21 Lilly

Lilly slid Rain’s photo back in her pocket. She took a deep breath and whispered “Hello,” turning to acknowledge everyone. The twenty-one pairs of eyes studied her, but she noticed in their faces something friendlier than she’d first seen. A few of the warriors even started to smile.

Something sharp jabbed her gut and her first thought was a spear—but no, none of them had directed their weapons at her. She rubbed the spot on her swollen tummy and felt movement beneath her tight skin: a kick.

The robed woman with rust hair and faded freckles stepped forward. Ever so gently she felt for the contours of the thing growing inside Lilly. The movement of her hand drew a shape and Lilly had to abandon her denial: the shape was a baby. Kicking and growing with or without her readiness.

“We’ll introduce ourselves,” the rust-haired woman said, returning to her place in the circle. The warriors went first:

All were grinning and their warmth created the encouragement Lilly so needed. They emanated a thought as solid as a hug: You’re gonna be just fine. Two of the littlest old ladies—Gertie and Flora—came forward and took Lilly’s hands. She was at least twice their height (her jeans ever shorter) and when she tried to follow them her painful toes made her wince and stop.

Lilly slipped off her ugly shoes and uncurled her cramped toes. She walked barefoot, the ladies leading her, and the ground was soft as a cushion. The procession headed for a church-like building, and Lilly didn’t even need to duck to pass through the immense doorway. Once inside she gasped in wonder. The interior was unlike any sanctuary she’d ever seen—no pews or a pulpit, but a meadow of grass and flowers with butterflies flitting about. Slender trees arched toward the center like the buttresses of a cathedral.

“Do you know where the Village of Wrong Things is?” Lilly asked, ever mindful of her mission.

“You aren’t a ‘wrong’ thing, child, you have no need of such a place,” Flora insisted.

“It’s been ages since we gathered.” Opal, the rust-haired priestess, gestured toward a wide stump of tree, intending for Lilly to sit. “But this will be a special one, and then we’ll accompany you on your way.”

“Where am I going?” Lilly sat on the stump, wondering what type of magnificent tree it had once been. She was glad they would guide her, but if not the Village then what was her destination?

“It won’t be an easy journey,” said Beryl, a squat brown woman with shells in her hair, “but you know that, and you’re ready.”

Lilly wasn’t so sure. “Will you help me take care of the baby? I’ve never even held a baby.”

“Many things will reveal themselves very soon, and you will know everything about who you are and what you were meant to be.” Beryl clapped her hands twice and the room erupted with purposeful movement. The twenty-one women scattered, a practiced choreography, as they set about their tasks.

There came the dragging out of great bolts of cloth. The retrieval of baskets full of bread and vegetables. The distribution of clay bowls and cast-iron pots. Two of the warriors built a fire in the stone-bound ring designed for the purpose, and fitted a frame over it from which the largest pot would hang.

Captivated by the flurry of activity, a word came to Lilly—cauldron—and she wondered what the mammoth pot was for. Knives appeared, and wooden boards, and around her burst the sound of chopping. Turnips and leeks, beets and carrots, potatoes and celery. The designated choppers handled their knives with the proficiency of professional chefs.

As comfortable as she felt among Angus’s mysterious ladies, Lilly had read enough fairytales to fear herself the main ingredient of whatever they were cooking up. Her fear became terror a scant moment later when three of the old ladies (their names were jumbled in her head) surrounded her, tugging off her shirt.

“What are you doing!” Lilly protested. But of course: they wouldn’t cook her with her clothes on.

From the fire ring came the sloshing of water as it was poured into the cast-iron pot. Next, in splishes and splashes, heaping piles of vegetables were added, scraped off the cutting boards. The ladies followed the direction of Lilly’s horrified gaze, and burst out laughing.

“Maybe she’s never seen it made fresh before, you know how they are in the Other place, with their frozen blocks of food.”

“Good, hearty roots, from the good, rich ground,” said Penelope, joining the gaggle. “We wouldn’t send you off without a proper meal.”

Lilly’s relieved sigh ruffled Helene’s (or Sibyl’s?) hair as she struggled with Lilly’s shirt.

