The Tower: Part 3: Samhain
Post #14: In which the trees ...
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PART 3 SAMHAIN
(SAH-win or SOW-in) Halloween; begins the dark half of the year and is the midpoint between autumn equinox and winter solstice. Fire festival; third of three harvest points in the cycle. Self-assessment and reflection, a time to let go of that which no longer serves. Ushers in a period of peace and rest.
The Card: The Heirophant
Faith; allegiance; trust.
CHAPTER 5
ROSE RED
Rose Red dreamt of Death snapping his fingers with bony clicks in a macabre dance, just as he had during the Ostara initiation with Baba Yaga. In the dream, the snap, snap became louder and more insistent, until it was the sound of bones breaking, dozens of bones, hundreds of them, breaking into jagged-edged pieces and falling onto the ground on a carpet of dead leaves, perfumed with death. She woke with a sound of distress, loud in her dream but low and quiet in the dim confines of her little house.
She turned on her back, warm tears sliding from the corners of her eyes into the curly hair at her temples. A bad dream, and yet not a dream. She found no relief in waking; her waking life was as shadowed and stained with dread as her dream. The oak tree forming part of her house was dying and her lover, Rowan, was slipping away.
It felt like very early morning. Desperately, she craved sleep’s forgetfulness, but she was wide awake. Experience had taught her not to lie in bed thinking. Better to begin the day with dragging fatigue than give way to panic and despair and sobbing herself into a headache and inability to eat breakfast.
She sat up and put her feet on the chilly floor. Tentatively, she reached out her hand and laid it against the trunk of the oak tree against which she slept.
It felt the same. Empty and cold, its vitality dammed and broken into nothing but a seep.
Later, Rose Red sat with her back against the oak tree and looked down the slope at Rowan Tree. Maria was on her hands and knees in the garden, digging carrots and potatoes. Gabriel leaned on a shovel nearby, talking. Rose Red could hear the sound of his voice, though not his words.
Smoke rose from the slaughterhouse shed Lugh had helped build the first year, and several people worked, butchering, smoking and preserving meat for the winter.
Heks and Ginger, lately returned from visiting Persephone and Rapunzel, trundled back and forth with loads of animal bedding and manure between the animal pens and sheds and the garden, spreading compost.
Leaves fell as she watched, oak leaves like little brown hands, rustling and curled as though in appeal, an appeal she could not answer. Gradually, the trees on the hill’s crown above Rowan Tree were baring themselves to purple and grey autumn skies.
It had not been a colorful fall. Whatever passion made the leaves flame and rejoice as the trees released them had not ignited, and orange muted to golden brown, scarlet to faded red. Even the sulpher shelf mushrooms growing on rotting stumps and logs did not display their usual vibrant golden orange. Another leaf floated into her lap, and she looked down at it and thought, What do you need? What can I do?
She hadn’t seen Rowan for weeks.
In the long cold deeps of a February night, a vixen had called for a mate, an entirely wild sound, neither yap, bark or howl. For several nights she called steadily, moving in the forest around Rowan Tree, and Rose Red lay alone in her bed and listened to the savage demand for a mate and for motherhood.
She didn’t blame Rowan. He must live true to his nature, as the rest of the forest did. She herself felt the compelling demand of the vixen’s call, the erotic thrill of the long cold night, the lust of fur and teeth and musk. Had she been a dog fox she would have gone without hesitation to bite and snap and snarl, to dominate and cover and thrust. It was right for Rowan to seek a mate among his own kind and father offspring.
Since the beginning of their union, they had shared each other with their respective tribes, though he could enter farther into her world with his ability to shape shift than she could into his. Her human form was all she had, and she often felt frustrated with her limitations. Rowan could experience two physical realities, but she was chained to one.
She’d understood for some time their relationship could not endure their differences, but understanding did not prepare her for the desolation she felt as he slipped away from her. She felt ashamed of herself, and withdrew from the others. What had she expected, when she took a fox man as a lover? They would think her naïve and weak, making drama out of an inevitable ending. Why could she not learn to take life casually, not make such a big deal out of everything? Maria, who had experienced real tragedy, would despise her, and she’d deserve it.
The gradual decline of the forest, though, was something different. That she should tell them about, and soon. Somehow, Rowan’s departure and the forest’s diminishment seemed inextricably tangled together, and she feared speaking about one would reveal her pain and grief about the other.
She had a frantic feeling if she began crying she wouldn’t be able to stop.
“Rosie?”
Rose Red started. She’d been so deep in her own misery she hadn’t heard Eurydice approach.
“Sorry,” said Eurydice. She sat down next to Rose Red.
“Are you all right? You look upset.”
