Raven awakes with the first light of dawn peeking into the cave. Mornings keep coming later and later, now that the Equinox has passed. He peers deep into the cave in hopes of seeing if The Old Woman has woken yet, but the light from the cave entrance is too weak to travel far, and the fire under the three cauldrons has reduced to embers. Raven swooshes down to the floor and swaggers over to the hearth. With a deft movement honed over a lifetime of snatching forbidden items from their clingy keepers, the Trickster plucks a single ember from the fire and skips quickly to the back of the cave.
The ember burns his beak, however, and Raven drops it. Blowing out quick little breaths to cool his overheated beak, Raven also manages to breathe more life into the ember. Tiny flames flicker and lick at The Old Woman’s blanket and the dried Moss beside her bed where Little Snake slumbers. A clump of sod loosened and fell from the cliff’s edge during the first of the autumn storms, and The Old Woman used it to build Little Snake a temporary den inside the cave.
The Old Woman awakes to the startling scent of burning fibers. She looks first to her tapestry, but frowns in confusion when she sees no sign of fire on her loom. A crackling sound beside her ear alerts her that the fire is much closer than she realized.
“Raven!” she exclaims when she sees the sooty silhouette of the Trickster in the dim light. “You already destroyed one of Little Snake’s dens, why must you set fire to this one?” She uses her blanket to smother the smoldering den.
“I didn’t mean to,” retorts Raven, affronted. “I was just trying to see if you were awake, and the fire fell from my beak.”
“A likely story,” mumbles The Old Woman. “Well, I’m awake now, so why don’t you go find yourself some breakfast.” Raven skip-hops away from the cranky old lady with the blanket and takes off flying into the dawn.
The Old Woman gets up and pours a ladleful of water onto the burnt bits of fabric and sod. The sun is not yet up, but she sets about her morning chores, placing the last bit of driftwood on the hot coals in the hearth and sweeping out the cave. Stepping out of the cave into a brief break in the rainclouds and a light, warm wind, she stops short when to her right, a Wolf pads silently down from the top of the island, sniffing the air. The Wolf crosses the highest reaches of the beach before disappearing from sight on her left.
The Old Woman walks down to the beach to collect driftwood for her fire, but stops again when she sees a black-headed Jay nibbling breakfast from a washed up spine and ribcage of a large mammal, perhaps a Sea Lion. The Old Woman stands and watches until the Jay has a full belly and flies off. She continues on her way, gathering bits of sea-tumbled wood into her sturdy arms.
On her way back up to the cave, she hears rustling and quacking, and looks up, high above her, to see a family of Ducks flapping low under the clouds. The Old Woman wonders if the Wolf spooked them, as she enters her cave, ready to add wood to her hearth and sit down for a full day of weaving.
Raven swoops in with the wind in his feathers and a morsel in his beak. He lands on his perch over the entrance and breakfast begins.
“Who are you eating?” asks The Old Woman.
“Seagull,” Raven replies between nibbles. “Do you know any good breakfast stories?”
“Of a sort,” says The Old Woman as she chooses a fine polypore yellow yarn with which to weave. “Would you like to hear it?”
“Klook! Of course!”
“Since the first sunrise spilled across the Earth, there has lived a great Dragon. In every era, she laid a clutch of eggs. When the eggs hatched, her children populated the whole world. The Dragon aged alongside her children, sometimes growing hot, sometimes growing cold. As the Dragon changed, many of her children perished in her fires, floods, and freezes. Those who survived found themselves changed, sometimes in shape, other times in less tangible ways. Fungi taught the plants how to grow roots and join the underground web. Trees that had survived months-long warm polar nights found that dropping their leaves suited them to cold winters. Dinosaurs took to the skies with feathers and to the waters as Alligators and Crocodiles.
“Time passed and the Dragon laid another clutch. From these hatched the furry and the wombed, the hoofed and the clawed. But one of the eggs took much longer to hatch than the rest, and when it finally did, all the furry siblings watched with great anticipation to see what sort of creature their youngest sibling would turn out to be. When the eggshell cracked open, they all looked on in sadness and concern.
