Chapter 26 Ritual #2
“Once the Bloodwalking is finished, we recuperate if we need to, and then we travel around and find each wight, and fight them,” Bjorn says as he crosses his arms, pure gold flashing in his battle-ready eyes.
“We weaken them enough that each soul of the Five feels Baldur’s Soulstone is a stronger home for them—and they transfer into the stone.
Or we kill each wight… whichever comes first.”
“Easier said than done,” Strom scoffs as he looks at Bjorn. “Or have you forgotten that the last time we came up against those wights at Unhaemmerten, we couldn’t do shit to them?”
“One problem at a time,” I assure Strom as I reach out, taking his hand.
“Once we’ve trapped the souls of the Five,” Baldur continues, “we finally shatter the Soulstone during a special Bloodwalking ceremony to release the Five’s souls back to the Void of Ancestors.
Where they will remain, their tether to this world broken—their souls no longer available to return to the Black Dragon.
Weakening it tremendously, with its Five original creators gone, unable to return to it. ”
“And maybe giving us some hope of bringing it down,” Mikkel says finally, finishing up our plan with a wry snort.
“It’s one in a million, what we’re doing here tonight, and in the coming days,” I agree as I take Baldur’s hand.
I feel him pour his deep calm through our group as I look at each of my drakes, plus Laerke.
“I couldn’t hope for a more valiant group of drakainas and drakes to be doing this with, though.
I’m beyond grateful for each of you. I hope you know that.
Whatever happens… I’m here for it. I will not let you down.
And I want you each to know… that I love you, all. To the depths of my soul and back.”
As I bare my deepest heart to each of my drakes, and Laerke, I feel my love go out to them. It floods along the paths of our bonds, even into Laerke; as each of my drakes draws a deep breath, I feel their love flood back into me, as well.
Because we all know it’s do or die time; we may never get another chance to say I love you to each other, if something goes wrong with our extremely high-level Bloodwalking right now and one or more of us don’t make it back.
It’s a risk we have to take, however, to bring down the insane behemoth we’re up against. Each of us knows that, as we prepare for what might very well be the biggest ceremony of our lives.
And might mean our deaths, if anything goes amiss.
I don’t want to think about the sheer number of those anythings, as I gaze around my drakes and give them each a smile now.
Because the truth is, those incalculable risks are just too great.
We’re flying by the roots of our wings, and we have to stay agile to make it through even the tiniest part of this.
“I am a leaf on the wind...” Strom quotes the movie Serenity now, based on the sci-fi show Firefly. It’s sad and makes my heart grip, even as it makes me smile. Because like the character Wash who gave that quote, we might not be coming back from everything we’re taking on next.
None of us.
As we all take deep breaths now, we know the time has come. Everything is set for the ritual; we will not get a better moment to begin, and delaying for our own comfort might just mean the decimation of our people, as the Black Dragon rampages.
Blood Dragons are not strangers to death, however; I feel all my drakes and Laerke steel ourselves now, accepting that final endpoint, which is just the counterpoint to life. Because if we die now, we all go to the Void of Ancestors, where we all came from, and to which we all return.
Only, if we’re devoured by the Black Dragon, we don’t get that chance.
To be with each other beyond death—in the place of our beloved family, Ancestors, and friends.
“Time to get going,” Bjorn says like a war-general now as he surveys us. We all know the drill; as each of us moves to the food table, getting a few last bites to fortify us, plus water, I feel how each of my drakes eats only the best delicacies, their favorites.
It’s like a last meal before the gallows as I pop a few dates in my mouth and chew. Then it’s time to begin, as Laerke embraces her brother and takes up her position by the food as our lookout.
Everyone else migrating to the bed.
Baldur brings the eternallurium stone to the bed with us, so it can be ready when the ceremony begins. As for the bed, it’s the biggest one we could find in the underground citadel, and the most intact.
A gargantuan beast of silberskrae with four towering posts carved with dragons, it looks like something fit for an emperor with its wealth of black silk sheets, a dark plum duvet, and embroidered pillows slung all over it, thanks to Mikkel.
We’ve set it up in the middle of the cavern, over the gargantuan sigil.
The bed had to be positioned right over the crack, to be in the exact center of the space as Baldur instructed; I feel that dark doom energy curl around me now, shivering over my skin as my drakes and I assemble by the bedside to get this party started.
I can’t focus on that now, however; forcing myself to come back to the present, I hold our agenda of hope in my heart now, as I stare into the eyes of each of my drakes.
Bjorn has brought a small ceremonial silver and gold stylus with him, plus a matching bowl.
