by Barbara Wood
But Keeka received no response from her cousin Laliari who was too filled with grief to speak. Because worse than the menacing fog and the cold and the unseen ghosts was the loss of their men.
Doron’s dark head disappearing beneath the violent water.
She tried to picture her beloved Doron as he had been before the tragedy—young, beardless, of slender build—a brave hunter who preferred to sit peacefully and carve ivory by the nightly campfire. Doron liked to laugh and tell stories, and he had a rare tolerance for children. Unlike the other men of the clan who had no patience with youngsters, Doron didn’t mind them crawling into his lap and in fact enjoyed it and could be seen laughing (although he did turn red with embarrassment when caught). But mostly Laliari remembered Doron’s embrace at night, how he would fall asleep afterward with his arms around her as he breathed softly into her neck.
Laliari choked back a sob. She must not think of him. It was bad luck to think of the dead.
The invasion had caught them by surprise. Laliari and her people had been going about their daily life in the river valley they had inhabited for countless generations when strangers from the west had suddenly appeared across the grassy plains, hundreds and thousands of them, saying that their land inland was drying up and becoming a desert. They had explained their plight while greedily eyeing the grassy expanses on either side of Laliari’s river, the grazing herds, the plentiful fish and bird life. A bounty of food. But they had wanted it all for themselves. The ensuing territorial dispute had been long and bitter, with the stronger and more numerous newcomers driving Laliari’s clan northward, forcing them to flee with their possessions on their backs—the massive elephant bones that formed the framework of their moveable tents, and the hides that stretched over the bones to make the tent walls. When the clan reached the delta where the river branched, they had encountered more people, much like themselves, but unwilling to share their food sources. And so another bloody battle over land and food had taken place, resulting in Laliari’s people being pushed out again, this time eastward.
What had started as a large exodus of several hundred people had by then been reduced to a band of eighty-nine, with the women, children, and elderly going ahead while the men stayed at the rear to protect them from the pursuing delta-dwellers. They had come to a vast expanse of boggy marsh and reeds and had started across. Just as the women made it to the other side, they turned in time to see a monstrous wall of water come rushing from out of nowhere, a swift deluge racing across the vast marshland as it swallowed up the unsuspecting men who were halfway across.
The women, on their high ground, had stared in shock as they watched the hunters vanish in an instant beneath the turbulent water, arms and legs tumbling like fragile sticks, the men’s cries silenced as water filled their lungs. And then the flood had grown calm and the women, not knowing that this marshy expanse was subjected to the vagaries of neap tides and spring tides—making it a swampland part of the time, an inundation at others—believed themselves to be standing at the edge of a newly formed sea.
Dazed and in shock, they had turned northward, following the eastern edge of the new sea until they had come to an even larger body of water—wider than their own river at its widest point, wider than the new sea covering the marshland of reeds and the bodies of their men. In fact, this vast sea went on to the horizon and the women could see neither land nor trees on the other side. It was also their first time seeing breakers and they screamed in fright at the water rolling toward them in huge waves, crashing on the beach, retreating, only to roll forward again, like an animal trying to attack them. Although they had found bountiful food here in the tide pools—limpets, periwinkles, and mussels—the women had turned and fled, moving inland away from the sea that would one day be called Mediterranean, and crossed a hostile wilderness until they came to a mist-filled river valley that bore little resemblance to their own.
Here, cut off from their ancestral land, from their men and everything they knew, their search for a new home had begun—a ragtag wandering band of nineteen women, two elders, and twenty-two babies and children.
As they trekked through yet another fog-shrouded dawn, having spent another moonless night in fear, the women kept hopeful watch for signs of their clan spirit, the gazelle. They had not sighted one since leaving their river valley. What if there were no gazelles in this strange land? Would the clan die without its spirit? Laliari, trudging along with her kinswomen through the unfamiliar valley, was haunted by an even more frightening thought: that there were worse things than losing their clan spirit. Worse things even than losing their men. Because in this strange mist-enshrouded world they could not see the moon. They had not, in fact, seen it in weeks.
