ZE-RAK's gaze was a point of fire driven into MOUSSEY's conscience. The Priestess's words still echoed, but the silence that followed was heavier than all her exhortations.
"Will you dishonor your brother's sacrifice?"
The words turned in MOUSSEY's mind, clashing with his pride and his fear. Under ZE-RAK's unblinking, intense stare, MOUSSEY felt heat rise to his cheeks. It wasn't shame, but the fire of provocation.
"You are not my opponent."
The phrase resonated, far more stinging than an insult. It meant he was beneath him, insignificant. And that, MOUSSEY could not accept.
His fingers clenched so hard on the feathers of his chicken that the animal let out a muffled cluck. Without a word, he detached himself from the group, his steps carving a determined path in the dust. He avoided ZE-RAK's gaze, focusing on the space before him, on the NDALA woman who waited, motionless.
He grabbed the knife offered to him. The blade was cold, impersonal. His hand trembled slightly. He looked at the chicken, its black, lively eyes, its warm neck pulsing under his fingers. MOUGBE's lesson came back to him, like a distant echo: "Dig for the earth. The blood returns to the earth."
He crouched, imitating not ZE-RAK's grace, but his determination. He planted the tip of the knife into the ground, digging a small hole with jerky, nervous gestures.
"I... I thank it," he murmured, the words burning his throat. He didn't know if he was speaking to the animal, to ZE-RAK, or to himself.
When he grabbed the chicken's head to immobilize it, a wave of nausea overwhelmed him. The animal struggled, sensing the inevitable. MOUSSEY closed his eyes, clenched his teeth. His hand, the one holding the knife, was sweaty.
The calloused hand of the NDALA woman rested on his. A simple contact, firm and warm.
"Gently," she whispered. "The animal's fear is natural. Your fear too. Breathe with it. Then let it go."
Guided by this expert hand, the trembling in his arm subsided. He felt the tension in the bird's neck, the precise point where the blade should be placed. He took a deep breath, and in the wake of his exhalation, the woman's hand helped him deliver the blow. Clean. Quick.
The blood spurted, a vivid red, and flowed into the small hole. MOUSSEY watched, fascinated and horrified, as the flow calmed and then ceased. Life had left the animal. There had been no struggle, only a departure.
He remained crouched for a long time, short of breath, looking at the lifeless carcass in his hands. The NDALA woman gently took the knife from him.
"It is done," she said simply. And in those words, there was no judgment, only a statement. He had taken the step.
--
It was like a dam breaking.
Seeing MOUSSEY succeed where they all hesitated, another apprentice rushed forward, then another. Soon, it was a coordinated, almost frantic movement. The NDALA women deployed, one for each apprentice, becoming benevolent and firm shadows at their sides. Whispers mingled with the sound of blades and the last flapping of wings.
"Deeper, the incision. Like this."
"Hold it firmly,but don't suffocate it."
"The blood must flow,don't hold it back."
The courtyard, which had been a chaos of hunting, transformed into a silent, efficient workshop of death and respect. The smell of blood, sharp and metallic, became the incense of this initiation ceremony.
ZE-RAK, off to the side with his already bled chicken, observed the scene. He no longer felt tingling, only a strange tranquility. He saw the energy fields of the other chickens going out one after the other, not like explosions, but like embers dying softly. Each extinction was different: some brutal and short, others slower, more resistant, as if the animal's soul took longer to leave its shell.
He now understood that the manner of giving death had a resonance, a quality of its own. His had been clean, quick, almost a sharp caress. MOUSSEY's had been more laborious, but just as determined.
When the last chicken had been killed, a new silence settled, heavy with what had just been accomplished. Nine lives had been taken. Nine pacts had been sealed.
--
Then, the NDALA women took charge again.
"Now, you honor the life that remains," announced NZUZI, one of them.
