Jo Clayton - A Gathering Of Stones

She was suddenly on Owl’s back, spiraling up and up until she was high above the meadow. She looked down and saw her body sprawled across the dreampattern blanket, the laprobe bunched beside her hip. She was at once frightened and exhilarated. Owl circled higher yet until she saw points of light sprayed out beneath his belly; stars, she thought, we fly above the stars.

Owl tilted suddenly. She slid off his back. She fell. Down and down and down she fell. She was terrified. She was screaming. Her throat was raw from screaming.

Then she was inside her body looking up into the face of Geidranay, a Geidranay made small, his golden flesh like sunlight given form.

The Groomer of Mountains touched her pullover and it fell open, baring her breasts. He plunged his left hand into the earth and brought it up again; he held an amethyst, a single crystal glowing violet and blue. He set it on her chest above her heart and watched it slip inside her, melting through her flesh. He thrust his right hand into the earth and brought it up again; this time he held a moonstone the size of her fist. He touched the closure of her trousers and they fell open, baring her navel. He set the moonstone on her navel and watched it slip inside her. He touched her forehead. His fingers were cool as the stones. He said nothing, but she knew she must not move. He took up the tin cup she used for drinking and drew a golden forefinger about its rim and it turned transparent, gleaming in the starlight like polished crystal. He reached into the air, closed his hand into a fist; when he opened his fingers, diamonds cascaded into the cup. He knelt, dipped the cup into the stream and brought it back to her, the diamonds like ice floating in the water. He cupped his hand behind her head and lifted her gently, tenderly; he put the cup to her lips and she drank. The water was delicately sweet and smelled of spring orchids. The diamonds melted into the water. She drank them also.

When she looked up, Geidranay was gone. The cup was tin again, ancient, battered, as familiar as her:hand.

Feathers brushed across her and her clothing vanished utterly, the laprobe was gone, the dreampattern blanket was gone. She lay on earth and grass. Great wings brushed across her and were gone. Owl walked toward her. It was the Old Man. He stood at her feet and looked down at her. She was ashamed at first because she was naked before him, but she was not afraid. He sank into the earth, slowly slowly. She wanted to laugh when she saw his round stupid face resting on her great toes, then the face slid down and vanished into the earth.

He was reborn from the earth, rising from it as slowly, silently, easily as he went into it. He was covered with red dust, otherwise he was naked and young and beautiful. He put his left foot on her right foot; gently, delicately he moved her leg aside. He put his right foot on her left foot; gently, delicately he moved this leg aside. He knelt between her legs and put his hands on her thighs. She shivered as she felt fire slide into her flesh. He looked at her, smiled. She cried -out with pleasure, as if that smile were hands touching her. He bent over her, his hands moving along her body; they left streams of red dust on her skin.

His hands moved over her, stroking, rubbing, even pinching where the small sharp pains intensified her pleasure. When he finally pushed into her, the pain was briefly terrible, he burned her, wrenched her open, then she was on fire with a pleasure almost too intense to endure. It went on and on until she was exhausted, too weary to feel anything more.

He rose from her. She cried out, desolate. He stood beside her, his broad tender smile warmed her once more. As Geidranay had reached into the air for diamonds, the Old Man Reborn Young reached up and plucked a square of fine linen from the shadowy air. He came back to her and pressed the cloth between her legs, catching the blood that came from the breaking of her .hymen. He sat on his heels and folded the cloth into a small packet, the bloodstains hidden inside. He leaned over her, touched her left hand, laid the packet on her palm. Again he said nothing, but she knew it was very very important that she keep the cloth safe and hidden, that she should never speak of it, not to Shahntien Shere or to Maksim, not even to her brother.

He set his right hand flat on the ground beside her thigh. The dreampattern blanket was under her again. He stepped over her leg and squatted beside her, drew the fingers of his left hand from. her ankles to her waist, drew the fingers of his right hand from her waist to her shoulders and she was dressed again. He snapped the fingers of his left hand, spread his hands; the laprobe hung between them. He laid it over her and smiled a last time, touched her cheek in a tender valediction. And was gone.

She slept. When she woke it was midmorning. The first day and the first night was done.

At fast she thought the events of the night were a dream, but when she moved her legs, she found she was still sore. The linen packet fell away when she sat up; she looked at the bloodstains for a long moment, then folded it up again and put it in her rucksack. Feeling more than a little lightheaded, she took the tin cup to the stream and filled it. She drank. The liquid was merely cold water with the acrid green taste common to most mountain streams. She remembered water flavored and scented with diamonds, but that might have been something she did dream. She sipped at the water and thought about sleeping. She wasn’t supposed to sleep, she was supposed to keep vigil. She didn’t feel like worrying about her lapse. After filling the cup once more, she carried it up the gentle slope to her blanket and set it on the grass by her foot. She looked around.

The meadow space, was filled with stippled sun rays, the misty light slanting through the dark needle-bunches on the upslope pines and cedars; there was no wind, the quiet was so thick she could feel it like the laprobe pulled heavy and close against her skin. Her mind was weary; it was hard to tie one word to another and make a phrase of them. She walked about a little, her legs shaky. Her inner thighs felt sticky, the cloth of her trousers clung briefly, broke away, clung again. She grimaced, disgust a mustiness in her mouth. She stripped, dropped her clothing on the blanket and took a twist of grass to the stream. She waded in. The water was knee-high, the cold was shocking. She shivered a moment, then gathered the will and went to her knees. She gasped, then examined her thighs. She’d bled copiously which surprised her, but she didn’t waste time worrying about that either. She splashed water over the stains, began scrubbing at them with the grass. Each move bounced her a little on the gravel lining the streambed, she felt the bumps against her knees and shins, the rubbing, but the cold was so numbing she felt no pain until she climbed out of the water, put her clothes back on and warmed up a little.

She grunted as she tried to fold her legs; the bruises and abrasions she’d acquired in the stream made themsclves apparent, so she crossed her ankles and straightened her back and began feeling her way into further meditation.

Flies came from everywhere and swarmed around her; they settled on her and walked on her hands and on her arms and on her legs, everywhere but her face; they were a mobile armor of jet and mica flakes, buzzing through a slow surging dance up and around and down, black twig feet stomping over every inch of her. She sat and let this happen. When the sun was directly overhead, the armor unwove itself and flew away.

She sat. Something was happening inside her. She didn’t understand anything, but she had fears she didn’t want to think about.

A one-legged woman stood under the trees across the stream. Vines grew out of her shoulders and fell around her. There was emptiness on her left side; the vines swayed parted, unveiling nothing; the vines on her right side grew round and round her single leg. She hopped. Stood still. Hopped again. The vines bounced. Arms outspread, she began jumping up and down on the same spot, turning faster and faster as she hopped. Korimenei heard a whining sound like all the flies singing in unison. The woman went misty and the mist went spinning away into the dim green twilight under the trees.