The forbidden ritual

At the noon, the Cooca witches prepared a feast and did a great party with dances and music. The Cooca witches are completely different from what she imagined, they seemed to have fun all the time, and as Sapoti pointed, they are all very pretty.

"It´s hard to say their age. Miss Butternuts is old. None of them is old?"

The adults didn´t want the kids near the witches, because of that they Hyde themselves to spy on them.

In the afternoon Auntie Arum Lily appeared to meet Cooca. She was an old satyr with long horns, a white blind eye, always wearing jewels in unnatural holes in her body acquired along the years, and always wore a feathered hat that shows her authority in the county.

"Auntie Arum, Sapoti whispered, she´s going to fight Cooca."

Cooca was on a throne made by the witches in the great table when auntie Arum stood in front of her. "Ah! The minotaur."

"What is a minotaur?"

Cooca pointed at her. "Elf Minotaur is a Minotaur. How elves don´t know nothing."

"You can hear the land and read hearths right?"

"It´s not hard."

"I´m doubt. I agree with Aracaea, everything in my head said that this is wrong. My heart feels that this is the start of the end of the empire as we know, and every time I throw bones to read they agree."

"Throw bones?"

"I read the fortune through bones," Auntie answered. "It´s an ancient skill from healing women. Also, there's a prophecy that says the demon lord is going to return to take the Licorne Empire and Cooca is all about making a queen."

"Cooca don´t care about fortunes and prophecies." She rolled her eyes. "Also there always half dozen boobs claiming to be the new evil lord who wants to take over the world. What´s the advantage of that?"

"I want to know if I really want to bless the ritual knowing that is the wrong thing to do."

"Too late. Minotaur elf already did it."

Auntie Arum Lily swallowed and with a perturbed expression went away.

"You can go out Gem," Cooca said. "Eat something."

They get out from the crate they are hiding.

"You know we are there all along?"

"Cooca knows how many worms there are under the table." She strokes the stuffed dragon. "How long puppy elves were going to be hidden?"

"Until we could." Sapoti sat at the table.

"You can give Cooca back to Gem?" Gem asked.

"Cooca?" Sapoti twisted her face in confusion. "You call the toy dragon Cooca?"

"Cooca needs it now. Cooca´s gives back after the ritual."

"That´s hard. I´m surprised that auntie Arum Lily blessed you guys, but Daisy is never going to do it."

"Daisy? The other puppy elf?" Cooca asked. "The land didn´t recognize the other puppy elf as the maiden."

"If Daisy is not the Tanzek Maiden who will be?"

Cooca sighed and rolled her eyes.

"You are," Gem asked. "Sapoti is the third Tanzec."

Sapoti looked at them with her mouth.

"How long puppy elf maiden didn't see Bonina dying baby?"

"I… I don´t know."

"Go there."

After the feast, Gem barely saw her mother but could give a look at Margot, with Sapoti. She seemed like a skinny baby lay down in the bed. It was disturbing she never saw a small child that was not at least a bit chubby. "Why she´s red?"

"I really don´t know."

"She looks like has trouble breathing. Margot is always like that?"

"Since I remember."

"You going to bless the ritual?"

"I… I don´t know." Sapoti looked to be in pain. "It was hard to believe that you two have the same age."

Sapoti had two older brothers who died before reached one year old, and her own mother died when she was born. Those are common events in the Licorne archipelago. From the kids was who most opposed.

There was even a custom to do not name a baby until it reached one-year-old.

The first-anniversary gift people receive was usually a first name and the privilege to not being called as "the baby" anymore. It was a piece of common knowledge that giving names make you attached to things.

Even crossing the barrier of the first year, Margot never could walk, it was small for her age and sick all the time, barely answered to healing magic it was just a matter of time until she died. That was normal with that kind of baby.

Gem didn't understand Sapoti since her parents were alive. She didn't saw him often and never knew her Uncle Zenon or anyone from the Marigold, but they were her family, and she liked the few ones she knew.

In the next three days, the children were not allowed to get out of the chateau. More and more witches came every day and they always make a feast and a party.

The smell was good and from the sound, they were having fun. The adults said that they couldn't eat because the witches made the food.

All the known adults were perturbed inside the house for unknown reasons since they refused to share the reasons for the concern with the children.

They speculated that the ritual would turn Margot in the next dark lord or dark lady.

"There´s almost fifth Cooca witches now." Crowclaw looked at the window.

"You saw they carving a thin channel alongside the road to the ruins?" Iron tortoise asked.

"No.," Sapoti said curiously.

"They were just pointing their finger and the rocks moved and carved itself like an invisible chisel."

"And also paint it with something red that I think was blood."

"I know I shouldn´t say it but sometimes I want to be one of them." Daisy sighed.

"It´s stormy and dark and they keep parting." Sapoti looked at the window.

"Until yesterday every day was nice and clear." Daisy had a goosebump. "I think they made it stormy and dark."

"Soon is going to end." Crowclaw sat down on the floor. "Daisy will never give their blessing to bring back the next dark lord."

"How you are so sure that will be the next dark lord?" Sapoti said worriedly.

"Please, Sapoti." He started to count on his finger. "A forbidden ritual by the own god, made by the queen of the wicked witches, bringing a soul from Uku Pacha. You have any doubt."

"Yes," Sapoti said hopefully. "Has to be four days that the witches are here and I didn't saw any blue flame, the milk didn't get sour, no egg had blood in it, no one had bad luck or broke anything and they didn't hex or jinxed anybody."

