ᴅᴇꜰɪᴀɴᴄᴇ - ɴᴀɴᴏᴡʀɪᴍᴏ 2019

03

The evening wind was freezing. Every bit of beauty the morning had was gone. As if nature was mourning me already. With heavy steps I walked back into the priest's quarters. Tonight will be painful and I wasn't ready for that. Why was all that preparation even necessary?

"Ah, Maethdess! Good that I see you. Basgorn is already preparing everything. He'll be waiting for you in the temple in an hour so be dressed accordingly and have a shower beforehand, yes?"

One priest, whose name I never could remember, told me as he saw me walking back to my room. I simply nodded, unable to probably say a proper sentence.

Back in my room I got out the heavy ceremonial clothing I was supposed to wear. I hated all the metal accessories, that weighed this quite revealing outfit down. With I sigh I heaved it all into my small bathroom and got undressed, before jumping in my bathtub.

***

I looked at myself in the mirror. My glowing of my extra eye was pulsating, probably through my nervosity. The metal necklaces were already rubbing against my neck and I most certainly wasn't used to wearing so many earrings. The constant tinkling was already getting on my nerves.

I took a last look at my tidied room. I shouldn't have slept the whole afternoon. I should've enjoyed my life, before it was way to late. I shook of my worries and thoughts of melancholy away and left the room. I never hated this place so much. This awkward feeling of suppression was stronger than ever. The tinkling of my jewellery echoed through the halls, making it seem as if I were a prisoner in chains.

Nearly in trance I opened the door to the cold and dark temple. Basgorn didn't seem to be here yet, so I decided to sit down on one of the many stone steps that spiralled down to the altar, similar to a colosseum. Soon I will stand there, in front of that altar, promising my body to religion and giving up my life. It seemed so surreal at this moment. In less than six hours from now, I will be dead. And I'm sitting here, in all the festive clothing, waiting for the man to come along, who will prepare me for the sacrifice.

It was paradox how I was even sitting here, on the stone step that might as well be a block of ice. I thought that I would have gone insane at this point, but I still was sitting here.

Soon I heard the door creak behind me, and I quickly turned around.

"Ah, great! I see you're already here. Let's get straight to it then. Where would you like to do it? Here, in your room, the infirmary... we'd probably even get some space in the smithy if you fancy that instead. Your room might be tricky, but I can understand if you want to be in a more comfortable environment."

Basgorn said, bombarding me with words. I thought for a while, but concluded, that I wouldn't really care.

"It's all fine for me. To be fair, I am extremely frightened by the mere thought of it, so I just want to get it over and done with."

I slowly replied, careful not to say anything wrong. Basgorn nodded supportively.

"I can understand. It really isn't nice to have one's body made non-decayable. But I hope you can understand, that we must do all of this before the ritual, so that we still have someone actively keeping the body alive, whilst I do my work. Otherwise all of this would be for nothing, and we don't want that, do we?"

I nodded and stood up, waiting for him to lead me somewhere.

"Oh yeah. Right. So, I think the infirmary would be best, since I don't think that you would want to go to the butchery. Yeah, that would indeed feel quite to negative. Let's go then, shall we?"

I nodded again, my throat feeling so empty, that I doubted that I could make a proper sound. Feeling satisfied, Basgorn then opened the doors again and led the way to the infirmary.