Sapphic Voices Fantasy

When Amazons Dream

Part Three Of A Three-Part Saga
Dream III: In The Realm Of Possibility

Disclaimers: `This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the Author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.'

Cautionary Note: This Story is not suitable for underage readers. If it were a movie it would likely be rated `R'--no one under eighteen admitted.'

Library of Congress Registration: Oct. 2004

DREAM III: IN THE REALM OF POSSIBILITY

You may forget but
Let me tell you
this: someone in
some future time
will think of us.

Sappho

Chapter I

The roar of motorcycles speeding up Main was so terrifying, Sadie forgot to breathe. To keep from swooning, she gripped Cynthia's arm.

"I'm sure Mariana knows what she's doing," the mayor whispered.

"Oh, lordie, I'm so afraid for her!" Sadie gasped.

"Sssh, now! There could me more of 'em upstairs," Cynthia cautioned in a half-whisper.

The two youngest children in the huddled group began to whimper about the cold; their mother gathered them close. "Fran? When do you think we can go back up?"

"I don't know, Sally. Just keep the little ones quiet." The constable fingered the handle of the .38 wedged behind her belt buckle. She tiptoed over to Sally's oldest and gave him her flashlight. "Lyle, I want you to climb up to the cellar door and put your ear right up close. And you signal me the second you hear anyone coming. Can I count on you?" she whispered.

Even in the dim light of the lantern hanging on the empty stall, Fran could see the boy's eyes were as big as saucers. Lyle nodded. "All right, as of now you are my official deputy. Now, go on, but be quiet as a mouse."

Lyle made his way up the cellar stairs, which creaked conspicuously with every step. The constable dug around in her jacket pocket and took a couple of lollipops from her ever-present supply. "Now, little ones. These I saved just for you. One's blackberry and one's licorice," she whispered, holding out one in each hand.

"Oh, Emma, look--licorice," the girl's mother tried her best to seem upbeat. Emma quickly snatched her favorite; her little brother was just as eager for the blackberry.

"That's the brave boy," Fran whispered just as a distant gunshot made her jump.

"Sounds like it came from south of town," Cynthia forgot to whisper and immediately put her hand over her mouth.

"Oh sweet Mother of God!" Sadie shrieked and crossed herself.

Cynthia gripped her old friend by both arms. "Sadie, you can't panic--our lives depend on it," she sternly admonished. A hush fell over the trembling group. Sadie, who'd calmed down enough to remember Mariana's instructions, broke from Cynthia's vise-like grip.

"Where in sam hill are you going?" Cynthia didn't bother whispering.

"Quick, everyone!" Sadie shouted, "Please! Join hands and make a circle!" All but Jake, the hotel manager, grudgingly went along with the strange request. "Now, listen to me real careful. I want you all to close your eyes and concentrate," Sadie instructed in a tremulous voice.

"You're off your rocker," Jake hissed from his dark corner.

"Do it! This is our last chance!" Sadie commanded with a wicked glare in his direction.

"OK, everybody, let's give it a go. What do we have to lose?" the mayor urged. "Come on down Lyle! Jake, get over here!" With a huge sigh, the born pessimist slipped between Joe and Carl, two retired loggers.

"OK…er…a…everybody, hold hands. OK, let’s see…I want you all to concentrate...think hard about..." Sadie's mind went blank.

"Better days?" Fran mercifully interjected.

"Yes...think about...when you didn't have a care in the world, maybe when you were a child at the seashore and.." Sadie stammered.

"Imagine safe harbor," Ted Kurdiz suggested. Until that moment, Sadie hadn't known the good doctor was present.

"Yes! That's it! Let's concentrate on safe harbor," Sadie said with renewed determination. Amidst heavy sighing from Jake, who was more than a little uncomfortable holding hands with two men, everyone strained for just the right image. Just when Jake was ready to break the circle, a low hum emanated from Rhea's empty stall. The cellar door rattled. The dirt floor rocked and rolled as the oldest building in Hecate's Cove creaked and groaned.

"It's an earthquake!" Fran cried.

"Don't break the circle, no matter what!" Sadie yelled over the din.

In moments, it was over. All was dead quiet. Then, a curtain of green light began to seep in from under the outside door.

"Don't let go of my hand, mama," Emma whimpered.

"I've got you, darling," Sally assured with tears streaming.

When the curtain of green light lifted, blinding Sunlight flooded in. Expecting to see a pile of smoldering rubble, Sadie was the first to survey the aftermath. The Sand Dollar Inn and all the shops on Main were gone. The whole town was gone. There was nothing but forest. She gazed up into the thick canopy of mammoth Sitkas and caught a glimpse of a sky so intensely blue it stung her eyes. When Sadie finally remembered to breathe, the scent was intoxicating.

"Oh, my," she said and broke with the circle. One by one the stunned survivors took their first steps into the grandeur of a primeval forest whose trees were twice the size of the last Sequoias left standing in the modern realm.

"Look, mama! A baby deer!" Emma shouted, clasping her little hands tightly under her chin. A white-tailed doe momentarily made eye contact with the wide-eyed child, then in a flash, she and her twin offspring leapt over a creek and bounded out of sight.

Sadie fell on her knees and crossed herself.

"Praise the lord!" she sobbed. The less devout fell prostrate and kissed the sweet Earth; some even rolled around on it.

"Well, ain't this a kick in the pants!" Cynthia cheered, brushing herself off.

While the seasoned loggers checked out the unbelievable girth of the nearest tree, the children began a game of hide and seek. The gardeners in the group marveled at the diversity of forest flora, which included several varieties of trillium, camas lily, salmon and huckleberry. Tears of gratitude flowed freely down the faces of all but one of the adults. The hotel manager leaned against a massive cedar with his arms folded tight over his pin-striped vest.

"Ain't it wonderful?!" Sadie approached the wet blanket and hung on his arm.

"I hate picnics," Jake muttered from behind a scowl.

"Since when, Jake Hawkins?" Sadie nudged his shoulder. "Why, I remember at last year's centennial Seafest, you were the life of the party. Don't tell me you don't remember that big bonfire you and the Riley clan started down on the south spit. I never danced so hard in all my life." Sadie looked in vain for a smile. "Besides, this ain't a mere picnic in the woods--this is a bona fide miracle!" she joyfully declared and crossed herself.

"Since when is death a miracle?" Jake growled.

"What are you talking about?" Sadie asked with her heart in her throat.

"We're dead...plain and simple...we're dead as doornails!" he shouted with a gallows snicker. Everyone but the children stopped their celebration. A couple of elk pranced into the open, and upon seeing their first humans, blew a warning to their own kind and high-tailed it into the brush.

Sadie was the only one to see a tear spill from Jake's pale blue eyes and fall into his salt and pepper mustache.

In the heat of the game, Lyle ran up to the tree, yelling, "Ollie, ollie in free!" His sister Emma tried to do the same, but tripped and fell over one of the giant's serpentine roots.

Jake scooped her up in his arms. "Hey, little miss, better be quick before you get caught," he said, fighting more tears. Emma, who under normal circumstances would have been howling from the nasty fall, giggled and tagged up before her little brother Derek could scramble around the other side of the massive trunk.

"Ha, ha! You're it again!" she gloated and jumped from Jake's arms.

With a second game in full swing, Cynthia walked up and said to Jake, "Do you really think they'd approve of hide and seek in heaven?"

"Who says we're in heaven? It's awful danged hot, if you ask me," the unbeliever dryly countered with a trace of a grin. Everyone laughed, especially Sadie, who practiced her own brand of Catholicism in which hell was not an option.

"Look around you. This is heaven on Earth," she said to nods all around.

"For as long as it lasts," Jake scoffed.

"I say we enjoy the hell out of it while we can," Carl piped up.

"Good thing you didn't bring your chain saw." Fran, an unabashed tree-hugger, was only half-teasing.

"We'll see what you say come Sundown without a fire," Carl retorted.

"Carl's right. I don't see a lick of deadwood around here," Cynthia said.

"How cold can it get?" Fran wiped her brow with the back of her hand. "It feels like a steam bath."

"It's not the temperature I'm worried about," Joe, Carl's cousin, chimed in. He took off his grimy Hausman's Timber Company cap and scratched his bald spot.

"What are you drivin' at?" Sadie impatiently asked.

"I'm thinkin' there's all kinds of man-eating predators around here. Why, they're probably sizing us up right this second," he replied and put his cap back on. Everyone, including Jake, warily scanned the perimeter. "They see us, but we can't see them," Joe, high on adrenaline, felt compelled to raise the fear level to his own.

"Before we all wet our pants, I say we hike down to the beach and look for driftwood." Cynthia McKibben wasn't elected mayor five times in a row for nothing--everyone had to agree with her. "At least there we can get a fire going. That should keep the saber tooth tigers from having us for supper," she teased with a smirk that belied her genuine uneasiness over that very possibility.

"Ready or not, here I come!" Lyle yelled, then growled like a lion for effect, which scared his brother and sister so bad they abandoned their hiding places screaming. Their exuberance was answered by a loud honking from something decidedly big and most likely cranky.

"What in sam hill is that?!" The constable clutched at the mayor, who'd turned white as a sheet.

"It's a T-rex," Lyle said with another roar that mortified his little brother and sister and sparked a cacophony of snorts and bellows so loud everyone had to cover their ears.

"Let's get out of here!" Cynthia shouted and headed for the beach. Without a better plan, everyone, including Jake, followed their fearless leader through the brush.

"Aha, there she is!" Joe, the first to see the powder blue Pacific, shouted for joy.

"The old hag never looked better!" Carl chimed in and started taking his boots off.

"Look, mama!" Emma pointed towards what everyone recognized as the north spit. A lounging mass of sea lions covered every square inch of the sandy beach. An enormous bull was the first to spot the intruders, who stared mutely at the once extinct mammoth. His tusks were so long they curled up on the ends, giving the appearance of a handle bar mustache.

"This don't make any sense," Jake said through a frog in his throat. He stepped in front of Cynthia for a better look.

"This must be their breeding grounds," Sadie said.

"Lovely," Fran complained. "We'll never get any sleep around here."

"How can you think of sleep at a time like this?" Sadie chided.

"Speaking of time, what geologic era do you figure we're dreaming in right now?" Ted Kurdiz, who'd been practicing relaxing self-talk since his harrowing escape into the cellar, inquired.

"Who cares, doc? I never set my alarm," Carl tried to joke, but it didn't come out right.

"I don't mean to burst your bubble, people, but coming face to face with death has apparently created a kind of group delusion. Let us hope that when we come to our senses, the radiation cloud will have by-passed us to the north."

Everyone looked at the good doctor like he was certifiable. Joe deeply inhaled the invigorating salt air. "I don't know about the rest of ya, but I ain't ever goin' back to that hell hole,"

"This can't be no trick of the mind," Sadie argued. "What brought us here is our faith." Dread for her one and only daughter was surely testing her own.

"In case this isn't a trance or some such thing, I say we at least find us a place to build a fire," Cynthia again insisted.

When she found a way down from their bird's eye viewpoint, everyone followed. Steering clear of the foul-smelling mammoths, the survivors trekked to the south spit they all knew so well and, using Jake's bifocals, managed to start a roaring fire next to a gigantic driftwood log. The flames and smoke so displeased the sea lions they lumbered en masse a good distance up the beach, barking and snorting up a storm of protest for the remainder of the day.

Things didn't quiet down until well after the most spectacular Sunset imaginable. Although it was a Moonless night sky, the brilliance of the Milky Way cast an iridescent glow over the ocean. Sadie sat alone on a rock watching the breakers and weeping, partly from relief, mostly from a gnawing emptiness only a mother could know. Like so many times before when Mariana refused to communicate, Sadie composed a silent letter to her:


"Wherever you and your brave friends might be, sweetheart, I am here if you need me. We all made it, just like you said we would. Dr. Kurdiz is here with us, and he thinks we're in some kind of a trance, but I think he's just trying to make sense of a blessed miracle. We're still in Hecate's Cove! Can you believe it?! But you wouldn't know it. How beautiful it is! And the sea lions are back--thousands of them. The children saw orcas playing in the breakers today and we saw a whole pod of humpbacks spouting beyond. It's as if the good lord turned back the hands of time and put us right back in the garden of Eden. I just hope us girls pay no never mind to that serpent this time around."

Sadie chuckled and looked to the heavens. She saw a trio of shooting Stars streak across the ladle of the Big Dipper.

"Did you make a wish?" Ted asked and climbed up next to her.

"Oh! Dr. Kurdiz!" Sadie said with a start.

