The Hanged Man: Part 9: Lughnasadh
Post #91: In which dance ...
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Radulf insisted they sit down without taking another step and talk. Ginger saw he couldn’t contain his delight or his curiosity. In the flurry of initial greeting and introduction, the wolf disappeared.
“Oh, she’s with me,” said Vasilisa, when he asked about it. “You’ll see her again at Rowan Tree.”
“Rowan Tree?” asked Ginger.
“That’s where you’re going, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know. I mean…no we weren’t going anywhere, exactly.”
“The crows were behaving oddly,” put in Radulf. Then, realizing this explained nothing, he grinned.
Vasilisa laughed. “Never mind. The crows you saw are at Rowan Tree, too. I think that is where you’re going, you just didn’t know it yet. That’s where I’m going, too. I’ll take you when you’re ready. Now, fire away, Sea Wolf!”
Ginger watched as Vasilisa leaned against a tree, smiling at Radulf, hugging her knees. It made her look childishly gleeful.
“Sea Wolf?”
Radulf looked uncomfortable. “A nickname,” he mumbled.
“Never mind,” said Ginger, amused. “We’ll talk later, Vasilisa?”
“We will,” Vasilisa assured her, glancing at Radulf with affection.
“I want to know where you came from,” said Radulf in a loud voice.
“All right, all right!” said Vasilisa. “I’ll tell you.”
“After you left, Marceau advised me to go home for a time. He said sometimes the only way forward is back. So, I did. I…traveled with him for a while.”
Radulf, knowing what it had meant to find part of her real family at last, cocked an eyebrow at her. She nodded silently. If she’d traveled with Marceau, she’d done it in the shape of a sea creature, which she was, at least in part.
“I went back to the forest where I grew up and first met Baba Yaga. My nephew Morfran lives there with the Rusalka. You met him at initiation, remember? There’s a community. They welcomed me home. It’s a strange place, full of deep magic, and Baba Yaga’s always springing up unexpectedly, just to make sure everyone keeps on their toes. She held a harvest marble tournament. Said she wanted to give everyone a chance to “harvest” from her collection. It was so raucous and sordid her chicken legs walked away and hid for three days, refusing to come back until it was over. And, of course, the Baba was the only one who “harvested” anything. The only champion who held his own was Odin!” She laughed.
Ginger, who’d heard of Baba Yaga from her mother but never met her, listened with fascination.
“I didn’t know she played marbles,” she said in amazement.
“Incongruous, isn’t it? She’s mad for them. Cheats shamelessly, of course. Don’t ever play with her.”
Ginger shook her head wordlessly.
“Who are the Rusalka?” asked Radulf.
“The Rusalka are spirits of field and forest,” said Vasilisa. They’re associates of Baba Yaga. They especially watch over rye and poppy fields. They spend the winters as mermaids if they have access to water. Each of them can take the shape of a creature as well as a human form. In the spring, they return to the birch forest, perching in trees to wash and comb their hair. They weave beautiful linen and embroider it with red thread.
“Shapeshifters,” said Ginger, remembering a long-ago lesson and the murder of crows in the treetops. “The crows.”
“They wanted to look at you,” said Vasilisa.
“Me!” Ginger said in surprise.
“Yes. It’s all about you. We’re waiting for you. That’s part of why I’ve come.”
Ginger began to cry.
***
Vasilisa led them through the woods. They’d left the birches behind and walked among maple, beech, ash, and oak when a fox streaked by Radulf’s knee, quick as a shaft of light, bringing him to a sudden stop and making him gasp.
“What…?”
“Radulf!” Ginger saw a graceful figure with a head of curly black hair running to meet them.
“Rosie!” Radulf embraced the young woman, half lifting her off her feet. She turned in his arms, flushed and laughing, to Ginger.
“The Red Dancer!” We’ve been waiting for you! I came to show you the way. I’m Rose Red.”
***
Radulf was a likeable man, but Ginger was surprised to find how warmly he was regarded by the people at the little community they called Rowan Tree. They all appeared to know him and they all wanted to talk to him. She felt hopelessly bewildered by the crowd of strangers, unable to take in a single name as she was introduced to one person after another. She longed to find a safe, quiet place and collect herself. Her throat tightened and she felt short of breath.
“What a noisy bunch!” A hand at her elbow made Ginger start. “Let’s get out of this.”
Vasilisa steered Ginger out of the group surrounding Radulf and they walked across the sloping hill, angling up to a large oak growing on the crest. “A lot of people came together here recently,” Vasilisa said casually. “It’s chaotic right now, but it’ll settle down. I’ve a friend I want you to meet.”
