by Kim Murphy
“How did you know I was here?” Henry asked, lowering his musket.
“Did you not signal me?”
“Nay.” He grasped my hand. “I have a shallop waiting.”
’Twas Lightning Storm, sending me a sign. Relieved to know that his presence had ne’er left me, I went along with Henry. Under the cover of darkness, he led me to the river. In amongst the trees where no light penetrated rested the boat. Henry helped me in. Aft he cast off, I rowed alongside him. For two nights, we traveled the river. On one occasion we came ashore to evade a search party.
Henry hoisted the shallop onto the bank. “I’ve sent word to your brother. You should meet him on the morrow. I’ll send Elenor when the sheriff is convinced you have fled for good.”
Aware that I would ne’er see Henry again, I hugged him. “I can ne’er repay you.”
“You already have, Phoebe. May God go with you.”
We shared a parting kiss. “I’m sorry, Henry.”
He placed two fingers to my lips. “Just go.”
Though I could not see his face through the darkness, I detected a waver in his voice. I turned to seek shelter for the night, so that I might start my flight anew in the morn. I barely went a hundred paces when I heard loud voices, questioning Henry. I bolted, nearly tripping over a tree root.
Calm. I evened my breath and pushed deeper into the forest. Afore long the sound of the lapping river was behind me. Branches scraped my arms, but I continued forward. My skirt protected my legs from the brambles, but my hands were sliced.
When I had traveled far enough to elude my pursuers, I sank to the ground in exhaustion. I drifted into a fitful sleep, only to be awakened by the light of torches. On my hands and knees, I scrambled along the forest floor. Only when the torches grew distant did I regain my feet.
No moonlight alighted my path to aid me. Halting to catch my breath, I focused on the night sounds. Branches, with rustling leaves, creaked in the wind, a screech owl trilled a mournful melody, and midges hummed past my ear. Upon hearing rushing water, I reasoned that I could follow its course and escape those who sought my death.
Unless the hounds were sent aft me, the advantage was mine. Unlike my pursuers, I had been taught to move swiftly and silently through the forest. Reaching the bank of the stream, I kicked off my leather shoes, for they were a hindrance. I dipped my toes into the water and felt the cool and slippery moss-covered rocks. Near me, a fish splashed. On the path behind me, I heard a familiar voice, hailing me and assuring me that no harm would come to me.
For a moment, I turned, contemplating whether I should continue on or turn back. Always steadfast in his devotion, Henry would not harm me. But was he alone? My back stung from the whip’s lashes. Like spiders waiting in their webs, those close to him could have spun a trap.
He called to me once more. I quivered with irresolution, when a voice inside me urged me to continue forward. Though my life with Henry had ne’er been true, I feared what lay ahead.
“Do not fear it. You will be reunited with what once was.”
’Twas his voice. So many years had passed that I had nearly forgotten the sound of it. Unashamedly, tears sprang into my eyes. Disregarding those who followed me, I called out to him in the tongue that had been forbidden to me for so long.
“Forward,” he urged.
Heeding his advice, I forded the stream. The water churned around my feet whilst fish kissed my toes. Near the middle, the water swirled about my waist. I slogged through it and reached the far bank, when suddenly I was lost.
Trees were everywhere. I stumbled my way through the gigantic roots. Ne’er having felt confused and alone in a forest, I cried, “Where, my love? Where am I to go?”
Raging shouts came from the opposite stream bank. My heart pounded at their nearness. If I did not seek refuge, the mob would be upon me. I could now see their torches, and my breaths quickened. In the breeze, my beloved whispered, and I followed his voice ’til an elegant white hound stood afore me. I now knew what I must do.
The dog’s body was made for coursing, but he kept a slower pace in order to guide the way. Deeper and deeper into the forest we traveled. I sought shelter in a dark opening within the roots of an immense oak. Instead of blackness surrounding me, a thick mist engulfed me. The clammy dampness upon my skin raised the hairs on my arms. The hound was my salvation, and I latched onto his leather collar.
On and on I faltered through the fog with the dog tracing a huge circle. I felt the rough, bare wood of a rocking and swaying ship neath my feet. A wave of nausea overcame me, and I clutched my stomach with my free hand. The hound failed to break stride. Onwards.
From a nearby branch, a crow cawed. Suddenly, I thought of a tiny lad vanishing in a similar mist, ne’er to be found again. Assured that my pursuers would reason that I suffered from the same fate, I continued walking along the arc.
When my beloved’s voice returned, I signaled the hound to halt. He kept going, and the loving voice faded. With a twinge of remorse, I thought of Henry. He, too, had loved me. A love that I could ne’er return, for my heart had always belonged to another.
The mist grew thinner, and he whispered in my ear for me to follow the light. Up ahead, I spied what looked like thousands of torches. As I emerged from the fog, the dog vanished. I blinked in disbelief. How could so much light be possible in the night sky? I scanned about me. Lights upon lights, swarming with people. And clattering noise. I pressed my hands to my ears to block the racket. The thoroughfare had a surface the likes of which I had ne’er seen. Where am I? Which lights should I follow?
