One
R. 12/23/2006.

Three. Three sides to a shape with no opposing force. That's what the triumvirate does for the Circle. Cassie as the bottom side of a shape where the other edges can lean and lean and push and pull and never fall out of balance. A frightful kind of symmetry.

Three months since the interim started, and now to make it perfect, without a single objection from the others. Three rituals done over the course of three weeks on three different days: cementing them as priestesses of the coven, of the land and space they occupy, of each other.

Drawing them ever closer, ever tighter to another, until it doesn't matter that they are three, until three is the same as one. One.

First ritual:

Cassie and two mirror-girls, reverse doppelgangers, placed at three corners, with the rest of the Circle (oh, irony of names) enclosed safely inside, arms outstretched as if they were linked across the expanse of sand between each of them, and over the swish swish swish of the quiet, rhythmic sea, she hears their voices melding into hers. Hum of ancient parallels, undying strength, a thrum like electricity surging through her.

Becoming. Not just as if their arms were linked, but they really are somehow, tied and held tight with almost-visible ropes of power. Cassie can feel the delicate coolness of Diana's fingers, the firm cruel grip of Faye's. Drawing power from moon and trees and air, cementing them as leaders, pillars, thrones. She can feel something melt and pool inside her, something slip away and converge and return, there on the otherwise silent, moonlit shore. One.

Second ritual:

The soft cushion of Cassie's living-room-floor rug, her mother gone to stay further on down the road for the night, smell of liquid candlewax and musk on the air. Six bodies on the floor marking out a six-pointed star--Cassie, Diana, Faye, Nick, Chris, Doug. The three priestesses and three energy-anchors, raisers, three partners attached but not too much.

Murmuring words against heated skin, long undulating incantations that bind, bind, bind the island to the land, to safety, that unite Circle and earth and sea and sky. They move, and move, languid, liquid, steam, and drawn inward, Diana looks outward, across the geometry of bodies. Something shifts.

Feelings that are decidedly not hers, at least, not precisely; a veil, a film pulled away, and suddenly she is three bodies moving toward a common goal, experiencing the movements of six hands on three different flat-planed bodies, shivering under the spell of three different facets of one ultimate pleasure. One.

Third ritual:

In Faye's bedroom with the door locked, not that anyone ever tries to come in, not that there's anyone else at home at this time of day anyway. Faye's got the gauzy red curtains drawn and the incense burning, Japanese paper lamp in the corner balancing out the mood.

A private time, for sisters, for more than sisters could ever hope or dare to be. Their three nude forms painted with signs, sigils, promises as they slip around on her clean satin sheets, Cassie's wavy hair wild like some jungle girl, power in her hands as they slide up Faye's abdomen, hunger in her eyes as they meet with Diana's next to her.

Pair-bonding time for a pair of three. Mate-bond. Three priestesses with the world holding its breath around them, with all their cycles and thoughts and breaths in sync, with their bodies barely dividing them from one another, from sinking in and dissolving there in that smoky red room.

Cassie's hand on Diana's hand on Faye's breast, both her hands busy at Cassie's waist with her mouth busy making small, delicate kisses against Diana's lips. Cyclical, physical ritual, deep and vital and strong in a way no magic she's ever done before, with anyone, has ever been. Mutuality and pure want on a level she can't even begin to gauge, but slow, patient, charged.

It's an urgency that's intent rather than hurried; she finds her hands migrating, all their hands, finding the soft sweet places that make each of them gasp, moan, whatever feels right; finds them rearranged so that dear Diana is on the bottom, so innocent even now, so blindly hungry.

Cassie's mouth like a lick of fire on her shoulder as they all three begin to move, touch in earnest, no softness in it now, but no roughness either, just want and want and want, three mirrors of wanting that drive them to a deep, silent place, and then release them again into the light.

Buoyant. Weightless. Sated. Drifting together, entwined, melted, borderless. One.

End.

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