The Blessing Stone

by Barbara Wood

  When she suddenly gathered the cold little body into her arms and wailed up to the sky, the others shifted in fear. We must leave her, half of them said. But she has the gazelle horns, argued the others. Doron squatted close to her, indecision shadowing his handsome face. He reached out but dared not touch her.

  After several moments of bitter weeping over her son, Laliari finally fell silent and a strange mood settled over her. She became deadly calm, her eyes blank and staring. What they were fixed upon were the caves in the nearby cliffs. Suddenly she thought of the one in which she had met Zant, and the child buried there. Reaching into a small bag that hung from her belt she brought out the stone figurine with the blue baby-crystal in its abdomen. As she gazed at it she recalled the night Zant had first shown it to her, the night he had buried a child. She hadn’t understood at the time what he was trying to tell her, but now it came to her: the crystal did not represent a womb with a baby in it—it was a grave with a child in it.

  My son will not be left to wild animals. He will not be left to the wind and the ghosts. And he will not be forgotten.

  While the others watched in bewilderment, Laliari first made sure her infant was safe and sleeping in its pouch on her back, then she gathered up Josu’s body, instructed Vivek to hold onto her skirt, and she began to walk away from the camp.

  The others hung back, wondering what she was doing. But when Bellek began to limp after her, the rest began to follow. But they remained at a distance, trailing behind the old shaman out of curiosity. Was he going to order her to leave the boy and come away? And where was Laliari going?

  They had their answer when she reached the foot of the cliffs and began the awkward climb up the rocky trail they had used for the past seven years. She had to pause several times to allow Vivek to catch up, or to shift her awkward burden. It was necessary at times to lay Josu down and lift Vivek up and over boulders, then to pick up her tragic burden and resume her resolute progress.

  She never once looked back.

  The cave Laliari chose was one that had not been lived in for it was small and shallow, and the ceiling too low. But it was protected from the elements and the floor was soft and sandy. Gently laying Josu down, she took the digging stick that always hung from her belt and began to dig.

  Everyone crowded at the entrance, peering in, whispering, none brave enough to go inside. After a few minutes Laliari’s baby began to cry. She paused in her digging to unstrap the pouch from her back and bring her infant daughter to her breast. When the child had nursed and was asleep again, Laliari laid the baby in a safe spot and resumed digging.

  When she had created a pit, she picked up Josu’s body and tenderly laid it inside, arranging him in a comfortable position, as if he were asleep. Then she rose to her feet and went out of the cave, the others falling back to let her pass. They all stood on the rocky precipice to watch as she moved among boulders and shrubs collecting wildflowers and fragrant boughs. When her arms were full, she brought the foliage back and gently spread it out on Josu’s body. The she covered him up with sandy soil, filling the pit and patting the earth down so that it was firm.

  She then went to the cave entrance where her six-year-old son stood with Doron. Taking Vivek’s hand, she led him to the grave where she said to him, “You are not to be afraid. Your brother is asleep now. He is safe from ghosts and from harm. And he can do no harm to you. His name is Josu and you will always remember him.”

  Everyone gasped. Laliari had spoken the name of the dead!

  She didn’t care what the others thought, or that Bellek had gone deathly pale, Laliari was aware only of the tremendous relief that washed over her to know that her baby was going to be kept here, safe in this cave, to dwell close by his family forever.

  When she finally emerged into the moonlight, her baby strapped to her back, little Vivek at her side, Laliari held up the figurine with the blue stone for all to see. Everyone fell silent and listened, for she was, after all, Keeper of the Gazelle Antlers. “The Mother gives life, and to the Mother life returns. It is not for us to forget this gift she gives us. From this day forward, the names of the dead are no longer taboo.”

  Laliari knew that it was going to be no easy thing for her people to overcome a generations-old taboo. But she stood firm in her new resolve. No longer were her people going to grieve uncomforted as she and the women had once grieved for the drowned hunters without the solace of speaking the men’s names. The dead should not be forgotten. She understood that now. Wisdom learned from a stranger named Zant.

