The Great Alta Saga Omnibus

by Jane Yolen

  “You are out of practice, my queen,” called Marga as the wands went back again.

  Slip-slap.

  “With wands,” Jenna replied, but she was smiling.

  “She is soft,” someone else called out.

  “A wand is not a sword,” Jenna replied, but she was grinning as she flipped the wand swiftly across to the speaker.

  Slip-slap.

  The wands were traveling more quickly now, end over end, with a fine, sharp rhythm. Then, just as Scillia was getting used to the sound of them, Marga called out “Two!” and set another pair of wands flying.

  Now the game became considerably more complex, as four willow wands cartwheeled through the air.

  Slip-slap.

  Slip-slap.

  “Two!” Marga called again, adding a third pair to the ring.

  Several more women left the table to enter the circle and soon Scillia lost count of the number of wands whizzing past.

  “Two!” Marga called again. And again, “Two!”

  “You catch one, child,” the toothy woman whispered to her. “Go on. We like to say, A girl is never too young for the game.”

  “I can’t,” Scillia said, turning her head and gesturing with her hand, as if to remind the woman she had but one. As she turned, a wand smacked into her hand.

  Slip-

  But the satisfying echo of slap did not follow as the wand fell, clattering to the floor.

  No one seemed to mind. One woman simply leaned down and picked up the wand and the game continued.

  But Scillia minded. “It is a stupid game for old women to be playing at,” she said, walking out of the circle and heading toward the door. Her palm tingled where the wand had slapped it. “And stupider still for a cripple.”

  Somehow Marga was by her side and with a hand on Scillia’s arm, stayed her. “Women with one hand have played before,” she said. “Do you think you are the only such one in the world?”

  “I think I am the only such one to find it a silly game.”

  “That is the second wrong thing you have said,” Marga told her. “It is not just a game. It is practice as well.”

  “Practice for what?”

  “For swords.”

  “These women are past fighting prime,” Scillia said witheringly. “Besides, they are cooks and farmers and carders of wool. I doubt any of them could hold a sword in battle.”

  “Then you would be wrong a third time,” Marga said. “Most of them fought by your mother’s side in the great battles of the War, or fought with their backs to the walls for the life of their own Hames. And they are hardly old. Except, perhaps, to one of your age.”

  Scillia shrugged and turned her hand up to a window’s light. There was a bright red mark in the center of her palm from the wand.

  “We call that ‘Alta’s Wound,’” Marga said. “You are one of Hers.”

  “I am not one of Hers or anyone else’s,” retorted the girl. “I am my own.”

  She turned and walked out the door and after several wrong turnings, found her way to the stairs that led up to her room.

  Jenna showed up moments later. “You were rude,” she said. “And you were unkind. Queens do not have leave to be either.”

  “I am not the queen, mother,” Scillia said. “You are.”

  Jenna sat down on the bed and looked away from Scillia toward the window where the sky was darkened for a moment by a rush of flying crows. “I know how to be a queen. But it seems I no longer know how to be a mother. You try me, my child.”

  “I am not a child anymore. I am thirteen. And I am not your daughter, though it seems I cannot get out of the habit of calling you mother.”

  “Is that what this is all about?” Jenna turned to look at her. “Is that what all this tasking has been about?”

  “I want to know her name at the very least. And what she was like.”

  Jenna sighed. “She was …”

  “Besides being brave and being murdered, I mean,” Scillia warned.

  “Come, sit by me and I will tell you all.” Jenna patted a place by her on the bed.

  “Are you ordering me as my queen?”

  “I am asking you as your mother.”

  “I prefer to stand.”

  Jenna sighed again. “Her name was Iluna and she was one of the few who ever saw that I was a woman, not a myth. I liked her for that.”

  Scillia sat on the bed, as if her legs would suddenly no longer hold her up, but not too close to Jenna. She left enough space between them that another woman might sit there.

