A Shrine to an Unknown God

SULFUR

I DON'T TELL DAHLIA that she's going to have to kill a sheep. Instead, I just sort of nod and smile at her and head off to find what she'll need.

It's not a very complicated ritual; it's just that it's extremely difficult to do correctly. You must be born a necromancer; you can't just become one. I'm pretty sure that, as the daughter of Hekate, Dahlia is. All she's going to need is some mead, water, and wine; white meal; a sheep, and something to kill it with.

Dahlia Boivin-Rot, the vegan who passes out around blood, is going to have to kill a sheep.

Do I think she can do it? I'm not sure. But necromancy is her birthright; this kind of stuff is in her blood. Maybe she'll rise to the challenge. Maybe she'll have it in her. I don't know. I don't know.

Hopefully. Because I don't know how else we'd find Ezra or Medusa, for that matter.

The drinks are easy. I find three abandoned kylikes—long, low wine-cups—half-hidden in the sand in the banks of the Acheron. Most likely, they were left there by the settlements of the unburied dead. Holding them by their handles to avoid actually touching the water, I dunk them in the Acheron, filling them as full as I can. The water is dark and bubbly, popping every so often like it's boiling. The scent of sulfur wounds deeply inside my nostrils as the bubbles pop, heavy and strong.

One kylix stays full of Acheron water. Another I turn to wine, and the second I turn to mead. Naturally, my powers allow me to turn any liquid into any sort of alcohol; wine just so happens to be my favorite.

I carry the wine kylix and the mead kylix back to Dahlia. I only have two hands, after all, so I can only carry two at a time.

"What am I supposed to do with these?" she asks me, giving me a Look.

"Don't do anything with them yet. And don't drink them."

She goes back to digging. "I figured they weren't for refreshments."

I go back for the water and bring it to her as well, placing it with the other two kylikes.

"Now do I do something with them?" she asks.

"Not yet. Wait until I have everything ready for you."

I leave her, walking with my back straight and my head held high (an imitation of my mother), pretending that I know what I'm doing.

Where am I supposed to get a sheep in the Underworld? Animals don't have souls; when they die, they get no afterlife, they simply cease to exist. Some are lucky enough to be killed alongside their owners and buried with them; then, like other precious objects such as jewelry or weapons, they can journey into the afterlife with their owners. Maybe I could find a sheep that came here like that, but chances are that someone who was able to bring their sheep with them into the afterlife is already on the other side of the Acheron and not stuck here with me and Dahlia and all the unburied dead.

Except maybe one of the recently deceased will show up with a sheep that I can snag before they manage to cross the Acheron. But who knows how long that could take?

And even if I can somehow find a sheep, who's to say you can kill something that's already dead?

What if the ritual can't even work down here? What if the fact that Dahlia's dead herself hinders her ability to raise the dead?

What if we can't do it? What if we never find Ezra? What if Dahlia and him can never resurrect themselves? What if they're stuck down here forever, what if their deaths were permanent?

What if mine is?

What if I'm stuck on these dark shores for the rest of eternity, doing nothing, completely alone other than the other shades who can't even look at me? What if I become like them?

I catch myself. I'm not a part of what's happening. I'm only helping. I'm not actually resurrecting myself. I would never. It's... it's wrong. It's blasphemous. It goes against the gods' plans.

... Right?

Forgetting all of that, how can I make Dahlia do this? Why is it fair that I make her kill a sheep when she can't even eat a chicken nugget, can't even look at a drop of blood?

There has to be another way that doesn't involve any violence.

I'm through with violence. I'm through with bloodshed. Even when it comes to animals.

Maybe, if I had lived a little longer, I might have even become a vegetarian.

Maybe. Chicken nuggets, I've found, really are delicious.

Especially when Ezra makes them.

Gods, if this works, I don't think I want my friends to leave me.