The Ritual

apart and the
forest grows and protects. It is the way of the Old Ones. They have been pushed to the little places, Luke. To the corners. By Christians, and immigrants and social democrats.’ Loki shakes
his head, in bitter despair, then looks up. ‘They call it by many names out here. In my family when I was a boy, they call it the Black Yule Goat. But that is not such a good name, I
think. But in these woods is a God. A very real God. You can be sure of that. Christians call it a demon. But it is a God. Just not their God.’ He shrugged. ‘This place is sacred. Here
there is resurrection. We come to make music of resurrection. To give a sacrifice and to receive blessings. To spread the message. To be in the presence of a God. As our ancestors once were. You,
my friend, are privileged. You will see.’
    ‘I’ve seen it.’
    Loki nods his head. ‘I envy you that, my friend. And we will see it too when it come to accept you. Soon. Now we have you, Luke. We have something to give. You see? As it should be. As it
was. As Odin wish it. And to us it will come. She promise, Luke. She save you for this. It is the only reason you live a little longer. So you can be our tribute. Our tithe, Luke. Our introduction
to the old ways. You are our proof that we are true.’
    ‘It’s no God, Loki. You are wrong. The Christians were probably closer to the truth. Everything you have done has been for nothing. It’s been pointless. Senseless. I’ve
seen the temple. It’s in ruins, mate. The old stones? Overgrown. No one to tend the cemetery. This is all forgotten, Loki. It’s over. Died out. There’s only that old woman left.
And she can’t have long, mate. And you’re too bored and stupid to hang around here for long. So it’s over. No more worshipping of some old wild, mad beast, or whatever it is. No
more sacrifice. No more murder. This thing you call a God has no future.’
    Loki’s eyes were too wide, too bright for his big face. His lips were suddenly trembling with drunken emotion when confronted by Luke’s repeated failure to understand, to
acknowledge, to believe.
    ‘And you’ll be in prison, mate,’ Luke continued. ‘At least you’ll be notorious. All that attention seeking will have paid off, eh? I only wish they had the death
penalty here. I really do. Because all three of you, and that evil thing out there . . . you all need putting down. It’s what you deserve.’
    ‘You are wrong, Luke from London. I show you. I show you. So you know why it is that you must die here.’

FIFTY-EIGHT
    They were coming for him again. All of them.
    Outside his room, Fenris chattered, Surtr’s bare feet scuffed the dusty floor, Loki’s great boots boomed in all of the hollow places, and the tiny loud feet of the old woman led the
strange procession of Blood Frenzy through the dark house.
    Beside her proclamation outside the house that morning, Luke had not heard the old woman speak. But something had upset her now. For so mute a creature, she had certainly wanted to be heard
downstairs in the confrontation preceding this noisy progress of his hosts towards his room.
    She had admonished the youths, raised her aged voice and its peculiar singsong dialect to the dim rafters. He guessed, and he could not stop himself hoping, she was imploring them not to do
something; like maybe kill him in what must be, he had come to believe, her home. But then he thought of her implacable little face and doubted his life was of any consequence to the diminutive
creature. So, maybe she was in dispute with Loki about something else entirely. And whatever it was, it terrified Luke.
    Her relationship to the youths was a curiosity. She was neither kin nor friend; but she may not have been in league with them either. During the confrontation he overheard downstairs, he was
beginning to intuit, or even hope – though hope was a dangerous thing and he distrusted it greatly – that her role was that of a reluctant host, a compromised confederate at best. And
maybe whatever Loki wanted to show Luke, and had threatened to share with him right now, their aged host was dead against him seeing it.
    Since his attempt to escape that morning, his wrists, and now his ankles too, were bound with nylon zip-lock ties, so there would be no struggle this time. When he ran for the trees they took
his final privilege of capacity from him.
    The door of his room opened.
    Luke kept his face blank, but watched the eyes of the old woman. She