Great Sky Woman

by Steven Barnes

  No, of course not.

  Still, it was always best to be careful.

  In the morning, T’Cori began her cleanliness rituals. After all, they were voyaging out as brides of Great Sky, with faith that the mountain itself would keep them safe from harm. They had to look and feel the part.

  So they washed and prepared themselves. Stillshadow made a mush of red berries and urine. With it she painted stripes and swirls along their bodies. Then she made white markings with a lump of chalk, sketching the bones and skull beneath the flesh.

  The chalk tickled, like a furry caterpillar crawling up their legs, but not a giggle escaped the girls. There had been no moment in their lives more serious than this, and every one of them knew it.

  When this was done Stillshadow drew the girls around her, and there spoke to them plainly. Her flame was cool and calm.

  “One day my flesh will flow up the mountain,” the old woman said. “My daughter Raven will keep the fire, but you will be at her side, and some of you will stand high.”

  “How will you decide?” Sister Quiet Water asked.

  “Your dreams will tell the tale,” the old woman said. “One at a time, I will come to each of you. In the night, in the dream time, I will show you a dance. Display these steps for me, and you are the one.

  “Dance in your dreams,” she told them. “Live in them. Come to me, although you are far away. The one who can dance my dance in dreams is the one who will follow me.” She paused, the very silence adding significance to her words. “Great Mother speaks in dreams,” she said.

  Alone in the cool of her hut, T’Cori knelt and with ritual precision gathered her bundle, rolled it in a zebra hide, and slung it over her back. Within was a sleeping skin, as well as dried meat and a pouch to carry whatever herbs and medicinal plants the girls gathered. Within it she would also carry foodstuffs or small creatures her guides might trap and kill. Every small motion, twist of wrist, and flex of her shoulders was as controlled as a dance. Softly, she sang a sacred journey song.

  Whirling Pool, a slender stick of a nine-spring, scurried up to her. “How long will you be gone?” Although young, Pool knew the name of every plant on Great Earth, and could repeat a dance after seeing it only once. She spread her arms and turned in a circle, dancing her name.

  Some of the fear T’Cori had not allowed herself to feel last night finally made itself known as a sour taste in the back of her throat, a tightness in her legs. “I don’t know. Days. Nights.” She paused. “A moon, perhaps. I am afraid.”

  “Don’t be afraid,” Whirling Pool said, perhaps peering into her flame. “Mother would not send you if you were not ready.”

  “I hope you’re right,” T’Cori said. “I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready.”

  Pool hugged T’Cori, then ran away. T’Cori realized that the words of encouragement were not actually meant for her. Whirling Pool was actually speaking to her own older self, knowing that one not so distant day it would be her own turn, wanting to believe that when that day came, things would be fine.

  When the girls were ready, they gathered together. Stillshadow blessed them, sprinkling a pinch of powder over each bowed head. Then, together, they started down Great Earth’s slopes, heading southeast.

  “Why must we do this?” Fawn pouted.

  “Because it is the path,” T’Cori said.

  Fawn glared at her. “Aren’t you afraid?” she asked.

  “This is everything we have trained for. We have protection—the hunt chiefs are with us, and we are on Great Mother’s work. When we return, we will be women.” She felt Fawn’s fear and frustration, but knew that strong words could stiffen a weak spine.

  Dove spoke for all of them. “We’ll be fine if we stay together. It’s a test of trust.”

  T’Cori prayed that that was true. But as she descended the path and glimpsed the two armed hunt chiefs who would accompany the young women, all strength seemed to abandon her. What was she doing? Didn’t Stillshadow know that there were risks out there, beyond the shadow? And why did she, T’Cori, imagine she could do such a thing?

  Then the taller of their guides turned. Owl Hooting smiled at her. And at that moment, she knew that all was right with the world.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  The four young dream dancers walked away from the rising sun. The girls carried slender bamboo walking sticks to help them across uneven ground and steep grades. Throughout the day they kept a steady pace, stopping occasionally to rest, study the plant life, or test the wind for unknown smells. Their escorts remained ahead of them far enough that it was all too easy to imagine themselves utterly alone.