Laliari was not alone in her fears. While the other women mourned the loss of their men, even greater was their grief over the loss of the moon. It had not shown its face in many days and they were beginning to fear that it might be gone forever. Without the moon there could be no babies, and no babies meant the ultimate death of the clan. Already the early signs were among them: in the weeks since they had been roaming on their own, not one of the women had become pregnant.
As Laliari shifted the heavy burden on her shoulders, she looked ahead at the two elders who led the small band through the fog and tried to take comfort from the thought that Alawa and Bellek, with their supernatural powers and knowledge of magic, would find the moon.
But Laliari could not know that Alawa was impelled by a deep terror of her own and that she harbored a terrible secret.
Old Alawa was Keeper of the Gazelle Antlers and therefore keeper of the clan’s history. Her name meant “the one who was searched for” because when she was a small child she had gotten lost and the clan had searched for days for her. She had the honor of wearing the gazelle antlers on her head, strapped under her chin with strips of animal sinew. Alawa’s earlobes had been so stretched over the years with ornamental plugs that they rested on her bony shoulders. Between her withered breasts hung necklaces of shell, bone, and ivory. Amulets covered the rest of her body, not for ornamentation but for ritualistic magic. Alawa’s people knew that for survival every bodily orifice must be guarded against the invasion of evil spirits. In childhood, the nasal septum was pierced with an ostrich quill and kept open through adulthood with an ivory needle. This prevented evil spirits from entering the body through the nostrils. Ears were pierced, top and bottom, as well as lips. Magic amulets were strung from belts so that they hung protectively over buttocks and pubis, for spirits were known to enter human beings through the rectum and vagina as well.
The other elder was Bellek, clan shaman and Keeper of the Mushrooms. Like Alawa, his hair was long and white and strung with beads that clicked gently as he walked. His only clothing was a loincloth made of soft gazelle skin, and his body was as heavily decorated with magic amulets as Alawa’s. Bellek carried dried mushrooms in a leather pouch, but he also searched for fresh ones in the wooded areas on the banks of this foreign river. Although mushrooms were plentiful and the band ate well of them as they traveled through this strange land of mists and ghosts, Bellek was looking for one mushroom in particular, the one with a long thin stem and distinctive cap that he always thought resembled a woman’s nipple. These were the mushrooms that, when ingested, transported a person into a metaphysical plane where supernatural beings dwelled.
Laliari was thankful that the clan still had Bellek and Alawa, for elders were the clan’s most prized members and together, Laliari was certain, the old pair would find the moon.
As if sensing the girl’s eyes on her, Alawa stopped suddenly and turned to peer through the mist at the younger woman. The others also stopped and looked at Alawa in alarm. The silence that engulfed them was terrifying, for it was the silence of ghosts holding their tongues, of evil spirits waiting to pounce. Several of the women gathered their little ones close to them and held babies tight. The moment seemed to hang suspended in time, Laliari held her breath, everyone waited.
And then Alawa, having come to a secret decision, turned and resumed her weary trek.
Alawa’s secret decision was this: that it was not yet time to tell the others of her new knowledge, which made her heart heavy with sadness. She had read the magic stones and studied her dreams, she had looked into the campfire smoke and tracked the flight of sparks, and altogether they had revealed a terrible truth that left no doubt in Alawa’s mind.
For the survival of the clan, the children must die.
By afternoon the fog cleared, as they had known it would, allowing the refugees a view of unfamiliar woodland and sandy river bank before the sun dipped to the horizon and robbed them of light.
They stopped to rest. While Keeka and other young mothers settled down to breast-feed and adolescent girls went to draw water, Laliari opened the last of their date reserves and distributed them among the group. The dates had been gathered days before, at a small palm grove on the river. With everyone throwing stones and rocks at the clusters of chewy fruit high overhead, they had reaped a rich harvest, feasting on the spot and then filling their baskets to carry on their backs.
