The reckoning only comes once a century, every four or five generations, but now it’s here. Today is tax day, and we are screwed. The brutal practice goes back for millennia and only the oldest among us truly understand the pain the world is about to endure. Most people alive today were not around to witness the last reckoning. At best they grew up in the immediate aftermath, but to the vast majority of us, it feels like a myth. We would normally write the stories off as complete fiction, ancient legends told to keep the populace compliant and under control. But the older generations have impressed on us that this cruel blood tax is very real and must be paid to ensure the future of our existence.
The accounts are passed down from generation to generation, but with each iteration, the urgency is obscured, the underlying fear a little less. Reality gets lost over time as the stories change from witnessed memories to bedtime tales of horror to unbelievable fables that are hard to take seriously. But I am assured this is very serious as I sit at the family council while we decide what the hell we are supposed to do now.
I am seated at my grandfather’s dining table, accompanied by my two brothers, my mother, my father, his brother and sister, and four of my cousins. But not my grandfather. He was supposed to be the 12th. He was supposed to be the savior of the family, the answer to our prayers. He was supposed to sacrifice himself for all of us.
The rest of the cousins, spouses, and kids busied themselves taking care of the youngest children and preparing what was supposed to be a celebratory dinner but now appears might be a last supper.
“What does this mean?” my cousin Drew asked.
His question was met with blank stares. We all know what it means. The rules of the reckoning are specific. On the seventh day of the seventh month, at the turn of each century, one family member must be sacrificed to the gods and their blood painted on their front door before midnight. Each family member, whether by blood or by marriage, must participate in the ritual of painting the door. Anyone who does not take part in this rite will perish before sunrise.
It’s an impossible decision, yet a decision impossible not to make. You must choose one family member to die or the whole family is wiped off the face of the earth. Grandfather was the perfect solution to our tax problem. He was already in decline after a long life. A good life. But this morning he died, a day too soon, and now the family is in a panic. Normally, families have decades to prepare and come to terms with who would be sacrificed, but now we only have hours.
We could already hear the wails and cries outside, rising in anger and pain as other families mourned the loss of their loved ones as they began their ritual of paying the blood tax on their own doors. Time was running out.
“I mean seriously,” Drew tried again. “Can’t we still use his blood?”
“He wasn’t sacrificed,” I said. “He died of natural causes. I’m pretty sure that won’t count in the eyes of the gods. We must choose another sacrifice.” I paused, waiting for someone to back me up. “I mean, right?”
My father looked up from the table for the first time, his eyes moist. “Who will volunteer? Will it be you, son?”
My heart seized momentarily. It never occurred to me I might be under consideration for the duty, but I suppose that’s how everyone is feeling right now. “I have a kid, Dad…”
“We all have kids,” he replied gently.
“I vote we choose our cousin Kyle,” Drew said. “Nobody likes Kyle.”
“Jesus, Drew!” my oldest brother said.
“It’s true,” Drew insisted. “If the reckoning doesn’t incentivize us to not be assholes, I don’t know what will.”
“You’re just pissed at him because he diddled your girlfriend in high school,” my other brother stated.
“Seriously, he deserves to—”
“Enough!” my father slammed his fist down on the table. “Kyle isn’t even at this table to defend himself. This is a decision to be made seriously, not to resolve a vendetta, and it is not a popularity contest. Am I clear?” He paused to look us in the eye in turn and held his gaze until we each lowered our eyes in concession. “Now, Mother and I drained Archie’s blood this morning.”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “You already collected it? Were you planning to go forward with this all along?”
My mother spoke up for the first time. “How do we even know the gods aren’t dead, honey? Have you seen any evidence they are real?”
“Mom! What about the stories you’ve told me all my life? I thought you believed in them. You taught me the gods were something to be feared and revered.”
“You’re a poet,” Drew started, “and didn’t even—”
“Shut up Drew!” everyone shouted in unison.
Part of the reason I never questioned any of this was because I thought my parents believed it with every ounce of their being. Now, I don’t know what to think. Could my mother be right? Or is she just unable to accept the idea of her father not fulfilling his destiny for our family?
“We believed because our parents believed, but there was never a personal connection with the gods. I don’t know, maybe it’s wishful thinking…” my mother trailed off.
“Maybe it is wishful thinking,” my father picked up the thought. “But who here is prepared to do this? For what? For the chance the gods are still alive? For the chance Archie’s blood might not be enough? We don’t know that it isn’t, so who is going to put their life on the line to take that chance?”
My father had a point. Grandfather was the last of his generation. He made sense. The man was already dying for crissakes. He was like our own family insurance policy against the reckoning. You know, in case it was real. The rest of us still have full lives ahead of us. Everyone here woke up today thinking they still had a lifetime to live out. How do you go from believing that to deciding to lay your life on the alter before you’ve even had dinner? You can’t go from 60 to zero that quickly without skidding and spinning out in a cloud of smoke.
We debated for hours, all the while listening to the shrieks of devastation coming from the neighboring homes, a painful reminder of how the world around us still the hell believes. As midnight approached, unable to come up with an acceptable alternate, our small family council agreed unanimously to go forward with the original plan of painting my grandfather’s blood on his front door. He did die on the day of sacrifice, after all.
We informed the rest of the family of our decision, which was acknowledged silently with tears of both relief and fear. I helped my father bring out the paint brushes and buckets of blood while the younger children were woken from their ignorant slumbers. Everyone had to participate.
A putrid copper scent filled the air as we went outside. No one ever talked about how it would smell. We all took turns covering the door with a few strokes of the scarlet tax. The adults helped the youngest with holding the brush as they filled in the bottom half of the door, while the tallest among us painted around the top. I was the last to go.
My wife and son were both painting their strokes on the bottom of the door when my father called out, “15 Seconds left!”
There was no time to get a brush, so I thrust my hands into the bucket and smacked them against the unpainted panels in the middle of the door and let them slide down, leaving streaks of crimson as midnight arrived.
We all looked at each other, unsure if grandfather’s blood satisfied the tax or not. With nothing left to do but wait, we all shuffled back inside, past the bloodied door, wondering if we’d see the dawn.
