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"You can well iine how I looked when I stepped from the oak The Druids had waited for my knock upon the door, and in od
"My hu finished, I was ravenous, and surelyskull No doubtfro on me as on a skeleton And no clearer evidence of iven to the Druids, who stood awestruck as I came out of the tree
"But I saw not merely their faces, I saw into their hearts I saw the relief in Mael that the god within had not been too feeble to create me I saw the confirmation in hireat vision that is ours to see -- the great spiritual depth of each man buried deep within a crucible of heated flesh and blood
"My thirst was pure agony And suth, I said `Take in’
"The Druids let out chilling screarove there ca roar from the multitudes who had waited for that cry
"We walked swiftly, in procession towards the clearing, and reet us and I found rant flowers from all sides, blossoms I crushed under my feet as I was saluted with hymns
"I need not tell you how the world looked to me with the new vision, how I saw each tint and surface beneath the thin veil of darkness, how these hymns and anthems assaulted rated inside this new being
"Tru as I mounted the steps of the stone altar and looked out over the thousands gathered there -- the sea of expectant faces, the giant wicker figures with their doo inside
"A great silver caldron of water stood before the altar, and as the priests sang, a chain of prisoners was led to this caldron, their arms bound behind their backs
"The voices were singing in concert around me as the priests placed the flowers in my hair, on my shoulders, at od of the woods and the fields, drink now the sacrifices offered to you, and as your wasted limbs fill with life, so the earth will renew itself So you will forgive us for the cutting of the corn which is the harvest, so you will bless the seed ’
"And I saw before me those selected to be my victims, three stout men, bound as the others were bound, but clean and dressed also in white robes, with flowers on their shoulders and in their hair Youths they were, handsome and innocent and overcood
"The tru was ceaseless I said:
"`Let the sacrifices begin!’ And as the first youth was delivered up to me, as I prepared to drink for the very first time from that truly divine cup which is human life, as I held the warm flesh of the victim in my hands, the blood ready forwicker giants, I saw the first two prisoners forced head down into the water of the silver caldron
"Death by fire, death by water, death by the piercing teeth of the hungry god
"Through the age-old ecstasy, the hyod of the woods and fields, you who are the very i with the blood of the victirow beautiful so that the Great Mother will take you to herself’
"How long did it last? I do not know It was forever -- the blaze of the wicker giants, the screa procession of those who must be drowned I drank and drank, not merely from the three selected for me, but from a dozen others before they were returned to the caldron, or forced into the blazing giants The priests cut the heads fro them in pyramids to either side of the altar, and the bodies were borne away
"Everywhere I turned I saw rapture on sweating faces, everywhere I turned I heard the antheiants were fallen into a s
"And it was now timents, for eance against others, and forI had drunk too much blood, but I felt such power inand deep into the forest I could have spread invisible wings, or so it seemed
"But I carried out my `destiny’ as Mael would have called it I found this one just, that one in error, this one innocent, that one deserving of death
"I don’t kno long it went on because er measured time in weariness But finally it was finished, and I realized the moment of action had cood had commanded me, which was to escape the imprisonment in the oak And I also had precious little time in which to do it, no more than an hour before dawn
"As for what lay ahead in Egypt, I had not made my decision yet But I knew that if I let the Druids enclose ain, I would starve in there until the shts until that time would be thirst and torture, and what the old one had called `the god’s dreams’ in which I’d learn the secrets of the tree and the grass that grew and the silent Mother
"But these secrets were not for me
"The Druids surrounded ain, the hy to a litany which commanded me to reuardian, and to speak kindly through the oak to those of the priesthood ould couidance of e pyre was blazing in the ht on the carved faces and the heaps off hu A current of terror shot through s have for us