  They proceeded in a strange fashion. First the girls decided upon a destination near the horizon, and then the hunt chiefs led the way until they had reached that spot, and the girls chose again.

  The nameless one found herself incapable of taking her eyes from Owl Hooting as he led the way. She found Owl’s loose, easy stride as dizzying as any of Stillshadow’s potions.

  T’Cori found it impossible to ignore the flex and play of muscles in the small of Owl’s back. She could not stop looking at the clustered scars, rewards for his skills and ranking among the hunt chiefs.

  When the sun was directly above them, Owl held up his hand, signaling for them to stop.

  “What is it?” Sister Quiet Water asked.

  “Lion scat,” he growled.

  “Lions?” T’Cori asked.

  “Perhaps,” he said. For two hands of breaths they waited as he tested the air, then his tight shoulders relaxed, and he waved them onward.

  They encountered the actual droppings only a little later, partially covered in sand. Owl Hooting bent, speaking with his fellow about the antelope fur fuzzing the gummy mass, speculating upon where and how the hapless animal had been run down.

  After the setting sun smote their eyes and the evening sky purpled, the girls stopped to camp. Owl and his brother cut thornbushes to make rude walls and vined them in a circle around their fire. T’Cori and her sisters ate some of their dried antelope meat. Not too much—it had to last until Owl and his brother made a hunt or until they found nuts and turtle eggs for a meal. Then the dream dancers lay down to sleep, trusting in the hunt chiefs to tend the fire and protect them.

  In the morning T’Cori ate more, and the girls made their toilet. Then they continued on, traveling southeast.

  The flat savannah was dotted with brush, patches of spiky green grass and trees with gnarled trunks. Herds of drowsy zebra and dusty wrinkled elephants lumbered past, usually ignoring the humans, but occasionally glancing and trumpeting in warning, protecting their calves.

  Kites and hawks and buzzards weighed down the top branches of the trees, and although some fled as the humans approached, other birds and animals simply watched the procession, judging the newcomers to be no threat.

  They saw evidence of both life and death: carcasses splayed in the sun with vultures or crows pecking, others that had crumbled to insect fodder. Dung beetles rolled away balls of half-dried elephant droppings in their path. Within days, nothing would remain.

  From time to time, each of them looked back in the direction of Great Earth. Already, the only home T’Cori had ever known was swallowed in a blur of clouds.

  “I have never been so far from home,” Dove said.

  The sense of loneliness was swelling within them when Quiet Water called, “Look! Thistleroot!”

  Instantly the mood shifted to one of excitement. “How much should we bring back?” Fawn asked.

  Dove paused, fingering the green, minty sprigs. Thistleroot grew in knee-high bunches as large as a woman’s hand. “Should we divide this? Or should it all go to Sister Quiet Water, who saw it first?”

  T’Cori clucked at them. “I think that it is more than that. Mother wants to learn how we are together. Do we work together? Who makes the way smoother?”

  Fawn scratched her head. “You should not call her mother. Raven would beat you.”

&nb
sp; “Raven is not here,” T’Cori replied.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  For half the day now, since long before dawn, Frog lay beside the wait-a-bit bush, struggling to keep his breath calm. Late the previous day he had detected the nyala tracks leading down to the water hole, and remembered one of the first things Uncle Snake and Break Spear had told him of the art of hunting.

  Look for them at dusk and dawn. It is then that the four-legged go to the watering holes, knowing that many meat-eaters hunt at night and men hunt during the day. Dawn and dusk are the times when elands and nyalas hope the lions and leopards and men are asleep and unaware. This is when you will find them.

  He’d spent the first day walking west, away from the places of possible danger. It took Frog three days to pass Great Earth and Earth boma, finally breaking into the bush beyond the Circle. Until this time he lived on fruit and nuts gathered as he went—all of this territory was known to him.