“Did you think we were going to put you in the pot?” Sibyl (or Helene) said with a chuckle.

“What am I going to wear?” Lilly wailed, hugging her chest. Even that didn’t help, as someone snuck behind her and undid her bra.

“We’ll make you something appropriate, and for now you can cover up with the quilt,” said Gertie.

Just when Lilly was ready to burst into tears, ashamed of her nudity, the old ladies draped a hodgepodge quilt, big enough for a giant, over her shoulders. She’d barely clutched it closed when they started yanking off her pants.

“I could’ve undressed myself, you know—if you’d asked, or explained what was going on.” She sounded as peevish as she felt.

Gertie looked at the others. “Huh. There’s a thought. We’ll try that next time—asking. Or explaining.”

“Sorry, pigeon. We know each other so well sometimes we forget to talk. We’re just so used to working as a group, everyone aware of their task.” Penelope patted her shoulder with a hand both gnarled and strong. “We meant no harm.”

This time, they asked for Lilly’s underwear, which she slipped off discreetly from beneath the quilt.

The old ladies sewed huge swaths of buff-colored material together. It wasn’t obvious what it would become, though it certainly looked large enough to keep her—and her expanding body—covered. Lilly considered her gibbous belly. A baby. Her baby.

She used to wish for a little brother or sister—would it be like that? Would it look like her? Or would she only see in it the snarling face of the evil doctor? It had all happened too fast and The Baby felt so separate from her, and yet here it was, growing rapidly inside her. We’re alike, then. Growing in ways that shouldn’t be possible. The thought caused an abrupt shift in her feelings. She wrapped a protective arm around her midsection.

Instead of worrying on it further, she watched the activity around her. A priestess tossed herbs into the soup, while a pair of warriors took turns stirring it with the heftiest wooden spoon Lilly had ever seen. The other priestesses sat close together, doing something with a handful of colorful stones. At first Lilly thought it was a game, but their expressions were too serious for that. One of the warriors sat on a stump near the doorway, whittling a narrow tree trunk.

The others stayed in a cluster, grinding and mixing things in the smallest of the handmade bowls.

“Does anyone need any help?” Lilly asked. It felt wrong to sit idle while everyone else worked.

Her question only earned her a few smiles and a faint “She’s a sweet pigeon,” from Penelope.

When the warriors approached with their little bowls Lilly grinned, thinking they were taking her up on her offer. But no. Decembra—her muscles as formidable as her ax—explained, “We will give you the markings of your journey. The girl. The fighter. The traveler. The mother. The mountain.”

“Will it hurt?” Lilly asked. Up close, she could see that their faces were decorated with a combination of paint and tattoos. Tattoos meant needles.

“No pain, little mother. Only brushes. And fingers.” The young warrior smiled and whispered, “Alala,” to remind Lilly of her name.

“Thank you,” Lilly said, mesmerized: Alala appeared to be only a few years older than she was.

They set about dabbing colors and stripes and dots around her face. Lilly shut her eyes; how good it felt to be painted, how tender their touch.

Lilly struggled with the quilt, trying to expose her tummy while keeping everything else covered. Decembra helped, folding the fabric around the nearly-full moon of Lilly’s child. My child’s in there. The mound looked alien to her eyes, with stretch marks that could have been the dried riverbeds of another planet. The warriors resumed their work; the light tickle of their brushes was a balm against an ache Lilly hadn’t much wanted to examine. For eleven-and-a-half years her life had proceeded at a certain pace, in a certain way. Her growth altered everything, and now the changes were coming too quickly to process.

When they finished, Lilly pressed her chin to her chest and studied their artistry. Black tendrils. Rose-colored shapes with meanings that eluded her. But she sensed something—even from the facial markings she couldn’t see: these were powerful symbols and they fed her soul.

“Good,” said Amethyst. (Lilly finally made the connection between the amulets and the priestesses’ names.) “We’re ready for soup.”

Again, Lilly wanted to help, but they urged her to stay where she was. Gertie brought her a large wooden bowl and set it, deliciously hot, on her palms. The aroma rising from it was arousing and rich. Lilly’s stomach grumbled and it was all she could do to wait for the twenty-one women to serve themselves and settle in around her. This time she wasn’t in the center, but part of the circle alongside her extraordinary hosts. Emerald, the dourest of the priestesses, made a brief blessing of thanks, and everyone dug in.

