Sentinel Stones…

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…But she knew.

She had seen it when the vision took her there…

Following the spirit path on the hawk’s wings…

They marked her when they had realised that she knew…

She would bear no children now, save at the god’s bidding.

She would not cook or weave for her man.

She had been marked for the enclosure…

*

…Above her the procession had wound its way to the top of the mound.

   Dark silhouettes against the flames are turned to the steep slope of the hillside beyond…

They are watching the dancing flames as the torchbearers climb…

They wait in a silence broken only by the drums…

As the lights crawl across the slope…

Taking their places around the great figure carved in chalk.

It had always been…

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…None remembered a time before it was…

It was too big to see, too high, fit for the Gods alone.

You could see a curve, a line, a shape… but not the whole.

Not clearly.

Except tonight when the sky was dark and cold and the torches took their place around the image, outlining it in flame.

The flickering shadows and lights brought it to life.

It seemed to move, a strange animation on the hilltop…

Extract from, ‘The Initiate…’ by Sue Vincent and Stuart France

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