He moves around as we stand by the bedside, sticking each of my drakes with the little silver-gold pin.
Catching their donation of blood in the small bowl.
“Blood begins this ritual,” Bjorn intones quietly now in his big basso voice, as I feel his training all those years ago from Maryse kick in.
“Blood of our Ancestors that runs through our veins; we are you and you are us. To you we offer this blood now, to hold safe this space as we come to you, contacting you in the old ways. Hear us, feel us, know us; accept our donation and praise our names. For we come to you as warriors and penitents, both: to find the knowledge we need to end the creature that plagues us. Hear our hearts now; feel our sincerity. Deliver us through the Veil into the Void, to be amongst you. And let us return when we are finished—with the quarry we seek.”
“Hear me now, Ancestors of our ancient dead,” I say now as I continue the ritual, as Bjorn pricks my wrist last with the stylus, and I shed a few drops of my blood into the bowl.
“For my name is Rikyava Andersen of the Andersen clan, and I am a Bloodwalker of the ancients. I come to you now not as a petitioner, but as a Matriarch: I am a battle-shamaness of old, and you will heed me. My need is great, my world in peril; doom comes to us like a fell tide, scything down our people. They will fall by the hundreds, then the thousands, then the millions, if you do not help us. Permit us passage to your ancient Realm now. And we will find the knowledge we seek, to save this world from never-ending destruction.”
As I finish my opening speech to the Ancestors, and my donation of blood with my drakes, I feel the fell tide of the Void sweep me. As an ancient wind lifts now, blowing around the gargantuan cavern like a massive tide of ghosts just heard us and responded, I suddenly feel my Ancestors listening.
Because even though I can’t speak to the exact person I want right now, through the strange black veil surrounding me in the Void, I’m still a Bloodwalker.
And I’m one of the strongest in thousands of years, I understand now, as I feel the blazing intention of my heart, plus all my drakes, spear through that oilslick-black sheen that surrounds me in the undying realm.
Our words have made our Ancestors listen; our blood has drawn them near. My power shakes them the fuck awake, alert and able to talk to us now, as I feel a massive concussion of my united magic blister out through the Void now, blazing and strong.
As Baldur takes the bowl and stylus, Bjorn slides my robe from my shoulders. As my drakes all shed their clothing, Baldur inscribes ancient sigils for a ritualistic Bloodwalking all over my chest, arms, and back, decorating my flesh.
Each of my drakes gets a unique sigil in each of their palms, plus one at their hearts. As we all receive a final sigil right at our third eye, me last, I feel a blazing awake-ness surge through all of us.
Ready to travel to the Void, at last.
I feel reality already slipping for each of us. Even though we ingested no ritual adjuvants like the perception-altering mushrooms my stepfathers like to use for ceremony, we don’t need them, thanks to the sheer voraciousness of these high-level magics we’re undertaking now.
As Baldur sets down his stylus, scattering the last of the blood across the bed and all around us on the floor with his fingertips, I feel how the ancient sigil beneath us drinks it in.
A feeling of evil rises, as that blood-donation to the cavern is made. As if a demon of the ancient world lives beneath our feet, deep inside that crack in the cavern’s floor, I feel a sense of hunger now, from the vile, barely there oilslick sheen all around us.
I wait for a heartbeat, fearing the worst.
Until nothing happens, and I look at Baldur.
“Ready?” I ask him, knowing what this might cost him, with his addiction to high-level magic.
“Ready,” he says quietly, though I can already feel the massive thrum of his energy as he anticipates what’s coming.
His addiction flaring like wildfire—to go big and never come home.
“I’m here,” I tell him then, as I reach out and take his hand. “I’m with you; we all are. Take a deep breath and find your way through it. Because we need you focused when shit hits the fan. Got it?”
“As my Bloodwalker commands.” Baldur’s lips quirk into a smile now, but his dark blue eyes are conflicted. I feel how eager his massive Blood Magic drake is already, to tear into this incredible magic we’re building and wrangle it all to do his bidding, making him akin to the gods.
But Baldur is one of us, pledged into our Bloodbond.
As I grip his hand, my left to his left, our silver rings connect.
A deep pulse rocks us as our union hammers through us from the rings.
It steadies Baldur; as he takes a deep breath, his eyes clear, back to their sparkling cerulean and diamond white.
Ready at last.
I nod as I see him come to readiness. Bjorn, Mikkel, and Strom have already climbed onto the bed; as they hold their hands out to me and Baldur, I take a deep breath.
Then climb on, joining them.