Celtic Tales 9, Gall, the Continent

Tale 1:

Gulf

I have done a lot of things in my life, but the one people still want to hear about is the day when the fire came from the heavens; the land went away; the sea came, and the trader people were no more. They keep saying that, but it wasn’t just one day.

According to my mother, I was a very bad person that day. My brother and I had fought many times, and Mother finally punished me by sending me to my room with no supper. Anytime my brother was afraid to do something, then I wasn’t allowed to do it either. Why would I get along with this guy? He was older than I was. I was for the wild and exciting things; he was studious and unimaginative. I always knew she loved my brother more. He was so weak. I couldn’t see why they even worried about him. Going without a meal didn’t bother me too much. I was ten years old and liked to go on the trail, so I had trail food squirreled away. That afternoon was just too much. I was hurt that I had been so badly wronged. I took my blankets, my food, my knives, and everything. I filled up my jug with water and snuck out the back way. I went up the hill and stopped at Garro’s house.

I said to my best friend, Garro, Why don’t you come with me? I am running up on the hill into the woods away from home forever.

He said he would come and he ran to tell his mother. She made me stop. She looked at me oddly and said, You must eat. We have just cooked a pot of food and flat bread.

I will not stop, because you will send someone for my parents.

She smiled and said, Well, here. She poured most of the stew into a clay jar, put a lid on it, put the retainers on, tied it, and slung it in the carry case. She gave her boy two skins of water and one thin blanket, but she knew I always shared my blankets with him. I had three good blankets. You are supposed to have your ground cover over you too, but I would always put it flat so we could both sleep on it. You get a little damp in the dew, but that dries out.

We went up the hill. There was a lake up there far up, but we could not reach it that night. We settled down and went to sleep. When the moon came up we woke. I wanted to get far away from my parents, so we went on up the hill and finally got to that lake. We came up over the west side and down a small incline to the lake. The moon was going over, so it was shadowed there. We picked up some branches and got a fire going. We had just lain down when the skies lit up off to the west as if the sun had come up. Quickly we scuttled around and got more firewood. Suddenly there was a wind like you have never seen before. It sucked the breath out of the air. It sucked the dirt off the ground. We quickly grabbed our stuff and we ran to hide in a nest of rocks. We had just dropped in that nest of rocks when the wind came back from the other way and drew the lake up over us. It was not solid; it was like very heavy rain. Where we had been there was nothing. Then there was another wind that came from the west and a lighter one going back again. It did that two times in each direction. When it came back from the west a second time, it was like a whisper or a breeze. There were smells like I’d never smelled before or since. It wasn’t just the fire. There were other smells in the air. We saw things traveling through the sky with that wind when it went over head. I swear, it looked as if trees, whole trees and other things that I felt I should be able to identify, light spinning things, were flying through the air. Even today I don’t know what they were, just patterns from long ago. We had trouble breathing, bad trouble. I guess that was because the wind sucked the dirt up off the ground. It settled back down and we went.

I looked at that steep slope behind us and I was worried about being in that nest of rocks. But it was the only shelter and we needed some place to get away from that wind. I was afraid the rocks were going to go click with us between them. We went to a place where there was a flat sheet of rock that the hill had gone down around before. We went up on that huge flat rock that tilted a little bit. There came from the sky a rain of hot mud and fiery rocks that set the woods on fire in a big burn. We could hear the lake popping and sizzling. We kept waiting for one of those hot things to come down, hit us, and kill us. We were afraid we would get hit, so we tumbled off there into the water. We hid under my ground cloth and blankets, dipping down under the water every now and again to keep the cloth wet. We kept doing that and God spared us. Near us we heard constant noises like sizzling as the hot rocks and debris hit the water. When we went in the water was cold. When we got out it was very warm. Fish were floating belly up. We talked about eating them, but we were afraid to eat things that died naturally.

