The Path Changes the Traveler Ch. 01

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I haven't looked in here in ages, not really wanting to after finding my work published freely without my knowledge and permission. But recently, I came to a realisation about why I wrote anything in the first place.

Mostly, it was out of a need to get what was inside of me ... well, out.

So if anybody might want to give this a try, this is a tale that really has two parts. A sense of history mandates that this part comes first. I used some historical facts to guide me along here and there, but beyond that, it should be remembered that this is a work of fiction.

There's no sex in this for a few chapters and if it bothers the reader, oh well ...

0_o

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1963 Eritrea

Her eyes opened and after a moment, she sat up in her bed. It wasn't a bed in the sense that most people in any sort of western culture might know. To likely anyone like that, it was little more than a rustic sort of mattress on a cleanly swept dirt floor, but then those same people didn't know any more about living here where she was than she knew of them and where they slept.

To her, it was her bed.

At first, she thought that it must have been her cramps which had caused her to awaken, but after a moment, she knew that it wasn't like that. Menstrual cramps were something rather new and very unpleasant to her, though it said that she was on the edge of her womanhood among her people.

She was thirteen and soon, her family would build her a house of her own where she would live her life, as it was done by her people for thousands of years. She wondered how she was to manage it, if she was to be afflicted with pain such as this at intervals her whole life long.

Hers cramps were awful, often confining her to this bed for a few days. She wondered how all of the women in the world that she was aware of could even cope at all. Most of the time, she wanted to weep though she never did somehow, at least not so anyone could hear her. A lot of the time, she forced herself to get up and do the things that living here demanded of everyone. You could only afford the luxury of lying in bed - no matter how much it hurt - when you had enough to eat.

Lying in bed in the agony of your period didn't get you the water that you need to drink or the food that you need to eat so that you can stay alive. For now, her family made some slight allowances for her. But soon she would live on her own and her survival was largely her own problem to a degree, not that she'd be allowed to perish, exactly, but still ...

She still didn't understand why she'd woken up, but she noticed that she wasn't feeling crampy at the moment, so that was a wonder all by itself which she wasn't about to question.

She looked around and saw that she was alone. None of her family were there and that was an odd thing, given the time of day. She couldn't say just how she knew, but she did know that it was evening. If nothing else, her mother at the very least ought to be here. But she wasn't. Where were her brothers and her sisters?

"Are you going to only sit there all evening?" she heard her mother's voice say from outside.

She got up and stepped to the door of their simple home and made to step out. "I wondered where you were, Mother," she said, "I am glad that you are he-"

She stared at the figure outside, sitting near to the outside cooking fire to warm herself.

Hearing the girl's voice, the creature turned and looked back for a moment.

This was not her mother, the girl thought.

This was a, ... a painted wolf, the largest of Africa's canids and though the girl didn't know it, they were second only to the gray wolf of North America in terms of size, which made them the second-largest naturally-occurring wild dogs of any sort on earth. Male and females typically went as heavy as 80 pounds or so and could stand as high as three feet at the shoulders on their very long legs.

They were tall and lean animals and bore little resemblance to any sort of wolf to a westerner's eyes. Their fur was short overall and they looked to be wearing a patchwork quilt, though the heads were usually all similar with their black faces and snouts under a very light tan-colored head with the ever-present dark stripe running down the middle of their heads to join the darkness over the nose.

Even their ears were substantially different. No long and narrow wolf's ears to these creatures. What was there looked much more like radar dishes than the ears of a wolf.

"You are not my mother," she said, "Why do you speak to me with her voice?"

To her amazement, the animal began to speak to her again, still in the same tone. It was startling to see.

"What sort of voice do you wish to hear from me? I chose this because I knew that you would listen to what I say to you then."

The shape began to shift a little as the creature stood up. Altogether it was rather humanlike, though the overall appearance was still very much that of an African Wild Dog. Now, however, she looked to have human traits and features all under the guise of the animal.

