Erectus does not seem to have reached Australia, though there are patterns of holes drilled in stone that seem to predate the arrival of modern mankind. Pending the solution to that mystery, the human presence on the continent seems to date from about 50,000 years ago. People soon spread all across the region, though resources in the interior were sparse.
One region that could have supported a human population in the central desert is today known as Alice Springs, where a mountain range meets a lake almost in the center of the continent. This makes it an edge zone, where there is a greater variety of species than exist in normal zones. The red gum tree supports many kinds of insects, birds, and mammals, and kangaroos graze in the fields. The time in one sense is about two thousand years ago: the year zero. In another sense—
Rebel woke to a headache. She opened her eyes, and found the scene blurry. She felt her head, and her hand came away damp. She blinked to clear her vision, and saw that her fingers were coated with brownish red. Blood—from her head.
It was too much to assimilate at the moment. She relaxed, closed her eyes, and sank back into unconsciousness.
She found herself in Dreamtime. This was a special state of being. Time separated into four phases: the future, the present, the past within living memory, and the distant past. At the far end of the distant past was the Dreamtime. It was the primordial period, when the ancestors traveled across the world, shaping the landscape as they went. The time before the great flood that washed away the previous landscape.
Dreamtime was also a state of being that extended across the other phases, so that sometimes people could reach it, through ritual or magic, and briefly become their ancestors. They could thus liberate their powers for a while, and re create the great journeys of their fore-bears. The logic of Dreamtime was not that of the normal world. There were no paradoxes or confusions there. Great distances could be covered in minutes, or a short walk might require many hours.
So Rebel walked the strange yet somehow familiar landscape, intrigued by its oddities. It was too bad that the flood had wiped it out, yet that had made possible the terrain that she lived in. She pondered the several explanations for that awful flood. Some said that ancestral heroes known as the Wandjina had caused the flood, then sent each to their own countries in the new landscape. Others believed that a blind old woman named Mudunkala had emerged from the ground carrying three infants. Maybe she had not impressed others, but as she walked across the barren wastes to the islands, water had bubbled up from her tracks, so voluminously that it raised the level of the sea itself and separated one land from another. But perhaps the most authoritative version was that the rainbow, in the form of a great serpent, made the flood, so that it would have a compatible place to sleep. That serpent was believed to exist still, hiding in the deepest pools. Woe to anyone who disturbed it!
Rebel loved it here, but she could not stay. Her own realm was drawing her back. Reluctantly she let herself be hauled to the present. She felt the water of the flood flowing from her head as she passed through it to reach her own phase.
This time when she woke, Haven was there, sponging off her head. Rebel was relieved to see her; Haven was very good at taking care of children and ill people. In Dreamtime Rebel might be gloriously healthy, but in the present she was an invalid. She opened her mouth to speak—but was unable to put together the words. They simply wouldn’t formulate.
Haven spoke. It was a liquid stream of sound, completely unintelligible.
Had she returned to her own realm? It seemed real, especially in its discomfort, but this was supernatural.
Rebel tried again to speak, but somehow the words were like stones she couldn’t grasp. They slipped away before she could organize them. This was frustrating, but again it was too much to handle immediately. She closed her eyes and faded out.
Each human band had its own wandjina, or ancestral spirit, represented by its totem animal. Some wandjina were very powerful. There was Biljara the Eaglehawk, and Wagu the Crow. They were the ones who had initiated the matrimonial laws, outlawing a man’s marriage to his sister, and establishing the degrees of kinship in which marriage was proper. The community was divided into two moieties associated with the participants of the ancestral marriage, and thereafter individuals were allowed to marry only into the opposite moiety. Children could belong to either, depending on local custom.
But Eaglehawk and Crow were not necessarily on friendly terms. Sometimes Crow tried to trick Eaglehawk, or work other mischief. Once Crow killed Eaglehawk’s son and tried to blame someone else, just as a joke. But Eaglehawk lacked a sufficient sense of humor, and discovered the truth, and buried Crow with the body.
But before Rebel could locate one of those spirits and plead for some insight into her situation, she was summoned back to her own realm. This was frustrating, but could not be avoided.
The third time she woke, her headache had retreated somewhat, and she seemed to be clean. Haven had made her comfortable. At the moment she was alone, so she tried to speak to herself. The words still wouldn’t come. It was as though she had no language.
Haven entered the chamber. Rebel saw now that it was actually a cave. In fact she recognized it; it was one the two of them had discovered years ago, and kept secret. A retreat that they could go to, that no one else knew about. Haven must have brought her here to mend.
But how had she gotten this way? She couldn’t remember. So she tried to ask her sister—and the words evaporated before she could catch them.
Haven spoke again, and again it was gibberish.
Rebel made another effort to speak, trying to force the words out. But all that happened was a frustrated groan.
Haven said something, and by the intonation it was a question. Rebel spread her hands to show her confusion.
Haven asked another question. Rebel put on a blank look.
Haven looked at her with dawning astonishment. “?” she asked.
Rebel shrugged. She could hear her sister perfectly well, but couldn’t understand her. She was pretty sure Haven wasn’t speaking a foreign language; how could she have so suddenly learned it? So it had to be Rebel herself who couldn’t understand it—or speak it. She had lost her language.
Slowly comprehension came to Haven’s face. “!” she said.
Rebel nodded. She was pretty sure her sister had come to the same conclusion.
Haven thought for a moment, then backed off, put her hand to the ground, and smoothed a section of the dirt. Then she took her forefinger and drew a circle. She drew another, smaller, beside it. Then she made a series of lines, extending from the large circle and connecting it to the small one.
It was a simple figure of a human being, with sticklike arms and legs and a funny face. Rebel smiled, recognizing its nature. This she could understand.
Then Haven added a little line between the legs. A penis, making the figure male. Rebel nodded. It was a relief to achieve some sort of communication at last.
Then Haven added wavy lines, signaling hair, and a heavy line across that hair. All at once Rebel recognized the man: the one who had been clubbed on the head during a fight. She couldn’t find his name, but remembered how he had been rather crazy for some time after that. Apparently the knock to the head had addled his common sense. The injury healed soon enough, but it took far longer for his personality to return to normal.
Then Rebel caught on to Haven’s purpose in drawing the figure. Yes, this had happened to her! She had been hit on the head—she couldn’t remember it, but her blood-matted hair was proof of it—and it must have addled her sense too. Or at least her language.
She touched the figure, and nodded, touching her own head. She was crazy because of the injury.
Haven nodded. She formed her right hand into a loose fist and raised it to her face, as if drinking from a cup. She raised an eyebrow in query.
Yes, Rebel was thirsty. So she made a similar fist and drank from it.
