"Druidess" by Emma Lydia Bates

Druidess

     I have to
slaughter my first goat today. And I’m not looking forward to it.

     Why should I? Most people- most
young girls, I should say, as that’s what they all are - most young girls long
for this day. I can’t see why. Great fun. Find a goat, slash its throat in a
special ritual and collect the blood in a ceremonial bowl. Yuck. Unlike most
druidesses-to-be, I adore goats. That’s what singles me out from the rest. I’m
the daughter of a goatherder and his wife who works as a spinner and milkmaid.
I am the thirteenth druidess and if any come to challenge me, I must relinquish
my post.         

     Which, I must
confess, I would do gladly. I don’t want a life of slaughtering goats and going
skyclad. I would rather look after the goats and spin their hair (which, in our
breed of mountain goats, is long and silky) into wool to make clothes for the
servers of the druidesses.

     Druidesses, you see, do not have
husbands, although they are not exactly single either. They have servers, who
act mostly as servants, but also companions. A server, though not mentioned in
any of the sacred texts, is almost as important to a druidess as a familiar. A
life of spells and other magic doesn’t leave much time for common household
chores that cannot be accomplished using magic (you try and clean a saucepan
with a purifying ritual and you no longer have a saucepan) so servers look
after the druidesses. The only bit of work the druidesses actually do for
themselves is looking after their familiar, and if they do not do that
themselves they lose the sacred magical bond they have to that animal.

     If I were a true druidess, I would
be very worried, because I suspect my sacred magical animal would be a goat.

     I say if I were a true druidess,
because I highly suspect I am not. A druidess is born with the mark of a
druidess upon her. It could be a small tail, a full head of shoulder-length
hair at birth, an aquiline nose, a strange symbol that seems to be burnt into
their hand or excessively high cheekbones. I had no such mark, unlike the other
twelve of the coven, who displayed some oddity very clearly, and in the case of
poor Rowana, it is very clear- whenever she points her finger at something, it
bursts into flame.   

     However, that
strong a sign is rare; it is because Rowana is a child born between a druidess
and her server, a very rare occurrence, which makes it unsurprising the union
birthed a child of extraordinary power. Rowana is the leader of our coven,
though soon- today in fact, she will accept a new druidess name and to call her
anything else would be an insult so great she would be fully justified in using
whoever said it as a sacrifice to the Goddess. That is partly what I dislike
about druidesses- a lifetime of such power turns them most conceited and
arrogant. They hold themselves higher and become somehow superior in being,
without saying a word.

     I even look like a goat, for the
sake of the seven Goddesses of the stars! I have a long and still pointed face.
My nose is small and delicate, but slightly snub. I have long thin bony legs
with wide but short feet. My ears are small but long and thin upwards and
evenly rounded at the top. My hair is dark brown in winter but turns to light
brown, near blond, when under the summer sun. If I were a man, I would probably
have a short pointed beard.

     I don’t look like any of the other
druidesses-to-be. They have long, waist-length hair which may be any colour,
but it is always an extreme. It is either black as a raven’s feathers, so blond
as almost to be white or red as flames, like Rowana. Never plain brown, like
mine.. Their eyes are piercing blue or sometimes bright green- never mud brown,
like mine. They always stare at you. I look at people with cow eyes, warm and
open and unsearching. I look at people- I look at people like a moon-forsaken
Goddess-loving goat!

      The call. I must dress in my
ceremonial gown- made of the finest silk (no goat hair here, no matter how
finely spun), deep red to hide the blood and down to my ankles, with a plunging
neckline and long bishop’s sleeves trimmed with lace. It comes wide across my
shoulders to be easy to get out off- for at the climax of the ritual we must be
dressed like druidesses at full power; skyclad (naked). In front of the entire
village. I’m dreading it.

       I join the rest of the
druidesses-to-be at the foot of the mystical hill we use for ceremonies of
power. They greet me warmly; we need to be friends, closer than sisters for the
bonding ceremony that is part of our ritual that will make us a true coven of
druidesses. Or at less, as much of a coven as it can be with only twelve real,
marked druidesses. And one mistake, needed to make up the numbers.

Me.

      “Mirioa?” Yana asks me. Mirioa.
Possibly the last time I hear my real name. “You seemed distant.”

     “Contemplating my fate.” Yana
looked at me, confused.

     “You do- want to be a druidess,
don’t you?” I could understand her confusion. She and all the others had wanted
to be druidesses since they understood what one was.

     “Oh,” I lied. “Of course I do. I’m
just a little nervous about the slaughtering. I’m worried the blood might spurt
out towards the old coven members, or I get something wrong, or something, and
they don’t let me be a druidess.”

