Marcus and Samuel both had to carry me to the cemetery where the ceremony would be held, and Aunt Vivian made a point of claiming I was simply being over-dramatic about the severity of my condition. I pointed out that she wouldn’t know, since she never had a proper initiation she never had to fast. At least not for this long.This revelation was made to me by mistake, of course, briefly after Jim left. During a casual dinner conversation I asked her why she hadn’t advanced in the ranks. Having had one too many glasses of wine, she let it slip that she was fully aware of the fact that the only reason she held the position she did was because my mother had passed away. It wasn’t because of her age that my mother was next in line. In fact, Marie was five years younger than Aunt Vivian. But Aunt Vivian wasn’t a very strong healer, and in this world the more spiritually powerful you were the farther fate would carry you.She even got a little misty-eyed when she talked about me being the new matriarch.
