The Story
? Chapter Four
THE STORY SO FAR: Dalton recounts how he witnessed the arrival of the powerful Eagles on top of the mountain. Only Elders will be selected to meet with them – but oh, how Rainera would love to go!
I wonder if Father will be chosen, Rainera thought as she carried a sack of potatoes from the storeroom. And I wonder what the Eagles are up to.
Bilt, walking behind her, dropped his sack of onions – which spilled all over the floor. Mother, who stood at the window staring into the night, hardly seemed to notice.
Bilt gathered his runaway onions, heaved them onto the counter, and announced, “I want to hear the Story! I was supposed to hear it. Tell it, Rain!”
But Rainera was still thinking about Eagles, and about Father. She was watching Mother. And she was working on her plan to get Dalton to guide her. So she said, “Hold it, Bilt.” Then she asked, “Mother, uh, why do they call dying Going Up the Mountain?” After all, if her plan worked, that’s where she’d soon be going.
Mother turned from the window and said, “It’s an old saying, Rain. Maybe it’s about the Eagles. They land there.” She looked out the window again, wiped her hands on her apron, and shivered.
“But what do they and the mountain have to do with … death?” asked Rainera somewhat uneasily.
“There was lots of foolishness long ago, and some people … died when the Eagles first came,” said her mother. “Maybe it began there. Leave the potatoes, Rain,” she added quickly. “I’ll wash them. Tell Bilt the story, will you?”
“All right,” said Rainera. Clearly Mother didn’t want to talk about Eagles and dying just then. She seemed so nervous and distracted that Rainera regretted even asking her. And her answer hadn’t been reassuring. “Well, telling the story might be useful,” Rainera told herself. “At least I’ll have the details fresh when I go to Dalton’s.”
“Bilt,” she said, sitting across from him at the table, “this is the most awesome night in a century. The Eagles are right above us!”
Bilt eyes widened, and he nodded uneasily.
“You know about the Dark Times?” asked Rainera.
“People rushed,” Bilt said softly. “‘Overreacting,’ Father says. Like in the hall. They were excited and scared.” He whispered the last word.
“Yes,” said Rainera. “Over a thousand years ago, there were awful wars with powerful weapons. After that came the Dark Times. There was sickness, death, bad hunting, and scant harvests.” Rainera imagined those times had not only been dark, but scary, difficult, and unhappy. As for Bilt, he didn’t know all the details, but he knew enough to be uneasy.
“And then the Eagles came and saved us,” continued Rainera. “And now they’re back!”
Rainera paused. “So why is everyone so jittery?” she thought. “Aren’t Eagles, well, good?” Of course, since Eagles were so big, came from outer space, and had advanced technologies, some people found them frightening and even feared the Eagles meant to enslave them.
But Rainera didn’t want to think that way. So she returned to the familiar details of the Story. “And so, everything’s okay now, right, Bilt?” she asked.
She heard a clatter and saw Mother bending by the stove. She was picking up a knife from the floor. It wasn’t like her to drop things.
Bilt nodded unconvincingly. His eyes strayed toward the window. “When did it start getting good?” he asked.
“Like I said, when the Eagles came,” Rainera answered, “a thousand years ago.”
“But how did they know we were here, needing help? And why didn’t they come sooner?”
“How can we hope to understand Eagles?” Rainera answered. Which was the standard response. She hoped it would satisfy Bilt. The truth was, it didn’t satisfy her. She was an adult and supposedly knew all that anyone knew about the Eagles. Yet she couldn’t answer her own brother’s simple questions. “Can anyone?” she asked herself.
“At first we were scared,” she continued. “After all, they were big and strange. But they brought us medicines, tools, instruments, and machines. They taught us advanced doctoring and farming. We once knew those things and more, much more, Bilt, but we’d forgotten. We only remembered little bits, and had only a few tools and machines left. Today, of course, we have things that came from the Eagles, things we invented in the Dark Times, and even things modified from stuff that survived from the Ancient Times before that. Yes, we’ve come a long way, thanks to the Eagles.
“Though the Eagles only visit once or twice a century, the records say they always look the same. They never age, Bilt! Imagine! The Elders say that’s because the Eagles are so wise and grown-up, they have no more growing to do. Of course, no one has seen them more than once – no one lives long enough – but the way they’re described makes us pretty sure that they’re the same.
“Wisest of all the Eagles is Eagle Mother, who reminds us to think before we act, so Dark Times don’t come again.”
“That’s her in the hall,” said Bilt.
“Yes,” said Rainera. “And now …”
The door flew open. Cold and snow whirled in. Mother exclaimed, “Oh!” and dropped a pot lid. Quickly, Father shut the door behind him.
“He looks worried,” Rainera thought. “Like when a patient is sick and he’s not sure what to do.”
When Father noticed them all staring he put on a big, showy smile, as if nothing in the world were the matter. He sniffed the air hungrily, and said, “Yum! What’s for supper?”
As if they could forget that the Eagles were waiting on the mountain! As if they weren’t dying to know who’d been chosen to meet them!
• NEXT WEEK: The Chosen