Page 21

The Sabbat isn’t unlike the Sacrament in that it’s a joined event, a celebration that brings the lands together.

The Sabbat is a day—or, here, a phase —of gods.

In Licht, it was my favourite day of the year.

Festivals flood the streets, fires smoke up into the skies, lives are sacrificed in blood and screams, gifts are passed from hand to hand, lovers are found in fields, and offerings are made to the gods in fruits and meats and wines.

Gifts were my favourite part of the Sabbat. I would receive a new pair of pretty sandals or a lovely dress from my father.

This Sabbat, I look forward to another practice.

I look forward to the sky messages.

This phase isn’t chosen at random, and it is the same for all lands. The Sabbat is chosen by the gods themselves, for it is the night that is coldest and the day that is warmest; it is the phase where the veil between the worlds is thinnest; the only time of the year that one from this world can write a message on parchment, then burn it and the smoke will rise up into the skies to deliver those sacred words to a passed loved one. The only time of the entire year that the dead can hear our whispers without suffering our pain.

We speak to the departed.

This will be the first time I do this, write to the dead. I didn’t have many dead ones in my life before coming here. Now, I will write to Aleana, as I’m certain Daxeel will, and his mother, and Rune and Dare and Eamon. Samick, I have no idea.

I think little of it, no more than a fleeting thought, before I sit on the foot of the narrow bed this Warmth, and I write my letters. Two letters.

Eamon writes his on the roof.

It is a private thing.

And as we write, we mutter the prayers to our gods, ask for the safe passage of our messages, and give thanks.

In Licht, we worship Gaia and the light. Sometimes the light is separate to Gaia, and we call it Sulis. Other times, Gaia and the light are one of the same.

They worship neither in Dorcha. There, it is all about Kahrimaht, the god of dark, of night, of evil, of famine, death and disease.

Here, in Kithe, all are worshiped. And I mean all …

Arawn, Macha, and Diancecht are ones I recognise in costume and sculpture. Badb and ēostre are gods I wouldn’t recognise at all, and I read their names on the boards that folk carry overhead. I suppose those god worshippers came from smaller villages and eventually settled in Kithe.

I watch them out there.

Letters finished, prayers ended, I stand at the window, and watch the gods pass me by.

Painted parchment statues of them are paraded through the vibrant streets of Kithe. Painted fae dance and sing and wave torches and throw chalk-bombs into the air. Bursts of pinks and blues and purples and yellows erupt all over the faces of homes, staining them for phases to come. But I see not a single frown of disproval on the faces on the street below. I see only joy—and anguish. Joy in the songs and the waving of torches, anguish in the harrowing, hollowed calls to the dead.

I draw back from the window, out of sight from those down there in the street, and start to peel off my clothes. I strip down to nakedness, then snatch the slip-skirt from the foot of the bed.

I’m climbing into it when Eamon shoulders lazily into the closed-over door and drags his withered self into the bedroom.

He falls onto his own bed. “That was a torture I could have lived without.”

I fix the waistband of the flimsy cream skirt and glance over my shoulder at him.

His dull stare is reddened and fixed up at the mould on the ceiling.

I snatch the matching strappy top from the bed, right next to Hedda who has taken to chewing up the leftover parchment.

Eamon sighs the question, “Did you get it done?”

Tugging the top over my head, I jerk my chin in a gesture to the windowsill, where I left the folded parchment letter for Aleana—and a second, smaller letter addressed to Taroh.

Eamon heaves himself off the bed with a grunt. He steals the letters into his fist before he strips down to his slacks, then kicks off his boots.

The Sabbat is for nudity or flimsy, small clothes. The paint should stain the flesh, mar the complexions for phases to come, drench our hair and change our faces.

Father never let me go nude. He said that nakedness was those without propriety, without civility, like the woodlanders or the crude ones who live too remote.

So I wear little, but I do wear something. My cotton set is accompanied by basic safety—the strap of a belt around my thigh, where I gently thread a small knife until it is secure.

Eamon does too. Shirtless, he tucks a knife into his wrist brace, the folded letters bitten between his teeth as he moves for the lounge.

I follow him through the doorway and march for the hearth.

Hedda’s frantic gallop chases me to the flames.

Eamon hands me the letters, reluctant almost. I don’t understand that, the caution of his pain slowing him down; it is a lovely thing to talk to the dead.

I have no hesitance.

I lift the thicker parchment fold. I reach out for the burning hearth—and I toss the letter into the flames.

“I miss you,” I whisper as the parchment burns to ash.

And I hope Aleana hears me.

I wait.

I wait for every last bit of the paper to sear away to nothing before I lift the second letter.

My eyes narrow on this one. My mouth purses and I suddenly doubt why I wrote it at all.

It’s a simple message.

‘Burn for all eternity, suffer as you made me suffer, and die every phase henceforth.’

I throw it into the fire.

Eamon doesn’t pry on the second, mystery letter of mine that is now being consumed by the flames.

He has one of his own.

I differentiated between Aleana’s and Taroh’s letters by thickness. One, a true letter, the other a mere scrap.

Eamon has three tucked envelopes… and to differentiate between them, he has inked the names onto their faces.

‘ Aleana ’ is the first envelope to touch the flames.

We watch, waiting for the last bit of paper to be gone, before Eamon lets another fall—one addressed to Caius.

My lips tuck inwards, and I bite down on them.

The familiar itch of shame tugs at me, because I had allowed myself to forget about Caius, that he is Eamon’s blood cousin, Daxeel’s brother…

Suppose I assumed his death did not hurt them.

I might have been wrong.

My mouth relaxes, then tilts, as the last of Caius’ message is devoured.

I shift my gaze to the final letter pinched in Eamon’s fingers, a grip so tense that the honeyed hue of his knuckles has whitened to bleached stone.

My curiosity was a tugged marionette string before… and now it’s a stone slinging around my insides.

I catch a glimpse of the inked name before he tosses it into the flames without care; it doesn’t slide from his fingertips as the first two did, it is discarded with a flick of the wrist.

‘ Ridge .’