Pots of boiling water were brought. The preparation process began, but this time, it was different. The apprentices were no longer mere observers or forcibly guided hands. They were invested. They plunged their own chicken into the water, plucked the feathers with concentrated application, feeling the bare, warm skin under their fingers.
ZE-RAK, plunging his hand into the hot water to pluck the feathers of his black rooster, was surprised by the sudden clarity of his perception. He didn't even need to look. His fingers seemed to know where to pull, feeling the slightest resistance, avoiding tearing the skin.
MOUSSEY, for his part, applied himself with meticulous rigor. Each plucked feather was a small victory over disgust, over fear. He watched ZE-RAK out of the corner of his eye, not with jealousy, but with a new understanding. What separated ZE-RAK from the others wasn't luck or arrogance, but a form of connection he didn't yet understand.
--
Then came the evisceration. The knives shone again, but this time to open bellies, not throats. The NDALA women were there, reminding them of the vital instructions.
"Watch the intestines. Lift, don't pierce."
"The liver,the heart. Keep everything. Nothing is wasted."
The steaming entrails fell into bowls, and the carcasses were washed carefully, every nook scrubbed until they were of an immaculate pallor, ready to be offered to the fire.
--
The sun was beginning to set seriously when the nine chickens, gutted, plucked, and washed, were skewered on sturdy sticks. A large fire had been prepared in the center of the courtyard. Not a bonfire, but a working fire, with glowing embers and fragrant smoke.
"We don't grill the meat here," explained NZUZI. "We smoke it. The smoke preserves it and gives it the flavor of patience."
The apprentices placed their chickens over the embers, at a distance where the heat was intense but the flames could not lick them. The smoke, spiced by herbs the women had thrown on the fire, enveloped the birds in a gray, fragrant mantle.
The hours that followed were long. The hunger, which had been an abstract concept, became a gnawing presence in their bellies. They turned their chickens regularly, watching the color of the skin change from white to golden, then to an appetizing brown. The fat dripped onto the embers with a hiss that was both torture and a promise.
--
Night had fallen when NZUZI gave the signal. The meat was ready.
The smoking chickens were removed from the fire. Without needing an order, the apprentices formed a circle around the hearth. The Priestess stood apart, observing, a slight smile on her lips. This was their moment.
ZE-RAK tore a thigh from his black rooster. The meat was firm, juicy, imbued with the taste of wood and herbs. He brought the first bite to his mouth.
The taste was explosive. It wasn't just the satisfaction of assuaged hunger. It was the taste of the dust from the chase, of fear overcome, of the chicken's resistance under his hand, of the knife's thrill, of the blood's warmth, of the respectful silence of the killing, of the patience of smoking. It was the taste of his own courage and fear mingled. It was the taste of the pact.
He looked around. MOUSSEY chewed with fierce concentration, his eyes fixed on his meat as if trying to extract every particle of meaning from it. The others also ate in silence, their youthful faces hardened by the ordeal, illuminated by the dancing flames.
No one spoke. Words were useless. The crackling of the fire, the sound of chewing, and the night wind composed a primitive chant.
When ZE-RAK finished, only clean bones remained. He threw them into the fire, a final homage. MOUSSEY did the same, then another, and another. The bones crackled in the flames, consuming the last vestiges of the sacrifice.
--
The Priestess then stepped forward into the dancing firelight.
"You were hungry, and you have eaten. But look at yourselves. You are no longer the same as you were at dawn. You have taken life, and it has nourished you. You have sealed the pact in your flesh and in your blood. Remember this taste. It is not just that of the meat. It is the taste of power. And it is the taste of the price to be paid."
ZE-RAK met MOUSSEY's gaze from across the fire. There was no more challenge, no more provocation. There was a mute understanding. They had passed through a door together that would never close again. They had tasted the first, the most fundamental of powers: that of taking a life to preserve one's own. And they knew, deep within themselves, that nothing would ever be the same again.
The circle was now formed. They were, now, apprentice hunters.