by P. C. Cast
Mari squared her shoulders and set aside her fear and uncertainty. Blindly, she reached up. Her mother’s delicate hand took hers in a firm, sure grip.
“Now speak the final words with me, and see it, Mari, see the silver power pour from the moon and Wash through me into you, then through you and into Rigel.”
Mari squeezed her mother’s hand and nodded. With her mother she spoke the familiar words that drew from the sky the invisible threads of power that only answered to a Moon Woman’s call.
“By right of blood and birth channel through me
the Goddess gift that is my destiny!”
Mari braced herself, and as she had so many times before, felt her mother stiffen while energy surged through Leda and into Mari, sizzling through her palm, down her arm to swirl around and around inside her, growing in power with each second that passed. Mari’s heartbeat began to hammer and her breathing suddenly increased until she was panting as hard as was the pup. In her arms, Rigel whined uncertainly.
“Focus.” Her mother’s voice was only a whisper, but Mari could feel it through her whole body. “You can do this. The power is not yours to keep—your body is merely its channel. Borrow serenity from the image of the Earth Mother. Though you may be surrounded by chaos or sickness or injuries, find the true you within. Release that which belongs to the world—fears, worry, sadness—so that the silver stream may Wash unimpeded through you. It is a waterfall at night. Rigel is the basin that must hold it.”
Mari stared at the beautiful image of the Earth Mother that Leda pruned and cared for so lovingly. But as always the figure was only foliage and art to Mari. She couldn’t feel the divine presence her mother revered. She could not find her true self—her center. “Mama, I c-can’t. It’s s-so c-cold. It—it hurts,” Mari stuttered through chattering teeth.
“Only because the healing power is not meant for you. Release the fears of your body, Mari. Focus! Find your grounding and become a channel for the moon’s energy. Tonight you must succeed. If you do not, your Rigel will surely die.”
Her mother’s words exploded through Mari’s body. “No! He can’t die. I won’t let him.” She gritted her teeth against the cold and tried to focus past the pain—to release the cacophony of emotions that swirled through her body unimpeded—and to be the channel for the moonfall of water. Yet, still the power was a whirlpool within her. It terrified Mari and threatened to suck her down to drown in its freezing depths.
This was when she usually failed. This was when she dropped her mother’s hand and allowed sickness to claim her so that she vomited, dry-heaving misery and moonlight while Leda stroked her back, consoling her with calm, loving words that reminded Mari there would be a next time—she would do better the next time.
But there was no next time for Rigel, and Mari refused to lose him. Think! Focus!
“Mari, slow your breathing. Calm your heart. This is no longer practice. You either heal Rigel, or fail and he dies from shock and blood loss. This is your reality.”
“That’s it, Mama! I need to make this my reality!” Mari squeezed her eyes closed. Could that be the answer? Could it really be that simple? Mari imagined that she was in their burrow, alone, sitting at her desk preparing to create a sketch. Her gulping breath slowed. Her hammering heart quieted. Mari found her grounding as she envisioned a blank sheet of paper. On that paper her imagination began to quickly, easily, sketch an image of herself, sitting cross-legged with Rigel spread across her lap. From above her silver light cascaded into her lifted palm, Washing through her body in a glistening wave to spout from her other palm, which was pressed against the pup’s bloody chest. Eyes still tightly shut Mari worked on the scene, creating a picture of Rigel’s body that was Washed clean of blood by the liquid light, leaving behind wounds that were neatly closed and already healing.
Suddenly the cold tide within Mari was controllable. Instead of drowning her, it used her as a conduit, passing through her harmlessly as she let go of the energy. I’m doing it! I’m doing it! And just that quickly her concentration shattered. The picture she’d been creating disappeared along with the tide of power within her.
“No! No! Get it back! I was doing it—it was working,” Mari gasped, gripping her mother’s hand like a lifeline.
“It’s too late. The sun is fully risen. Even with your help I cannot call the moon back to me.” Leda knelt beside Mari, gently disentangling her daughter’s hand from hers. “But it was enough. You did it, sweet girl. I knew you could. Praise the Earth Mother and the blessed moon! You have saved him.”
