American Pagans
Becky had been spending a lot of time in the company of a girl with the antique name, Edna. Edna Rosenberg.
Edna “Ravenchild” Rosenberg.
“Ravenchild?”
“Yeah, we’re all picking pagan names. What do you think?”
“I don’t know,” Becky admitted. “I’m supposed to come up with something like that?”
“Yeah. We all are.”
“Ravenchild?”
“Ravenchild. Exactly. Doesn’t it sound cool?”
“Uh-huh…”
It was dusk. They were hanging out in the parking lot outside Bennigan’s, waiting for Donna Sokolski—Donna “Winterhawk” Sokolski—to get out of work.
“So, what name should I be?” Becky asked, lighting a cigarette.
“I don’t know. You have to find your own name. You have to dream for it or chant for it. You gotta beseech the Goddess. She will then reveal your true pagan name.”
“Okay. Beseech the Goddess. Gotcha…”
“Yeah. I meditated for, like, over twenty minutes until the Goddess blessed me with my name. Ravenchild.”
“Okay. I’ll try that.”
“Cool. Can’t wait to hear what you come up with.”
“So, um, what exactly am I supposed to do at this thing again?”
“You don’t have to do shit. You and Donna are just there to observe. You can’t enter the Cone of Power until you’re initiated.”
“Right. Okay.”
“Here comes Donna. It’s about goddamn time.”
Donna Sokolski was a short, plump girl of nineteen. She wore small round glasses and always appeared to be squinting, as if her thick lenses obscured her vision rather than enhance it. “Hey, guys,” she said. She was still wearing her waitress uniform and smelled like food. She was holding a Styrofoam take-out container and she opened it toward them. “Broccoli Bite?”
“No thanks,” said Ravenchild.
Becky said, “I’ll take one. Thanks, Donna.”
“Sure, no prob.”
“We better get going,” said Ravenchild. “The sun’s almost down.”
The three women climbed into Ravenchild’s red Volkswagen Jetta and soon they were speeding down highway 12.
“Hey, you got a pagan name yet?” Donna – Winterhawk – asked Becky.
“No. Not yet. What about Bumblebee?”
“Bumblebee?” said Ravenchild.
“Yeah.” Becky said. “I always liked bees. They’re associated with flowers and honey. They’re pretty but they’ll also sting you if you give them any shit. I saw this documentary once that said bees have, like, their own language. They’re, like, the smartest, most organized insects around, bar none. It’s really kinda cool.”
“That’s retarded,” said Ravenchild. “You absolutely can NOT be “Bumblebee.”
Becky deflated. Fuck you, bitch! This whole thing was fucking lame anyway. Fuck you AND your goddess! was what she wanted to say. Instead, she said, “Oh. Okay. I’ll think of something else…”
“I told you. You have to pray to the Goddess to get your name.”
“Oh yeah. Sorry, Edna.”
“What?”
“Oops! I mean Ravenchild. Sorry…”
“You better snap out of that shit when we get there.”
A few minutes later, Ravenchild pulled off the highway and soon they were bouncing down a rutted dirt road. Low-hanging branches hissed against the sides of the car. They stopped at the edge of a small clearing surrounded by pine trees and blind night.
Three other cars were already parked in the clearing.
Ravenchild shut off the engine. “This is it. I gotta change first.”
Once Ravenchild was costumed in a toga she’d fashioned from a white bedsheet, she led Becky and Winterhawk into the woods.
A narrow path, thickly carpeted with damp red-pine needles, unspooled through the dark forest, making their footfalls eerily silent. After a few minutes, Becky could see a flickering light winking through the trees. She realized her heart started beating faster the closer they got to the fire.
They joined six more robed people standing around a small bonfire. Four women and two men. Becky had met them all before at Edna’s house but this was the first time she’d seen them in their pagan regalia. Things were getting creepy, Becky thought. Her heart rate continued to race.
“Welcome, sisters,” said a tall, red-haired woman that Becky had met as Winifred O’Brian a couple weeks ago.
“Hi, Winnie,” she said.
“Hi Becky. You can call me Silverfox now.”
“Okay. Silverfox. Pretty name.”
“I know, right?” She turned toward the others. “I guess we’re all here now. We might as well get started,” said Silverfox. She pulled a long curved dagger from the folds of her robe. She held it out toward the fire.
“Wait!” Winterhawk interrupted. “We’re not all here yet.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Ravenchild, an edge of suspicion in her voice. “I count nine.”
“I told my boyfriend he could come. He’ll be here any minute.”
“You did what?” Ravenchild lowered her hood to face Winterhawk. “You can’t do that!” she yelled. “You’re not even in the coven yet! You can’t just invite people to a ritual until you’re a member of the coven!”
Winterhawk looked down at her feet. “Oh. Um, sorry, Edna. I didn’t know.”
Becky was startled by a sudden crunching noise behind her. She turned. A small goat was tied to a tree. It bleated at her and then went back to eating twigs.
“Hey,” she said. “Where’d you get the goat?”
“I can’t fucking believe you invited your boyfriend,” said Ravenchild.
“Calm down, sister Ravenchild,” said Silverfox. “It’s not the end of the world. The ritual won’t take long. But let’s get started. Maybe we can finish before he gets here. It could be worse. Remember, you wanted for us to be skyclad. At least we ain’t naked right now.”
“I’m really sorry you guys,” said Winterhawk.
Ravenchild glared at her for a few extra seconds, then flipped her hood back up.
Becky turned from the goat to Silverfox. “Hey, what’s the knife for?”
