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I knew the story well. Everyone in this room and the town beyond had been brought up on it. Even those who came before us. I did not need reminding now.
“Should we not tie this up?” I said. “Unlike you all, I have somewhere important to be.”
The sharp crack of Mother’s laugh sounded painfully. “With wit like that, Jak, you will fail long before entering the door.”
“Do not let it worry you. I can assure you I will play the part well.” With that I smiled, relaxing the tension from my face. My lips softened and my forehead smoothed. It was an act — but a simple one. A face I had mastered from years before a mirror. “I have had years of practice… Mother.”
Her dress swept across the wooden floor, catching dust among the swirling black fabric as she walked away from me. I kept still, holding my blissful expression as though it were a test to myself.
“You are permitted to take two items during the Claiming. Items in which we have prepared.”
There was a clink of metal as she fussed with a clothed table in the middle of the room. Her altar, although organised, was a shamble of relics, candles and jarred herbs.
It was a risk taking anything that would give me away as a witch to the creature. It would ruin the entire plan in a heartbeat if a candle etched with Mother’s runes, or a pack of tarot cards would be found in my possession by him.
“I felt these were necessary. You will not be allowed to leave the grounds of the castle. Not for the entire duration of the Claiming, not even if you desire to. The cycle of the moon will be your guide. From tonight you will have until the next full moon. Only when the moon bleeds on the final night will you do what is needed of you. This bowl…” From the plain brown sack, she pulled a brass item. Shallow enough for stew or soup, there was nothing out of the ordinary about its design. “You can use to scry. I have its sister component with me. Simply reach for it if you need our aid. Or … encouragement.”
“I do not imagine encouragement is what I will be craving.”
“Jak, do not be fooled. The creature is a trickster. A devil. This cycle of his has gone on many years and he has perfected his own agenda, I am certain. The bowl is there when you need it. Not if.”
She put the tool back into the sack. I waited for her to retrieve the final item but her hand came back out empty.
“What of the other?”
“That is for you to decide,” she replied, her bright stare trailing me from head to foot. “Perhaps a home comfort would be ideal to take with you.”
My brows tugged inward. There was nothing that I could think of that would be of such nature. No comforts but my grimoires and tools that I had to leave behind.
“The bowl will be enough,” I said plainly.
Mother tugged at the thin rope that bound the sack closed and handed it to me. I was surprised with how light it felt.
“Then you must take your leave, my son.”
Suddenly my legs did not work. I heard her speak but my body seemed to ignore her. Twenty-one years had led up to this night. This moment. Now looking forward at the front door of our home, I lost all ability to move.
Mother was inches from me. A waft of sage and cedar wood filled my nose. “You are ready for this, Jak. I know you are. Go, do what is needed to be done. And when you return, your name will be remembered for an eternity.”
She pressed her lips to my cheek and held them there. Beneath her hands that gripped at either of my shoulders I felt her warmth. Human, living warmth.
The last I would feel in weeks. For it would be death that I dwelled alongside. Until I gave him his release from his entrapment.And my own.Or I failed and his bindings to the castle would break. Allowing him to be free to spread his disease across the world.
His curse was the flipside of our own. With one that succeeded, the other would not.
As I was guided to the front door I only hoped that I had learned enough. Retained what I needed to know.
The front door opened and with it the cold was invited into the home. Snow dusted by my feet and every dark hair on my arm stood on end.
“After you... Jak. He waits.”
This is it.
2
Much like those who watched from cracks in doors and behind shuttered windows, I too had been a criminal of the same intrigue. Studying as the yearly Claims walked through the streets of Darkmourn towards the boundaries of the castle that crowned it. But my interest was always educational. Seeing how the Claims held themselves as they walked, or were dragged, towards their doom. I often wondered what my day would be like. I suppose, as I now walked calmly surrounded by the coven, I did not imagine it to be far different from this.
The only difference between those that watched my procession, was they would have revelled in knowing that it was my turn. The son of the very woman who picked those that were sent before me. It was the duty of our family since the first Claiming – to choose whose child would be sent. Knowing that it would one day end with me.