  Singing songs of hunts and knots and whittling, he kept his eyes open for anything that he could use. A bleached buffalo skeleton, tumbled in a dry wash, triggered his imagination. Frog broke the rotted old ligaments to tear a shinbone free. This, he thought as he slipped it into his sack, a clever boy could find use for.

  The following day, Frog walked until he found new water, and then soon afterward found the branches needed for a fire-bow and spears. The happy discovery of a knobby stand of fill-cactus gladdened his heart. As he hacked out its heart and scraped pulp into a folded leaf, he swore he would not need it…. But on the other hand, if hunting went poorly and hunger bared its teeth, he would be happy for the respite.

  He made and set snares, determining to return the next day to check his luck. Now then…where was that poison-grub bush Uncle Snake had been so happy to find? A quarter later he located it, and dug up thumb-long, wiggling red-ringed crawlers. Grinning, he simply squeezed the grub’s guts directly on the tip of his spear. Uncle Snake probably wouldn’t approve, but then again, Uncle Snake wasn’t here, was he?

  The previous night Frog had thought not to have fire, figuring that the smell of smoke sometimes scared off prey: fire was friend only to man, not animals.

  But tonight he longed for the comfort of the leaping tongues, needed to remember home. He brought together the materials for a fine blaze, thinking that tonight he might very well cook chunks of a potential kill. Of course, he would have preferred to bring a coal from the family hearth, but Uncle Snake had watched him carefully. He would have to make his own fire. If he did not, if he could not, Frog Hopping was unfit to provide for a family.

  So he took stock of his gathered resources. Most important among them was a flexible green branch as thick as his finger. It was both strong and springy, and about as long as his arm.

  As he went to work, all disappointment drained away. The sun was near the western horizon and would be down shortly, only the stars and the moon above providing light. Time was vital.

  Using his stone knife, Frog cut notches in the ends of the branch, then tied tough woven vine around the ends. This was an important skill: choosing the vines, weaving thin ones together tightly to make a strong, pliable cord. The texture was also important. Select the wrong vines, and there would be too much or too little friction, which was not good.

  When the bow was bent and the vines tight, he tested the stretch. This had to be just right, and feeling the tension of the vines was another skill that took time to learn.

  The vine was the right length, the bow tight. He was a little afraid that it might break, so when he inserted the drill stick he looped it once, rolling the bow back and forth, testing. Then he stopped, started over by adjusting the length of his makeshift twine, then tried again, this time satisfied that the flex of the branch made the vine snug enough to provide good traction.

  Frog required two other pieces to build a blaze, and he had spent the earlier part of the day making these ready. One was the fire trough, and the other was a cap for the stick. Two pieces of wood were sufficient, but it had taken a quarter to find the right pieces.

  Already, his efforts had gouged a furrow in the wood now flat against the ground, and braced between his knees. As he slipped the stick into position, Frog tested the friction and draw by rolling the bow back and forth. This time, he managed to make it turn evenly.

  It was important to begin with a drill stick as straight as possible, about as thick as one’s small finger. If the drill stick was not straight, it would wobble and become absurdly difficult to control.

  The fire trough was the buffalo shinbone Frog had discovered in the ravine. Uncle Snake told Frog that his father, Baobab, had always preferred bone to wood. The stick was cut to a dull point—not a sharp one, as he had seen some of the other boys make. Uncle Snake had judged that a bad idea. It could actually burn a hole in the bone, and where would he be then?

  Frog braced his knee against the shinbone and nestled the stick in the depression. The bowstring was set facing his leg, with the bow wood horizontal and away from him. The piece of wood capped the stick, and he leaned down on it just enough to make the proper contact with the tip of the stick and the bone.

  Then, humming a fire song to keep time, Frog began a gentle sawing motion, as he had been taught by Uncle, and as Uncle had been taught by his father, back to the first sons of Father Mountain.

