Jack has followed the others through the dark forest. Rain was getting under his clothes and water seeped into his cheap boots. He had been lost in thought. Unnerved.
They were walking in solemn silence. The quiet, backtracked by the rain hitting the leaves and branches, broken only by the sound of their boots hitting mud was one of the factors in making the whole trip creepy. The sizzling torch constantly reminding him of the purpose of it didn't help either.
Finally they breached the final wall of trees and emerged to a semi-covered clearing with a boulder on one end. He knew the place well. They all did. Stunned for a while, they walked around the perimeter of the clearing, not quite daring to walk into the center. They formed quiet groups and avoided eye contact. Jack found himself towards the trail edge of the group, rain dripping onto his head from a tree. Despite that he didn't dare walking too much farther. The woods seemed too dark and scary right then, even if Jack wasn't a particularly squeamish person. He knew the men in their group, all from the same village. Grisly old men and burly young ones. None of them spoke a word since they departed.
Finally after a good while as the rain slowly subsided, a final part of the group entered the clearing. A robed man whom Jack knew to be their priest and a girl dressed in a white robe, made dirty by the trek through the woods. Her hands protruded from the front of the robe, tied together tightly as she was lead in between the others and to the middle, near the stone.
The priest set down his torch near the boulder and nodded to the others. They knew their job.
Slowly they walked into a semi circle around the clearing, the stone completing it. Each held a torch in a stern hand, facing toward the middle. Their faces cold and set, unmoving. Jack felt sick from anticipation, from the significance of what was about to happen.
In the center, the priest slowly unwound the robe from the girl. Her dark skin slowly coming out to the light of the torches. Their light danced in the reflection of her curves. As robe went down from her body, its nakedness played a contrast to how dressed the priest and the others were. Only ropes binding her skin and pulling on it in various spots proving inadequate for most situations but this one. Jack found himself staring at the play of light over the skin of her full breasts as she was slowly stripped, soon following down over the ropes curving around her bottom and squeezing her thighs. In all other situations he would be quite enjoying the sight of her. But not now. Not here.
Jack remembered of how he was growing up, hearing and learning about the dangers of the woods. The deep forests around their village were wild with beasts of other realms. Demons and worse would stalk upon unsuspecting people or even assault settlements and raze them to the ground for their amusement. People would find bodies stripped of their flesh, parts of them eaten yet still alive. And for that reason, Jack knew, the rituals were important. A cost of sacrifice, helping the village ward the demons away sate them in a relatively safe way and protect the others. If it weren't for them, they would be all long dead.
Jack knew all of this. But he also heard rumors. How those who witnessed the rituals went mad. How the flesh of the sacrifice was eaten and bodies thrown around. Some where the sacrifice was made to burn alive while others watched. He remembered how a friend of his even mentioned being at one and being so scarred to spill what happened. It was explained to Jack that through the rituals, the demonic souls that would otherwise stalk the woods were placed into the soul of the sacrifice and then slain, sated or the sacrifice itself was offered to them. The methods done depended upon the soul's weaknesses and needs in particular.
Jack shuddered and went back to focus on the ritual just in time as the priest gave a signal. All ten of the assembled men started chanting the few lines they were given. Weak at first, but soon increasing in volume as the men worked away the shyness of their voices.
The girl kneeling in the middle as the priest dripped oil over her naked body from a heavy cup. The liquid spreading over her tan skin added to its reflectivness. Jack could clearly see droplets of it hanging onto her breasts and eventually crashing onto her thighs.