The Fifth Sacred Thing

by Starhawk

  Then suddenly the energy shifted. Between Isis and Sara, the air became viscous; subliminal thunder rumbled. Madrone could feel the tension shift to attraction. Slowly their hands migrated across her back until their fingers touched; an electric current poured through her.

  “Use them,” Rachel whispered again.

  Madrone’s tongue flicked on Katy’s forehead, tasted her sweat. Her hands searched, they felt out the core of wrongness in Katy, pulled it forth for her inner eyes to see. Yes, there was something she recognized, a cousin of the earlier plague. The pulsing power behind her was like the swell of the ocean. She could ride on it—out, to rip loose connections, dissolve a link here, a protein there—and then in, to create something new, another bonding, so that the thing changed form and shape and function, melted and re-formed, until it became a harmless chunk of protein, just formed enough to mate with its own kind, transforming and undoing them. It was done.

  “Honey,” Madrone whispered, and Mary Ellen brought her a dishful. She let a drop of her sweat fall into the bowl, to charge the amber liquid with the energies of this change. They could feed it to Katy in small doses throughout the night. Maybe it wasn’t necessary; the change felt complete. But it couldn’t hurt.

  Madrone shook out her hands and turned the power coming through her to a cool stream of water washing through Katy’s body, easing the fever, cleansing, soothing, cooling. Her hands smoothed Katy’s aura, and the power flowing through her was golden light. Katy was sleeping now, her breathing rhythmic and relaxed. Madrone felt drained, so tired she could hardly hold her head up.

  “Take in something for yourself,” Rachel whispered. Madrone nodded, breathing in the gold and the fire and the light.

  “Thanks, Isis, Sara. Shake out your hands now, and you can relax. We’ve done good work here.”

  They pulled away, but as they faced each other Madrone could still sense the charge between them. Maybe this will distract Sara from her infatuation with me, let me get some sleep. But, Diosa, when have I last felt that? Maybe when Bird came back. With Sandy it was just sweetness and steadiness, not this hovering electric tension. At any moment, lightning would zigzag through the narrow cabin, the downpour would begin.

  “We done?” Isis asked. “Now can we throw the rich white bitch overboard?”

  Madrone heard Mary Ellen’s indrawn breath. But Sara only smiled. It was an amazing smile, slow, knowing, inviting, confident.

  “Just joking,” Isis said. Slowly, with the slightest of winks, she returned Sara’s smile.

  It makes perfect sense, Madrone thought. The black fringed iris, the white cupped lily, grown from the same soil, familiar with the parameters of the same beds. And me, I’m a little wild weed, not meant for this garden at all. She was too tired to feel jealous, too tired to feel much of anything at all.

  “Madrone, child, you go catch some sleep,” Mary Ellen said.

  “I can lie down right here on the floor and stay near Katy.”

  “No, you cannot. You go take the cabin, get some real rest. I’ll stay with her and call you when you’re needed. You two”—she pointed her chin at Isis and Sara—“it’s a warm night. You can sleep up top.”

  Several hours later Mary Ellen roused Madrone. “It’s time,” she said. “Her water’s broke. I cleaned up the bed, but I think you better come now.”

  Through the galley porthole, Madrone could see the waning crescent of the moon rising. She still felt tired, but some residue of energy had returned that she could draw on.

  Katy’s flesh was still cool, and Madrone breathed thanks to the Goddess. Waves of contractions rippled over her body. Her open eyes were lucid but filled with fear.

  “Katy, it’s okay. You’re safe. You’re safe, here.”

  “Madrone?”

  “I’m here. I won’t leave you.”

  Katy reached up her arms like a child reaching for comfort and buried her face in Madrone’s shoulders.

  “It’s all right,” Madrone murmured, patting and soothing her. “It’s really all right now.”

  “I feel so shaky. Everything’s rocking.”

  “We’re on a boat, querida. We’re sailing away, sailing home.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  Katy smiled, then grimaced as another contraction caught her.

  “They’re hurting me,” she said. “They’ve done something to me. It still hurts, Madrone. It hurts bad.”

