command, moppet. Don't make me come yank you away from the gates of Heaven, because I will do it and spit on the angels at the gates. I agreed to do this, but the price is you give me what I want."
"Anything," Agnes said softly, petting her with drifting hands. "It's okay, Gracie. It's all right. Don't be afraid. It will all be okay."
Miraculously, the words brought Grace strength, and comfort. Raising her head, Grace met her gaze. For all her earlier distress, Agnes's expression now was calm as a lake. "We all know life ends too soon," the witch whispered. "The blessing is when we are given any amount of time to love. To truly love another. And yes, if you do this for me, for all of us, I will become your third mark. I would have anyway. But you've agreed to the ritual, so you can't back out now. It would be dishonorable."
Grace saw that mischievous spark she knew so well and adored fiercely, especially at this moment.
"Honor is a male concept, and a mostly useless one," she said tartly. Her eyes were full of tears as she framed Agnes's face. Leaning down, she did what she had never done in their years together. She kissed her as a lover, parting her lips and teasing her with the sexual promise a vampire had in abundance. Even in her condition, Agnes's body stirred to it, likely because it was far better than focusing on the other, far more horrible feelings she was suffering. When Grace lifted her head, she met her eyes as she would if Agnes stood healthy and whole before her.
"My full servant. I'll hold you to that," she said evenly.
"I hold you to the same." Agnes tightened her grip on Grace's wrist. "But heed me, Grace. You don't have to pretend to feel something you don't. Go to Him and Her with an open heart, no matter if it's bleeding and full of rage and sickness. Give Them all of yourself, the way you want me to give all myself to you. Hold nothing back. It's the only way Love truly works."
* * *
When Grace was dressed in the robe and nothing else, her hair brushed and loose, she departed Agnes's home. Moving to the outskirts of the village, she left it behind. As she moved deeper into the forest, toward the site the witches normally used for their rituals, she saw a lone deer forlornly picking through the snow for a blade of grass or a scrap of foliage. It almost brought her to her knees, the simple evidence of how hard life could be sometimes. She stumbled, a reminder she was dangerously weak. The hunger was dragging her mind back into melancholy, no matter the one precious moment of hope and light Agnes had given her.
One step at a time. She would start the ritual. By going through the motions, the motions might become genuine and closer to what Agnes was asking of her. It was the only way Grace knew how to do it.
Regardless of her godless frame of mind, she admitted the coven's ritual site had a particular energy to it, even when it was silent and still as it was now. Seeing it empty like this was another blow. Eight of the thirteen had died so far, and she already knew they'd lose three more. Agnes and perhaps Gertrude would be the only survivors, since Gertrude was showing some sign of rallying. And Grace wasn't going to lose Agnes. If Agnes could make it through this night, Grace was giving her the third mark, and it would call her back from the brink of death. Grace would accept no other possibility. She'd tried once more to get Agnes to agree to it beforehand, using the logic that if the mark healed Agnes entirely, a trained priestess could do the Great Rite, increasing the chance of its effectiveness. Agnes had shook her head.
"It doesn't work that way, Grace. We can't give ourselves something we want before we offer ourselves in all our weakness to the Lord and Lady. We have to be willing to make the sacrifice, to risk all of it."
"Bollocks," Grace muttered. "Human nonsense." If she was a god, she'd want her minions to use all their strengths rather than setting them aside to prove some useless point about their love and devotion. She kicked at a frozen tuft of dead leaves and shuffled through the snow into the center of the clearing. It was ringed with birch, oak and ash trees. The cairn in the middle had been built up over time from stones the women had brought to it, infusing them with particular memories and energy. They'd laid out trails from the rocks, forming spokes to a wheel that surrounded the whole thing. It was far enough from the village and off the commonly traveled paths to decrease the likelihood of discovery by those who would assign the Devil's intent to such a symbol. The witches had also warded it repeatedly so any who strayed too close to it would be compelled toward a different trail.