We looked around and tried to figure out what to do. Garro kept yelling for his mother and father, his sisters and brothers. I didn’t care. I was punished too many times for too many things I didn’t do or for things that my brother was equally guilty of. We knew all the people were dead. I didn’t care about anything at the moment but staying alive. We saw fire everywhere down below. I think it was those hot stones coming from the sky. To this day I can hear them sizzling into the water. We kept waiting for one of them to hit us. I know it would have gone all the way through us.

When we came out of the water, there were burnt rocks all over that area we had been. Our blankets had burned a little bit, but they were wool and they were in the water with us. That day we heated up the stew with half burned wood that we found. We ate it and then kept it hot so it would not spoil. We still had my dry food, but not knowing how long it would be before we could get more food, we were careful to eat only what we needed.

We went back up over that ridge. We saw smoke and forest fires. All the stuff inside that bowl was smoky and had burned that night. We went back to the bowl and the lake. We stayed there until the fires were gone. The heavens had covered over with a reddish-orange color that lasted most of the day. It was not dark but you could hardly see. The next day was dark and cold. We went over around the lake and off the other side. It had burned there too. We had a little food. We talked about going back to the west, but we went east because there were no smoke clouds there. The east side had been logged heavily, and so what was there had mostly burned. The other side of the mountain would burn for days. We packed water from the lake, and we went down below.

We saw ships racing in under full sail. We waved. They put off a small boat and picked us up. They sailed around the new island that used to be a mountain. Water covered the cities and villages. Our plantation had been no where near the seacoast. There had been jungle and farmlands below our mountain, Mt. Aruba. Now the mountain was an island and all around was sea water.

I never saw my parents again. I still feel guilty about that. The fires had burned the towns, burned everything. The sea people said that the hammer of God had struck the earth and struck off part. God had decided that the trader people had had enough time; that they would be no more.

I don’t know how long the lights were out; it seemed like years. The sea people don’t worry about such things like the land people do. What do they care for such things? They worried about how it affected the weather, but if they needed wood they could just go to the other side of the ocean. If things are too bad one place they just sail somewhere else.

I don’t know where the thing hit. It couldn’t have been too near or I would be dead. It had to be far away and to the west and a little north. We thought the sun was coming up, and then we realized it was in the wrong place. The sun comes up north; it doesn’t come up straight east. We realized it was in the west. We thought oh, oh, the earth is turning. There were a lot of natives that thought the sun came up. They say the earth turned backwards once. Isn’t that funny? They say it went back down again. Then it got cold, bad cold for a year.

When the earth went backwards, some of the people, like the ones on the Washita survived. The medicine men made them go out and chop down trees, many trees. He made them build houses with trees on the bottom, trees on the sides, trees on the top, and sharp shaped roofs. Many people would live in these houses. They chopped down more trees. Everyone brought up more firewood. They killed many animals, dried the meat, and saved the skins. Even though it was dark, he made them go hunting. Even though there were fires, they bade them go where the animals had been driven and killed to retrieve what skins they could. The people who did that did fine. They had a lot of neighbors they never saw again. They think they died.

The old lady on that big ship listened to me. Somebody said that it was a good thing I was in trouble at home or I would have been killed too. She laughed. She said that gave me a better than even chance of living. It took me awhile to realize she was saying that I must have always been in trouble. She was correct.

My mother knew many things. My father was put into plantations because they were afraid he would start the old experiments again. I don’t know where they came from, somewhere to the east I think. Both of them wrote extremely well. My father kept his records on clay tablets. I remember him sitting there with that little stick. The clay was on wood. I remember he had just finished this one block and he left it. So I went over and used his stick and made him prettier drawings than he had made. He was very excited and upset about that. Then he stopped and he laughed. Now I think he suddenly realized that it was not so important. After that he would give me a clay thing in a wooden box and one of those sticks. The wood was like a little tray. Someone else had mashed the clay flat in the tray. It was nice and level, even with the top of the tray. It was soft enough to write on. My father made rows of little dents in the clay. Real fast he wrote. They tried to teach me to read and write. I am afraid I am not so good a student. I learned some, but I wanted to be up away in the mountains. First I would write and draw and then I would start digging the clay out. Father didn’t go for that.