  “Iluna.” Scillia made the sound of the name last a long time.

  “She lived atop a rock with her sisters.”

  Scillia leaned toward her mother. “A rock? What do you mean?”

  “There was a Hame called M’dorah carved into a great cliff. And there Iluna lived with her sisters. They did not have a Mother Alta, a priestess, to lead them, as did all the other Hames. Instead they had someone called a True Speaker who …” Jenna’s voice trailed off. “My little Scillia, do you really want me to tell you all of this? What does it matter now? I have forgotten so much.”

  Scillia pulled back from her, sitting up straight. “It matters to me. She was my real mother. I want to hear it all.”

  “The True Speaker told us that they had broken with the other Hames and worshipped the real Alta who waits in the green hall where no one stands highest when all stand together.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  Jenna stood and walked over to the window. “If you interrupt me, the tale will never be done.”

  “Done? You want it done? I want to hear it now. This moment. And tomorrow. And the next day after that. I want you to repeat it to me till the parts you have forgotten come back to you. This is my life, oh queen, that you have purposely kept from me. Yes—I want to hear it all!” Scillia’s body shook with her anger.

  “Then listen. At that place, M’dorah, where I had gone to enlist more warriors to our cause, there were many women. But the very first to volunteer to fight was Iluna. She said—and this I will never forget—she said ‘I will go though no one else goes with me.’ Though of course you had to go with her, tied as you were to her back by cradle strings.”

  “I was tied to her by more than that. By flesh. By blood.”

  “Not by flesh. Not by blood.”

  Scillia stood and went over to stand so close to Jenna, their shadows were one on the rush floor behind them. “What do you mean?”

  “The M’dorans got their daughters from the New Steading folk. They took those the countrymen left out, neglected, ill-treated, or threw away. Iluna told me that is where she found you.”

  “But Marga said Iluna was my womb mother.” Scillia unconsciously began to rub the shoulder of the stunted arm. If she was unaware of the gesture, Jenna was not. She reached out and gently pulled the unresisting girl to her.

  “Marga did not know Iluna. I let the story stand.”

  Scillia spoke, her words partly muffled in Jenna’s shirt. “Was I thrown away because … I was not whole?”

  Jenna stroked her hair. “I was whole, my darling, and yet I, too, was thrown away as a babe. Girls were of such little value in those days. It is a custom your father and I have worked hard—and fought hard—to change. No children—boys or girls—should ever again be lost that way.”

  They stood, breast to breast, mother to child, until the darkness beginning in the sky was neither crows nor clouds but simply day’s end. They did not cry for they were past crying with one another. But they did not speak either, until night rushed in around them.

  Then Jenna said, “Do you want to hear more?”

  Scillia shook her head imperceptibly, adding aloud, “In time, mother. In time.”

  THE HISTORY:

  Memo: Dalian Historical Society (First Draft)

  The materials you have sent over so far included one of Magon’s infamous challenges to my late father’s scholarship, specifically Magon’s insist
ence that the empty leather cylinders found at the Sigel and Salmon digs—which he labeled “wand carriers”—was further proof of the dark sisterhood in the Homes. It is yet another quarrelsome piece in the war of words my father had with this insufferable man. I hesitate to use the word “scholar” in his case.

  Is it not laughable that, so many years after their-conflict, Magon’s words still have the power to wound me. Of course, his work is vow mainly discredited and the dark sister thesis, which he held on to so tenaciously, is hardly even referred to in scholarly circles any more. But it is fascinating to see how he tries to bend or warp every Dalian artifact to prove his ludicrous point. Metaphysical claptrap it was then, and metaphysical claptrap it remains.

  But what else can we expect from a man who spent his final years in front of one of the excavated mirrors trying in vain to call up his own Dark Brother? If his ending had not been so pitiful, it would have been amusing. I have actually considered writing a screenplay based on his life.