  “No, Katy, they’re not hurting you now. You’re having a baby, that’s all. I know it feels like pain, but it’s not a pain to fear.”

  “I can’t help it, Madrone. I’m afraid. They’ve made me afraid.”

  “I know. But I’m here, and I’ve caught hundreds of babies, and I’m not afraid for you.” And that, of course, is only partly true, because dear Goddess, here we are, with no midwife’s bag, no herbs, no drugs, no clamps, no syringes, no backup, no help if anything goes wrong.

  The night wore on. Katy labored but she wasn’t making much progress, and Madrone sat, pushing down worry. Mary Ellen hovered, bathing Katy’s face with soft cloths and giving her sips of water and teaspoonfuls of Madrone’s honey. They had put Angela to sleep in the forward bunk. Sara and Isis were still asleep on deck.

  “It won’t come,” Katy said. “Madrone, I want to stop. Please make it stop.”

  “I can’t do that, niña. This is birth, it takes its own time. Here, hold my hand. Would you like a sip of water?”

  “I just want it to be over.”

  “Just let go. Open.”

  “I can’t. I’m afraid.”

  “I know, you’ve been in hell together, you and the kid. You don’t want to let her out to face this world apart from you. But it’s time. You can’t keep her safe inside you any longer.”

  “I can’t do it. I’m not strong enough, Madrone.”

  “Trust your body, Katy. Your woman’s body has given birth for millions of years. It knows what to do.”

  “I don’t. I don’t know what to do. Oh, Madrone, I’m so glad you’re here!”

  “Me too.”

  “All that other stuff—it seems so far away now. It doesn’t matter.”

  “Hush, don’t even think about it. Just think about opening, like a flower opening to the sun.”

  “They killed our flowers. Madrone, they killed Littlejohn and—”

  “No, querida, don’t think about that now. I know what happened. There’ll be time to talk about that tomorrow. Right now you need to imagine beautiful things, hopeful things. Think about light, the sun rising out of the earth. You know, in Spanish, Katy, there are two ways to say ‘give birth.’ There’s estar de parto, which means to separate, to part, and dar a luz, which is to give to light. And that’s what you’ve got to do: let go. Give your child to the light and give the light to her. Even in English, birth is something you give.”

  Katy let out a new cry, and Madrone checked her cervix once more. Praise the earth, she was open at last.

  “Push, honey. Do you feel that urge to push? Mary Ellen, wake Sara and Isis, it won’t be long now. And then support her back, will you? Go with it, Katy. Feel the contraction coming, take a deep breath, hold it, and push.”

  Madrone sang to her while the others gathered.

  “Siente tu poder,

  El poder de la mujer.

  La madre primera,

  Es la madre tierra.”

  “That means ‘Feel your power, the power of the woman. The first mother is mother earth.’ ”

  Katy sat up, leaning back on Mary Ellen’s strong arms, dug her heels into the bunk, and began to push. Her fear was gone. On her face was a look of tremendous concentration; her skin glistened with sweat. Sara had come sleepily down the ladder from the deck, and Katy gripped her white arm so hard the veins stood out. Isis stood behind them, watching.

  “Good work, Katy,” Madrone said. “Isis, Sara—take her feet so she can get more leverage. Now, Katy, again—push!”

  “I know,” Katy s
aid. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

  “No, querida, I don’t need to tell you. The wisdom is in your cells, in your womb, and they are here with us tonight, the mothers, all the mothers, every woman who has ever given birth, your mother, my mother too. Lean on them, let them support you, they will hold your back.”

  An hour passed, then another hour, almost unnoticed as they focused on Katy. At last, when Madrone checked Katy’s vagina, she could feel the baby’s head pushing against the lips.

  “Good work!” Madrone said again, smiling up at Katy as she massaged and stretched her perineum. “I wish we had a mirror, so you could see your child’s black curly hair. Bring us the head now.”

