Summer 10, 513 AV
Facetshine Pavilion
---------------------
The spindle spun, and hummed and spun, and Ara breathed, in long slow, rhythmic breaths - she had discovered, now in the fast, busy days of her new home, a way of holding her breathing just so, that reduced the interference of her body with the spindle, that synchronized her breathing, in fact, such that the subtle dropping of breath from her lips, happened in time with the bottom of the the rounds of the subtle wobble of her spindle, the spindle she knew so intimately, the little wooden maiden. Unconsciously, she pursed blips, and held her tongue, just so, so that the whistling of her breath harmonized with the soft, feathery hum. Like webbing. Like webbing. She spun cotton for canvas, long, rough-thin strands of it from rough duck-fiber. It had taken getting used to, for her hands were used to fine burn of good cotton fiber, and of the lanolin smoothness of wool. Duck cloth was different, one had to learn not how to achiever perfection, but the specific types of imperfection that were unacceptable, and to probe for them between thumb and forefinger, amidst the sensory noise of a thousand little rasps and bumps that must be ignored.
She adjusted the distaff, and closed her eyes. She knew the names of her new family at Facetshine, but did not… really KNOW any of them. So, when, like now, Livvy was out tending to errands and business - and there was so MUCH of that now, with setting up a new household - Ara could only bare to stay in the real world for short periods. The spinning was wonderful, because the music of it was so familiar that her body would keep up the movement even while she shut her eyes - she almost felt felt crippled now entering the Web without the feel of fiber running over her fingertips.
And then she knew she was there again, for she heard her voice, the pale low moan, like Livvy-song, that her Grandmother had taught her to keep, now that her child-song had faded. and this made her think of grandmother. The thought came often to her mind, now, often. Grandmother. Grandmother was somewhere, looking, watching her here. Being proud, or ashamed. She longed to see her, and murmured quietly along the cable of her pavilion - she was still unfamiliar with the webbing here, though it was of much better quality than at home, the work, i twas clear, of gifted web-workers for many years. She felt out slowly, along the lines, looking, again, from Grandmother, who would be somewhere. Her song was soft and general, more a moaning request, than an actual search - Grandmama, where are you? Where are you? And she noticed this, and wondered, quietly.
What if Grandmama could not answer? Is that why she could not find her? Ara frowned, then, nervous, and rushed forward along the knot lines, feeling the song of her tumble and snap.
No. Slow down. Grandmama would not want her to be dangerous. Slow, slow, slow and careful. She drifted down, down, down out of her panic, and into the hollow place at the core of her. Calm, weary, endless calm…
She stopped herself, and felt the pull of her hands, rocking and twirling the canvas fabric. She was real. She lived. She had a life, a human body. Duty. She took a deep breath, and banished from her mind the faint echoing siren call of the udnervoices, with their song that wrapped so sinuously through Ara's own, if only she let it. Rest! Rest! Rest! No. She would not. She would go to the web of her father's pavilion. And there, she would look from her Grandmother.
More slowly, carefully, now she sang herself by measure and bar, down the silken song fibers, plucking them cautiously with the ghost of a finger, to feel that she was balanced upon them, like the muscles of her thighs flexing and unflexing to keep atop her horse at a full gallop. there, a thread of Amethyst, and there a thread of Stonewhistling, follow, follow, follow, sing your way along…
Grandmama.
She felt with the word, using it like a brush to sweep the corners of the web. Grandmama, Grandmama.
And nothing. She sighed, and looked about… but no. And she recalled, for when her Grandmama was here, no the web, she was not the old mother at all. And so she called again, the name of Grandmama's youth.
"Helese. Helese."
She imbed, now, slow, her hands moving slowly, moving the brush of her name in the slow whirling time of the spindle, far off in her hand-flesh-hand.
"Helese."
And there she was, a little girl, huddled quiet underneath a brake of half-tumbled song, the dark-queer child's song, of her Grandmother. But it was lost, and scattered, now, and the child-face confused and frightened, and it looked up at Ara with the fear of a lost infant.
"Who are you? Who told you I was here?"
And Ara frowned, softly, "Grandmama…"
Her grandmother squeaked softly, and began to retract back into the tumbledown of broken notes she hid beneath, her eyes frightened and vulnerable.
"No! No!" Ara sang out quietly, pleadingly, "Helese, Helese… your… your… mother sent me."
The frightened-child-grandmama stopped, and looked up, trembling, "Mama?"
"Yes, Helese… yes, she is… away, you know, in the sea…"
Helese slipped back again, and quivered. Ara stopped and shook her head. No… no… what good would that do? It would confuse her, it would make a tangled web of stories, that would frighten Grandmama away again. Grandmama, loved… loved her singing…
"Helese, Helese,
Trembling one,
Come to me, come to me,
We will rest.
