The Rome Prophecy

22

The new one tries to hide her fear, but I see it.

We all see it.

It is glazed in the whiteness of her eyes as they lower her into the pit. Pass her into the womb of the earth.

She is naked and pink. Curled and cowed like a foetus.

Her soft, virgin skin is like a dropped silk handkerchief in the centuries-old soil. She sits on a cushion of earth, encrusted with the dried blood of many sacrifices.

Soon there will be more.

Above her, the drumming begins.

It starts like the peck of a bird, becomes the thump of a hoof, and grows into the stampede of cattle.

Taurobolium has begun.

The new one peeks through her fingers into the blackness above her and sees the first flickers of our lights.

I feel for her.

I envy her.

I love her and hate her.

We are lighting candles around the edge of the triangular pit. Her eyes catch mine and I fail to see what is so special about her. They say she is ‘the one’.

The favoured one.

But I see nothing that will stop me usurping her.

Nothing that will prevent me from taking my rightful place in line .

The Korybantes dance their way to the front, naked but for their shields, swords and helmets.

The sound of metal on metal makes a sinister percussion. The steel is there to slice.

To cut.

To kill.

There is an orgiastic surge in the music.

The Galli begin their chanting.

We gather closer and bond tightly with our sisters from Baby lonia, Syria, Asia Minor, Etruria and Anatolia.

The nine Korybantes are joined with the three magical Dactyls.

We are all one.

The music, drumming and chanting reaches its climax.

The goddess is here!

Our Mother has arrived.

She holds aloft the hands that eight thousand years ago dug into the earth of Catal Huyuk, the hands that spread the soil of time while She gave birth flanked by leopards.

We all scream.

Scream so loud our spirits almost fly from our throats.

Somewhere down in the blackness, the special one gathers the fine clothes we have sewn for her and dresses herself.

She moves to the centre of the pit.

The limbs of eunuchs strain on thick ropes and the rafters creak.

Above us, a bull that has trod pastures for six summers bucks in its harness.

Then it thrashes no more.

The blades open up its sacred rivers of blood and they pour down on the libation boards across the pit.

My sister showers in the animal’s life force.

She dances joyously as the blood from the Bull of Heaven purifies her.

Now she is born again – for eternity.

Unless I can stop her.