The hare hadn’t noticed her yet.
Roisin crouched low in the field of gold grass. The breeze masked the slight movements she made as she adjusted her footing, eyes fixed on the hare a few feet away. The hare poked about the ground, then rose onto its hind legs and sniffed at the air. Roisin felt a pang of guilt in her chest.
“What are you doing, Roisin?” Vulpo said. The red fox nosed her straining calf muscle. There came a jangle from the pouch of coins at her hip as Vulpo attempted to coax one out. She grabbed at it, silencing the gentle clinking, before Vulpo’s pushing spooked the hare.
“It has to be alone, Vulpo. Nothing with family.” She cast her mind back to a sacrifice about a month ago, cringing. “Imagine if it had a litter.”
“A litter of leverets. Quite the monster you would be.”
She sighed. “You’re not making me feel any better about this.”
The hare was fat. Dead gods didn’t demand health in its sacrifices, but it was welcome all the same.
“Duck down, Vulpo.”
“You’re going to check it first?”
“Of course,” she replied. “A hare that fat is either pregnant or feeding or…just fat.” She chewed on the inside of her cheek, twirling the coin between her fingers.
The fox settled in beside her, curling his brushy tail beneath his hind legs.
“You won’t know unless you check,” Vulpo whispered. He nudged her again. “Have more certainty.”
Roisin exhaled and closed her fist around the coin. She breathed a quiet prayer onto it— “Groundformer, assist me”—before pushing the coin into the ground beside her feet. Tendrils of earth met her fingertips, tugging the coin from her. Gold melted to liquid in that earthen grasp and drained into the cracks of earth. A moment of silence passed, during which Roisin waited and listened and watched.
She inhaled deeply.
Then, power.
She felt rather than saw the mantle of green wrap around her being. Warmth welled up through her feet, her stomach, her heart and filled her head with a gentle buzzing sound. She felt her feet, where her boots met the ground, most powerfully, her centre of gravity anchored to the earth with absolute precision. The pulse of her own heartbeat louder now, as her awareness of her surroundings slowly came into piecemeal focus.
From that spot anchored beneath her feet, her senses ventured out. Forward, between the root systems and ants hard at work, and long, barren stretches of dirt. She felt roots drawing on water in the dirt, worms as they squirmed. The roots of the trees around her were like boulders, the force of their old presence a heavy weight as she drifted amongst their metres-deep roots. Eventually, that sense stopped below the hare, and settled. She heard the hare now, its grunting-snuffle noise, its pulse, and its thoughts.
Food, food, food, whistle, grass, bird, food.
They weren’t really words coming from the hare, but images and sounds; a cacophonous montage. Morning light glinting off dew on a blade of grass. The red-breasted robin watching from the trees, singing a dainty tune. The taste of bitter grass rose in her mouth, like an old flavour resurfacing in her saliva.
“Focus,” Vulpo said. His voice was so distant now, like she was hearing through the hare’s ears and not her own. “You know you can do this.”
“I can do this,” she whispered, waving away any pressing doubt. Well, most of it.
“Can you hear anything else happening in its mind?” Vulpo asked. “Any other voices.”
She quested deeper into the hare’s mind, searching for some sign.
Food, birds, sky, sun, water, rushing water, river with angry bear, running, running, running, mate, find mate.
That moment settled it. For a second, she could smell the pheromones the hare released to lure a mate. Something tingled up her spine. She focused again.
“She’s alone,” Roisin said.
“Go.”
Her hands hesitated, cautious of the hare darting. Groundformer magic could be violent. A still sacrifice was a clean sacrifice. What if it pounced? What if it saw her before the act?
“Not helping yourself, Roisin.” Vulpo pressed, voice firmer. “Do it.”
The hare’s heart slowed. She wasn’t about to pounce.
Roisin flipped her palm skyward. Tendrils of rock solidified beneath the hare. It didn’t notice the movement below, didn’t have time to react. She closed her fist. Tentacles of stone shot out from the earth in a violent spray of dust and rock. It enclosed the hare, a trap snapping shut. Distress burst through the connection to Roisin, as the hare endeavoured to leap from the trap. But it was stuck, too big to squeeze between the gaps.
Roisin opened her eyes, breathless.
“Good,” Vulpo said softly, his body now rising back up, his tail unfurling from between his legs. He looked to her, amber eyes bright, playful. “Much more finesse. Now go collect it and we can be on our way.”
The sky rumbled. Grey clouds swirled.
Roisin rose to her full height, buttoning up her black coat, straightening the hem. She checked nothing had dropped from her person while crouched there. The magic she called faded slowly. Even now, she caught snatches of the hare’s struggle.