My mother was a power woman. My father was the kind that experiments. They put him there and told him to raise food or not, but he was not allowed to leave. It wasn’t a bad life. My mother loved him and so the council knew they would do well, but he was far away from where he could begin to do most of the things he wanted to do. He still did experiments, but not like he could have. He grew different kinds of things, but few people wanted them. He grew a plant whose fruit was full of good fibers for clothes. If they are spun right the clothes are warm in the winter and cool in the summer. The plant just opens up and inside is the fiber. It is white usually, although my father grew eight different colors, yellow, chocolate, and such. He called it cotton. People didn’t want it because it had seeds in it. Besides, they had other things to wear. People always laughed at him about that plant, but the traders took it and traded it places. You know how traders are. I always liked his fruit garden. He had new kinds of fruit there. He was always trying to give away seeds to those in the north. Some were sweet and tart; some were sweet. Most were tree plants. Some were vines. He had one berry that was about as big as my thumb and it was black looking, but it left red-purple stains. It was sweet and tart. The flavors were so good. He would start with other plants and he would get them to change. It was very difficult. They don’t like people like him experimenting, because they have blown places up, left places so they glow in the dark for generations. Most people do not like people who do something different. They like the results though. My mother loved my father, but she would not let me go near his lab. She was afraid I might grow an extra eye or something. He had his woman, his children, and his lab. That was mostly what he cared about.

When I was young I had been up in the hills with my friend and one of his brothers. We had been attacked by the tusks. I had taken a rock and beat a limb off a tree. I beat the end off of that and I beat the tusks when they came close. I hit them on the snout. The forester heard them screaming and came to see what was wrong. He went down and got the hunters. When they came the tusks had already gone away. The hunters looked at my club and they were very excited about it. It took me a long time to make. The blisters on my hands broke and blood dripped down, but what else was I going to do? My mother gave me a hug and then she spanked me because we had been gone for two nights up that tree. It wasn’t our fault. I told her that, but she usually didn’t listen to me. My mother always listened to what my mother wanted to no matter who it was, us kids, dad, or other people. She was a nice lady and I loved her, but I wasn’t broken up the way my friend was broken up.

I remember the first time I ran all the way to that lake without stopping. I got up there, rested, drank some water, and worked my way back down that hill. I went to my mother. I was so excited. I told her I ran all the way up that hill to the lake without stopping. I thought it was so great.

She said, Oh, oh. What are you doing going out by yourself? You don’t do that, young man. You don’t do anything.

I was very disappointed. I told my father. He was overjoyed. He told me that was the most wonderful thing. After that I ran every day I could think of until it got boring. It was amazing. The first time I ran up there it was difficult, but after that I had no trouble. Things that once seemed remote were now right there. The human mind is strange.

My brother would always wimp out. I don’t know how many times I wasn’t allowed to do something because he was afraid to do it. My mother was always worried about my brother because he just didn’t have any guts.

My father said, Why worry about that? He is just like your brother.

She got angry, but he spoke the straight, plain truth. Sometimes Father greatly offended people

I found out that I am not an average clansman. The council had been watching me since I was a small child because of my parents. That is why the boats rushed in so fast after the explosion.

They finally found a home for my friend. They put him ashore with their protection as an apprentice to a merchant because he seemed able to trade well. They gave the merchant the money he wanted to apprentice him and then bought a big share for his ventures. You should see the merchants’ eyes light up when the sea people trot out that pure white salt that flows like fine beach sand. They make it. Or gold, gold is always good.

The people who are born on the ships move around the rigging like fish swim in the sea. They lose some of them too, but if they didn’t they wouldn’t have the quality. I felt smothered in their society with their constant attention to money. It isn’t just the money; it’s the power. It is not just what people owe you, but the rate at which they consume from you. God help them if they get sick or hurt. But I neither fit on the ships, nor could they find a place for me ashore.

