Leo continued on about honor and sacrifice for some time, but I stopped listening to the bullshit line he was feeding everyone. I couldn’t believe how everyone stared at him, fascinated, as he justified the public banging of some guy’s wife for the sake of impregnating her. None of it made any sense to me, but then again, I didn’t understand why some monks refuse to wear clothes, either. It wasn’t my culture, so maybe I just needed to get over the whole thing.
There was one person who didn’t seem as enthralled about what was being said, though. As everyone else focused on the council leader, I watched Brandon instead. His hands were shaking, and he kept looking from Leo to Nikki with a shocked expression on his face. He stared at the circle of men who would soon be lining up to take a turn at her.
“As the vessel of life takes the seed of the community—”
“No!”
The shout seemed to startle the people on either side of me, and Brandon took a couple of steps forward, moving between Leo and the table where Nikki lay on her back. I could see her trying to lift her head a little to see, but she was too drugged to do it.
Brandon stepped up to his wife’s side and leaned close to her.
“We’re not doing this!” I heard him exclaim as he started unwinding the ribbons from her arms. “We’re going to find some other way. I’m not going to let you go through with this!”
Nikki sat up and promptly slumped against him. I didn’t know what had been in the bowl, but it obviously had her pretty out of it.
“But…but we said we would…” she mumbled.
“Forget it!” Brandon exclaimed.
“I want a baby…for you…”
“We’ll have one,” he promised her. “We’ll find some way.”
“Brandon,” Leo said, interrupting, “this isn’t just about you and Nikki. I know it’s difficult, but for the s
ake of your people—”
“I don’t care!” Brandon stated. “I’m not going to just stand around and watch this. Liam was right—this is just too fucked up!”
All eyes turned to me, and Tria’s back pushed up against my chest a little tighter as she tilted her head back to look at me. Keith’s hateful glare bore down on me almost as murderously as his father’s.
“What?” I asked. “I didn’t do anything!”
“Come on, Nikki,” Brandon said. He lifted her up under her arms and tried to help her stand. She nearly fell over, but he kept his grip on her.
“I don’t have to do it?” she asked quietly.
“Brandon, think about what you are doing,” Leo said. “Your people need you. The community needs you, and you need to—”
“No, Nikki,” he told her as he ignored Leo’s words. “We’re not doing this.”
“Oh…good,” she mumbled in her drugged stupor. “I didn’t want to do it.”
“I know,” he replied as he gave up trying to get her to stand on her feet and bent down to pick her up in his arms.
“Nikki…” Patricia took a step forward and out of the circle, but she didn’t seem to know what she wanted to say past her own daughter’s name.
“Could you take us home, please?” Brandon asked as he passed his mother-in-law.
“Thank God,” Steven mumbled quietly next to me.
Everyone just kind of stood there and watched, some with mouths hanging open, as Brandon carried Nikki out of the clearing. Patricia followed them without another word, and within a couple of minutes, the guests of honor were pulling out around a tree and moving off down the road, heading out of sight.
“So, is there a backup ceremony or anything now?” I asked Tria with a wide grin.
“Liam!” she said through a tight jaw. “Shut up!”
She looked back at Leo, who was openly glaring at me now as he shuffled over to us.