The warriors gobbled their soup greedily, slurping and clacking their teeth on their spoons. Lilly felt the same hunger, and the soup brought warm happiness to her insides. The vegetables were tender, but with a hint of resistance, and they tasted nothing like what she’d anticipated. Instead of a recognizable flavor, each bite triggered a word.

As she gazed on her companions, each absorbed in their own sustenance, Lilly wondered if they tasted the same words, or were they each experiencing their own flavorful interpretations.

Jade, with her large, carved amulet, pointed a finger at Lilly as if she’d just won a prize. Once Lilly might have thought it outlandish that someone could read her mind, but not anymore—not since meeting Angus and traveling to…wherever they were.

When they were finished, the entire cauldron consumed, the warriors collected the bowls (again refusing Lilly’s help). The old ladies brought forward their finished garment—it took all seven to carry it. Lilly thought it resembled a sand dune.

This time, instead of stripping off her quilt, Flora politely asked her to remove it. Lilly hesitated; everyone was looking at her and she didn’t want to be naked for even a second. Opal and Beryl stepped in to help. While Lilly pretzled her arms and legs, the priestesses lifted the quilt and the old ladies swiftly draped the new garment over her, directing her arms through the designated slits. They buttoned the front with big wooden toggles and loops made of rough-hewn rope.

Roma, the warrior who’d been whittling the long pole, presented her with the finished gift: a sturdy walking stick, fit for a giant. Lilly stood for the first time since she’d entered the church.

Her joints creaked. Her back felt stiff, like the dried pages of a book forgotten in the rain (a mistake Lilly only made once). She rose and rose, soaring upward like a construction crane reaching for a faraway roof. She wasn’t sure how much she’d grown while comfortable in the ladies’ meadow, but it was a lot. The voluminous garment enveloped her, stopping below her shins, with long openings for her arms and ample room for her to grow.

What do I look like? Face painted, taller than ever. She was double the size of the warriors now. The baby did a happy somersault and for the first time Lilly smiled at the thought of having a companion.

The word “no” quivered on her lips. Then Lilly remembered the things she felt while eating the soup. Thankful. Strong. Earth. Endurance. Rock. Power. River. Love. Eternity.

And they were within her. Around her. Her. She’d grown into herself, and had never felt so strong, so powerful, so thankful or full of love.

The twenty-one women escorted her out the back doorway, which had appeared to be a hedgerow. Lilly touched the leaves on the ceiling as the tree limbs kissed her goodbye. The landscape beyond the backdoor was entirely different than the terrain through the front. They were at the mouth of a valley, nestled between rising mountains. It didn’t surprise her (such was her acceptance now) that the colorful mountains were unlike any she had ever seen, each created from a different kind of rock. Reds, browns, pinks, grays. A geological oddity. Some sparkled with ribbons of bright minerals or veins of colored quartz, visible even from afar.

Though Lilly still wasn’t sure where she was going, she felt a connection to something out there on the horizon, and the ladies were more trustworthy than the beating of her own, ever-expanding heart. They walked solemnly on either side of her as they left Town Town behind.

L I L L Y

While the path through the valley wasn’t strenuous, Lilly was grateful for the walking stick. Her body moved differently now. It wasn’t just the baby inside; her limbs were getting heavy. She felt her blood thickening, a syrup sludging through her veins. Could that mean her heart, too, had almost completed its journey?

“If I die,” she asked them, “will you take care of my daughter?”

“They’ll be no need for that,” Emerald said with gentle confidence.

“You’ll do just fine.” Opal gave her the wisest of smiles and Lilly felt a surge of real excitement: the baby inside her (she was sure it was a girl) was all hers. It belonged to no one else, and just as Lilly had defied expectations, so would her daughter.

Halfway down the vale they turned eastward to cross the first ascending slope. The peaks looked too steep to traverse but Lilly didn’t worry on that; they would find a way. A glowing sun beamed down on her, and butterflies swirled about, chasing each other in a game of tag. The procession walked without speaking but the wind whispered in the tall grasses—an invocation that Lilly could almost hear.