Haven went to the side of the cave and picked up a closed gourd. She poured it into a leaf cup, and brought the cup to Rebel. Rebel drank thirstily, gulping it down immediately. Haven filled it again, and this time Rebel drank more slowly.
Haven put her fingers to her mouth, as if conveying something here. She bit at an invisible fruit, and glanced at Rebel.
Rebel nodded. She was hungry. Haven went to the side of the cave, and opened a hide bag. She brought out a ripe fruit and brought it to Rebel. Rebel took it and bit into it, satisfying her hunger.
Then she needed to urinate. She gestured to the appropriate section of her body, and Haven nodded. Haven helped her stand and supported her while she wavered dizzily, waiting for the resurgent headache to fade. Then they went out of the cave, into the bright light beyond, and to the bushes nearby.
That was enough; she was tired. Rebel returned to her bed and lay down, and slept. She was feeling somewhat better physically, and much better emotionally, because she had established communication with Haven. Now she understood what had happened to her, and that gave her direction. She needed to discover who had done it, and why. The spirits of Dreamtime would know, if they cared to tell. But this could be complicated.
There were not just primordial ancestors of human clans in Dreamtime. There were also ancestral plants and animals, as well as sacred rocks, wells, and ritual areas of great power. Hostile or trickster spirits might also be present, as they were in the real world. Such spirits might empty a fine bees’ nest of its honey just before a person could harvest it, or inflict some awful disease or curse, or kill a person, ignore her, or teach her a new way to dance or hunt. Everything depended on whether the spirit was beneficial or evil or merely capricious, and on how it was approached, or perhaps on what mood it was in at the moment. A person could approach a spirit the wrong way simply by not recognizing it, and the spirits could masquerade as anything, so it could be tricky indeed. Rebel would be better off to approach none of them, than to accost one the wrong way.
She paused to consider, as this was best done before she encountered a spirit. She believed those of Dreamtime were similar to those of the real world, so that should be a guide. In the real world, the Wurulu-Wurulu stole honey by using bottlebrush flowers tied to sticks to empty the nest. They also caused mischief by putting their own paintings over those left by ancestral heroes. So probably she didn’t want to approach one of them. There were the Argula, who were associated with evil sorcery. They painted distorted human figures in rock shelters and sang evil curses into them. That wouldn’t do either. Then there were the graceful Mimi, who lived in cracks on cliff faces, and left their own paintings, which were said to predate the flood. They were not inimical, but could inflict sickness or curses if they were angered or suddenly surprised. Sometimes folk found a wallaby that seemed tame; that made it likely to be a pet of a Mimi, so it was left alone rather than hunted. That was perhaps the best prospect. Then there were the Namorodo, associated with shooting stars, so thin that they were no more than skin and bone held together by sinew. They traveled at night, flying through the air with a swishing sound and killing with their long claws. If a dead person’s spirit was captured by a Namorodo, it could not rejoin the wandering totemic ancestors, but became instead a malevolent spirit wandering through the brush.
So she should seek a Mimi, hoping not to surprise it. Then, if she pleaded prettily enough, it might give her the information she wanted. She set out, moving through Dreamtime at mysteriously variable speed, sometimes flying without wings, sometimes walking without moving her feet. It wasn’t really by her volition; the dream terrain took her where it would, how it would.
Then she found a Mimi. It was in the form of a wisp of mist rising from a crevice in a cliff wall. She halted respectfully before it, giving it time to see her. After a while it curled toward her, acknowledging her presence. “O Mimi,” she pleaded. “I beg you, tell me what I must know.”
The Mimi considered. Then it spoke, with a voice like that of a moth. “Kungarankalpa.” It faded away.
Rebel woke. She understood that word! It was the Seven Sisters. They were ancestral heroines of the north, who fled south to escape a lustful man named Nyiru, who wanted to rape the eldest sister. Their path across the continent was marked throughout, crossing the territories of many clans. East of Uluru was a string of claypans and rock pools, evidence of their passage. West of Atila they had camped for the night, building a windbreak which became a low cliff. In the morning they dived into the ground, emerging again at Tjuntalitja, a sacred well. But Nyiru watched them from a nearby sandhill. From there they walked to Wanakula, a rock hole collecting water. Then to Walinya, a hill on which they built a hut and camped again. That hut became a cave in a grove of wild fig trees, and one of the fig trees, standing apart, was associated with the oldest sister, the one fleeing the rape.
Nyiru watched until night, when he thought they were asleep, then burst into the hut. He was going to possess the woman he desired, and the others couldn’t stop him. But when he landed on her body, he found it to be a pile of brush and leaves. Meanwhile, the sisters were escaping through a low opening in the rear of the cave. No chance to catch them by surprise; they had anticipated his move.
The Seven Sisters finally made their way to the southern coast, where there was a great gulf reaching into the land. There, still fleeing Nyiru’s implacable pursuit, they plunged into the sea. The shock of the cold water caused them to jump into the sky; they weren’t accustomed to the chill of the southern waters. They became the constellation Kurialya, called the Seven Sisters. But Nyiru still chased them, and his footprints also marked the night sky, his toes becoming three bright stars nearby. He did not seem to have caught them, but if those three bright toes ever moved to the seven faint ones, that would be evidence of his victory.
Rebel considered. She was the younger of two sisters, so the legend didn’t seem to fit. But the Mimi had named it, so it had to be relevant. Her larger family consisted of seven, including her sister, three brothers, husband, and husband’s sister, who was about her own age. Maybe that was it. But Haven was the elder sister, and nothing had happened to her. So it still didn’t fit.
Well, she would have to ask Haven. Except that they couldn’t talk. That was a continuing frustration. Anyway, Haven wasn’t here right now. So there was nothing to do except ponder it alone.
She wasn’t sure whether it was a dream or a vision, or both, but was sure it wasn’t reality. If it was another aspect of Dreamtime, it was a strange one, as it matched none of the legends she knew. She was among monkeys, or rather apes, who dropped from the trees to the ground and scrambled across it, four footed. But this was awkward, because their feet were made for grasping branches, and they had to walk on knuckles. Also, there was danger on the ground, from predators like lions and leopards and hyenas and canines, as well as ornery hogs and buffalo and rhinos and elephants. It was difficult to eat enough on the ground before being driven back to the trees for safety. They needed to grab handfuls of food to take back to the trees, to be eaten at leisure—but that was hard when running on knuckles. So they specialized, making their hind feet more solid so they could support more weight, and the forepaws more delicate and mobile so that they could grasp and hold food more competently. Of course it was awkward climbing a tree with the hands holding food, so there had to be compromises, but this still worked better than the old system. Soon they were walking, striding, and running on two hind feet all the time, using the front feet for carrying or climbing, depending on the need.