Helese, Helese,
Trembling one,
Bring me your heart,
I will sing it to sleep."
The girl frowned, but slid, just a slight step tentatively forward. Ara sang again,
"Helese, Helese,
Your fingers are strings,
That I will thread into
My horsewoman harp.
And I will play minuets
Over you, child,
And we shall lie down to sleep.
And I will play minuets
Over you, child,
And we shall lie down to sleep."
And the child came forward, crawling as servile as a dog, her eyes losing their guard, and turning up at Ara's, again, frightened, now, and vulnerable, and pleading with her. She said nothing, but only lifted up her hand and spread her tiny fingers. And Ara threaded the fingers into her own, and plucked with the kiss of ghost-of-a-lip, and the fingers hummed a lulling song.
"Listen close to the song of you.
Listen close to the song of you,
And rest little child,
In your own good courage.
Listen close to the song of you,
Helese, Helese."
And she kissed the tiny fingers once more, fresh and sweet and small, and looking at her grandmother, felt welling from put of her stomach a great, smothering weight of compassion. And she cried, and the tears were mirrors again, and the child looked into them, and leapt forward into her granddaughter', wrapping tiny arms around her neck, sobbing child-tears into the warm crook of her neck.
"Shhh… shh, rest Helese,
Shhh… shh, rest Helese…"
"Ara, Ara, I am frightened. I am forgetting myself. I will die soon…" The words were clear, and sweet and true even in the effervescent fear of a child's voice.
"Shh… shh… its alright…"
"Ara… Aramenta, I am not afraid to die. But I do not want to be seen, I do not want to be seen. And I have forgotten how to weave, I am forgetting how to hide myself…"
And Aramenta leaned her grandmother back in her lap, and looked into the quiet fear of her delicate-glass eyes. And the great hollowness of Ara's emotions returned, and she nodded quietly, submissively. In the end, it was as Grandmother had said, she was a giver. And if this was all she could give… if this was all…
"Grandmama, Helese… Helese, open up my breast and put your hands inside my heart. I will weave a box for you, and we shall put you in, and you will rest."
And she closed her eyes and felt the tiny child fingers, thread between the ghost of her ribs, and pry them open signing gratitude and fear and love, all at the same time, and the the hands came to her heart, and there, there, a tear lay open already. And Grandmama looked up at her, her eyes grown wild.
"Aramenta… a woman of strange blood has torn this hole in you… a name I do not know, and… the scent of the bringers of death."
Aramenta nodded soft and solemn, and was silent a moment. Then she murmured soft, "I am a giver, Grandmama, and I have given to her. And if she comes, the Winged Woman, I will give again."
And Grandmama, small and ancient, and child all at once looked at her with solemn eyes, then leaned toward her granddaughter, and and kissed the hollow hole there where her feelings drained and left a hollow pit. She lifted up her head then, lips smeared red with hearts-own blood, and softly kissed Aramenta on the forehead. And Aramenta felt it, and felt the mark laid there, felt it creep beneath the ghost of her skin, and she accepted it, and wave knots of herself into it, took the mark of her own blood and her grandmother's lips upon her as a part of her. This was who she was, this tear, and the smear of her drained soul, a mark red and blazing on her pale forehead, like a second wind mark. The spindle on her back made her a Drykas. The smear of bloodied lips upon her secret forehead… it marked her now as something else. And she accepted it, with bowed head.
Her grandmother spoke softly, "A benediction I put on you, Aramenta. A benediction, and a blessing. Remember your heart, and be blessed by its tenderness, child and friend."
And Aramenta nodded softly, and began to song, a long and wordless song of wood and ride, and woven silk, and the batting of quilts, and the soft comfort of fine lambswool, and a pillow plump and soft, and the steel of little hinges, and a lock that unlocked from the inside, and a tiny silver key. And then she rocked her grandmother against her breast in wracking sobs of mirrored tears that poured on her grandmother's child-fine hear, and soaked it, turned it black and still. and she slid the key into her hand, then lay her in the little box, and kissed her lips with the softness of a grieving mother, and Grandmama, exhaustion and confusion returning smiled the thin doomed smile of the-call-for-rest. And Aramenta shut the blonde-wood lid. And from inside, the silver keys made soft, and final snick.
