The day of the girls’ return, Zan waited with the others. At twilight, the air was silvered by a distant cry, strange and haunting. She shivered and without knowing why held out her arms.
“The Menari!” Ainu held her baby daughter in the air, her face alight.
“Oh, listen,” Mai’bu cried. “Listen! Listen!” Kneeling, she hugged Ai’ma. “Listen, daughter!”
And Zan, standing with the women, longed to cry out herself, Oh, listen to the Menari!
Laughing and crying, imploring and exulting, the Menari sang. Hear me. I am I . . . I am you . . . I am the Menari . . . hear me . . . oh, hear me!
Then Zan saw them coming, the women behind, the girls ahead. Adorned with leaves and flowers, they came slowly up the path, hands on one another’s shoulders, their movements rhythmic, faces radiant, singing to the Menari as they came. I am I, I am you, I am the moon, the Menari sang, and the girls sang back, We hear you, O Menari, we hear you singing in the forest . . .
The last light of the sun illuminated their figures; light sprang from their heads like sprays of water, and all around them the air was golden, quivering. Up they came, singing, proud. They stopped before Farwe’s fire and there, arms around each other’s waist, danced around the hearth.
They sang and danced at Farwe’s fire till the sun was gone; then they moved on to the next fire, and the next, and on to each fire. With each stop the crowd grew. Everyone was there, men and women, the old ones, the boys, and the little girls who watched their older sisters and cousins with envious eyes.
Eyes glistening, bodies bedewed with perspiration, the girls pounded their feet upon the earth in exultation. Their sisters and brothers danced with them, lifting their knees and stamping their feet; their mothers danced, shedding years as they twirled and shook; and their fathers and uncles danced, raising their arms and throwing back their heads to sing. Feet thudding, hands slapping rhythmically against flesh, mouths open in song, they danced till they fell back, exhausted, their places taken immediately by others. Only the Sussuru girls danced on and on through the night, their throats taut, their beatific faces turned always toward the forest and the haunting, distant music of the Menari.
As the hours of the night passed, the wild dancing and exultant singing called to Zan, drew her even closer, until at last she, too, began to dance. Burrum’s arm went around her waist and they danced together. Bending, shaking, stamping, on and on they danced. Zan’s face was flaming; cold sweat filmed her body like another skin. In the center of her self there was a deep ache, as if she, the daughter of Others, had long ago lost the sweet taste of life and only now knew it was lost.
The fire blazed in the center of the circle of dancers; the earth resounded with stamping feet; heat and excitement mingled like smoke; and the silver voice of the Menari untiringly twined with the ecstatic voices of the swaying dancers: voices that cried and called, voices like the voices of birds, the voices of animals, the voices of the river and the trees and the wind. Somewhere inside herself, Zan briefly understood everything and began to cry and sing in a voice she had never heard, a voice that was part of the dust and the heat, part of the night and the bodies, part of the air and the wind, part of all that was and all that would ever be.
Chapter 25
Waking, Zan looked at once, as she always did, toward the entrance of the cave. The last shreds of a blue morning mist floated above the ground. For an instant, she, too, seemed to float above herself as she recalled again the ecstasy of the Sussuru night. “Aii, Burrum, my sister,” she said softly, turning. But Burrum was not curled up next to her. Nor was Farwe sitting up in her place, smiling and nodding. Rather she and Burrum and the old grandmother were bent over Lishum. He moaned and thrashed out with his arms.
“Burrum—?” Zan said, rising. The girl threw her a swift, terrified glance.
“My head hurts,” Lishum cried. “There is a bird inside my head. Oh, he is pecking at my eyes. Burrum! Auuhmaa! Meezzan!” he screamed, flailing about. “Make the bird go away.”
Farwe put her face against her son’s. “How hot he is! He is hot like the sun!”
“Lishum, Lishum, don’t you want to get up?” Burrum said. “Come, we’ll go down to the river and bathe. Here’s Meezzan, we’ll all go together.”
“No, no, make that bird go away. Oh, he is pecking out my eyes. I’ll fall from the tree like old Nabrushi! Burrum! Meezzan! Why don’t you take him away!”
“Yes, yes, Lishum, he’s going, he’s flying away,” Zan said, squatting down next to the child, but he continued to scream and moan.