So I said, Take me back to the closest place to where I came from.

I wish I had been older. Then I would have known more. But if I had been older I probably would have died, because I couldn’t have hidden in those rocks, or would have stood up to see what was going on. I was small, but I was strong. We were barely in those rocks. We got right down there in the base of those rocks. We could feel the wind lifting us up.

They took me back to a place where the great Mississippi came down. They took me up it until they reached the bluff. They said it was close to where I came from. How do I know? Where I came from is underwater with a little island sticking out straight south of where the Mississippi now dumps. That all used to be land, except for lakes and rivers and such. They took me up until the river came in from the west. They let me off there. The natives named their river after me. They say it is the river where Washita lives. I lived there for a few years when I was a young man. The traders came and said there was a council who would have me for their seer, their messenger. The one they had was getting old. It was time to train a new one.

I said, I don’t know much about that, but it beats the heck out of eating roots and berries.

I went to that place. They taught me many things. I would have been better off eating roots and berries. The council is a pain.

I am going to try to talk the sea people into taking me away. Right now I live on Shark Island. There is no place to go to get away from the council. People don’t come here much. There are two good harbors. One has lots of coral. The other is a natural harbor. There is fresh water that the people catch from rain. Other than that, there is no fresh water and not much edible growth because of the way they plant. The only way off is with the sea people. It is lonely. My life is boring and average, except when I am carrying messages. The council sits there and thinks up problems they have. They worry about what the younger people want to do; they are hard to control. These old men from the council are on this island. The sea people, for money, must bring them food, water, and lots of stuff. Of course the sea people enjoy playing there on the beach with the pink sand. I don’t know where Shark Island is. Even small boats are not allowed. Some of us might go to freedom. I am allowed to talk to the sea people sometimes, but I must be very careful. Those old ones are not above chopping off a man’s toes. I could make future promises to the sea people, but I don’t like being indebted. They probably wouldn’t go for that anyway.

The sea people could take me where I want to go and tell the council I was washed overboard. They are good at that. I used to sail with them. I’m not bad in the rigging. I am not great either. I go for sails with them every now and again, but they are very careful to stay far from shore. We just go out and run for the fun of it. I swim hard and I run on the beach, but I am not as much in condition as those sailors. We have servants, but this is a prison. It is a nice prison, but it is still a prison. Most of the servants live way around on the tail. That side has bugs.

The council wants me to go to a council meeting in Karnak to help them stabilize some land for a big building project. I could sit around and make some beads out of the pink coral. I did that for awhile to fight boredom. I still have my equipment for drilling and shaping. I guess I could take it to this conference and give it to people for gold. I will go look at this place and see what is going on. I will take these coral beads in my personal traveling pouch. I thought I would make them oblong with two or three groves along the sides. I have a machine that turns and I can make the bean shape pretty fast and then drill holes. If they split, throw them away. I’m in it for the most I can make the fastest. I made some beads a couple of years ago. I made big ones and little tiny ones because I was bored. The machine is still in the main room of my apartment. That is one nice thing about this place, everyone has plenty of room. Of course it is not just for us. There is no water here. We have these very large houses with roofs that will collect the rain water. You must have so and so much roof on the average for each person. The sea people charge a dear price for every keg of water they sell them. They can get it.

After the meeting I will pay the sea people to return me to the continent bypassing the island. I still have trouble believing that the plantations are all under water now. Life is fragile; it can be forever changed in an instant.

Tale 2:

Guardian

I am known as the guardian. I lived west of Mu in the foothills. We had rice paddies, mulberries for the silk worms, and little blossoms for the bugs for the silk spiders. We let our spiders roam and capture their own bugs. We don’t like to just feed it to them. As a result our spider silk is sought more for armor than anyone else’s.

