[2003] LOSS & PORPHYRY the novels  

9080 - LOSS Chapter 3 - EQUINOX

The next few weeks went by uneventfully. Calmed by routine of normal life, I began to put behind me the disturbing stories that had been told, in such a matter of fact way, by the new arrivals; and, of course, the rest of the community, save Isac, had never been exposed to them.

In this time, Isac himself laboured on, to improve his casting technique; and, as the equinox approached, he and the smiths were coming close to perfecting the process. They were now regularly able to cast excellent bronzes, at least as good as the original specimen he had brought back with him. With gradually increasing yields, the smithy started to build stocks of these. They would be a very worthwhile addition to the community's offerings, when the large caravans took to the roads again in the late spring.

It was at the meeting of the council that I, almost accidentally, made my own contribution to this programme. Isac was proposing that more than half the total output of the smithy, over the whole winter, should be devoted to producing a stockpile of these new brooches. Some might have seen this as a very speculative venture, for there was no similar product as yet traded. But all the council recognised the inherently very high quality of this new product; and, accordingly, its likely potential. Our existing crudely cast pins had already found a ready market, even where other villages made similar products; and that indicated that this new development could well be even more successful. So it was unanimously agreed that the investment in the stockpile should be made.

It was while Isac was presenting this proposal that he circulated some of the latest castings, to demonstrate the very high quality now being achieved. As I turned one of these over in my hand, I was immediately struck by how its random 'weave' had, albeit  accidentally, become a close likeness to one of the wood-carvings by the head of my own bed: "Would it be possible to shape the wax to look like a wood carving?" was thus my own first, very indirect, contribution to the new business venture - one which would ultimately prove fateful.

Isac immediately understood the thrust of the question. But, regretfully, he was forced to reply that it had proved very difficult to shape the delicate filaments: "It has taken us nearly three months just to get the textured effect you have before you."

But, with the idea starting to take root in my mind, I could not so easily abandon it. Thus, as the rest of the meeting flowed around me, I found myself pursuing that challenge almost subconsciously; until, totally out of context, I suddenly returned to the theme: "Of course I recognise the difficulties of weaving the wax fibres. But why can't we use another approach? A bronze that matched our best wood carvings would be doubly valuable."

There was grudging support for this idea; though it was clear that few of those present could see where it might lead. But, undeterred, I went on to suggest some further experiments: "Could we not carve a subject directly out of a solid block of beeswax, so that it is still a carving, but made so thin and delicate that it might look as if it was woven? Do our children not sometimes practice their carving skills on beeswax precisely because it is easier to handle than even wood?"

Isac was the first to agree that this was an idea well worth exploring: "It is strange how the simplest solutions to problems are those most easily overlooked. We have spent many weeks trying to develop a very sophisticated solution, based on weaving; simply because that was what I saw working. Yet the simplicity of carving direct was all around us. I think it may well work; and work well."

In less than a week Isac and the smiths were able to produce as good as perfect 'carved' bronzes. As was so often the case, however, the weeks of work spent exploring the more difficult, 'weaving', process were not wholly wasted; for the skills, that had been developed in order to reproduce the very fine strands, could be just as easily applied to the carvings. The resulting castings were exquisite, beyond even that our wood carvings, showing a degree of fine detail that we would previously never have thought possible, had we not been forced to achieve it for the weaving process.

Thus we came to merge the skills of our carvers, who were already renowned for their work in wood, with those of the smiths, who dominated the production of castings in their valley; all in the context of the exciting new technology. The result was both artistic and commercial; a very valuable commodity indeed.

                                                ****

The harvests had been successfully gathered in. As had been promised by the spirit, they exceeded those of any previous year. Even now the gatherers were busy digging new grain pits to take the surplus; and, in the huts around, could be heard the rhythmic sound of pounding as the winter task of threshing the ears of corn, from the overflowing heaps as yet stored in the barns, got under way once more.

The bean crops, likewise, had been excellent, and were now lying preserved; dried by the sun, or layered in salt. They would plentifully sustain the community over the coming winter months, as would the stores of nut and fruit.

Thus were we, in our usual calm and well-ordered way, prepared for the winter to come.

Although as part of the coven she attended the classes I gave daily for all my young pupils, I made sure that Trina also benefited from additional, private, sessions of tuition which I ran for her. The justification I made to myself, for this indulgence, was that it was needed to bring her education up to the same level as the others. But in truth this was no longer the case, for she had already caught up and raced ahead of her contemporaries; though they were not yet aware of her abilities, and I myself was only slowly becoming fully aware of them. Her troubled past had taught her to hide her talents very deep, away from the prying eyes of those around her. As a slave it had been decidedly unwise to be anything other than very ordinary; and that was a lesson she had learnt well, merging quietly into the background.