  Interim

  Everyone was afraid of Laliari after that—at least for a while. But when they saw that no bad luck had come to the clan through her uttering the name of a dead child, that in fact the new season brought forth an abundance of food in the valley, they began to wonder if she possessed new power. When Bellek died the following spring, Laliari spoke his name during the silent-sitting, told of his deeds and his long life. Then he was laid to rest in the cave next to Josu. When once again no bad luck came to the clan for Laliari having broken the name taboo, others began to lose their fears and started to utter the names of those lost long ago—sons and brothers who had died at the hands of the invaders.

  When ghosts did not haunt them and the valley continued to provide plentiful food, the people began to forget the old name taboo until it became a regular part of the silent-sitting to speak of the deceased—so that it was no longer silent-sitting but a remember-sitting. Because it was the homely figurine with the astonishing blue stone that had instructed Laliari in these new laws, it became the custom at every remember-sitting to pass the stone around for each member to hold as she spoke words of praise and remembrance over the deceased.

  When, years later, Laliari was laid to rest in the cave next to her son, each member of the clan took turns saying what she remembered best about the elderly Keeper of the Gazelle Antlers, but mostly it was about the time, many seasons in the past, before most of the clan members had been born, when Laliari had brought the moon and fertility back to her people, and had taught them how to remember the dead.

  Now that the race of humans that had nearly hunted them to extinction had left, the wildlife gradually returned to the Jordan River Valley and the people of the Gazelle Clan followed the herds, moving with the seasons, summering by cool springs in the south, wintering in the warm caves in the north. And always, wherever they went, the little fertility figurine went with them.

  The miracle of the blue stone lay in its beauty. If it had been more homely like jasper, or dull and blunt like carnelian, it might have eventually gotten lost or misplaced and forgotten. But its dazzling sparkle enthralled people, and each successive generation was bewitched anew so that the shimmering nugget of cosmic meteorite was handed down and kept safe, to be revered, worshipped, marveled over.

  The blue stone eventually became so special that people stopped carrying it around as if it were any ordinary amulet. Because the stone was set into the abdomen of a stone woman, a miniature shelter was constructed for her, a tiny little hut made of wood and mud and placed in the care of a special caretaker. Like the Keeper of the Gazelle Antlers and the Keeper of the Mushrooms, there was now a Keeper of the Stone.

  Ten thousand years after Laliari and Zant had lain in each other’s arms, a particularly cold winter hit the valley and the Galilee was blanketed with snow. The people of the Gazelle Clan sat huddled in their caves and the Keeper of the Stone had a dream. In the dream the blue crystal spoke to him and it told him it was tired of living in a small body. So the clan elders conferred and decided that the stone should be transferred to a new body, better and larger, as was befitting its power. Artisans were appointed to carve out a new figurine, more detailed and lifelike, this time with facial features and even a woman’s long hair etched into its head. The blue crystal was then lovingly placed in her abdomen, for the crystal was the statue’s spirit. The statue’s little house was also enlarged and constructed of more durable material, and because i
t was heavier, it now required two men to carry it on a platform between two poles. Wherever the Gazelle Clan roamed, thus was the statue, in her special house, carried and men vied for the honor to be its bearers.

  As the size of the statue, and her house, grew, so did its spirit in the minds of the people. Twenty thousand years after Laliari buried her son in a Galilee cave, the people of the Gazelle Clan knew that a goddess dwelled in their midst. She lived in the crystal womb of a stone woman who lived in her own stone house.

  The clan grew in size and number until it became too large for local food sources to support it. And so smaller groups splintered off to claim other territories for hunting and gathering. But all remained members of the same tribe, revering the same ancestors and the same Goddess, and all coming together at an annual summer Gathering of the Clans at the place of a perennial spring, just north of the dead sea and west of the Jordan River.