I wanted to go exploring. I couldn’t find any of my friends that were interested in exploring. There were three kooks that I wouldn’t go across the street with that said they’d go, but I wasn’t that desperate. About three weeks after I came riding into town a most beautiful clan woman rode in. She was proud with a high chin. With her were three men obviously brothers. They were her brothers.

She said to me, Are you the guardian who wants to wander?

I said, What do you mean by wander?

When we were small children, my brothers and I read an account book about our uncle’s trip across the ocean. We would like to go east across the ocean, travel on that continent, and maybe settle there.

They were thinking of taking other young people who liked the mountains and their freedom. They wished to go in the mountains in the new place and start a place.

One of the brothers said, Our sister thinks we need you, guardian. I say we don’t need a guardian. We can take care of ourselves.

She said to me, You will fight each of my brothers in turn. If you can beat them, I will allow you to sign on.

They looked at her. I was very angry. I said, First of all, this is my thing. As guardian I will lead the expedition. Someone else can lead the civil stuff. Second of all, I don’t fight the way you say for show. If I fight, your brothers would be dead. One brother leapt from his saddle down towards me. I stepped aside. He landed in the dirt. I put my foot on his neck with my sword to his throat. I told him to go away. Another brother spurred his horse. When he did I cut the lance tip off his lance and tripped his horse. He fell under his horse. The girl was shocked, because this was a fine animal. I said to her, What do you care? Do you think you are going to take horses across the ocean?

For the first time she realized she shouldn’t do that. I don’t know what she thought she was doing. I lifted the horse so the brother could get out. He was very angry. I told them they were probably going to be too angry for me. They would not like to have me around. Two days later she came back alone. She said I would lead the expedition once we got to the other side.

I said, I want big input on the planning on what to take and that sort of thing.

She said, That’s fine, but I decide who to take. Probably all clan, but maybe some other people too.

The unfit will die fast.

I got together my kit, and I was leaving. Down from the hill came four members of the Clan of the Bear. I looked at them and found my kind of people.

They said, We do not have money to pay for passage.

The look of the eagle was there. They were high country people.

I said, Come along. I will feed you. If we get to the new land, then you can feed me while I learn new ways.

But it will be new for us too.

I laughed and said, It will be mountains. Their eyes laughed when I said that. They were coming. Part of my contract negotiations was for eight people. Six made a good start. One man knelt down and said he would swear sword fealty. I said, Sword fealty is not necessary. We can be friends.

He said, No. If we go as a group with a leader, our fortunes wax or wane with those of the leader; if we go alone we will go with a group of flatlanders. I will not be comfortable with that.

I was not born in the high mountains.

No, but you are of the Bear Clan. You are our people. Even if you weren’t bear, you’d be our kind of people.

I knew what he meant, so I outed my sword. When he saw my sword his eyes grew very round as did the eyes of the others, for they knew that those of us with a sword that fine don’t let it be seen much. When I kill they rarely see the color of my blade for it is done and sheathed. I’ve seen others follow my style since then, but I don’t think people understood. Out, stroke, and back so fast people don’t notice the weapon. Everyone, even the women, swore sword fealty. I thought that strange at the time, but later on I found that those women fought as hard as the men.

They came packed the day before we departed. They had their packs on their backs. I had horses ready for them. They had ridden, but not the large, lowland beasts like the women had sent us. I could see they felt uncomfortable high off the ground like that, which is odd since they were mountain people. I always like to have extra things for when we are going down. I thought we might find good bargains, so I had three extra horses and two extra riding pads, not the saddles but the pads because sometimes they get wet or sweaty. I like to have extra for my horse so I do not gall him sore. I know they weren’t my horses, but I told that woman eight. As we were getting ready to leave it was about three hours before daylight. We wanted to be well down the road before daylight. I knew these people. They would eat a handful of ration from the saddle, take a swig or two from their canteen, and that would be it. I would have to stop for the horses, not the people.

We were just pulling out when a shadow came forward and said, Sir. I looked. There was a woman in a travel cloak made of good material. By daylight