Ginger saw the black curly head of Rose Red, the girl who’d come to greet them in the birch wood. Rose Red sat with her back against a huge old oak. A fox lay at her feet on a bed of leaves, licking a paw. Girl, fox and tree made such an exquisite picture that Ginger faltered, feeling near tears at their beauty.
Rose Red looked up and met Ginger’s eyes. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said. “I wanted to talk quietly. Impossible when everyone’s trying to speak to Radulf! I asked Vasilisa to steal you away.”
The fox trotted to Ginger, sniffing interestedly. She stood still under its inspection, not afraid but respectful. The fox drew back its lips, revealing sharp teeth, in a catlike expression of response to scent. The animal glanced at Rose Red and flowed past Ginger, brushing her leg with a thick russet tail, disappearing soundlessly into the woods.
“That’s Rowan,” said Rose Red, off hand. “Do you want to see my house?” She stood, brushing leaves off her clothes.
On the other side of the tree stood a small shelter, the oak forming most of one wall.
Gratefully, Ginger splashed water from a bucket on her face and accepted food and drink. They took their picnic back out; evidently Rose Red’s favorite place to sit.
“Thank you,” said Ginger a few minutes later. She felt immensely better. “I’m stupid about meeting new people. I haven’t done it much.”
“I’m not good at it, either,” said Rose Red. “Sometimes I get overwhelmed, and then I need to spend some time quietly to recover.” They smiled at one another in understanding.
“Ginger,” said Vasilisa, “we’re glad to see Radulf, but you’re the one Rowan Tree needs.”
“How can that be?” asked Ginger. “I’ve spent my whole life in my father’s castle with my eleven sisters. I’ve never been anywhere or done anything.”
“Cassandra calls you ‘the Red Dancer,’” said Rose Red.
“Who’s Cassandra?”
“She’s the rather worn-looking older woman there. See her? She’s standing behind the rest of the group looking up at the sky. She sounds half-mad most of the time. Speaks in riddles. We think she can prophesize the future.”
Ginger looked across the grassy hill where Radulf and the others inspected the animals.
Tears rose in Ginger’s throat again. The Red Dancer without a dance, she thought. When she thought she could speak calmly, she said, “Yes. My sisters and I danced together. And my mother, before she…died.”
“It’s more than dancing, though, isn’t it?” asked Rose Red. “It’s spiritual work as well. It’s a sacred women’s circle, a practice of power.”
Ginger was so surprised she forgot her distress. “It is — was,” she said. “How did you know?”
“Baubo and Persephone taught me to dance,” said Rose Red. “I’m not very good at it. I’m afraid of it — or not afraid of it, exactly, but afraid of the way it makes feeling …come up.” She grimaced.
“The Rusalka dance, too,” said Vasilisa. “I’ve danced with them. When they dance it’s not so much a matter of feelings coming up as it is of thoughts falling away. When the Rusalka dance, they dance with everything they are.”
Ginger was open mouthed. “But Baubo danced with us, too!” she said excitedly.
“What we’re trying to say is we want this in Rowan Tree,” said Rose Red. “We need someone to hold space for dance as a spiritual practice. Many of us have danced before, but none of us feel comfortable leading such a practice. We don’t know enough about it. Maria, who is becoming a sort of community leader, thinks both women and men need private circles. I agree with her. The Rusalka will support us in starting a women’s dance group. Eurydice is a doorkeeper for a portal here. She can open a way to a dancing place, like you used with your sisters. We need a leader. Will you help us?”
RADULF
Radulf wondered if he’d feel compelled to follow every wolf he saw for the rest of his life. He was glad no one was with him.
It was early, the sky faintly tinged with dawn. He walked, soft-footed, through the woods. The previous day had been damp and grey, so the carpet of leaves was silenced.
A grey wolf materialized out of the trees like tattered fog, amber eyed. It looked right into Radulf’s face. Impossible to tell if it was the same wolf who guided him to the White Stag, or even the Rusalka whose wolf-form he’d seen in the birch wood the day he and Ginger found Rowan Tree.
When it turned away into the trees, he followed it.
Dawn crept into the sky.
The wolf led him up through the forest onto a bare hill top.
The sun was rising.
On the hill stood a figure, swathed in a worn cloak and hood, with a lit torch in her hand. As he watched, sunlight fell on the torch and it went out. The wolf sat at the figure’s feet.
“Odin?” said Radulf. The figure wore a hood rather than a hat, but possessed an air of silent power and authority that reminded him of Odin.