  Katy grunted, held her breath, and pushed hard as Mary Ellen wiped the sweat from her face. In a smooth motion, the baby’s head emerged. A new person was coming forth into light, Madrone thought, who could at this moment be anyone or anything. Out of one being comes another, out of All Possibilities, one. Oh, most sacred mystery! Blessed be the Creative One, Mother of Surprises, fecund, more tenacious even than death.

  But in the next contraction, the baby’s head pulled back and its chin jammed against the perineum, its lips clenched and beginning to darken.

  “Hands and knees,” Madrone cried automatically. “Mary Ellen, help her flip. Support her, Isis.”

  “What’s wrong?” Sara asked anxiously.

  “Shoulder dystocia. There, get her over. Don’t you worry, Katy, just relax.”

  “What in Jesus is that?” Isis asked.

  “Stuck shoulders. I need to get in there and turn them.”

  She slid one hand up into the vagina, slipped two fingers of the other hand behind the baby’s head. It called for a turning motion, like unscrewing a bolt; she had done it fifty times but never without tension. There was so much that could go wrong. If she dislocated the child’s shoulder or broke its arm, or if this proved the one impossible to move.…

  Stop those thoughts. Feel the timing, the contractions. Now.

  “Push, Katy, push.” She could feel the muscles bear down, as she pushed and pulled and twisted in that tight, narrow space, until suddenly everything gave way and the child slid free.

  Her hands caught it, her eyes noted that it was a girl, and she placed the baby on Katy’s belly. There was no suction bulb to clear its nostrils and throat, but the child opened her tiny mouth and began to breathe and cry.

  Katy placed her hands on the child’s back, stroking its skin wonderingly.

  “It’s so slimy,” Isis whispered in alarm.

  Madrone laughed. “That’s the vernix that covers the skin in the womb to keep it healthy. In a moment we’ll rub it in. Or rub some on your skin—there’s nothing better for it.”

  But Isis’ comments reminded her that a child should enter the world to blessings and praise. As she tied the string she had prepared around the umbilical cord, which still extended into Katy’s vagina, she motioned to the others to gather around.

  “We need to welcome her and give her blessings. Are your hands clean? Then one by one, stroke her gently, rub some of the vernix into her skin, and make a wish for her, something that comes from your own life. Then you will always have a link with her.”

  Madrone went first, rubbing a spiral pattern on the wet silk skin. “I wish that you may always find the healing you need.”

  “I wish that you will always have enough to eat and drink and share with others,” Mary Ellen said.

  “I wish that you will find true love,” Sara said.

  “I wish that you will escape every trap they set for you,” Isis said.

  Katy reached down and stroked the baby’s arms and legs. “I wish you the strength to survive.”

  “Who will cut the cord and break the last link between the child and the womb?” Madrone asked.

  “You do it,” they all said, so she did, using the knife Mary Ellen had sterilized earlier.

  “Be free, be strong, be yourself, be lucky, be proud to be a woman, be loved and loving; live among flowers, surrounded by free flowing waters; live in the sun’s warmth, breathing clear air, nourished by moonlight and starlight; know that you are welcome, that you are a precious gift to us; be blessed,” Madrone said.

  The child cried and Katy lifted her to her breast to suck. With a last moan, she expelled the placenta, and Mary Ellen caught it in a basin while Madrone kneaded Katy’s womb to help it contract. There was blood all over the bunk, but praise the Goddess she had hardly torn at all, and there was no hemorrhage.

  “I’ll clean up,” Mary Ellen said. “You rest yourself, Madrone.”

  Madrone sat down at last. Her body was trembling; she was as exhausted as if she herself had given birth. Which she had, in a way. For she had rescued Katy from the lab, and if she hadn’t, this child would already be dead, a specimen useful for data and products that didn’t bear thinking of. Oh, she had saved this tiny life five times already, and qué milagro that it lived and breathed, that Katy’s own hands could comfort and stroke it and hold it to her breast.

  There were still dangers, still a hundred ways El Mundo Malo could reach up and grab them and suck them down. But now, just for now, she could savor her triumph. Something had turned. A new child had come to the world of light and dark, and I am still alive, Madrone thought, and the sun is rising over the swelling waves, and today, yes today, we are turning our faces toward home.