But going two-footed led to endless complications. It straightened out their bodies, making it possible to mate face-to-face. Rebel did it many times, intrigued by her new ability to see her partner during the act. It made her front as interesting to males as her rear, so she developed frontal attractions, because there were advantages to being able to hold a man’s attention from any position. It provided her with greater control than she had had before, and that was nice. But it also made it harder for children, because they took time to learn the art of balancing on two feet, and had to be carried until they did learn. Carrying a baby had the same problem as carrying food: it limited her options, making it harder to climb trees or to forage. She couldn’t do them all at once, and that made survival harder. She needed help.
She solved that by intensifying her ability to attract and hold the interest of a man. Then he protected her and her baby, and got her food. Thus families were founded. But this required better social skills as well as foraging, sexual, and baby-raising skills. There was so much to learn and remember, and much of it could be learned from the experience of others. So she grew a larger brain, becoming smarter, to handle this more complicated two-footed life on the ground. Still, there were limits to observation of others, because the things she needed to know weren’t always happening when she needed to know them. Some of them were rarities, like getting burned by the fire from a volcano; it was better if someone who had experienced that, however long ago or far away, could tell her what it was like. But how was that to be done, with no way to express it?
Other species didn’t try. But hers did. They started showing and telling each other about things that existed or happened far away. To do this they needed to discover symbols: words or gestures that stood for other things. This was the hardest concept to grasp: that what was being indicated was not here but elsewhere. A hungry lion was in the valley, an angry river was flooding its banks, a fruit tree had just ripened. But those who were able to grasp the concept had a better chance to avoid the lion or river, and to reach the tree before others got its fruit. Thus a concept improved survival.
Once that started working, it got better. Those who were quickest to master concepts lived better and had more children. They became more facile at the art of elsewhere. “Good berries, that way,” Haven said as she pointed. Haven was in this vision, while she had not been in Dreamtime. “Bad leopard.” So Rebel knew she could get food, but would have to watch out for the leopard. She warned Haven’s son Risk, and went in the indicated direction. The leopard was there, and they had to leap for a tree. The leopard could climb a tree, but not as well as people could, so it did not pursue them there. But when the leopard left, they dropped back down and reached the berry patch and feasted. They had avoided danger and gotten their bellies full, because Haven had told them about both.
Rebel woke. The dream had seemed so real, and now reality seemed dreamlike. She was in a cave, and Haven was there. She wanted to tell her sister about the good berries and the bad leopard, but knew she couldn’t; she had no language, here in the cave. In the dream she had a very simple language, but that was vastly better than this. Haven also had a son, as she did not have in life. How could that be explained?
In a way, Rebel faced the same challenge here as she had there: to communicate efficiently with her sister. In the hot forest and field she had had just a few key words: the thing she was talking about, like berries or leopard, and modifications, like good or bad. But those had done the job. She had avoided the leopard and eaten the berries. She had survived, thanks to communication. Now she needed the same, to understand her present situation. For Haven surely knew it, if she could only tell it.
Haven spoke, and again it was a liquid and rather lovely flow of sound, with breaks and inflections and nuances and meanings, all of which were lost on Rebel. She spread her hands to show her continuing bewilderment.
Haven smiled sadly. She pointed to her mouth: food?
Rebel nodded, then pointed to her crotch: she had to pee. Gestures worked well, for immediate things.
Haven helped her walk out of the cave. Rebel was feeling better, or less worse; her headache had faded to moderate, and there was very little new blood in her hair, and she walked with greater steadiness. She was recovering.
But what had happened? How had she gotten bashed on the head? Why had Haven dragged her to this cave, instead of home to her husband, whose name she could not yet recover? She trusted her sister, and knew that Haven would never do her ill. There had to be good reason. But what was it?
She would learn the answers when she learned to communicate better. Maybe she could follow the route her dream ancestor had taken, establishing simple words for simple concepts, and modifying them. Yet what word could stand for the whole of her unknown situation? She was unable to address it until she had developed a more competent language. One that went well beyond pointing to mouths or crotches.
Haven showed Rebel what she had brought: fruits and nuts. Rebel reached for the nuts, but Haven stopped her hand.
Oh—those were poison nuts. She could not name them, but she knew their nature. They had to be soaked to wash out the toxin, before they could be ground and baked into excellent bread. Rebel nodded. She poured some water into an open bowl-shaped gourd, then put the nuts into it, starting the soaking process.
Haven nodded, satisfied that Rebel remembered the food if not the language. She would not poison herself by eating the nuts prematurely. Haven must have found them and brought them directly here, trusting that there would be time and competence to process them. She was correct. Rebel was not in good condition, and could not speak, but she could handle this chore; it was time-consuming rather than demanding.
She ate the fruits that Haven had brought, pondering. Then she tried. She leaned over to draw a picture in the dirt. She tried to draw herself, but wasn’t very effective, so she pointed to herself and to the figure and glanced at Haven.
Haven understood. “Rebel,” she said, pointing to the figure and to Rebel.
“Re-bel,” Rebel said, forming her mouth around the unfamiliar word. Then she drew another figure, more solid. She pointed to it and to Haven.
“Haven,” her sister said.
“Ha-ven.” The name of her, the sound of it as unfamiliar as the name of herself. She focused on the two words, trying to remember them. Rebel, Haven, Rebel, Haven. It was a beginning.
Rebel drew a male figure. “Re-bel. . .?” How could she ask?
But Haven understood. She drew two figures together, male and female. “Rebel–Harbinger.”
So that was her husband. But it still didn’t tell how or why she had gotten bashed and brought here to recover alone. Neither did it explain the relevance of the legend of the Seven Sisters.
Haven had to go; it was clear she couldn’t stay long in the cave. Rebel hoped to learn why, as soon as their communication improved. This limitation was truly frustrating.
However, she had made progress. Now she was tired again, so she lay down and returned to sleep.
Her strange dream vision returned. Now she and Haven were larger, with projecting noses. They had developed a huge vocabulary, almost every word identifying a person or a thing. Every significant tree had its name, which distinguished it from all other trees. Every key fork in the river, every unusual rock formation, every useful place of shelter from the elements, including especially caves.
They were foraging for edible tubers near the edge of their band’s range. There should be good yams in this ground. When they found one, they would leave the top of the tuber attached to the tendril so that the yam would grow again, and later they would be able to harvest another from the same place. They would also spit out fruit seeds into the debris of fish and shellfish remains, as the rotting compost was very good for new tree growth, assuring more fruit trees in the future.