And in the hands of eyes of Helese, the web was like a river, in her eyes in hands, it always had been. And in the river, stepped a young girl, newly wed, wading deeper, deeper, with a wooden chest held in her arms. And the river ran clear, and cold and clean, and up to the slender waist of the young girl, newly-wed, and washed away the gobbets of the bursted blood of her failed virginity. And the girl lay the chest on breast of the river's current, and it slowly, slowly, ever so slowly, drifted away. And at last, inside, the heart of little Helese, after seventy-five years of fear and watchfulness, shut its eyes, and felt the honeyed kiss of rest. And the silver key she lay against her pretty child-s tongue, and swallowed.
x
Facetshine Pavilion
---------------------
The spindle spun, and hummed and spun, and Ara breathed, in long slow, rhythmic breaths - she had discovered, now in the fast, busy days of her new home, a way of holding her breathing just so, that reduced the interference of her body with the spindle, that synchronized her breathing, in fact, such that the subtle dropping of breath from her lips, happened in time with the bottom of the the rounds of the subtle wobble of her spindle, the spindle she knew so intimately, the little wooden maiden. Unconsciously, she pursed blips, and held her tongue, just so, so that the whistling of her breath harmonized with the soft, feathery hum. Like webbing. Like webbing. She spun cotton for canvas, long, rough-thin strands of it from rough duck-fiber. It had taken getting used to, for her hands were used to fine burn of good cotton fiber, and of the lanolin smoothness of wool. Duck cloth was different, one had to learn not how to achiever perfection, but the specific types of imperfection that were unacceptable, and to probe for them between thumb and forefinger, amidst the sensory noise of a thousand little rasps and bumps that must be ignored.
She adjusted the distaff, and closed her eyes. She knew the names of her new family at Facetshine, but did not… really KNOW any of them. So, when, like now, Livvy was out tending to errands and business - and there was so MUCH of that now, with setting up a new household - Ara could only bare to stay in the real world for short periods. The spinning was wonderful, because the music of it was so familiar that her body would keep up the movement even while she shut her eyes - she almost felt felt crippled now entering the Web without the feel of fiber running over her fingertips.
And then she knew she was there again, for she heard her voice, the pale low moan, like Livvy-song, that her Grandmother had taught her to keep, now that her child-song had faded. and this made her think of grandmother. The thought came often to her mind, now, often. Grandmother. Grandmother was somewhere, looking, watching her here. Being proud, or ashamed. She longed to see her, and murmured quietly along the cable of her pavilion - she was still unfamiliar with the webbing here, though it was of much better quality than at home, the work, i twas clear, of gifted web-workers for many years. She felt out slowly, along the lines, looking, again, from Grandmother, who would be somewhere. Her song was soft and general, more a moaning request, than an actual search - Grandmama, where are you? Where are you? And she noticed this, and wondered, quietly.
What if Grandmama could not answer? Is that why she could not find her? Ara frowned, then, nervous, and rushed forward along the knot lines, feeling the song of her tumble and snap.
No. Slow down. Grandmama would not want her to be dangerous. Slow, slow, slow and careful. She drifted down, down, down out of her panic, and into the hollow place at the core of her. Calm, weary, endless calm…
She stopped herself, and felt the pull of her hands, rocking and twirling the canvas fabric. She was real. She lived. She had a life, a human body. Duty. She took a deep breath, and banished from her mind the faint echoing siren call of the udnervoices, with their song that wrapped so sinuously through Ara's own, if only she let it. Rest! Rest! Rest! No. She would not. She would go to the web of her father's pavilion. And there, she would look from her Grandmother.
More slowly, carefully, now she sang herself by measure and bar, down the silken song fibers, plucking them cautiously with the ghost of a finger, to feel that she was balanced upon them, like the muscles of her thighs flexing and unflexing to keep atop her horse at a full gallop. there, a thread of Amethyst, and there a thread of Stonewhistling, follow, follow, follow, sing your way along…
Grandmama.
She felt with the word, using it like a brush to sweep the corners of the web. Grandmama, Grandmama.
And nothing. She sighed, and looked about… but no. And she recalled, for when her Grandmama was here, no the web, she was not the old mother at all. And so she called again, the name of Grandmama's youth.
"Helese. Helese."
She imbed, now, slow, her hands moving slowly, moving the brush of her name in the slow whirling time of the spindle, far off in her hand-flesh-hand.
"Helese."
And there she was, a little girl, huddled quiet underneath a brake of half-tumbled song, the dark-queer child's song, of her Grandmother. But it was lost, and scattered, now, and the child-face confused and frightened, and it looked up at Ara with the fear of a lost infant.
"Who are you? Who told you I was here?"
And Ara frowned, softly, "Grandmama…"
Her grandmother squeaked softly, and began to retract back into the tumbledown of broken notes she hid beneath, her eyes frightened and vulnerable.
"No! No!" Ara sang out quietly, pleadingly, "Helese, Helese… your… your… mother sent me."
The frightened-child-grandmama stopped, and looked up, trembling, "Mama?"
"Yes, Helese… yes, she is… away, you know, in the sea…"
Helese slipped back again, and quivered. Ara stopped and shook her head. No… no… what good would that do? It would confuse her, it would make a tangled web of stories, that would frighten Grandmama away again. Grandmama, loved… loved her singing…
"Helese, Helese,
Trembling one,
Come to me, come to me,
We will rest.
Helese, Helese,
Trembling one,
Bring me your heart,
I will sing it to sleep."