  This brings me to the core of this memo. To whom must I apply for permission to print the unpublished memoirs and memoranda from Magon? I am sure that if Magon’s entire correspondence with my father and other members of the Society were made available to the general public, my father would finally be avenged given the credit he deserves.

  THE LEGEND:

  It was in the town of New Teding, at the yearly Lammas Fair, that a certain Mrs. Morrison saw the one-armed child. A baby it was, unwrapped and sleeping, lying in a cradle of rushes near the Clamat River.

  Thinking the child’s mother was nearby, Mrs. Morrison did naught but cluck at its poor missing arm, and cover it up with the blanket. Then she went on to the Lammas Fair with her pies.

  On returning, she saw the basket still out in the open air. And thinking that was surely a long time to leave a child on its own, she went over to check on the puir wee thing.

  This time there was nothing in the cradle but a figure of sticks, one branch of which was broken off at the crossing. It was a tinker’s sign.

  Mrs. Morrison thought nothing more of this, till the following year when she was once again going home from the Lammas Fair, and she once again took the shortcut past the river.

  There was the rush cradle again, lying on the river bank, close by the water.

  Being a good soul, though a bit nosy if truth be told, Mrs. Morrison went over to peek in. There was nought lying in the rushes but the figure of sticks with the blanket snugged up under its broken-off arm.

  The next year Mrs. Morrison took a different route home. Best to take care. There is no knowing what the tinkers—the Greenmen—will do if you meddle too often with their things.

  THE STORY:

  That evening, before dinner, the women of the Hame gathered in the amphitheater. It was in the lee-time of the moon, and so but half the sisters stood silent in the meadow. Once the torches around the inner bowl were lit, the number of women was immediately doubled. Only Marga and Scillia were without a dark twin.

  Standing next to Marga, her cape pulled tight against the cold, Scillia asked, “Why of all these women are you alone?”

  “A long story, child. But in the short: It was my own choice.” She moved away before she had quite finished speaking, the word choice floating back to the girl like the train of a bridal dress.

  Mounting the steps to the altar, Marga looked neither right nor left till she reached the stone. She put her hand on it, turned, and only then surveyed the women below whose faces were silvered in the flickering torchlight.

  “Who bears the child?” she asked.

  “Mother, we do.” The speakers were Jenna and Skada. They moved to stand by Scillia.

  “What are you doing?” Scillia asked.

  “Something Jenna should have done thirteen years ago,” Skada said. “No one ever said she was quick about things. Though in the old days we did these rites in the summer time, and not on an achingly cold early-spring night.”

  Jenna took Scillia’s hand in hers. Skada covered them both.

  “Is this some sort of …” Scillia began.

  “Hush!” Jenna and Skada said together, pulling her up onto the first of the steps.

  “And who bore the child?” Marga asked.

  “A woman of New Steading,” Jenna said.

  “And she gave her away,” added Skada.

  They pulled the now rigid Scillia to the second step.

  “And who bleeds for the child?” Marga asked.

  “Iluna, a warrior of M’dorah bled for her,” said Skada.

  “And now we bleed for her as well,” Jenna said.

  “Don’t do this, mother.” Scillia’s voice was a harsh rasp.

  They yanked her onto the third step and Marga leaned forward, holding out a hand.

  Scillia was trapped between. Ignoring Marga’s hand, she pulled away from Jenna and Skada. “You could have asked me.”

  Marga whispered. “There is no precedent for asking. This is done to a baby. A baby has nothing to say in the ritual. We thought it best therefore …”

  “Best for who?”

  “For you,” said Jenna.

  “For whom!” Skada said at the same time, a hint of laughter in her voice.

  “We haven’t done one of these ceremonies in years,” Marga explained.

  “Well, don’t start again on my account.”

  “I told you it was a bad idea,” Skada said to Jenna.

  “You said it was better now than never.”

  “I did not.”

  “Indeed you did.”

  “Jenna, you have ears like the Garunian cat, the one who hears wind passing but knows not the weather.”

