As promised, here is a descriptive approach to a Heortling animistic
exorcism. It is freely adapted from a ceremony that appears in Brian Bates'
'The Way of Wyrd'. I've pulled it together in some haste, and extemporised
some bad Heortling poetry. You'll get the idea.
All Heortling ceremonies are constructed explicitly as stories and dramas.
Different people will see different things according to their own cultic
powers and vision, but even children or invited outsiders will be able to
follow and comprehend the sacred drama as it unfolds. My own rules for
ceremonies are to cultivate mystery (there will always be something that
can't easily be explained) and to up the wonder and drama.
The following description should provide plenty of cues for contests of
various types as the ceremony unfolds.
The Spirit Battle
I'll assume a female Heortling spirit talker named Talks-To-Powers, and a
male possession victim known as Braggi. The ceremony is conducted publicly.
- Talks-To-Powers is dressed in masks, animal skins and bizarre clothing,
with exaggerated weapons and animal claws.
- As many people as possible are gathered to participate in the ceremony,
including women with children and babies.
- The locale is a sacred spot or spirit house, a place of power, with
central area bounded by ropes, and a larger roped or walled area that
contains worshippers.
- The ceremony is explicitly staged as a story /drama, with victim in
"starring role" and the emotions of the celebrants harvested to power the
ceremony.
- Several assistants will drum, pipe, lead in chanting and care for the
victim as the ceremony proceeds.
- The ceremony begins at sunset with singing and chanting and dancing by
assembled worshippers: some may enter trance states, most will have their
powers of perception and suggestion heightened, allowing them glimpses of
the battle to come.
- When ceremony proper begins, the worshippers sit silent in a circle, lit
by flickering firelight.
- Talks-To-Powers begins by boasting of her power and prowess, and describes
some of her victories through cattle boasts, verse and song. (Very Heortling
this). She directly addresses both the victim and the spirit possessing the
victim.
- Lets us assume the shaman has two powerful spirit followers, a wolf and a
raven. She wears a wolf skin. She will begin to circle the bound Braggi like
a wolf on all fours, as if hunting. She will hound and terrify him.
- Talks-To-Powers will then address the spirit directly: "Why do you dwell
in this person, who is called Braggi? You have choked his breath, and
without his soul he is dying. His body is not yours to plunder and raid!
Where are you lurking? Do you prowl the forest outside the palisades? Are
you on [local landmark], or [another landmark] or are you hiding like a
wounded fox in stagnant ditchwater? You are far from home, and have
overstayed your welcome. I will hunt you down!"
- Talks-To-Powers will play out both sides of her conversation with the
spirit, shedding her wolf skin and rolling into an ugly ball each time she
takes the part of the spirit to make reply. The possessing spirit's voice
will be high, shrill, and unworldly. Its presence will be revealed as a
showy figure in the smoke that envelopes the shaman each time the spirit
'speaks'.
- Spirit: "Leave me alone! He is mine!"
- Shaman: "Leave you alone? I will hunt you down! You will feel my claws, my
teeth!"
*Spirit: "Why are you hunting me?"
- Shaman: "You are a waste-dweller trespassing where you are not wanted. You
are a menace, to be driven out!"
- The sense of danger is very real to the audience. As Talks-To-Powers
speaks her part, she dons the wolf skin and paces about the victim. To many
in the audience, she has become a wolf.
- An assistant calms the terrified Braggi, though warning him and the spirit
that the great wolf is hunting waste-dwellers.
- The shaman suddenly rears above Braggi like a wolf pouncing, and slaps his
face with a branch of crushed leaves. The spirit keens and continues to do
so: nearly all watching can now hear it.
- Talks-To-Powers continues to pace and pounce, threatening and debating the
spirit, which will make reply and counter threat. With every pounce she
slaps Braggi's face with the sacred leaves, harder and harder till his whole
body slams back from the impact.
- The shaman reveals a wolf's claw (or the wolf flexes its own mighty claw
above the victim). The bound Braggi trembles violently, unable to keep his
eyes from the claw as the wolf paces about.
- Assistants and the crowd begin chanting a song to the Great Wolf Spirit.
"Great Battle-Wrarg, Greedy One,
You are hungry, you will hunt!
Heath-Beast, Hoar Howler,
You have scented your prey!
Humakt's Hound, Telmor Kin,
You are stalking your prey!
Sedge-buck, Strangler,
Your prey is close!
Smell its hot blood!
Mountain-enemy, Gors Power,
Choose your prey!
Your claws are sharp!
Dusk Trooper, Ravener,
Your teeth hunger,
Pounce and tear!
Grey howler of the gors,
Tear its neck and taste hot blood!"
etc.
- As the chanting grows, the spirit becomes visible to everyone as a dark
smoky figure, as does the circling wolf.
- The wolf pounces, and wrestles with the spirit by the fire, which roars
and sparks!
- The spirit disappears, and the shaman springs to her feet, howling in
triumph.
- This is repeated several times: the spirit and wolf wrestle - sometimes
the wolf is forced back, sometimes the spirit is cowed. The attacks weary
both shaman and spirit.
- The wolf shaman begins to hum, and the audience takes up the refrain, also
clapping in time. The humming grows in volume, rising and falling.with
increasing power, until the hearth posts and the very walls hum and vibrate
with raw power.
- Talks-To-Powers takes rune stones from her pouch, and with them makes a
small circle on the ground. She produces a glazed bowl, also adorned with
runes, which she places in the center of the stone circle. She pours a
mixture of dried leaves and herbs into the bowl, which she then lights with
a taper from the flame.