The girl frowned, but slid, just a slight step tentatively forward. Ara sang again,
"Helese, Helese,
Your fingers are strings,
That I will thread into
My horsewoman harp.
And I will play minuets
Over you, child,
And we shall lie down to sleep.
And I will play minuets
Over you, child,
And we shall lie down to sleep."
And the child came forward, crawling as servile as a dog, her eyes losing their guard, and turning up at Ara's, again, frightened, now, and vulnerable, and pleading with her. She said nothing, but only lifted up her hand and spread her tiny fingers. And Ara threaded the fingers into her own, and plucked with the kiss of ghost-of-a-lip, and the fingers hummed a lulling song.
"Listen close to the song of you.
Listen close to the song of you,
And rest little child,
In your own good courage.
Listen close to the song of you,
Helese, Helese."
And she kissed the tiny fingers once more, fresh and sweet and small, and looking at her grandmother, felt welling from put of her stomach a great, smothering weight of compassion. And she cried, and the tears were mirrors again, and the child looked into them, and leapt forward into her granddaughter', wrapping tiny arms around her neck, sobbing child-tears into the warm crook of her neck.
"Shhh… shh, rest Helese,
Shhh… shh, rest Helese…"
"Ara, Ara, I am frightened. I am forgetting myself. I will die soon…" The words were clear, and sweet and true even in the effervescent fear of a child's voice.
"Shh… shh… its alright…"
"Ara… Aramenta, I am not afraid to die. But I do not want to be seen, I do not want to be seen. And I have forgotten how to weave, I am forgetting how to hide myself…"
And Aramenta leaned her grandmother back in her lap, and looked into the quiet fear of her delicate-glass eyes. And the great hollowness of Ara's emotions returned, and she nodded quietly, submissively. In the end, it was as Grandmother had said, she was a giver. And if this was all she could give… if this was all…
"Grandmama, Helese… Helese, open up my breast and put your hands inside my heart. I will weave a box for you, and we shall put you in, and you will rest."
And she closed her eyes and felt the tiny child fingers, thread between the ghost of her ribs, and pry them open signing gratitude and fear and love, all at the same time, and the the hands came to her heart, and there, there, a tear lay open already. And Grandmama looked up at her, her eyes grown wild.
"Aramenta… a woman of strange blood has torn this hole in you… a name I do not know, and… the scent of the bringers of death."
Aramenta nodded soft and solemn, and was silent a moment. Then she murmured soft, "I am a giver, Grandmama, and I have given to her. And if she comes, the Winged Woman, I will give again."
And Grandmama, small and ancient, and child all at once looked at her with solemn eyes, then leaned toward her granddaughter, and and kissed the hollow hole there where her feelings drained and left a hollow pit. She lifted up her head then, lips smeared red with hearts-own blood, and softly kissed Aramenta on the forehead. And Aramenta felt it, and felt the mark laid there, felt it creep beneath the ghost of her skin, and she accepted it, and wave knots of herself into it, took the mark of her own blood and her grandmother's lips upon her as a part of her. This was who she was, this tear, and the smear of her drained soul, a mark red and blazing on her pale forehead, like a second wind mark. The spindle on her back made her a Drykas. The smear of bloodied lips upon her secret forehead… it marked her now as something else. And she accepted it, with bowed head.
Her grandmother spoke softly, "A benediction I put on you, Aramenta. A benediction, and a blessing. Remember your heart, and be blessed by its tenderness, child and friend."
And Aramenta nodded softly, and began to song, a long and wordless song of wood and ride, and woven silk, and the batting of quilts, and the soft comfort of fine lambswool, and a pillow plump and soft, and the steel of little hinges, and a lock that unlocked from the inside, and a tiny silver key. And then she rocked her grandmother against her breast in wracking sobs of mirrored tears that poured on her grandmother's child-fine hear, and soaked it, turned it black and still. and she slid the key into her hand, then lay her in the little box, and kissed her lips with the softness of a grieving mother, and Grandmama, exhaustion and confusion returning smiled the thin doomed smile of the-call-for-rest. And Aramenta shut the blonde-wood lid. And from inside, the silver keys made soft, and final snick.
And in the hands of eyes of Helese, the web was like a river, in her eyes in hands, it always had been. And in the river, stepped a young girl, newly wed, wading deeper, deeper, with a wooden chest held in her arms. And the river ran clear, and cold and clean, and up to the slender waist of the young girl, newly-wed, and washed away the gobbets of the bursted blood of her failed virginity. And the girl lay the chest on breast of the river's current, and it slowly, slowly, ever so slowly, drifted away. And at last, inside, the heart of little Helese, after seventy-five years of fear and watchfulness, shut its eyes, and felt the honeyed kiss of rest. And the silver key she lay against her pretty child-s tongue, and swallowed.
x
