“She said not to intervene.”
“How can we not?” I looked at Stella beside me.
“She said not to. They outnumber us.”
I looked back at the spectacle. Stella was right. They did outnumber us, but not if the nuns were on our side. Not if they chose us over them. It was something even Stella said she wasn’t sure about. Maybe they’d follow, maybe they won’t, she’d said. We can’t save them all. We’re not God. Stella’s hand squeezed tighter when the priest disrobed and stood in yet another robe, this one brown like the one the monks wore. He spoke, said something about the trinity, about sacrifice again, turned his face to look at Stella and me. To seal our fates. Only the chosen ones survive. What did that even mean? I wondered where Debbie was, where Dr. Thompson was. They should have been here by now with the police. They should have been here five minutes ago.
“Tonight is a long-awaited night,” the priest announced, his voice floating throughout the forest. “Thirty years we’ve waited for this. Thirty years, and because we have a perfect trinity—three sisters, triplets—we are able to partake in this sacred ritual. Our sisters will raise their gowns tonight and let the men in. Our establishment . . . ”
He continued on, but I couldn’t make out his words past the ringing in my ears. I looked at Stella.
“Everyone?” I asked. “All of them, all of us, will be raped? Even the elders?”
“I’ve never . . . ” Stella’s tears trickled down her face.
“Had sex?” My heart stopped.
“Not like that.” She shook her head.
Not with a man. That was what she meant. I knew it and it killed me that she couldn’t say it aloud. She’d just left The Institute. They’d probably done another round of that stupid conversion therapy on her. It killed me that they’d made her think her feelings weren’t valid because they weren’t for the sex they preferred a woman to be with.
“I won’t let them touch you.” I squeezed her hand.
She’d just left The Institute. They’d probably done another round of that stupid conversion therapy on her and now this. Looking around, I wasn’t sure what to think about the monks. Were they happy about this? Horrified? Their expressions were blank, completely bare of emotion. It occurred to me that I’d spent the last few weeks vilifying all of them. I hadn’t realized how young they were or how coerced they must have felt. I kept saying the rape of that woman, the rape of all of these women today, but in a sense weren’t they being raped as well? The ones being forced to participate anyway.
Suddenly, Wendy’s kidnapping made sense. If that was the case, what were they so afraid of? We should have gone to them before this, told them they didn’t have to do this, before we’d armed ourselves with knives and prepared ourselves to attack. In hindsight, I was beginning to regret a lot of things. At the top of the list—not looking for Adam and telling him what our plan was. I realized that the priest had stopped speaking. When I looked back in that direction, he was kneeling and Wendy was being disrobed.
It all happened fast after that. It wasn’t like in the movies, where things played out in slow motion. The only thing I knew was that if I had to stand in front of a jury to explain what happened, I wouldn’t be able to. My heart was in my throat as everyone ran past me in every which direction. This definitely wasn’t part of the plan. It wasn’t anything we’d discussed. What was happening? Were the cops here? Had I not heard them announcing their arrival? I looked beside me and realized Stella was no longer there. There were men and women with guns. There were nuns stabbing monks on the ground. There were groans and yells of pain, of remorse, all sounds I tried to block as I tried to listen for Stella’s answer to my call.
“Stella?” I looked around frantically, pushing through the crowd. “Stella?”
I couldn’t see her. My next instinct was to check on Wendy. As I ran over to the bench, shouldering past the monks running in the opposite direction, I was grabbed from behind. I kicked and screamed, jerking my body to try to free my arms to grab my blade, but it was no use, whoever grabbed me had a hold on me.
“Let go.” I tried to fight them off.
“No.” He growled, holding me tighter. “You’re the sacrifice.”
Tried to kick him again. I screamed as loud as I could, screamed again, but it was loud, everyone was screaming. Suddenly, I heard the loud bang of a gun. It was so close to my ears, my hearing was instantly replaced by loud ringing and muffled sounds. Something splatted on my face, covering my eyes, landing on my lips. I reached up and wiped it with the back of my hand and smelled the blood. This time, I screamed at the top of my lungs, but even that was muted to me. I couldn’t hear anything. And when a new pair of arms wrapped around me from behind, I couldn’t find the strength to fight, or scream, or cry.