  Placing the bone over the log, Frog sawed smoothly, back and forth, back and forth, not letting the vine catch, a little worried that if it did, it might break. There was a perfect rhythm to be found here, and Frog searched until he found it. The smooth play of his muscles, leaning on the stick, turning it with each bow stroke—all of these melded together until he smelled the first smoky wisps. He continued for a few more strokes, until the smell grew stronger, then stopped and looked at the little coal glowing in the depression of the wood.

  Although he added only a few tiny pinches of tinder at a time, Frog accidentally smothered the coal, and it died. He did not lose heart: this was a skill in which he was reasonably proficient, even if perfection continued to elude him.

  He would continue. He would open the door between the human world and the world of fire, and it would come. It would.

  With infinite patience, Frog began again. This time when the first spicy curl of smoke tickled his nose he smiled and continued. He sprinkled a pinch of shaved wood and dried moss into the depression, and continued his stroking until the smoke darkened, the sign that it was almost there.

  Frog took away the bone and bow, and brought his lips down close to the glowing embers, blowing carefully, adding a few more scraps of dry moss, until the first tiny tongue of flame appeared.

  It was easy to build on that initial success, and in a few hands of breaths he had summoned a healthy fire and was feeding it scraps of stick. When it could eat those handily, he gave it larger sticks, and then carefully stacked rocks around the edge of the fire pit, adding wood as it felt safe to do so.

  And when he had summoned a fire-spirit fully to life, and it accepted his offerings of sticks and shavings with a grateful crackle, Frog lay back, ate nuts and berries gathered during the day and went to sleep with a reasonably full belly and a contented smile on his face.

  Just Frog and the fire, two predators in the night.

  Awakening the very next morning, Frog knew the ancestors were pleased with him. Through the tall grass he spied, just within spear-casting distance, the gray-brown flank of a grazing antelope. He was as silent as he had ever been rolling up, setting himself and making a good throw. The spear struck the antelope in the belly, driving fist deep. The wounded buck bucked and tried to run, but made only five steps before toppling onto its side.

  Thank you, Father Mountain, he thought as he cut its throat. Fresh meat, and so soon after beginning the hunt! But it was too soon to take the carcass back to Fire boma. His people needed to know that he could survive in the bush for at least a moon.

  He had to dress the antelope immediately, remembering the lessons learned
from Uncle Snake. The sooner the organs were removed, the faster the meat would cool, delaying putrefaction.

  Hands shaking, Frog ripped and sliced the liver free from the steaming guts and ate it raw, savoring the hot blood spilling over his chin.

  Then Frog got down to business. It was important to keep dirt and foreign objects away from the exposed body cavity. Removing the scent glands was not absolutely necessary, but the hunt chiefs saved the glands for use as cures while hunting. Removing the glands carelessly could taint the meat.

  He rolled the carcass over on its back, placing the rump lower than the shoulders, and spread the hind legs. With his uncle’s obsidian knife Frog made a cut along the centerline of the belly, from breastbone to base of tail. First cut through the hide, then through the tough belly muscle. To avoid cutting into the paunch and intestines he held them away from the knife with his left hand while guiding the stone sliver with his right.

  Frog cut through the sternum and up the neck as far as he could, looking to remove as much of the windpipe as possible. The windpipe rotted rapidly and would taint the meat before he could eat or cure it.

  He cut around the anus and drew it into the body cavity, so that it came free with the guts. Very very careful here. Piercing the bladder would be an unpleasant mistake: no hunter wanted a dead antelope pissing on its own flesh!

  Frog loosened and rolled out the stomach and intestines, then cut around the edge of the diaphragm, which separated the chest and stomach cavities. He split the breastbone. Then Frog reached forward to cut the windpipe and gullet ahead of the lungs. This allowed him to pull the lungs and heart from the chest cavity. The heart was good meat, a nugget of pure chewy flavor the size of his brother Wasp’s fist.

  There were important decisions to make. He could hang the corpse from a tree, using spice to keep the flies away, but he had no spice. Frog wasted no time longing for what he did not have, choosing instead to make himself a slow fire, enveloping the meat with smoke. This would both cook it, dry it and add a savory smoky flavor.