     “Don’t be silly!” Yana laughed,
trying to be comforting. “You were destined to be a druidess- they can’t stop
you now!” She adjusted her long black hair nervously, to reveal her pointed
ears. Then the leader of the old coven, an old lady of seventy or more years,
came to the head of our little group and motioned as if to speak. Instantly all
conversation stopped.

     “Come,” She intoned, and slowly
climbed the hill for what she knew was the last time. Soon she and the rest of
the group would be passing on into the Goddess’s hands. Into death. And we were
the new coven, to take their place.

     We gathered around the altar among
the stones. We are lucky to have a circle of power- others have to make do with
any lump of rock. Apart from blood, particularly goat blood, one thing that
focuses the power of a druidess is ancient stones, the older the better. So we
gathered around the altar in the centre of the circle and waited for Lindi the
Walker (the leader of the old coven) to give us our instructions.

     “Soon you will be bound together
through powerful ritual. You must forget all hatred you have ever had of each
other, or else it may hinder the ritual. You will know each other’s feelings,
if not each other’s thoughts. You will be friends beyond the meaning of friendship.
Let the ritual begin.” Suddenly the frail old woman seemed to grow in power and
majesty. Her voice deepened into the magical tone,making every word said truth.
“You will form a circle around the sacred stone, hold hands and send whatever
limited power you have out of yourself into your companions.” Instantly I felt
a tingle at my fingers from one side of me then a surge of power that had been
released from Rowana. “I will touch the ancient stone, and you will release
each other but still be joined, move away from each other and still be
together, be separate people and still be one!” I felt the power to complete
the spell emerge from the stone- it hit like a tidal wave, making me stumble
back, although I didn’t fall over. I could feel- I could sense everyone who was
to be in the new coven, and more, I could feel what they were feeling. Rowana
was proud and majestic, proud of herself, proud of us, proud of everyone who
had helped us achieve this. Yana, always sensitive to the feelings of others,
was elated to be able to truly understand them. I knew twelve sets of feelings.
The only feelings I was unsure of were my own.

       We moved to the next stage of the
ritual to become true druidesses. The part where I knew I would fail.

The first server-to-be appeared, pulling along a goat with him. I nearly cried
out to see how he was treating the poor animal- yanking it along and making it
stumble. Just whispering a few encouraging words to it would have made all the
difference to the poor creature’s suffering, but I suppose it didn’t matter- it
was going to die soon anyway. It was a fine animal too, a young billy goat with
a fine coat, able to sire many kids. And going to die. At least it was not one
of our goats; I don’t know whether I could have been able to see it killed.

     Rowana came up to the altar,
dropped her robe with the same easy grace as a snake sloughs its skin and laid
the goat’s head sideways upon it, a position that was very painful for the goat
but the server stopped it from butting or kicking, or trying to get away.
Rowana picked up the sacrificial bowl and knife, and in one quick, clean cut,
sliced the goat’s throat and collected its blood. The server dragged the
deadgoat away and then returned for the next part of the ritual. Lindi dipped a
finger in the blood and drew on Rowana’s forehead a thirteen-pointed star, with
thirteen dots of each of the points. This symbolised the coven. Once Lindi had
finished, Rowana dipped a finger in the blood herself and drew a flame of the
forehead of the man who was to be her server. The flame represented the form in
which Rowana’s magic took; fire. The server in turn dipped a finger in the bowl
of blood- although he didn’t do it nearly as elegantly as Lindi or Rowana had-
and daubed the thirteen-pointed star on Lindi’s forehead. Lindi turned to
Rowana and held her hands out to her, as if to offer up her magic, and said “I
honour and respect you, and give you my power as coven leader- Rigana of the
Flame.” Then, almost in slow motion, the old lady, devoid of her power that had
kept her alive beyond her years, fell and died. Her one-time server scooped her
up in his arms with reverence, and carried her away in preparation to be
buried.

      I was thinking about Rowana’s new
name. Rigana, meaning leader with power. A traditional coven leader’s name,
fitting someone so obviously in control. Lindi meant ‘follower who rules’- at
first apparently the majestic lady had been shy of her power, and had only
grown into it later.