I stepped into the road to escape. More lights chased aft me, blinding me. I froze in my path, deafened by a piercing sound and sudden screeching. The earth trembled, and I was flying afore striking the pavement. I closed my eyes to the pain. Soon, my beloved, I will join you. Recalling all that had happened, I gasped.
Shae gazed at me with a mixture of fear and relief upon her countenance.
“Lee!” I sprang from the chair, shouting his name again and again. By the time I reached the door, it opened and I was in his arms. “’Twasn’t Lightning Storm who summoned me here... but you.”
“Me? How?”
I stepped back and fought the tears. “You are the lad who vanished in the mist, Crow in the Woods. Along with my momma, your mother, Snow Bird, taught me the art of wisakon. You are Paspahegh—the last of your tribe.”
“The last...” Confounded, he stared at me. “That’s not possible.”
“It is,” came Shae’s voice. “Think about what you saw, Lee. The fire, terrified people running, and your mother. I found Henry Wynne’s letter dated 1630 in the archives. He said Phoebe vanished in a mist.”
His gaze came to rest upon me, studying me as if finally making sense of all that had happened. “Netab,” he said. “In the hospital, you were asking if we were friends.” He grasped the arrowhead round my neck. “And this... was my father’s.”
With a kiss to his lips, I placed my arms about him. Henry had vowed to return me to my tribe. Even he could have ne’er known that Crow in the Woods had traveled in the mist afore me. For me, Walks Through Mist, my journey was complete.
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75
Phoebe
Later that August, Shae married her betrothed. ’Twas a small gathering of family and friends with Lee and I included. I no longer see Shae in a professional capacity. We both know who I am and where I am from and have now become friends.
In December, she reciprocated the favor and attended my wedding with Lee. Ne’er afore had I experienced a honeymoon trip, but Lee granted me two of my wishes by taking one. For the first time in my life, I flew on a plane. The discomfort in my ears was a minor annoyance compared to the months of nausea at sea. How small the ocean seemed when transversing it in a few hours.
Aft our arrival in London, Lee rented a car, and we continued our journey to Dorset. We traveled along the hedgerows and winding lanes. Stone cottages dotted the count
ryside. Whilst there, we visited the giant man, carved into the chalk hillside. Though time had a way of bypassing Dorset, little seemed familiar to me. Deep down, I realized ’twas the closest I could come in transporting Momma back to the land of her kinsmen. As I gazed upon the hills, I knew she had found peace.
Upon our homecoming to Virginia, Lee returned to active duty as a detective. I worried about the danger of his job, but the Arrohateck women had taught me to focus on day-to-day affairs and not to try to change the heart of a warrior. I followed their wisdom, and our love continued to blossom.
Over the months, I kept up with my studies. Meg and Valerie were invaluable in aiding me to achieve my goal of acquiring a GED diploma by the following summer. In my prior life, I had ne’er dreamt that an education was possible for a woman. I looked forward to college and becoming a nurse like Meg, but aft the first semester, my coursework was interrupted, when I birthed a little lass.
We called her Heather, giving her a connection to England as well as the Algonquian name, meaning Snow Bird. Her hair was black, and her eyes were dark brown. She reminded me so much of my Elenor that my heart ached.
Lee noted my melancholy, and once again, we joined in the dreaming. The mist became an impenetrable fog, engulfing us. With the spirit dog guiding the way, I latched onto his collar and Lee’s hand.
As we traveled, Lee was no longer aside me. I called out. “Lee?” I spied him in the distance with Ed at his side. Across from them was a man in sneakers. Gunfire surrounded me. My heart pounded as my beloved fell. “Lee!”
A crow cawed, and the bird took flight, whilst a gentle squeeze came to my hand. “I’m here, Phoebe. That’s part of the past.”
I drew a relieved breath and continued forward. Lee was fine, and the hound began tracing along a circular path. Bright lights filled the night sky. Then came the sound of cars racing to and fro. The walkways were crowded with people. ’Twas the site where I had been struck by a car. Not wishing to relive the event, I clenched Lee’s hand all the tighter to reassure myself that he remained aside me.
As we walked, I felt a long skirt against my legs. Up ahead, the mist thinned, and when we emerged, I found myself standing on the bank of a river.
Attired in breeches and a linen shirt, Lee said, “It’s the James, but I don’t recognize the landmarks.”
Trying to discover our whereabouts, I cast my gaze about. The gentle roll of the land appeared familiar. It couldn’t be. I bolted, following the river downstream.
“Phoebe!”
Lee easily caught up with me, but I did not stop running ’til I was winded.
The palisade had long been torn down, and the pitched-roof house was no longer built of wood, but brick. Out front stood a man. I drew closer. His hair had some gray, and wrinkles had formed near his eyes. “Henry...”
He blinked in disbelief. “Phoebe? How is this possible? You look the same as when—”
“As when I vanished?”
He nodded and glanced at Lee.
“’Tis through the dreaming that I appear afore you. This is my husband, Lee Crowley. He is Paspahegh.”
With tears in his eyes, he kissed my hands and shook Lee’s.
“I’m honored to meet you, sir,” Lee said.
Thrilled by the chance I had been given, I could no longer hold back. “Where is Elenor?”