“‘Oh no! they have come out too soon!’ they cried.
“‘Look, they have only a small patch of fur upon their heads!’
“‘Look, they have no claws!’
“‘Look, their teeth are dull and small!’
“Kraak! Kraak!” interrupts Raven, laughing. “They sound ugly! What were they, ‘Dragon’s Great Mistake’?”
“Some have said so, but many of them have considered themselves the pinnacle of creation.”
“How humble of them,” snorts Raven. “Who was right?”
“Neither,” states The Old Woman. “So, all the commotion drew the attention of the Dragon’s older children, and they gathered around to catch a glimpse of the youngest sibling of all. Their distress soon drew the attention of the Dragon herself. She looked upon her bare, claw-less, and fang-less children, and upon her other children whose fretting had grown quite loud.
“‘My children,’ she spoke to all her grown offspring, ‘just as the Sun and you and I care for each other, so must we care for my youngest children, the Humans.’
“A Doe stepped forward. ‘My love for the Humans is strong. They are my kin. I will give my body for them to eat and my fur to cover themselves.’
“Inspired by the Doe, a Whale breached. ‘My love for the Humans is strong. They are my kin. I will give them my body to eat, and my bones and skin to build a body to float on the water.’
“A Cedar spoke from the canopy. ‘My love for the Humans is strong. They are my kin. I will give them my body to build their shelters and their fires.’
“The Dragon mother spoke to the Humans. ‘Welcome, my children. My love for you is strong. I give you my body - the stones and the metals - to make the claws and teeth that you lack. I give you my waters to drink, and my winds to breathe. I give you my fire for warmth. I ask in return that you share your own gifts freely.’
“For a long time, the Dragon’s many children lived through her seasons in the dance we call life. Like the mast years on the Oaks, there were times of abundance followed by times of famine. The elder siblings kept the Humans alive, and in return, the Humans offered their own gifts of food, song, beauty, and most of all, tending. Wherever they went in the world, they cultivated and tended life.
“Then a lie spread like a curse through some of the Human clans, claiming that the great Dragon had been vanquished and all was dead and lifeless, and her treasures were just waiting for the mightiest heroes to plunder them. However, there were those who could still hear the Dragon’s heart beating. They tried to ignore the lie, some even spoke out against it, but the conquering heroes turned their curse against the Dragon’s loyal children. They took more than they needed, and claimed ownership of the wild and free.
“In a blink of the Dragon’s eye, her youngest children forgot - or were forced to pretend they had forgotten - to share their gifts. Their songs grew empty and their tending turned to taking. For tied up in the lie and the curse was the paradoxical belief that the Earth’s abundance could never run out, and fear that there was only so much any one person could grab.
“The Dragon tried speaking to her youngest children, but believing she was dead, they paid her no mind. She tried scolding them with disasters, but they brushed off her reprimands with flimsy explanations. They turned all their considerable cleverness to making and taking and heating and lighting, and all for their own desires. They burned the Dragon’s body hot. In her grief, she cried tears that had been frozen for thousands of years.
“Everyone from those born of spore and seed to those born of egg and womb migrated away from the heat around the middle of the Earth. Species perished, yet the Human population kept growing. All of the Dragon’s children feared there would not be enough land or water or food left for them to survive. As they traveled together, though, some of the Humans looked over and saw their elder siblings fleeing in fear beside them. Their hearts ached for their long-divided kin.
“In a refuge where lonely Trees were all that was left of a vast forest, the Wolves paced around an encampment, calling, ‘We are hungry! We are hungry! Can anyone feed us?’
“‘There is not enough food for us. We have nothing to give you,’ came the reply from the refuge.
“But a woman stood up and said, ‘My love for the Wolves is strong. They are my kin, so I will go and feed them.’
“Her family protested. ‘No, don’t go! We will miss you too much!’ But the woman insisted.
“As she walked out to the Wolves, she called back, ‘When you miss me, remember the Wolves. You are the Wolf Clan now, so you must take care of them as they once took care of our ancestors. Look for me with the Wolves, for I will be among them. Join me when your time comes to feed them.’
