Chapter 3: The Cauldron Forged

31 August 1974, Minneapolis, MN

“I WON’T DO IT. You know I won’t do it and there is no sense arguing about it. Why do you insist?”

“She’s ready. Goddess! She’s absolutely ripe. She needs her final initiation and the raising of power. She’s eighteen. I was fifteen when I raised power the first time.”

“I was twenty-one. There’s no rush.”

“You promised the circle that you would replace the cauldron and we four joined to complete your circle.”

“The cauldron of rebirth. I am not as ignorant about this as I was when you first scrambled my brain and tried to initiate me. I know what is involved and what is needed. She’ll know when the time is right.”

“You promised the circle.”

“Stop whining. I promised her mother. You were there. You swore the same oath. ‘All between these hands I commit to the Goddess. I, Promethean known as The Unbound, do of my own free will most solemnly swear to protect, help, and defend my sisters and brothers of the Art. I take this vow as Vagabond Priest and as champion of the High Priestess ... and her daughter. So mote it be.’ I repeat it to myself daily.”

“I know. I remind myself each morning. ‘We of the Fifth Circle accept the task of training your daughter, protecting her from all ill, and in league with your champion will forge the Cauldron Ops. So mote it be.’ It’s been five years. Can you blame us for becoming impatient?”

“No. But Serepte is something more than any of us or even all of us combined. I feel that we are close, as well, but I can’t rush it right now.”

“We really are a pair, aren’t we?” Judith lifted her lips to touch his and let the kiss deepen as he responded to her. “You know, I do love you,” she whispered. “It isn’t all about power. But lately...”

“What is it, Judith? This isn’t just about Serepte.”

“It is and it isn’t. Maybe I’m spending too much time at the Ren Faire, but I feel something moving in the area. Something dangerous.”

“You can tell by the itch in your thumbs, something wicked this way comes.”

“Don’t laugh. It’s like the veil is thinning and I can see through. We talk about the thin veil and walking between the worlds at Samhain, but this is different—more sinister. A presence is straining to reach us. I think she’s in danger. Serious danger if we don’t move quickly.”

“All of us have felt something,” Wayne sighed. “All we can do is be vigilant and be near when she needs us.”

“It’s full moon tonight. Will you meet us on the roof?”

“I get off work at one. I’ll join you then.”

The four priestesses and their vagabond priest sat on a rooftop in Minneapolis early on Sunday morning. The city was beginning to quiet down, though they could still hear an occasional horn blast or loud muffler on Hennepin Avenue, just a few blocks away. Judith, as always, led the charge.

“You’ve raised power with all the rest of us. Why not with her? Is our sex somehow less sacred?”

“Judith, when you and I first made love it was for love, not power. She should have the same opportunity.”

“That’s not usual for us,” Lissa said. “The first time for the other three of us was for power.”

“I understood that with Pallas and Rhea,” Wayne protested. “And we waited until we were fully comfortable with each other and did it for our enjoyment. I have to say, Chameleon, that the first time with you, I didn’t know that was what we were doing. My head was so muddled by the three of you, and the Bound, that I didn’t understand any of what was going on. And, my darling Badh, even when we raised power with sex, it was a by-product. An afterthought. It was a result of our love. At least it was to me.”

“We’re frustrated,” Meaghan said. “I didn’t realize when I volunteered for this that it was going to take a third of my life. And since she turned eighteen, Serepte has been more distant, not engaging in even our simple rituals like the full moon tonight. She spends her time in her room playing the flute.”

“She takes her music seriously,” Wayne said. He looked at his priestesses and sighed. “I need to share something else with you. I hoped it would just come as a natural part of our circle, but it seems I was wrong.”

“All the more reason to give her more power,” Elizabeth said.

“That’s just it. We can’t. When I visited The Hart this summer, she told me something else—a missing piece of the puzzle. She’s kept it from us until we moved here because she always assumed we would be nearby and she could fill us in at the right time. The time is right to share it with you, my priestesses is now. Serepte is a healer.”

“Only just now?”

“That’s what I asked. On the night we first forged our circle at the Duddo Five Stones, five years ago, Serepte died.”

“What?” The priestesses all pressed toward their priest, wanting to be closer as he revealed what had happened.

“It took the Hart a while to fit the pieces together. Serepte’s godfather was dying of cancer. He’d called her into his room to give her his blessing, but when she saw him, she immediately began playing her flute. He was literally on the brink of death, but her playing revived him. When she had finished playing, she fell into a coma. Her godfather, on the other hand, was completely healed of the cancer. You remember how the Hart suddenly left the morning after our Litha celebration? It was to rush home to be at Serepte’s side in the hospital.”

“And you say she died the night of our first circle? That was two weeks later,” Lissa said.

“Yes. And we all celebrated seeing a vision of Serepte as we raised our cone of power and opened a gate. It was our first act as the Cauldron of Ops to call Serepte back into her body.”

“Goddess!”

“What do you mean as the Cauldron of Ops. We were commissioned to forge a new cauldron.”

“And we did. We confused the two aspects of our mission as being one. We swore to reforge the cauldron, but also...”

“We of the Fifth Circle accept the task of training your daughter, protecting her from all ill, and in league with your champion will forge the Cauldron Ops,” the four priestesses recited their oath.

“We forged the Cauldron Ops when we brought our circle together and first raised the power. And our first act was to protect Serepte and bring her through the circle of rebirth.” Wayne let his words sink into the stunned priestesses.

“And we thought we were to forge her into the cauldron,” Meaghan whispered. “But at every gathering of the Great Circle, we represented the cauldron. Only it wasn’t a representation.”