Cage, rock, cage, GIRL, knife, fox, food.
And on and on the words and sounds and images went.
Vulpo approached the stone cage first, sniffing at the rocky bars, and at the hare. The hare pulled back.
“Ah, little hare. Do not fear. It is not on my teeth you meet your doom.”
“You’re not helping her,” Roisin said.
Vulpo grinned a toothy fox grin at her.
“It is not my business to help anyone but you.”
Roisin grumbled. The last of the Groundformer magic wavered. With what little remained, she touched the hare’s conscience, and sent it to sleep. The frantic thoughts, the jumbled words, all stopped. She watched the hare sleeping for a moment, then cracked the soft dirt of the cage’s peak with the heel of her boot. She grabbed the hare around its middle and cradled it close to her chest.
“You never carry me like that,” Vulpo commented.
“I’m never dragging you to your death.” Her hands idly stroked the hare’s fur. “Let’s go.”
The clouds darkened further as Roisin made her way to the altar. It rumbled, growled, seemingly in disapproval.
“The clouds have no opinion on your sacrifice, Roisin,” Vulpo said dryly.
She opened her mouth to reply, but stopped. She breathed. Perhaps it was just the storm making her uneasy, or the animals racing to their burrows and holes around them. With the fleeting remainder of the Groundformer magic, she could sense vestiges of animal thoughts, which were frantic as the energy in the air shifted for the storm.
She stepped into the clearing which held the Altar, with the bloodstone at its centre. The bloodstone was a pale grey rock, oval in shape, tilted to one side. While its surface appeared smooth from a distance, it was actually covered in tiny pores and channels. Dark rocks made a path to the stone and encircled it. A hooded figure stood beside the bloodstone, face hidden, eyes cast down. They wore emerald green Groundformer robes, which whipped in the growing wind.
Vulpo pounced ahead and took his place atop a slightly raised rock to the side opposite the sentinel. He turned three times—not part of the ritual, just a habit—and settled down to face the bloodstone.
Now closer to the bloodstone, Roisin could make out veins of white crystal in the rock.
“You may approach,” came the androgynous voice of the sentinel. “Present the sacrifice.”
She cradled the hare, its tawny fur slowly darkening as the rain became heavier. She felt her fluttering heart, the rise and fall of his torso as he worked his lungs. She adjusted the hare in her grip to draw attention to it.
“Bring it forth.”
She stepped on each of the flat-topped stones as she neared the bloodstone. She unbuttoned her coat once more, letting it hang open at the front. The wind picked up, blustering her dark, kinky hair, and the hem of her coat. She felt, in a weird way, powerful; coat billowing, steps sure.
“Name yourself.”
“Roisin.”
“And name your offer.”
“A hare for our God.” She paused. “Gaphrael.”
“And your witness.”
“Vulpo.”
The sentinel paused.
“Present.”
First she placed the knife flat against the rock, then she held the hare up to the rock, belly down, the underside of his head against the porous surface. Its long ears sat flat against the hare’s back, legs dangling. One hand on the knife, one hand on the hare, she waited, glancing at Vulpo.
“Upon instruction, you may complete your sacrifice.”
She waited for Vulpo to nod. He took a moment, then did so.
But the hare seemed to spasm in her hand. Or maybe that was her own muscles, jolting from holding them so tense against the rock? Or maybe it was just her imagination?
The animal cannot be aware of its sacrifice. It must go unknowingly; peacefully. Those were Vulpo’s words. The Priests’ words. Nestor’s words. When she became one of the town’s apprentice Groundformers, there were several protocols to follow. That was one, and perhaps most paramount. A sacrifice struggling is no sacrifice. It is murder.
Vulpo nodded again, his gesture more forward, more obvious. Roisin’s hand shook as it held the knife against the hare’s throat. The sky above rumbled, trembling through the ground, a shiver echoing through the rock. Or was that the hare, shuddering back to awareness?
You’re overthinking it. Stop doubting. Do it.
She twisted the blade out so it pressed deep into the hare’s flesh, then pulled. Quickly. Fur, skin, sinew, muscle all sliced beneath the blade. The knife scraped against bone. Blood poured hot against her hand, ran down the rock, soaking in. She held the hare there a moment as it drained out, watching the rock absorb the blood like a sponge. The veins of crystal were dyed red, like a heart as it pulses blood for the very first time.
The ground beneath her feet rumbled. A definite rumble; nothing at all like the thunder from the sky, or the uncertain spasms of the hare.
“Gaphrael accepts,” both the sentinel and Vulpo said at once.
Roisin released the breath she’d been holding, and the heavens released their deluge.