Many candles burned silently in the dark, spreading a pleasant, delicate scent of honey through a room they barely lit. Neither their weak light nor their faint fragrance could withstand the impenetrable gloom around them and the pungent metallic stench that seemed poised to swallow and suffocate everything. In that grim, almost unbreathable air, a figure wrapped in a broad veil of black silk ascended a few steps slowly, accompanied only by the rustle of her robe and the faint echo of her bare feet on the cold floor. There was something ceremonial in her movements, at once measured and hesitant, like someone compelled to carry out a task she almost feared.
Stopping before a small, roughly rectangular stone basin that rose at the top of the stair, the figure hesitated a little, then spoke. “Master, the offering has been given,” a trembling female voice whispered into the darkness, laden with fear and anguish. “The rite is complete.”
A new silence then wrapped the woman — deep, dark, terrible — seeming to last for centuries. A silence thick with tension and expectation, during which the figure stood motionless, head bowed and eyes fixed on the floor. After an endless wait, a deep, powerful voice broke that stillness. But only in the mind of the one who had spoken.
“I sense your fear, woman,” it said in a tone at first detached and almost disdainful, which then softened into one of satisfaction, “it clings to the air like a reek of rot…so sweet to my nostrils…a fear that is well founded…”
“I…I-I’m sorry for the d-d-delay, Master,” the figure stammered nervously, keeping her head bowed. “W-we had…p-p-problems…”
The brief silence that followed those words was suddenly shattered by a furious outburst that seemed to shake the darkness and the surrounding walls. “I do not care!!” the voice thundered, pouring into her mind like a river of molten lava rising from the deepest, blackest abyss, “You spoke a vow and we forged a pact! A pact that binds us and cannot be broken. Your part in it is clear. You dare not keep me waiting!!!”
Beneath her black veil, the woman closed her eyes and fought not to put her hands to her ears in a vain attempt to dull the voice only she could hear. She succeeded, but could not stop the tremor that inevitably began to run through her body — a primal, uncontrollable shudder born of the unmistakable sensation that those yells were clawing at and tearing apart her very essence. A pain she had never felt yet could not endure.
Without mercy, the voice continued. “I am your Master and you are my servant!” it exploded again, sounding with vehemence into the void, “And servants obey without fail! Or shall I remind you in terms that even a creature such as yourself can comprehend?”
Suddenly the candlelight dimmed, withering like autumn leaves, and the flames went out, only to flare again after a single moment of darkness. But now they glowed with a bluish tint. An unnatural, menacing hue that plunged the place into an even grimmer, more unsettling gloom. The woman opened her eyes only to close them immediately, gripped by fear that grew increasingly uncontrollable. That fear became almost unmanageable when the ring around the little finger of her left hand began to burn as if it had just been forged in blazing flames. For an instant she felt as though her soul were catching fire and being reduced to ash. The pain was a thousand times worse.
Only her willpower and a terror greater still — of what might befall her if she rebelled — allowed her to endure that searing agony. Her body stiffened and her hand convulsed in a terrible spasm. She bit her lip, held her breath, not daring even to inhale, and her heart pounded so violently it felt as if it would burst and rend her chest. Yet she did not move, waiting and hoping that it would end.
Then, after interminable moments while the echo of the last words in her mind faded, the lights suddenly returned to their usual amber tone and the darkest shadows seemed to dissolve. When she opened her eyes again, uncertainly, the renewed glow around her fell weakly upon the placid crimson ripples that filled the basin. On its outer rim the carvings incised in the stone now seemed to shift and come alive in the flickering flamelight that danced silently on the wax.
Soaked in sweat, the figure began to breathe again, though raggedly. The pain, as suddenly as it had come, had vanished completely, leaving nothing behind. She knew well what that meant. The time had come.
“I will tolerate no more mistakes…” the voice resumed, this time apparently calmer, as if its fury had been spent. Then, waning word by word, it added. “I now accept your offering. The rite is complete. Blood for blood,” it concluded in a whisper that dissolved into nothing.
Suddenly the woman was alone in that darkness. With relief she drew a long breath and prepared herself for what would follow. She could not linger. Gathering all her resolve, she stepped forward toward the basin. A biting gust of iron-scented air assaulted her senses, so intense it left her nauseous and reeling. She had not yet grown used to it, and perhaps she never would. But this was what she wanted. What she needed.
With slow, deliberate movements she slipped the silk veil that covered her completely from her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor and revealing her naked body to the trembling candlelight. Then she climbed onto the basin’s edge and, without hesitation, waded in, sinking slowly into the dense crimson liquid.
Moments later, as the waves swallowed her, silence descended over all once more.
