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But I don’t have a choice.
I’m a dead man if I try to run.
* * *
The Black Skull Society’s dimly lit chamber, also known as The Pit, is a place where morality fades into the shadows and the air is thick with dread.
The walls are lined with ancient stone, darkened by soot and age, and adorned with macabre tapestries that depict the Society’s twisted history and the rites of initiation.Flickering candlelight casts long, distorted shadows, creating an atmosphere that feels alive with whispered secrets and unfulfilled promises.
In the center of the room stands an altar, rough-hewn from obsidian stone, its surface glistening from the flicker of the candlelight.
Surrounding the altar are several members of the Society clad in dark, hooded robes that obscure their identities, their faces hidden by skull masks. Each holds a ceremonial dagger, its blade glinting ominously, ready to perform the dark pact that binds them to the Society and their infernal master. The Devil himself.
The rest of us, the initiates, stand in a circle around the altar. My heart is pounding in my chest as I breathe in the stale air. There are four steps in our initiation; the first two were taken back when we turned eighteen. The Temptation and The Trial.
We are lured as new recruits with the promise of wealth and forbidden power. Those of us who are heirs are told about the Society once we learn to talk. Our fathers ingrain it in us so that when they tempt us, we immediately give in.
Once we are lured into the Society, we are thrown into trials. They are brutal initiation rites. From rape, to framing people in the most heinous of crimes to take them out, and even our own humiliation.
In college, we take the other two rituals. The Dark Oath and then the Blood Pact. The Dark Oath is done after the initiates survive the trials. They swear their unholy oath to Satan and the Black Skull Society. That, as a member, you will carry out whatever is asked of you by the Society. Without question.
The Blood Pact is the final step. No one ever talks about it. I have no idea what it entails, but if the other steps are any indication, it’s not puppies and rainbows.
It took everything I had to convince my father to let me postpone the last step. And since he sits on the Council of Shadows, he was able to convince the others to allow me to delay my initiation.
The postponement ends now, I guess.
Looking at the initiates around me through the openings of the skull mask I’m wearing, I am sure there are some that are filled with fear.
If I could see their faces, I’d bet they are pale and ready to throw up. Then there are probably others who are twisted with anticipation. But we all realize the darkness we are about to embrace.
Above us sits a heavy iron chandelier, the candles in it burning, the air thick with the grotesque proceedings that are about to take place.
One of the members of the Council of Shadows steps forward, and the room falls silent around us. As the figure draped in their black robe starts to speak Latin and the words echo through the chambers, my heart thumps away in my chest. Fear grips me.
I don’t want to do this.
The figure proceeds with the ritual, the Council of Shadows standing there watching the initiates take their last rite into the final initiation process. Once completed, they are officially members for life in the Black Skull Society.
The words mean nothing to me, of course. I can barely hear them over the sound of my heart beating anyway. I am so lost in my own thoughts that I don’t notice when one of the hooded figures steps up to me and hands me a blade.
Clean, pristine. Never used.
And my blood freezes.
I try not to let my hands shake as I grab it from the hooded figure.
Their voice booms through the foreboding space, “To prove your loyalty, it is required for all those who wish to become an elite member of the Black Skulls Society to bind themselves to Satan.”
I watch them bring a hooded figure in a white robe into the chambers. My mouth goes dry as I realize exactly what the last step is.
Death. Or more specifically, murder.
The figures who brought them in, The Shadow Keepers, push the figure forward and kick in their knees, making the captive fall to the ground. A grunt from that person lets me know it’s a man.
“Step forward and claim your place among us,” the figure next to me says.
I try to slowly calm myself as I take each step, walking up to the white hooded figure. My hand grips the hood over their head, and I hold my breath as I yank it off the poor soul under it.