Page 36 of Saint, Sorrow, Sinner
“Calm down,” the witch yowled. She poked Sophia’s cheek with her toe, earning a swat. She grinned and scissored two fingers toward Juniper, asking for the joint. “So Colin told me you’ve been communing with Lilith.”
At the same time, Sophia and Juniper said, “What?”
“Hey, don’t shoot the messenger. That’s what the cleaner said,” she mumbled, pinching the skinny end of the joint between her lips. The tip smoldered and sparked, lighting without the use of a flame. It was things like that, casual magic, that made Sophia’s chest clench. Tehlor blew plumes into the air and tipped her head back, sinking deeper into the tub. She rested her ankles on the lip next to Sophia’s shoulder. “She’s one tough bitch, little girl. Be careful.”
“I have no idea who I’mcommuningwith, but it’s not lily—”
“Lilith,” Juniper corrected.
Tehlor laughed.
“Lilith, whatever,” Sophia snapped.
“It’s not whatever,” Tehlor said. Her tone was sobering. She took another puff and held the joint toward her. When Sophia shook herhead, she shrugged. “I’m guessing you don’t know much about her given Haven’s obsession with building a necrophiliac army—”
Juniper whipped around. “Tehlor—”
“What, c’mon, she was there,” Tehlor sneered. She offered the joint to Juniper, who politely declined. “But yeah, anyway, do you know who she is?”
Sophia shook her head. She knew Mary of Nazareth, and Rachel—God hearkened to her—and Miriam the prophet, and Mary of Bethany, and all the other women scattered throughout the Bible. But the only one she could manage to think about was Lot’s wife, unnamed and a bearer of burdens, who glanced back at Sodom and was turned into a pillar of salt. She relaxed, extending her legs beneath the water.
Womanhood was a strange, changing thing, and Sophia found herself apprehended by the suddenness of it. Intimacy she’d never experienced; vulnerability she’d always yearned for. She thought of movies—teenagers sharing bubble baths, young women doing each other’s makeup, brides surrounded by maidens—and ignored her shyness in favor of something else. Tehlor and Juniper, trust and ease, growth and newness.
“Lilith is a lot of different things. She’s a demoness in some iterations,” Tehlor said, muffling a cough. “A Sumerian goddess, one of the mothers of witchcraft, child of Lucifer, blah, blah. Lots of people think she’s Adam’s disobedient first wife. God gave her the boot for bein’ hypersexual or some shit, I don’t know, but there’s a few old Aramaic texts that hint at her being the firstanythingtoo.” She met Sophia’s eyes. Her smile deepened. “So some people think Lilith is the bridge between angels and humans. That God created her before creating light and cast her out of Eden because she was too cunning to control. Pretty hot bitch of her if you ask me.”
Juniper sighed. “Everything is rooted inbelief, Sophia. People who believe she’s a demon, receive her as a demon. If they believe she’s a goddess, they’ll find a goddess. Has she reached for you?”
Sophia toyed with the amethyst, pressing each finger to its sharp fang. “Someone spoke to me. I don’t know who.”
“Rumor has it, she’s the voice who drove Joan of Arc to victory. Everyone called her crazy, but ...” Tehlor shrugged and laughed triumphantly, billowing smoke like a dragon. “Viva la révolution!”
God guided Joan of Arc to victory.Sophia swallowed hard. Heat still clung to the water, but a chill ran through her, and she sank back down, submerging her shoulders.Not some demoness.
“Hola,” Juniper whispered lovingly, like someone would to a baby, and lifted her palm eye level. Gunnhild rested in her hand, nose twitching. “Tehlor, did you leave Colin and Lincoln alone together?”
“They’re fine,” she assured, smiling fondly at the plump rat.
“If you say so.”
“Can we get back to the demon, goddess, deity,whoever, please?” Sophia asked. “What do ... What do they want? Like, how do I do this? I can’t ... I don’t get it. I don’t know what to do.”
“Don’t get what? How to connect with deities? Yeah, nobody really knows how. We all just wing it and cross our fingers,” Tehlor said. “I didn’t expect Fenrir to pick me.”
Sophia remembered the mountainous shape on the horizon, shadowing the Gideon Preserve. How snow framed its massive jaws. “That’s your god?”
“I have many gods,” Tehlor said. She finished the joint and extinguished the butt with a tap to the water’s surface. “True gods. But yeah, Fenrir came to me in a dream, then accepted my sacrifice at the revival. Flooded me with power.” She considered her next wordsbefore relenting. “You’ve probably never done, like, coke, right? Cocaine?”
Sophia narrowed her eyes.
“Taking that as a no.Anyway, channeling Fenrir was a lot like doing somethin’ risky, you know? Felt great, felt fuckin’ awesome, felt terrifying too,” she said quietly. Her expression relaxed and she rubbed the hawk tattooed on her neck. “Power isn’t protected. What’s given can be taken away. Faith, though? Worship? Dedication? That’ll keep you safe when you’ve got nothing left.”
Finally,Sophia thought,you’re telling the truth.
“What if I don’t want power?” Sophia asked.
“Be for real.” Tehlor snorted. “Everyone wants power. Even you. Especially you, actually.”
“You don’t know that.”
