Free The Uncrowned Queen by Posie Graeme-evans Page A

Perhaps it was the earth.
    â€œWhat was that?”
    It was unlike Deborah to be fearful of the night, but for a moment it had seemed as if the ground beneath her feet, in the depth of the oak grove, had moved.
    â€œI felt it too.”
    Anne was uneasy. Something smelled strange up here. A stormcoming—was that it? And yet the sky was clear, so clear they could see the setting sickle of moon and the morning star beginning its rise in the east. They would have to be quick.
    With cold fingers, Anne fumbled in the little bag slung from the belt around her kirtle. “Here it is, Mother.” She only called Deborah “mother” at moments like this, when the kinship between them became an even stronger bond. If one Seeker ventured out into the night world alone, another must remain behind to call the Voyager back. Mother and daughter, daughter and mother—so it had been for many generations. So it was tonight.
    â€œVery well. But we must uncover the circle first, then we can light our way.”
    Anne and Deborah hunted among the trees to find the collection of stones they’d previously laid out in a circle and then covered in fallen leaves. They were mostly rounded white quartz, water smoothed, secretly and laboriously brought up from the river over the months since summer.
    â€œHelp me, child.” Deborah was trying to carry the largest stone into the center of the circle. It was the size of half a woman and similarly shaped, even to the suggestion of arms, legs, and vulva. Surmounting the form was a “face” sketched by the line of a nose and a slit for the mouth. This stone was black and too heavy to lift alone.
    Breathing hard from the effort, Anne and Deborah placed the woman-stone upright in the center of their little circle. Traces of wax could be seen on the head of the stone pillar; it had dribbled down like hair. Anne shivered when she touched it. The stone was bedded into a dimple hastily scraped in the earth floor, then Deborah flint-lit a wax candle; the click as she scraped sparks from the metal was very loud in the night. When the candle was alight, she handed it to her daughter, who carefully dripped new wax onto the old. It would form a bed in which to sit their light tonight.
    Eyes closed, Anne cupped her hands around the wavering flame as it grew from a point. She could feel the warmth on her palms as it settled, sending a tiny trail of smoke into the freezing air. The honey smell from the wax was a faint breath of summer.
    â€œAre you ready, daughter?”
    Anne nodded. “I am ready, Mother.”
    Deborah leaned forward and unclasped the pin that held Anne’s cloak together at the throat; it was gold, a little dragon with blind eyes of pearl, the same color as the last of the stars. In one quick movement Anne shrugged herself out of the garment. She was naked. The cold night touched her skin and she sobbed one sharp breath, as a swimmer does on entering freezing water.
    Deborah felt the cold in her own bones too but suppressed pity and fear. This was important, for the sacrifice must be willingly made. “Now?” she said.
    Anne nodded and the women joined hands, kneeling down on either side of the stone pillar, their arms stretching around it completely. “The sacrifice.”
    Shaking, Anne extended one hand toward the candle flame. Deborah brought an awl from the bag hanging at her belt. Quickly she pricked the girl’s outstretched Jupiter finger so that one fat drop of blood, then another, fell into the transparent heart of the flame. A hiss like a cat, the smell of burning iron, and then the flame burned up again, clean, faintly blue. Unwavering.
    Deborah, whispering, began a chant. “Mother of All, Mother of All, hear us, hear your children.”
    Anne, her teeth clenched against the gripping cold, tried to sink herself in the darkness, fixing her eyes on the shape of the candle flame, echoing the words. Her hands were numb, and her