And the sense of flight changed, altered, gaining Power and the memory of times long past and places far away. Green Spider circled, drawing the clouds around him like a thick cocoon.
In one scaled foot he clutched the Power of lightning, ready to strike. With his keen Spirit, Vision, he studied the scene below.
“Many Colored Crow?”
“I have heard you crying for a Vision.”
“But I … it’s so … “
‘‘ down! Observe. This is one of the two holiest days of the year.”
Despite the sullen cold of winter, people had braved the chill to journey from isolated farmsteads or from the loose aggregates of oblong houses where they gardened, hunted, and gathered food during the year. From as far away as a six-day walk, they had converged on the mound center of the City of the Dead.
They came wrapped in blankets, their feet bound to shield them from the crusted snow. Their backs were bowed, burdened by pots full of food, offerings, or the ashes of those who had died during the preceding year. Some had come along the rivers, paddling canoes through the icy waters of still swamps and meandering streams.
People congregated here four times a year, on the solstices and equinoxes. Some came to bury their Dead, others to honor their ancestors, to bring them food or gifts—to remind the Dead that the living remembered and cherished them. To beg for help in the coming year.
Still others came for the feasting and dancing, for on this winter solstice, the shamans would welcome the new year and invite Father Sun to begin his trip northward. Observances would be kept, and sacred artifacts would be cleaned, their Spirits ritually fed and cared for before being stowed in receptacles within the temple buildings.
The ceremonial societies would Dance and perform the rituals that would ensure a good year for all. The young who sought initiation would be tested. Those who passed the ordeals would be accepted into the secrets of their societies. The structures and enclosures within which these events occurred would be inspected and plans laid for their upkeep. The sacred grounds of the City of the Dead would be policed, and invading saplings chopped out.
During the four days of the ceremonies, clans conducted most of their business. The female clan leaders would decide which crops would be planted in spring. Fields needed to be rotated and farmsteads moved. Hours would be spent in serious council regarding soils, seed crops, and where the forests should be cleared. Internal matters would be dealt with: disputes settled, marriages negotiated, and in some cases, divorces granted.
“Will this Vision give me the Power to call the storms? To control nature and people?”
"Green Spider. You seek order, and you will find only Truth. Look at them. See the people? You will never see them the same way again.”
As Green Spider gazed down from above, most of those people slept. He turned his attention to the long, thatched temple that stood just south of the highest mound in the central group.
There, five men remained awake despite the hour.
Four old men, the Clan Elders, sat inside the temple. They hunched like shriveled toads as they watched a naked young man prone on the floor.
“Me … that’s me!” Green Spider’s senseless body still lay facedown on the mat-covered floor. How pitiful his flesh looked, inert, little more than warm clay.
“Yes, you … as you were. Who are those old men who watch you so? Is their faith in you justified?”
“They are the Clan Elders, the old men who see to the rituals.
They are the Spiritual guardians of my people.”
Green Spider studied the familiar Clan Elders. Summer suns and winter winds had deepened and enriched those walnut complexions with a patina of age. Copper ear spools hung from stretched earlobes, and the wrinkles camouflaged faded tattoos.
Mouths puckered around toothless jaws, but their eyes remained bright, sharply focused on Green Spider’s inert body.
They wore long winter coats, fringed shawls, and fur-lined moccasins that rose to mid-calf. The cloth, woven from processed nettle and milkweed, had been spun into the finest of fibers before master weavers had strung thread over loom. Great artistry had gone into the weaving, and intricate patterns decorated the carefully dyed cloth. The color represented each Elder’s clan affiliation.
The Red Bloods were the clan of the east; to them, the color red was sacred. They dyed it into the stunning fabrics they specialized in producing, and painted it on their bodies for the ceremonials.
Blood represented the Power of life that was shared by all living things. With it, the clans renewed the fields in spring and painted themselves after a successful hunt to thank the Spirits of the animals upon which they depended. Old Man Blood carried a conch shell, the symbol of his office.