"I didn't mean to frighten you..and, please call me Ted."

"I was lost in my thoughts," Sadie said, trying to catch her breath. She turned to the soft-spoken psychiatrist. "I was thinking about my daughter. Do you think she and the others could be nearby?"

"I would think there's a good chance," Kurdiz held out hope, even though he believed otherwise.

"She might never said it, but I know my girl has nothing but respect for you, doc...Ted. As far as I see it, you saved her life."

Ted patted Sadie on the back, gazed trance-like into the Cosmos and said, "Mariana saved her own life."

Chapter II

Spring's arrival was bittersweet for the Santee clan. The warmer weather and longer days were a welcome relief, but breaking camp was a tedious sad affair. Although Buffalo Woman didn't make it a condition for safe passage west, everyone agreed that they would do their utmost to leave that corner of her garden as they found it. Tearing down the structures was the hardest part, since Claire insisted that every stone be placed as close as possible to where they remembered finding it. Robin assured that such painstaking effort would make for good karma for the long trek ahead. When all was said and done, which included an elaborate ritual of thanksgiving and heart-felt individual farewells to their home away from home, not a trace of human habitation was evident, except for a kind of blue-green aura barely visible to the naked eye.

The plan was to head south to a milder climate, but at the grand fork in the Lakota River (so named by Claire), an irresistible force lured them north.

"At least you'll know the lay of the land up there," Loren said to Marty as they trudged along the lazy north fork of the Lakota.

"Assuming most of it's not under ice," the Wyoming native said, stopping to adjust her heavy load. "What I wouldn't give for a set of wheels right now."

"And pollute this pristine world of ours?"

"As soon as we get home, let's have the engineers build a solar vehicle, just to truck around in."

"Out of driftwood, I suppose. Come on, kiddo, we're holding up the show."

The Santee pilgrims had set a goal of at least twenty miles a day. The grueling climb to the high desert made that notion less and less practical. Yet the last thing they wanted was to get stuck in the middle of the Rockies in Winter. The pace was taking its toll on everyone, including the one remaining goat whose hooves had worn down to the quick. At Grace's bidding, everyone took turns carrying the precious animal on their shoulders. But even Misha with her superior stamina had to stop and rest at least six times in a day.

Exhaustion and quick tempers forced the trekkers to camp for a few days at the edge of a pine forest, where it was left to the engineers to devise a pull-cart in which to transport the nanny and the heavier supplies. But fashioning wheels proved out of the question. Instead, a half-dozen travoises were tethered together with strips of pine bark. At first, the goat had to be hog-tied before she would tolerate the motion of the unwieldy contraption, but eventually she settled in for a free ride. Her caretakers, on the other hand, cursed like mad against the strain of having to drag the heavy loads over ever-rockier terrain and through the countless icy streams that crisscrossed it.

Under Marty's steady guidance, they arrived in the great salt basin in early Fall, but because potable water was scarce, they pressed on to the Snake River. Along its banks, they were lucky enough to find a large cave in which to ride out the killer winds of a mountain Winter. Sadly, around the Solstice, the nanny wandered off and froze to death. On top of that, fish in the river weren't biting; and supplies were down to a basket of rancid corn meal and two baskets of dried apples.

Unrelenting blizzards and strict rationing tore at the fabric of the clan. Robin, who, during her momentous days in Nyasa had learned the basics of conjuring from Lineah Jackson, invoked Buffalo Woman for assistance. The crone finally showed up on a most bitterly cold night and bestowed life-saving knowledge of ice fishing as well as smoking and drying techniques.

By Spring thaw, everyone but Misha and Grace was eager to hit the trail. Grace's outlook was tenuous at best even before she left the Santee, but the death of her precious nanny was almost more than she could bear. Although she argued valiantly against it, the carcass was butchered. In protest, Grace went on a hunger strike.

Misha was nearly driven mad by Grace's refusal to eat. It seemed that everyone except the devoted Amazon understood that Mariana's death had plunged Grace into a grief so profound that not even the strongest of Earthly ties could lift her out of it. She spent more and more time sleeping. Eventually, delirium reduced her to rambling conversations with Mariana, until one unbearably frigid morning Claire diagnosed a deep coma.

Unwilling to give up hope, Misha sat night and day by Grace's side. She rocked her, kept her as warm as possible, and hummed the same Cossack lullaby over and over until her voice gave out. But nothing she did made any difference. She too refused to eat.

When the end seemed near, Misha pleaded with Robin to invoke the Virgin Mary.

"She will take us to paradise," the Russian whispered, near her last breath.

"But, Misha. I have no power to..." Robin choked on her own despair.

"Do it!" Misha commanded with what was left of her strength, clutching at Robin's cloak. Even though the novice shaman knew it was futile, she instructed the clan to gather on their knees in a circle around the fading couple.

Loren, who had maintained a stiff upper lip throughout the morbid ordeal, refused to participate. During the chanting of the Sacred Syllable, she yelled at the top of her lungs, "Damn you, Mariana! Let her go!"

The heartsick weaver ran cursing out of the cave. Everyone else continued chanting. Aching knees notwithstanding, they persevered well past midday. Marty was the first to notice the putrid mist rising from the floor of the cave. The fire at the entrance went out and the air turned gray with smoke. Almost in total darkness, the closed loop of desperate souls kept chanting until the air had cleared.

"Blessed Be and holy cow!" Robin was the first to see Grace sitting up with her beautiful blanket wrapped around her. Misha was barely able to raise her head. Grace looked into her lover's half-closed bloodshot eyes.

"You look awful," she said.

The chanters burst into giggles. Misha, somewhere between delirium and bliss, managed to raise herself up on one arm and respond, "You don't look so hot yourself, funny face." Amidst the laughter, Loren shuffled into the cave to a standing ovation.

"Well, don't just stand there. Help me get the fire going before we freeze our ever-loving tits off," she ordered with a grin made crooked by her half-frozen face.

Grace tried to get to her feet, but her knees buckled. Misha was too weak to even think of rising to the occasion.

"Take it easy, querida," Marty said as she re-arranged the blanket around her.

"I'm so hungry," Grace whined.

"Sit tight, I'll bring you two some vegetable broth and corn cakes," Marty happily offered.

"That sounds heavenly," Grace sighed. She fell back and lay face to face with Misha, who was struggling to keep her eyes open. "What a pair we are," she said, stroking the foolish romantic's bluish lips. Misha mouthed something inaudible and passed out.

Chapter III

It was Jake who insisted on keeping track of time in lock step with Gregorian dictates. Most afternoons would find him scratching out the days and months on the sheer rock face of Raven's Bluff. He had worn down the blade of his Swiss army knife so badly, it was useless for filleting the catch of the day. And, until Lyle figured out by accident how to chip stone into a decent cutting tool, everyone took their life in their hands every time they bit into a chunk of fire-roasted un-boned salmon. It was Lyle who fashioned stone axes for the construction of a cedar commons and a sleeping cottage.

"Do you know what day it is today?" Jake asked Joe, who was returning to camp with a capful of chanterelles.

"Mushroom soup day," Joe answered.

"No, idiot. It's December the tenth, twenty fourteen, the anniversary of our salvation."

"Well, I'll be. Only fifteen more shopping days 'til Xmas," Joe wisecracked.

"Show a little respect for the millions who never made it back to the stone age," Jake bitterly chided.

"Come on, man! The past is over and done with. What's the use of dredging it up again?" Joe longingly eyed the golden treasures in his grimy cap.

"You always were an ignorant son of a bitch," Jake muttered.

"Hey, man, it wasn't me stupid enough to drive a backhoe over my brother's head."

Jake grabbed Joe by his ragged shirt collar. "Shut your hole or I'll shut it for you!" The capful of mushrooms went flying. Joe took a swing and missed. The two men struggled, each pulling on the other's woolly beard. Hair balls rolled like miniature tumbleweeds down the trail; one stuck to the top of Sadie's muddy boot.

"If I can believe my eyes, seems like you two just had yerselves a reg'lar cat fight," she laughed, picking off the tuft of hair. "This would fit nice right up here on your bald spot," she approached Jake with a titter. When Jake slapped her hand away, Joe lunged from behind and put him in a chokehold.

"You apologize to the lady, or her face will be the last thing you see on this Earth," he snarled in Jake's reddened ear. The burly logger was twice his girth and three times as strong, so there wasn't any choice but to cave.

"Sorry," Jake half-heartedly mumbled.

"Louder! I don't think she heard ya," Joe demanded, squeezing tighter. Jake gasped for air.

"Oh, for cryin' out loud! Stoppit, you old fools!" Sadie growled, but to no avail. Jake was turning blue. Sadie grabbed a stick and was set to beat them both more senseless than they already were, when Fran, who was hauling creek water in a giant clam shell, emptied the whole thing over their heads.

"This is getting to be a regular habit," the ex-constable scolded the dripping combatants. "I think it's time you two maniacs sit down with our resident shrink and maybe get your fat heads examined before you do some real damage."

"I second that. You two are killing morale," Sadie said, folding her arms across her ample breasts that Joe was always ogling even though he thought he was being subtle about it. Jake, who for decades had carried a torch for the buxom redhead, would get hot under the collar every time Joe tried to engage him in a bit of lowdown commentary about the most appealing widow in primal Hecate's Cove.

Truth was, sexual tension between the men and women of the tiny settlement was coloring nearly all their interactions. Liaisons were imminent between the most unlikely of pairs, who under normal circumstances wouldn't give each other a second glance.

`It goes to show you,' Sadie would often muse, `idle hands are the devil's playground.' She kept as busy as possible, yet, much to her shame, she found that the more unappealing the man, the more often he starred in her ever more frequent erotic fantasies. Although she prayed for strength and guidance during vigorous walks to and from the south spit, her libido grew more demanding. She said the rosary at least three times before bed, but to no avail. Rituals of atonement only made her blood run hotter.

One night, it occurred to the tormented widow that her childhood friend might be suffering similar torture, so she invited her for a stroll out under the Stars.

"The Moon is waxing," Cynthia wistfully said. "Beware the Full Moon."

"Nonsense," Sadie scoffed, pulling her frayed shawl tighter around her shoulders.

"You know what they say?"

"About what?"

"The Full Moon makes people do crazy things."

Sadie thought about how important the Moon was to Mariana, who diligently worshipped it, even when it was invisible. "That's just an old wive's tale."

"Some old wives are pretty darned sharp, if you ask me," Cynthia countered, glancing at the silver highlights in Sadie's auburn hair, which took on a lavender sheen in the Moonlight.

"You don't mean me."

"Of course not. You're not old." Cynthia was nothing if not charming. Sadie gave her a playful punch in the shoulder.

"I sure don't feel very wise these days."

"You seem steady as she goes from what I can tell."

"Just like a rusty old tanker headed for dry dock."

"That's not what I meant."

"Say what you mean, then, for heaven's sake," Sadie snapped.

"I have to admire your calm since we arrived," Cynthia said. "Especially, with Mariana gone to who knows where. I don't know how you stood it after Jack died, Mariana's drinking, fits of rage...ah, jeez, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stir it all up again."

Sadie stopped in her tracks. "Since when do you walk on eggshells around me?"

The mayor stopped, too, and zeroed in on the Moon, which hung like a lantern in the western horizon, casting a ghostly luminescence over the tops of the breakers.

"How long have we known each other, Sadie?"

"I swear we were twins separated at birth," Sadie had to chuckle.

Cynthia picked up a stone and hurled it past the surf. "Nobody knows me better than you, that's the truth."

"I feel the same about you," Sadie said.

"Well, then, maybe you can help me with this problem I'm having." Cynthia picked up a larger stone.

"Ain't that a coincidence. I was just about to ask you for some friendly advice."

"You go first." Cynthia hurled the second stone farther than the first.

"No, no. Age before beauty."

"In that case, I'm all ears." Cynthia had already picked up a third stone, but tossed it aside. "Come on, lets take a load off," she said and took Sadie by the arm over to a log.

During Sadie's sordid confession, Cynthia hung on every word, interjecting empathetic comments and nods at all the right moments. With every erotic notion that Sadie owned up to, Cynthia's heart ached a little more; by the time the Moon had slipped into the ocean, the articulate pillar of strength was a tangle of conflicting emotions.

"Isn't that the most disgustin' bunch of claptrap you ever heard?" Sadie was embarrassed and ashamed.

With a deep sigh, Cynthia took in the Milky Way, whose Stars seemed close enough to touch. "I'd be the last person on Earth to say one way or another," she said.

