This is my 'freebie', an excerpt of the first chapter of a novel inspired by my regression experience and to a small degree Hillerman's book, Thieves of Time. In this you meet the heroine a young woman of the Anasazi people who lived about the year 1000 CE. It was written some time ago and I would change a few things now but still kind of hope to complete it one dfy. . The photos are not quite as I visualize her home but of that period and those people.
July, 1154 A.D.
In
The Canyons, now Northern Arizona
Change fell hard into Wind Dancer’s
life, beginning the day she met the puma. It was her sixteenth summer and she
well knew now what to do when the time of the blood came.
She retreated obediently to the women’s hut. Normally she knew a day or two
ahead of time and made ready. Things had been busy recently, and she’d
lost count of the days. The sudden twist of pain in her
belly warned her. She gathered the items she would need
and hurried off up the path before she could meet and contaminate a warrior
with her feminine energies.
The path to the women’s place led
steeply up from Red Wall Village.
It climbed along the wooded hillside, then edging out around a sharp spur of
cliff that jutted into the canyon. Finally the trail turned back into a steep,
narrow chute to end in the hidden niche that held the women’s shelter.
Wind Dancer walked fast, trying to
ignore the stitching pain in her side. She clutched her pouch of shredded
juniper bark in one hand and her new medicine pot in the other. The pot had
gone through its first firing yesterday coming sound from the
kiln. The shape felt smooth and right, fitting perfectly in her hand. Her work
was good. All that remained to be done now was to paint the designs on the
gently curved surfaces.
Perhaps it wasn’t strictly proper,
although no one had ever said it was forbidden to work on such a task at the
Women’s
Place.
So, she’d paint while she waited there, where she had little
else to do. The two small bags of white and black powder and the yucca fiber
brush rested inside the pot.
As
she walked out along the ledge around the jutting rocks, her
thoughts centered on the patterns she intended to create. Rounding the tip, she
jerked to a halt. There on the same ledge, not five bow lengths beyond her
stood a puma, a huge tawny mother puma. The cat’s speckled cub paused behind,
almost bumping against the mother’s rear legs. The puma turned her head just
enough to see both Wind Dancer and the cub at the same time. She gave a
coughing hiss. The cub mewed in distress, but it turned obediently and fled,
back the way they had come.
Wind Dancer edged over against the
towering wall of red stone. She pressed so tightly against the cliff she could
feel the cold through her leather tunic. Unless the sun shone directly upon it,
the cliff stone was always cold.
The great cat stood poised, one forepaw
lifted so that only the front edge touched the ground. Her eyes flared green
fire and her whiskers trembled. She wrinkled her nose, drawing her lip back to
reveal keen white fangs. Wind Dancer’s heart banged against her ribs and
bounced up to block her throat. Weak and dizzy, she slid slowly down, scraping
her back against the stone until her bottom touched the ground behind her heels.
She wrapped her arms around her knees and made herself as small as she could. Please, Mother Puma, I do not want to be
your prey.
The puma moved one step closer,
another. She paused then, her tail making fitful lashes. She sank back on her
haunches and watched Wind Dancer, just watched. Dropping again, she stretched
her forelegs out before her. Lifting one great paw, she swiped her tongue
across it and began to wash her face. After a moment, she changed paws and
repeated the process. Wind Dancer hardly dared to breath. She wanted to shut
her eyes, but when she did, it was even worse, not knowing what the puma was
doing. She
blinked and stared for a moment at the rim of the ledge.
Silly human kit, I am not going to hurt you.
Why are you afraid? Use your wits, child. What does the Puma mean? What is my
medicine?
Wind
Dancer’s gaze snapped up from the stone in front of her moccasins. She stared
at the puma. Had the great cat really spoken to her, mind to mind without a
sound? There was no way to be sure for the cat simply continued her toilet as
if she were all alone.
