Atlas folded his maps by the shore of a great lake. He had expected a canal, as the parchment described an old road that led down the valley to a village beside the River of Creation. Mystified but content to rest, Atlas sat under the shadow of a yew tree and cast his line into the water. He would have to replenish his stores if there was no township to trade with. While the bait sunk into the depths, a woman approached.
‘What brings you to my tree?’ the woman asked. ‘You have the eyes of a traveller and a stomach for stories. There is little here on which to feast but the aril of this yew.’
‘Then on that I shall feast,’ answered he. ‘Tell me how it came to stand by this lake.’
‘No-one has asked me that tale before.’
Atlas shrugged, ‘Then let me be the first.’
The woman nodded and plucked an aril from the tree, as if to hold its memory in her hands. She knelt beside Atlas and watched his line trail deep into the lake. After a moment of reflection, she began to recount the story. This is what she spoke.
There once stood a village by a fast-flowing river. The houses were plain but homely. People there were few as the valley sloped such that access was difficult. It would take a boy and his cart a full day to descend from the valley’s edge. This afforded the village its isolation, supported only by the river that ran along its length. This blessing nourished the soil and procured food in the form of fish, eels and small crustaceans. Without it, life on the valley floor would become unworkable. For this, they named it the River of Creation.
Their days passed in solitude. The elderly died, their young grew old and fostered offspring of their own. With the passing of a generation the small village forgot about the world above. The paths were unkempt and grasses soon disguised any route leading out of the gorge. There was but one crone left amongst them who told the old stories. Her eyes had seen the suns of long ago, and her body bore scars of beasts not known to the village. Frail in her age, the stories she told became far off myths. The children played until all was merely rhythm and rhyme – its origins lost amongst the widow weed. The crone was not wistful at this. She did not chastise the young for their ignorance - for she understood that with each new proverb comes the moral of one far older. Left to their own beliefs, the village prospered with local traditions.
This winter was particularly harsh. The River of Creation carried a bitter chill through the valley. Many of the men whispered that the sun had finally fallen from the sky and that this was the last year of the world. Families struggled to abide. However, winter had never come to pass without honouring the river’s fertility. The villagers feared that an everlasting night would swallow the valley were the ritual not performed. And so, a week before the solstice, young women were told to choose an elder to ready them for the task.
They honoured the river each year. It was enacted in the depths of midwinter – a fertility rite to withstand the most barren of months. The ceremony was weighted on the gentle shoulders of those girls at the cusp of their adolescence. Under an elder’s guidance, they would negotiate the fords that crossed the river. It was both an initiation into the rigours of womanhood and a trial of will. Once across, each youth harvested an aril from the yew tree. The first to return, berry in hand, had her choice of the young men to wed – and so forth, until every girl was matched.
It was the night before midwinter. The children slept deeply, conserving their energy for the trial to come. The guardians too retired early. And so, the village was hushed by slumber - all save for the haste of a feisty youth. Her toes kneaded the tender grass that flew underfoot. She ran, too bewildered to explain the blood on her frock. The girl feared to be seen. The village cried ill omens after those that tainted the earth before crossing the river. Rumour had it that they would be lifted above the men’s heads and tossed into the current. In practice the juveniles often fled, too ashamed to talk of their sin. To break this taboo was to be cursed by bad luck and lusty spirit.
The youth sullied her clothes by scrambling through the trees until her cloth was sullied, clambering to escape the valley. But the walls were too steep, too thick with underbrush. She slowed until she stopped, sat briefly and then stumbled back fraught with tears. It wasn’t until she saw the crone that her crying ceased.
The crone watched the girl trudge distraught through the grasses. It wasn’t until their eyes met that the girl’s pace slowed. They stood at distance, not knowing – wary, waiting for one another to breach the chasm. Neither spoke a word. Their bodies were wooden, tied rigid as if by roots. The youth felt her heart leap but alas, her legs would not follow. Seeing her struggle, the crone nodded once and tapped her cane.
‘Ye who stand like a tree,
Be gentle – come with me.’
A fireplace crackled inside the hut. The youth stared into it as one stares into the immeasurable. How many years of maturity it took to warm her hands for a few short minutes, she could not know. All she felt were the flames it stoked in her legs. Unashamed of the blood on her dress, the young woman scrubbed her blemish with a basin of soap water and a brush. It would clear for but a moment before returning deeper and redder than before. Flustered, she scoured harder until the exertion wore her constitution thinner than the cloth as she worked it. The duty soon took its toll as her head lolled limp, taken by the soft caress of sleep. So night became day, and the crone rested as her fire slowly burnt to embers.
At the sun’s apex the youth awoke with a start. Her body had grown shapely, and the dress now flushed scarlet from hem to high.
‘What ill omen is this that forms my figure?’ She cried.
The crone was unmoved, ‘It is neither blessing nor curse. The bosom shall swell and fall as the seasons abide.’
Hearing the calls of children friends the youth walked to the door, but found her stride ungainly as it now swung like a woman’s. The young girls were at the river’s edge - some already waist deep in the water. Not waiting a moment, the youth turned woman rushed to the bank. She could not cross without an elder and so beckoned to the crone. Though the old woman moved slowly, they crossed the fords with ease. She was the wisest and knew the path well.
As they reached the farthest edge the earth trembled and the birds wailed loudly. A surge came rushing down the river. It reached over the banks and up to their knees.
‘What ill omen is this that floods my ford?’
The crone was unmoved.
‘It is neither blessing nor curse. The river must swell and fall as the seasons abide.’
The woman picked a berry from the yew tree and was struck by an answer.
‘This river can not cut a valley without crumbling a mountain. So too, the river of creation must find a path through me.’
This revelation was followed by a second, greater tremble that shook the earth such that the birds wailed even louder. The girls knew well that the ford would flood and hurried back to the village. Though the crone was wisest, she was also old and now waited for her breath to return. The young woman waited by her side, dreading the surge that was sure to come.
At once it came, rising up out of the river and curling like a wave. As it swept over their bodies the young woman cried. A fist clenched inside her stomach, dragging her down to the river’s depth. She lost sight of the crone, afraid to look past the blackness before her eyes. Lost in the current, her body sunk to the bottom.
When the woman awoke she was adrift on the river. At once she felt different. Her belly was whole and floated above the water. This she knew was the mark of a mother. In her hand, the aril had been squeezed from the seed.
There came from all around her the tears of the villagers. She could hear them crying, deep below the river’s surface. The yew tree was gone, the crone and herself as well. They wept underwater, submerging the village and onwards until it swelled over the valley itself. And so the river became a great lake, raising the mother by her belly until she washed ashore. Nothing was heard of the village ever since.
Atlas swung his line over the lake, staring out over the water. It was coloured in many hues, as the afternoon was coming to an end.
‘That’s quite a tale. Who told you it?’
‘My late mother,’ the woman answered, also staring across the lake. ‘She planted the seed that day, right here.’
‘Do you believe it?’
‘I don’t know. The tree stands whether I believe it or not, so perhaps it doesn’t matter.’
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