[50024 Years Ago/ The Lake]
Heba was walking a trail bordered by reeds and cast in the blue light of the moon. It was the deepest part of the night. She found this curious since she couldn't remember leaving Stump Rock to come here.
She came over a low rise and there she saw the four dead rock lizards, but they weren't eviscerated corpses as before. If it weren't for the lethal wounds each of them bore, it would have seemed they were awaiting her.
Heba came closer and studied them. These were definitely the ones Mike had killed, and she could see he hadn't dragged them into the reeds randomly. They were all facing the mountains in a perfect row and were posed to have a regality about them, as if they were chieftains ready for an audience.
There was the sound of light footfalls. Someone was coming up the trail, but Heba wasn't afraid. Somehow, she knew it was Mike. He soon came into view to stand before the carcasses.
"Mike, what are you doing here?" Heba said, but Mike didn't hear her. She could barely hear herself. She looked about and came to the sudden realization that she was in a dream.
"I'm sorry, Great Ones," Mike said to the rock lizards. "You deserved a better death than the one I gave you, and you deserved a better foe, but I had to do what I did. My tribe couldn't live with you nearby. I had no choice." Mike came to each of the predators and touched it lightly on the head. "In my tribe, when a great warrior dies, his heart is buried at the heart of the village to give it strength." Mike drew his knife. "It's the only way I can honor you."
Heba watched as Mike cut the hearts from the lizards, then after he said a prayer to the gods on behalf of the dead, he went back toward the village.
"He felt bad for those monsters?" Heba said, when she was once again alone.
A brilliant light began to shine and Heba shut her eyes to it. After a few moments to acclimate, she opened them again and found herself on the great hill that sat in solitude to the south of the Lake. It was midday and the sun was burning down, but still the sky had a darkness to it, as if the sun were slanting its light down a well.
Heba looked to the village. The hill provided a good view, but she saw no people. It seemed abandoned.
She turned to the mountains in the south. She saw their icy peaks marching to the east and west. Then she looked down the hill and to her surprise there were two men there. Both were strangers to her, and both were strange to look upon. One of the men was short and plump and had a long white beard. The men of the Lake Tribe had facial hair, but it rarely grew more than a few inches. This man's beard hung to his waist. But the bearded one was not nearly as unusual as his companion. He was very tall and had the head of a young man, but the body was made of wood and stone. The arms and legs were sticks, the body a thick trunk, and each of the joints was made of chiseled granite. The man lifted a wooden hand to shade his eyes.
Heba would have been greatly afraid of such a man, but she knew this was still a dream and he could do her no harm.
A rushing sound caught Heba's attention, and she turned to see a flock of many types of birds whirling like a brilliant and multi-colored dust devil around a young naked woman who was dancing gracefully and beautifully as she came up the hill from the north.
When she arrived, all the hundreds of brightly colored birds burst out and away, leaving her alone with Heba. This woman was tall and lithe and beautiful and Heba had to smile to the smile the woman held.
"Who are you?" Heba said.
"You don't remember?" the woman said, then looked to the south. "Strange. You were the one who named me."
Heba frowned in confusion but then remembered where she was. "What are you doing in my dream?" she said.
"So you know that you dream?"
"Yes," Heba said, chuckling. "Not that it took any talent to guess."
The woman nodded but didn't take her eyes from the south. "You asked what I'm doing here," she said. "I'm waiting."
"Waiting for what?"
"For Mike."
Heba looked to the south but could see nothing on the plain. She looked up to sky and the many birds there, then her mouth fell open giving a gurgling sound. She pointed once she could speak again. "The birds," she said, "they don't move."
"No," the woman said, glancing up to the birds, each frozen in midflight, then she looked to the south again. "Nothing moves. All in creation wait to see if Mike survives."
"Mike's in trouble?"
"A great deal."
Heba went forward. "I have to help him."
"You have," the woman said. "Now it's up to him if he survives."
Heba sensed something profound in what the woman had said; something that was on a scale that nearly overwhelmed her. She came back to the woman. "What happens if he doesn't survive?"
The woman shivered though it was a very hot day. "Then all is over."
"Can't you help him?"
The woman looked with sympathy on Heba and said, "It's one of the few things in this Universe that I can't do."
Heba looked fearfully to the south, hoping to find Mike somewhere in the expanse of yellow grasses, but she could see no sign of him. She turned to the woman again. "What happens if he does survive?"
The woman nodded as if to convince herself this was possible. "Then we will begin the Second Turn of the Wheel."
"I don't understand," Heba said.
"You will one day, but now is not the time. However, you will notice your power will grow as a seer. Soon enough, you'll not rely so heavily on dreams to know what to do. You will know in your waking hours. You will know . . . here."
She pointed to Heba's abdomen.
"Who are you?" Heba said.
The woman looked at Heba and Heba saw her eyes sparkled as if reflecting all the stars in the night sky.
Heba gasped and said, "The Cosmic Dancer."
"I always liked that name," the woman said.
Then she faded from Heba's sight and when Heba looked down to the two strange men, they faded away as well, but she knew all three visitors were still there looking as fervently to the south as they had been.
She also knew that somewhere in her memory were their names, but before she could remember them, she woke.
Heba sprang to her feet, then put her hand against Stump Rock to keep herself steady as her head cleared of sleep. She looked to the solitary hill in the distance, and as parts of her dream came back to her, she began walking toward it to reach its summit and its view of the southern plain.