Victoria Blake has a story to tell…

Vanity of vanities, says the preacher. All is vanity.

Aida woke late. She was, thankfully, alone. Whatever other deficiencies Helena had, at least she got up on time. Aida rolled out of bed and tossed a corner of the sheet up to the head of the bed. It lay there, wrinkled, like so many ripples coming in to meet the edge of the laundry bucket.

A normal day began with feeding the chickens. Although Aida’s family was the weaving family, they also kept hens for eggs and a cow for milk. The hens were Aida’s responsibility, and the cow was Lysias’s. Sometimes Aida’s soul was offended that her younger brother got a more responsible responsibility, but most of the time she was glad to leave it to him. So Aida fed the hens, and while they were busy clucking down their feed with crusty greedy eyes, she stole their eggs. She wondered if they ever noticed when their eggs were gone. She doubted it. Chickens didn’t have minds, only instincts. Perhaps she only had instincts too. Maybe the chickens seemed to themselves to have minds. Maybe the gods took something out of her room every day, and she never noticed. Maybe the gods just viewed people as chickens, and their offerings as eggs. And then, did the gods themselves have owners? Or did the chickens have subjects? Although, the chickens weren’t exactly subjects. Aida’s  mind begun working in profane earnest. They were the chickens of the gods. And if they rebelled? Adventure.

The day continued with monotonous hours at the loom, filled with the petty conversations and fights and complaints of her siblings, allowed for a little play in the mosquito-bitten evening, and concluded with a sacrifice. Not a blood sacrifice, but a goods sacrifice.

At the end of the day there were always extra threads; a pile for each weaver. Instead of saving the threads and tying them in the next day, each person took his pile of threads to the priest. If a piece of cloth was finished, he would take the cloth as well. The cloth they gave to the priest for safe-keeping until the next evening when the tailors would pick it up. They left the pile of threads with the priest as well, for his own incense-smelling use. That was the offering to the gods. Then they would take the fresh supplies brought from the spinner the previous night, and go home.

The priest’s house could be a friendly rendezvous, or a sacred terror, depending on what time you came. If you came just at sundown, then you would meet all your neighbors, and there would be no fear. But if you came later, the house would be full of rank smells, and no pleasant chatter would abate the beady eyes and flabby cheeks of the priest.

Aida usually took great care to go on time, but once in a while she got caught up in something, and she would skulk to the priest’s house long after dark. She would make the exchange of sacrifice and supplies as quickly as possible, letting her eyes dart about nervously so as to avoid the priest’s gaze, and holding her breath to avoid the smell.

The first step was the hardest. After that, somehow, it got easier. At the end of Aida’s first abnormal day, she put aside her pile of threads for sacrifice, as usual. Then she joined her friends in a raucous game of hide and seek. This too was usual. She had no close friends—that wasn’t particularly encouraged—but she had any number of friendly acquaintances, especially among the other weavers and the spinners and the tailors. And the terrain was splendid for playing hide. Each house had a miniature woods separating it from the next, and an honest to goodness forest that eventually morphed into a swamp split the village in half with only a small isthmus at the north end. That was where the priest lived.

The boundaries of the game were the forest on the west and south, the priest’s house in the north, and a sainted tree on the east. The tree, marked with a wreath of seasonal flowers and the initials of scores of boys, was the safe base and the counting spot.

Because of the forest, most of the players were from the east side of the village. A few westerners came over, but east and west did not mingle as a general rule. If pressed, neither side could find fault with the other, but it was much easier to stay among your own kind. Only the border kids went wherever they pleased.

Aida had suggested the game of the evening. Thankfully, it had been a pushover, because her plans depended on hide and seek. As soon as the seeker began counting, Aida broke a rule of the game. Taking care not to be seen, she went inside the weaving house—insides were out of bounds.  She scooped up her pile of extra threads, and shoved it down the neck of her tunic. Then she tightened her belt so it wouldn’t fall out the bottom. All the while she glanced about nervously. She could not hear the seeker counting, because you never could. All the same, she wished she could this time. She was counting to herself, but some seekers got impatient and counted fast. She skipped ten just to be on the safe side, and peered cautiously out. There was no one in sight, but then again, people weren’t supposed to be in sight in hide and seek. There could very well be someone hiding with a prime view of the door. She hadn’t thought of that. For a moment she stood, hesitant, her stomach banging against the threads in her tunic. It wasn’t that she was afraid of cheating at the game—she could talk her way out of that—it was just that she did not want to be conspicuous. She wanted them to forget who suggested the game; she wanted them to forget she was even playing. Because she was going to hide somewhere she would never be found.

She was at 100. That only gave her 100 more pseudoseconds to get all the way to and through the forest. She was going to the west side.