“I’m fine,” said Rose Red. She moved so Eurydice could share the tree trunk as a back rest and turned toward her, manufacturing an air of serene inquiry.
“I’m not,” said Eurydice with enviable frankness. “I’m scared. I feel like a bit of a fool, but something’s wrong. At first, I thought I imagined things, but the feeling of wrongness is getting … bigger.”
Rose Red took a deep breath, feeling relieved. She drew up her knees and wrapped her arms around them.
“Tell me.”
“I’m not sure I can. That’s why I haven’t said anything. In the beginning, it was a feeling more than anything else. Just a feeling that something about Rowan Gate was different. When I tried to pin it down, I couldn’t. Something seemed … off. Then, as the season turns, I’ve noticed the trees are different. The last couple of years the leaves have been a riot of color, almost a shout, you know? This fall they’re dull. Kunik and I have both noticed it.”
“Me, too,” said Rose Red.
“The latest news is the portal is not working properly,” said Eurydice. She picked up oak leaves, one by one, and fanned them out, holding the brittle stems between her fingers. Her thick dark hair swung forward, hiding her face. An errant shaft of sunlight gave her head a momentary purple sheen.
“Rosie, I’m afraid it’s my fault. I don’t mean the forest — I’m not that important! But the gate. Maybe I’m not a good gatekeeper after all. Maybe it was a mistake for me to try to look after Rowan Gate?”
Rose Red reached for Eurydice’s hand, and Eurydice dropped the fan of withered leaves and gave it to her. Rose Red pressed her palm against the tree trunk behind them.
“It’s not you. My tree … this tree is dying.”
Tears rose in her throat, and Eurydice’s appalled look made her feel she needn’t hide them. She let them fall.
Eurydice put her own palm against the tree’s body and closed her eyes, as though listening. After a moment she dropped her hand without speaking, and intertwined her fingers with Rose Red’s. Their hands rested on the rustling carpet of leaves.
“What do you think is wrong?”
Rose Red wiped her cheeks. “I don’t know. I’ve wondered if it’s my fault. Maybe I’m not a proper guardian of the forest and Artemis made a mistake. But when you say that’s how you feel, I know it can’t be right, so maybe it’s not me, either. Maybe it’s something bigger than us.”
“It must be, if it affects the whole forest.”
“I don’t know how much of the forest is affected,” said Rose Red. “I suppose we’d better find out.”
“What do you think we should do?”
“I think we should visit the birch wood and talk with the Rusalka, to start with,” said Rose Red. “If something’s wrong in their wood, they’ll know it. They have more power and wisdom than I do, and perhaps they can advise us. I’ll talk with Artemis, too, and Gwelda and Jan. If something’s amiss with the trees, they’ll have noticed it.”
“And the gate?”
“What do you mean when you say it’s not working properly?”
Eurydice frowned, thinking. “You know when a gate is rusted or a door warps or swells, and it gets hard to open?”
Rose Red nodded.
“It’s like that. I feel resistance when I open the portal, like I have to push much harder and it drags or is blocked somehow. I first noticed it when one of the Rusalka traveled back and forth between here and Morfran’s forest.”
Rose Red stood and brushed leaves off her leggings. “I think we’d better talk with the others before we do anything else.”
“I feel better,” said Eurydice, and opened her arms for a hug.
“Me, too,” Rose Red whispered into her shoulder, sinking into Eurydice’s generous embrace and feeling comforted. “Me, too.”
***
The leader of the group of Rusalka near Rowan Tree was Valeria. The Rusalka, though they danced with the women of Rowan Tree, did not mingle freely with the human community. They had the most contact with Eurydice, as they made occasional use of Rowan Gate to travel between their home forest and Rowan Tree. Rose Red wanted to know them better and knew they could teach her a great deal, but their aloof self-sufficiency and power intimidated her.
However, her uneasiness about the forest’s well-being made her forget her own sense of inadequacy, and she and Eurydice set out on an October afternoon for the Rusalka’s birch forest. Breakfast in the community’s all-purpose gathering space had become a protracted affair as Eurydice and Rose Red shared with the others their concerns and observations. Rose Red was surprised to find Ginger and Heks both possessed information to contribute. Ginger shared a letter she’d received from Radulf and Heks introduced them to the concept of Yrtym.
Rose Red, sitting with the others and listening in wonder to Heks, realized how isolated she’d become. Preoccupied with her private misery since early spring, she’d not paid attention to the changing seasons. Naturally shy and quiet, Rowan had provided her with most of the companionship she wanted as Rowan Tree was built and settled. As he slipped out of her life, she’d made no effort to reach out to others, and her friends, used to her solitary presence on the community’s edge and ignorant of Rowan’s absence, hadn’t known of her trouble.