But, as her earlier tutors had observed, she was a joy to teach. Belying her tender years, she immediately absorbed, and understood, everything I laid in front of her. More, she discussed it using perspectives I had never before considered; so that I learnt as much as she did. In this way I came to particularly look forward to that time each day when I would be closeted alone with her. I found the intellectual stimulation of her company on these occasions almost intoxicating, and it was obvious that she felt much the same about my teaching.

                                                                        ****

With the approach of Autumn, as the ox-teams began to plough the high fields, I found myself in the midden with Jon, helping to load the rich manure onto wagons. Unlike Trina, Jon had not seen the need for any special training in our customs, and so over the previous weeks I had only occasionally talked with him; and even then without learning a great deal about the youth's background. Now I took the opportunity to try and clarify my own thoughts about the peculiar forms of organisation, of that strange tribal life, which both Jon and Trina had described: "I now understand how your king ruled, but I still don't see why?"

By then we had discussed religion on a number of occasions, and Jon had learned that I would no longer be easily put aside in the same way that I had been distracted by the earlier claims that it was simply pre-ordained by the sun god, so he was forced to offer a reply: "The first point to be made is that it is the existing system. It has existed for many generations and our people know no other. As such it is the natural system; or at least, as you would claim, my people perceive it as the natural system. In that respect it is to them much as your own council led system is to your people. When I first arrived I was astonished by your own lack of organisation. Everything seemed strange and chaotic; indeed anarchic. I could not see how anything would be done. I now realise that it has existed so long that everyone knows his role in all things. But then, when I was first exposed to it, I expected it to lapse into total uncontrolled chaos within weeks. I was very nervous that the whole fabric of your society would be torn apart. Yet I now recognise that the tradition of many generations can contain even this tendency to self destruction. On the other hand, I still believe that it is inherently unstable, and exists because it has never been put to the test; but exist it does. So, also, does the monarchy as the natural form of rule in my own society."

"But what, apart from the continuum of history, does it offer as a positive advantage?" Despite my own community's reliance on the sagas, I had long held the view that to justify anything solely by a call to the past, to the great virtues of tradition, was an evasion; an unhelpful and weak avoidance of considering what might be different in the future - and the future would come whatever the past. From my personal experience I knew that the spirit was as firmly entrenched in that future, drawing its strength as much from the societies of that future, as it did from the past.

"Well, there is the purely negative aspect of what would happen if we did remove our king. How would our society be run? Who would tell us what to do? We do not have the tradition, built of many generations, where everyone knows their own role. Instead, our instructions are passed down from the king, and if such instructions were to cease then chaos would result. Nobody would know who was responsible for anything. It would be real anarchy, and our society would collapse; as I feared yours would, and as it may yet do. There would be nobody to give the orders for the planting of the crops, and starvation would surely ensue. Our slaves and serfs are not trained to take such decisions; and show no signs of being capable of taking them. All that they would do would be to fight each other for what little was left; until that too was gone, and all starved alike."

I privately thought of the slave Trina's rare talents. But I respected her right to privacy, her fear of discovery, and did not comment. Thus, I allowed Jon to continue unchecked.

"In any case, before all this could happen our enemies would sense our weakness and invade. We would become vassals of these foreigners. Without our rulers, without its officers, how would the army resist?"

I found this a particularly bleak answer; but it contained more than a grain of truth. In a land of madmen the sane man was clearly at some disadvantage. If, by means of what pure reason, he restored his near companions to a degree of sanity they were still all at risk from the wider insanity; from the lunatics that still surrounded them. Only if all the lunatics could be persuaded to abandon their lunacy could sanity be safely restored; and the pleasures of my own innocent society regained. But how could you reason, when the seductive logic that Jon was relating suggested that to even seek for sanity, in such a generally insane society, generated its own perverse madness. For the time being at least I chose to concede the point to Jon, but could not resist adding the rider: "Is it not worth the attempt; to see if sanity is not really stronger?"

As I had half expected, this riled Jon; for the youth still had not abandoned his loyalties to his former way of life. He burst out with: "But what makes you so sure that you have the sole right to choose what is sanity! Your way has its own significant problems. On the surface it may look idyllic. Everybody is very happy; arguably they are happier than in my own society. Certainly the lower orders are considerably richer than those of my villages. But what of your future? Where will you go from here! In this village you have perhaps forty families; a total of less than a hundred men, women and children. Yet your system is, by your own admission, already starting to creak at the seams. You are even now considering, in council, when you will split into two communities; Is that not the case? When will half your people have to leave to make a new village - as bees leave for a new hive?"

I was forced to recognise that what he said was true. Every generation or so we outgrew our village and half the community were forced to leave, to set up a new village. It had last happened some twenty years before. We still maintained links with that village. Its new council had chosen to move some distance away, to the relatively unpopulated northern borders of Wales, and set up as a combined farming and industrial village; at a location where one of Isac's predecessors had identified both fertile farming land and a river which hid rich deposits of alluvial gold. With this knowledge, my reply was, therefore, untroubled: "Yes, that is the case. It is a quite natural part of development. The new village will be well resourced, and will succeed; we will ensure that it does." Indeed, that recent new village had rapidly become one of the richest in that part of Wales; and was now the source of much of our own trade from that area.

