Mary didn’t know the goddess’s name, but she carried her wherever she went, as had her mother and her grandmother before her. Mary was the Keeper, ensuring the goddess’s safe arrival everywhere her coven travelled. Everyone knew if the Keeper cared for the idol, the goddess protected the coven.
The idol’s head was larger than her body with large black eyes, yellow hair, no nose or mouth. The goddess didn’t need either. She communicated heart to heart. Mary kept her wrapped in red and white striped altar cloth containing a blue block with white stars.
When the coven travelled to the Source, they slept in a forest clearing. The nearby tidepools and plentiful deer would provide bountiful food. The High Priestess praised Mary for pleasing the goddess, though Mary worried about the howling she’d been hearing in the night.
Mary meticulously cleared the stone altar. It was chilly for the eighth moon, and despite her mother’s sacrifice to the wolves in this place three years prior, this trek was Mary’s favorite time of the year. She loved frolicking in the water with her sisters, but that was for tomorrow. Mary smiled as she placed the altar cloth, then positioned the goddess in the place of honor.
“Is the altar ready?” The High Priestess asked.
“It is.” Mary paused. “I think we need to move away from the Source. The wolves are nearing. I’ve heard them the past three nights.”
“Is this a command from the goddess?”
“No, I heard them.”
“I’ve heard nothing. Fear not. The goddess will protect us.”
“But they are coming,” Mary whispered. The day she became Keeper, she vowed to protect the coven, even with her life, but at only 14 summers, she didn’t want to die.
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Mary warned her sisters about the wolves, but they each dismissed her concerns as an overreaction. Awakened by the chilling cries of wolves, she realized they were much closer that night. Not one of her sisters stirred. The High Priestess remained asleep, unresponsive, despite Mary’s desperate attempts to rouse her. For several hours she lay awake, weighing her options. Before sunrise, she packed up her belongings, including the idol.
“I must try to survive without the coven. They already think I’m crazy.” Mary thought. She stepped around her sisters, all twenty her family, but each had ridiculed her. She looked back, noticing Anna, a girl of only eleven summers, the same age she had been when she became the Keeper. Her face contorted in a grimace as she approached the altar.
Mary knew what she must do, even if it terrified her. Just like any other morning, she prepared the altar, the soft glow of candles illuminating the space. The goddess was carefully placed on the altar, and she bowed her head, the hushed sounds of her prayers echoing softly. “May you protect them, as they believe you will. May the wolves spare them and may there be no more Keepers.”
The wolves had closed in, their low growls a chilling sound in the silence. She saw one near the edge of her camp, its eyes glinting. She yelled out to her sisters, a desperate plea echoing through the woods, giving them one final opportunity to escape their fate. She sprinted towards the water, her heart pounding, her only hope of escape from the pack.