“Please explain to me once again how you were able to get a lamb this quickly?” Deyanira questioned.
“My uncle works on a farm and every year he gives me one of the smaller animals—I just asked for a lamb. He’s probably going to be disappointed when I tell him that I ‘lost’ the lamb when I wasn’t paying enough attention.” Lieta answered, “Here’s the offering bowl—sit it right beside that stick.” Lieta pointed at a small stick.
“Here?” Deyanira asked.
“Yeah,” Lieta answered as she stood up and held a knife towards Deyanira, “Here’s the knife—it’s special.” Lieta winked.
Deyanira half smiled and chucked before taking the weapon and turning towards the tiny lamb.
“It’s a good thing we didn’t bring Aubrey along for this—she’d faint.” Lieta stated.
Deyanira let out a quick laugh before taking a breath and looking directly at the lamb. “I’m sorry, little guy, but this must be done. I promise this won’t hurt a bit—Lieta made sure that this knife was special so I promise that this will be peaceful.” Deyanira smiled as she kneeled beside the lamb and petted him with her free hand.
Just barely above a whisper, Deyanira sang the lamb a lullaby as she pet him. After about ten minutes, the lamb had fallen asleep.
“There,” Deyanira said before slowly pushing the knife into the lamb’s stomach, “Like I promised earlier, you won’t feel a thing.” And she was right—the lamb felt nothing. The death that would’ve been violent with any other knife was more peaceful to the lamb than dying naturally—it was purely soothing.
Once Deyanira had a steady flow of blood pouring from the cut, she lifted the lamb’s body and Lieta picked up the bowl and sat it where the blood had stained the grass. Deyanira held the lamb where all the blood would flow into the bowl.
After about thirty minutes, the blood stopped flowing—the lamb’s body was all dried out. Deyanira gently sat the lamb’s body in a nearby creek before lifting the offering bowl and drinking a small amount of blood. Deyanira slightly winced as she sat down the bowl and wiped blood off her lip.
“Now just say what you want from this offering.” Lieta instructed.
Deyanira nodded and looked up. “I have sacrificed the life of a lamb for you and I give you a majority of its blood—for this offering I would please like for the timebomb to be deactivated so that the human race may continue life on Earth.” Deyanira continued to look at the sky as if she expected for lightning to strike the bowl and Zeus appear to receive the blood, but nothing happened.
“We must leave now—they can’t get it with us here.” Lieta said, “They’ll get it within a week. If they don’t get it by then then this didn’t work. We can check back in a week to see.”
“Okay,” Deyanira said, “Let’s go.”
YOU ARE READING
Timebomb Tattoo
Short StoryBefore I even give a description I need to say one thing: This story is something I wrote to give all my friends as a Christmas present, but I didn't do what most people would. What I did was I wrote each friend a different ending. There are 21 diff...