Disappointed and mystified, Sadie was sure she'd made a mistake airing her dirtiest laundry. But when she noticed tears pooling in her old friend's eyes, it occurred to her that Cynthia, who never married and never talked of things romantic, might have some heartache of her own. How strange, Sadie realized, that after decades of friendship they never once talked about sex. But, then again, Sadie had taken the same tack with her own daughter, who made things easy by keeping her offbeat love life a mystery, not because she was ashamed of it, but because she held it sacred. Like many a loving mother, Sadie let well enough alone; abiding by one of her favorite expressions, she `took it all in stride,' an expression that summed up her philosophy of parenting.

"I've been rattling on like an old fool."

Cynthia turned to her in earnest. "There's only one fool sitting on this log and it isn't you."

The mayor stood and walked briskly down the beach. Sadie didn't know what to think or do. Then, it hit her like a ton of bricks.

"No, it's me!" she shouted after her. The spry-for-her-age widow easily caught up with the mayor, who was huffing and puffing like a steam engine. "Wait up, for cryin' out loud!" Sadie sputtered. "I'm the fool, not you."

Cynthia stopped, but wouldn't make eye contact; instead she looked once more to the Milky Way, as if for divine guidance.

"You don't understand," Cynthia said, desperately trying to rein in some wild tresses that had escaped their prison of hair combs and bobby pins.

"I do understand. I haven't been a very good friend, have I?" Sadie persisted.

"What are you blathering about?" Cynthia retorted as if she couldn't care less, when nothing could be further from the truth.

"Why didn't you ever confide in me about the important things?"

"What things?"

"You know--romance, sex...and what not," Sadie tiptoed.

"It takes two to tango, my dear," Cynthia tried to make light.

"I'm ready to stop dancin' around, if you are," Sadie countered with a grin that Cynthia couldn't resist.

"All right. You asked for it." She walked up close to the redhead, took her hands in hers, and couldn't believe the words that spilled out of her own mouth. "The plain and simple truth is...I love you."

"I love you, too. You're the best friend a person could ever have."

Cynthia squeezed hard. "You don't understand. I'm in love with you, Sadie." She watched Sadie's expression go from confused to shocked and back again. "Did you hear me? I'm in love with you--always have been, always will be. There! I've said it!"

Speech had deserted, but the most outrageous notion shot like a meteor across Sadie's muddled mind. `Oh, lord help me, she's going to kiss me!' She made a painfully conscious effort to not do anything that would show her fear, like wrenching her hands from the tender grasp.

"Oh, relax, I'm not going to make a pass," Cynthia, fine-tuned to the most subtle signs of revulsion, assured with a chuckle. She released Sadie's clammy hands. "How about that! It feels damn good to finally come right out and say it!" Like the talented outfielder she was, Cynthia McKibben picked up another innocent stone and threw it higher and farther than ever. "Hey, big beautiful world! I'm here, I'm queer, get used to it!" she proclaimed, shaking her fist at the Stars.

Sadie's mind raced inside a maze of incomplete thoughts; she tried desperately to come up with the perfect words for the momentous occasion. Fear of losing Cynthia's friendship ultimately won out.

"I hope we can still be friends," she weakly began.

"I should hope so!" Cynthia impulsively swept Sadie up into a bear hug.

"Because you know, Cynthia, I'm not that way," Sadie grunted, trying her darnedest not to struggle.

"You normals are so predictable," Cynthia snorted and loosened her embrace.

Sadie put her hands on her curvaceous hips. "What’s that supposed to mean?"

"Look, dear heart. Don't you realize what you've done? You've made an honest woman out of me." Cynthia heaved another stone.

"You're gonna have an awful sore arm tomorrow."

"Who cares? Come on, give it a go." The hurler handed Sadie a stone of her own.

"For cryin' out loud," Sadie disdained with her game face on. The closet arm took a big wind-up and launched a line-drive well past the breakers.

"Holy moly! I had no idea! We sure could have used you at the last softball tournament." A gust of wind blew her baseball cap off. Sadie automatically chased it down and placed it over Cynthia's unruly mane of grey with honey highlights. As she tucked in the wayward wisps, a moment of tenderness caught them both by surprise. `Lord help me,' Sadie silently prayed and experienced her first kiss from a woman.

Later that night Sadie Morgan said the rosary at light speed. She excused the sweetest moment in her new life by calling it `the devil's work.' The next day, while everyone else was watching the great whale migration, she and Joe went at it like rabbits out in the wood shed. Although Joe wanted to continue their torrid liaison, Sadie would have nothing more to do with the burly bachelor. Cynthia, keenly aware of group morale, noticed the iciness between the two, and decided she had to do something about it.

One frosty Winter morning she marched to the south point, where Sadie always began each day perched on a rock praying for the safe return of her daughter.

"The tide'll be in soon!" Cynthia shouted. Sadie reeled around and nearly lost her balance.

"You 'bout gave me a heart attack!" she snapped and gathered her shawl tightly around herself.

"You're awful jumpy this morning." Sadie resumed her trance-like stare into the distance. "There's a storm brewing," Cynthia persisted and climbed up next to the thorny object of her affection.

"It's gonna be a whopper," Sadie absently agreed.

"Come on, let me walk you back to the commons before the sky opens up on us," Cynthia said, clasping the redhead's freckled hand.

"Do you remember when we'd stroll on the beach right after a storm?" Sadie asked.

"Of course, I do. I have...I mean I had a ton of glass floats to prove it."

"Remember that old tackle box full of cash?"

"Sure I do--nothing but a soggy stew."

"Just our luck." Sadie pulled her hand from Cynthia's and watched a lone sea gull fly over to a distant promontory and land. Its persistent call filled her with ineffable sorrow. "Do you think Mariana is somewhere close to the ocean?"

"If she isn't, I'm sure she misses it," Cynthia answered with an eye on the angry surf.

"How she loves a good storm. Her and Andrea never missed a chance to be out in the middle of the worst of 'em. It's a miracle they didn't get swamped by a sneaker."

"They took chances, those two," Cynthia reminisced.

The sea gull on the promontory called again and took flight. It skimmed over the wispy tops of the breakers and blended with its own kind. Sadie turned to Cynthia. "I've been coming here every morning since we got here, and when I close my eyes, I can see Mariana's face just as plain as day. She's got that stubborn look of hers, the same one she had when she took her first step, that gleam in her green eyes, same color as Jack's, you know. The fun the three of us had! Oh lordie, it's like it was yesterday! And from this here rock ...call me crazy, but I can't help feelin' her arms around me, like she left a little of herself for me to hold onto, no matter what." Sadie wiped a tear from her cheek. The rising tide swirled around their barnacled perch.

"Come on, dear heart, before we get swamped," Cynthia gently urged. She came close to taking the anguished love of her life in her arms, but instead jumped down into six inches of foamy brine. Sadie stood, turned her back on the ocean, and surveyed the towering cliffs.

"Mariana, the other girls, I bet they all met right up there on Raven's Bluff, and.."

"Jumped," Cynthia blurted out and instantly regretted it.

"No! They took wing out over the cove just like that sea gull." Sadie pointed to one flying directly overhead.

"Please, hon, don't do this to yourself."

Sadie looked down at Cynthia, who was up to her knees in a mean undertow. "I had a dream last night. And I saw my Mariana and that mare of hers fly right up to the Stars."

"Anything's possible in a dream. For heaven sakes, Sadie, get down before we both drown!"

"What a dreamer my girl is," Sadie rambled on. "You know, I used to scold her for it...all those big ideas of hers, ranting and raving against the world. There's so many things I wish I would of done different."

"If only, if only. That game will drive you crazy."

"There's so much I don't understand about her, Cynthia. I could have done better by her, but..."

"But what?" Cynthia braced herself against a strong surge of frigid brine that sprayed against Sadie's perch.

"Nothing. I'm just a silly old woman. Let's go back."

"Atta girl. Ted's cooking up another one of his breakfast stews."

"Not squirrel again," Sadie groaned and, with Cynthia's help, lowered herself into knee-deep salt water.

"Rabbit," Cynthia said with a grunt. She took Sadie's hand and together they splashed around the point to safety.

"Did you say rabbit?" Sadie asked, breathing hard.

"Emma's been howling about it all morning."

"Not her pet!"

"Lyle skinned it before he brought it into the kitchen. By the time Ted got down to the truth of the matter, the stew was already simmering in that abalone pot of his. There was no use tossing it out, especially with everyone sick to death of fish." Cynthia plopped down in the deep sand and removed her soggy sneakers.

"I say it's time for a heart to heart with our little Daniel Boone," Sadie said and sat down beside her.

"Out in the woodshed."

"Lucky for him, Mariana's not here."

"He'd be singing soprano for days, that's for sure."

The two old friends had a good laugh, but, as they made their way back to the settlement, in the back of their minds they knew that something had to be done about the flare-ups in testosterone, which were becoming more frequent and divisive. Although as mayor Cynthia McKibben had enjoyed and made plenty of political hay from her status as `one of the boys,' there were times like the present when she wished she could send every last one of them to Mars.

Chapter IV

After the terrible news, Andrea was inconsolable. Signe and Daria did everything within their considerable power to pull her out of the death spiral of insomnia and no appetite. Moab enticed her to drink a little broth now and then, but it wasn't until Ariel invoked the grieving water witch to the Angaran outpost that Andrea found the strength to face the truth. At Mariana's grave, she at last found some peace of mind. It was there that Ariel informed her that Taji and his clan would be headed for the land bridge in the Spring.

"Are you going?" Andrea tearfully asked the soft-spoken Finlandian.

"For certain. Taji and the others will seek the plains of Turtle Island. I will follow the seacoast south to Mariana's home."

"Hecate's Cove?!"

"Yes. She often talked of its beauty and I will feel at home with her spirit there."

"Of course. But how will you cross the mouth of the Columbia? Those waters are the most treacherous in the world."

"I do not know of it. But we will find a way, perhaps inland. Taji thinks there might be an island in the river or maybe a shallow spot not too far from the Sea of Dragons."

"You mean the Pacific."

"That's what Mariana always called it."

"You're a brave soul. How long do you think it'll take to reach the other side of the world?"

"Three, maybe four Springs from now. It depends. But I know one thing for certain."

"What's that, dear?"

"I will think of Mariana every step of the way."

"To have her life end this way--she deserved so much more." Andrea fell to her knees in sobs.

"You must come with me now," Ariel said, reaching out.

"No! I can’t!"

"I wish for you to walk with me--it will do you much good."

Andrea dared look into the Finlandian's blue-gray eyes, which gleamed. "Where to?"

"Along the canyon rim," Ariel replied, pointing east. The griever wondered how it was that Mariana's lover seemed so upbeat. Ariel looked more lovely than ever, as if somehow the searing pain of loss had summoned the beauty of her soul. "Come." She rested her hand on Andrea's shoulder.

Steeling herself against another tidal wave of sorrow, Mariana's lifelong friend rose from her aching knees and gazed at the distant perpetually snow-capped mountains. The setting Sun poked through a crack in the overcast sky and cast a golden sheen over the drifting snow. Ariel slipped her arm through Andrea's and cheerfully requested, "Talk to me of Hecate's Cove."

Andrea took one last look at the mound of river rocks that marked the hero's grave. "Where do I begin?"

"Were you born in Hecate's Cove?" Ariel asked with a gentle tug on Andrea's heavy cloak. They began their walk.

"I was born in Texas."

"Where is this Tagsazz?"

Andrea, mildly amused by the mispronunciation, replied, "About as far from here as you can get."

"Do you miss Tagsazz?"

"Not one bit. I left there when I was still in diapers."

"Dy-pares?"

"This could be a very long walk," Andrea, for the first time since the tragedy, had to laugh.

"All the way to Hecate's Cove," Ariel said, squeezing her conjured guest's arm. The water witch stopped short.

"Oh, no you don't. I'm going back to Crete tonight, at the latest. And I ain't walkin'."

Ariel giggled. "Mariana said you could be stubborn."

"She did, huh?"

"Why would you not return to your home?"

"Not on foot, I wouldn't."

"Can you shape-shift?"

"Unfortunately, I can't, not that I would want to. But I'm very conjurable, as you know."

"Very well, then, as soon as I get to Hecate's Cove, I will send for you," Ariel promised and pulled harder on Andrea's arm.

"And how will you know when you've found it?" Andrea asked.

"I will know," the Finlandian replied with a wink.

"Well, it seems to me that Taji and his clan should at least escort you there before they take off for the wide open spaces."

"I will not be alone," Ariel said with an air of mystery Andrea couldn't resist.

"Leah and Kara are going?"