A hand threw back the hood and Radulf saw an old woman with iron grey straight hair cut close to her head, like a man’s.
“I’m Hecate, She of the crossroad,” she said. “You’ve come to a place of choice. You know what you don’t want to do. You’ve stood at this crossroad before.”
He had. He knew it. It was the old familiar place of tension between what he expected from himself and what his heart wanted. Now he felt torn again between his head and his heart, between mind and being.
“Sea Wolf,” said Hecate.
The sea. Marella loving the youth he’d been. His poor anxious wife, nearly faceless in his memory. The marble steps, his boyhood home, the familiar streets of the city. Irvin and the children. Were they with Marceau now? Had Irvin left the town and white-walled church? Marceau. Morfran. The wide-open sea and worlds beyond. Sea Wolf. See, Wolf!
I’m going back to the sea! he thought, and his heart lifted with joy.
GINGER
The expectant group of women huddled together at Rowan Gate. Ginger felt sick with tension. How was she going to lead this group of nervous women in dance? Could Eurydice open the way to the proper space for them?
“Open the way, doorkeeper. We’ll guide you,” said Sofiya, the Rusalka with the strange round owl’s eyes.
“I don’t have a key,” said Eurydice. Ginger realized Eurydice felt as nervous as she did.
“You are the key,” said Sofiya.
Ginger watched Eurydice. She stood with her eyes closed, her body tense, as though with inward effort.
The spring inside its shelter gurgled, shimmered, and they stepped forward. Vasilisa moved in front of Ginger, a fiery skull on a stick in her hand, and a large square of smooth wooden floor without walls or roof suddenly became illuminated as skulls on poles spaced around its perimeter lit with a whoosh. Vasilisa thrust the pole carrying her skull into the ground at a corner of the floor.
Ginger stepped onto the floor, suddenly confident. It was perfect. It was going to be all right.
Drumming like a heartbeat began, steady, sure, endless. The sound of bright small bells joined it. Persephone wore bracelets of bells around each naked ankle. They heard a ripple of piped invitation, and from the shadows beyond the dancing floor an old woman danced toward them.
She moved bare footed, thick ankled. Curls of gray hair moved as she danced, exposing pink scalp. She paused suddenly and pulled her sack-like garment over her head, turning to show lumpy, wobbling buttocks. Another flourish of the pipe at the lips of one of the Rusalka, and the old woman put a hand on her waist, cocked one massive hip coyly, and tossed the covering away. She giggled, then guffawed. More hair grew over her sex than on her head. It looked like a thick beard. Persephone laughed and began to clap her hands. The beat quickened. Persephone stepped off the floor and danced to meet the old woman. They kissed, still dancing. They laughed at one another, still dancing. They advanced to the center of the floor, the lovely young queen and the old woman, thick as a slab of rock, each dancing her own dance, yet making a third together.
Ginger, laughing with joy, allowed the music to take her. She wore a gauzy skirt the color of flames, and her hair was unbound. She whirled around the edge of the dance floor, making friends with it, finding the edges, looking into the eyes of each fiery skull, discovering the feel of the floor under her bare feet. She danced along each side, let her flaring skirt fill the corners, and then tightened her circle gradually until her spiraling dance contained Baubo’s and Persephone’s dance.
“Gwelda,” called out Baubo, the dancing stone, the dancing ancient tree, the dancing mountain topped with curls of snow and stardust. “Gwelda, my daughter, it’s your time now. Show us the way. Make yourself big!”
Gwelda laughed like a delighted child. A rustle in shadows at the edge of the floor as clothing dropped, and she came into the light, hair in spikes, eyes shining, a landscape of warm flesh, humid hollows, thickets and forests and hidden springs throbbing with life. She leapt like a falling tree onto the dance floor, making it shake. She raised her arms and small shadowed shapes flitted out from her left armpit, silent as dark ash. She drummed with her huge feet, thumped as loudly as she could, and the drummer followed her, passed her, pushed her faster, harder. Her breasts bobbed hugely. Her thighs trembled. The flesh on the back of her arms shook. She turned on the spot, thumping her feet with glee, showing huge buttocks like bare hillsides with a thick forest dividing, growing up the slopes of thighs and belly. She looked magnificent. She danced.
Relief filled Ginger. She was not the only leader. She was not the only dancer. These three, at least, needed no guidance.
“Dance with me,” Gwelda called to Rose Red. “Please, come dance with me!” Rose Red, standing at the edge of the floor, shook her head, looking miserable. Ginger flowed towards her in the arms of the music.
