Big talk. But Agnes is dead. And I don’t know if you heard, but your little woodland circle’s been broken. So I don’t really see, anything getting in my way, if I wanted to burn the flesh, off your snarky bones.

We burned down five acres of woodland to create the site. At the center of the blackened, ash-covered forest we built a pyre so high and strong the flame would be clear for miles, and so cunningly built it would catch in moments. Before it, the great bowl of pure water for Asag’s scalding baptism. And in the center of pyre, a hollow, where Eileen was to lay. We prayed, and sacrificed, and anointed her body with holy oil and a crown of kindling. I protested the last one, felt we could do better than to ape the Christians, but I was shouted down. At last, the hour was at hand, and as the first contractions started, Arthur struck a match. The fire was so immediate, so intense, that I was almost brought to my knees, the light of the pyre so bright for a second before it turned inwards, robbed of its glow and comfort, and turned entirely into blistering and unbearable heat. It covered Eileen in a second, flesh blackening and cracking, lips parting in a scream that was all at once agony and joy and terror and communion, as layer after layer of skin and muscle and bone were one by one destroyed by the force of the flames, until at last nothing remained of her but ash and bone. And on top of that, sleeping peacefully among the fire, a baby. Untouched, unharmed, and to our eyes, alight with a burning divinity.