Then Rebel caught a whiff of a foreign scent. Male, and not one of their own. “Alien!” she said.
Haven understood immediately, for the word described foreign intruders, who were by definition dangerous. Both women dived for cover behind nearby trees, alert for the aliens.
It turned out to be a scouting party of two Green Feather, brutish neighbors who constantly invaded Family territory. The Family men needed to be warned right away.
Rebel saw Haven back away from her concealing tree, warily watching to be sure the aliens did not spy her. But in so doing she tripped over a fallen branch, and tumbled backward.
The aliens heard the sound, and recognized it as something not of nature. Both turned and oriented on it.
Rebel realized that it would not be possible to avoid these brutes. They were muscular and swift; they could outrun the women.
Haven realized it too. “Rebel go Family!” she cried, and scrambled for the most climbable nearby tree.
Rebel didn’t answer or move, for either could give away her presence. Haven was acting as a diversion, so that the enemy men would not realize there was more than one girl.
The two men quickly charged Haven’s tree. Haven screamed and climbed it as rapidly as she could, her bare legs flashing below her belly. She had good legs, firmly fleshed, perhaps her best feature, and from the base of the tree the men could see up between those legs. The men stood and gazed upward, fascinated, though in truth there was not much to be seen in that shadowed region. Men were dull witted about such things; they would freeze and watch any woman who showed or seemed to show more than the usual flesh, even if they were well familiar with the anatomy.
Haven’s necklace snagged on a branch and came apart. It fell down, leaving the woman naked. The men continued to stare up, licking their lips.
Rebel realized that Haven had exposed herself on purpose, to distract the men, so that Rebel could escape unobserved. In practical terms, a woman in her necklace showed just as much flesh as one without it, but in social terms there was a significant difference. A woman who divested herself of her ornaments was signaling her availability for sex, and one who was spied by a man in that state was sure to be approached, even if it was an accident. In fact many men actually preferred accidental views to deliberately presented ones, and hardly realized that women seldom really showed more than intended. The Green Feather men were caught; they desired her.
But her ploy was dangerous. Soon one of the men would climb the tree to fetch her down, so they could both rape her and drag her back to their own camp. But this would take time, because they would not want her to fall from the tree and be killed before they had their turns at her. Dead women were no fun. The men would have to catch her and drag her down, branch by branch, a complicated process. They might have hurled rocks until they knocked her out of the tree, had she not shown them her legs and crotch in the absence of her necklace. Now their suddenly aroused lust limited their options. They wanted her whole and healthy.
Rebel turned and sneaked away from the scene, knowing that Haven had given her time to bring help. She needed to get the men of the Family here before the Green Feather brought Haven all the way to the ground.
When Rebel was clear of the scene, she ran with all her speed. She was slender and healthy, and could move well through familiar territory.
In moments, it seemed, she was at the home base. “Greenfeather!” she cried. “Sweettuberpatch! Haven!” They understood. With three words she had identified the enemy, the place, and the problem.
For she would not have come so breathless and excited unless there was bad trouble, and naming the Green Feather identified the nature of it.
Where the scattered Family members were she didn’t know, but suddenly Hero was on his way to the sweet tuber patch, and Craft with additional weapons, and Keeper with his wife Crenelle and three eager dogs. Rebel followed, clasping her own favored weapon, a sharp stone knife. Harbinger was beside her, concerned for her welfare. She flashed him a smile to show she was all right.
When they got there, the climbing enemy had just reached Haven, and had hold of her ankle. The man on the ground took one look at Hero and fled, leaving his companion to his fate.
The man above looked down, and realized he was in trouble. But he didn’t dissolve into despair. He drew on Haven’s ankle, lifting her leg out from the tree. He could send her hurtling to the ground.
The Family men paused. If the Green Feather man killed Haven, they would kill him, for he had no escape from the tree. But they didn’t want Haven to die.
“Truce,” Hero called. It was a word that transcended cultures. It meant that the combative parties would disengage without fighting. It was normally honored, because without it there would be situations nobody could resolve.
“Truce,” the Green Feather man agreed. He let go of Haven’s ankle. Hero and the others stepped back, putting their weapons at rest. Each side had backed off a stage. The dogs growled, but obeyed Keeper’s signal to stay clear.
The man descended the tree. Haven remained aloft. The man reached the ground and walked away. He might have wanted to run, but he was demonstrating that the truce protected him. The Family men stood unmoving.
Only when the Green Feather man was gone did Haven start down the tree. The Family men went up to it to help her. She embraced Hero, relieved to be safe. Then she turned to Rebel and hugged her too. Haven had provided the distraction that enabled Rebel to escape; Rebel had brought the help that saved Haven. The Family had protected its own, as it always did. Usually it was Rebel who distracted, and Haven who went home; this time their roles had been reversed, but the outcome was the same. Three words had done it.
Rebel woke. All the members of the Family had been in that dream. They had worked together to save Haven from the enemy. The elder sister, threatened with rape. But here in the cave it was Rebel who had suffered, and Haven helping her. Had the Green Feather attacked again? Were there three words to clarify the situation?
In the language of the dream, the words had all been things: the name of the enemy, the name of the place, and the name of the Family member in trouble. Context clarified the rest. Even the term “truce” was a thing, meaning that nothing would happen. It took more understanding to handle truce, but could be done. But here in the cave, more was needed. Rebel could not formulate the language she once had known, but remembered that it had contained other types of terms. Such as modifiers, to show whether a thing was good or bad or nice or nasty or near or far. As with the good berries and the bad leopard. It also had terms that were not things, but that connected things. So it was possible to tell where one thing was in relation to another, or how one thing affected another. Enemy attack Haven. Rebel eat berries. She needed those connectors.
She cast about for such words. How could she generate them, when she had no way to make Haven understand?
Haven heard her stirring, and came from the deeper recess of the cave. She made an incomprehensible query, and Rebel shook her head to indicate that it still made no sense to her. But she went immediately to the dirt drawing pad. She sketched herself, then drew a circle around it to indicate the cave. “Re-bel—” she started, but lacked the word to continue. How had she come here? What had happened? Without the words, she couldn’t ask. What a limit the lack of language was!
But Haven understood. She pointed to the line. “Cave,” she said, identifying it. “Rebel in cave. How?”
“How,” Rebel repeated, knowing by the inflection that this was the key word.
Haven frowned, suggesting that the matter was not simple. Then she started sketching figures. “Rebel,” she said as she drew. “Harbinger.” She circled the two. “Married.”
Rebel nodded. She had already learned that, and they had been married in her dream.