With a gleam in his eye, Jon pounced on the answer: "But why is it necessary? Why can they not stay here? There would be food and resources in plenty, so why must they move?" Before I could reply the young man made it clear that these were purely rhetorical questions, and that he knew the answer as well as I did: "Is not the answer that you society cannot cope with more than forty or so families? Does it not break down beyond that level?"

Again, despite the warning gleam in the youth's eye, I found this an easy question to answer: "That is true. The personal relationships become too complex beyond that point. From experience we know that the council will tend to become bogged down in arguments. There will just be too many people to easily agree with each other. That is why we choose to split into smaller groups. But those smaller groups continue to work as well as ever. So there is no problem; no price to pay. It is a good solution. It works, it works naturally, and it works well."

Too late I realised, as Jon began his answer, that I had fallen into a trap set for me: "That is the nub of the problem. Up to forty families your society may work well. Within that limit you can all live well. What is more, you can easily do everything you want with much less than these forty families. You can grow your crops, make your pottery, even cast your bronzes. As far as I have observed you have no single activity which demands that more than five families at a time be involved. So this limit on the upper size of your community as yet imposes no costs. But, just suppose, you came across such an activity; one that does need more than forty families. How would you, how could you, cope with it?"

Jon paused. I knew. By then, that he was not awaiting an answer, but once more was using the pause for theatrical effect: "For example, in my kingdom we were planning to build a hill as high as a hundred people; to attract the power of the sun god down, so that we might use it to defeat our enemies. That would be an enormous task, which would require many thousands of people to complete; and was one reason why we were gradually conquering other tribes, other kingdoms. With just forty families you couldn't even make a start on that. More mundanely, how will you raise an army of a thousand to protect yourself from the army of a thousand that will surely come to attack you at some time in the future. Indeed, with a physical limit of less than a hundred you must fall prey to even the smallest marauding band that would precede such an army!"

"I take your point about marauding bands, but we must hope that they regain their sanity before the disease reaches this far. As for the man-made mountain, it must be the most blatant symptom of a sick society. We would have no need of this obscenity. The spirit does not demand such things." I thought it best that my response should sound confident, even if I was beginning to feel rather nervous about the true strength of his arguments.

"But what of progress. You, and the council, are always talking of progress. You make great virtue of it. Look at the most recent example; of the bronze castings. Isac, with your blessing, actively looks for things to improve your way of life. He is constantly seeking such new ideas; and you are all thirsting after them. But, again, what if such progress were to demand the efforts of more than forty families. Take an example of the bronze castings. It takes at least four men working together to produce castings the size of a brooch. What if you wanted castings the size of a tree branch, or even a whole tree? I admit that I cannot think what such an enormous casting might be required for; though it is perhaps no more fanciful than our own hill. But if it were required it must demand the efforts of hundreds of men just to lift the pot of molten bronze. So you don't want to cast bronze trees, but who knows what you might want to do at some time in the future. I suspect that you are locked into a present that will someday, someday not too far distant, become too small to contain future progress; and I know you will not be able to resist the might of kingdoms such as my own."

He was beginning to warm to his theme, as much as I was beginning to wilt under the inexorable onslaught of his logic. Both of us had by now stopped shovelling manure onto the cart. The discussion at hand was far more important than the needs of the land. Jon rested on his fork to concentrate on the point in hand: "But it is a more fundamental question than that. It is about how you organise what you do. At present you organise by what I can only describe as spontaneous action. Even the smiths do their combined work almost instinctively. There are no obvious commands issued. That is fine where you have tasks that are the responsibility of one individual; or even when two or three work together in a routine that they know well. But, once more, what happens if you need more than two or three to be involved; or if it is a totally new, and strange, task. What happens if you need ten or twenty to take part. Then someone must take charge. Someone becomes a leader. If it happens regularly, that person becomes a permanent leader; an officer, and ultimately a king. In a situation where you have an army that is no mere academic theory. If that officer is not able to marshal his warriors, for example to present a straight line of shields against an enemy charge, then all is lost. But in our system of rule, as opposed to your anarchy, my father the king could issue a command to each of ten officers, who could each transmit it with the full force of the king's command to ten junior officers, who could likewise each issue it to their ten warriors. In this way it would only take a matter of a few moments before a thousand warriors had received their instruction; even on the most chaotic field of battle. Each would know exactly what to do. Such a hierarchy, with the discipline it imposes, is a very efficient means of directing activity."

He rested; content with his argument. I found, once more to my dismay, that I really had no answer. What was worse, Jon knew it had been an intellectual triumph for him. He had carefully rehearsed his thoughts, knowing that sooner or later he would have to face these questions. His argument was, at least as far as I could see, unchallangeable. It had exposed a weakness of the society that I now realised I had never even considered; and my thoughts were again in a turmoil; You can be so close to an object that you cannot see it; and finally only are able to find it by tripping over it. In this manner, I realised, I had long been blind to a major limitation on the future of our society. There was no disguising that Jon had made a valid, potentially damaging, point. Just how damaging it might be, and what might be done to rectify the problem, I did not know. It would take a considerable amount of deep thought; a very considerable amount, and I sensed that the question had no easy short term answer.