While the others ate, Alawa separated herself from the group to find a partially sunny spot for the reading of her magic stones. At the same time, Bellek, stooped and nearsighted, scrutinized every twig and branch, every shrub and blade of grass to determine whether this was a lucky place to stay. So far, he had seen little good magic here.
Sixty-five thousand years in the past it had not occurred to a man named Lion that his people could alter their circumstances. But it had occurred to a girl named Tall One and it was her actions that had led to the survival of her race. This was her legacy to her descendants, to know that they need not be at the mercy of their environment. However, down through the millennia, as humans had multiplied and expanded the boundaries of their world, Tall One’s descendents had grown extreme in their new knowledge of change and control, for now they tried constantly to manage every microscopic aspect of their environment through the appeasing and honoring of ghosts. They had to be always on the alert in order to keep their world in balance. The slightest misstep could upset the spirits and bring bad luck upon the people. If they crossed a stream they would first say, “Spirit in this stream, we wish to pass in peace.” When they killed an animal, they asked its forgiveness. They were forever “reading” their surroundings. Whereas their ancestors of sixty-five millennia earlier had paid no heed to a smoking volcano, Laliari and her family read omens in the slightest spark from an ember. Which was why Alawa, as she interpreted the toss of her magic stones, wondered what they had done wrong at the Reed Sea to cause it to swallow up the hunters. Of course they hadn’t known it was going to be a sea, so how could they have spoken the appropriate words? They hadn’t even known its name so how could they have invoked its spirit? But surely there had been signs to read—there were always signs. What had they missed that would have prevented the catastrophe?
And, she thought darkly as she gathered up her stones, signs that could have prevented the catastrophe yet to come. For once again the collection of pebbles and small rocks that had been handed down through countless generations, all the way back to the very first Keeper of the Gazelle Horns, told the same message: the children were going to have to die.
She peered through the trees at the tragic collection of women and children. They were weary from lack of sleep. Nightmares plagued them, horrific dreams that Alawa believed were the result of the dead not having had a silent-sitting. If the silent-sitting had been performed, the unhappy ghosts would not now be haunting the dreams of the living.
Her own daughter, running, an invader close on her heels, grabbing her flying hair, pulling her off her feet, slamming her down onto her back, his club coming down again and again.
At first it had only been a few invaders and Doron and the hunters had been able to drive them off. But then more strangers had come, having heard of the lush green savanna teeming with wildlife, and then more invaders, swarming like ants over the western hills until Alawa’s people were overwhelmed. Pushed north, they had encountered other settlements—kinsmen whom they saw at the annual gathering of the clans: Crocodile Clan, which Bellek had come from many seasons ago, and Egret Clan, which had been Doron’s. There, with the help of kinsmen, Alawa’s people had tried to stop and fight. But the invaders, stronger and in greater numbers, had kept up their assault, unwilling to share the abundant valley.
Little Hinto, child of Alawa’s daughter, seized by an arm and flung into the air to come down on an invader’s spear. Istaqa, Keeper of the Moon-hut, turning to throw a spear at a pursuer, to be struck by a rock in her face with such force that it split her skull open. The blood running into the earth. The screams of the stricken. The moans of the dying. Blind fear and panic. Old Alawa running for her life, her feet pounding in cadence with her thumping heart. Young Doron and the hunters staying behind to protect the women and the elders.
Perhaps they should perform the silent-sitting now, Alawa thought as she rose to her feet, her ancient joints creaking. Perhaps that would appease the unhappy ghosts who were haunting their dreams. But there was a problem: to perform the ritual meant speaking the names of the dead, and to do so would be to break the most powerful taboo in the clan.