She drew a breath. Cast the circle, then eat the walnut. She slid the robe off her shoulders. Pausing to fold it over her arm, she stroked the tiny embroidery stitches. It had taken Agnes since her teens to get this far with it, and she still had plans for the bottom hem. Grace would make sure she had the chance to do that. Laying the robe over a low hanging tree branch, she closed her eyes as the cold air enveloped her. Shivering, she stepped out of her shoes, bringing her bare soles in contact with the earth.
Was it her imagination, or did things seem more still here? On a winter night, there wasn't much sound, but usually Grace picked up animal rustlings or leaves quivering from a flitting breeze. Vampire senses could detect the slightest noise, and it seemed to be getting even quieter. She began to walk the circle, drawing down energy in her mind, how the witches said they did it. Whereas she could see the shimmerings of power when they did it, even with her untrained eyes, she saw nothing. Still, she did it three times as they did, imagining the circle as a warded, sacred place, where magic could be raised.
She caught her toe on a rock and stumbled again, dropping to a knee and cutting it on a root protrusion. "Damn it." She sucked back the curse, but it was already out. She was so bad at this.
Can you feel sorrier for yourself? Agnes is facing death, with horrible bulbous things rupturing on her body. You have to walk in a circle and chant and try to call down energy. Poor you. Shut up, stop whining and do it.
"I am sorry, Lord and Lady." She spoke the words woodenly, uncertain, but as they hit the crisp night air, they tingled through her, recalling Agnes's words. Just be open, even if your heart is bleeding. "I'm angry, I'm tired, I'm sad. I don't know if I can do this. But I love my friend. I love all of them. I want to do whatever I can for them. Please...if you're there, please help us. Please...I'm filled with rage and I don't know how to set it aside to call to you, to be worthy, or deserving, or whatever the fuck...whatever I'm supposed to be." She opened her palm and looked at the walnut she'd taken out of the robe.
Yule was usually when the witches celebrated the birth of the Lord, sacrificed at the harvest for the renewal of life, and reborn through the Goddess's womb on this night so he could become her lover in the spr
ing and start the cycle anew. Father to son, son to father, Mother of all, lover to the Great Lord. Their union, the harvest cycle, the cycle of birth, life and death, formed a circle like this one. The Christians celebrated the birth of Jesus, their savior who died for their sins so they could have everlasting life. Take our sins. A sin-eater... She couldn't keep track of all the magics and religions that tangled together and crossed, overlapped. It was time to reduce all of it to one act of faith, whatever its intent or outcome.
Her knee was bleeding, staining the snow. It didn't matter. Grace broke open the walnut. The contents looked like a fully formed sweet meat, not all dried up as she'd expected. But it was swollen with magic. When Agnes had first laid hands on it, it probably had been desiccated.
Grace put the walnut in her mouth. She hesitated, not knowing if she should chew or simply swallow, if it would make a difference to the magic, but the pleasant taste inspired her to bite down. Sensation exploded in her mouth. Her throat worked, swallowing it without her command. She felt the magic unfurl and...
She cried out and was flung to the ground, caught in an internal detonation of startling suddenness. Something seized the reins, shoving her flat. She shuddered, her body rolling, convulsing on the hard earth. As the magic spread out within her, excruciating pain took over. Not a physical pain. She wished it was. The tortures of the Inquisition were the playful tickling of a baby's feet compared to this.
There was no greater pain in the world than that inflicted on the heart and soul, and hers were being invaded by an army. Lies, resentment, fear, guilt... Agnes was right. Even the least of the villagers knew sin, sins small and large, regretted, cried over or nastily celebrated. She saw into the hearts and minds of every one of them, unable to turn away from the glare of the light or the sucking weight of the dark. That painful brightness and soulless darkness filled her up to overflowing. These were good people. She could only imagine what it would be like to experience this flood from a village of bad souls.