We returned to our shovelling, filling the cart with its powerfully odorous load, in silence; but I could discern triumph in Jon's silence. Once more, I myself was having some difficulty in keeping an unwelcome element of despair out of my own thoughts.

                                                                        ****

It was the autumn equinox; the next of the four great feast days. Unlike the other feasts, however, the ceremony took place in the evening; at sunset. Once more, however, I made my customary rounds of the village activities. On the other hand, my time with Doal, at the river, was kept short. This time I simply did not want to spend time in deep thought. Over the past days I had already spent too much time in fruitless contemplation; trying to solve the problem Jon had set me, but with, at least as yet, no success. This was not necessarily of great consequence for the village as a whole. My thinking had at least allowed me to come to one positive conclusion; that it would surely be a very long time before the progress of the village was held back by the limitation that Jon had found. Long before then a solution would have been found; by a shaman wiser than me. But, even so, it was an intellectual problem that I found I couldn't dismiss. It would not go away. It constantly nagged at me to find a solution; and I would not be happy until I found it.

After what must have seemed to Doal to have been an almost perfunctory visit, I made my way up the hill to what remained of the oak forest. Today it was a veritable hive of activity. Wilm and Benj were in their element. They were darting to and fro, directing groups of villagers in various tasks. Some of these were chopping at the base of the smaller trees. Some were pulling on ropes attached to larger trees that were just about to be felled. All this bustling activity was designed to clear the ground between the very large trees which Wilm had already marked, as the ones that would eventually be hauled into the fenced off part of the timber-yard; for seasoning. Many of the, smaller, trees being hauled away on the ox carts would also end up in the yard; for use as building or fencing material. But it was the large ones that we really coveted; since they, seasoned over a number of years, would form the raw material for our carvers and craftsmen.

As the trees were felled, groups of villagers swarmed over them, hacking off the branches; so that it was just the bare trunk that remained to be taken away. The larger of the branches were tossed into waiting wagons, to be added to the wood-pile; there should be enough to fuel the community's fires, and charcoal clamps, for three years or more. That would be a boon, since it would mean that they would all be relieved of the tedious chore of gathering firewood.

Today many of the smaller branches, unusable for anything else, were also being piled into carts, to be carried up to the bonfire site alongside the sacred circle. Tonight's beacon would be the biggest in many a year. Despite my recent misgivings, it was surely a good omen.

I wended my way through the scuttling villagers; pausing only to watch my coven noisily helping load the small branches onto the wagons. As I reached Wilm I warmly congratulated the forester; "It looks as if everything is going very well indeed."

"Couldn't be better" was the latter's pleased reply "I reckon we will clear nearly two thirds in time for the spring sowing; and the large trees that we have brought down so far are in superb condition." For once, he and Benj were the centre of attention. Normally they led a rather solitary life. Now they were exposed to a riot of activity; and they were loving every hectic minute of it.

In the distance I could see Jon leading the youths, as they felled some of the smaller trees. The pace of their attack on the trees seemed to indicate that some form of competition was in progress; and their excited cheers and laughter, that regularly carried to me, indicated just how much they were enjoying it. But then, I happily noted to myself, such community activities always were a source of enjoyment, and entertainment, for everyone.

I was, indeed, reassured that in some ways this partly organised, and partly magnificently disorganised, scene of human activity was a rebuff to Jon's challenge. There must have been something like fifty people all working happily together. Yet there were no 'officers', and the work was still done well. Thus was he finally reassured that the practice, if not the theory, was viable.

                                                                        ****

The equinox ceremony was treated by all alike as a celebration of the harvest gathered in. Once more the village processed as a body up the trail to the sacred circle. But this time no solemn silence was observed. Instead all was a hubbub of noise. In the approaching dusk, with the red flares of sunset starting to advance overhead, it was a happy and very noisy throng; that sang and danced its way up the hill. The villagers were led by the orchestra, supplemented for this occasion by many of the youths who merrily banged on their own drums; even while dancing and singing. So, to the overwhelming beat of dozens of drums, a constantly shifting kaleidoscope of colour danced its way up to the sacred circle.

By tradition I, as shaman, was at the centre of this carnival, happy to be no more or less than any other dancer, threading my way in and out of the members of the coven. It was an exhilarating experience; even though I had yet to take the sacred mushroom. At this ceremony I was only given this when the throng finally reached the sacred circle. Even so, around me I distinctly felt the spirit growing, fired just by the shared joy of the people; and I began to sense the real power that the full, thirteen strong, coven now could offer.