  Jenna’s voice was nearly breaking. “I just wanted Scillia to understand that we had ties, too, greater than old blood. I wanted her to know she is as much mine as Iluna’s. And more certainly mine than the poor fool who …” Her voice trailed off.

  “… who threw me away?”

  It was as though they had forgotten Scillia was even with them. Both Jenna and Skada turned, startled by the girl’s remark. But even as they were turning, Scillia pulled loose of them, running down the few steps and past the assembled sisters, going so quickly the tail of her cape fluttered as if there were a strong wind.

  “I knew I should never have allowed this,” Marga said. “Jenna, you still have the power to talk me into mischief.”

  For once Jenna and Skada were both silent.

  Leaning forward, Marga whispered to them. “Things have changed greatly in the years, my dear friends, though we here at Selden have changed least of all. We do not do these old ceremonies anymore for a reason. There are no more girl children for us to take in, and that is a good thing you have done for the Dales, Jenna. You should have trusted in your legacy. Selden is a Hame for old women now, not girls.” She straightened and said in a voice that carried to all: “Let us go back inside. It is too cold to stand about here in the meadow. And the child refuses the rite. We have many chores still, and the infirmarer needs no one sick with a spring chill.” She descended the stairs, followed by the still silent Jenna and Skada.

  There were whispers as they walked past the rows, but Skada was wise enough not to comment back until they reached the Hame. Then all she said to Jenna was “I did not!”

  It was enough.

  Jenna returned no answer, but left the well-lit dining hall at once and went into her bedroom where she guttered the torch against the metal brackets so she might be alone.

  Her thoughts were jumbled, water over stone, and though she lay down at last in her bed, she did not fall asleep until dawn.

  THE BALLAD:

  SONG OF THE THREE MOTHERS

  One is the mother who bore me,

  In bright red rivers of blood.

  Two is the mother who wore me,

  Through fire and fever and flood.

  Three is the mother who carried me

  Year after year after year.

  And she is the mother who married mer />
  To my faults and fancies and fear.

  One to make me,

  Two to take me,

  Three to carry me away.

  One is the mother who bred me,

  A moment of passion and heat.

  Two is the mother who fed me

  Her blood and milk and meat.

  Three is the mother who led me

  Through love and pain and war.

  She is the mother who’s wed me

  To all that is worth living for.

  One to make me,

  Two to take me,

  Three to carry me away.

  THE STORY:

  “Jenna, wake up! You must get up! She is gone!”

  Sunlight puddled on the floor near the window, too far from the bed to wake a really deep sleeper. But Marga’s insistent voice pulled Jenna out of her dreams at once.

  “Who is gone?” she asked sleepily.

  “Scillia. She did not come to dinner, but then neither did you. But her bed was not slept in which we found when we went to call her for breakfast. We have searched the Hame for her. She is not here.”

  Jenna sat up in an instant. “Why did you not call me sooner?”

  “We thought she was just hiding. Or sulking. We are not so old that we have forgotten what it is like to be thirteen. And many of the women here were part of the old cullings, adopted into Hames by second mothers. They are not unsympathetic to the child.” Marga handed Jenna her leathers.

  “Have you forgotten my own history?” Jenna growled. “I had three mothers, just as Scillia had. But worse, there was the scandal of my last mothers, dark and light, who quarreled over me which led directly to their deaths. Surely you recall it?”

  Marga did not answer her question, but said only, “Her horse is gone as well.”

  Jenna pulled on trousers and tunic, then bound up her long braid with a thick ribband. She vowed to herself not to say a word more to Marga about the past. Only the present. Finding her boots, she pulled them on with two quick tugs. “Did Scillia take any food as if for a long trip?”

  “Not that we could tell.”

  “Then she was being stupid. She is not trained for the woods as we were, Pynt.”

  “Perhaps,” Marga said slowly. “But perhaps she only means to be gone for a little. To frighten you.”