Chapter 31

On the wrong side of the river on an unknown planet.

"So—" asked Ureeblay, calm again and wanting to find out more about the Centaurs who were looking for Pegasia now that they'd both stopped laughing, "—you're not of this Long Spears Tribe, who are going to the effort of finding you for some reason, and whose ancestors, according to your traditions, were the last group of Centaurs the Dauktaur's people brought forth into the world at the birth place across the Muddy River in the tapu land?"

"Sheee ... no, I am not of the Limp Spears tribe," the young woman told him with a dismissive jerk of her head, and sounding quite a bit like his sister when she replied to one of his observations that she felt was as obvious as Father Sun in the noon sky on a clear day.

"Why do they want you then?" he asked, looking at the four-legged girl beside him and grinning at her name for the Twilf Tribe. "Is it because you're a Daughter of Churon?

"Goodness," Ureeblay quickly said, trying to sound scandalized, "you're not a thief, are you?"

He saw Pegasia knit her eyebrows together as her exotic facial features showed her surprise.

"Ohhh," the young man said, pressing his advantage now that she was off-balance and not teasing him in response for a change, "no, no, I'd wager that you farted during some ceremony the Long Spears consider very tapu ... Wait—Pegasia—did you throw mud-balls at some boys in this secret society? Is that it, is that why they are looking for you?"

"Yeh, mate—" the young Centaur woman tried to growl and she pointed her right index finger at his face before she started grinning as they followed the scrapes on the forest floor left behind by his travel-drag. "—Bein' ah Daughter of Churon is one rayson they want to take me back with them, Maki Boy."

"There are more? What are the other reasons?" the young man asked the Centaur girl, fighting back the full smile he could feel forming at the corners of his grinning mouth. "And for your information, the proper form of address is—Maki Boy, my Great Protector. Understand, young lady? Remember the terms of our ceremony on the bank of the Muddy River when I agreed to take you under my spear arm? I remember you promising to serve me in all ways. Back-talk and rude comments are not considered by the Welow Swongli as serving one's protector."

She made a little bow in his direction with her torso and brought her right hand up to touch her forehead with her cupped palm and fingers before she smirked at Ureeblay.

"Yahr words are my command, oh Great Maki Boy, my protector. But just listen to yahr mangai movin' and the way yah talk to me!" she said to him in a scolding tone of voice, her tail flicking over her right rump. "I say, even with the difference in our peoples' generations, by yahr bad manners, yah can't be all that groan up." And she gave him a big smile while wiggling her exotic eyebrows at him.

"Did you just attempt ... to make a joke?" Ureeblay asked Pegasia, trying to frown at her. He took in a deep breath and exhaled, wanting to get serious again. "And I need to know why these youngest warriors of the Long Spears have been so diligent, to the point of using, ahh, a rangorango to communicate while searching for such a young, impudent person such as you. I'll wager that a couple mud balls or a few of your farts aren't reasons enough for all that effort."

"What Centaur would know enough to make jokes in yahr language, Ureebay?" Pegasia retorted, sounding aggrieved. "And farts—farts are cansidared complemants to my people."

"Well, let me consider that—" Ureeblay quickly replied, "—a wind-filled Centaur girl named Pegasia, would be my guess as to a Centaur sharp-tongued enough to make jokes in my language, and I don't know if that is a compliment or not. Now—what other reasons are there for these young warriors to be after you?"

"Welllll," Pegasia said, suddenly sounding almost contrite to Ureeblay. "I am also the youngest daughter," and she swayed her torso to her right and then to her left while shrugging her shoulders, "of the Whaea Tuotahi, the First Mother—the leader—of the Oak Grove Kentauroi Tribe, as the Dauk-taur named my tribe in the beginning."

That said Pegasia bent forward at her waist and slightly away from Ureeblay. Gracefully reaching down with her left hand and, without missing a step, she pulled free a long, straight, two-finger-thick shaft of what looked like oak to the young man from a pile of storm-washed limbs, sticks, and leaves caught against the base of a tree. The oak shaft seemed to be long enough to reach her hair-hidden breasts with one end resting on the ground.

