“Fine,” I said, lifting my chin. “Then just show me the way out.”
He shook his head. “I can’t. I’m sorry. It’s too late.”
“What do you mean?”
“They will try to silence you.”
My mouth went dry, and for a second I believed him. After all, I’d just had my digits inside a dead man’s eye sockets. These people used human skulls as light fixtures; maybe they should be taken seriously. And then I remembered Malcolm and his clumsy letter delivery that afternoon. These weren’t omnipotent officials, they were college kids. If something happened to me, they wouldn’t get away with it. Lydia, at least, knew where I’d gone tonight.
“You people talk big, but you don’t have anything to back it up.”
“So you’ve always expressed.” He smiled then, an ill-tempered grimace, and in the strange, angled light, he resembled the evil emperor from Star Wars.
Uh-oh, Amy. This guy doesn’t want to help you.
“You gave us a challenge at your interview,” he went on. “And Diggers don’t take things lying down. You’re here to learn a lesson, Amy Haskel.” The door behind me flew open. “I got her, guys,” I heard him say as both of my arms were twisted behind my back, firmly, but not uncomfortably, and the first figure prodded me between my shoulder blades to make me march.
“Time for the Grand Tour.”
“This is assault,” I said. “I’m going to scream.”
“If anyone could hear you, which they can’t, do you think they’d react to it? A scream coming from the Rose & Grave tomb on Initiation Night?” A few of the figures surrounding me laughed.
Fear skittered down my spine and my skin began to crawl everywhere my captors were touching me. This had to be a joke, right? Part of the initiation game. But then again, I’d heard stories about Diggers and their run-ins with the law. Somehow, the power of Rose & Grave prevailed and the members wormed their way out of all charges. Some people said the society owned the police.
“Where’s Malcolm?” I asked, in a voice far more devoid of snark than I’d been using a few moments earlier. Malcolm Cabot was a governor’s son—he wouldn’t be party to anything too illegal, right? Unless you believed the legends that said the society owned the whole government as well.
“He’ll be around…eventually. Now shut up and enjoy the ride.”
With that, they shoved me forward into the waiting arms of another group, who spun me around, lifted me up, and deposited me not-so-gently onto a hard, flat surface.
“You’re destined for a pauper’s grave.”
For a moment, I thought they were letting me go. Boy, was I wrong—a point that became clear a few seconds later when they closed a lid in my face. I tried to move, but the walls closed tight around me on all sides. I could feel sanded wood a few inches from my shoulders, above my head, and most noticeably, right beyond my nose.
They’d put me in a coffin.
I pounded on the lid, but it was closed shut. “Let me out! Let me out, you sons of bitches!” I screamed, kicking my legs. They responded by turning me over. I tumbled around, hoping at once that the movement would knock a few screws loose and also that it was sturdy enough not to spill me out without warning.
“You don’t take us seriously enough, Neophyte Haskel,” said Darth Digger. His voice was muffled through the coffin, but I recognized it now. He was the jerk from my interview. The one who kept arguing with Malcolm about not letting me in the society.
“I promise you, I’ve learned my lesson!” I pounded the coffin lid for emphasis.
“You belittle us,” he went on, as if he didn’t hear. “You ridicule us. You challenge us. You call our Sacred Vestments costumes….”
“Well, you dress like extras at a D&D convention.”
They shook the coffin, which shut me up.
“Before this night is over, Neophyte, you will learn respect for your Elders.”
I bit my tongue to keep from pointing out that I didn’t count a few months as a generation gap. They’d been carrying me for what seemed like ages, but it was difficult to tell how much of the jostling was actual forward motion and how much was cleverly designed to seem that way. At last they set me down. I thought I could hear splashing sounds all around. Another bathroom?
I could hear my captor’s voice very clearly now, as if he’d leaned down to whisper directly into the coffin lid. “You are in our power now, and we hold your life in our hands. This is the pool room, Neophyte. If we wanted, we could drop you in. Do you think you’d escape from the coffin before you drowned?”