Haven drew another male figure. “Bub.” Rebel experienced a chill; she had heard that name before, in some sexual connection. Haven drew a third figure, herself, and then a line from the Bub figure’s face to the Haven figure’s crotch. “Bub want Haven.”
Rebel studied the figures. Bub threw a spear at Haven? No, not from his face. Bub looked at Haven? That must be it. And this man Bub was not her husband.
Haven made it plainer: she drew an erect stick at Bub’s crotch. For sexual excitement. So it wasn’t just a look, it was desire.
“Haven no,” Haven continued, erasing the figure so that Bub had nothing to look at or desire in that direction. “Then Bub want Rebel. Rebel no.”
That made sense. Rebel was married; what would she want with a strange man? She nodded.
Haven grimaced. Now she drew another male figure beside Bub. She did not name that one, so Rebel realized that this was just a helper, not important in himself. What were they up to?
Haven drew the Rebel figure again, right in front of the two men, and facing away. “Men seek Haven, but catch Rebel,” she said grimly. She drew the second man’s arms holding Rebel from behind, and moved the Bub figure in front of her. “Rape Rebel.”
What were they doing? She didn’t know the word, and couldn’t grasp why one man would be behind her and one in front of her.
“Rape,” Haven repeated. She drew in the erect stick penis, this time touching the Rebel figure’s crotch.
Now she understood. Forcible sex! She wouldn’t tolerate that.
But if one man had held her, while the other did it, she must have had no choice. Bub had wanted the elder sister, but settled for the one he could catch. Still, Rebel could have killed them right after it.
Haven redrew the figures. “Bub hit Rebel,” she said. She drew a club in the man’s hands, and touched the Rebel figure’s head. He had bashed her and knocked her out! That was why she hadn’t gone after them with her knife.
“Drag Rebel away,” Haven said. She drew the figures again, showing Rebel being dragged across the ground by her feet. “Left for dead.” The figure was shown in a gully.
Raped her and killed her, so she couldn’t tell. That was the way of brute men. But she hadn’t died, and that would be their undoing. As soon as she recovered.
Haven drew another female figure, herself. “Haven miss Rebel. Look for Rebel. Find scuffle marks.” The words weren’t intelligible, but Rebel got the gist of it. Her sister had searched for her, and found her in the gully, and managed to get her to their secret cave.
So now she knew, and she had learned several key words. She was recovering, and in due course would have her revenge. She would find this Bub character and kill him.
Satisfied, she relaxed, and realized she was hungry. The nuts were not yet ready; she would have to rinse them and soak them again, then dry them and grind them between stones to make flour. But Haven had brought millet. Millet was good, but hard to harvest in any quantity at one time; the wild grains tended to ripen at different times, scattered in distant patches. So they would cut the grass when the seed was full but the stems remained green, and store it while it ripened. Then they would thresh it, so that all the seed fell to the ground in one place. It was a lot of trouble, but the dry regions had spread during the drought, becoming better for millet. Haven had found some almost ripe millet that could be threshed now. So they got to work on it, and before long had a fair pile. They pounded the seed between stones and wet it, making a paste they could bake over a small fire. They finally had some fresh bread to chew on.
Rebel had a thought she wouldn’t have cared to speak, even if she had the words. She was married to Harbinger, but now was away from him. Haven could see him often. Would Haven take advantage of that? No, of course not; Haven was her loyal sister. But was it possible that she was tempted on occasion? What about Harbinger? Rebel could bear him no babies, while Haven could. Haven had almost done so, once, before breaking with him. What memories of that might they both be harboring?
Rebel pushed the thought from her mind. Haven wouldn’t do any such thing, she was sure. It was just her own illness and helplessness that made her worry foolishly. After all, wasn’t Haven taking good care of her, here in the cave?
Haven left, and Rebel slept again. This time her dream was not of herself or her family, but of great groups of people. This must be the time after Dreamtime, but still very long ago, when people were spreading out to occupy the land. Some went north, and some went east, and some stayed south. The northerners settled in cold lands. They developed a huge vocabulary, with specific names for everything of interest to them. They hardly needed connectors; they weren’t interested in interactions between words, just in the words themselves, with some modifications. The good berry patch and bad leopards were enough for them. This worked well enough, but required a prodigious memory, with a big head to contain it.
The easterners traveled far, meeting many new challenges. They settled in warm lands, or in mountainous lands, or in cold lands, or by the shore. They developed connections between terms, so that they could describe more complicated interactions. Because of this, they needed fewer terms, and did not have to remember as much. But they did just as well.
The southerners remained in warm lands. They developed a new class of words to describe things that didn’t happen. This was confusing to the northerners and easterners, and they had nothing to do with it. But these new terms facilitated understanding of things that might have been. Storytelling came into existence. Children listened raptly to the adventures of men and women who didn’t really exist. They dreamed of things that had happened long ago, or were happening far away, or that might happen in times to come. Of things that could happen, if something were different from what they knew. They developed imagination. Useless as this seemed, it nevertheless improved their command of language, and made them better able to cope in an increasingly complicated society.
But this didn’t make sense, she realized as she woke. The south was not warm, it was cold; the warmth was in the north. So this aspect of Dreamtime seemed reversed. If it was really Dreamtime. Maybe in the period after Dreamtime, the nature of things changed, and then changed back again in recent times.
But direction didn’t matter as much as substance. She now knew that the bad man Bub desired the elder sister, but had actually raped the younger one. She was that one. She didn’t know why the men of her family weren’t going out to kill Bub for that insult.
Well, she was obviously in that branch of people who had imagination. She should use it to figure out why.
Haven arrived, with more food. She had a bag of roasted moth abdomens. What delight! Rebel knew how the moths were caught and prepared. In the summer they swarmed to the heights of the distant mountains to aestivate. They piled high in crevices, layer upon layer, where they could be gathered. A fire was made on a flat stone base, and when the embers were swept aside, the rock remained hot, and the moths were dumped on it for cooking. The dust and ash were winnowed out, leaving the abdomens, each the size of the last digit of a little finger. They were delicious, and made folk fat and sleek. But they could be obtained only by trading with distant tribes, and were a rare treat in this location. Somehow Haven had gotten some, and here they were.
Rebel ate them avidly. They were just the thing for strength for recovery. Then she saw that her sister wasn’t eating. She paused. “Eat?”
Haven shook her head. “For you.”
But Rebel insisted that her sister share, and then Haven did eat a few. Rebel knew Haven loved the moths as much as she did, but was trying to help Rebel mend.
Soon they talked. They were developing a larger mutual vocabulary, and Rebel was beginning to remember words. The dreams had helped her, giving her inspiration and direction, and maybe her head was healing inside too. “Bub want Haven, rape Rebel,” she said, setting the base for further clarification. She strained for a moment, and captured the key word: “Vengeance?”