“In the underwater ruins of a coastal city swam a family of Sea Lions. They called out to survivors who had built a refuge above their lost city, ‘We are hungry! We are hungry! Can anybody feed us?’
“‘There is not enough food for us. We have nothing to give you,’ came the reply from the land.
“But a man stepped toward the sea and said, “My love for the Sea Lions is strong. They are my kin, so I will go and feed them.’
“His family protested. ‘No, don’t go! We will miss you too much!’ But the man insisted.
“As he walked into the Ocean to the Sea Lions, he turned back and said, ‘When you miss me, look for me among the Sea Lions. You are the Sea Lion Clan now, so you must take care of them. Join me when your time comes to feed them.’
“Between the wildfires, the earthquakes, and the sea storms, the Humans lost their shelters and their means for cooking their meager food. The Trees had suffered great losses as well. So when a woodcutter entered a sparse remnant of a once great forest laden with an axe and a saw, a liminal person raced ahead.
“‘My love for the Trees is strong,’ they said. ‘They are my kin, so do not cut them down, but take my life instead. Lay me out here upon these roots and let the Jays and the Weasels and the Worms eat my flesh. Let their excrements feed these Trees—’”
“What about Ravens?” demands the Trickster.
“No, just the Jays,” teases The Old Woman with a wink. Raven fluffs his wings indignantly.
The Old Woman continues. “The liminal person told the woodcutter, ‘When my bones are clean, take them home to burn to cook your food. When my bones have turned to ash, carry them back here to feed the Trees. Then you will have the air you need to breathe.’
“‘But I cannot kill you,’ argued the woodcutter. ‘That would be murder.’
“‘Yet you are ready to kill the Trees,’ countered the person. ‘You will not be murdering me, for I am giving my life freely so that my body will feed many. Take it as a gift and remember me when you come to the forest. Your family is now the Fire Clan, and mine is the Forest Clan. Together, our people will take care of each other. Join me when your time comes to feed the Fire and the Forest.’ The liminal person laid down among the Tree roots on the forest floor, and their death was peaceful, held in ceremony and the woodcutter’s grief.
“All around the world, Humans followed their hearts and spirits to feed and shelter their elder siblings, carrying them as the elder siblings had once carried the Humans’ ancestors. Clans sprang up like blossoms all over the world. In the face of extreme scarcity, they forgot their fears and joined together in generosity.
“They were not martyrs, but Tenders, who lived on in the ties of kinship they formed in the transference of their lives. Their families carried on those ties, following their own spirits’ calls to feed their kin. In so doing, even the most headstrong came to realize that the Dragon had only been buried and ignored, but not killed. Her voice resonated and her children heard her call.”
“I still think it’s unfair,” remarks Raven from his roost, “that you didn’t mention any Raven clans.”
“Silly bird,” tuts The Old Woman. “You Ravens already have Human clans all around the world. There’s no need to get greedy.”
Raven preens his feathers, as if ignoring her rebuke. He did not like the sound of her words hanging in the air too long, so he asked, “What do you think Little Snake would say about your story?”
The Old Woman looks back into the dark recesses of the cave where Little Snake slumbers in her makeshift den with the burn mark on the side. “She would probably not understand how any of the Dragon’s children could choose to let a sibling kill and eat them.”
“Raak!” agrees Raven. “I have a hard time understanding that, too.”
“You have heard the saying, ‘We are what we eat’?”
“Raak! Yes.”
“Well, the inverse is also true,” explains The Old Woman. “That which we feed, we become. Just as the Salmon who ate the nine Hazelnuts from the Well of Wisdom became the keeper of the world’s wisdom, the Hazelnuts themselves lived on as the Salmon. The Hare feeds the Coyotes, thus becoming the Coyotes. When the Humans feed the Wolves, they live on as Wolves. When we feed joy, we become joy. When we feed the Dragon, we become the Dragon.”
“Naark!” laughs Raven. “I feed chaos!”
“And you are definitely chaotic, my friend,” agrees The Old Woman as she comes to the end of her yellow yarn.