"Perhaps...and some others you might know."

"Are you going to tell me who, or must I play twenty questions?" Ariel laughed.

"These modern expressions always amuse. I will tell you that a big gathering is planned."

"Where?"

"Here."

"Of whom?"

"Many, many pilgrims. Some are walking all the way from Nyasa."

"My coven is coming here?!" Andrea stopped short again.

"I would guess so, and some from Ibera, from Anatolia, from the bamboo forests to the south, and, oh yes, Crete."

"Crete? Oh, I don't think so." Andrea couldn't believe how much Signe had kept from her. Irritated, she picked up the pace.

"There are young novices there, Sophia says, who want to go. They will build a shrine on the distant shores of the Passafick."

"Where on the Pacific?"

Ariel smiled. "Guess."

"Blessed Be."

Ariel and the wily witch walked and talked for the remainder of the short Winter day and returned under a Starry sky. The roar of the waterfall drew them to the sapphire pool, where Andrea gave a blessing and an affectionate good-bye to her trusted conjurer. No promises were made, but the Finlandian knew in her heart they would meet again--without the benefit of magic.

Chapter V

"All right, people!" Cynthia said, banging on the rustic table with Ted's one and only wooden soup ladle. The chatter gradually faded as everyone's attention turned towards their perennial leader.

"First, kudos to Ted for the gourmet feast."

"Hear! Hear!" everyone cheered. Ted modestly waved off the adulation.

Emma, who'd been sulking all day on a stool in the corner of the commons, jumped up and screamed at her big brother, "Rabbit killer! I hate you, forever and ever and ever!" Her distraught mother rushed to the seven-year-old and whispered something in her ear. Whatever she said made things worse, because Emma ran sobbing out the door and into the pouring rain.

"I'll go get her, Sal," Joe said and made a quick exit. Sadie eased the tension when she stood to clear the table. Jake and Fran gladly helped.

"Now, listen up, everyone. I'm calling a meeting tonight after the little ones are tucked in. Lyle, I expect you to attend." Cynthia made a point of looking the boy straight in his dark brooding eyes. His right leg bounced up and down like a jack hammer as he nervously scanned the rafters of the commons. "Yes, ma'am," he mumbled.

"May I be 'scused?" Lyle's little brother, Derek, asked his mother.

"Yes, dear," Sally said and kissed his mop of black curls. Derek made a bee line for a toy fire truck Jake had carved from a chunk of deadwood. Making all the appropriate sound effects, the four-year-old scooted the toy back and forth across the rough hearth stones of the huge fireplace. "Don't get too close to the flame, honey," Sally said and sat down next to Lyle, who recoiled when she tried to brush the thick bangs from his eyes. Under normal circumstances, the typically teen-aged behavior would have been taken in stride, but Sally, widowed a week before doomsday, was cut deep by her son's rejection.

Lyle Watts, Jr. carried the grief over his father's murder deep inside and found precious little solace in his new role as `head of the family.' At age fifteen, he could pass for twenty, depending on his mood, which since his father's death at the hands of looters, ranged from sullen to hateful. The more dire his outlook, the older he appeared. His bushy eyebrows and deep set eyes enhanced the overall appearance of the angry young man who'd taken the entire weight of surviving the new world onto his bony shoulders.

Apart from helping to run the hardware store, where he'd worked every single Saturday since the tender age of seven, hunting had been the one activity he shared with his father. Lyle Watts, Sr. took it for granted that his oldest son would take over the business, and, except for wanting to become a volunteer fireman at the Rocky Beach firehouse, the boy had no dreams of his own, at least none that anybody knew about.

It was no surprise to his mother when her son took it upon himself to make spears and hunt small mammals stone-age style. Lyle was gone from the settlement for most of every day, tromping around in the rain forest as far inland as daylight allowed. He knew every deer, bear and raccoon trail in the vicinity and if it were up to him he would live alone in a tree house the rest of his life and not be bothered with the likes of Cynthia McKibben, who came to symbolize everything he despised about civilization.

Rather than face the music over the rabbit slaying, he considered high-tailing it into the woods and hiding out in one of the many cave-like hollows in the giant Sitkas. But killing the very creature that he had nursed back to health was an act he could not come to terms with on his own. Anyone with eyes could see the festering torment that lived behind Lyle's perpetual scowl, and after a brief consultation with the resident psychiatrist, Cynthia decided to give the boy a chance to speak up for himself, hoping it would get the teen `back on track.'

"OK," Cynthia started out, motioning for everyone to sit down. "This won't take long." She glanced at Lyle, who sat to her right scowling as usual with his arms wrapped tight around his rib cage, the very picture of misery masquerading as defiance. "Lyle has something he wants to get off his chest and it's important you hear him out before you open your big yaps," the mayor set the stage. Everyone but the teen chuckled. "Lyle. Go ahead," she said with a nod.

The boy avoided all eye contact. He took a deep breath and stood with his arms still folded tight around himself. He cleared his throat and in a voice that cracked between soprano and base, he confessed, "The rabbit you ate tonight was Emma's pet." The collective gasp made him want to run, yet he couldn't act the coward. "I killed it because I couldn't...because I.." Lyle swallowed hard and glanced at his mother whose teary eyes made him even more tongue-tied.

"Go ahead, son. You're doing just fine," Cynthia said. He swallowed hard again, shifted from one foot to the other and stuffed both hands in the pockets of his baggy cut-offs.

"I had a real good bead on this six-point deer, but I couldn't throw my spear... I froze up." Lyle again hugged himself tight. He swallowed hard. "So when I came back and saw Whiskers outside his cage headin' for the woods, I..." Lyle's knees began to shake. "I killed him, because...he shoudda knowed better..he shoudda knowed when he was well off!"

Lyle bolted for the door, but Ted was blocking it. Knowing the boy was mortified that anyone should see him in tears, the good doctor quickly escorted him outside. "I didn't mean to---I didn't!" Lyle sobbed against Ted's shoulder.

"I know, son. You told the truth--that's what matters," Ted reassured against the driving rain drenching them both. Good-sized branches were flying all around them as Ted ushered the boy into the sleeping cottage, where Joe was telling Emma a bedtime story. After she fell asleep, he had the good sense to leave.

"You're a brave kid," Ted said to the self-loathing teen. "You're crazy," Lyle hissed, staring into the blazing fire.

"To admit a wrong takes courage, son."

"Stop calling me that! You ain't my father!"

"You're right. I apologize."

Lyle grew antsy. "I'm turning in."

"In a moment. There's something you need to do before you turn in," Ted said. Lyle sighed and kept staring into the fire. "I want you to promise me you'll apologize to Emma in the morning. It will mean a great deal to her and it will help you forgive yourself for the mistake you made."

"I didn't make no mistake. I did what I felt like." Lyle found little solace in talking tough.

"I don't believe you wanted to kill Whiskers."

"I had to. Ain't nobody else puttin' real food on the table."

"That's not true. What about all the fish we catch every day and the greens you gather in the forest?"

"My dad says it's a fact that red meat keeps us strong. Without it, we die."

"Well, that's a matter of opinion. Take the mayor, for instance, until we arrived here, she was a strict vegetarian and she's as healthy as a horse."

"Looks like one, too," Lyle sneered.

"Do you dislike her for some reason?"

"She thinks she's boss and she's nothin' but a fat ugly dyke," Lyle snarled and clenched his fists.

"That's a hateful thing to say."

"I hate queers."

"Why?"

"They're sick in the head--everybody knows that."

"Lyle, I'm going to let you in on a little secret."

"I'm turning in," the boy snapped and started to walk away. Ted grabbed him by the shoulders and spun him around.

"Not until you hear what I have to say." Lyle struggled, but Ted was never more determined. "Look at me," the good doctor commanded. Lyle's eyes darted every which way. "What we hate in others, we hate in ourselves." The boy stared daggers at the seasoned counselor, who continued undaunted, "Hatred made the kind of world that killed your father. You, me, and everyone here must do all we can to make sure that it stops with us. Do you understand, Lyle?" Ted watched the boy squirm between fight and flight.

"I didn't hate Whiskers!" Lyle blurted out, fighting tears.

"I know you didn't. But you were very angry with yourself."

While the storm raged ever louder outside, Ted waited to see if Lyle would deny the truth, but the boy only stared slump-shouldered into the fire that reflected orange in the dilated pupils of his hazel eyes.

Ted released his grip. "I better get back. Make sure you lock the shutters up tight." He moved towards the door of the sleeping cottage and was about to leave, when Lyle spoke from his heart.

"Do you think it would be OK if I didn't go hunting tomorrow?"

"Would you like me to bring it up with the adults tonight?" Lyle nodded. Ted gave the thumbs up and stepped out with a grin into a typhoon. Dodging flying debris, he made a mad dash for the commons. He'd just stepped inside, when Sally ran up with Derek in her arms.

"I have to go to my children."

Ted blocked the way. "They're safe, Sally. It's too dangerous out there now."

"Let me out!" she screamed. Derek began to cry.

"I'll go with you," Joe, who'd been eyeing Sally all evening, hastily volunteered and rudely pushed Ted aside.

"Now, see here!" Ted protested.

"This ain't no time for none of yer fancy talkin', doc," Joe unlatched the door. An awesome wind tore inside, blowing out the fire and tossing chairs around as if they were dollhouse furniture. Wooden eating utensils became deadly missiles. Everyone dove under the table. Finally, the heavy door creaked and groaned shut. Joe, Sally and Derek had left.

"That damned fool!" Sadie grumbled.

"Damned gutsy, if you ask me," Carl said.

"Well, nobody asked ya," Sadie sharply chided. She crawled from under the table and promptly stumbled over a chair. "Damnation! I can't see a blamed thing!"

"Sadie, get back under here!" Cynthia ordered. "We may as well stay put until this thing blows over." Suddenly, the door rattled violently. "Quick, everybody! Shove the table over there!" the mayor shouted above the roar. Just before the biggest gust of all hit, the table was in place. It still took the strength of everyone to keep it there. One last horrific assault brought a huge tree limb crashing through the pole roof, and as the rain poured in, the winds mercifully began to die down.

The Full Moon peeked between the thinning clouds and cast a silvery glow inside the commons. When, one by one, the survivors stepped outside into the balmy air, they were stunned by the horrendous devastation. The tiny settlement was buried in so much debris, even Fran had to second Carl's wish for a chain saw. It took the rest of the night for the men to remove the heavy limbs from the door of the sleeping cottage, where they found Lyle curled up on the floor in the far corner with his sister. Jake was the first to rush to them.

"You kids all right?" he asked, expecting the worst. Lyle groaned and finally opened his eyes. Emma began to whimper. "Thank god," Jake said and tried to help the boy stand.

"Eoww!" Lyle cried out. "My leg!"

"Take it easy, son. We'll get you fixed up," Jake said. Emma wriggled out of her brother's arms and crawled on her hands and knees towards the door.

"Mommy...I want my mommy," she whimpered. Carl scooped her up in his arms.

"Hey, little missy. Don't you worry none, she's on her way," he said, even though every fiber of his being told him otherwise.

"Somebody get Sadie!" Jake shouted. Sadie, once a nurse's aide, was the only person willing to try to set Lyle's fractured leg. The boy stoically endured the agonizing process by biting down on a twig, only to pass out from sheer exhaustion when it was over. Sadie, overcome with emotion, crawled into Jake's arms.

Meanwhile, Carl had found Joe, Sally, and poor little Derek crushed to death under a massive Sitka tree limb. It was left to Cynthia and Fran to keep the terrible news from Emma whose wailing for her mother didn't give way to sleep until Sunrise.

Tragedy, the great equalizer, dissolved power struggles, obliterated gender divisions and created the first human family on the west coast of Turtle Island. And there wasn't anything any one of the six adults wouldn't do for Sally's children whom they now regarded as their own flesh and blood. Of course, Emma took the loss of her beloved mother very hard. Sadie and Fran did their best to fill the immeasurable need for maternal love, but it was Lyle's unyielding devotion to his sister that brought the devastated seven-year-old through the worst of it.

Emma came to idolize her brother, who taught her everything he knew about animals and the great outdoors. Everything except hunting, that is, which he gave up after the big storm. Together they became devoted students of the rain forest, where they spent the better part of every day gathering roots, mushrooms, and assorted unknown greenery for the family's increasingly vegetarian tastes.