His lips were swollen, his skin flushed and puffy. Several times that day he vomited a yellow-green, foul-smelling bile. Even after it was cleaned up with handfuls of grass, the acid odor lingered in the air. He gibbered nonsense, screamed, and once bolted upright and staggered toward the back of the cave. “Come away,” Burrum cried, but before she could reach him he fell in a heap. Raaniu carried his son back to his bed and lay down next to him, holding the boy in his arms.
Zan stayed by the child all day, feeling angry and useless. If only there was something she could do. If only she had an aspirin! She slept uneasily that night, waking with Lishum’s moans. Several times she heard Farwe and Raaniu whispering to each other and to the child. In the morning Lishum whimpered that his neck hurt, he couldn’t move his neck. He spoke wildly of the Bear People, he thought the Bear People had come in the night and were eating his neck. The family hovered around him. His mother stroked his face, his uncles brought him water.
He seemed to sleep for a while and they left him with the old grandmother, so that they could bathe and find some fruit. When they returned he was still asleep, no longer thrashing violently about. Farwe was pleased. “My son sleeps. Soon he will wake and be well.” But the day passed and Lishum couldn’t be wakened. “Aii, I am frightened for my son!” Raaniu exclaimed.
Farwe pinched the boy, gently at first, then more violently.
“Lishum!” Zan shook his arm, determined to wake him. “Lishum, do you hear me? Wake up!” She shook him harder. “Lishum!” He slept on. “Lishum!”
Burrum tugged Zan away.
“Aunt Ainu has gone for Diwera,” she said. “The Wai Wai will help Lishum. Shhh, do not scream, Meezzan. The Anouch’i will hear you and find my little brother.”
When Diwera came, she knelt by the child and ran her hands over the body. His limbs twitched and jerked, but his eyes stayed closed. Diwera placed her mouth against his and sucked in mightily.
“What is she doing?” Zan whispered.
“She is sucking his throat, so his throat may grow fresh again.”
Diwera straightened, sprinkling the child with invisible water. “Come, Miiawa, daughter of the forest,” she chanted, “you are beautiful, come and refresh the body of this sick child with your cool hands, with your green hands like little leaves. Come, Miiawa, who lives along the streams and among the cool trees, come sing, pri, pri, pri, and refresh the child’s hot body.” She sprinkled the invisible water on his face, his hands, and his chest. After this she gave Farwe a leaf full of black powder and told her when to give it to Lishum, and how to hold up his head so that he would swallow the powder.
Through the rest of that day and the night and the next day, Farwe gave Lishum pinches of the black powder on his tongue. But when it was all gone, he still slept Farwe began to cry. “I do not want my child to die.” She pulled at her cheeks as if she would strip the flesh from the bones. “I do not want to lose my son!”
Raaniu clutched his belly. “If my son dies, I will die inside here.”
Now the First Old Ones were sent for. Four women and two men, the oldest of the old. Their legs trembled as they walked, many were half blind, and rarely did any of them leave their daughters’ caves. They were old and wise, wise in ways unknown to those who had not attained such a great age, wiser even than the Wai Wai who came to watch them try to cure the child.
The old ones squatted around Lishum. They touc
hed his fevered jerking limbs with claw-like hands. They pushed back his eyelids to see his senselessly staring eyes. They talked among themselves and at last concluded that the Anouch’i had stolen the child’s Ta.
“Aiii,” the Auuhmaa cried, tears falling from her single good eye.
“Let us find the Anouch’i and ask them to return the child’s Ta,” Foomikii, an old man, said loudly.
“Yes, what need do they have for such a young child?” Bai agreed. “Let us find those Anouch’i.”
They went outside, followed by the family and Diwera, and lay down on the ground with their ears pressed hard to the earth, still wet from the morning rains. “Who hears the Anouch’i?” Taomi said shrilly. She sniffed the air. “I smell the birds. I smell the animals beneath the earth. I hear them talking, but I do not hear the Anouch’i.”