  31

  Maya’s head ached. The meeting room was a dark basement garage, with people crowded and crammed into the space. It stank of sweat and fear, overlaid with a tinge of sage. The Voices in their masks were jammed together with everybody else. The discussion was heated, with nasty undertones, and in Maya’s opinion had already gone on far too long.

  “Bird has gone over to the enemy.”

  Cress from the Water Council addressed the room. His eyes were red and there was a three-day growth of beard over his narrow chin. He looks stretched too tight, Maya thought, like all of us. Still, I cannot help but dislike him.

  “Don’t say that!” protested Sachiko from the Musicians’ Guild. “We don’t know what they did to him.”

  “As far as that goes, we don’t know that they did anything to him at all,” Cress said. “No, don’t shout me down! I have a right to raise this question. He disappears into the South for almost ten years, comes back a few months before the invading armies, just in time to talk us out of building any weapons or planning armed resistance. Now he’s handing out their water ration cards. It’s suspicious, that’s all I’m saying.”

  Maya half rose to speak, but Sam laid a restraining arm on her. “You can’t defend him,” he whispered. “You’re his grandmother.”

  For a moment Maya thought nobody else would speak. Then the big man sitting beside Sachiko rose. Maya recognized one of Bird’s old friends, another guitarist. What was his name? Walker?

  “I’ve known Bird many years,” Walker said. “I can believe he might give way under torture. Any of us might. But I’ll never believe he’s a traitor. Even if he were, nobody should be tried in absentia by rumors and innuendo. Suspicions like yours, Cress, do more harm than ten collaborators. Especially if they keep us from supporting one of our own, who’s been through Goddess only knows what.”

  “I’m not condemning him,” Cress said. “Personally, I’m willing to believe he just overestimated his capacity to resist. But don’t you all see, that proves my point. He’s an example that when it comes down to the ultimate test, we can’t withstand their force.”

  “Maybe he’s still resisting, in his own way,” Walker suggested.

  “How? Running their rationing program?”

  “Nobody’s taken any of their cards yet,” Walker said. “Why? Because almost every house in this city has a cistern, which is still pretty full from the winter rains. If Bird’s a traitor, why hasn’t he told them about the cisterns? Why haven’t they done anything about them?”

  An older woman wearing the handspun garments of the Silk Guild
rose. “My daughter was captured by the soldiers. She is still too shocked and hurt to tell her story here in public, but I will tell it for her. They were going to rape her, a whole gang of them. She fought them but they tied her down to the bed. Then Bird came in.” She paused. In the hush, Maya squeezed Sam’s hand so hard that his fingers turned from red to white. “Somehow he talked them out of it,” the woman went on. “He made them let her go. He is no traitor.”

  Maya let out a long sigh, and Sam patted her hand as she released his.

  “That’s not the question at hand here,” Cress objected. “It’s not Bird who’s on trial, it’s our whole strategy. We’ve been too naïve. What is it going to take to make us admit that noncooperation isn’t working?”

  “We expected casualties,” Lily said. She was dressed in a simple gray shift, and she too looked tired and drawn. “We knew there would be suffering.”

  “Maybe it’s time we inflicted some,” Cress said.

  In the silence that followed, Maya could feel the tensions in the room polarize. Yes, there were many who agreed with Cress, and there would be many more as the days wore on.

  “Defense does not agree,” Lily said.

  “That goes without saying, but what do you suggest? We can’t just go on lying down and eating their laser burns. We can’t let them turn us all into Birds, one by one.”

  “I’m not proposing that we do.” Lily’s voice was calm. How does she do it? Maya thought. Does she practice in the mirror, or does it come from so many years of sitting meditation?

  “Then propose something else,” Cress challenged her. “The Forest people have held the railway right-of-way. The South Bay groups have blown the tracks and cut their supply lines.”

  “Is that true?” Salal, who was Crow of the meeting for the day, broke in. “Can anyone verify that piece of news?”