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“Come,” she whispered. “My visions are ended.” Her voice was a croak, weakened by age, by the years of calling her people together, and by the smoke and fire that was the center of their tribe.
Wood smoke and fire meant life, and it was ever and always with them: the smoke of cooking fires, the smoke of preserving meat, the fire that warmed their circles, trapped in the thatch, the smoke of cleansing and purification, and the smoke of thegatheringsas the flames leaped high.
And after the ceremonial burning, the wood ash would be carefully collected, mixed with fat and pigments and stored in folded bits of hide until needed. For ceremony, the images of hunting and the images of the womb would be painted upon their bodies. The ash of wood from fallen limbs would cover them. Everything in all their long tribal lives had been twined with the trees and the wood and the fire, smoke, and ash of their burning.
After so many years, the smoke had darkened her brown skin. And after these last visions, the dreams of the Vision Moon—the terrible images of loss—she was hoarse, her voice rough, dry, and weak. Her body feeble. The leaves of her head dry and crackled and brown. The vision—theseeings—had lasted long, and she had cried out her body’s moisture.
Vision Moon had been hard this winter season, but it was the prophecy that had broken Old Mother of Winter Trees. Had broken her voice as she screamed and grieved.
She had hoped to survive until the First Gather of the new year, the solstice and that first mating moon, when her great-great-great granddaughter would be born, when her favorite great-great-granddaughter would choose her first man from among the clanless hunters. She had hoped to pass her staff to the woman of its choosing at Spring’s First Gather festival. Old Mother of Winter Trees had hoped so many things. Desperately, fervently hoped for another cycle, another gather.
Most importantly, she had hoped to deliver a different vision of the coming years from the one she had been given. But it was not to be.
She tried again to call, but instead, coughed, the sound a wet rumble in her chest. A horrible tearing pain. She rolled to her side and hacked deeply, a racking spasm. She spat out the contents blocking her lungs and there was blood in the gobbet. The visions were true.Sun and Moon, she thought,the visions are true. The coughing fit left her exhausted. She lay in her bear furs, trembling, but breathing easier, regaining her strength. Outside, winter sleet whispered on the thatch above her. It shushed and sang against the stone walls of the Womb Circle where she lay. The cold had come early and brought with it much ice, just as her summer visions had foretold.
When a measure of strength had returned, Old Mother slid her long bony fingers from the warm furs and found the small stone. It was her singing stone, and was perfectly fitted to her hand. With it, she tapped three times on the Calling Stone of the Winter Solstice. It was located on the Womb Circle’s back wall. The clear tones each tap made upon contact would call her women to her.
Moments later, a thread of cold air swirled through the smoke as the outer-hide-cover slid aside, allowing two women to crawl into the curving Womb Passage and across the ancient staffs embedded in the clay floor. The Womb Passage was the symbol of mating and birthing and death. Each time they crawled through the curving narrow passage, their fingers and knees on the wood staffs of the previous Old Mothers, it was a reminder of their ways. It was a reminder of who they were and what they were.
The outer hide closed against the winter air. Then the inner-hide-cover opened, and the air shivered with cold, the low flames of the Womb Circle dancing with the delight of mating and joy, of life and death, of the hunt and feasting, of the turning of the seasons. Except now, with the visions overlaying their future, all Old Mother could see was death and destruction.
With the proper ceremony of the Vision Moon, her great-granddaughter, Summer Blossoms, said, “Old Mother of Winter Trees, we attend you. Old Mother and Staff Bearer of the Women of the Womb, we attend you. Old Mother of All the Tribes, we attend you. Speak and we will listen.”
Her words carrying the weight of decades and many Vision Moons, Old Mother gave the ceremonial reply, “My visions are ended. You may feed the Womb fire and give me to drink.”
Summer Blossoms and Rippling Stream set aside their burdens, difficult to carry through the entrance, on hands and knees. Silently, they added dry twigs, broken limbs, and dried herbs to the fire, where it crackled and its fragrant smoke rose. Old Mother of all the tribes coughed and hacked, her body as desiccated from the days of fasting as the herbs that blazed high. She accepted the water offered by the two who served her, though she dribbled most of it onto the ground, as she was too weak to raise her head.
When they sat back on their heels, Old Mother continued with the formal words of the visions. “The Vision Moon has spoken its wisdom to me. My vision is true.”
“Yes, Old Mother of Winter Trees,” the two women said softly, together.
“You will call all the Women of the Womb in all the tribes to meet here before the next full moon. They must hear the visions. They must know the future.”
The eyes of the two went wide and shocked. The leaves that grew from their scalps rustled; the vines that twined from their fingertips quivered. A winter calling had never been done, at least not in their lifetimes.
Only once, in her own.
She said, “You will send word for all the Old Mothers of all the tribes, all who lift toddlers, all with babes at the breast,all who are with child, all young who are newly bled, yes all the Women of the Womb. And you will call all the women who war and hunt, who trade and weave, who make baskets and who fish among the men. All the women of every tribe will come here, now.” She raised her head and met the eyes of the two women. “It is time. My staff must be passed. A new Staff Bearer of the Women must be chosen by the next full moon. I will not last until the Spring Gathering. The Earth and my tree call for my bones.”
“Surely you will not go to your tree before the First Gather,” Rippling Stream whispered in horror. “I will place offerings of honey in the roots of your tree. It will be satisfied and not call for you.”
Old Mother laughed. It was a harsh sound, composed of fear and grief more so than amusement. “Call the women. Call all of them. The Vision Moon has spoken.”
Summer Blossoms, who had always been wise and full of understanding, knelt beside her, touched her face and hissed softly. She lifted Old Mother upright and Rippling Stream handed her a wood cup carried among their burdens. Summer Blossoms held the cup to her lips. “Warm willow bark tea,” she said, “with honey. This will help with fever and give you healing.”
“I will need bone broth as well,” Old Mother said when the cup was empty. “My vision has driven strength from me.”
“We will bring it,” Rippling Stream said. “We have frozen bones stacked and waiting for need.”
“What can be so terrible that it drives strength from the bones of the Old Mother of all the tribes of women?” Summer Blossoms asked her, easing her back to her furs.
“The killers of trees are coming.”
Both women sucked breaths of distress. Their leaves rustled and twined and grew as if it was summer. The flowers that gave Summer Blossoms her name budded upon her scalp.
“How would anything live without the trees?” Rippling Stream asked.