“It’s called an Athame,” Ravenchild corrected her.
“Yeah? So, what’s it for?”
“For the sacrifice. What do you think?”
“You’re gonna kill the goat?” Becky said, horrified.
Silverfox nodded, smiling. “M-hm.”
“Oh my God.”
“Hey, Becky? Shut the fuck up,” Ravenchild said. “You’re here to observe. You’re supposed to do that with your mouth shut. Capice?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t know you’d be killing a…” She stopped. Voices were traveling up the path toward them.
“Now what?” said Silverfox.
“Hey hey hey!” said a deep, man’s voice. “Let’s get this showboat on the rowboat!” He was carrying two 30-packs of Budweiser. Six other people followed him. They carried the smell of pot along with them.
“What the actual fuck,” said Silverfox.
Winterhawk kissed the man holding the beer. “Hey, Tony,” she said.
“I can’t fucking believe this,” said Ravenchild, shaking her head.
The goat bleated.
The man plopped down the boxes of beer, ripped open a 30-pack and started passing out cold wet cans. “Okay! Who needs a brew?” he said. “What’d you guys bring?”
Winterhawk pulled him aside. “Hey, um, sweetie? You didn’t tell me you were bringing the whole gang.”
He shrugged. “The more the merrier, that’s my policy!”
“Yeah, well, I guess I didn’t make it clear that this isn’t actually a party.”
“Coulda fooled me,” he said, looking at the toga-clad gathering.
“Yeah, well, anyway, we’re kinda in the middle of a ritual right now. You think you guys could hang back and mellow out for a while?”
He shrugged again. “Yeah, sure babes. What kinda ritual?”
“I don’t know. The regular kind…”
“Hey! Look at the goat!” said a girl’s voice. Becky watched as a pretty blond girl knelt beside the goat and stuck out her hand. “Does he bite?” she asked Becky.
“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”
The blond girl stroked the goat’s neck. “This is so cool! I used to love petting zoos.”
“Can we get started?” said one of the robed men, a skinny, twenty-something named Edgar “Wolfman” Petrovski.
“Hey, do goats really eat tin cans?” the blond girl asked Becky.
“I have no idea.”
“Excuse me!” Ravenchild elbowed the blond aside and untied the goat. She led it over to Silverfox on the other side of the fire.
“Hey, what are they gonna do with the goat?” asked the blond girl.
“Kill it,” Becky said.
The blond’s eyes widened. “What? Are you shitting me?”
Becky shook her head. “No. It’s a pagan thing.”
“But they can’t do that!”
“Quiet!” Ravenchild hissed at them.
The blond girl pulled Becky away from the fire and whispered, “Are they really gonna kill that poor little goat?”
“That’s the plan. Fucked up, huh?”
“That’s fucked up.”
“I know.”
She stuck out her hand. “My name’s Eve by the way.”
Becky shook her hand. “Hi Eve. I’m Becky.”
“Good to meet you, Becky.”
“You too.”
“So, are you like a witch or something?”
Becky laughed. “No. I’m just here to observe.”
“You’re here to watch a goat get stabbed?”
“I guess. Sad, huh?”
“Yeah. Very. And very fucked up…” And then she said, “Come on, let’s get a closer look.”
They returned to the fire. Silverfox was standing over the goat. The dagger— Athame—clutched in both hands.
Silence descended as she raised the knife. She held it over her head for a few long seconds. Then she lowered it again. “I don’t think I can do this.”
The goat was grazing at her knees, munching twigs and pine needles. She held the knife out to Wolfman. “Can you do it?”
He looked at the knife for a moment, and then stepped forward and grabbed it.
“Hey, hurry up!” yelled one of the guys who’d arrived with Tony. He was a large, bearded man wearing a backwards baseball cap. “I’m starving.”
“Shut up!” Ravenchild told him. “We’re not eating the goat!”
“You’re not?” said the man. “That’s a fucken waste of meat. You shouldn’t kill anything you don’t intend to eat.”
“Will you please be quiet please,” said Wolfman, lifting the knife.
“Sorry, dude,” said the man after a slurp of beer.
“In the name of Diana, Goddess of the hunt and the moon and the trees, I offer this sacrifice.”
Silence. Then the fizzing crack of another beer opening.
A belch. Laughter.
Someone tossed an empty can into the fire. The backwash quickly sizzled away.
Wolfman held the knife poised over his head. His hands began to shake. “I’m not sure I can do this either.”
“What a bunch of shit!” said the man with the beard. “I’ll take care of this.” He pushed Wolfman out of the way, and then yanked a pistol out of his jacket pocket.
“Sayonara, goat!” he said and then shot the animal through the top of the head.
Eve screamed and hugged Becky, hiding her face against her shoulder.
“Jesus Christ!” said Wolfman, staggering backwards. The goat had folded, dead.
Becky broke off the embrace and looked into Eve’s eyes, noticing again how beautiful she was. “It’s okay,” she told her. “It’s over now.”
The bearded man elbowed Wolfman. “Hey gimme that knife,” he said. “Let’s get this puppy dressed and roasting on the fire!”
“Roast goat! Hey, that rhymes!” said Winterhawk’s boyfriend, Tony.
“Well, I don’t need to see this,” Eve announced. “I’m calling it a night. Anyone need a ride?” she said.
Becky said, “I do,” and left with Eve, eager to get away from the pagan ritual. She knew the smell of cooked goat would make her sick.
Becky left with Eve and they headed back to Bennigan’s for white wine spritzers.
Horror Sleaze Trash 