With a lump in her throat and a sudden need to crack her right elbow, she slipped out the door. Nothing happened. Surely they would call her out immediately…and if they were saving it for the end of the round, hopefully they would forget…things like that did tend to slip one’s mind in exciting games…

Then she ran. Once she was back in the bounds of the game, she was perfectly safe. They would only think she was indecisive. She ran, holding her stomach so the threads wouldn’t fall out. Then a horrible thought occurred to her. What if her family noticed that her pile of threads was missing? They would notice. For sure they would. They would come in to bring their offering to the priest, and see that hers was gone. So they would assume she had already gone. And then when she came back late…She almost prayed that they wouldn’t notice it, but then she remembered that she was trying to anger the gods, and the irony was too much for her. So she relied on blind hope, and reached the forest panting. Once in the forest, she slowed down. It would take the seeker a while to get to the forest.

In the middle of the forest, there was a brook. Technically, the edge of the game was the west edge of the forest, but in practice it was the brook. Aida decided it would probably be wisest—she laughed. Wisest.—to cross the brook but stay in the forest. She didn’t really want to be seen loitering on the west side, after all. She reached the brook, then crossed it. She stood for a few moments, because the clear part of her plan had run out. Then she did her dreadful deed. She let the threads out of her tunic, and squatted down behind a tree. Watchfully, she dropped thread after thread into the brook, and watched the fragmented rainbow float away from the village forever.

It was a terrible thing, and she knew it. Every sound made her jump, and the oncoming dark scared her in a way it never had before. She had intended to go exploring after her disposal, but she found she was too scared even to stand up. So she crouched, until it was completely dark. But she wasn’t afraid of the gods. Is a chicken afraid of its humans? She was afraid of the little animals that might dart across her path and startle her, and of people, and of being found. But at the same time she wished desperately for company. She wished she had a friend whom she could call “best” who would help her and crouch there and shiver with her. Then they would be shivers of delight, not shivers of sheer terror. It never occurred to her that a real friend would try to dissuade her of her plan.

It had to be quite late by now, but Aida was afraid to move, because she knew the sound of her moving would scare her. But the silence scared her equally. But she just couldn’t move. It was a fearsome quandary, and she found herself biting back a scream. But she couldn’t scream. That would startle thousands of tiny animals, and the thought of little animals darting in fright, rustling the leaves below and possibly running over her foot…it was unbearable.

Presently, though, she managed to calm herself a little. There was nothing really dangerous in the forest. She began to hum, to break the silence. When you sang, it somehow seemed like someone else was with you. Her hum was faltering and guttural at first, but it grew steadier. Then she began to sing, and after a bit she felt she had company enough to stand up. The forest really wasn’t such a bad place at night. She stood up.

A large bird flew up suddenly, scolding at this unseemly disturbance, and Aida screamed. Not like a school-girl squeal, but a genuine scream. She bolted and ran like she was fleeing death itself. At her feet innocent animals awoke and scattered in dismay, and she ran blindly on.

After an eternity of nightmare, as it seemed, she reached the west edge of the forest. She stopped, panting, and looked up. It was a gorgeous full moon, the kind that was huge and round and white like marble. Suddenly the terror of the forest seemed silly. Aida tossed her head, shuddered convulsively, and skirted the forest to the priest’s house as if nothing had happened.

When she reached his house, the fear returned, but it was a new fear. It was the fear of a premeditated lie. Summoning all her courage, Aida knocked. The door opened, and Aida was almost blown over by the smell of incense. The priest looked at her, and his beady eyes seemed to know everything. Aida forced herself to look him in the eye.

“By the grace of the gods,” she said, “I have no thread left today.”

The priest looked her over and over, his chin swaying slightly, and a terrible urge to confess seized her. But she mastered it, and finally the priest turned slowly from her and led her into the room. He gave her the thread for the next day, then wordlessly bade her leave.

As she left sight of the house, she was taken again with a violent shudder, a shudder of simultaneous relief and dread. Then she continued home lighthearted.

When she reached home, she explained that she had hidden so well that no one had found her, and that she had lost track of time, but that immediately she discovered her error, she took her sacrifice herself to the priest.

“Where did you hide?” Helena wanted to know petulantly. Helena was always slightly petulant.

“I’m not telling.”

“Why didn’t you take me?” asked Lysias. This was more difficult. Usually, Aida hated going to the priest alone, so she would beg Lysias to go with her. Lysias liked going to the priest for some reason.

“It’s because the smell of incense gives me good ideas,” he had explained once, but that had seemed implausible. How could a smell like that give anyone good ideas? It gave Aida a headache.

Aida avoided his question. “I’ve got to put my threads away,” she said, and left. Then she claimed tiredness—that was always a serviceable excuse—and went to bed.

After that it got easier.