THE PRICE PAID IN BLOOD. HAN MIYOUNG,
WE ENTREAT THEE. RISE. RISE. RISE!
being in the lone presence of the high priest is an extraordinary honor and right now, you are in the thick of it. the ever so watchful eyes of ho sangchul rarely glance over to you, he does not even need a proper look to read you like an open book. busy hands with sharp fingernails skim through your file, placing an ominous scribble here and there before he finally raises his voice.
“thank you for meeting me, sister. do tell me something about yourself.”
lips part, a door opens in access to the words that form on her tongue, but miyoung says nothing. her lips meld against one another as she thinks about the words she can say. from a young age the witch had barricaded herself in libraries, devouring the testimonies that witches and warlocks before her had left behind. she is aware of how to craft a story, of how to string words together to leave a lasting impression on the young mind.
but han miyoung is not a testimony, and she has yet to learn how to perfect the self-serving propaganda that will fall off of any witch’s tongue. she takes her time on the question, taking her time with each syllable.
hands which are sitting atop her lap unfold themselves as she prepares an answer, fingers twitching, readying themselves to move with her every word.
“i was born on the twenty-second of january, i’m sure it’s there in my file but i say this because of it’s significance. my uncle tells me that the number twenty-two is the number of the master builder, and as the day of my birth it marks me as someone who can turn my dreams into reality. the number one because of the first month has to do with leadership and independence.” it’s a human thing to want to decorate one’s body with such things, and miyoung almost allowed herself one of these human indulgences.
the young witch takes a pause, and then continues. “i am the youngest of two siblings. and as any other witch or warlock i have participated in the dark baptism during my sixteenth year,” her parents and closest family had attended as was tradition ― and miyoung had pretended that she didn’t notice that attendance had been lacking in comparison to that of her older siblings. “the lupercalia and feast of autumn are mandated as part of my family.”
“before joining the academy i spent years under the tutelage of a private tutor who helped me master six ancient tongues, i have an affinity for languages it seems and i spend much of my time reading…for the sake of reading mostly, which i believe is the best reason to do so. knowledge for the sake of knowledge.” although she knew knowledge was power, she sought joy in the acquisition of knowledge and not the praise that came from acquiring it. “i think i could be an archivist or something along those lines.”
this was one of the many things that emphasized the parallel between herself and her older sibling; miyoung could amass all this knowledge and never tell a soul. if there was no one with expectations about who she should be, she would still devour the ancient scriptures with a vicious hunger.
miyoung thinks about anything she’s missed, eyes gazing up at the ceiling in search of answers before her lips form a small ‘o’. “Goethe’s Faust; when i wasn’t spending my time learning i did have acting classes, my parents insist on the extracurriculars and my aunt herself is a thespian, i’m sure she would love to see me in the play.”
“i see. now, your file contains the bare necessities about your family. i would like to hear more.”
“family is important; we are bound to his excellency and we are bound to our mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters.” from the very beginning these ideals were instilled in the young witch. her family is prestigious, and must cement that status by assuring themselves of their children’s success.
“the han family is a family of silver spoons, we are not overt in our wealth or influence, because we are aware that certain times demand silence, and if one must act you may opt to use a sleight of hand. we are devoted.” it’s not slyness that keeps the family afloat, it is their adherence to tradition, she tells herself, but miyoung and the high priest both know to read between the lines.
her mother and father were the pinnacle of the household, and she loved the two and all they had to teach her. loved them until she did not.
“my mother is a strong woman who is selfless and serves my father just as her mother did served her father and so on. my father is the benevolent head of the household, he is heavy handed and will take none of anyone scoffing at tradition. but he is loving.”
miyoung wishes she had more to say, but she fears there may be a slip of the tongue and she shows herself to be anything less than a devoted daughter.
“as i said before i am the younger of two. they like to tease me for being less driven than they are but we just express that drive in different ways.”
she loves and resents them, but she smiles and holds a hand to her breast, miyoung is a loving younger sister, devoted, “we have our differences as siblings typically do, but they are my kin, and by that bond of blood they are my everything.”
“of them all my favorite, if i may allow myself one, is my aunt gyeongri, whom i had been living with for about six years. her library was much bigger than the one we have at home, and her support endless.” it was good to live with a woman who was the helm of her own household, a woman who supported miyoung’s dreams and shared her own.
a woman on a pillar she had crafted from bone and ivory was a powerful thing.
“how very interesting. here it says you specialize in sacred geometry, ancient tongue & scriptures. what evoked your interest?”
miyoung had missed her first two years of study by accident; in her eighteenth and nineteenth years the young witch had been nothing more than a hermit, locking herself inside four walls filled with old texts. she had read the texts and scrolls in the old tongues, had memorized the words of their dark lord and could recite the history of their craft backwards and forwards.
before then she had been surrounded by historians, men and women of her family name who studied the past through the study of the decayed body or the forgotten text.
men and women who enforced the laws of the swine and the swine-herder, the witch and the warlock.
“well, those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it,” the words are airy, like music. “what is a witch who knows nothing of how she came to be, what is a witch who knows nothing of the foundations of her art? she is nothing,”
but a witch is always nothing. in the eyes of her family, in the eyes of the warlocks a witch is nothing. and yet, miyoung knows, she knows that a witch has never been nothing. who if not a witch begun the feast of autumn, who if not a witch bears life to every warlock that becomes a high priest, and every witch who must serve beneath him.
“if always believed that having this thirst for knowledge is the same as teaching a man to fish, he will be fed forever and is able to support his yearning. it only makes sense to me that i indulge and make attempts at satiating my appetite. my mother practices necromancy and my father practices poppet puppetry, but i prefer to stay away from the physical. as you are aware the body dies but the scripture lives on.”
“i am sure you will excel at it with the help of the academy. one last question, perhaps more in my own humble interest. say, the devil himself would honor you with a task only you could fulfill. how far would you go to satisfy his excellency?”
the answer to this question comes much easier than any others; it is a question she was often asked at family banquets and coven reunions. this one rolls off the tongue with ease.
“if his excellency asks that i walk through the fires of hell in order to prove my loyalty, i will do so without hesitation. in a homage to the first woman who served him, i would slay my kin, burn cities and bring forth a chaos like no other. i would even take your life if he so much as asked.”
miyoung allows the words to hang between them and remains calm, unblinking. the smile on her lips is as practiced as her words, but the fire that resides behind those eyes has always been her nature.
and there were no lies to be said; she would do all these things as she is sure anyone in her family would expect as such.
she leaves the most sinful of her tasks unsaid, one that she knows his excellency would have whispered in her own ears had he doubted her intelligence; had he doubted her ability to find his message within all the words she’s read.
for his excellency she would bring the very foundations of this coven to its knees, for his excellency she would show them that all his children were equal, for his excellency she would burn the fourth rule to the ground.
a witch was no less than a warlock.
a human was something more than swine.
the coven could only grow from shedding their old views. and for this she would even take the father’s life if his excellency so much as asked.
“that is all i needed to hear. thank you.”