Haven sighed. “Not yet.”
“Brothers do?”
“Not yet.”
“Why?” There was one of the key concept words, that separated mankind from the cousin species. The others settled for what and how; her own kind sought when and if and why. The terms of imagination.
Haven frowned. “Hard to tell.” She meant it was difficult to explain, because it was complicated and they lacked the words.
But Rebel insisted on knowing. She had no memory of the event, but might bring it back by hearing what Haven knew. A bad man had gone after the elder sister, but unlike the legend, had caught the younger one. That much was clear; Rebel surely had not been fleeing, not realizing that she could be in danger too. But if they knew who did it, why wasn’t vengeance already being accomplished?
Haven tried. “Brothers work with Bub’s clan.”
It took a moment to assimilate the statement, but she was getting better. “Why?”
“Drought. Family hungry. Need food.”
It took another moment to get “drought,” but it came. A prolonged period of dryness, that shriveled plants and starved animals. She remembered: it had indeed been very dry. They lived near a lake, and that helped, but they foraged well beyond it, and out there the land was suffering. Turkey, geese, and bird eggs were sparse, and the wallaby and kangaroo were ranging elsewhere in search of better grazing. Rebel and Haven and Crenelle had been going out in the dugout canoe to fish with hook and line, while the brothers went after fish with spears. But even the fish were getting scarce, as if they too felt the dryness. It might be better, hunting and fishing elsewhere, but they were limited to their territory, on pain of keeping the peace with the neighboring clans.
So they had made a deal with a neighbor, the men agreeing to join its hunt across larger territory, for a share of the kill. Rebel remembered now, as Haven described it. The women had done the same, assisting the foraging and gathering. It wasn’t ideal, but it was better than going hungry.
Then the neighbor subchief had approached Haven. He liked her look, and wanted her as a mistress. She had demurred; she wasn’t married, but he was, and she didn’t much like him anyway. He had made it clear that the family could prosper if she obliged him and kept silent about it, and that the family could suffer if she did not. She wanted no part of it, but did not tell others in the family, because they needed the work. So it was that she didn’t tell Bub outright no, but did try to avoid him. The brothers got work, because Bub knew that if he sent them away, Haven would go too, and he would lose his chance. He was trying to play her in gradually, to convert her, so that she would willingly do his bidding. He evidently had some experience at bending women to his way.
But still she eluded him, and he was getting impatient. When Haven and Rebel switched places in the foraging line, so that Bub discovered the younger sister where he had thought to catch the elder, he must have been angry. Perhaps in frustration, or maybe as a warning to Haven, or maybe just because she was there, he had taken Rebel. She must have fought, so that he knew there would be trouble, so he tried to kill her. At least that was the way Haven re created the scene; she had not been there.
Rebel nodded. She would have fought.
So Haven had rescued Rebel, after finding her in the gully. And saved her life. But she still hadn’t dared tell the others, because she knew they would seek immediate vengeance, and that would get them exiled or killed.
“First,” she said, “we must get you well, physically and mentally. You are improving, but you remain weak, and your speech is not back to normal.”
“I know it,” Rebel said, for she had to struggle to comprehend that speech. At least she was able to; connections were evidently being made in her head. Her comprehension seemed to have recovered to about the extent her body had: maybe halfway. “But why not home with Harbinger?”
“Because then Bub would know you survived. There would be trouble. If he even learned you are in this cave, he might seek to kill you, so you couldn’t tell. But if you get well, then we can handle him. So it must be secret, until we are ready.”
“While our brothers and Harbinger work for Bub?” Rebel asked, appalled.
“Yes, so as to give no notice. So that when we are ready, we can kill him.”
“As the Seven Sisters would have killed Nyiru,” Rebel agreed, liking it better. “Had they been able to.”
“Yes,” Haven agreed grimly, understanding the reference. “If they had been able to catch him unawares.”
“And does Harbinger know I survive?”
“Yes, we all know. But all of us pretend we don’t know where you are. Bub says you must have run away, not liking to work hard.”
“The liar!”
“Of course. We express doubt, but since we are supposed not to know, we merely hope you will return. So things are uneasy, and there is no sign of you. And I still avoid Bub, though it is not easy.”
Rebel chafed at the restriction, but knew her sister was right. It was better for Rebel to remain lost, until she was well again, and until the drought ended. Then—ah, then!
Yet she couldn’t quite suppress that nagging concern. Was this the truth? Did Rebel really need to remain sealed away from her husband all this time? She knew her worry was foolish, yet could not completely abolish it.
She slept again, and dreamed richly, learning to talk more perfectly. When she woke it was true; her language was returning rapidly. As time passed, her head and body mended, and she was whole again. Haven visited frequently, usually at night, bringing what food she could scrounge without being obvious. Rebel suspected that much of it was Haven’s own food, that she had pretended to eat but actually hidden, and hoped her sister wasn’t starving herself. She brought assorted fruits, taro, arrowroot, coconut, and nuts. And of course they had the processed poison nuts, now detoxified.
One night Rebel woke, aware of a presence. It wasn’t Haven. She clutched her knife.
“Rebel.”
“Harbinger!” she cried with glad recognition.
Then they were embracing. “Haven said you were well enough now,” he said. “So I came alone, secretly.” He sounded uncertain.
“I am well enough,” she agreed, embracing him and spreading her legs. She hadn’t realized how hungry for him she had been. She wrapped her legs around him and drew him in, welcoming his ardor. It wasn’t just because of the time they had been apart; it was that sometimes a man would reject a wife who had been raped. Considering the way their own relationship had started—
But there was no rejection, only passion. He was bursting inside her. She was relieved and delighted, milking him of all he had to give. But another part of her was neither forgetting nor forgiving the injuries she had experienced, though she still did not remember their actual occurrence.
In due course, they talked. He confirmed what Haven had said. They were all working with Bub’s clan, because the drought hadn’t ended. The work was good, but they hated it, not least because they knew what had happened to her. But the moment the drought ended, they would not be bound. Then they could deal with Bub.
“Meanwhile, what of Haven?” Rebel asked, suspecting that the situation with her was worse than she had admitted. Rebel had borne this foolish concern that her sister might be thinking of getting back together with Harbinger; obviously there had been no such design. But the real situation was just as bad.
“She can’t continue much longer,” he said seriously. “One of us is always with her—Hero, Craft, Keeper, or me—but Bub tries constantly to isolate her. He needs our help with the hunting, and of course his wife watches him, so he can’t be obvious, but if the drought doesn’t end soon, he will find a way to catch her alone.”