  There were two main clans now, the western and the northern, which were divided into families. Talitha’s family was of the Gazelle Clan in the north, Serophia was Raven Clan in the west. It had become the custom, when the families and clans gathered annually at the oasis just north of the dead sea, for the Goddess in her house to be passed to another family for safekeeping for the coming year. Future generations would declare that it was no coincidence that the summer Talitha discovered the magic grape juice was also the summer the Goddess was in Talitha’s safekeeping.

  And that was when all the trouble began.

  But really, the storytellers would say, the trouble had actually begun years earlier, when Talitha and Serophia were young and the clans were camped north of the dead sea, enduring the searing summer heat. It was not unusual for the occasional stranger to appear, hunters who preferred to live and roam alone, affiliated with no family or clan. Such men would come out of the hills with a fresh kill and search the camp for a hearth where they would share their catch with whoever skinned and cooked it for them. Talitha, a plump mother of five, was known for keeping a good hearth; her fire never went out, her cooking stones were always hot, and she knew secrets about spices. She also had a voluptuous body and enjoyed taking pleasure with men. So it was that the stranger who arrived that summer, a strong hunter named Bazel with a fine ewe on his shoulders, found his way to Talitha’s tent where he stayed for a week, enjoying her bed and her cooking. When he made signs of moving on, for roving was in his nature, Talitha decided she wanted to keep him, and so enticed him with tasty roasted grains and juice pressed from grapes, skills she had perfected and would share with no one else.

  He stayed another week in Talitha’s tent, and then one morning went into the hills to hunt gazelle. When he returned, it was not to Talitha but to a grass shelter on the other side of the spring, where another clan was camped. This second shelter was kept by a woman named Serophia, younger and more slender than Talitha, and with fewer children. Here Bazel spent another two weeks of delight before turning restless eyes once again to the horizon. While the men of the two clans were only too glad to see the newcomer move on, for they coveted Talitha and Serophia for themselves, the two women were of a different opinion. Each wanted to keep the hunter for herself on a permanent basis.

  The ensuing competition became the main entertainment of that summer and was spoken of for many years afterward. Talitha and Serophia launched a campaign that hunters declared rivaled the best tactics of any hunt or battle, with Bazel happily in the middle, dividing his time between tent and hut, sharing himself as democratically as he could. He had never been so well fed, nor enjoyed so much sex. It was a summer he would never forget.

  But then the day came when the seers announced that it was time for the Gathering to disassemble and for clans to start off for their winter homes. Talitha and Serophia grew desperate, for Bazel had not yet made a commitment.

  No one could really say afterward what happened. Accusations flew on all sides: some said Talitha had cast the evil eye upon Serophia, some said Serophia had brought bad magic upon Talitha. Both women came down with a bloody flux that caused painful urination, rendered them unable to have sex, and did not clear up until well into the winter. Neither the seers nor the medicine women could divine what the problem was, nor find a cure. Yet it was clear that each had been invaded by an evil spirit. One night, during the dark of the moon, deciding that he had better leave before everyone accused him of bringing this evil spirit among them, Bazel picked up his spear and slipped out of the camp, never to be seen again.

  As the clans made their treks westward and northward to ancestral lands, both women were sick and miserable, each blaming the other for this misfortune, and each forming a grudge so deep and black that it was to have repercussions for centuries to come.

  “And now we come to the Summer of the Grapes,” was how the storytellers would introduce it. “The summer that all the trouble began.”

  By now the hunter Bazel was forgotten. Only the mutual hatred between the two women remained. Over the years each had risen in status among her clan. Both had produced a prodigious number of children and were now revered grandmothers full of postmenopausal moon-power. Talitha had grown thick-boned and heavy-set because she had the blood of Zant in her veins. Serophia was still slender although by no means frail. Both were made of tough fiber and indomitable personalities. As the seasons had passed and the clans had continued to gather annually, the war had quietly continued to rage. “Hmp! Serophia’s chickpeas taste like pig shit!” Talitha would grumble to the women of other clans. “Every egg Talitha touches turns rotten,” Serophia told anyone who would listen. Their rivalry became legend and a source of amusement for the clan gossips. Spies would run back and forth to report. When Serophia declared, “When a man lies between Talitha’s legs, she falls asleep,” Talitha countered with, “When a man lies between Serophia’s legs, he falls asleep!” Even the men—those who were not currently involved with a female and who therefore were gathered outside the hunters’ communal tent, men who rarely involved themselves in women’s issues—became involved. Points were awarded to one side or another, wagers were made. At every summer gathering, the latest news on the Talitha–Serophia fight became nightly entertainment at all the campfires.