When they reached the base of the mountain range the sun remained high above, as if time, busy elsewhere, hadn’t kept pace. The procession stopped and the ladies clustered around Lilly. Judging by the distance between her eyes and the tops of their heads, she’d grown during the walk. Her belly stuck out too far to see her feet, and the hem of her cloak brushed against the back of her knees.

“We’ll take leave of you here,” said Flora, indicating her fellow old ladies. “But the others will keep on.”

Penelope reached up and held her finger. “Goodbye, pigeon, you’ve been a delight. So glad we could share this part of the journey with you.”

“Farewell my dear,” Gertie said, so small beside Lilly. “We’ll visit you often.” All of the ladies nodded, excited at the prospect. “What a treasure you are, truly.”

One by one the little old ladies wished her well, gripped her fingers, and told her they loved her. As they retreated across the valley, Lilly knew not to be sad: she would see them again, as promised—and she was feeling an urgency. Her destination beckoned.

The fourteen remaining women—the priestesses at the front—continued up the mountain. Lilly’s bare feet were so solid she couldn’t feel the rocks poking against her soles. They headed up long switchbacks that zigged, then zagged, across the face of a gray-striped escarpment. The view made her marvel—the distances she could see in all directions, and the treasures she found tucked into the rocks near her head. Delicate blooming flowers, and nests of newly hatched birds, tweeting their hellos.

At one very steep section they crossed over a lower point in the rocky range, and left the valley behind. Now Lilly saw how deep the mountains went, and how varied in colors and geology and even, she supposed, habitats. Some peaks were topped with snow, others were awash in rich jungle greens. Where the Forest of All maintained an individual ecology for each tree, here there were the worlds that thrived on a multitude of distinctive mountains.

They descended a trail and came to the base of a hill with a terrain Lilly hadn’t yet seen. It was sandy colored—not unlike her garment—and the boulders were flattened and stacked, with stripes of erosion on their rounded edges. Shrubs and pine trees sprouted between the sculptural rock formations, and the ground felt inviting on Lilly’s feet, soft as velvet.

As the procession stopped, a savage pain tore through her midsection and she half-expected her bulge to break apart and tumble off like an avalanche.

“Getting close,” said Beryl.

“This is where we leave you,” Decembra said, indicating the warriors. “But the others will keep going.”

Once again Lilly was showered with love and goodbyes. Her cloak was up to her thighs and her hands too awkward to reach, so the warriors gave the back of her calves a hearty pat, the farewell of comrades. They, too, promised to visit often, and reassured her she would never be alone. Again, she felt only gratitude for the shared part of their journey, and no sadness as they went their separate ways. Her very perception of space was changing, and a great excitement welled inside her as she tasted a welcoming with each cool inhalation of air.

Another pain came. Lilly clutched her great belly and hunched over, breathing out gusts that stirred the soil at her feet.

“You’re almost there, Lilly Wolf,” Opal said, her rust hair billowing.

When she was ready, Lilly gripped her walking stick, nearly a cane now in her great hand, and shuffled onward, up the dusty, pine-speckled hill. The seven priestesses let her lead the way, and they followed slowly behind. Her legs, her body, her baby felt nearly as solid as the boulders around her. The strange sensations within her blotted out everything else. Her daughter punched against her insides, demanding to get out.

“Soon, little one,” Lilly said, rubbing her baby’s fist.

As Lilly climbed the hill, one heavy foot after another, she abruptly lifted her eyes—and there was her destination. The distance might have been as small as a step or as great as a mile, she could no longer gauge with accuracy using the measurements of her previous life. The certainty of her journey’s end gave her a renewed energy to reach it. To claim it. To tumble into the comforts of her very own abode.

“We’ll wait here,” said Beryl, and the priestesses nodded.

“You’re almost there, brave girl.”

“You’ll know what to do.”

“We’re here if you need us.”

“Oh Lilly Wolf!”

“Be the greatness you were destined for.”

“You are, and always were, the everything.”

Clutching her enormous belly, Lilly dropped the stick and used instead her powerful arm, limping apelike and alone up the final switchback.