No. Something scraped against the bottom of the box—or perhaps it was the coffin itself, being shoved along the ground. I felt myself sliding forward, as if tipping, and then something wet splashed against my legs. Water, flowing through the seams in the coffin. Oh my God, they were doing it! They were submerging me in the pool!
“Stop! Stop, please!” I shrieked, kicking for all I was worth. The wooden walls of the coffin remained uncompromised.
Oh, God, I can’t swim. I can’t swim! Let me out, please, don’t let me drown!
Pure terror washed through my body as I practically broke my hands pounding on the lid. I heard a rush of water above my head, and it started seeping in at the top of the coffin, wetting my hair and my shirt. Any second now, they’d let go and I’d sink to the bottom. Helpless. How long would it take? The coffin’s seams didn’t appear very tight. “Please, please, take me out! I beg of you!”
My cry broke on the last words into a sob. At last, I felt them lift me up and the hysteria ebbed.
“Well, that was quick,” he commented dryly.
Hot tears ran down my face and mixed with the cold pool water. Now that the danger had passed, I felt nothing but anger at myself for having let them see me squirm. I vowed I’d have no reaction for the rest of this crazy ride, no matter what they did to me.
“Do you remember what you said to us at your interview, Neophyte?” my head captor asked. He was clearly the master of ceremonies here—everyone else was playing the part of muscle. My captors swung the coffin in earnest now, and the water inside sloshed around, drenching the legs of my metal-free pants.
“Speak!”
Not a chance. But when I didn’t they began shaking me up and down. “Okay, okay,” I capitulated. “Which part of my interview?”
“Your parting shot.”
I struggled to recall. I remembered giving them the finger, but that was about it. “Not really,” I said haltingly, wondering what else they could possibly have planned for me. Whatever it was, there was no way it could beat the pool.
“Then let us jog your memory,” he said as his cohorts jogged my container. “Knights!”
And then, in unison: “I don’t do drugs, I’ve never been arrested, and from what I hear, I’m not too shabby in bed. Not that any of you people will ever have the opportunity to discover that firsthand!” The cacophony of voices had a garish, military quality to it, and if possible, I was even more humiliated by their recitation than I had been when I’d first opened my big mouth in that interview room.
“Have you ever heard the story of the Diggers’ Whore, Neophyte?”
I shuddered at the way he addressed me.
“I take it by your silence that’s a ‘no.’ ”
Ugh, I could almost hear the bastard’s smug smile. “Either that or you’ve knocked me cold in here.”
“She doesn’t learn her lesson, does she, boys?” Someone, I assumed it was my Sith M.C., thumped loudly on the lid of the coffin. “Do we have to dump you in the water again?”
Oh, boy, was this jerk going to lose some parts of his anatomy when I finally got out of here.
“As I was saying, the Diggers’ Whore is a very special woman, given the sacred trust to Initiate the Knights of our Order into the Mysteries of Connubial Bliss.”
“Lovely,” I said, with extraordinarily minimal sarcasm. But this is what I thought: Initiate? Hardly—or at least, not in the last few
decades. If a man like Malcolm Cabot was a virgin, then I was a nun.
As if he heard my unspoken musings, the M.C. went on. “Though most of the Knights are already familiar with such Earthly Pleasures”—
And Purple Prose.
—“there are few who leave Eli without having tasted of her Delights.” The coffin stopped moving, as if we’d reached our destination. “Have you heard such tales, Neophyte?”
No, not as such, but it didn’t sound off-base. A prostitute on call at the Rose & Grave tomb? A little gross, but in keeping with every other tall tale I’d ever heard about the society. “Sure, why not?”
He leaned so close to the coffin, it was as if he hissed the following words directly into my ear. “And have you never wondered, Miss Not-Too-Shabby-in-Bed, from whence we recruit her?”