Holding the long oak rod near the slightly thicker end, she easily brought the shaft back over her left shoulder before whipping the length down and smacking the forest floor out in front of them. The impact flipped up dirt and blades of torn grass as the strong shaft tip kicked back up in the air. The young woman easily lifted the weight of the oak shaft back up and pointed the far tip straight in front of her. A pleased smile formed on her face as she gazed along the solid length.

"Among my people, my tribe is known as the Foloi Forest Tribe." Pegasia told Ureeblay. She raised her right hand in front of her as she stuck out her left index finger from her other hand gripping the slightly larger end of her oak shaft. Then she stuck out all the fingers and the thumb on her right hand as well and said, "My ancestors were the Suxth tribe brought forth—that is a hand and one."

The young man, fascinated by her movements, dipped his head to let her know he understood as they walked side by side following the tracks made earlier by his travel-drag.

"The Dauk-taur," Pegasia told him, as she dropped her right hand and started using the oak stick in her left hand for a walking staff, "moved among my first ancestors and talked with them, and taught them as they grew, as He did with all the tribes brought forth before them.

"The Dauk-taur," the young woman said, her words now delivered in a rhythmic manner, "taught His Language, His Laws, and the Accepted Knowledge to my people so they would understand we were His children, and that He was the Papa Tuatahi, the First Father of all Centaurs. He taught them with the help of the first Maori Mentors—special teachers—and the Tapuhi Mares, which were the Whaea Hoiho—the nurse hoiho, who frayly gave their teat mailk and protection to every newborn Centaur in the beginning. They help raise their charges, along with the Mentors, as if each new Centaur was their own.

"That is why all hoiho should be tapu to all tribes of the Centaurs," said Pegasia, sounding to Ureeblay as if she suddenly was angry. She snorted, and held her right hand out flat near her hip, her thumb sticking out to her left and widely separated from her index and middle fingers, which in turn were widely separated from her second finger and little finger, held tightly together also. Then she curled her thumb and fingers into a fist and struck it downward, opening her hand as if she were throwing something to the ground.

Pegasia seemed to calm down after that gesture. Ureeblay did notice she ground the tip of her new oak walking staff into the forest floor before lifting it up with her next step.

"Te Pono say," Pegasia told Ureeblay, "sheee ... I mean, the Faithful say that after the hand-and-fuor tribe, the Nointh Tribe, was brought forth, the Dauk-taur had tired from His great efforts. Layving behind the Mentors and the Tapuhi Mares to guide and care for those tribes already born and those yet to be born, as well as layving behind his people living acrass the Purple Mountains, He and His chieftains departed Thessaly for His bed in the rangi—His bed in the sky. Once there, the Dauk-taur had His Te Wa Moe Tuatahi—His First Draim Time. He and His chieftains returned to all the growing tribes of His children two of our generations later, taking up His teaching again. That is why the Final Three Tribes claim the Dauk-taur did not create our people to be his true chosen children. And they hold He is false."

"His first draim time?" Ureeblay asked while part of him was very aware of their surroundings as they followed the marks made his travel-drag. "I don't understand."

"Sheee ... when we slayp at night and have vesions?" she replied.

"Oh, dreams!" Ureeblay said, realizing what she meant and feeling excited to find out about this aspect of Centaur life. "My people call our dream lives, when we sleep, our Second Life. If a person is lucky, or chosen for some reason, the World Mother, or some spirit or spirits, might show that person visions of what might be. Or the lucky person might be given clues hidden in their Second Life visions that they might use to suss out understanding, if they are thoughtful and vigilant to the task, so they can figure out problems they face here in the First Life." He wondered how much more he should tell her about his Second Life.

"Yes, such dreams can be kaha. There are mata kite among my people," Pegasia said, nodding her head while stepping around a big fern in their path, "who have such dreams. That is where some of my peoples' matauranga whaka kitea ... sss ... the Revealed Knowledge comes. In the past, all the tribes, but the First Three, hid their Revealed Knowledge from the Dauk-taur when He and His chieftains walked among His children. The First Three Tribes did not heed the revelations of the mata kite because the Dauk-taur's Law forbids my people learning any but His Accepted Knowledge," the young woman said, making a face. "Almost all the members of the First Three Tribes are Te Pono, the Faithful.