The day Emma discovered an entire meadow of camas lily was a milestone in the settlement's diet. Fortunately, Cynthia, an avid gardener, knew the difference between the edible and poisonous varieties of the attractive plant. Weeding out the `bad camas' became Emma's primary job, while Ted for whom the discovery was heaven-sent, came up with a seemingly endless number of ways to cook the energizing staple, thus solving the age old problem of dietary boredom. Lyle discovered that the camas bulb, as well as other edible flora, could be cultivated within the forest itself, and in so doing he unknowingly fathered a forest agriculture similar to that practiced by the African Nasai for millennia.

In addition, since they were no longer being hunted, forest animals began showing up near the settlement. Without having to resort to cages or pens, Emma enjoyed a large circle of wild friends, including rabbits. Sometimes animals down on their luck came around for handouts, which made for some tense moments between humans and wily predators like the cougar and bobcat. But Emma, to everyone's relief and amazement, always found a way to resolve potential disputes short of open warfare. She claimed a common language with all the forest denizens, but Lyle was the only one who really believed in it, even though he never actually heard it himself.

Any envy he might have harbored over this fact, he short-circuited by telling himself it was a fair price to pay for past crimes against his furry friends. Traces of guilt were further mitigated by his true purpose in life: learning the secrets of plants and trees, especially the Sitka giants with whom he conversed when nobody was around.

Chapter VI

Upwards of a thousand women gathered on the coast of Anatolia for the grand migration east to Angara. Except for the dozen novice priests from Crete, the pilgrims were all exiles from various patriarchal eras. Nearly half were modern women, who, during the end days of 2012 and 2013 I.E.(Idiotic Era, so named by Andrea), had carried out desperate and daring escapes from an intolerable existence. They each had been invoked by a shaman or local channeler who foresaw the destruction of the world and decided there was no time like the Mother-Loving present for decisive action.

While the horse rescue was the focus for the Santee, the Angaran outpost, and Andrea's coven in Nyasa, the rest of the conjured women soaked up as much wisdom and knowledge as they could from the diverse cultures of the Mediterranean basin to which they were variously called. As Signe's brainchild, the world's first cultural exchange program was to be the foundation for human civilization on the continent of Turtle Island and eventually on its southern counterpart yet unnamed. Rumor had it that their destination was an obscure cove on the western edge of the northern rainforest, where a shrine would be built to draw down the power of the Sun, the Seven Sisters and, of course, the Moon.

Moab and his Brotherhood of Swan Lake had outfitted a grand sailing ship for the send off. It carried Signe, Daria, Andrea (just along for the trip), and the twelve novice priests in grand style to Ananna on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean. It was in that epicenter of aboriginal Sumerian culture that all the pilgrims greeted the famed Oracle of Crete with sustained fanfare. The celebration went on for days during which Moab achieved the forbidden ecstasy with Andrea. This unexpected development made for some heated exchanges between Signe and the oversexed water witch that culminated in Moab's unprecedented decision to leave the Brotherhood.

His sister, of course, did not take this lightly. But Moab was determined to see the new world, and he pleaded with Andrea to join him. Much to his distress, she adamantly refused and told him of her plans to be conveniently invoked when the accommodations there were `less primitive.' Out of bitter disappointment, Moab complained to Signe, who had been at odds for days with the water witch over her refusal to join the pilgrimage. A few days before they were to set sail back to Crete, Signe took Andrea aside.

"I've decided to give my blessing to your union with Moab. He will bring you much happiness."

"He already has. Only now he wants to leave me," Andrea pouted. She warily studied the Oracle's hypnotic eyes and knew the wheel of Fate was turning ever so steadily behind them.

"His heart breaks that you won't go with him."

"I love him dearly, but I have to think of what's best for myself. You, of all people, should appreciate that."

"Your new life awaits in Hecate's Cove," Signe re-asserted.

"I know that, and I will go, when the time is right."

"I have grown very fond of you, Andrea, in spite of our differences."

"Uh-oh, I feel a but coming on."

Signe scowled at yet another modern expression whose meaning in Sumerian bordered on insult. "I will never fully understand you, but I will miss your compulsion to speak your mind," the Oracle said and erased her scowl with a pleasant albeit forced smile.

"I'm not ready to say good-bye to Crete and that's that," Andrea stubbornly reiterated, even though pangs of doubt had recently weakened her resolve.
"I am giving you a choice, my friend. You may come home to Crete with me and stay, or you go now with your own kind."

"I'm not exactly sure what you mean by `my own kind,' but with all due respect, Signe, you do not determine my options, nor can you keep me a prisoner."

"Nor would I wish to. But Crete is not your home. It is mine. I alone determine which souls are conjured to and from it. You are needed by your coven. Do you not feel a longing for them?"

"What I need is more time to grieve." Andrea bit her lip to keep from weeping. "To go now would be too painful. Besides, I wouldn't be any use to anybody."

"Tell me this. What would Mariana advise?" Signe was nothing if not clever.

Andrea gazed out over the Mediterranean, her salt and pepper tresses tossed by the steady breeze.

"She would want me to be happy, of course."

Signe said nothing as the confounding water witch floundered in a sea of emotional turmoil. Finally, Andrea turned to the Oracle and confessed, "The truth is I haven't been happy since I left Hecate's Cove..not really."

"Yes, I know," Signe said, careful not to gloat before victory was hers.

"Moab's a wonderful man, but I don't love him the way he needs me to. He deserves someone more his age, not an old bat like me." Tears ran down Andrea's bronze face.

"Is there no one you need?"

"As you need Daria?" Signe nodded. Andrea picked up a pink agate and held it up to the Sun. She entertained the remote possibility that if she avoided eye contact, perhaps the Oracle of Crete wouldn't be able to read her mind.

"You long for someone," Signe summarily shattered that notion.

The foiled witch angrily tossed the gem into the turquoise sea. "His name is..was Frank. I left him behind to die a terrible death." For the first time since they met, Andrea wept in Signe's arms.

"I'm saddened by the choice you had to make. But he did not suffer, wild heart. He remains a soul yet unborn."

"That's not true! Our flesh and blood are one!" Andrea sputtered.

Signe lifted her face to her own and said, "You must understand that unless you make the pilgrimage home, your own soul will be forever lost between realms."

"But I am here--I am alive now," Andrea whimpered.

"Yes, and now you must make your choice, as they all have done," Signe said, pointing to the crowd of milling pilgrims. "You may live out your life as my honored guest on Crete, or you can become the woman you were meant to be."

"I don't understand," Andrea sniffled.

The Oracle brushed stray curls from Andrea's bloodshot eyes. "To follow your heart, your feet must touch the ground every step of the way," she said in a motherly tone. Seeing that the modern's mind was a tangle of more confounding questions, Signe abruptly broke their embrace and climbed the rope ladder draped over the bow of the great ship. "Wait there!" she shouted from the deck.

Patience was never hers, so Andrea grew more and more agitated. Finally and mercifully, Signe climbed down with a large woven satchel under her arm.

"Welcome home, here's your suitcase," Andrea managed to wisecrack, which of course went right over the exquisitely adorned headdress.

"Look inside," Signe said, handing over the heavy bag. Andrea hesitated.

"Go ahead," the Oracle urged.

"Sandals?"

"There is more."

Andrea pulled out a beautifully woven cloak and draped it over her shoulders. " Oh, it's lovely! And it has a willow design!"

"Of course. And the other is for the shape-shifter who has already flown to the new world." Andrea took the second cloak from the satchel. "Roku says Ananza will know who it's from. You may wear it if you desire a change of style along the way."

"What a perfect portrait of Her Raptorness!"

"It will suit her well," the Oracle said.

"Could this mean the Santee crowd is headed to Hecate's Cove as we speak?"

"I would think so," Signe replied with a twinkle in her breathtaking ebony eyes.

"And what about my coven?" Andrea asked. Dread, like the Angaran wind, chilled her to the core.

Signe pointed seaward. A small sailing vessel was making its way to shore. As it drew closer, Andrea's heart nearly exploded. "Oh, Blessed Be! Lineah! Ren!...the twins!" she cried. "Shu-Li!" she shouted to the astrologer, who waved and jumped from the crusty bow into the shallow waters. Single-handedly, she tried to pull the boat up onto the ivory sand. When Ren jumped ship to help, Andrea waded into her embrace. "My baby sister!"

Lineah, Shu-Li, and the twins piled on for a group hug amidst hoots, hollers, and joyous weeping. In the excitement, the line was left unattended and the boat began to drift away. Signe, elegant finery and all, waded waist deep and grabbed hold, but the steady wind in the sails made for a losing battle.

"I need assistance!" she called out. Luckily, Moab on his way back from tending to his camels, splashed out to his floundering sister.

"What a way to treat an Oracle," Andrea scolded with tongue in cheek. Lineah rushed to their aid.

"I have it in hand," Moab said to the tallest African he'd ever seen. "You climb aboard and take down the sail." It was the first time Lineah had heard a man speak the common language, an order no less; she was a bit taken aback. Moab repeated his instruction with a toothy grin. Amazon pride notwithstanding, Lineah climbed up onto the deck. While she held tight to the rudder, Moab, Ren, and the twins pulled the weather-beaten vessel up on the sand.

"Signe, I want you to meet my coven," Andrea said, overwhelmed with joy. The Oracle, who at that point was losing control of her ornate hairdo, barely nodded with each introduction. When the mass of black curls broke loose and fell across her shoulders, Shu-Li boldly rose to the occasion and, without asking permission, guided the Mediterranean Queen of the Divine Feminine over to a nearby rock, sat her down, and went to work re-arranging the complicated headdress of hibiscus blooms and silk ribbon.

"Never in my wildest dreams could I've imagined such a spectacle," Andrea chuckled to Ren, who clung tight around her sister's waist.

"You know Shu-Li. Mo-Ati Herself wouldn't intimidate her," Ren giggled. At that moment, the twins, quite taken with Moab, began dancing rings around him. At first he was wary of the mischievous duo, but one wink from Andrea and he succumbed to their contagious laughter and a rowdy game of tag. The sight so pleased his lover, that she dragged her sister into the fray. All five joined hands and spun around until they collapsed from dizziness. To his delight, Moab ended up at the bottom of the pile. A tickling match ensued, which Shu-Li, Signe, and Lineah took as their cue to leave.

"You had a smooth passage, I trust," Signe said to Lineah as they strolled towards the city's plaza.

"Smooth as glass for most of the way."

"Except for nearly running aground on a shoal at the mouth of the Aegean," Shu-Li said.

"Navigating the islands can be treacherous in Winter," Signe said.

"If not for the short days, I would never guess it was Winter," Lineah said. "What a trip this part of the world is. No wonder Andrea doesn't want to leave it."

"Can you see her riding a camel?" Shu-Li sniggered.

"You must do all you can to convince her to do just that," Signe sternly said.

"I know you haven't known her all that long, Your Reverence, but let me tell you, argument is her forte," Shu-Li said. "She has an answer for everything."

"We will see how clever words serve her tomorrow morning," Signe rather ominously said as they passed a group of Anatolians, who bowed in her presence. Lineah was about to ask for clarification, when a wild cheer rang out at the entrance to the grand amphitheater. Lineah and Shu-Li tried to blend into the background, but Signe wouldn't hear of it.

"The adulation is as much for you as it is deference to me," the Oracle said, taking them by the hand.

The two windblown seafarers from Nyasa politely bowed to the crowd without knowing why. Signe motioned for quiet, but didn't get it; the revelers chanted, "Yin not Yang," until Lineah, who could have had a career in opera, stepped from behind the Oracle and trumpeted, "Silencio!" The imposing resonance of her mezzo soprano voice hushed the crowd. "That's better! The Oracle of Crete will now speak!"

After more polite sustained applause, Signe took center stage. "What joy to see your happy faces. I am honored to be with you as you prepare to embark on this auspicious migration. Not since our ancestors journeyed from the heart of Africa countless seasons ago, have so many gathered to follow their dreams." She was interrupted with a standing ovation that Lineah once again cut short. "Today," Signe's echoed, "I have the honor of introducing those modern pilgrims whose courage and diligence in Nyasa made this new beginning possible."

The crowd went wild again. Cheers of `Hail to Ombazi', `Epona Forever!', mixed with `Yin not Yang' reverberated inside the marble amphitheater. There was nothing to do but step back and let the honorees bask in the glow.

Things got even wilder when the rest of Andrea's coven showed up, picking sand from various parts of their bodies. The frightened twins tried to hide behind the row of Signe's novices, but the steady pounding of feet and drums forced them to center stage, where Lineah and Shu-Li were both in tears.

"What's going on?!" Andrea yelled in Lineah's ear.

"They're paying tribute to us!"

"Too bad Ananza couldn't see this!" Andrea shouted.