Uh-oh.
“Why don’t you find out?”
And with that, they flipped a latch and turned the coffin on its end, tipping me out. Plunging forward, I braced myself for a crash that never came. I fell down and down, too shocked by the disappearance of the ground even to scream.
And when I finally landed, things got even worse.
5. Initiation
Blankets buffered my fall, and after the first bounce, I felt strong male arms close around my torso to keep me steady. But I was no one’s whore. I lunged out with my fists.
“Help!” I clawed at my face, fighting to get my wet hair out of my eyes, and kicked to untangle my legs from the blankets. “Help! Rape! Fire!”
(I’d always been taught that people pay more attention when you yell “Fire” than when you yell “Rape” because fire endangers them as well. Fun world we live in, huh?)
“Help me, please!” My fist grazed someone’s jaw.
“Ow! Amy, jeez, chill out.” I paused in my flailing for a moment and peered through the ropy strands of my hair to see who was holding me. It was Malcolm, robed, but with his hood pushed back off his face.
“Get your hands off me, you political slime,” I shouted, “or I swear to God I’ll make sure your father never holds elected office again!”
These are the types of threats one makes at Eli.
He laughed then, and loosened his grip, setting me on my feet. “You’re preaching to the choir, girl.” He brushed my hair back behind my ear. “And no one’s going to touch you, least of all me. It was just a joke.”
I looked around at the boys who stood there, holding the ends of the makeshift blanket parachute, and then up at the staircase landing, where the plywood coffin stood open. A few more robed figures were traipsing down the stairs to join us, pushing their hoods back as they went.
“Well, it wasn’t funny,” I said, straightening my clothes and glaring at Malcolm. “Especially the bit about the pool. I have a phobia about water.”
“What?” Malcolm’s voice betrayed genuine surprise.
“Oh, right. Like you know who my third-grade homeroom teacher was but not why I never joined the swim team?”
Malcolm’s gaze flashed to the leader of the staircase crew, who merely lifted his chin in defiance. The guy was slim of build, with dark hair and very pale skin. I’d never seen him before, but knew instantly that this was my Sith M.C., Shadow Guy #2, he of the This-Is-Your-FBI-File line.
“Well, now you can add it to your fucking files.” I wrung out my left pant leg and straightened. “Where’s the exit?”
Malcolm’s face fell. “You’re not leaving?!?”
“You bet your GPA I am!” I pointed at Darth Digger. “I wouldn’t join a tea party that asshole’s at.” I headed off, ignoring the squishing sound in my left sneaker and hoping that I was correct in my assessment that I was walking toward something vaguely exit-esque. The hallways were lined with dark red paper and lighted only intermittently by dim candles in skull-shaped sconces. With my luck, I would end up in their dungeon, and in seventy years, it would be my cranium lighting their way.
“Amy, wait!”
I turned, but it wasn’t Malcolm who’d put his robed hand over mine.
“I’m sorry,” the jerk said. His head was bowed as if in contrition, but the position just made him look like he was doing that evil looking-at-me-through-his-eyebrows thing so popular on horror movie posters. “Can we start again?” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Poe.”
“Is that Korean?”
He blinked at me. “It’s my society name.” He pointed back at Malcolm. “Like Lancelot. We can’t use any others while inside the tomb.” He raised his eyebrow and gave me a wry smile. “And now that I’ve told you, you’ve got to join.”
“Or what?”
“Or we’ll have to kill you.” Totally deadpan.
I nodded and opened the door. “Good luck with that. I’m going home.”
No such luck. The door did not lead to High Street, but instead to a small, square courtyard ringed all around with towering walls of brown sandstone. Crap.
Poe chuckled softly. “Nice try, Neophyte.” He leaned against the doorjamb and I could see Malcolm—I mean, Lancelot—join him on the other side.