Then Wind Dancer noticed a jagged white
line running down the puma’s right shoulder to curve inward and vanish under
her chest. At one time, the puma had a serious wound there, a wound that had
healed with white hair instead of tan. Another scar across her face put a
slight squint to one eye. This puma was a survivor, one who had endured and
overcome painful injury.
Her keen eyes held a strange calm
wisdom as she gazed at Wind Dancer, scarcely blinking. You
are marked for adventure, just as I am. You will see and do things none of your
people have ever experienced. Your children will carry the legend of Wind
Dancer and Thunder, and they will live to go forth when many die. You must be
strong and have courage, for the survival of your people depends upon you.
Again
Wind Dancer was unsure whether the cat truly had spoken to her or her
imagination was playing tricks on her. Surely enough
time passed for the sun to travel across half the sky, although the shadows did
not show it. She
breathed slowly, as evenly as she could, seeking to calm her fears.
Abruptly, the puma stood. She gave one
sharp yowl and then in a supple twist, she turned around and loped off in the
direction her cub had taken, stretching into long leaping bounds before she
vanished.
Every bit of Wind Dancer’s body
shivered. She set the pot down at her side lest she drop and break it. For a
long time she sat until finally the cold drove her to move. Slowly, slowly she
pushed herself erect. Picking up her pot and pouch, she moved off up the trail,
forcing one foot in front on the other, over and over.
The puma had to be long gone, but Wind
Dancer could not keep from peering into every shadowy hollow, behind every bush
and tree and boulder. When she finally reached the hut, she staggered inside
and sank to the floor, breathing as if she had run half the day.
Star Falling, one of the elders, was
there to teach the two young girls who had come for their first stay. She came
to Wind Dancer and knelt at her side.
“Daughter, what ails you? You are
whiter than new snow. Did a spirit cross your path?”
Wind Dancer shook her head, striving to
control her shivers. “No, wise one, but I met a mother puma on the ledge.”
Star Falling leaned forward, keen
interest on her weathered face. “Tell me,” she commanded. “Tell me everything
that happened. This is a wonder, strange and terrible. I must know all that
occurred in order to interpret what it means.”
Wind Dancer told the whole tale as best
she could, forcing herself to relive every terrifying instant. Her friend
Morning Rain, who had come up two days before, brought a thick-furred blanket
and settled it over her shoulders. Finally the fur began to drive the chill
from her bones and her shivering stopped.
After pondering for some time, Star
Falling turned to Wind Dancer. “I think this beast is your spirit totem.
Although your mother named you for the small quick birds that come in the
summer to taste the flowers, the ones that visit in the season in which you
were born, it may be that you need another beast to teach and protect you.
Surely, if the puma meant you harm, you would not be here now.”
“Aye, grandmother. That may be true. I
was scared, but you are right, the puma made no move to attack or injure me.
She could have done so, but she did not. If I ever see her again, I will know
her, for she is strangely scarred. It even seemed that she spoke to me,
although I could not be sure. I thought maybe I was dreaming of old legends
with that.”
Star
Falling smiled slightly. “Where do you think the tales comes from, Daughter?
Once the animals did talk and we could understand them. Maybe they changed or
maybe we did, but that link has been lost. It would be good to have it once
again.”
Thus reassured, Wind Dancer calmed
enough to help with the preparation of the evening meal and getting the younger
ones settled for the night. Still, when she finally slept, she dreamed of pumas
and blood.
She saw torn flesh,
broken bones and blood splattered everywhere. They were horrible dreams.
She
kept waking herself from them only to fall asleep in weariness and dream yet
again.
**************
Wind Dancer awoke feeling tired and
cross. She had slept badly and the gnawing pain in her belly did not subside.
After eating a small portion of ground corn mush, she wandered outside and
found a seat in the morning sun. It wouldn’t shine here long, so she’d enjoy
the warmth and light while she could.
Morning Rain soon joined her. “Star
Falling is worried,” Morning Rain said. “I can tell by the way she’s acting,
looking around as if she expects an attack or a bad storm.”