So she had been correct: Haven was in more trouble than she could handle much longer. “And if the drought does end soon?”
“Then we won’t need him,” Harbinger said grimly. “We will kill him and go.”
“But he won’t need you either,” Rebel pointed out. “Then he’ll simply rape Haven, as he did me.”
He evidently hadn’t thought of that. “We must kill him first.”
“We can’t do it openly,” she said. “For the same reason he can’t do his desire openly. The clans do not allow murder or rape.”
“But he has done the one, and we must do the other.”
“Let me do it,” she said. “When the drought ends, I can appear. I am the one he raped; I have the right to vengeance.”
“But you can’t—”
“Yes I can. If I surprise him alone, with my knife ready. Let Haven lead him to me.”
She felt his nod in the darkness. “He would follow her, if he thought to finally catch her alone.”
“Yes. And he doesn’t know I’m alive. So he can know that all our family is accounted for, yet be surprised.”
“It is right,” he agreed reluctantly. “But you must make sure you kill him.”
“I will make sure,” she agreed grimly. “Meanwhile, stay close to her. Protect her.” That was her penance for doubting her sister’s loyalty.
Soon he had to leave, lest he be missed, even in the night. They could afford to give no hint that Rebel was alive and almost well. She kissed him, much cheered. Not only did she have the reassurance of his continuing love and desire, she had a clear plan to achieve her vengeance on Bub.
Near morning Haven came, with more food. “I can’t stay,” she said. “It’s hard to take food without it being missed. I fear Bub is suspicious.”
“Yes he is.” It was a man’s voice at the entrance. It was Bub! “I wondered why you were sneaking out at such an odd hour, so I followed you.”
Rebel’s shock crystallized. “Flee, sister!” she cried. “There is no help for me anyway.”
But Haven hovered near, unwilling to desert her charge.
“Go!” Rebel hissed.
“You can’t escape,” Bub called. “There is no other exit from this cave.” His voice was closer. He was tracking them by sound, and he was alone. Obviously he had no fear of women.
Haven retreated, realizing that Rebel had something in mind. She knew Rebel was far from helpless, having by now recovered almost completely.
Satisfied, Rebel grasped her knife. She groaned, then spoke to the man. “So you come to finish the job you started,” she said, making her voice sound weak. “You raped me and almost killed me, and now you want to do it again.”
Bub moved cautiously forward, feeling his way, still guided by her voice. “No. I doubt you are very appealing in your present condition. I will simply kill you, then at last get to rape your sister.”
“You monster!” Rebel gasped weakly.
He came close. “Keep talking, wench. This time I will make quite sure of you.”
“Oh,” she wailed. “You would never be able to do this, were I healthy.”
“Too bad for you.” He leaned over her. She was tracking him by his voice, as much as he was tracking her by hers. Apparently it hadn’t occurred to him that two could play this game.
She reached out with her free hand and found his leg. She hauled hard on it, making him stumble. As he lost his balance, she sat up suddenly and stabbed upward with the knife.
She was aiming for the groin, the most fitting target, but got him in the belly instead.
Or the loincloth; her knife snagged in it. She tried to wrench it out, but Bub was jerking back, and her knife was yanked from her hand.
This was trouble. He had more muscle than she, and was not just recovering from injury. He could and would kill her this time, if she didn’t find a quick way to prevent it. But what could she do?
Even as she struggled mentally to devise a strategy of combat, she was acting physically. She flung her arms out and found his legs. She grasped his ankles and hauled on them, trying to pull him down. But the effect was to draw her body into him.
Well, maybe that would do. He was bending forward, reaching down. She knew he would stab her with his knife in a moment. She had to keep active. She clung to his ankles, rolled halfway on her back, and kicked up with one leg, trying again for his crotch.
She missed, again. Her foot jammed into his belly. But this had an effect. It pushed him back, breaking his balance, but he couldn’t step back to recover it. So he fell, with an exclamation, landing hard on his back. She heard the knife skitter away across the cave floor. Good—she had disarmed him.
But she needed that knife herself, for she couldn’t outwrestle him. She let go of his legs and launched herself in the direction she had heard the knife go. But he was reaching for it himself. She flopped prone on his extended arm and shoulder, pinning them to the ground. She reached beyond, casting for the knife.
But his fingers were already grasping it. She was too late. She had to get away, if she could. She twisted, trying to scramble clear of him, so she could lose herself in the darkness. But his other arm came across to cover her legs, pinning her.
She wrenched herself around, trying to get to her feet. But his arm clasped her legs, and she fell back across his body, this time with her head on his belly.
“I’ve got the knife,” he said. “I can kill you now. But if you stop fighting, I’ll merely rape you, completing what I didn’t do before. You’re a lot healthier than I thought.”
“Don’t you remember? You fought so hard I had to bash you instead. Then I thought you were dead, and dead women lack appeal, so I threw you away. But now I am reminded what a fine body you have.” His hand worked its way up her thigh to her bare buttock, and squeezed. “I’ll let you go, after, if you behave.”
She had not been raped! Only bashed, costing her her memory of the occasion. What a relief.
But she couldn’t trust him. Once he had his will of her, he would kill her anyway, and then kill Haven too, to prevent them from talking.
“Do you agree?” he asked, running his fingers in between her buttocks. She was aware of his penis stirring in the darkness; he was getting an erection, spawned by his exploration of her taut bottom. Her thighs were not as thick as Haven’s, and her buttocks were less fleshy, but men had always found them supremely interesting. “I want your word.”
He knew her word was good, though his wasn’t. But if she didn’t give it, he would simply stab her through the back until she died. What choice did she have?
“Haven too?” she asked, forcing her body to relax, though that encouraged his traveling hand. At least that was a considerable distraction to him, perhaps putting him somewhat off guard.
“Her too,” he agreed as his questing fingers found her cleft. His member was now quite hard; she felt its radiating heat near her face.
Rebel held herself still and physically relaxed despite her revulsion at his touch and obvious lust. Her sex appeal was making him negotiate, and that gave her brief respite. She realized that his statement was ambiguous. “To let her go.”
“After I rape her,” he agreed, trying to work a finger into her. The angle was wrong at the moment, but he would soon correct that. He knew she resented his intrusion, and that surely excited him yet more. Just as many men preferred to get illicit peeks at women’s normally hidden flesh, some men liked to ravish unwilling women. “I mean to have that plush body.”
Rebel wondered whether she could leap free without getting stabbed. She was pretty sure she couldn’t. But it seemed to be a choice between getting stabbed to death now, or after he raped her. He was already working his way into the rape. The irony was that his own bared genital region was within her easy reach, but she lacked any desire to explore it in retaliation. A further irony was that she might have been interested in having an affair with him, had he not tried to rape her; he was an interesting man, in his abusive fashion. Had he come to her with an offer, instead of—but of course she was married. So there was nothing there. She had to escape him.