Arrived at the circle, we formed themselves into the familiar concentric patterns. We were the same for all the festivals, but the difference here was that the participants were now whirling around their respective circles in a riotous pattern of movement; still to the insistent beat of the drums. Only in the centre was there any semblance of calm, as I finally took the sacred mushroom; this time, for this somewhat lesser ceremony, only a slice not the whole fruit.

As the beat of the drums around me steadily increased, in both speed and volume, I felt the mushroom produce its usual hypnotic effect. As my expanding consciousness reached the circle of the coven that directly surrounded me, I experienced a totally new sensation. For the first time I felt a surge of real power. Where previously I had floated almost gently upwards now I surged forcefully forward. At long last I had tapped the power of a the complete coven; of the full thirteen virgins. It was like the effect of a draught of ice cold ale on a thirsty traveller. Its icy fire seemed to bite though to every extremity of my body. I felt as if I could almost reach out and tear the dying sun from the sky.

The feeling intensified, and I felt a clarity of thought I had never before experienced. I knew then that I could unravel any of the secrets of the universe. Where, before, I had been in a near trance I was now coolly aware of everything around me. I was aware of each of the dancers; and I was aware of their whole life, their future as much as their past and present.

The drumming reached a frenetic crescendo, as did the feelings of exhilaration that overwhelmed everyone around me; and the disc of the sun finally disappeared behind the hills. At that moment every sound, every movement, ceased and all the participants dropped to their knees.

In the deafening silence that followed, I joyfully began my autumn song. But this time my visions were no longer limited to dim allegories. There was no crisis of identity this time. Indeed, the visions shone out as clearly as if I was there.

"I see the hunters surrounding a stag and five hinds, in the forest just by the oak tree that has the shape of a running man." The vision was crystal clear. I could see each of the hunters as they slowly crept up on the browsing herd. Finally I saw Jon leap onto the stag and, with one savage sweep, cut its throat; at the same time as the other hunters speared the hinds. It was clearly destined to be a great hunt.

"I see a lone wolf, which has attacked our sheep in their folds. It is being tracked down by the hunters to its lair on the hill above the smallest field." Again I could see the individual hunters this time using their bows to pour volley after volley of arrows into the stricken beast.

"I see the hunters searching, this time for metal." The picture was just as clear as the previous ones but the message was confusing. They were following an animal track, but there was no doubt that they were looking for metal rather than an animal. Their thoughts, which I could clearly sense, told of an urgent search for both copper and tin.

"I see the village renewing its walls." In the vision I could see what looked like the whole village labouring to put in place the timbers, the trunks of the small trees that had been cut from the forest, to replace the wattle fences that had previously topped the earth banks surrounding the village.

"I see a body, savagely torn. A girl, lying in the snow; with dark all around."  This was the most vivid picture of all. Yet nothing in it moved. Below me lay the crumpled body of a girl, limbs strangely twisted, her body savaged by some wild beast; the snow around her stained bright red with her blood, looking like some perverse painting of a poppy. Oddly, the body was lit by a circle of flaming torches, beyond which was the dark of night.

Then all went dark. "The vision ends."

Outside the circles, in the dark beyond, I could now hear the crackling as the first torch was set to the beacon.

The visions were the most vivid I had ever experienced. The completed coven was, as predicted, a very powerful device. I could swear that I had seen every detail, every twig and every stone. Yet the messages still remained worryingly enigmatic. It was clear that the winter would bring great successes for the hunters. But it was always the time when they came into their own. During the spring and summer they had, in their eyes, been reduced to acting as mere gatherers. Now they would be free to revel in the fierce pleasures of the hunt.

But, I wondered, why were they hunting for metal? Maybe there would be the possibility of finding a deposit nearby, from which we could mine our own supplies of ore. That would be good news. But why should the replacement of the village walls be so significant; and why were the villagers working with such urgency?

Most mysterious of all, I continued to ask myself, what was the identity of the poor girl so savagely slain. According to travellers tales, children, and even adults, had been attacked by wolves and bears. But I knew this was a very rare occurrence indeed. In the whole of my lifetime I could only remember one small child being attacked by a bear; and, even then, the prompt arrival of other villagers drove the beast away before it could do any serious harm.

But the vividness of the pictures indicated to me that they were no longer symbolic. They were actual events, yet to come. So there was no longer any point in trying to tease out their inner meaning. All that meaning had already been conveyed very clearly.

There remained just one final mystery. As I was watching the pictures I had sensed, as if out of the corner of my 'spiritual' eye, that I was in turn being watched; by those same deep dark brown eyes that had appeared in my midsummer vision. I could not swear that I definitely saw them; for, had

 I diverted my eyes to confront them I was sure that they would have instantly vanished, as did the shadows that haunt the edge of sight on a dark night. But where previously, in midsummer, they were startled I now sensed that they were friendly, almost amused, at his intrusion. I did not know why, but I found this reassuring.

