Page 16 of Sacrifice

“As soon as I realized they didn’t know, it felt like a lightning bolt hit me,” I went on. “Suddenly there was just one thought in my head. Actually, it was a voice.Yourvoice, telling me it was all wrong. All made up. After that, things kept snowballing in my brain. I could barely even sleep last night. I just kept thinking about all the things that no longer make sense to me.”

“Like what?” Sebastian asked, cocking his head.

“Like how women aren’t allowed to be elders, for example. In fact, we aren’t allowed to make any major decisions at all. Only the men can.” I threw my hands up. “All my life, I was raisedto believe that was the right way to do things. That we were all equal when we so clearly weren’t.”

He grunted. “No shit.”

“And the other thing you pointed out a while ago, about the sacrifices. I wasn’t ready to think about it then, but I am now.” I turned and looked at him again. “Why is it only girls and women who have to die during the eclipses? Why aren’t men ever sacrificed? Where’s the equality there?”

“Nowhere. It’s fucked up.”

“I feel so stupid.”

“You aren’t stupid. Not one bit. You were conditioned from birth, like everyone else here.”

“It feels more like I was blind this whole time, and suddenly I can see clearly.” I shook my head. “The thing that really got me was when I remembered a history lesson from my school years. About the founders.”

“Dubois and Brouxard?”

“That’s right. This probably won’t surprise you in the slightest, but they were both motherless,” I said in a wry tone. “Their mothers died giving birth to their younger sisters.”

“Ah.” Sebastian nodded slowly. “Of course.”

“You were right all along. The Covenant founders hated women, and they based their entire religious doctrine around that hatred.” I narrowed my eyes, looking at the elders standing around the bonfire. “And they all know. Theyknowand they don’t care because it benefits them at our expense.”

“If it’s any consolation, I don’t think the founders consciously despised women,” Sebastian replied. “They were a product of their time. Raised to see women as their subordinates. It’s very hard to break out of the mindset you’re born and raised in. You know that better than most.”

“But what about the sacrifices?” I said, knitting my brows. “You don’t think they created the concept of celestial virgins to punish their sisters in perpetuity?”

He shook his head. “I think their personal histories shaped the doctrine they invented, but I don’t think it was a conscious decision to punish women.”

“How could itnotbe conscious?”

Sebastian was silent for a moment, brows drawn into a contemplative frown. “Something struck me when your father first told me the story of the founders,” he finally said. “I remember thinking the whole story sounded like a giant drug trip.”

“A drug trip?”

“When people take certain drugs, they end up in an altered state of mind,” he explained. “They might see, hear, and feel things that aren’t there. It can also heighten their sense of emotions and bring back long-buried memories. All that put together—that’s what we call a trip.”

“Oh, I see.” My nose wrinkled. “So what does a drug trip have to do with Dubois and Brouxard?”

“I think that’s what happened to the two of them. I think they got lost in the woods and ran out of food. They eventually came across a cave and ate some mushrooms they found inside. Mushrooms that turned out to have psychedelic properties. Then the two of them ended up tripping in a major way,” Sebastian said. “Of course, they didn’t understand what was happening to them at the time, so they viewed it as a holy experience. They truly believed they were seeing and hearing God.”

“But it was just their own minds,” I said, finally realizing what he was getting at.

“Exactly. That’s why the belief system they came up with seems to be influenced by their religious roots—Dubois’s Catholicism and Brouxard’s paganism. It’s not just a coincidence,” he replied. “It wasn’t only shaped by their religious beliefs, either. It was also shaped by their own personal experiences. Both having mothers that died delivering baby girls, for example. That wound up in their new doctrine in the form of celestial virgin sacrifices, because it was something that had deeply affected them both.”

“That makes sense,” I murmured, nodding slowly.

“Like I said, I don’t think these men consciously hated their sisters and wanted to punish them, along with every other girl whose mother died giving birth to them,” he went on. “I think they genuinely believed that they’d shared a holy experience in that cave. One that told them exactly how they—and everyone else around them—should live their lives. When really, they were just high as fuck and coming up with stuff based on their own experiences.”

“Well, whether their doctrine is based on hatred or not, countless innocent women have died because of it,” I said. “Iwas going to die because of it.”

A muscle ticked in Sebastian’s jaw. “I know. It’s fucked up. But I’m not going to let that happen to you.”

“I know.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry you had to find out like this. I can’t imagine how confusing and terrifying it must be for you to have your whole life and belief system uprooted so suddenly.”

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