Now, seeing concerned and puzzled faces around her as Heks talked of matterenergytime, Rose Red realized her withdrawal was self-destructive and useless, her sense of shame a familiar prison she need not inhabit. Kunik, as the child of an ice bear and a human, would certainly understand the complexities of her relationship with Rowan. Eurydice would not condemn her, or Maria, or any of the people she worked, danced and lived with.
While she’d been emotionally absent, Rowan Tree harvested and prepared for winter, Ginger had visited Persephone and Rapunzel and returned. (What happened during that visit and how were Persephone and Rapunzel? She’d never asked.) Heks had reappeared, returned from her journey through the portal, (where had she been and what had she done?) a more assertive, more confident Heks, who spoke knowledgably of things Rose Red had never heard of before. If the strangely-named Yrtym underlay life everywhere in the cosmos, it was part of the forest, and protecting the forest was her business.
It was as though she’d looked through a pinhole for months, and the pinhole suddenly widened into an infinite view. In this new view she realized how insignificant any single person was, and the abrupt shift in perspective brought her a sense of relief and expansion, as though an unutterable burden lifted from her shoulders. If what Heks said was true, not only Rose Red’s beloved oak, but Rowan and the entirety of the forest, including the Rowan Tree community, were at risk. It appeared the very stars were somehow loosening from the sky, and life everywhere was threatened.
As they walked through the crisp October forest after breakfast, Rose Red reached for Eurydice’s hand, seeking to both give and receive comfort. Eurydice was a tree nymph, and if trees sickened everywhere, could her people survive? Could Eurydice herself survive?
The thought brought an icy rush of fear.
Eurydice’s strong, broad hand clasped her own gratefully.
“It’s so big,” said Eurydice. “How do we fix something as vast as this … Yrtym when we can’t see it? I don’t really understand what it is.”
“I’m not sure anyone does,” replied Rose Red.
“I suppose this is what’s wrong with Rowan Gate as well.”
They reached the edge of the birch forest. Slim black and white trunks stretched before them. Bark peeled away in delicate, feathery strips. Yellow and red mushrooms grew amongst the thick trees.
A crow took flight from nearby, rattling the naked branches with its harsh caw.
“The sentry,” said Rose Red.
They waited, still with clasped hands, and Rose Red thought they must look like a picture in a fairytale, two young female travelers or waifs, dwarfed by the duns, greys and shadows of an autumn birch wood.
She glimpsed movement between the trees and a large boar came into sight, its heavy head with curved tusks below broad humped shoulders, knotty with muscle. It was far larger than the native wild pigs that roamed in small sounders and were occasionally hunted by the people of Rowan Tree. This boar was alone.
It grunted, and Eurydice said, “Valeria, we’ve come to take counsel with you, Rose Red and I.”
The boar grunted again and turned away, leading them farther into the forest.
The Rusalka lived among the birch trees during spring, summer and fall, weaving garments from their hair and feathers. Rose Red never found herself among them without remembering with grief her old friend Jenny, who had spun gold out of straw and been murdered.
The Rusalka were shape shifters, each female in human form, but also able to wear the aspect of other creatures, and most of them had a favorite. Valeria, for example, often took a wild boar’s form, and to dance with her was to dance with glittering savage small eye, slashing curved tusk, bristly hair, and the grunts, squeals, screams and even purrs of a boar. In her human form she looked, like all the Rusalka, a beautiful woman, dark-haired, dark-eyed and pale-skinned as milk, with an occasional swathe of bristles visible between her powerful shoulder blades.
Valeria wove linen from both bristles and the heavy fall of hair she wore in human form, and the other Rusalka wove also from hair gathered from at least one of their shapes. In some cases, they used feathers and even scales, as more than one of them frequently took a snake’s shape.
The Rusalka had joined Rowan Tree when it was founded, staying in the birch wood until winter and then returning through the portal called Rowan Gate to their first home, Baba Yaga’s birch wood, where their sisters, Vasilisa, Morfran and his mate Sofia, also a Rusalka, lived. In the winter, they inhabited the waters of the portal on their side, the icy plunge pool beneath a bathhouse, resuming their mermaid shapes. In the spring they returned to the birch wood outside Rowan Tree and lived among the trees, weaving and watching over the wood and Rowan Gate, along with Eurydice, gatekeeper, and Rose Red, handmaiden to Artemis.
They would leave with the first snow, but today, as Valeria led Rose Red and Eurydice into the forest’s heart on her strangely delicate hooves, they found the Rusalka perched high among the naked branches, chattering together, combing out long skeins of hair as women or grooming, plucking, and preening as animals, and weaving on looms of living birch branches.