She looked at the children and felt an immense sadness sweep over her. So many of them were orphans, their mothers having been killed during the battles with the invaders. And then there was little Gowron, son of her daughter’s daughter, playing with a frog he had found. Alawa herself had pierced his little nose with the egret bone that prevented evil spirits from entering his body through his nostrils. It pained Alawa’s heart to know he must die.
She turned her attention to Bellek, bent and wheezing as he explored the surrounding tamarisk thickets for signs and omens. He had to find the moon and so it was crucial that he concentrate and pay attention to every little detail. One mistake could spell disaster for them.
Even back on their ancestral land the people had lived in constant fear of the world around them. Death came often, swiftly, and brutally so that even there, among familiar rocks and trees and river, there was enough to be afraid of. The people had been constantly on the alert not to offend any spirits, constantly speaking the spells, carrying the right amulets, making the appropriate gestures that they had all learned since earliest childhood. But one of the problems they faced in this strange place was not knowing the names of things. They saw unfamiliar flowers and trees, birds with new plumage, fish they had never encountered before. What to call them? How to make sure no harm came to the survivors of the Gazelle Clan?
As Alawa watched the withered old shaman go about his readings, crouching to inspect a pebble, sniffing a flower, running dirt through his fingers, she wondered how he was going to react to her news. It occurred to her that Bellek might not like having to kill the children, even if it meant the survival of the clan.
It also occurred to her that Bellek was past usefulness.
Alawa had always been contemptuous of men anyway since they didn’t create life, and she had often wondered why the moon even made male children. Perhaps back in their river valley the men had been good for bringing home rhinoceros and hippopotamus meat, work too heavy for women, thus feeding the clan for weeks. But this new place was filled with food for the picking. Hunters were no longer necessary. Was this why her dreams and the magic stones were telling her to sacrifice the children? As a way of cleansing the clan?
Alawa returned her attention to the children as they ate and played and tugged at mothers’ breasts. She especially watched the boys, who ranged in age from nursing infant to the threshold of puberty. Boys older than this had left their mothers and joined the band of hunters, and so they had perished in the Reed Sea. As Alawa kept her eyes on the boys she thought again of the dead hunters and the lost moon and the nightmares that were plaguing the women, and the frightening thought that had formed in her mind days ago spoke louder now: that the drowned men were unha
ppy and jealous of the living. This was why they haunted the women’s dreams. How could it be otherwise as there had been no silent-sitting performed for them? Everyone knew that the dead were jealous of the living, which was why ghosts were so greatly feared. And would the dead hunters not be especially jealous of the little boys who they could see growing up to take their places?
Reluctant though she was to carry out the deed, Alawa was firm in her resolve. As long as the hunters continued to be jealous of the boys and therefore haunt the women, the moon would not come out. And without the moon the clan would die. Therefore the little boys must be sacrificed to send the ghosts away. Then the moon would return and put babies into the women again. And thus the clan would survive.
At the next resting stop, the women sat with their backs to trees to nurse babies and cuddle their children. Some, having reached the end of their stamina, began to cry.
They had all lost loved ones in the Reed Sea—sons, brothers, nephews, uncles, sleeping partners. Bellek had watched his younger brothers perish; Keeka, the sons of her mother’s sisters; Alawa, five sons and twelve sons of her daughters; Laliari, her brothers and her beloved Doron. A loss beyond comprehension, beyond counting. When the new tide had swallowed up the band of hunters, the women had run up and down the shore, screaming and shouting, hoping for a glimpse of survivors. Two had thrown themselves into the raging water to disappear forever. The women had camped on the new shore for a week until Bellek, after eating magic mushrooms and walking in the nether realm, had decreed the place bad luck and that they must leave. That was when they had gone north to encounter a vast, terrifying sea, and then had turned inland, to go in search of the moon.
But they still had not found it and the women were becoming disconsolate.
Seeing the tears streaking down Keeka’s cheeks, Laliari reached into the pouch that hung from her belt and, bringing out a handful of nuts, offered them to her cousin.