Mahalat

After the rite and the silence, the smoke began to rise.

It was born from a bowl of dark metal that radiated a faint light, illuminating from below a face that, at her age, should have been more marked by time, but which retained a strange smoothness, as if old age were afraid of her.

The blind augur extended the bowl toward her. Mahalat tilted her head and parted her lips. The smoke hesitated for an instant, halting its spiral, as if suddenly aware of her presence.
Then it stretched into a living thread and began to slide into her mouth.

It did not enter as smoke enters the lungs. It entered like a tongue exploring, like a root searching for damp earth. She felt it spread through her throat and branch out inside her chest, beating where her heart should beat, evicting her soul like a delinquent tenant and taking its place.

Something behind her own eyes contemplated the world for the first time.