Rose Red greeted them formally and respectfully, as one guardian to another, and the Rusalka and two humans gathered to talk.
Eurydice, clearly and deliberately, shared her own concerns and observations, her talk with Rose Red early that morning, and the subsequent information they’d obtained.
As she spoke, Rose Red looked around the circle, fascinated, as always, by the shifting kaleidoscope of aspects that was the constant state of every Rusalka. They preferred to be naked, no matter what the weather, and to sit among them was to be in a dream of boundary ecstasy in which breast, hand, hip, buttock, tusk, fang, wing, talon, claw, ear and paw mingled, as though their being was too powerful to be contained in only one aspect.
To dance with them was to dance with infinite expression from savage and primordial to fathomless physical beauty and sensuality. They reminded her of Rowan, though he was limited to two shapes.
It was as unthinkable they should be captured as it was that Rowan should be. Such wild power lay beyond civilization, beyond taming. To be graced with its presence, even fleetingly, felt like a gift, and a feeling of resignation that might one day mellow into gratitude eased her heartache.
Eurydice ceased speaking.
“We have not heard of this Yrtym,” said Valeria, glancing at the perplexed faces around her. “However, we too have noticed the season’s dullness, and it appears the birches no longer provide us looms with such joy. If the portal is affected, as you say, I’m greatly concerned. I think perhaps we should depart early this season and talk with our sisters and the Mother of Witches. Maybe they know more than we do. In any case, we do not want to be trapped here on your side if the portal breaks down.”
Eurydice bowed her head.
“From what you’ve said, if the portal closes, it’s not your fault,” said Valeria.
“I don’t want to lose you,” said Eurydice, looking around the circle, “any of you.”
Neither did Rose Red. Having the Rusalka nearby gave her a feeling of magic and power, and also of safety. She wished she had not been so tentative in approaching them. Would they ever return if the gate broke down during the winter? What had she missed learning from them?
Unexpectedly, another Rusalka spoke up, one who often appeared as a lynx. “We don’t want to lose you, either. We’ve enjoyed our second home, and you and your human community have taught us a great deal. Also, you share dance with us, a powerful bond. Still, we cannot be permanently divided from our sisters or the Hag. If we can return safely, we will.”
Murmurs of assent came from others around the circle.
“We can give one another more,” agreed Valeria, looking at Rose Red. “For now, though, I think we must counsel with our sisters at home and seek more information.”
She turned to Eurydice. “Do you know of the Mother trees, nymph?”
“The mother trees are the largest, and the first,” said Eurydice. “They birth, nurture and shelter their daughters and sons.”
“Yes,” said Valeria, “but there is more.”
She stood and laid her hand on a massive tree trunk. It took three Rusalka in human form with outstretched arms to girdle it. It rose a hundred feet above the canopy and other trunks split off the main. The greyish trunk was deeply fissured and scored with black. Thick roots snaked across the ground around its base, partially covered by the forest floor.
“This is a mother birch,” said Valeria. “She’s connected to the entire birch forest, as well as many other trees in this region, through a network of roots and fungi. We recognize a birch forest as one tree, and Mother trees are the heart of any forest. They possess the ability to send food, water and messages to other trees and plants. They favor their own species, although they will share with other species as well. They are the nexus of power, the fixed point around which everything in the forest revolves. If they die, the forest dies.”
She turned to Rose Red. “I suspect your oak is a mother tree as well.”
“It’s certainly the biggest oak in the area,” said Rose Red.
“Your grief is well founded,” said Valeria. “If the oak is lost, many other trees depending upon it will die.”
“The greatest mother tree of all,” said Eurydice, looking appalled, “is …”
“Yggdrasil,” said Valeria. “Yes. This is why we must take your news to our home place and seek counsel. If the threat to the thing you call Yrtym can kill the mother trees, the Rusalka’s world will die.”
Eurydice met Rose Red’s gaze. She looked pale. Rose Red felt as if she’d taken a blow to the belly. She hadn’t grasped the enormity of the threat before Valeria’s words. Perhaps I still haven’t grasped it, she thought fearfully.
“We will leave tonight through the portal,” said Valeria. The Rusalka stood, shifting from four legs to two. To Rose Red’s surprise, Valeria stepped forward and embraced her. The Rusalka rarely initiated physical contact, though Rose Red often longed to stroke their varied textures. One by one, each Rusalka embraced both Rose Red and Eurydice, and by the time the last one released Rose Red, she was weeping.
Together, she and Eurydice turned and made their way back to Rowan Tree.