The Devil Next Door

74

The girl was broken.

The ritual began.

The Huntress watched the clan seize the girl, take hold of her and drag her from the shadows where she cowered. She did not fight at first. She was becoming of the clan, but she still acted stupid and helpless like prey. Her brain was not yet the brain of a hunter.

But soon.

Soon she would hunt with them.

The Huntress was certain of it. Because just as she could smell fear or the telltale scent trail of other hunters, she could smell what was going on inside the girl. The more like them the girl became, the more her blood ran hot and bright.

At my side. When you have proven yourself, you will hunt at my side.

Then she could wear the paint of the skull, but not before. Only the ones the Huntress selected were given this privilege. Her inner circle.

The men wanted to have the girl, of course. Many of them. They could smell her ripeness and hers was a fruit they wished to pluck so very sweet and juicy was it. But she had been broken by the one the Huntress chose. That was enough. For now. The others would not have her nor the women who wished her for sport. This one was special and she belonged to the Huntress and none dared violate that taboo. The Huntress had other reasons for wanting the girl. She was somehow connected to the man and the Huntress desired to have the man.

But he was sly.

He was cunning.

She would use the girl as bait.

Even now, the Huntress could hear his strange, mystical words:

Come over here, Michelle. I’m your husband. I love you. I won’t let them hurt you.

The Huntress did not understand what he said exactly, but she knew there was a special meaning to those words. The pain and depth of emotion in the man had been all too apparent. And his voice, what he said and how he said it… it had touched something in her, made her feel warm, weak, and soft. And so she had set the clan upon him before they smelled her uncertainty.

The girl cried out in pain.

The clanswomen had thrown a rope over the naked beams above and, tying the girl’s wrists, were hoisting her up by them. The girl was crying out. Her wrists were raw from the other ropes she had been tied with, the skin scraped red. A trickle of blood ran down her left forearm.

“Let it begin,” the Huntress told them.

This was the ritual. The Huntress remembered it from another time and that time seemed to be long ago. When she tried to recall it, everything was dim and misty and what faces she could see were not faces she recognized, yet she was certain that she knew them. And well. No matter. The ritual was ancient and correct. It was a test for a true warrior maiden. If the girl did not cry and whimper like an infant, if she withstood the ordeal, then she would hunt with them.

If not, there were the men.

Then the women and their skinning knives.

It started with sticks from the fire. Once the ends were blazing hot, the women withdrew them and, chanting archaic words under their tongues, they spun the girl so that she twisted on the rope and as she rotated, they jabbed her with the hot sticks. The blazing ends hissed as they sank into her pale white skin. She would forever be marked and forever remembered for this. None that looked upon her would doubt her courage or importance.

The Huntress knew that some died during the ritual.

It was unfortunate, but necessary. If this one died, her ghost would be released from the shell of her body and would be angry. It would seek vengeance as ghosts often did. Young ghosts were always angry.

The girl did not beg for mercy or even whimper during the burning. She just twisted on her rope from bloody wrists, her eyes glazed over and staring. The women were angered by their inability to break her. They took up branches and whipped her mercilessly, drawing blood, tearing open the burned pink flesh until red creeks ran down the girl’s belly and legs.

The Huntress raised her hand and she was cut free.

The women now knotted her hair and tied it tight with the rope. Again, the girl was hoisted above. The man had sticks in their hands. As they passed, they swatted her with them. And when they were finished, they urinated on her.

She was left to hang like that.

Maybe for hours…