“I can’t,” said Rose Red, with something like panic as Ginger drew close to her. “My only dance is rage. I’m not like you. I’ve never been able to. I want to, but I can’t. I’ll just watch.”
“You danced at initiation,” Vasilisa, who stood nearby watching the others, reminded her. “You told me you danced with Artemis on the Night of Trees.”
“I don’t want to,” said Rose Red. “It makes me feel too much.”
“Are your feelings that big?” Ginger indicated Gwelda.
Rose Red smiled in spite of herself. “I don’t know. Maybe. I don’t want to know.”
“You want to make yourself small.”
Rose Red hesitated. “Not myself,” she said, “just my feelings.”
“Dance a small dance, then,” said Ginger. “Find a place on the edge out of the light and dance so small that you don’t wake up any of your feelings. Let them sleep while you dance.”
“Can I do that?” asked Rose Red doubtfully.
“Why not? Will you try, just once? I’ll never ask you to do it again, I promise.”
“Rosie!” called Gwelda from the middle of the dancing floor.
“I’ll try, then,” said Rose Red, “just this once.”
Ginger left her, trusting the power of the dance to do the rest. She made her way along one side of the floor, looking for anyone else who needed support. Baubo, grinning widely danced face to thighs with a giggling Gwelda, each trying to out jiggle the other.
Ginger watched Vasilisa bare her feet, carefully and deliberately, as though engaging in private ritual. She chose a corner close to her fiery skull and fell into the rhythm of the music, paying no attention to anyone around her and looking down at the floor. Ginger thought she was remote and a little frightening in her solitude.
A tentative hand on her arm distracted her. “I don’t know how to do this,” said Eurydice. “Look at Gwelda!” The giantess now thumped and whirled all over the floor, side to side and corner to corner. She was like an avalanche with the power to steer. She snorted and giggled, cried out wordlessly in triumphant delight. She farted enormously, making everyone laugh.
“You’re Eurydice, the doorkeeper?” asked Ginger. She was still trying to learn everyone’s name and role.
“Yes. I’ve never danced before. I’m a tree nymph. Rosie told me she’s seen tree nymphs dancing, but I never have. Maybe olive trees can’t dance?”
“All trees dance! Think of a tree in the wind!”
“Is it a dance if you can’t move your feet?”
“It’s a dance if you can dance it,” said Ginger simply. “Everyone and everything has a dance. You only need to find yours. The music will show you the way. Will you come out with me?” She held out a hand to Eurydice, who took it shyly.
They found an open spot. Ginger took both Eurydice’s hands in hers. “Now, find the drumbeat with your feet. Let it lead you. Don’t think. Just let your feet move however they want.”
She watched Eurydice give her feet to the music and dropped her hands. “Now, think of your olive trees. Remember their bodies and their scent, the fine invisible mist of their respiration. Remember the language of their leaves, and the way they looked in the sun. Think about the feeling of being home. Dance for them. Dance their dance. Let them dance through you.”
Eurydice danced, her face wearing the inward expression Ginger had seen on other dancers. Her body relaxed, swaying and flowing. She stepped out of her clothes, flinging them off the floor, and danced, naked and unselfconscious. Her hair slid over her shoulders and she ran her hands over her heavy breasts and down her thick flanks.
“Eurydice, do you remember Hades?” Maria danced by, naked, dark hair star streaked with silver, breasts bare.
“I remember,” said Eurydice.
Ginger turned away, satisfied. The dance floor was filled with bodies, clothed and bare, whirling, stamping, clapping, swaying and playing music. The old feeling of awe touched Ginger, the feeling she’d always experienced when dancing with her sisters. We’re beautiful, she thought. Women are so beautiful.
Ginger gave herself to her own dance then, and the music wove her into the rest of them, twisting them together in weft of power and warp of movement, starlight, tear, blood and bone. She danced the sharp brittle yarrow stalks, the avenue of trees and the heavy cloth sail of her little boat on the lake. She danced the grief of her mother’s absence and her father’s disinterest. She bared her breasts and her feet and danced for each of her sisters and for her friend Radulf.
She danced the first time she stood on the crest of the grassy hill at Rowan Tree and looked across at animal pens, gardens, structures taking shape as though wood and rock bloomed in their own strange harvest. The whole place balanced on the chaotic edge of creation, garnering and gathering lives into something new. Here was tragedy and loss, rebirth and transformation. Here was cycle and season, guardianship and mystery. Here was a new dance, and here were new dancers.
She danced until she was mindless, nameless, a shaft of flame and darkness without a story.