The Ritual

Fenris squeezed him through the narrow passageway and down the cramped and unstable staircase, because he did not want them to drop him. Being three feet from the
hard ground with no arms and legs at his disposal, to stick out and break a fall upon all of the sharp wooden edges and corners, made him nervous.
    It was only when they took him outside, into the cold damp air, and under that sky dimming from grey to black, that he fought. Inside the little clearing of grass and within the pointy shadow of
the old black house, he pulled his legs back suddenly using his hips, and broke them from Fenris’s arms, which were supporting him like a heavy roll of carpet against his side. And then Luke
twisted around within Loki’s long white arms, so he was suddenly facing the earth before he was dropped to the moist grass.
    He broke his fall with his knees, then tried to stand and fell immediately over, onto his side. In the cold wet grass, he paused to consider his next move.
    Fenris issued his long thin laugh into the darkening air.
    ‘Where will you go, Luke?’ Loki said, wheezing but wistful.
    The great fire cracked and spat and leapt out its orange tongues so high at the sky. Showers of sparks and porous sheets of leaf drifted up in hot draughts, twisted, and extinguished themselves
in glowing red sparks.
    The violent music played. The sound was dulled through the earth, but still enough of the cacophony spluttered and crackled out there and into the cold sunless forest, so that whatever crawled
this terrible black earth, would know it was dealing with Blood Frenzy this night.
    The rifle leant against the porch railing, perhaps as insurance in case Odin failed to discriminate between sacrifice and chosen one. In the shadows of the porch, sat upon a little wooden chair,
the old woman watched Luke, her black eyes glinting at the end of the firelight that beat gently against her expressionless face.
    To get him on that cross they’d have to cut the nylon from his wrists; and that would be his last chance. He heaved as much air into his lungs as he could and shuddered right down to his
joints. Tried not to let urine stream down his legs. And failed; it spouted warm, like life, out of him, over him.
    The dark crucifix looked thin, insubstantial. He wondered if it could hold his weight, and imagined the farce and banality of his own death upon an upside-down crucifix that would not stay
upright.
    ‘Oh God,’ he said, and could not prevent himself making this exclamation of alarm, when he thought of long nails and a mallet; of Fenris’s spindly tattooed arms swinging the
hammer in the dying light.
    But beside the crucifix, he saw coils of old fibrous rope, thin as a washing line, and prayed they were for his wrists and ankles.
    Against the dimming trees, as the light drew back like a tide across the ancient roots and bracken of the forest, the sign of the inverted cross now looked too basic, and mock sinister; a prop
in a bad horror film with no budget and a cast of overacting amateurs in face-paint. It was uninspiring and unimpressive, like a place or artefact that had acquired an undeserved cult status, and
always disappointed whenever it was actually revealed. What a way to die. It should have been funny, but was just dismal and depressing instead.
    ‘Now, Luke. You can run nowhere,’ Loki said, his breathing returning to normal. ‘We keep your feet tied. So there is no way you get away from this. If you struggle too much, we
have to . . . er . . .’
    ‘Knock you the fuck out!’ Fenris shrieked.
    ‘More or less,’ Loki said in agreement. ‘But what I can do for you is give you a last drink, my friend.’
    The drinking horn was freed from behind Loki’s silver bullet belt and then upended over his face. Luke welcomed its sour chemical burn inside his mouth and throat and stomach. He moved his
chin to guide that brackish stream into his gullet. Then it made him want to throw up, before spreading a generous warmth through his gut. It made him dizzy too; like it was the first strong drink
he had ever swallowed. It was neat alcohol cut with sweetened orange juice, and brewed in buckets by the desperate. He rolled onto his side and coughed some of it back out of his throat and
mouth.
    Blood Frenzy had also made a special effort tonight for a special occasion; it was not often they made the acquaintance of an ancient deity of the woods. Loki and Fenris had adorned themselves
with a plethora of chains