"I'm sure she received a hero's welcome in Nebraska!" Lineah shouted and waved at a group of young African women dressed in stunning robes.

"Groupies!" Ren shouted in Lineah's ear.

"Don't let it go to your head!" Lineah shouted back as she caught a bouquet from a drop-dead gorgeous woman in the front row. Her smile muffled the din; her face was the only one in focus.

"Hey! Snap out of it!" Andrea teased the smitten conjuror. Lineah didn't hear the admonition; she motioned to the beautiful stranger, slipped back stage and down a narrow stairway. Behind the amphitheater, Lineah entered a grand garden, complete with an artesian fountain and a table piled high with fruit, nuts, cheese, bread and jugs of wine. Although the Amazon was starving, she could only pace until the woman of her wildest dreams showed up.

"Do you have the common language?" she asked.

"I sure do," Lineah replied the obvious.

The stunning beauty approached. She wore a flowing gown of fine linen and a crown of hibiscus in her wavy chestnut hair. "How are you called?"

"Lineah. And you?"

"Helen," she answered with a smile.

Naturally, Lineah thought of the one woman never excluded from the modern realm's ancient history books, the one whose face launched a thousand ships. "Of Troy?"

"I have heard of it, but I am from Selenia."

"I see," Lineah said, hypnotized by the unblinking pools of sapphire.

"You have been to my homeland?" Helen asked.

"What?" Lineah realized she was staring. "No I haven't. Where is it?"

"North on the Sea of Darkness."

"It sounds very mysterious."

"Yes, it holds many secrets."

"Like what?" Lineah dreamily asked.

"If I knew, I wouldn't be in human form, now, would I."

Lineah found Helen's cryptic answer more charming than confusing. "I guess some secrets are forever," she feebly responded. "Otherwise, the Sea of Darkness might just dry up and blow away." Lineah hoped her awkward attempt at humor hadn't insulted the beautiful Selenian.

"I understand you and your coven are from a realm called America." Helen plucked a grape from the mountain of fruit.

"That's right." Lineah grabbed an apple and bit into it.

"You escaped the end times of America?"

"Just barely," Lineah replied through a mouthful of sweet pulp.

"I narrowly escaped, also. Horsemen killed all but a few of us."

"Your coven?"

"Celestial Singers." Helen hummed a strange melody.

"That's different. What key is it in?" Even though Lineah had perfect pitch, she couldn't identify it.

"It's a song for the sorrowful heart. I know many songs, each for a single purpose. None are for unlocking doors." Lineah chuckled at the misunderstanding; at the same time, she felt an inexplicable longing.

"Oh, but you will some day," Helen said.

Lineah was completely mystified. "I will what?"

"Have a baby of your own."

"You read minds, I see," the misty-eyed Missouri conjuror deduced.

"No, only hearts," Helen answered.

"This is too weird." Lineah chomped on her apple.

"Perhaps when you are not so hungry, we will sing together. You have a splendid voice."

"Thank you." Lineah bit again into her apple. "Tell me, how did you escape the horsemen?"

"Just before she was murdered, my mother sent me and my two younger sisters to Ibera."

"I'm sorry."

"Oh, don't be. Mother's soul is eager to be born into a free land."

Lineah was too hungry and tired to iron out another wrinkle in metaphysical time. "So you've been living in Spain?"

"I have heard it called that. Yes, we arrived here yesterday."

"When you say your mother sent you to Ibera, you were actually invoked by someone there, right?"

"There is a great shaman on the Sea of Chaos who gave me sanctuary. I have learned a good deal of magic from her and the Iberan people."

"I can imagine." Lineah had no clue whether the Sea of Chaos was in fact the Atlantic or the Mediterranean or some other mysterious body of water she never heard of, but again, hunger trumped curiosity. She broke a loaf of bread and offered some to Helen.

"I'm not hungry, but I would enjoy watching you eat," the Selenian said. She stepped up close to Lineah whose desire for the enchantress was now at war with her stomach. Hunger won the first skirmish when Lineah practically inhaled a pear. "Do not eat so fast. You will miss the pleasure of the palate," Helen said and rested her elegant hand on Lineah's shoulder.

Lust made eating impossible; the modern conjuror dropped a half-eaten crust of bread on the ground and asked, "Would you kiss me?"

"If you want me to."

"From the very moment I saw you." Helen draped her arms around the alluring African. During their first kiss she remembered seeing that face in a dream. After the second, Helen gathered some fruit, a loaf of bread, and a jug of wine. Lineah followed her to an intimate alcove off the main garden, where a double hammock was strung between two palms. Swinging freely in the breeze, they treated each other to a sensual feast that lasted well past Sunset. In the Waxing Moonlight, Lineah surrendered to dreamless sleep.

The roosters first crowing brought Andrea to the love nest.

"Rise and shine, you two!"

Helen was the first to awaken to that impish grin. Lineah took a little more coaxing, since she hadn't slept at all well during the harrowing snake-infested trek along the banks of the Nile. Three days of seasickness on the Mediterranean surely hadn't helped.

"Arise, my lazy lioness," Helen said, pulling on her dream lover's hand. With Andrea's help, she eased the bushy-topped sleeper out of the hammock, where she teetered on blistered feet.

"Linnie, are you OK?" Andrea asked.

"Just a little weak in the knees," Lineah slurred and draped an arm around her lover. "I want you to meet Helen. She's from Selenia, way up on the Sea of Darkness," she yawned. Helen didn't know what to do when Andrea offered her hand, so she kissed it several times.

"Pleased to meet you, too," Andrea chuckled.

On their way back to the amphitheater, where the excited crowd was already gathered for the send-off ceremony, Andrea whispered in Lineah's ear, "Robbing the cradle now, are we?"

Lineah said loud enough for Helen to hear, "We love each other."

Andrea scoffed, "After one night together?" The rest of her coven strolled up.

"Morning," Ren and Shu-Li said in tandem with sly glances at Lineah. The twins signed a greeting to Helen, who, much to their delight, eagerly kissed their childlike hands.

"They read minds, so be careful," Lineah warned her new lover.

"Good morning, Emerald and Joy," Helen said.

Lineah received a playful poke in the ribs from Ren. “Wonders never cease, do they, hotlips?"

"I hope not."

"Don't worry, Linnie. Only minds that are open can be read," Shu-Li taunted.

"When's the last time yours was read?" Lineah snapped and wished she hadn't. "Sorry, Shu, I didn't mean that."

"Sure you did," the testy astrologer countered and turned to Andrea, who was yawning. "You look like hell, Tedesco. Pulled an all-nighter, I suppose."

"Aren't you little miss Sunshine this morning. Not that it's any of your bee's wax, but I spent the night alone."

"Sorry," Shu-Li said, but she wasn't. As was her style, she got down to the nitty-gritty. "Are you coming with us or not?" All eyes were upon the wayward witch.

"Let me put it this way," Andrea replied. "If I don't, I'll be forced to hitch a ride with the next gypsy caravan from Marrakesh." Her coven snickered.

"They're our people, after all," Ren reminded her sister.

"And you've always wanted to learn palm reading," Lineah chimed in.

"Are you saying now you don't want me to come with you?"

"Lineah has talked of nothing else since we left Nyasa. Isn't that so, hotlips?" Shu-Li teased.

"Knock it off," Lineah hissed, glancing at the Selenian, who didn't seem the least bit phased by the tension in the sweet morning air. "Of course, we want you with us. Since Crete is heaven on Earth, we just assumed that..."

"You don't need us anymore," Ren interjected with a pained expression.

"But we very much need you," Emerald plaintively said in her little girl voice that never matured.

Joy tearfully jumped in with, "And we will be lost without you."

Andrea, who'd weathered a storm of conflicting emotions all night long, fell to pieces. A river of grief poured out of her soul. Shu-Li and Lineah helped the beloved witch to the shade of a palm, where they eased her into Ren's lap. When the tears dried up, each coven member spoke a remembrance of Mariana. Helen sang an ode in Selenian to the New Moon. An exhilarating trumpeting of the conch was the perfect ending to the cathartic renewal of bonds. When the celebrated coven of Hecate's Cove arrived arm and arm outside the great amphitheater of Ananna, the crowd of pilgrims, including Moab and a dozen of his brethren, not to mention several hundred goats, twenty heavily-laden camels, countless carts carrying squawking poultry, feed, seed, and sundries were impatiently assembled at the entrance. Perched atop a marble pedestal in the middle of the gathering, Signe began her farewell dedication:

"The Fates are with you all on this glorious morning. You took refuge from harsh realms that now will never be. With what you've learned here in this one, you are free to live in harmony with the ones to come. Your journey will not be easy, but I promise you it will inspire wonder and stir deep memory of Mother Africa Herself. Your numbers will grow as you walk the plains, forests, and deserts. If you are fortunate, you may catch a glimpse of the pony herds now flourishing in Angara." An emotional cheer rose from the crowd. Signe motioned for silence and this time, got it.

"You will delight in the Angaran llamas essential to a successful crossing of the land bridge. You will travel down a forested coastline abundant in fish and edible plants. As you have learned so well in this realm, no warm-blooded creatures need die for your sustenance. And always remember...waste nothing.

"When you arrive at Hecate's Cove, your task after making shelter, will be to build a shrine high above the sea. My novices will choose its location and guide its construction, and upon its completion they will consecrate it to the Moon and the Seven Sisters. Along with my brother Moab, they and the Anatolian guides will return home."

Signe raised her arms to the azure sky and sang out:

"Mother Sun! Give these brave pilgrims warmth against the coldest days. Sister Moon and Stars! Light their darkest nights and ease their heavy hearts!"

Signe stepped down from the pedestal, knelt on the ground, and kissed it. "Mother Earth! Release your bounty and give gentle rest at journey's end!"

The Oracle stood and gave a sign to Moab, who stepped up on the pedestal and blew the conch shell three times.

"Hail Mo-Ati!" the crowd cheered.

Andrea rushed to Signe and clasped her hands. "I will have Ananza conjure you for the whale migration."

"Only if I have the pleasure of your company for the Harvest Feast," the teary-eyed Oracle said.

"You've got it," Andrea said and kissed Signe full on the lips.

Daria, who was standing nearby, asked, "Are you two turning on?" The trio enjoyed a contagious belly laugh, which infected the entire crowd with hysterics.

"What's so funny?" Shu-Li, not laughing and most impatient to be on the move, had to ask.

"Kiss me and find out," Andrea said, expecting to see a scowl. To her surprise, she received a very tender kiss.

"Well?" the astrologer asked.

"Compared to the Oracle, not bad, not bad at all."

The entire coven got in on the act; kissing spread like wildfire from pilgrim to pilgrim. Moab finally gave the signal for the amorous caravan to line up at the east gate of the city, where two young girls atop a magnificent tasseled camel led the way out. Signe presented to them a wreath of hibiscus with a personal blessing, then proceeded to do the same for each and every pilgrim passing through the city gate that momentous day.

Andrea and her coven brought up the rear of the procession. Sneezing inside a cloud of dust, the water witch received a lingering hug and a string pouch of herbs from Daria.

"For your hay fever," the regal healer said and kissed Andrea three times--once on the forehead and once on each cheek.

"I will never forget your kindness," Andrea said and impulsively kissed Daria full on the lips.

"Uh-oh, if I didn't know better I'd say my sister is finally coming out of the closet," Ren said into Lineah's ear.

"Yeah, and with the Oracle's honey, no less. How does she rate?"

Helen, who took the wisecrack as an invitation, marched up to Daria. "Would the Oracle be offended if I kissed you?"

"I kiss whom I please," Daria haughtily replied. She cupped Helen's face in her bejeweled hands and tenderly caressed her lips with her own.

"Did I please you?" Helen asked, breathless.

"I will visit your dreams," Daria whispered in her ear. Helen blushed and started to swoon.

Lineah, a tad jealous, lunged forward and steadied her. "What did she say to you?"

Helen was compelled to tell her first fib. "I..I couldn't quite hear."

"Come on, you two, let's get this show on the road," said Shu-Li, re-adjusting her heavy pack.

Lineah received a lingering hug from Daria and a small jade Labrys from Signe, who advised, "Above all else, cherish your vision."

Lineah's compulsion for clarity was short-circuited by Andrea's clarion call: "Your carriage awaits, ladies!"

Moab coaxed a cranky camel to his knobby knees, then motioned impatiently for Lineah and Helen to climb aboard. Not without difficulty, Lineah was the first to situate herself between the two blanketed humps. She helped Helen wedge herself in front. With her arms tight around her dream come true, Lineah shouted with gusto, "Let's rock and roll!"