"Each of His Dream Times, it is said," Pegasia announced in double rhythm with her steps, "lasted for two of our generations. Such a long sleep I cannot understand. However, He and His chieftains always returned to His other people acrass the Purple Mountains and He'd dwell with them and visited among the tribes of my people again. And so it went for generations upon generations. The Dauk-taur would labor fuor yars or a hand of yars among the tribes ... before He tired again. And then He and His chieftains would return to His sky bed for His next Dream Time. And so it was from the beginning, until the Dauk-taur and His chieftains finally returned no more."

Fascinated by what she was saying and only forming a general idea of what she was relating, Ureeblay could only nod his head as he walked along under the trees.

"Our Maori Mentors now," Pegasia said moving her torso to the right and then the left before shrugging her bare, brown shoulders, "say they know not why He has not returned, nor do they seem to care, saying the Dauk-taur would not approve of things they and their ancestors have taught my people if He were to return again and find out their deception.

"How the Dauk-taur could live so long as Te Pono say," the young woman admitted, slowly shaking her head and making her long hair move, "when His Mentors, who have remained behind and share their wisdom with my people, die in their time as all living beings do—this is something that I, also, do not understand fully. However, I am young and have only been named as ah Daughter of Churon for one full yar ... ssss, a cycle now. I have much more to learn, and I will work hard to understand, but with the young warriors from the Twilf Tribe after me now, I don't know when I can study with my Mentor again, or how she might find me. Still I look forward to learnin' new things all the days of my life until it is my turn to travel to the final high meadow and join my ancestors."

Ureeblay was enthralled by her words and felt her sorrow at losing contact with those she cared for because she was fleeing the Twilf Tribe. The knowledge of the Centaur people and the Dauktaur that she willingly shared with him as they walked along was astonishing. While he didn't understand half of it, Ureeblay found he looked forward to learning more from her and making sense of all this new information.

Off to their left through the foliage he again saw the great turtle shell suspended from the tree limb; they were getting closer. The travel-drag trail started to slowly snake in that direction among the tree trunks.

"Because the Dauk-taur did not walk and teach among the first few generations of their ancestors," Pegasia told Ureeblay, "the Limp Spears Tribe, as do all the Final Three Tribes, rayject our traditions remindin' us of the Dauk-taur's role in bringing forth our people on this world. They now have even shunned His Mentors and claim that having reverence for hoiho only comes from their old ones telling children misguided tales of imagined Tapuhi Mares to put the old ones and the children to sleep at night.

"That is why," Pegasia announced, "the Final Three Tribes deny the Dauk-taur, saying that He is te wairua kino ... sss ... you would say, the evil spirit, trying to keep all Centaurs from living near or at the top of the hill of crayation—and for His forbidding our learning any but the Accepted Knowledge, while not sharing with us so many of the wonders He brought with his people down from the stars."

"Creation," Ureeblay said, correcting her pronunciation as they walked along toward his camp. He suddenly experienced wooly-worm feelings go up his spine under his vest at what Pegasia just told him about wonders from the stars. He realized stars was Centaur for the Swongli in the night sky. Perhaps, Ureeblay considered, the Dauktaur and His people are the new men who sometimes come down to this good earth to live among my people and share new ideas with us.

"My mother says, discovering and sharing the mysteries of creation," Pegasia told Ureeblay as a serene look formed on her exotic features, "are why we are put on te whenua, on this earth."

"I wish my sire was still alive," Ureeblay said, hearing the wistfulness in his deep voice as he swept the tip of his hickory staff through the grass in front of his moccasins, "so he could hear you talk of these amazing things."

