August 13th Group Ritual Rite of the Devouring Torch A Working of Hecate — the Feast of Torches There is one night in the height of summer when the torch-bearing goddess steps out of the dark she is usually associated with and stands in the open — and makes her demand before the harvest is completed. She comes in August because August is when there is still something to lose. This is a group ritual working dedicated to Hecate in her aspect as the Torch-Bearer and the Lady of Storms, performed on the night of August 13th — the Feast of the Torches, the Hecatean Ides, the night drawn from the ancient Nemoralia when women carried flames through the darkness to the sacred lake and made their offerings before the storm season could take everything they had grown. This is not the Hecate of autumn's gentle decline into darkness. This is the Hecate who governs the height of summer: who was propitiated in the Zerinthian cave against terrors and storms, whose torch-lit...