- The humming and clapping continue. Wreathes of copper-coloured smoke
spiral from the bowl, slowly filling the sacred space. Talks-To-Powers blows
steadily into the bowl, then exhales powerfully, hissing like a striking
snake! The pungent smoke is like a winter frost burning at the worshippers'
nostrils. Their eyes stream and their ears buzz, and most of them can now
see and hear the spirits clearly.
- The shaman leans over the smoking bowl, breathing deeply and rhythmically.
The wolf's skin expands and contracts like bellows.
- Taking one last, long breath, the shaman rises to sitting position, her
mouth clamped shut and her cheeks blown out like a bullfrog.
- Suddenly, her mouth snaps open and she belches long streams of smoke over
Braggi like an enraged dragon. The humming and clapping cease. The heavy
breathing of the worshippers is like some trapped animal.
- The shaman rises, and drinks heavily from a bowl of water. Wisps of smoke
stream from the corners of her mouth as she drinks.
- Talks-To-Powers takes heavy leaves from a sack and throws them
dramatically across the main fire. The smothered flames hiss and die,
streams of smoke fill the sacred space, and red embers glow balefully in the
ensuing gloom.
- Only the shaman's silhouette, seated motionless by a struggling Braggi,
is visible through the gloom. She hiccups loudly, and the entire wolf skin
shivers.
- The sound of talking begins to issue from the darkness surrounding the
shaman. Many voices, snatches of conversation in different dialects, bursts
of screams and laughter. The voices are shrill and unwordly. It eventually
becomes more melodious, almost singing, as the shaman claps her hands in
time, and laughs, but is otherwise silent. Eventually the strange display
fades. The gathered celebrants barely dare breathe.
*Suddenly, without warning, the air is filled by raucous caws, and a
flapping bird shape that swoops through the air about the seated shaman.The
cawing is answered by cheeps and whistles and cries of a hundred different
birds, and the air becomes thick with beating wings.
- Talks-To-Powers' voice cuts through the tumult, which ceases instantly.
The raven shape alights on her shoulders. The shaman stands discarding her
wolf skin to reveal a shining black cloak of feathers.
"My spirits are here!
They aid me in my quest!
They will take me to the wasteland,
where dwells the breath of lost men!
I shall enter, I do not fear!
I shall return with the breath of Braggi!
I fly now, the stead is tiny below me!
I fly high, the tula seems small beneath my wings!
Swiftly I go, swooping past the green corn,
past the friendly, river, the towering mountain,
into the Land of Mighty Powers!
- She drops to a crouch, opening her cloak of feathers. The fire splutters,
the shadow of her outstretched wings seem enormous.
"Down I plunge!
Down , Down, Down!
Here in the wasteland
I see the breath of a brave man,
tormented by animal powers!
She crouches, suddenly silent, still and motionless. Nobody moves, or even
dare breathe. For long seconds she remains still, though her entire body
trembles. Bound and helpless, Braggi keens in fear.
- Talks-To-Powers leaps high into the air, her arm held high. It is the wolf
that leaps, and its claw arcs high, dragging down a struggling animal shape
from the darkness above! The wolf twists and rolls about the sacred circle,
something black struggling in its clenched mouth.
- The voice that issues forth seems to echo from within the celebrants'
skulls.
"Haiii! I have you!
My fangs bite deep,
Your armour is torn and rent!
Your nine powers I will strip away,
and when the last is put to flame,
This man Braggi will be free!
Nine layers of hide and bone!
Nine layers of power!
But my teeth are strong,
Nine become eight!
- The wolf holds the black thing down beneath its claws, and its teeth rip
something dark away, which is tossed into the flames. The fire sparks and
roars!
"And eight become seven!
- The audience joins in the chant, sharing their power.
"And seven become six!"
*The celebrants roar their approval as each spirit part is consumed to the
now-roaring flames.
"And six become five!
And five become four!
And four become three!
And three becomes two!"
- The audience are screaming their approval now, shouting out the words of
the chant. On the floor before them, the wolf struggle becomes bitter,
twisting and rolling across the dirt. Braggi is screaming in pure terror.
"And two becomes one!"
- Talks-To-Powers is pitched violently across the floor. The black thing in
her mouth is keening.
"And one becomes none!"
- The writhing animal blackness is finally consigned to the flames!
- The crowd erupts in cheers and hoots and thunder shouts, while Braggi's
body begins to writhe and convulse uncontrollably. The wolf pins him to the
floor, licking his face as the fit slowly subsides. Then there is only
Braggi, and Talks-To-Powers draped in a wolf skin above him.
- At a signal from the shaman, Braggi's kin surge forward to hug and touch
and kiss, to hold him and lead him out in to the cool night air. The signs
and disfigurements of his possession are gone.
- Talks-To-Powers nearly collapses as the powers withdraw. Her body is
bruised and bloodied and running with sweat. She too walks into the
welcoming cool of the night. The clan will now celebrate with ale and
honeycake.
Bates 'The Way of Wyrd" is a prime Heortling resource!
Cheers
John
nysalor_at_... John Hughes
Questlines:
http://home.iprimus.com.au/pipnjim/questlines/
Call the people from their herds now
To my feasting hearth invite them,
Summon cowman, cottar, godi
Call the gyrda and the thane!
Give the word to all my clansfolk
And invite my distant kinsmen,
>From the meadows and the mountains
Call them to my feasting flame!