The Book of Artemis

“The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak!” Daddy cries from the porch after each self-flagellation with his leather whip. Mama weeps in the kitchen; this I know without hearing it. I know, before the next full moon, my bedroom door will creep open and he will invite himself inside, no matter how many stripes he puts on himself.

In the wooded hollow, I am Artemis. I take my sister’s hand and we walk until the forest quells the scripture being hurled down like thunder. Bluebells and phlox line the worn path that tumbles down to the river. I show Caddie a cratered, pointed mushroom cap hiding amongst the forest ferns.

“Today we hunt morels,” I explain. When I open my satchel and draw out the knife, she gasps. “It’s for cutting them,” I say. She spies the fading, dog-eared book inside, and the knife is forgotten. We will go to the boulder to read.

She sits nymph-like as I open Ancient Greek Mythology the way Daddy opens his Bible. Her goddess is Demeter, who yearns for a lost child. But she is more like Persephone than she realizes. Her mother will not save her from Hades. I will.

“There once lived a skillful hunter named Actaeon,” I begin. The river sings below us, and there on the bank I see a hunter with bow and quiver, striding toward the unwitting goddess. I’ve memorized the page, and she follows the words with her finger, giggling about Actaeon spying on the bathing Artemis. When I stall, she hands me the book, and I pick up where she leaves off: “Artemis scooped a handful of the water and threw it in Actaeon’s face. As the vengeful drops fell to his shoulders, she added a curse: ‘Now tell your friends - if you can - about seeing a naked goddess!’” I read the passage twice. I recite it to Caddie. The words are inside me.

#

The night is cool, but behind my eyes, the roaming look Daddy gave Caddie at dinner burns like an orange coal. I ignored his compliments, and now he sits alone sipping whiskey. The residue of a false morel will quicken its effect. I watch from the dark pantry as he empties the bottle.

"Daddy?” I whisper.

His startled eyes change when he sees me in Mama’s silk nightgown.

“There is a full moon. Can we walk to the river?” I don’t wait for an answer; I know he will follow me.

I light out under the night sky. Behind me, his boots stumble.

“Daddy, are you OK?” I wait for his heavy footsteps to resume then I move on. When he calls my name, I beckon to him. He pursues me in jagged, stumbling paths. At the boulder, I watch as he reaches the steepest part of the slope. He pitches forward and becomes a ball of twisted bone and sticks, cracking and careening until it stops at the foot of an oak tree.

“Please,” he says to me.

I cradle his head in the nook of my elbow. His tears and sweat pump the smell of whiskey into the air as he gazes into the knife hovering above him. As I open his skin at the throat, I whisper, “and not until so many countless wounds had drained away his lifeblood, was the wrath of chaste Artemis satisfied.”

I drop the gown beside him, bathe in the river, and climb out of the hollow.

The End

BIO: Kristi Schirtzinger holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Ashland University. She grew up in rural Ohio, where she and many family members still reside. Her work has been featured in The Black Fork Review, Fiction on the Web, Drunk Monkeys, Wild Greens Magazine, and others. Her fascination with Celtic history has inspired folktale retellings, short stories, and a novel about the Boudiccan rebellion of 60 AD entitled Three Summer Moons.

Find Kristi’s work at https://www.gravelroadtales.com/