By now the fiercely crackling fire was consuming the whole beacon, which was certainly the largest any of us had ever seen; a full three men in height, with the flames leaping twice as high again. The sacred circle was lit almost as bright as day by its flames, and in that circle the dance was once more under way; to the renewed beat of the drums and the thin high sound of the pipes. In the far distance we could just discern the glow of two other beacons; from our neighbouring villages, each some half a day's walk away.

Around the coven the dancers gyrated, revelling in their frenetic skills. But the small group that was the coven itself excitedly discussed the events of the ceremony. For the first time, they too had shared the visions in all their detail. They had never previously experienced anything like it. Even the most seasoned of them had before only received the briefest of glimpses of the blurred and incomplete visions I myself had seen on earlier occasions. This time they had seen everything in graphic detail. It was an experience they would remember all their lives, telling and retelling it to their children and grandchildren.

When the flames finally died, to leave just the red-glowing ashes, the community danced its happy way, still to the beat of the drum and the sound of the pipe, down to the village below; flaming torches, swirling to and fro with the dancers, fantastically lighting the way. Below, in the various huts, the feast awaited. This time the party would almost riotously move from hut to hut; eating fish and poultry in one, roast boar and jugged hare in another, and dancing and singing in yet others.

As with all the feasts there would be much carousing, and love-making. But this equinox always hampered my own involvement in such things. The side effects of the mushroom lasted for at least half a day; and of these side effects one very obvious problem was impotence, total and complete. I would be able to serve nobody this evening.

It was with little regret, therefore, that at the end of the evening I found myself dancing in the fire hut with Trina. In addition to the obligatory half moon, her naked young body, now beginning to attractively flesh out, was decorated with skilfully drawn pictures of herbs; and she was also drenched in the scent of these. The dancing had been energetic and in the flickering lamplight her erotically swaying body was covered with a fine sheen of sweat. There was no doubt but that she would become a very beautiful woman, and I gave silent thanks for the normally unwanted side effects of the mushroom!

Even though the fire hut was, like all the other living huts, a good eight man lengths wide, it still seemed incredibly overcrowded; filled, as it was, with all the members of the coven dancing madly in company with their current amours. The noise, from the pipe and drum band, perched precariously around the hearth, was quite deafening.

I decided that, under the circumstances, I wanted to talk rather than dance. So, to cut off at least some of the noise of the pipes and drums, I and Trina retreated to my bed; which was under the lowest part of the roof, at the edge of the hut. There we buried ourselves under its covers. It was not unusual for a virgin to join me in its depths; particularly when they sought consolation, to restore their confidence after one of the frequent knocks that set back the progress of their adolescence. It was not even unusual for that consolation to extend to a degree of mutual erotic stimulation; perhaps as far as each reaching, separately, an orgasm. It was, however, very rare indeed that I had become the one to take the gift of a virgin's maidenhead. The young girls nearly always showed excellent taste; choosing someone much closer to their own age, and to their ideal, for their first true lover. I was convinced that every young girl's first lover should have a magical quality; where they would remember him, and sometimes dream of him, for the rest of their lives.

There had been just one exception to this rule. Some fifteen years ago, when I was a much more youthful shaman, one virgin had managed to persuade the council to let me be her first lover. It had been an exhilarating experience; to add to the encyclopaedia of my life. But neither of us had fooled ourselves into believing that it was anything more than a short term romance. The shaman's role was sometimes a particularly solitary one.

I sensed that this time my relationship with Trina was in danger of becoming even more equivocal; though, thankfully, there was no evidence that she had any awareness of this. I had moved from indifference, scarcely noticing the frail waif who arrived on his doorstep, through to fatherly concern, desperately trying to compensate for the terrors that had destroyed her childhood. But now I was beginning to suspect that I had almost lost control. I no longer knew where I stood. I was no longer confident of what I felt. I feared that I could very easily make a fool of myself; a middle-aged idiot lusting after a child who could almost be my grandchild. The very thought of it made me shudder. It was fortunate indeed that the mushroom would this night dull my normal responses. No matter what I really desired, my approach could be nothing but fatherly.

Even so as we snuggled together, under the bedclothes, her naked body against mine severely tested my resolve. In order to hear above the noise, we had to lie in each others arms, cheek to cheek, whispering, as might lovers, directly into each other's ears.

In this very intimate manner, I explored Trina's life once more. Safe in my arms, in this way, she was able to recall the joys of her childhood without fear of the later terrors. It was a further part of the healing process for her, where she previously had totally cut herself off from her childhood - even from its happy moments - to try and bury the unbearable grief.

But it was also fascinating for me. In my own community I knew the detailed history of every individual. But here was a stranger whose every story offered a new insight into her secret life. Every new discovery was a thrilling new intimacy; a sharing of a life. I found the thrill this new knowledge brought to me was almost a sexual experience. It was true, again I gave silent prayer, I was not exploring the body of a lover. But I was just as avidly exploring the mind of one. I was immersing myself in the life of someone who was becoming as close to me as anyone ever had. In many ways this sharing of minds, of our past lives, was even more intimate than love-making. I reflected that once orgasm is achieved you can each go your own ways unaffected by what has happened, but in such a sharing of minds I found that I, and Trina, were changed for ever by the experience.

