One day they had traversed a fold in the mountain and a strange sight was revealed, and she felt uneasy and did not know why. Her parents had gone very still. Her mother came to her father and he held her in his arms and neither looked away, though they looked as though they wanted to do nothing else. In silence they stared at the valley below, and it was like nothing she had ever seen.
Burnt mountains rose up from that valley. Blackened stumps like grasping fingers reaching for the sky. They had no natural shape. Squares, white squares, blackened as if by an immense fire. Her mother cried, silently, and her father said, “Tel Aviv,” but still she could not grasp it. The valley below was man-made, her father said, and her mother said, “man- and woman-made,” and her father said, “Of course, that’s what I meant.”
It was made by people. It was the place they often talked about, the Spring, and she was horrified by it. And though it was terribly ugly, there was, strangely, beauty in it too, and she felt herself restless, and didn’t know why.
The wind picked up then, a cold clean wind that swooped down from the mountain to the valley below, and when it returned it was warm and carried with it strange scents she did not know, and sounds, and the sounds were harsh and alien and she felt herself shiver, and her father said, “They’re shooting at each other!”
And her mother said, “So they are still alive. There were survivors after all,” and her parents held each other closer still. And her father said, “But for how long?” and his face was troubled.
Her parents made to turn away from the sight then, but she did not turn with them. For a long moment she stood and stared out at the miniature world spread out below, and she felt many sensations, like hot and cold currents running through her, and a voice seemed to whisper in her head, the way it sometimes did in the isolated places of the world, and she listened to it, though perhaps it was only her inner self that was speaking to her in her own voice.
Her parents turned back to her, and she saw in their faces that they knew her thoughts, and were troubled by them. “Come with us,” they said. “Come back to the high places, where the air is cold and clear and the silence speaks only truth. Come back with us to the great open spaces where the children of the wind run and play. Come back with us — ”
They fell silent then, for they knew her mind, and knew it could not be changed. And so they approached her and held her close to them, and her mother stroked her hair and her father kissed her brow, and she saw them both cry and felt wonder.
And so, at last, she bid them farewell; and carrying no burden, but that of love, she travelled down into the world of women and men.