NormBlog

she awoke before dawn. she was hungry. she was always hungry. but lately, she had felt insatiable. there was no food in the barracks. there was never any food in the barracks. she definitely wasn’t going outside.

it was still dark out. the monsters were mostly nocturnal, large, hairy beasts. there hadn’t been an attack in her memory but she was still afraid. they were all afraid, as long as it was dark out.

this isn’t what had her awake before dawn. she was waiting for the high priest to perform the rite of dawn. she was waiting to hear him sing. she didn’t like to hear him sing. in fact, she hated the rite of dawn. she hated the priest.

she remembered the first time they had put her in a room with the priest, alone. they told her that it happened to everyone. it happened to every female in the barracks. it was going to be okay. maybe she would have a child. that was good. that would make them happy. that would keep her in the barracks.

she had had children. they had all been taken, taken from her, taken from her life and her care. they were either in a different barracks or in the priesthood.

the other day, she had had a strange thought. she had been outside, in the light, the warm light. she had been taking her turn sorting through the seeds and the feed. she had wondered if there was another option. was it possible to not be in a barracks and not be a priest? was there some other option? she felt weird just thinking about it. it turned out that she wasn’t clever enough to actually think of a different option.

right now, she was thinking about her children. one of them had died. she had known it right away. the others had been taken, taken away from her. she was wondering if they still believed in the sun god?

when she had been young, young and blonde, she had loved the sun god. she had loved to be out in his warmth and his safety. she had been told, and believed what she had been told, about the sun god. each day, the priest would celebrate the return of the sun with the rite of dawn. for, as she had been told, the sun god brought all good things to them. and while the sun god may have left them for a while, it would always come back to them. this was part of the tradition of the rite of dawn. the endless joy brought by the return of the sun. the monsters almost never came in the light. almost.

they had taken her children in the light, right in front of her.

she was pacing and muttering. she might have been doing this for a while. she wasn’t certain. some of the other women were up now, too. one was close. it was one of the old women. one of the ones that was always poking into everyone else’s business. she knew she must have been muttering because the old one turned and faced her.

the old one turned to her and said, “you are right to hate the priest. you are right to point out the hypocrisy.” the old woman must also have realized that the sun didn’t protect them from all evil. didn’t keep them absolutely safe. they had probably taken the children of the old one in the light, too.

The old one clucked on, “you didn’t know the old priest, did you? sometimes he would miss the rite of dawn. we would be waiting but it would never come. They left him here until he was old and stringy. but, he was no good in the room, not with us ladies. so, they replaced him, replaced him with someone who is good in the room, good with the ladies.”

it was close now. there were no windows in the barracks but it was cheaply built and there were many cracks between the boards. and the walls were thin. the floor was old and thin. she could see some of the sky turning from black to dark blue, signaling that the rite of dawn would be sung soon.

she said, not to the old one but louder than her earlier muttering, “i hated being in the room with this one.”

the old one replied, “we all hate it in the room. he’s a cock!” then, she sauntered off, gently laughing and bobbing her head.

the dark blue was turning to a light blue in the sky. the priest would be making his way up to the top of the fence. soon, he would sing the rite of dawn. soon they would all hear him, they would hear the cock-a-doodle-do of the rite of dawn.