"I'd like that very much, if it could be, mate," said the young Centaur woman walking at his side in the forest. "Yah will take me and my hoiho with yah and the daugg," she asked sounding hopeful, "when yah crass the big rivah again, so I can meet yahr mother and sister? So I can learn some of the mysteries of yahr people and lands, and find out what tales the boy who pushed yah inta the rivah spread about yah?"

"That will take a lot of logs," Ureeblay said, finding he was chuckling, surprised to find he was relieved that Pegasia was offering to leave the lands of her people behind when he did find a way to cross the Toolie. "And a lot of logs will be a lot of work."

"Yah got some strong, willin' backs to help yah now," she said, sounding pleased, "—my protector."

"Some willing strong backs?" Ureeblay asked, his voice sounding skeptical to his ears, as he rested his left hand on the shafts of the spears coming out of his quiver that moved with his hip as he walked along. "I only see your strong back, Pegasia ... Well, now that I consider the words, you do have two backs."

"Is it easy for yah to talk so, while only havin' two legs, my protector, and no hiku, no tail?" she asked the young man, and then shook her head slightly while giving her tail a flick. "I told you, Ureebay, my hoiho are my hoa pai, my good friends and trail mates. We take care of each othah. They help me—as it was in the beginning, so they will help me help you—after I introduce yah to them.

"See, at least I ... have good manners."

"You should say," Ureeblay retorted, "I ... have good manners, My Great Protector."

Pegasia made a snorting sound and moved her right arm across her chest. With her fingers up and together, her thumb out, the young woman extended her hand, her palm almost seeming to push his words back at his face. He shook his head and chuckled, focusing on the forest around them for anything out of the ordinary.

On his right, Pegasia dropped her raised arm back to her side.

"So—those are the reasons the Final Three tribes," Ureeblay asked, wanting to get back to trying make sense of a little bit of what she was telling him about her people, this mysterious Dauktaur she claimed created all the tribes of her people, as well as discover more about the Twilf Tribe, "they don't hold that the Dauktaur created your people?"

"At least, not their ancestors," Pegasia said. "But my Maori Mentor has told me several times that the Dauk-taur's creation of our people is not only a matter of faith for Te Pono, it is also a matter of fact. So I believe, even if some of the tribes of my people choose not to believe. And my Mentor says her brethren could show the doubters actual visions of what happened, if the Mentors were still able to do so here in our lands."

That claim caused Ureeblay to turn his head toward Pegasia. He saw the look in her sky-blue eyes as she recognized the astonishment he was certain must be evident on his features.

"It is the truth, Ureebay. I know the Mentors have so much knowledge we do not have," she told him, nodding her head, "knowledge the Dauk-taur brought with Him to this world, and most of which, by His Laws, are forbidden to my people. But some of that knowledge is not. In the beginning, the Mentors taught all the tribes the Accepted Knowledge. Now the Mentors teach the Daughters of Churon many things outside the Accepted Way.

"I am blessed to be counted among their number—as we are sworn to teach, any members of any tribe who wish to learn. Or," the young woman said with anger burning in her eyes, "those that are permitted to learn in some tribes, and then only certain things—as I have recently found out."

"Do you know how the Mentors you tell me about would show your people the visions—these facts—that happened so long ago?" Ureeblay asked, wondering if these Maori Mentors were some kind of powerful shamans to be able to do what Pegasia claimed.

"I am not certain," the Centaur girl admitted to the young man, sounding sad that she did not know. "However, the Mentors who taught my Sister Daughters and me told us that some of the wondrous material things produced by their knowledge are startin' to fail here in our lands. The ability to show the Tribes the visions of what the Dauk-taur did at the beginning is one of those failing things, at least here on this side of the Purple Mountains."

"The Purple Mountains?" Ureeblay asked.

"The Purple Mountains, Ureebay, are the high mountains on the other side of the Matimati Pukapuka, the Hoof Hills, and are beyond the Fruited Plain to the Eve. My Mentor told me that to be shown those true visions of the past now, my people would have to trek acrass the Purple Mountains," Pegasia explained, "and visit the Mentors' home territory near the Great Salt Sea. All the tribes know the powers of the Mentors and the Dauk-taur's remaining people are still strong in their homelands acrass the mountains. However, with bands of Te Hinga, the Fallen, now holding the passes across the Purple Mountains, it would mean war to try and travel over the mountains to get the Great Salt Sea."