"Come Daughter," the thing said pleasantly, "My time here is short this night and I have things to tell."

"Are you a ghost or some sort of spirit?" she asked the thing, "Are you some sort of god?"

The creature smiled and shook her head, "No. I am one who troubles to come to you so that I might speak wisdom to you. Come," she said, slipping her long pawed arm over the girl's shoulders, "Sit with me and let us eat together."

Surprised at herself, the girl sat next to the animal and they shared some meat by the fire. When she asked, she was told that they were eating gazelle.

"I have chosen you as my learner. You do not see it yet, but it is plain to me that we are much alike."

"But you are not one of the ones which I am to know of and say prayers to," the girl said.

The beast nodded, "So if that is so, are you saying that you shun the teaching that I have for you alone?"

The young girl hesitated, "Well, no, ... but -"

"Good," the animal nodded, pleased, "It shows that I was right to come then. For our time together, you are to call me Mother - the same as you would say to the woman who gave you life. I am the one who will give you wisdom of a special kind."

They sat together after the meal and the girl looked over, "Where is my mother and my family? Where is everyone?"

The creature shrugged, "Not here."

She looked back at the girl and asked, "Have you ever seen one like me before? Like this? The way that I am here?"

The girl shook her head, "No. I have seen many of your kind, but none like you, who can look as a woman inside a painted wolf."

"That is because I am not there, where you live. I live here. Now let us begin."

She extended her long and thin arm, moving the pawed hand across the night horizon. "The reason that I have come is to say that this; ... all of this, which has been this way for both your kind and mine forever is beginning to change. That change will affect us both and all of everyone else besides.

I have seen you hunt, learning the ways of it from your father," the canine girl said to the human one, "I have seen as well that you try to learn the ways of the warrior when it is something not done by the women here. It is another reason why I have come.

You do it because you love your father and enjoy spending time with him. He loves you in return and shows you what you wish to know. It has turned into a young girl learning what some might say is not for the girl to know.

But you must know something else, Daughter. The warrior's way leads to one becoming a warrior. That is simple and clear. What is less clear is the way that you will be seen by the men of your own kind. They will not see you as a warrior at first. They will see a girl who does the things of a warrior and has no right to it.

Your people give much power to their women as it is. Men cannot be the sorceresses or the diviners, the healers and the soothsayers. That is a woman's place if it is seen that she has the power as a girl."

"I don't have that," the girl said.

"It remains to be seen in time," the animal smiled, "Not all with the power come into this world waving their tiny hands and watching the things around them move from it. In many, it comes later in childhood.

In some, it comes late, but when the gift comes, it comes almost all at once. It is my belief that you will be one like that.

It is true, you have little now, but you have other things; a sharp eye and a very strong arm for a girl; a quick mind and a hunger to know and make your place. If you continue along the warrior's path, you will become a warrior - no matter what the men say or think - and no matter what they say that you ought to do as a woman.

I am here to help you. All of this will change soon. At that time, you will be a warrior just when you are needed. But, ... "

She held up her paw, "It is a sad truth that one who is such a person and who helps her people will find that at the end of things, she is no longer one of the people who she did it all for.

The path changes the traveler.

You must know this, so I say it now - right here at the outset."

The young girl was trying to understand all of it, "What will happen?"

The creature shrugged, "What is the purpose of a warrior? Tell me this first."

The girl thought for a moment, "Well, to fight."

"Not so," her strange companion replied, "That is how the purpose is accomplished, girl. The purpose of a warrior is to make war in either direction, always to the front, whether advancing or withdrawing, but it is always the same.

I am here to meet my learner. You and I will speak like this often, and I will teach you what you need to know. My kind knows this way and we know of other ways which your kind has no knowledge of at all. My kind hunts without fear, males and females together.

Hyenas are larger and stronger than we are, and yet, my kind will battle hyenas if we must and with enough of us, we win often - because we have the wisdom to choose our fights.

