A little ways off, Isolde is seated on a fallen log, legs spread awkward to make room for her pregnant belly. The white of her dress is so thin you can see the shadow of her skin underneath. She’s cradling her stomach with one hand and picking at the moss with the other. Her eyes never leave the posts. I see her lips moving, a whisper to herself, a mantra, maybe.
Eve stands away from them all, by the line of trees, her arms crossed, a cigarette burning between her fingers. She watches everything, eyes sharp and unsmiling, the smoke curling up around her face. Every so often, she glances at the posts, then at the knives, then at me.
It’s all real. I’m here. I am a girl in a white dress at the center of a massacre, and no matter what happens next, I won’t leave this place the same.
The weight of it lands on me, full force. I freeze, every cell screaming to run, to disappear back into the dark, but my feet are glued in the muck. I feel the attention of everyone in the space—the girls, the men at the posts, the men moving at the edge of the lanterns—like the light is a hand, pressing me forward.
Julian lets go of my hand. He leans close, lips to my ear, and whispers, “You don’t have to watch if you don’t want to.”
Oh, but I do. I have to. I need to see.
“I have to make sure your special guest is good. I’ll be back in a minute.” He steps away, leaving me alone in the cold light.
Across the circle, one of the men begins to weep. The sound is muffled, but I know it for what it is. I wonder which one is my father. I wonder if he’s already thinking of what will happen next, or if he’s still clinging to the fantasy of survival.
In the center, the knives gleam, perfect and untouched.
I stand there, breathing as quietly as I can, and wait for the world to end.
My teeth clack as I shiver. None of them react. For a moment, I wonder if I’m the only one who feels the weight of the thing that’s about to happen. Maybe this is just another day to them, another party with a theme.
But I know… it’s not.
On the other side of the posts, the Feral Boys finish with the last of the captives. I recognize them by their silhouettes. Bam, broad and swaying, uses his elbow to force a man to his knees before strapping his ankles with duct tape. Rhett moves slower, almost gentle, as he wraps a roll of plastic around the waist of a groaning, shuddering Board member. Colton zip ties his hands behind the wood and puts one around his neck, the man wheezing as he ties it tight.
Julian comes back to me, steps right into my bubble of air, and I can’t help but inhale his smell— soap and blood and the sharp, bitter edge of whiskey. He doesn’t ask if I’m okay. He just watches me shake.
He reaches out, catches my chin in two fingers. His touch is gentle, almost reverent, and when he tilts my face up to look at him, it’s the softest he’s ever been.
His thumb strokes under my jaw. "Breathe," he says. Not a question, a command.
I try. My breath is ragged, shallow, a gasp caught between two worlds.
"What—what is happening?" My voice sounds small, half-swallowed by the dark. Maybe I want him to lie to me, but I know he won’t.
He leans in, his forehead to mine, mouth barely a whisper. "We’re doing what we promised. It needs to end, Amara. They won’t stop. You can watch, look away, or take your life into your own hands at the end of a knife. I won’t force you either way.”
His words ripple through me. They’re not a shock. They’re a confirmation of everything I’ve tried not to believe. The knives, the sacks, the white dresses.
It’s a ritual of another kind.
Julian watches my face for a reaction, and when he sees I won’t run, he lets me go. His hand lingers for a second at my throat before he steps back.
Dahlia snorts, flicking a bead of blood off her thumb. "She doesn’t get it yet," she giggles. "She will."
Eve flicks her cigarette into the dirt, grinds it out with the toe of her boot. "She’s smarter than you, Dahlia. She just isn’t as bloodthirsty."
"Yet," Dahlia says, licking the red from her thumb.
Isolde doesn’t look up. She just hums, rocking gently on the log, lost in her own little orbit. Rhett stands behind her, rubbing her shoulders and whispering something into her ear.
I want to protest, to say I don’t want to be here, but I don’t. I can’t. I want to see. I want to watch it happen.
Across the circle, one of the men begins to sob in earnest. The sound is ugly, helpless, the sound of a man who knows he’s already dead.
Julian slips behind me, arms wrapping around my waist. His body is so warm it burns through the chill. He puts his mouth to my ear and says, "It’s okay to be afraid.”
But I’m not afraid.