They struggled to their feet, groaning because their bones were stiff with age. “Let us look for the path of the Anouch’i,” Meetil, the oldest of the old, said. He raised a quivering arm. “I know the path for Sun,” he chanted. “I know the path for Moon, I know the path for Night, I know the path for Day. Animals have their paths, and Miiawa has her paths. The fish swim in their paths. Where is the path that leads to the Anouch’i? Where are the tracks of the Anouch’i?” he asked in a quavering voice.
They overturned stones and peered into the leafy branches of trees. They panted with exertion, sweat covered their bodies, and their eyes bulged with fatigue.
“Come, Anouch’i, come, we are not afraid of you!” Meetil cried tremblingly. Spittle stood at the corners of his mouth, his legs were visibly shaking, and his eyes seemed to stare into something unseen. His chest heaved up and down. “Anouch’i, Anouch’i, we are not—not—not afraid—” All at once, his legs gave way and he fell, striking the ground heavily. “The Anouch’i have found me,” he gasped. “They have struck me in the eye. They have struck me in the chest. Oh, my eye, my chest, oh, oh—” He lay on the ground, unable to rise.
The other old ones stood around Meetil, shaking like trees in a storm, their hands trembling around their faces. “Thou, O Anouch’i, are greater than we,” Bai wailed. “You have taken away the child,” she cried thinly. “You have struck down this man.” She tottered into Farwe’s cave, wailing praise of the Anouch’i, tearing off her necklaces and bracelets and throwing them into the fire. She tore hair from her head and threw this, too, into the fire.
“Now, Anouch’i!” she cried, raising her veiny arms. “I have given you things. I have given you everything. Give me back the child. You do not need the child’s Ta, Anouch’i.” The other old ones crowded in after her, tearing off their ornaments, seizing hunks of their hair and throwing all into the fire. Then Farwe and Raaniu, Burrum, Ainu, and all of the family, and Zan, too, tore off everything they wore, tore out hair and threw it into the fire.
“We are giving you everything,” Farwe moaned. “Now give us back our little son.”
“Give him back, give him back,” they cried, and caught up in the delirium of wailing and crying, Zan added her voice to the others, pleading with the Anouch’i for the little boy.
But the Anouch’i did not give him up and, shaking with exhaustion, the old ones had to be fetched back to their caves by their sons and daughters. Near tears, Zan ran out of the cave. She had believed—she had wanted to believe in the old ones’ power and knowledge. She pushed her forehead against a tree, rubbing it back and forth. Maybe Lishum would get better anyway. Maybe in the morning he would sit up smiling and grab her arm, demanding that she play with him. Right now, he would say. I want to play now, Meezzan! He would grab her, grunting fiercely, and . . .
A hand, hot and heavy, came down on her shoulder. “Meezzan.”
She shook her head. She didn’t want to talk to anyone . . . Lishum would grab her arm and she would fall down on the ground, pretending he had overpowered her . . .
“Meezzan.” She was spun around. “Look at my eyes,” Diwera said. She put her forefinger against Zan’s breastbone. “Hear me. If the child dies, you must leave the People.” Her finger poked fiercely into Zan’s chest. “Listen to what I say. If the child dies, do not stay here. Take your powers and return to that place where you belong. Go away from the People.” Her lips tightened. “Leave us! Leave us!”
Chapter 26
In the morning, Raaniu, who had slept all night with his arms around Lishum, woke to find himself embracing a lifeless body. He shook Farwe’s shoulder. “Wake up, mother of my son! Your son has left us. His Ta has left us.” Tears fell down Raaniu’s cheeks. “Your son has gone to be happy in Place-of-Night-Sun.”
Farwe reached for the dead child and rocked him at her breast as if he had been an infant. “Lishum,” she called softly. “Lishum, lishum . . .”
Now, everyone was awake and crying. “Let me kiss my brother,” Burrum said, stroking his hair. “Meezzan, come and kiss my brother.”
Dazedly, Zan bent over the child’s body and put her lips to his mouth. There was a terrible pain behind her ribs. Only days before, Lishum had been alive, laughing, crying, speaking, touching. Now there was only this—tiring. This—body. Unresponsive, Clammy, stiffening. He was—dead.
She understood.
But that it had happened to a child, to Lishum—it was unfair!
“My cousin is so cold,” Ai’ma said in her deep voice. “I don’t like Lishum to be so cold!”