"That we know." Iron Tortoise said.

Bonina crossed the room and went to take the baby Margot.

The kids changed stares and ran after her meeting the three old ladies with other adults at the living room and Cooca at the door with Jolly Acacia.

"Sorry but is over." Auntie Granny calla announced. "Cooca you must go home with your witches now."

"Granny?" Bonina said shocked.

"Let it go Bonina." Auntie Aracaea said. "That should be done."

"She´s your future countess Auntie," Bonina said. "My mom, your sister died, and you only had boys. Our branch ended, who will keep the lineage? That´s not so important to you"

"Calla and Lily kids.; It´s not the first time it happens, it's part of life."

"I understand your pain. I lost three of my five kids." Granny Calla said. "But such heresy? The betrayal of our gods and the Empress Paraffin the merciless? A head Tanzek can't allow a Dharmaquation made by witches in Marigold land."

"Really? The elf did it at the moment Cooca asked."

"What? I never said such a thing."

"The land doesn´t care about what elves had to say. It doesn´t even understand the elven language." Cooca embraced the baby and went out rolling her eyes. "How elves can be so dumb."

"I starting to think that this elf thing is an offense," Daisy said.

"It is." Kale appeared at the door and answered. "Be offended."

They went out leaving the adults exchanging scared stares.

Gem didn't understand why she also was scared since cousin Bonina and her mother were out there, with Cooca. That she found a nice person. The adults said that witches were bad, and often that wizards were bad too.

Her mother Jolly Acacia was a wizard, but she wasn't bad like the witches and Cooca witches were super bad.

Gem agreed with Cooca that elves were dumb and sometimes was worried if she will also be dumb like the adults when she grows up.

Her older cousins Daisy, Crowclaw and Iron Tortoise left the chateau from the back hidden from the adults, and on the third day Sapoti discovered. Gem also followed them, for none reason. They sneaked through a bunch of passages until the hoof of one of the buildings in front of the courtyard.

They went to a variety of mysterious and exciting places every day. She even saw a nest with eggs and a black cat in the way.

As all slight older relatives they had a condescending attitude towards her, which made her follow them in a distance far enough to feel like it was alone in an adventure.

They crawled to the roof of the Villa house in dust passages, that only children could fit, swinging rope bridges, and even Sapoti saw places that she hadn't an idea that existed until a roof with a view to the large patio were Lady Bonina and the hooded woman gathered with many other hooded women.

Gem could see Cooca with her mother. Cooca was the entire time with her stuffed dragon under her arm. That was a bit annoying. She wants her toy back but didn´t have the courage to ask for it.

Above the dark clouds, silent flashes of lightning lit the sky in short intervals. Maybe it was just an unreliable memory with her imagination, which made Sapoti and gem swear that they saw the image of a dragon with five heads, like the descriptions of Tainakan, the goddess mother of all dragons, every time the sky was clear by a flash of lightning.

They tried to make their older cousins looked at it without making much noise, but they were too busy watching the weird event and told her to be quiet.

She knew that something happened with the baby of the countess. However, that was natural.

They made gestures like a dance carved a draw in the ground, as invisible chisels did the work, the way Iron tortoise described.

Cooca put the child in the middle.

It was inspiring to see countess Bonina giving orders. Her presence felt like a giant. Cooca was chill as if she didn't have any worry in the world.

Miss Kale, the women with the longest staff draw inside a big circle in the dirt, they brought the biggest tapiras in the whole Manor. Tapiras were a kind of mix of Buffalo and Sheep. The witches sheared the animal and made draws on their body; while sang, dance, and play an unfamiliar song. The Cooca witches just waved their arms in the air and a shining ink made symbols in the skin of the animals.

For a few moments that looked fun, until some women changed to the shape of creatures similar to giant bats and then started to cut the head of the animals.

Bonina changed to a satyr with long horns. Even Jolly Acacia that always was pretty in her unicorn form was scary.

It was the first time in her life, which Gem saw a wrolok, the beast-folk who could turn in to half-bats.

In Propasa there were many kinds of people; the juvaká, self-proclaimed gods, and the dragons that some people claimed they were gods, the nagual, the beast-folk that could turn into animals, and the eniyan, humans that could not turn into animals.

To make things worst they took the animal blood and started to draw in the child

There was no blade or nothing similar, with just a fast gesture of their arms, the head of the animals fell and their necks had a perfect cut.

The blood flowed filling the sulk and the draws in their skin glowed with a blue light.

It was a view similar to the lights in an airport aiding the planes to land.

Of course, such an analogy could pass through her head because Gem never saw an airport and they don't exist in Propasa.

She ran until the other side of the roof and saw the long trail of blood going through the prayers in the direction of the crops doing a long path of shinning blood.

From the villa to the ruins at the horizon they saw that every draw was connected in weird symbols that even reminded a complex mathematical equation, shining in the whole Manor. That was the feared dharmaquation.

The wind got warm and stronger, filled with electricity and a metallic smell, thunders started to struck, the blood in the channels answered glowing with its own light and illuminated by the lightning's a shape of a dragon with five heads appeared among the clouds.

That was more than enough for the small gem to run away in, back to the chateau. Sapoti didn't confess and said that she went after Gem to take care of her, but the truth was that she was almost in a panic because of that.

In the way, the sky brightened repeatedly showing the dragon in the clouds in different positions as if moved between the thunders strikes. Gem reminded of Cooca saying that they would summon the soul of a dragon and frightened ran to her room to hide under the sheets looking at the window until fell asleep.