After Andrea quickly explained to Moab what the modern expression meant, he forcefully ordered the moody ship of the desert to rise to the occasion. The jolt nearly unseated the greenhorns, which greatly amused the mischievous witch, who took the opportunity to deliver her own version of the famous line: "Fasten your seat belts, girls--it's going to be a long and bumpy grind!"

Chapter VII

The Santee pilgrims didn't reach the majestic Sheowa Gorge (so named by Claire) until the middle of Fall. Following the Snake River was a grueling roundabout way to go, but without benefit of a map or familiar landmarks, they had no choice. Nevertheless, in spite of aching limbs and the looming Winter season, the panorama of the great river to the Pacific renewed their determination to reach Cascadia before the first snows.

"Ah!" Loren said, taking in a deep breath. "I can smell the salt air already."

"Dreamer." Claire slipped her arm through Loren's.

"From here, it's a piece of cake," Marty said from inside Robin's embrace. Misha and Grace huffed and puffed the last few steps up to the spectacular viewpoint.

"You two OK?" Loren asked.

"Nothing a good night's sleep in a real bed couldn't cure," Misha replied between gasps.

Grace, unsteady on her feet, hung on her teetering partner and said, "Preferably, in a hospital."

Anya strolled up with a basketful of assorted flora.

"What do you have for us today?" Robin asked the novice herbalist.

"I recognized these from Risa's notebook," Anya answered, rifling through her collection. "This one is supposed to strengthen the immune system," she added, holding up a gnarly sprig with a single orange flower attached.

"What's that thing?" Loren asked.

Anya shrugged her shoulders and fingered the delicate petals. "I don't know the name. The ink in Risa's sketch is smudged, but it's supposed to quicken the blood."

"Well, kiddo, it'll either cure you or kill you," Loren said to Grace, who at that point in the journey was willing to try anything to ease the chronic cough that plagued both her and Misha since their near-death folly on the Snake River.

"What else do you have there?" Misha asked, rifling through the basket. Anya playfully slapped her hand away.

"I have nettle and some wild garlic and something that smells like sage," she replied.

"I say we set up camp down in the gully out of this infernal wind." Misha kissed Grace on her forehead. "You're burning up."

"You always say that. Putting one foot in front of the other is better than sitting around a campfire hoping the snow doesn't fly," Grace argued. Misha's doting bordered on smothering, but her angel was not about to get into a snit over it and waste whatever was left of her precious energy. Grace felt she'd given up any right to complain the day her foolish hunger strike nearly killed the woman who loved her more than life itself.

Step by agonizing step since leaving that putrid cave on the Snake, images of an unspoiled rainforest had kept the frail stoic going; for she truly believed that once she got there, peace of mind would finally be hers.

"OK, let's get cracking," Robin said with a gusto that belied her growing fear that her companeras were on the brink of physical and mental collapse. Even the Russians, whose good cheer and resourcefulness was fading fast, had that same hollowness she saw in her father's eyes the day he came home from the hospital after his second by-pass surgery. On that day, his optimism that could always make her feel safe had deserted; when he died a month later, the natural world, for all it's beauty, seemed desolate.

If Robin dared look in the little mirror Anya had brought with her, she would see that same desolation harshly reflecting back at her. What she found most disconcerting was the dispiriting fatigue so clearly evident in Marty's demeanor. On good days, it spurred the novice shaman ever westward, no matter the pain of hunger, cold, and aching bones. On bad days it made her want to curl up with her beloved and give up the ghost.

Nobody in the blended family of Russians and Americans wanted to come out and say it, but the closer they got to a place they called `home,' the less they actually believed in it. After all, Hecate's Cove was sure to be a dark formidable wilderness, a hunting ground for bear, cougar and wolves, and who knows what other predatory beasts, certainly not the cozy little retreat by the sea the Americans liked to recount in nostalgic stories around the campfire. As for the Russians, who couldn't be farther from their homeland, Hecate's Cove was nothing more than a charming name for the home town of a fallen hero they never met.

"It just occurred to me," Loren said, sipping Anya's elixir du jour at the crackling campfire, "We're no different than soldiers heading home from the front only to find that mom's apple pie ain't what it used to be."

"You can't go home again," Robin sighed.

"That's an understatement," Grace had to agree.

"There'll be no parades for us, that's for sure," Sashi, Anya's lover, bitterly chipped in.

"At least the landscape will be familiar," Grace said.

"Raven's Bluff will surely be there, I would imagine," Marty said. She looked to Loren for confirmation, but got none.

"I'm sure it'll be more spectacular than I remember," Grace assured herself out loud.

"Tell me, angel. Do you picture your dream house?" Misha asked with a shiver.

"As a matter of fact, I do. It'll be round and made of cedar." A vivid memory of that miraculous afternoon with Mariana nearly took her breath away, yet Grace maintained her facade of good cheer. "And it must be built around a natural spa so that exotic plants can grow year round."

"What about fruit trees?" Marty asked.

"Of course--all kinds. Date, mango, peach, you name it, a veritable garden of delights." Grace poured more steaming brew into her battered tin cup.

"I miss our apartment," Robin wistfully said to Marty, who was cuddled up with her inside a tattered blanket.

"That dump?" Marty said and suffered a nudge in the ribs.

"It wasn't a dump. It had those nice leaded windows and a kitchen nook that looked out over..."

"The parking lot," Marty snickered.

"On a clear day you could see the downtown skyline," Robin said.

"And how often was that?" Loren snorted.

"Come to think of it, hardly ever. What about you, Loren? Do you miss your place...what street was that?"

"Sitka Drive."

"Nice view from up there."

"I didn't have a view. Not that it mattered--I was hardly ever there, except to shower and crash."

"Your typical workaholic," teased Claire, who since leaving the Santee rarely joined in campfire banter.

"Truth is, until I met you, my dear, I was warming a bar stool at Cheng's just about every night." Everyone but Claire laughed.

"How about you, Gracie? Where were your digs?" Robin asked.

"Wellington Heights."

"Wow! Talk about the good life."

"I don't recall one good thing about it--except for Zoe."

"Who's that, the maid?" Claire asked with a slight edge in her voice.

"She was my cat. The cook's name was Clara and the house servant was Barnes, who doubled as the chauffeur."

Her unapologetic reply was a real conversation-stopper, which was fine with Grace, who didn't like to think about that drafty old mansion of childhood horrors, much less talk about it.

"Before the revolution, my great grandparents had a lovely estate just outside of St. Petersburg," Anya piped up. "My great grandfather was a commissar in the palace brigade."

"A close friend of Nicki's, I presume," Loren teased.

"Oh, yes. He knew all of the royal family."
\
"You don't say. I bet you heard some great stories when you were growing up," Loren said and tossed another stick of wood on the fire.

"Grandpapa was murdered by the Bolsheviks."

"Sorry," Loren sheepishly recanted.

Misha, keenly aware of low morale, did her best to lighten the mood. "Anya, tell them about your great aunt, the countess," she coaxed between coughs.

Anya suffered an attack of shyness and shook her head.

"I'm sure no one wants to hear my life story."

"Go ahead, Annie," Marty said. "I'm in the mood for some juicy intrigue."

"If you want intrigue, I have some Cossack folktales that'll give you goose bumps," Misha managed in the middle of a coughing fit.

"Cossacks. Weren't they mercenaries?" Claire pointedly asked.

"Not my ancestors," Misha defended, still coughing. Grace patted her lover on the back and offered her some brew. Misha refused it.

"Why in hell would we want to hear about a bunch of war-mongering horsemen?" Claire challenged with surprising venom.

"Take it easy, hon. We're just making conversation," Loren tried on the role of peacemaker.

"It's late. I'm turning in." Claire abruptly withdrew under the rocky overhang, their shelter for the night.

"Something's been eating her ever since we left the lake," Robin muttered. "I'm going to talk to her."

Loren grabbed her by the arm. " It'll only make things worse. Believe me, I know."

"Seems like we're all stressed to the max," Robin said, breaking Loren's grip.

"There are moments on the trail when I feel like I want to lie down and cry my eyes out," Sashi confessed.

"Me too," Anya said, fighting tears.

"Things were tough enough back at the lake, but this nomadic gig is for the birds. Speaking of which, Robin, why can't you switch into your raptor self and fly us two at a time to the promised land?" Loren was only half-joking as she poked at the fire. Orange sparks flew high into the Starry sky.

"If only I could. My flight from Nyasa to Nebraska was my last; and for that I had to promise Ombazi I'd give up shape-shifting for good."

"Who's Ombazi?" Grace asked, snuggling up to Misha.

"Mother Africa."

"Uh-huh." Grace stifled a snicker.

"I met her, but I didn't exactly get to know her, although one time we played charades."

"You're full of it, Walker," Loren said with a nudge to her shoulder.

"It's true. Ombazi's a fabulous artist. Once she sketched my image of Marty onto a cliff wall--perfect likeness, I might add. I was having a devil of a time trying to communicate with the Nasai, who never speak."

"They have no language?" Grace was intrigued.

"Oh, they have a language, all right. I was too dense to get the hang of it. You see, they communicate through a kind of telepathy. And although I never actually observed it, Lineah, who was the liaison between us moderns and the local village, she claimed that the Nasai can imagine what they want and it simply appears. Like if they're walking through the forest and have a craving for a mango, all they'd have to do is picture it in their mind, and voila, it falls at their feet."

"And never on their head, of course," Loren couldn't resist. When the snorting and snickering died down, for the sake of argument, the incurable wise acre asked, "Where's the fun in that? Half of life is going after what you think you want, no?"

"The Nasai have plenty of fun. They were always laughing or humming, even when they worked in the fields."

"So they do have to grow some things," Loren disdainfully quizzed.

"Oh, sure. An assortment of grains and lots and lots of hemp. They make everything from hemp, which they call `The Web of Life.' The only thing they don't do with it is smoke it. They don't need to, they get plenty high on the Natural World, especially the antics of Zebras."

"You must miss Nyasa," Grace said.

"I do, and I'm going back for a visit some day."

"She's taking me next time," Marty chimed in.

"You must have racked up a hell of a lot of frequent flier miles by now," Loren said and earned a round of giggles, especially from Sashi and Luka, the engineers.

"Like I said, my flying days ended when I fished your sorry ass out of the drink," Robin parried.

The ensuing laughter was cut short when Claire's voice echoed from the darkness, "Why did you come back?"

Robin strained to see the Lakota Swede. "I always planned to. I was going to make the trek up the east African coast with Lineah's coven to Anatolia, but then...." Robin lost her train of thought when Claire emerged from the shadows wrapped in her blanket; she sat down between the novice shaman and Loren. "As I was saying, after the Convergence and the Zebras left for the Serengeti, I started having a recurring dream...a nightmare, really. I'd wake up screaming my head off--freaked out the whole coven."

"What was the nightmare about?" Grace asked with keen interest.

"Basically, that all of you were turning on each other. It got so I couldn't think of anything else. Lineah, the chief conjuror for the coven, was so concerned she made a special trip on foot to the mountains, where she met with Ombazi, who actually showed up at my hammock one night and spoke directly to me. She was too beautiful for words; had these multi-colored eyes that hypnotized. I thought I was dreaming again."

"Maybe you were," Grace said.

"No, I wasn't, because at dawn I said good-bye to Lineah and the gang, and just like that, I was soaring high above Mo-Ati on my way to the Atlantic."

"Mo-what?" Misha asked.

"Mo-Ati. The largest mountain in east Africa, Ombazi's home. It means `Mother of All That Is." A group `ah' was met with mournful cries of coyotes. "Hey, just for fun, let's try an experiment," Robin suggested. Despite groans of protest, the novice shaman closed her eyes and began chanting the sacred `Om,' which her companeras found irresistible. They joined hands around the spitting flames and in unison sustained a resonance amplified by the rocky walls of the gully.

When Robin gave the signal to stop, the silence was profound. Even the gurgling of the nearby creek was inaudible. Motion was suspended. Things stayed like that for several moments, until a cacophony of animal calls blared in the distance. When they quieted down, the babble of the creek resumed, as did all the sounds of Nature.

"That was weird," Marty said to her beloved. Everyone else was speechless. Suddenly, Claire broke with the circle and stood, only to collapse in a heap.

"You and your experiments, Walker," Loren grumbled while trying to revive her lover.

"She's just exhausted," Robin assured and felt Claire's cool forehead.

"Is she dreaming?" Grace asked.

"Check her eyelids," Misha said.

In the glow of the fire, Loren was relieved to see rapid eye movements. "Yup, my babe's in dreamland." Everyone gathered around for a look.