Then she saw a way. It would take nerve and control, but was her only chance.
“Well?” he demanded, trying to twist his hand around for a better angle. He was almost there; she knew it better than he did.
“No.” She remained quite still
He moved the hand with the knife. She knew it was poised to stab into her back, severing her spine with the first strike. “Are you sure?”
Suddenly she moved. She swept one hand across his belly, finding his hot, throbbing penis. At the same time she hunched forward, bringing her face there. She took the end of his member into her mouth, setting her teeth firmly but not biting down, while her hand took a solid hold on his scrotum.
Bub froze. He realized that he could quickly incapacitate her with one stab of the knife—but not before she bit off his penis and crushed his testicles. She would die, but he would be castrate. Even if he then managed to catch and kill Haven, so as to prevent the secret of his deed from getting out, he would never rape another woman.
Rebel could not speak, but didn’t need to. She squeezed slowly, giving him a hint of what was coming. She didn’t much care how she hurt him, and he knew that. She had nothing to lose.
“Truce!” he gasped.
She released her pressure just slightly, and waited.
“I will let you both go,” he said.
She began to squeeze again. She noticed that his penis was not losing erection; he found her hold on his anatomy exciting despite its threat.
“Without rape,” he added quickly. “I will simply depart, saying nothing.”
Rebel eased up, then began to squeeze again.
“I take your silence to mean agreement to the truce,” he said. “You will let me go, if I let you go.”
She eased up slightly with her hand, but nipped slightly with her teeth.
He knew what she wanted. “Here is the knife.” He moved his arm slowly across, until his hand touched hers. His fingers relaxed, letting the knife drop to the ground. Her fingers clasped it, and carried it beyond his reach.
Only then did she lift her head, releasing his member. But she clasped his scrotum a bit longer. “Get your hand out of my cleft.” That seemed ironic, considering where her own hand was.
The hand withdrew. Now at last she felt a softening in his penis, as he accepted the fact that he would not be raping anyone this hour. It was a better signal of his intention than his words were.
She loosened her grip without giving it up entirely. “Remain still while I get off you. If you move, I will use the knife.”
“Agreed.” He knew she was not bluffing. She would be fair, but would strike where it counted if he gave her reason. It was the only way to handle a man like him.
She held the knife ready, let go of his member, and rolled off him. She got to her feet and backed away. “Now go. We will not speak of this if you do not.”
“Agreed.” He rolled to his feet and walked to the mouth of the cave.
She remained still, watching his outline against the pale light of dawn beyond the cave, and following him with her ears too. She needed to be sure he did not wait outside in ambush.
He did not. She heard his footsteps departing the area. She went to the mouth of the cave, peering out to make sure. She saw his retreating back.
“He’s gone,” she said to Haven. Now at last she could truly relax. She felt weak; she had not recovered as far as she had thought.
Haven came from the deeper recesses. “How did you make him go?”
“I got hold of something he valued more than my life, or yours.” Rebel took a breath. “He’s gone—but I think it will not be safe for our family any more. We’ll have to go—now, drought or not.”
“Yes. And you can’t stay in this cave, now that Bub knows about it. I wish I’d been more careful, so that he hadn’t—”
“He was bound to get suspicious. You couldn’t take such good care of me without risking discovery.”
They picked up their things and stepped out of the cave. It was a glad yet sad moment: Rebel’s long confinement was through, but at the cost of the welfare of the family.
Rebel felt something. She paused. “What is that?”
Haven stopped. “What?” Then she felt it. “Rain! It’s starting to rain! Our Wandjina has come to our aid.”
Their ancestral spirit, associated with their totem animal, the wallaby. Wandjina were not all-powerful, but did what they could when they could. Now, just in time, theirs had acted.
“The drought is ending,” Rebel said. “Now we can survive on our own.”
“On our own,” Haven agreed thankfully.
We don’t really know the history or interpersonal relations of the Australian Aborigines before the white man took over their continent. But their diet and legends are as presented here. They did not have pottery or the bow and arrow, as these things seem to have been developed after they crossed to Australia, but did have the spear, atlatl, war club, and boomerang. They did not practice formal agriculture, but did preserve yam plants and spit fruit seeds into fertilized ground as described. So they understood the principles of planting and nurturing, and surely would have taken it farther had it been expedient. They did just fine, until the more advanced technology of the Europeans intruded.
Rebel’s dream visions were of two kinds: Dreamtime legends existing among various Aborigine clans, and re-creations of the ancestors of humankind. They were correct in essence, if not in detail; she tended to fill in details she knew in her present, such as dingo dogs, that had not been domesticated two million years before. She was tracing the development of her species, in her fashion, as she sought to recover her faculty of language.
The thing that most clearly distinguishes mankind from all other species on Earth is his giant brain, monstrous for a body his size. Theories for its development abound, and there may be no consensus, but the evidence is growing that it was symbolic language that powered the brain’s ascent. When our ancestors diverged from the chimpanzees, they started out with similar mental capacities. But Australopithecus may have stumbled on a better way to get along: the first organized verbal symbols. Many animals have verbal expressions for danger, pain, warning, comfort, alarm or whatever, and these can be considered symbols, as a cry of pain is not the pain itself. But they are fixed; the animals do not organize or manipulate them. They never say, “If you get bitten by a rattlesnake, you will be in pain.” They don’t have language. Neither did our ancestors, originally, but somewhere along the way they took the step that led to the first very simple language. It may have consisted of all proper nouns, with each significant tree or rock or path given its special name. It may have developed adjectives to qualify those nouns: the good berries, the bad leopard, making communication more flexible. They may have discovered prepositions: leopard in the berry patch, fruit under the tree. That may have led to verbs: the leopard is in the berry patch. We don’t know how it developed, just that it did. Slowly, over the course of millennia, of eons, true symbolic language developed. Because even the simplest language was immensely more complicated than mere animal sounds, it powered an enormous increase in the size of the brain. This in turn forced other significant compromises, such as the reduction of body fur and promotion of sweating as a cooling mechanism, because that burgeoning brain had to be cooled. But it was worth it, because with superior communication came superior intelligence and group organization, leading to the eventual conquest of the world by mankind. Appreciation of symbolism also brought the arts, including storytelling, which encouraged further development of language.
And so our species became what it is today, distinguished by its huge brain and its appreciation of all the arts, powered by the gradual development of ever more sophisticated language. There are no simple languages today, but there were two million years ago.