She shared her earliest memories with me; the golden days helping her mother collect the harvest, the excitement of attending her first feast, of boisterously climbing trees with her friends, of playing practical jokes on each other as they watched the traders haggle, of playing in the crisp white snow before rushing back to the protective warmth of the hearth. All of these earliest memories were fragments suffused by the glow of nostalgia; tinged with an almost unbearable sadness, but also of joy. In many respects, however, I recognised that time had made them almost as mythical as real.

For the first time she allowed the beginnings of her true character to emerge from these stories, as we moved from the area of nostalgic myth to real biography. Those earliest memories came from the age of four or five years. Yet even then she was precocious; and that precocity was encouraged by doting parents. It was a small, close, community; and within it her family was a particularly affectionate one. Many of her best remembered stories revolved around what happened in her family's hut; helping her father carve figures of animals, helping her mother bake bread in the hut's oven.

As she described her later experiences, the shaman from that far-off community began to feature in the stories; becoming almost her personal tutor. In turn she became almost an apprentice to him, posing an anomaly which she had not recognised at the time - but one that was all too obvious to me. Such an apprentice was invariably required by tradition to be male. But it was also clear to me that she had fully lived up to the demands of that role. Her intellect came shining through the fondest remembered lessons; learning the secrets of the nature that surrounded her, learning the basic technologies of daily life, taking in the philosophies that motivated the community.

It was past dawn when the torrent of whispered tales finally ceased; and, exhausted, she fell asleep in my arms.

I found myself in a remarkably equivocal position; on a number of fronts. I had begun by loving her as a daughter. Now I found myself developing an even closer relationship; sharing lives almost as a lover. Indeed the depth of that relationship was already deeper, and more intense, than that of any ordinary lover. At one extreme I had made no sexual overtures to her. Yet my invasion of her early life, albeit fully invited, was as privileged as any sexual penetration. It was also as rewarding, as stimulating; bringing them ever closer together, and leaving me with a feeling of satisfaction I had never gained from the most explosive orgasm with Melani. In my arms I now held a being whose very existence, whose personal history, I was beginning to share in the most intimate manner. It posed many paradoxes for me, at many levels; and I was desperately unsure how I should, or could, handle it.

In the meantime I looked tenderly down on the precious scrap of humanity nestling in my arms. Almost every part of her was out of proportion. Her facial features were just that bit too large for her delicate build; her mouth was too broad. Her limbs were too long; with fingers that seemed so fragile that they must break off at any moment. Her long hair was neither straight nor curled; and it was a non-descript brown, but it shone with the healthy gloss of youth. Her slenderness would have indicated a high pitched voice, and yet in practice it held an almost hypnotic huskiness; constantly interrupted by an infectiously bubbling giggle. But most of all it was the fluidity of her features, and the constantly shifting flux that imbued them, which was distinctive. The parts were less than pretty, indeed some might have thought them almost clumsy, but in combination they added up to a rare beauty. I did not think she had any idea of how beautiful she was, but as I too drifted into sleep I gazed, with something akin to wonder, on this very special being.

                                                                        ****

It was a few weeks later that Isac came into the fire hut wearing an expression of smug satisfaction; one which I knew, from long experience, betokened yet another 'invention'. He kept me in suspense for barely a moment before he produced a knife from within his robes. It was a superb piece of work. Its handle was, as usual, carved to fit the user's hand; and, again as usual, was decorated with various geometric patterns carved into the hard wood. But it was the blade that immediately drew my attention. It was nearly two hand-widths long; all of it in highly polished bronze.

Anticipating the as yet unasked question, he took one of the logs from the stack alongside the oven and attacked it with the knife. As the chips of wood flew around them it became very obvious to me that the edge of its blade must be at least as sharp as the best flint.

Still, I had to ask the obvious question: "But how did you achieve this miracle?"

Isac settled himself down on a stool; it was going to be a long conversation. "We were gradually increasing the size of the brooches, the bronze castings, we were making. As their size grew, it eventually dawned on me that we should be able to just as easily make tools. The problem was only in deciding which tools would be worthwhile; remembering the high cost of the bronze involved. Clearly there would be no advantage, for example, in producing bronze weights for our weaving looms; our stone weights are perfectly adequate. But, after much deliberation, we decided to try and produce a small pick; to help make holes in wood and stone. Unfortunately we found that we couldn't cast a thick section; we had problems with fractures and mysterious bubbles in the metal. So we gradually tried thinner and thinner sections. Finally we ended up with a section very much like the one you have in your hand. But it was Rog who made the real breakthrough. As you know we have, for some time now, been using sandstone to polish up the highlights of the brooches, and Rog applied the same process to this new 'pick'. To our astonishment we discovered that on the sharp edges the grinding action of the sandstone created a cutting edge which was as good as that on a well-struck flint. You hold in your hand the outcome."