Pegasia took in a long, deep breath, causing her upper chest to expand as well as the barrel of her lower body. Watching the Centaur girl walking beside him, Ureeblay heard her extended sigh as she exhaled. Pegasia gazed over at him, a thoughtful look in her sky-blue eyes while his mind raced with everything she'd told him. She maintained eye contact for a few steps before she looked ahead at the trail. The two walked along, seemingly content to be quiet as they followed the curving trail put down earlier in the day when Ureeblay picked a clear path between the trees for the travel-drag.

Who are the Fallen? Ureeblay wondered. Storytellers of his people sometimes told tales of war. In their tales it would be two groups of animal characters who attacked each other for reasons describe by the storytellers in ways that made the two warring factions sound like spoiled, selfish children in the young man's opinion. Was there any way these Fallen she just mentioned could threaten my people by getting across the Toolie? How far away are these Purple Mountains?

It seemed to Ureeblay that the more this Centaur girl talked, the more new ideas, like buzzing bees, filled his head. Every one that buzzed out of her mouth tried to claim his attention before the others had time to settle down. Ureeblay felt relieved that while Pegasia claimed the Dauktaur came down from the stars, which were actually the Swongli in the night sky, and then created her people using jains, she now said that not all the Centaurs believed as she did.

Now he did understand this—Pegasia admitted the Mentors taught the Daughters of Churon some of the knowledge the Dauktaur brought down from the Swongli, while other Swongli knowledge was forbidden them. The Daughters of Churon then went throughout the different tribes teaching the star knowledge. Ureeblay felt frustration rising up inside his chest. He still didn't understand the difference between Accepted Knowledge, Forbidden Knowledge, and this Revealed Knowledge that Pegasia had told him about.

His head started to hurt. Ureeblay hoped it was because he needed to eat. However, he wanted answers and a better understanding of so many of the things she'd said before he would be able to swallow anything he chewed, or before his stomach would quietly accept food.

"Pegasia," Ureeblay asked, "why exactly would there be war if any of your people tried to travel across these Purple Mountains ... and who are the Fallen?" From up in the treetops, the young man recognized the queeah ... queeah voice of a red-headed woodpecker that was part of the background sounds of the forest they moved through.

"Accordin' to the Mentors, the ancestors of the Fallen," Pegasia told him as she looked up into the leaves and branches overhead, "once were some of the Dauk-taur's people. Some say they suffahed ah sickness even the Dauk-taur's medicines could not cure, or that the sickness was caused by a thing the Dauk-taur created using his star knowledge. In any case, those people were cast out by their brethren. Then over the yars since the beginning, the Fallen gathered together high in the hoof hills on the other side of the Purple Mountains," the young woman said, brushing a few dry, stray hairs away from her left eye with her right hand. "And from there, they moved intah the lower valleys of the Purples as their numbers slowly increased over the generations.

"I've even heard others say," the young woman told him, "that the first Fallen fled from the lands near the Great Salt Sea because they feared the earth shakes there. The Mentors tell us that earth shakes happen in their lands near the big water from time to time."

Ureeblay caught her eye and nodded his head in understanding.

"I have heard about earth shakes at my people's solstice congregation," Ureeblay told Pegasia. "The storytellers of several Warmisher clans tell tales about the World Mother suffering terrible indigestion in their territories, or of stone giants deep in the earth fighting in their halls after drinking too much fermented stone blood. They claim those things cause the canyons far to the Warm, even to the distant desert before the Snowy Mountains, to shake down hillsides, collapse older shelters made from the Warmishers' sun-baked clay, mud, and straw mixtures, and make the ground sway and heave so much that people and animals are knocked off their feet. Some of the other tales they tell of things that happen during earth shakes are so amazing, I can't believe them."