“She’s fine, Phoebe. You’d be proud. She cares for me now. Come.” He waved the way inside. A hall with wooden floors divided the house. A table was to one side with candles atop it and a looking glass above. Instead of a ladder to the loft, a staircase with a black walnut handrail wound the way to the second story.
In the parlor, a black-haired woman was bent over a spinning wheel. She looked up as we entered the room.
“Elenor, we have guests.”
She stood, slowly came closer, and studied my face.
Unable to keep my tears at bay, I ran over to her and hugged her. “Elenor, I’ve thought about you e’ery day. I ne’er meant to leave you behind.”
“Momma?”
We embraced and cried in each others’ arms. “Poppa told me what happened. If you hadn’t taken the witchcraft charges for Bess, she would have certainly been hanged.”
I stepped back and dried my tears. Of course, she would think of Henry as her poppa. ’Twas proper.
Aft another round of introductions, we sat in the chairs around the parlor, where Elenor introduced me to my grandchildren. Tall and ungainly, Christopher was named aft his poppa and was nearly seven. He had Elenor’s black hair. At five, Elsa looked a lot like myself, with her blue-green eyes, reddish hair, and freckles. With light-brown hair and blue eyes, Nicolas was two. Elenor said he took aft his poppa.
Upon seeing me, Bess shrieked with joy and joined us.
My melancholy faded as Henry told me that he had remarried, but she had passed on a few years afore. He also had a son by the name of David. He, along with Elenor’s husband, was a merchant, and both were presently in England. They told me of my brother Charging Bear. Living farther up the river, he oft brought them venison and fish in exchange for English goods.
In turn, I went on to tell my family how I had come to meet Lee. Their eyes widened when I mentioned the twenty-first century, and they had all sorts of questions. Whilst we chatted, hours passed without our noticing.
Sad that our time together had to end, I felt a fullness in my breasts. Heather needed my attention, not Elenor. I hugged each and every one of them goodbye, except for Elenor. My daughter accompanied Lee and me outside.
Near the mist-covered river, the waves lapped against the bank. Lee gazed upon the water. No words were necessary. I knew he thought of how the land had once belonged to the Paspahegh. He held his hands out afore him, palms facing up. My eyes filled with tears. At long last, he understood the sacrifice of the woman who had birthed him.
The fog on the river enlarged and spread beyond the bank. The hound stood off to the edge, and I knew the moment had arrived. One last time, I embraced Elenor and whispered, “If you e’er need me, contact me through the dreaming.”
She nodded in understanding. Like myself, and my mother, and her mother afore her, Elenor is a cunning woman.
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Author’s Note
Throughout much of European history, the cunning folk were the healers of society, using herbs and magic. Some had familiars, like Phoebe’s greyhound, and were essentially the shamans of European society. Although I have read about the Virginia Algonquian-speaking people—often referred to as the Powhatan—having visions, the records are obscure and generally written from an English-biased perspective. Rather than misrepresent another culture’s belief system, I chose to draw on another portion of history that tends to be ignored in the history books. The dreaming is meant to represent one cunning woman’s shamanic journey.
During the seventeenth century, doctors were fairly uncommon in English society, and few people could afford them. Those who could often didn’t trust them. Like healers of any time period, some were excellent, others were charlatans. People would travel many miles to seek the aid of a renowned healer. While a number of historians state the majority of cunning folk were men, many were women. In the patriarchal society of the time, clashes resulted. Although the cunning folk were not the most frequent members of society to be tried as witches, such charges against them weren’t unusual, and as might be guessed, women were more often suspect.
In the United States, Salem is most noted for witch trials,
but Virginia has the dubious honor of being the first to hold such a trial on the North American continent, in 1626. Thirteen women and two men are known to have been tried as witches in Virginia, but records for others have likely been lost. Unlike in Salem, in Virginia only one woman is recorded to have been executed. In 1654, Katherine Grady was hanged at sea en route from England to Virginia.
I have uncovered no records of cunning women in Virginia, but due to their prevalence during the period, I have no doubt they were in the colony. I sincerely believe at least two of the women tried as witches were cunning women. In 1626, Joan Wright often foretold the future and was a midwife, and the most famous witch trial was that of Grace Sherwood, beginning in 1698. She fully admitted to being an herbalist, healer, and midwife.
Many of the historical accounts portrayed in The Dreaming are accurate. Throughout the early colonization period, the conditions were harsh. Jamestown was located in an area where many died of salt poisoning from drinking the water. The colonists encroached on the land of the Paspahegh, a tributary tribe of the paramount chief, Powhatan. The Paspahegh resisted the infringement and were labeled as hostile. As a result, conflicts ignited.
In 1609, the first group of English women arrived in Jamestown. Unfortunately, their arrival coincided with the harsh winter known as the “Starving Time.” Sixty of approximately five hundred colonists survived the winter. Depending on shipments from England for supplies, they had grown no food for themselves, leaving them ill prepared. They had slaughtered all of their livestock. Colonists were reduced to eating rats, and some dug up corpses. One record indicates a man killed and ate his wife. For his crime, he was burned at the stake.