Feeling dizzy and disconnected, Mari looked down at Rigel. The pup wagged his tail animatedly and sat up, licking her face. Even though she felt light-headed, she laughed weakly and put her arms around him. He nested there, curled against her body and, sending her waves of contentment, Rigel fell sound to sleep in her arms. With a trembling hand, Mari brushed aside the blood-matted fur on his chest. What had only moments before been deep, seeping, whiplike lacerations were now pink lines of newly joined flesh that had ceased bleeding.
“I knew it was true. You do have my powers and more.” Leda’s voice was filled with happiness. “Rigel has changed everything.”
Mari kept staring at Rigel, trying to take in her victory while she sifted through the emotions that bombarded her. “He has changed everything,” she said as the morning breeze awoke and, with a warming gust, the fog above them swirled and then parted, allowing yellow sunlight to fill their little clearing. Mari felt the light instantly, and her eyes automatically lifted, dilating as they absorbed the brilliant rays. Warmth filled her body and, unable to stop herself, Mari breathed deeply, accepting the heat and power and light before she slowly, sadly, looked down at herself. The golden pattern was forming just under her skin. It glowed and expanded, spreading with the warmth that coursed through Mari’s blood, to cover her entire body.
At that moment Rigel opened his eyes and looked up into the sky. As Mari watched, they began to glow, changing from amber to the color of sunlight.
Mari knew without the precious looking glass that the eyes she turned to meet her mother’s gaze had gone from silver-gray to a brilliant, blazing gold—the same color as Rigel’s.
“Oh, sweet girl, the two of you look so much like Galen and Orion!” Leda smiled through tears.
“Yes, Mother, Rigel has changed everything and nothing. Everything and nothing.”
9
“I don’t think this is quite right, Mama. Could you check it for me?” Mari offered the wooden bowl up for Leda’s inspection.
Leda pinched a small amount between her fingers of the concoction Mari had been muddling and sniffed it. “You have enough comfrey and chicory, but you’re correct—the salve needs more processed plantain, and not simply the dried mixture of leaves you’ve used.”
“The processed plantain is in the medium basket mixed with cooled beeswax, right?”
Leda nodded. “Right.” She threw a smile at the ball of fur curled on a sweetgrass pallet beneath Mari’s desk. “I think Rigel is a better teacher than I am.” The young Shepherd seemed to be sound asleep, but when Leda spoke his name his eyes slitted and his gaze automatically found her. His tail thumped thrice lazily against the ground before he closed his eyes again, and with a contented sigh began to snore softly. “You’ve learned more about healing in the past nine days since your canine has been here than I taught you over eighteen winters of your life.”
“Well, I hate to admit it out loud, but I don’t think I have been the best of students.” Mari smiled over her shoulder at her mother as she looked through the medium-sized baskets that lined the wall of their burrow’s well-stocked medical pantry. “Here it is!” She carried the basket back to her desk and carefully began to add the gelatinous mixture to the muddled herbs.
“Not the best of students, perhaps, but the best of daughters,” Leda said.
“Mama, you’re totally biased.” Mari laughed. “That’s like me saying Rigel is the best of canines.
”
“Well, he is, isn’t he?”
“Absolutely! So, I guess that makes you right again!” Both women giggled, and Mari thought how girlish her mother suddenly seemed. As Leda laughed, the worry lines that had begun to trespass on her face softened, making Mari realize that her mother, who was also her best friend, was aging. A little shiver of trepidation skittered down her spine, and she blurted, “Yesterday, when I took Rigel out, I noticed that the wild carrots in the clearing by the west stream are ready to be harvested, and you know they’re always sweeter pulled at night. It’s not Third Night until tomorrow. The Clan can get by without you tonight. Why don’t you stay with Rigel and me, and we’ll go together to pick a big basketful?”
Leda’s smile was distracted as she returned to the basket she’d been weaving. “Not tonight, sweet girl. I have called a Gathering of the Clan before sunset, and afterward there is much Clan business to which I must attend.”