"The First Tribe of my people," Pegasia said, and Ureeblay detected a funny note in her young voice as she softly clomped along beside him, "named by the Dauk-taur, the Proti Kentauroi, and who the Final Three Tribes mock by referrin' to them as the Pretty Ponies, have earth shakes in their territory to the Warm also. Before finally bein' named a Daughter of Churon, I accompainkneed my Mentor on the Graind Trek with a group of other ackalights and their Mentors. Making the long journey, we traveled through the territory of each of the Twilve Tribes of the Centaur people. I learned much about our lands and some of the particular ways of each different tribe on that trail.

"When we reached the hoof hills of the Purple Mountains, in the territory of the Twilf Tribe, the Long Spear warriors traveling with us as our onnar guard would not allow our group of pilgrims to ventcha any higher," the Centaur girl told Ureeblay. "They repeated tales of battles with the Fallen, who sometimes raid their lands now, and who have even enslaved herds of hoiho the warriors say. And being terrible two-legs," she said in a soft, plaintive-sounding voice, "the warriors of the Fallen ride on those poor hoihos' backs! I cannot tell yah the other things one of the Long Spear warriors told me the Fallen did with their hoiho slave mares as the two of us gathahed firewood one evening outside of our camp."

When Ureeblay looked at the suddenly meek-sounding girl's face, he realized that the naturally brown skin of her high cheekbones actually showed her blush. She kept her eyes on the forest floor in front of them and did not return his gaze.

"I cannot believe the distant ancestors of the Fallen were once nice people like our Mentors, who call them barbarians," said Pegasia. "However, for any of my people to see these visions of the past that would prove the Dauk-taur is our Papa Tuatahi, and show us His true face and form, my people would have to travel as we do now, along His Trail, His Way. Once we reached the major passes through the mountains, we'd have to fight through the Fallen warriors. However, the Mentors still command a few of the quiet, floating vessels and more of the winged vessels that they can direct to fly above the ground. Using those, the Mentors are carried over the mountains high enough that they avoid the Fallen every time they travel back and forth to visit us."

Ureeblay almost stumbled on a clump of bracken as he came to a sudden stop with his moccasins between the two ruts made earlier by his travel-drag. He felt his mouth hanging open and the air wanting to dry out his exposed tongue as the Daughter of Churon's words buzzed around inside his head—" ... the winged vessels that they can direct to fly above the ground and carry them over the mountains... "

Did the same vessels, the stunned young man managed to wonder, ever carry the Dauktaur's people across the Toolie River?

"On this last visit I made to the Limp Spears, I have learned that all of the Final Three Tribes fight from time to time with the Fallen off to the west, ssss, I mean, to the far Eve in the Purple Mountains," Pegasia told Ureeblay as she stopped and looked back at him, her face animated again and her young voice full of concern. "They claim skirmishas happen more than before. I also learned terrible things about the plans of the Kingi, the leader of the Twilf Tribe, as well as horrible things this secret young-warrior society does ... all while I was the promised guest of those sarry Limp Spears."

Ureeblay just stood there, feeling as if he were adrift on that log out in the Toolie again. He gripped his hickory staff as tightly as he'd held onto the ring of tree roots that had stuck up from the tree trunk surrounded by the deep, blue water of the big river.

Is this what my sister meant, he managed to wonder, when she told me about the river of my dreams on her visit to me in my Second Life?

"I would nevah accept Mikaere na Sisa Wikitoria as my mate now," Pegasia announced, raising her chin in a way that made her exotic features appear haughty to Ureeblay, even thought what she'd just said shocked him silent. "And now I am a member of yahr whare, of yahr household. I will sarve yah in ... sss, all ways ... as you reminded me.

"I will nevah," she spoke louder with conviction, "be Mikaere's wahine or his pononga. I can tell, Ureebay, yah're toa, and kaha, even if yah're still young. You will protect me."

Ureeblay didn't answer as he continued to stare in partial shock at the girl, feeling his heart beating strongly in his moving chest.

"Ureebay," she asked him, sounding less sure than before, and perhaps noticing his shocked demeanor, "yah are toa and kaha ... yes?"