Wind Dancer sighed. “I know. I feel
something too, a trouble in the wind, maybe, or a restless spirit going by.”
Just then Star Falling called them. “You
two go down to the stream and get some willow bark. Blue Jay Girl is hurting
too badly and she needs medicine to ease her pain. I used all I had for her
last night.” She looked sharply at Wind Dancer. “You know how to get the right
kind?”
Wind Dancer nodded. “Yes, the inner
white part, against the wood.” She got
up and went back to the hut to get her stone blade. The sharp edge of the
obsidian flake would slice easily through the willow’s soft bark and peel
strips of the inner bark from the wood. She could chew on a bit of it herself,
which would relieve her discomfort, too.
“I need to get more juniper bark,”
Morning Rain said. “I thought I had more left from last time, but it’s almost
gone.”
Wind Dancer nodded her understanding.
They shredded the soft, stringy bark of the “shag bark” juniper and put it
inside a leather clout to catch their flow. When the bark became saturated,
they replaced it and buried the used parts in a safe place where no one would
be tainted by the blood.
“There are junipers along the way to
the creek,” she said. “We can accomplish both tasks at once.”
The sun was near the zenith when they
made their way back up the steep hill from the creek. Morning Rain had a pouch
full of juniper bark and Wind Dancer had enough willow bark to last for some
time. She gnawed on a strip of it, tasting the bitter juice that dulled pain.
Already the ache in her side had eased.
They emerged from the bushes about ten
bow lengths from the hut, at the edge of the little flat in which it sat. Wind
Dancer stopped, suddenly sensing something was wrong. When Morning Rain bumped
into her back, she put out a hand to stop her friend. “Shush.”
A man stood in the doorway of the hut, a huge,
strange man, perhaps half bear for his face was covered with shaggy reddish
hair and more hair hung down over his shoulders. She bit her lip to still her half-formed cry
of alarm.
As she watched, he reached back inside
the hut and hauled Blue Jay Girl out into the light. The girl cried out just
before he slashed across her throat with a bright silvery blade. Blood gushed.
With ruthless force, he jerked the string of precious turquoise beads from
around the girl’s neck.
A gust of breeze rose then, bringing to
Wind Dancer the smell of blood, just like in her dreams. Hot,
sharp and bitter-sweet. Morning Rain screamed, starting forward before Wind
Dancer could stop her.
“No, no! You cannot do that to my
friend, my little clan-sister.”
Wind Dancer could not move. She felt as
if her feet were trapped in deep snow or quicksand. Morning Rain was going to
die and she could not prevent it.
At that instant, a tawny blur came
flying over the top of the hut. Wind Dancer heard a snarl and a thud as the
puma’s leap put her on the bear-man’s back. He whirled away from Morning Rain.
Blue Jay Girl’s limp body slipped from his arms. He
slashed at the puma, but his shiny blade could find no purchase in the animal’s
thick fur. The cat’s big head whipped in an arc before she
sank her fangs into the back of his neck.
More blood. A red haze dimmed Wind
Dancer’s eyes. Released suddenly from stasis, she turned and ran, blindly and
without goal or purpose, simply fleeing from the blood, the torn flesh and
broken bones. From
the dead. Unseeing, unthinking, she ran and ran and ran until
she could not run any more.
She bent to put her hands
on her trembling knees, gulping air in great painful gasps. Her heart hammered
against her ribs until she thought it might burst free. A red haze still dimmed
her eyes, as if her face had been splattered with blood, clouding her vision.
With a broken sob, she sank to her
knees and then fell forward onto the ground. Had she been a coward, not going to aid
her friends or had she been wise to flee and at least save herself? Her
question brought no answer, and she was too exhausted to think about it.
She curled into a ball, her knees
almost under her chin, her eyes squeezed tightly shut as if she could close out
the horrible scenes she had witnessed, and thus will them not to have happened.
*********
Three photos are mine in Verde Valley, Tuzigoot and Montezuma Castle; last is borrowed but more the scenery I visualized
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