Even prides of lions give way to us, yet one lion can kill many of us. How do we win then?"

"I, ... I do not know, "the girl answered honestly, "but I have heard of this."

"It is because a pride of lions is no match for one of our hunting packs. We speak to each other and work together. What are five or seven lions against twenty-five and more of us? I may hunt with three or four others and bring down my prey, and then lions come to steal what is mine.

I cannot defend against them, and so I withdraw and begin to call on the wind.

I come back with many of my kind and then we eat what we wish and hunt for more. No lion or hyena will do more than stand back and wish that he had our ability.

For all of the respect that your kind gives to lions, it is not deserved."

She held up a single fur-covered finger, "Lions - when they actually hunt for themselves - find success only three times out of ten. If they could not steal from others or eat what we leave behind, they would starve - and yet they are given honor and respect."

She smirked a little sardonically, "When we hunt, we eat nine hunts out of ten. Think on this Daughter, and tell me that the king is not a lowly thief."

She smiled at her student then, "But it is time for you to go, my young student. We will talk again soon."

She stretched toward the girl slightly and licked her cheek once.

----

She opened her eyes the second time and she heard her family eating outside. The girl sat up and was about to stand, realizing that it had been a dream - but for the slight wetness that she felt on her cheek.

She found afterwards that she had these dreams sometimes. That was what she told herself that they were and she told no one of them. The disquieting thing to her was that what was taught to her was nothing that she already knew; the tactics and the hunting. Many of them went against the ways that she'd learned from her father. She kept both within herself.

-----

1964

"Let us think that we are hunting something larger than ourselves."

They sat in the low branches of a tree watching one time as several of her teacher's kind flashed past at the edges of the thundering hooves of many animals in a fear-filled stampede.

"Here is how it goes," the beautiful female wolf said, pointing, "The pack moves near in cover and some go to the outside edges to learn of the extent of the herd. Things are said between them and the main pack.

When all is ready, the main group charges the herd to cause fear and the running begins as they stampede. Each step is an unknown and with the teeth of the pack behind them, almost none dare to slow even a little, though it must be said that depending on the kind of the game being hunted, one or two may turn to fight or to give the young a better chance to get away."

She smiled a little, "Those ones are mobbed and pulled down as quickly as possible. There is no hope for the herd to be had there.

The outside ones keep a moving fence to hem the herd in tightly. One by one, the prey is selected and then it begins - the hunts within the hunt.

The first thing is that one seizes the tail and slows the prey. It also causes even more fear and if the one is sick or infirm, the heart may fail and it becomes even easier.

Next, the lips or the nose must be seized. We take even warthogs and buffalo this way. As soon as the prey slows, the rest begin the disembowelment. "

She looked over, "It is a messy thing, but it is done quickly and then the prey is dead. Think to learn how this can be done by your kind."

-----

1964

"What is this change that you always speak of, Mother?" the girl asked as they stood at the edges of some trees, looking out at a vast expanse of savannah.

"It is already here," her teacher remarked in reply, "though it has not come right here as yet. Your land has been at war with the land to the south for a time now. Your warriors fight in the ways that they know, but those ways are not what is used almost everywhere else in this time.

When it comes, there will be much sadness - even for you, Daughter. The warriors will try to stand and fight and then they will die and the rest will be as gazelles who cannot outrun what comes to eat them. Your warriors are famous for their deeds with their long knives, but what good are they against an enemy who sends death from farther away in many ways?

In this time, one no longer needs the courage to look his or her foe in the eye as it is decided between them who will die. They move only one finger and it is done from farther off. Very easy to kill like that."

She turned then, regarding her learner with dark eyes. "Very easy to kill my kind as well like that and it is done every day. In other parts of this land and elsewhere, there are now many men who walk with the sticks which shoot death. They shoot whatever they want, since it is so easy to do now. They shoot because they are bored. They shoot because they can."