"Let the woman dream in peace," Grace admonished. "Misha, let's turn in."

"We should all stay close to Claire right now," Robin insisted in dead earnest.

"Tears," Loren reported and wiped one from Claire's cheek. She took off her ratty old cardigan, rolled it up, and placed it under the sorrowful dreamer's head.

No one said a word after that, nor did they leave the campfire, except to wrap themselves in blankets. Claire dreamt throughout the night, sometimes murmuring. At dawn, she opened her eyes and stretched. Everyone but Loren and Robin was sound asleep.

"Morning, Sunshine," Loren said.

"Hey," Claire sleepily answered.

"How do you feel, Claire?" Robin asked.

Claire sat up. "Why are we out here?"

"You passed out by the fire," Loren replied.

"I did?" Claire yawned.

"You were having a whale of a dream."

"Do you remember any of it?" Robin asked.

Claire yawned again. "I was in Sweden."

Thinking Claire was pulling their leg, Loren snickered.

"So don't believe me," Claire snapped.

"I believe you," Robin said and shot Loren a dirty look. "Do you feel like talking about it?"

"There's not much to tell. Lonely, barren, cold. Icicles gleaming in the northern lights."

"Were you alone?" Loren asked.

"My father was there. He wanted me to stay with him. But I kept asking for mother. He said she was dead. That's all I remember." Without emotion, the dreamer stood, stretched, and went to search for firewood.

Later that day on the grassy banks of the Sheowa, Claire opened up to Loren as never before. As they strolled along together, memories began to flood in about growing up in the Black Hills. The beautiful Lakota Swede talked about her two younger sisters, who were run down by a drunken driver from the reservation, and about her parent's divorce afterwards. She told how her mother was unable to cope and eventually turned to alcohol, and how at the stormy age of twelve, Claire was left to take care of her mother when no one else would. Her father's side of the family had disowned him the moment he married the full-blooded Lakota. It made no difference to them that she was Miss South Dakota at the time, for their hatred of the Indian ran deep.

"Many of my Swedish ancestors were massacred."

"In the Black Hills?"

"At the lake."

Loren stopped in her tracks. "Our lake?!"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"Until last night, I didn't know it myself. That first day at the lake, one of those deja vu feelings grabbed hold of me and it wouldn't let go. Sometimes, it would wake me up."

"That explains your nocturnal wanderings."

"I figure my father's ancestors were probably killed at the time of night, when it's darkest."

"The hour of the wolf," Loren said. Claire nodded. "And to think I assumed you were communing with Nature."

"When my father left, I blamed myself," Claire continued. "I vowed to never burden my mother with my own worries. Those, I kept to myself."

"That sucks," Loren said. Claire searched Loren's bloodshot browns. "What is it?"

"Do you need me, Loren?"

"Of course I do. What a question!"

"Why do you need me...exactly?" Claire seemed desperate.

"Because you are your beautiful self."

"I have an ugly side, you know."

"That's hard to imagine."

"It's there all right."

"You've certainly seen mine plenty of times," Loren said and kicked a stone over the river bank. In addition to being dog tired from no sleep, Loren was uneasy about the tone and direction of their rare heart-to-heart.

"Even when you're being an asshole, your adorable," Claire said with a smirk.

"Is that so?" Loren wrapped her arms around her beloved. "And trying to slit Misha's throat was most endearing, I suppose."

"That wasn't you."

"Some part of me was a willing accomplice."

"What part?" Claire's eyes again searched Loren's for the truth, but found none.

Loren loosened her amorous grip and gazed out across the Sheowa. "Beats me."

"Loren, I love you, but there are times like right now when I don't know who you are. It's like you're..."

"An enigma," Loren said, averting Claire's gaze. It was much safer to focus on the herd of elk happily grazing the opposite bank of the mighty Sheowa.

"It pisses me off when you put words in my mouth. You do that a lot."

Loren turned to her beloved whose eyes were dilating, even in the glare of the Sun. "I'm sorry, babe. You were saying?"

"You don't trust me," Claire cut to the chase.

"That's absurd," Loren scoffed. Her gaze drifted back to the herd of elk.

"Then how come you never want me to make love to you?"

"What?" Loren turned to a face she'd not seen before.

"Don't play dumb. Every time I try, you switch things around; it's like you expect me to be lousy at it," the face angrily accused.

"That's not true!" Loren grasped Claire's shoulders and found them trembling.

"I watched you with Misha the time everybody went hog wild at the hot springs. She was all over you and I heard you moan and groan for more. But when I try to do the same, you shut me down with your stupid jokes." Unrelenting, Claire's demeanor was completely out of character, her blue eyes resembled dancing spheres of obsidian. "At first I told myself it doesn't matter, but it does. It cuts real deep. And I can see by the look on your face right now that you don't give a damn!"

Out of the corner of her eye, Loren saw the clan disappear around the bend. "Of course I give a damn. But, come on babe, this is hardly the time or place for this. We better get a move on, or we'll never catch up."

Loren had walked several paces ahead, when Claire yelled, "Take another step and we're through!"

Loren turned on her heel and had the nerve to laugh, "You can't be serious."

"No wonder you wanted to slit Misha's throat! You were eaten alive with guilt and you still are!"

"I'm afraid your diagnosis is way off on this one, Raintree," Loren smugly countered. Claire marched up nose to nose with the queen of evasion and said with the venom of a diamondback, "There are plenty of women in this little tribe of ours who would jump at a chance with me."

"Why are you doing this?" Loren asked in disbelief. It felt like she'd been kicked squarely in the solar plexus, breathing was painful.

"I just told you why, but as usual you don't listen!" Claire screamed.

Loren found her lover's anger frightening yet decidedly arousing. But at least she had the good sense to take what she truly believed was the high road and once more walked away. Claire lunged, grabbed her by the shoulders, and spun her around like the birthday girl at a pinata party.

"Dammit, Loren! You're going to tell the whole truth, if it's the last thing you do on this Earth!" Loren, certain that her Claire had completely lost her mind, was ready to run for help. "You don't want me! You've never wanted me!" Claire raved on. "You use my body whenever you have the urge, but I'm not good enough to use yours! That's how it is--admit it, admit it, you asshole!"

Loren could do or say nothing; like a crash dummy she absorbed the impact of Claire’s pent-up outrage. Robin came running back down the trail and was shocked by what she saw. Loren had fallen to her knees with her hands over her ears. Claire was screaming a litany of complaints and mostly false accusations at the top of her lungs. Robin, who felt responsible for opening the emotional can of worms, stepped in the middle of the fray.

"What the hell's going on?!"

"Robin, back off! This is between Loren and me!"

Claire’s tone was vicious, but Robin stood her ground. "Now, my friend, it's between you and me. Step back and cool off," she calmly ordered. Claire clenched and unclenched her jaw, then went mute. Robin reached out, but the Lakota Swede recoiled and bolted up the trail, bumping and pushing her way through the aghast faces. When she gave an extra hard shove to Misha, the ailing Amazon fell to the ground.

Grace was incensed; she plowed ahead and growled, "What do you think you're doing?!"

"Leave me alone, or I'll put you out of your everlasting misery," Claire spat and lurched ahead at a wicked pace.

"What a cruel thing to say," Grace retorted and hooked Claire's arm. Claire stopped dead in her tracks; she grabbed Grace roughly by the shoulders.

"Tell me--Gracie," she said with mocking emphasis on the diminutive form of her name. "You're the sex guru of our little tribe. Why is it that someone like Misha can fuck Loren's brains out, but I'm not allowed to?"

If Grace was shocked by the lurid query, she didn't show it. One by one, she peeled Claire's fingers from her shoulders and flatly replied, "Taking pleasure is one thing, surrendering to a loving touch is another." Grace's penetrating gaze didn't flinch. Her pointed answer went straight to the heart of the matter and Claire knew it. She walked to the edge of the river bank and wrapped her arms around herself.

"I can't take this shit anymore!" she sobbed. Her words echoed inside the gorge and scattered the grazing elk. Grace rushed to her, but didn't touch.

"Loren needs you. We all need each other more than ever before," the lion-hearted peacemaker as usual nailed the bottom-line truth. The rest of the clan walked silently past. Loren, in tears, brought up the rear. With a firm nudge from Grace, Claire reluctantly shadowed her anguished lover whose eyes were glued to the ground.

"Don't give up on me," Loren whimpered.

"I won't, if you won't," Claire said and took hold of Loren's hand.

Chapter VIII

Synchronization of bleeding cycles was inevitable. At first, the regular event strengthened the fabric of the group, but the constant pressure to keep moving made it an inconvenient and messy fact of life. Having mediated a number of pre-menstrual emotional storms, Robin, the undisputed shaman of the tiny tribe, was the first to verbalize the connection between the beginning of bleeding and the Full Moon. She, like countless shamans before her, decided it should be celebrated, not dreaded.

Campfire brainstorming produced various ideas for new rituals, but the one that everyone found most intriguing was adding Life's precious liquid to Anya's herbal concoctions. Initially, everyone was squeamish about putting it to the test. Numerous jokes about vampirism and cannibalism notwithstanding, so called `taboos' were dismissed as man's primal fear and envy of the Almighty Womb.

Some of the heartier members of the clan participated in `bleeding circles,' which often took place in the chilly waters of whatever stream was handy. Although this practice slowed down progress, it did reduce the number of embarrassing accidents on the trail. It also proved to be a powerful aphrodisiac, which did wonders for group morale.

"I can't believe we didn't think of this before," Marty said while sitting bottomless in a babbling brook one night under the Full Moon.

"One of the many joys we lost along the way to oblivion," Robin said with chattering teeth.

"I read somewhere that spontaneous pregnancy can be caused by extreme cold," Sashi said.

"Maybe you should test that old wive's tale," Anya teased, tweaking Sashi's icy thigh.

"I'd love to," Sashi, whose family tree happened to be exceptionally fruitful, was quick to volunteer.

"There's got to be easier and more enjoyable ways to get pregnant," Marty said with an alluring smile at Robin.

"Who knows? Maybe we'll all be knocked up by the time we reach the Pacific," Loren said while sipping menstrual tea at the stream bank.

"Keep drinking that stuff and you'll be nursing twins by Summer Solstice," Robin sparked a round of laughter.

"Maybe you should cut back." Claire, never more amorous, stroked Loren's left breast. "I say we turn in. Maybe with an early start, we'll get some sleep for a change," the Lakota Swede said and eased her lover into the shadows.

Two menstrual cycles later, the clan of born-again pagans made it as far as the foothills of the Cascades (a name Claire deemed good enough to keep). The towering cliffs of the Sheowa Gorge forced them south along one of its many tributaries. According to Marty's hazy recollections of cross-country ski trips, they were within a couple days hike of a relatively low-elevation pass. But, as fate would have it, a monster blizzard kept them from reaching the summit. Unable to find natural shelter, they were in real danger of hypothermia.

Fighting fatigue, everyone pitched in and threw together a crude lean-to of forest debris against a massive lava boulder. But the ever-changing wind kept blowing out the fire. They took turns tending it throughout the miserable nights; sleep was fitful at best. All in all, it was the toughest three days and nights of their post-modern lives.

Food, which had until then consisted of fresh fish and plentiful roots and bulbs, was limited to whatever they could dig from the forest floor, including grubs. As much as they hated to, they unanimously declared all mammals fair game for Misha's skill with a spear she'd fashioned from a pine sapling and a wedge of obsidian she'd collected along the Snake River.

Luck finally turned, when, in tracking a reckless rabbit, the reluctant hunter stumbled upon a pack of wolves gorging themselves on a fresh kill. Having never seen a human before, they scattered, leaving the steaming remains of a six-point elk bleeding in the snow. As was probably the case for the earliest homo sapiens, the Santee clan sank to scavenging. Everyone, including the hardcore vegetarians, gorged themselves on under-cooked red meat. And despite severe indigestion, they too thanked Mo-Ati for their gain and the wolve's timely loss.

After the blizzard finally let up, Misha skinned the rotting carcass and dried the hide as best she could during the fleeting periods of Sun. The overwhelming stench caused some skirmishes as did fears created by wearing the skin of an animal, one of Buffalo Woman's taboos. But, Loren in her inimical style, short-circuited campfire diatribes with the undeniable truth of the matter: `we ain't in Nebraska anymore.'

A string of unseasonably warm days melted most of the snow and created the illusion of Spring. Heartened, the clan unanimously decided to forge westward. With a little luck, they figured they could reach the temperate valleys before the Solstice, and from there it would be an easy most