“Keeping them from eating each other isn’t Clan business—it’s charity work,” Mari muttered.
“Earth Walkers do not eat other humans, you know that.”
“Not as long as you’re there to Wash them of Night Fever, they don’t,” Mari said in an exaggerated whisper.
“Skin Stealers are cannibals, and not to be spoken of with sarcasm and flippancy. You know better. Recite the teaching rhyme, Mari.”
Mari stifled a sighed and recited by rote, “Of cities beware—Skin Stealers are there.”
“Always remember the rhymes that have punctuated your childhood. I didn’t teach them to you just to pass time.” Leda paused, obviously collecting herself. When she spoke again her mood had shifted. Her patience had returned, but so had the weariness that caused shadows under her expressive gray eyes. “Mari, being a Moon Woman isn’t charity—it’s destiny. You’ve felt the power and understand that your gift should be cherished and used well, for the greater good of the Clan.”
“Mother, I know what you’re saying, but I don’t feel like you about it. Over and over again you save the same people who would condemn you and me if we didn’t hide the truth from them.”
“The Law was set long before I met Galen, when the first of our Clan migrated here from the coast and the Companions discovered our connection to the Earth Mother, and all that she grows. We were willing to help them, to aid them in coaxing crops from the fertile ground of their island, but instead of thanking us, they captured a group of women, holding them against their will. Without their Moon Woman, the Clanswomen were overwhelmed with Night Fever, and the Tribe refused to release them, killing or enslaving any of the Clan who attempted to free them. Henceforth, the women of the Clan forbade any contact with the Tribe of the Trees.”
“Yeah, and if they found out about me, according to Clan Law, you and I would be driven into Companion territory and abandoned there. Let’s just say that doesn’t endear them to me.”
“So you would have me withhold from the Clan that which soothes them and keeps them sane. You would have me stop healing the wounded and sick who need my touch and my skill. What about Jenna and her father? Would you consign your friend and her father to sorrow and madness?”
“No, I didn’t mean that.” Mari frowned.
“Mari, I often wish your life could be different.”
“Well, I wish our lives could be different,” Mari said firmly.
Leda looked up from her basket and met Mari’s gaze. “I can imagine no life I would have savored more than the one I have shared with you.”
“Oh, Mama, I love you so much! I just wish our lives could have more happiness to balance the sadness.”
“Sweet girl, thanks to Rigel, I believe your wish is coming true. Since he chose you, I have seen you filled with great joy.”
Mari grinned and reached down to caress Rigel’s head. The half-grown canine yawned happily and stretched, then nuzzled her hand and looked up at her adoringly. “He does make me happy. But, Mama, he’s changed everything and nothing,” she repeated the sentiment that was never far from her mind.
“Mari, if something happens to me, I want you to promise that you will take Rigel and go to the Companions.”
Inside Mari went very cold. “Mother, nothing is going to happen to you!”
“Promise me that you will remember my wish is that you go to your father’s people.”
“No, Mama! I won’t make that promise. The Companions kill us or enslave us. It doesn’t make any sense for me to go to them.”
“Mari, listen to me. It is different for you because Rigel makes you one of them. You are bonded to a Shepherd—a Leader canine. That is a sacred thing. You are valuable to their Tribe, and what benefits the Tribe is always what is most important to the Companions.”
“My father was bonded to Orion, a Leader canine, and important to the Tribe. They killed him.”
“Because he broke one of their most sacred tenets—he stole from the Mother Plant. But you have broken no tenet. I believe they will accept you.”
“Mama, how much do you know about the Companions today?” As Leda started to answer her, Mari lifted a hand, halting her mother’s response. “Before you speak I think we should look at what we really understand about them, and not the stories you have been told in the past. It has been eighteen winters since you’ve spoken to any Companion. For my entire life you’ve told me that my father was a good man—kind and loving. You’ve also told me that he was different. He loved you instead of capturing and enslaving you, but the two of you knew that you would have to find a new place to live if you were to have any chance to be together.”