Tears filled Zan’s eyes. Lishum. She rocked Ai’ma back and forth. How could it be?
Oh, she understood what death meant. Breath stopped, heart and brain, kidneys and liver, arms and legs and eyes all stopped working and pumping and being. Yes, that was it, but really, she didn’t understand it at all! Why had it happened? It was wrong! She wanted to cover her head and crawl into a corner.
But there were things to be done and no one could hide in a corner. One by one they kissed the dead child. Now, Farwe lay him down on the bed of leaves and crawled on hands and knees to the hearth, where she rubbed ashes in her hair and smeared her face and body with soot. “Come, take the ashes,” Burrum said. Her hands were burning hot on Zan’s arms. “Protect yourself from the Anouch’i. They have found our little brother. We must not let them find anyone else.” Faces and bodies disappeared beneath the ashes. Only eyes glowed large and wet from the sooty masks.
“Come, Keyria, Foomia,” Raaniu said in a loud voice. “Come, my brothers, come, Miiniu, we will take this child’s body away. Vulture will devour this useless shell.” The four men picked up the child, one at each limb, and carried him from the cave.
Something hard and frantic was pumping in Zan’s throat. Lishum had said, When I am grown, I will be Meezzan’s man! Now his body was to be eaten by animals. She clutched Burrum. “Where are they going? Oh, what are they doing?”
Burrum’s face was streaked with sooty tears. She put her mouth to Zan’s ear. “Hush, hush, they are taking him to Cave-of-No-Name.” Zan’s heart slipped sideways in her chest. She remembered the old man, Toufa, his agitation, her confusion. “We must not let the Anouch’i know,” Burrum whispered, “else they will come and steal his body!”
The bedding on which Lishum had lain during his illness was thrown into a far, dark part of the cave, and fresh bedding was gathered. The men returned and once again all smeared themselves with soot and ashes.
Farwe and Mai’bu took brands from the fire. Ainu put her baby down on the bed and, leaving Ai’ma to care for the infant, everyone else followed Farwe out of the cave. They climbed up the path, joined along the way by other families. The rain fell. The path became slippery. Here was the hill where Zan had stood the day Burrum was at the Women’s Stream. She remembered her naive pleasure in exploring all alone. Lishum had wanted to come with her, but she had slipped away from him.
Now, with people packed densely behind her, with everyone here except Lishum, she again followed the stream coursing between gray ledges, again came suddenly upon the enormous mushroom rock, hurried past it, and came to the soaked, g
reen entrance of Cave-of-No-Name.
Entering the cave, they followed the stream into the cavernous, high-ceilinged room bejeweled with stone formations. Here, Zan thought, they would stop, but they continued on, moving to the end of the room where it narrowed into a low tunnel.
Ahead of Zan, Burrum entered the tunnel on hands and knees and disappeared into the darkness. Zan followed.
Acrid smoke from torches filled the air. Zan’s throat burned. Soon her hands and knees were scraped raw. Crawling behind Burrum, pressed by people behind her,
Zan sensed the narrowness of the ledge and the awful depths to her right, but she could see nothing.
“Keep close to the wall,” Burrum instructed. Her voice sounded oddly hollow. “Do not be afraid.”
Zan crawled slowly forward. From deep inside the mountain came the measured beat of a drum, as if the heart of the mountain were pounding. It seemed to her that it was pounding out Lishum’s name. Li-shum . . . Li-shum . . . Lishum . . . The beating of the drum drew her on, beating through the earth, beating in her head. The ledge widened, sloped downward. She was able to stand again.
Her legs tottery, she followed Burrum into a large rounded chamber already half filled with people. More people crowded in. Torches flickered. From somewhere in the center of the room came the incessant drum beat. Bones and skulls were heaped in the corners and along the edges of the walls. A large opening in the ceiling let in a wash of smoky light that fell across a platform of rock, where Lishum’s body lay.
People swayed and sang, groaning, keening, “Little son, you are gone. You have left us.” On hands and knees, Raaniu beat his head against the earth. And next to him, Farwe mourned, “Oh, let me go to Place-of-Night-Sun! I am tired of suffering in this world. I want to see my little son, I want to be with him in that happy place.”
Saturday, the Twelfth of October Page 16