"A man is missing," the girl said quietly, "His family looks for him."

The painted wolf nodded as she raised her paw toward the horizon.

"He lies over there. He is the one who came back from the war with the rifle that he stole. He was one of the bored killers to us."

The wolf looked over, her eyes gleaming coldly and her expression grim, "But even the death sticks can only hold so much death. Some few of us know this, and so we waited. When he had used many shots, he turned to go home, not knowing that he had been deceived into shooting at shadows in the evening.

When he turned, he saw the rest of the pack waiting for him. Fools are only permitted so much foolishness.

My kind will leave here soon, before we are all gone. We will live somewhere else.

Some few - we who can see ahead - will leave. Most will not, and those ones will all be killed."

"What will you do?" the girl asked and the creature shrugged.

"I am not here. It does not concern me.

But I will go as well one day and you will know that by then, you will be what we have spoken of because you will not need me anymore.

But for today, I need for you to think.

You see only this land of yours and to you, it is a large thing. But it is only a part of a larger land. That land has fought against the land to the south for a time now. This larger land was given over as a part of the southern land, but the people have always desired to be a nation unto themselves.

Two summers ago, the southern land removed many freedoms and it began."

She looked off into the distance and to her student; it appeared that she saw farther off into time as well for a long moment.

"So there is war, but the warriors fight among themselves as much or more than they fight the southerners. There are many things which split the people. Many still think like clans and tribes when they should think like nations. Many think in terms of the way that they pray and whom they pray to. It is another thing which divides them."

She turned to the girl with a slightly sad smile, "And here, where they have lived for so long, wanting only to keep to their ways, are your people. When the fighting comes here, there will be little else but slaughter, no matter who comes; the southerners or the others from all around you who should know enough to call you sister and yet do not.

Packs fighting against packs while the hyenas laugh and wait to kill what is left to them."

She changed the subject abruptly then with her own question.

"You are ready to become a woman now in the ways of your kind, are you not? You have your own house, I see."

"Yes," the girl replied, "though it still feels strange to me, exciting and worrisome both."

Among her people and left to their ways, a girl was given a house which was built for her by her family at about fourteen. Among her kind, a woman's affairs are her own business, but until she becomes a mother, she is not considered a woman.

A woman is a woman because she can give birth, and until that happens, ... she is still a girl. In her own home, she is free to take as many boyfriends and lovers as she wishes. Sooner or later, she becomes a woman from it.

She can decide to take only one man and marry him at some point, and this was the place where the girl now found herself.

"I will marry soon," she smiled with a mixture of shyness and a little pride, "Ajjiuar is a fine young man and we begin to plan for our wedding."

She sighed with a smiling nod, "He is good for me as a lover and a husband."

The creature turned away then, holding her thoughts to herself, since she knew much of the future. Sad to say, she thought, but even this will be needed to force the last step. It was unavoidable in any event.

"And what of the warrior's way within you?" she asked, "Does he allow you this?"

The girl nodded a little absently, "I hunt as I have the need and the want of it. It is my business, though I do not hold it up to his face very much. I do not wish for Ajjiuar to have to feel shame from the others."

"Are you ready to fight in this new way for your people, when the war comes here?"

She shook her head a little, "I have learned the lessons that you have taught me; how to fight and when to fight. I do not need the death sticks and their noise."

"You will, my learner," the animal said a little sadly, "When the time comes, you will need them."

The wolf's expression turned to one of profound sadness then, "You are not ready to see it yet, but one day, you will need them, and by then, Daughter...

You will ache to use them."

----

1965

She saw her guide a few times after that and then the dreams stopped. The girl didn't really notice it, being the young and busy bride that she was now.

But she had occasion to think back much later when the men came with their weapons. Ajjiuar fought bravely but he was shot down. Before he died, his bride couldn't tear her eyes away as several men finished the one that she loved by hacking him to pieces alive with their machetes, laughing and taunting all the while.