“That is true, but Galen told me many stories of his friends and family, and though he admitted to being different, he also said that there were good people, wise and just, who made up the Tribe of the Trees.”
“What if he was telling you stories like you and I tell each other?” Mari’s frustration finally boiled over and she gave voice to the nagging worry that was never far from her mind. “What if Galen made his people into living myths to amuse you and to keep you from worrying too much?”
“No,” Leda almost whispered. “I don’t want to believe that. I can’t.”
Hating her mother’s pale, strained look, Mari amended. “Okay, okay. Let’s say everything Galen told you was true. But that was then, Mother. More than eighteen winters ago. And even then those good people weren’t wise and just enough to allow him to live. Imagine the changes that might have happened during the winters of my life. In that time a lot of things could be different for the Tribe of the Trees.”
“Some of the differences could be for the better,” Leda said.
“But from what we can tell, that’s just not true. Mama, you told me that you’ve felt a great restlessness in the Earth Mother. Well, I believe you. Something is happening. The Companions’ hunting packs have grown. They have begun to search for us outside the confines of their Sugar Pine Forest. They capture more, and not fewer, of our people as the winters pass. They continue to kill us. But I do agree with you in part. I believe they have changed, just not for the better, and Rigel is proof of that.”
“Rigel?”
“He’s a Leader canine, revered and protected by the Tribe, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then what is he doing here?”
“Choosing you as his Companion, of course,” her mother said.
“No, Mama, I don’t mean literally. I mean how could he have gotten away from a people who revere and protect their canines with their very lives?”
Leda blinked and then stared at the pup as if seeing him for the first time. “I had not thought of it until now, but you may be correct, Mari. The Tribe your father described would never have allowed a valuable Shepherd pup to run loose, especially not after sunset.” Leda shook her head, as if clearing dark thoughts from her mind. “Yet you are a Companion, just as surely as you are my daughter. I understand it must seem dangerous and frightening to go to your father’s people, but sweet girl, when I am no more
you must find a place for yourself and for Rigel in this world, and that place is not in a burrow, hiding from half of your birthright.”
“Why are you saying these things? I thought I was going to be Moon Woman after you. What has happened?” Attuned to Mari’s mood Rigel whined softly and she petted him reassuringly.
Leda sighed and set her basket aside. Folding her hands in her lap, she faced her daughter. “The women of the Clan announced last night that I must name my heir and proclaim her my apprentice so that her instruction may begin.”
Mari felt as if she’d just lost her footing and tumbled, headfirst, into a freezing stream. “Because they’re tired of waiting for me to grow out of the supposed sickness I have and claim my powers.”
“No, sweet girl. Because the Earth Walkers need to know that there is a young Moon Woman among them who will care for the Clan after I am too old to draw down the moon.”
“Let me try again. I know more about controlling my powers now. I helped you save Rigel! Let me be your true apprentice. It’s my right as your daughter, Mama.”
“The only thing I would love more than choosing you as my apprentice is knowing that by not choosing you I am keeping you safe.”
“But I will be safe! I’ll be sure that I never seek out the Clan before sunset or after sunrise. I’ll pay better attention to keeping my hair dyed, and I’ll be sure I cover my features. Always.”
“I wish I could say yes. You know that, Mari, but it is simply too dangerous, especially now.” Leda glanced at Rigel. “The Law is clear. Moon Woman or not, you would be banished from the Clan if they discovered your secret.”
Following her gaze, Mari said, “He’ll stay here. I’ll tell him to. You know he’ll listen to me—he always does.” Rigel thumped his tail, and scooted closer to Mari, as if in agreement.
“There is much I do not know about the Companion-canine bond, but I do know this—though your Rigel will do as you command, it will cause him pain to be separated from you, just as it will cause you pain to be parted from him. Mari, it has only been nine nights since he chose you, and already the two of you are inseparable.” Her mother shook her head. Her eyes were sad, but her conviction did not waver. “I have chosen Sora. I make the announcement before dusk this very night.”