  Because of the coincidence of a fever and a weakness, the stalemate ended during the soon-to-be legendary Summer of the Grapes.

  Talitha’s clan, on its trek from the northern caves, had been held up by an early summer fever that had spread through the children, so that Serophia’s clan was the first to arrive at the southern spring. Seeing that they were alone, and knowing that Talitha had a passion for grapes, Serophia ordered her kinsfolk to gather all the wild grapes, stripping the vines clean. When the other, smaller clans arrived, Serophia happily traded the grapes for goods the others had to offer—flax from the south, salt from the east. But when Talitha’s large band arrived, there were no more grapes for trade, and none left on the vine. When Talitha heard what had been taking place, her fury erupted.

  She marched over to Serophia’s tent and when she saw the fresh grape juice stains on Serophia’s doeskin skirt, she exploded. “You let he-goats mount you!”

  “Scorpions run when they see you coming!” Serophia spat back.

  “Vultures wouldn’t touch your carcass!”

  “When snakes bite you, they die!”

  Their families had to pull them apart, and while Serophia enjoyed the smug feeling of victory, Talitha secretly plotted retaliation.

  The next summer, Talitha saw to it that her clan arrived at the spring first. There she had her people strip the vines of every last grape, some of which they ate, some of which they traded with the smaller clans. What was left over, Talitha had her people store in watertight baskets, and then hide the baskets in a nearby limestone cave. When the clans returned the following summer, Serophia could harvest all the grapes she wanted, for Talitha would already have a secret supply.

  But when the clans gathered one year later at the perennial spring to erect their tents and huts,
to light their many cooking fires and to commence the summerlong rituals of making deals, forming alliances, judging lawbreakers, Talitha’s people experienced a shock. The baskets filled with grapes, so well hidden that they had indeed sat untouched in the cool dark cave for a year, had undergone a strange transformation.

  The grapes had continued to ripen until they burst, skins mingling with flesh and juice so that the baskets now contained a sluggish mess. But the aroma was not unpleasant, and when one of the seers dipped a finger into the juice and tasted it, he found the flavor exotic and intriguing.

  So Talitha dipped her hand in, scooped out the purple slush and sucked it up from her palm. Everyone waited while she smacked her lips and ran her tongue around her mouth, a look of indecision on her face.

  “What do you think, Talitha?” asked Janka, the current Keeper of the Goddess, a stodgy solemn man given to airs of self-importance.

  Talitha licked the rest of the mixture off her hand, then scooped up some more. She couldn’t decide if she liked the taste of it or not. But there was something else, something she could not put a finger to…

  She drank some more, thought about it some more, and found herself suddenly of cheery disposition. Declaring the grape sludge drinkable, Talitha ordered the men to haul the heavy, swollen baskets back to their camp that was but part of a massive encampment of hundreds of tents and shelters on the plain surrounding the bubbling spring. By the time Talitha’s band arrived back with the baskets, numerous cook fires were sending smoke up to the stars, laughter and shouts were on the air, families were busy about the industry of life, and the people of the Gazelle Clan settled down to ponder the new mystery in their midst.

  Sitting on a wide stool, elbows braced on monumental thighs, Talitha dipped a wooden cup into one of the baskets from the cave and drank again. While everyone watched and waited, she again smacked her lips and ran her tongue around her mouth. A strange taste, she thought, but palatable. There was none of the usual sweetness one found in grape juice, but rather a peculiar kind of dryness. Signaling to the others, they all dipped their wooden cups into the slush and all tasted, some hesitantly, some boldly. Lips smacked loudly, opinions flew around the circle, indecision drove the cups back into the juice again and again.