      Slowly, each of my- my what?
Members of a coven called each other sisters, but that seemed too intimate for
a relationship which had only just begun. But still, each one of my new sisters
went through the ritual with their new servers and their corresponding member
of the old coven. Aridane became Quavi of the water, a symbol like waves upon
her forehead in the blood of some poor goat. Tarisa became Atia of Music.
Kirion became Lebba the Beautiful. Zaski became Saniti, commander of weather.
Ranhui became Abbli of Growth. Grenil; Wxan of the Air, Uila; Fwera of Light.
Dara became Etra of Endless Life, meaning she would be a healer, and live for a
long time herself. As a result, the rest of the coven would live for as long
themselves. Pjonu became Phantia the Remember. Fria was the- the what? Most
frightening, I suppose. Fria was a reserved sort of person who wouldn’t hurt a
fly, but as she stepped up to the stone, it was as though she had thrown off an
old skin, or emerged out of a chrysalis. She grabbed the goat and slit its
throat as though she had been trained at a butcher’s. She seemed so powerful,
almost as powerful as Rowana- no, I must call her Rigana now- but through our
bond I could tell that although she was exhilarated, she was frightened by
herself and how she was feeling at killing something. But when she dipped her
finger in the blood and drew upon the forehead of her server, her finger was
controlled only through the guiding force of her magic, not by her brain. She
drew the altar stone. When it came for the member of the old coven to hand
over, there was a gasp as she said “I honour and respect you, and give you my
power as a coven member- Shador, Dealer of death.”

       The next to walk up to the altar
was Yana. My heart went out to her. She had seemed so confident- but my link to
her emotions suggested that she was in fact very nervous. The old coven member
she was to replace was Frina, who I would miss when she died- she was never as
arrogant or aloof as the other druidesses, and for that she was my favourite.
Yana winced as the goat was brought up to her, and closed her eyes so not to
see it bleed. Frina smiled encouragement to Yana as she dipped her finger in
the blood and formed the thirteen-pointed star if Yana’s forehead. Yana turned
to the man who was to be her server and drew on his forehead a shape that
looked meaningless to me; a sort of wobbly line that crisscrossed but went
vaguely into a spiral. Frina seemed to understand completely though, and once
the server had finished drawing the star on her forehead, she held her hands
out to Yana and said; “I honour and respect you, and give you my power as coven
member- Mimosa the Sensitive.” Yana’s, no, Mimosa’s eyes widened but she
smiled. To be sensitive to things others could not sense was a great and very
useful power to have.

      I was pleased to see none of the
goats they were using were ours- they had all been given by other goatherds,
and I had cared for none of then, expect for a goatherd’s sadness at the death
of a fine goat. Some of the goats used had been old, some young, some male,
some female, but none I recognised, so I did not pine too much over their loss.


      However, as I walked up to the
altar, dropped my robe and looked at the goat being lead towards me, I cried
out. It was Lucky, a runt I had raised personally and who had lived only
because of my care. I ran towards the server, who I could tell was trying to be
gentle to such a young goat, but who was actually being quite rough, and
grabbed the rope he was using to pull Lucky along off him. I gently carried my
precious goat to the altar, and sat him down beside me, it was not his blood I
poured into the bowl. Instead I used the knife to scrape a small amount of dust
off the ancient rocks that stood in a circle around us. It was hard work, but
eventually I had enough dust to use to replace the blood as a medium for the
symbols needed. The coven member I would replace raised her eyebrows, but to
say anything might disturb the ritual even more than it had already been
disturbed by my shriek at seeing Lucky. Anyway they had no reason to complain.
Goat’s blood and ancient stone were the two best mediums to amplify power and
they could replace each other. It was just that in some places one was more
practical than the other.

     The old coven member, who I suddenly
remembered was called Tli of Emotions, dipped her finger in the dust and used
it to draw the star of the coven upon my forehead. It seemed impossible, but in
the power that came with this symbol I felt even more bound to the rest of the
coven than I already did. I got some dust upon my finger and looked at the man
who would be my companion until we died (servers lives are bound to those who
they serve, and they live only long enough after their mistress’s death to see
her buried, and then they die.) He about my age, or a bit older, and not
handsome, but sweet-looking. He was cute, like a goat. I reached out towards
his forehead, though my hand seemed guided only by my power. I traced upon his
forehead the shape of- a goat, I realised in dismay.

     I looked around, thinking I would
see frowns on everyone’s faces, but they only looked expectant, and Rigana and
Tli were nodding, as if this were what should be happening. My server reached
towards Tli and drew the star in dust upon her forehead. She said, “I honour
and respect you, and give you my power as coven member- Mania of Animals.” With
that the old lady died, and was carried away by her ever-faithful server.

      My head was spinning. Firstly, I
was an anointed druidess- I was really a true druidess! And- even better, I had
power of Animals; to talk to them, to understand them. Nobody had had that for
five generations of druidesses, I knew, and when it came it was a power second
only to that of coven leader. Nobody could demand me to relinquish my post now.
I picked up my robe and got dressed as Rigana moved to the altar, and cleared
her throat.

     “You may now go, my coven, until we
meet for further rituals. Go out, and discover your familiars, although” she
smiled “it seems Mania has already found hers. You may go now. The ritual is
complete!” She raised her arms up, in the gesture used to pray to the Goddess,
and intoned, “We are a true coven of druidesses.”