Very gingerly I was testing the edge of the knife with his thumb. I discovered that Isac was not exaggerating. It was amazing. The edge was flint sharp; and it was as sharp for the whole length of the blade, not just in parts as a comparable flint knife would be: "Do you realise what this means?" It was a silly question on my part. Isac well knew how important this discovery was; so I continued, without waiting for an answer: "The bronze brooches will undoubtedly increase our wealth. But this knife will revolutionise our life. There are so many things that we will be able to do much better; and no doubt many things we will be able to attempt for the first time. It is impossible to conceive of all the possibilities. And the same will be true for every other village which will clamour to buy from us."

"I have been thinking of nothing else for the past few days, while conducting the last tests to make certain that there were no hidden problems. It is a breakthrough that will have impact across every field; from cutting cloth to felling trees. It will be so popular that we will have to ration supplies to the traders. I calculate that we should be able cast and grind something over two hundred knives, if we switch all our resources to it for the rest of the winter. I will ask the council for approval tonight." Isac was jubilant; and justifiably so.

                                                                        ****

The council meeting was, inevitably, a triumph for Isac. Less predictably it was also one for Jon, who had only just joined it; but who was now chosen to help Isac set up this new industry. Or it was in part a triumph; for Jon also took the opportunity to try and persuade the other members of the council that there was a real, and immediate, threat to the security of the community.

He told a much shortened, and well rehearsed, version of the history combined with autobiography that he had already spent many hours communicating to me. In the specific context of his current preoccupations, however, the element of the history he concentrated on was that of the wars in which he and his tribe had become enmeshed.

It was, however, too bold a challenge to existing values for a newcomer to make; even if it had any foundation in truth. Predictably, he was not even allowed an opportunity to bring forward any proposals. The council was unanimous in rejecting his views as unwarranted fears. None of its members believed that such threats were real; at least in the area of their own community. It was just possible that they existed in the society from which Jon had fled. But that was so many days journey away, at the other end of the land, that it was inconceivable, even if the fantastic stories were true, that there could be any threat to their own isolated community. So, to Jon's obvious regret and even distress, the matter was dropped.

                                                                        ****

As some consolation for the youth's so obvious disappointment, I decided to take him under my wing as my apprentice. Perhaps I just hoped that I would in this way be able to exert some influence over the wayward young man. As yet the newcomer didn't display any of the conventional signs of precognition. But he I had been sure that there was a very powerful contact with the spirit lurking beneath the surface.

But first of all I needed to redirect the youth's almost blazing allegiance to his sun god, and harness that energy to bring him into true contact with the spirit. That experience, I was certain, would surely open his eyes at last. From my long experience I knew that nobody could encounter the purity of the spirit without being cleansed. So at the end of the council meeting, after the others had left the fire hut, I broached the subject: "Much of what you described as being the power of the sun god can be experienced in the true spirit. Most of the apparent difference is, I am certain, due to pure semantics. The paranormal, or supranormal, power is there just the same. However, to us the sun is but one aspect of the spirit; even if it is the most obvious one."

Starting the first of many hard fought discussions, not to say heated arguments, Jon immediately countered with: "But the relationship is completely different. I, with my people, worship the sun god! He is a being who we cannot comprehend. He is beyond the understanding of mere mortals. He created us from just part of himself; and we can only appreciate that small part. You, on the other hand, are blind in your worship. You arrogantly see this 'spirit' as your equal. You are ignorant. You cannot even begin to comprehend what lies behind; which is far greater than you might ever imagine. The sun god demands our worship, and punishes those who do not give him his due. But he rewards those who do worship, who recognise his true powers, by giving our king, our high priest, powers that enable him to enslave our enemies."

Once more, I was alarmed at the violent ideas the youth espoused. He chose to ignore these, however, and continued: "But each of us has that power. We share that power, drawing it equally from the spirit. Of course the spirit is greater than any one of us, and cannot be understood by an individual. The spirit is all of us; all of us who are, who have been, and who will be. But it is not separate from us. We are part of it, and it is part of us. The whole is one continuum. There is no artificial gap created between us and it; such a chasm would surely reduce our powers."

"But if each of you has direct contact then there must be anarchy. Only our sun god can determine what are the rules of right and wrong; of what we need to do to live a pure life. And those rules are transmitted through just one person, the king, so that there can be no confusion; no anarchy. Otherwise everyone could choose for himself what was good and bad."

"How do you know what is good, and what is bad? We only know what is expedient; what is necessary for the spiritual life. Each of us, guided by the spirit, does naturally what is best for all; for what is best for the community must be best for each of us. Even though your royal family lives well, the great majority of your people live far poorer lives than any of our village. So what is wrong with our anarchy; if that is what creates wealth?" I knew I was not making much headway with this stubborn youth. But there would be other days, and ultimately the newcomer must come to face the inevitable logic of my arguments. I had never found a pupil to fail, in the end, to accept the lessons of history.

                                                                        ****

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