Wait, what the hell was I thinking? I wasn’t a Digger. I could call him whatever I wanted. Malcolm, Malcolm, Bo-Balcolm…I folded my arms across my chest.
“Come on, Amy,” Malcolm said. “It’s a little late to back out now. You accepted the tap.”
“That was before the swimming lesson.”
Malcolm tossed a look at Poe, who returned a smug smile. “I told you this would happen.”
“Poe,” Malcolm said in warning.
The guy sighed, then grumbled, “Okay. We don’t have a pool.”
My jaw forgot how to work. “But how—”
“Old trick,” Poe said through clenched teeth. “Coolers filled with water on either side of you, sloshing. Super Soakers for the leakage.”
Genius. Malicious, but genius. And it was killing him to tell me. I loved it.
Malcolm stepped forward and took my hands in his. “I won’t lie and say we’re all nice, Amy, but we’re good people to have on your side. Trust me. This is the best thing you’ll ever do at Eli.” His eyes were pleading, practically desperate, but he straightened then, and spoke in a much louder voice. “The life that we invite you to share in our society is based on such intangible factors that we cannot meaningfully convey to you either its nature or its quality. I’d ask you not to judge our worth by a few ill-advised jokes.” And then, in a hushed whisper: “Come on, what do you say?”
I was so going to regret this.
“Aye.”
***
I told Lancelot that I’d prefer they didn’t carry me.
He said it couldn’t be helped.
I wanted to know in advance where I would be taken.
He said all would become clear in time.
I was absolutely adamant that there would be no drinking of the blood of slaughtered virgins.
He said he’d see what he could do.
And that’s how I found myself suspended in the arms of six hooded figures, blindfold loosened at last, poised over what looked for all the world like a skull full of blood. But in the plus column, how was I to know the sexual proclivities of the blood’s previous owner?
“Drink it! Drink it! Drink it!” the figures chanted. The cup was lifted and placed in my hands, and the blindfold whisked away completely. The bone was smooth and almost slippery beneath my fingers, worn, perhaps, from almost two centuries of use. They’d plugged up the holes with the same clay that lined the interior, but that small nod to decency hardly swayed me. Drink it? This had been part of a person once.
And in all likelihood, it had also been a biology project, my rational side reasoned. Where else would college kids get their specimens? Okay, Amy, time to get into the spirit of the proceedings. Skulls, schmulls. I took a deep breath and Tory’s Cupped it.
A fruit juice of some sort, perhaps mixed with Gatorade. There was a strange, tart current beneath the flavor, hinting at an additional ingredient—maybe dye to give it
that dark red coloring? — but I’d bitten my tongue enough times in my life to know this wasn’t blood. I finished it off, gave the skull a little rub on my shirt—no way in hell would I lick the bowl—and earned a few chuckles from my companions who recognized the act.
“Thatagirl,” Lancelot said, as he tied the blindfold back on. “And away you go!”
Looking back, it’s tough to define a chain of events for Initiation Night. Everything moved so quickly, with such chaotic visuals, and a cacophony of sounds, that I remember it mostly as a series of tableaux—a slide show of moments that all led up to the main event. They kept our blindfolds on as we moved from room to room, perhaps to make each vision all the more shocking by revealing it to us all at once, when we were already in the midst of the scenes. Indeed, with all the frenzy of the players, it took me several flashes of sight to even notice I was now in the company of other neophytes, two or three intersecting in any given room at a time.
This is what I remember:
*Flash*
A courtyard ringed in fire, in which a man dressed as a devil jumped around, letting out deep-throated shrieks. A group of men in rags stood before him, chained, and let out soft moans.
*Flash*
A tiny room lit by candlelight, with a figure dressed as Quetzacoatl, in shimmering gold and colorful feathers. He leaned over a stone slab, a golden knife poised ready to cut out the heart of a maybe-naked woman who lay with her long black hair splayed out behind her. As he brought the knife down, the candle went out. The woman screamed.
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