A NOVEL SET IN PREHISTORY
The Oak People
Chapter 9: Ansa gives birth
Ansa
Ansa arches her head back against the birthing rock, to relieve the aching low down in her spine. After the icy winds of winter, spring has come at last to the mountain and with it have come her pains. Before they left, the women tucked a skin around her but the nights are still cold and she is shivering. The wind slows now, breathing a silent calm over the plain below. She searches the sky but there is no sign of Balqa. This is the fourth night since he slipped into the land of death. It is the time of waiting. Waiting for Balqa to return, bringing flowers that shoot up amid the long grass. Bringing food for their bellies. Bringing new life.
The pain comes tearing again, like the teeth of a cat busy with her kill. Ansa’s huge belly grows tight and hard under her hand. She pushes her elbows against the rock, as the women showed her. When it passes, she leans back, breathing heavily. Thirsty, she climbs to her feet, and stumbles towards the spring. It is slippery underfoot. She loses her footing and grabs at a tuft of grass, sprouting from between the rocks. Ansa drinks greedily and straightens up, the night air drying the sweat from her forehead. She makes her way back to the birthing rock.
At the next tearing she shakes with the effort of keeping silent. The pains are growing more fierce. The first one surprised her at dusk, as she was climbing back up to the cave in the wind. The women saw at once that the baby was coming. They brought her here to the rock and showed her what she must do. They were kind but she can’t forget the anxious look in Gashi’s eyes, nor her words. If you cry out, the baby will be born twisted.
She knows there is worse to fear than that. Once, when she was a child in the desert, one of the women screamed and screamed till the men covered their ears and went off far away, past the wadi. Then everything went quiet and, later, she saw them digging a hole in the sand.
Ansa’s whole body is a gaping fear. The next pain is stalking her, waiting for the moment to attack, and there is nowhere for her to run. She scrabbles around on the damp ground till her fingers find the small skin bag. Shaking, she unties it and drops the Balqa stone into her cupped palm. As her belly hardens with the next pain, it seems to her that the power of Balqa pulses from the stone into her hand and up through her body. The mist of fear begins to lift, revealing a calm certainty that lay beneath it all along. Just as the winter is coming to an end, so Balqa will be born again in the sky. There will be food again on the mountain. A child will leave her body in the morning — a living child. Her belly softens and Ansa’s lips form a smile in the dark. The next tightening comes — more powerful than ever — but she is no longer frightened. When it has passed, Ansa replaces the tiny sphere in its bag and ties the bag tightly.
The night wears on and the pains are stronger than she could have thought possible. Her lip is bleeding where she has bitten it to stop from crying out, but still the calm of Balqa hangs over her. The women are close by, in the cave, waiting. They will come as soon as they hear the baby crying. Meanwhile, she is alone on the welcoming mountain, alone with a task which belongs only to her.
Ansa can scarcely feel her feet and hands but her belly is on fire, moving with a rhythm all of its own: first hardening into a monstrous rock of pain, then slackening and leaving her exhausted. How can there be so much pain? Even the thought of that grave in the sand is not enough, now, to stop her screaming out.
She can no longer smell smoke from the cave and tears begin to form, running down her cheeks. What if they have forgotten? What if they don’t hear the baby crying? What if the baby will not come out? With the next pain comes a wave of sickness, as if she has eaten sour fruit, and a great weight inside her body, pressing down and down.
Bo
Charged with the task of listening, Bo is curled up near the cave mouth, dozing, when she hears it. She gets up at once and, skirting the dying embers of fire in the hearth, crosses to where Gashi lies sleeping. She touches her arm and Gashi is instantly awake.
‘What did you hear? Was it Ansa or the baby?’
‘It was the baby — I know it was. Listen!’
The shrill rattling cry starts up again, like the call of the birds who fly over the Salt Water. Gashi springs to life. ‘You go to her. I’ll wake Koru and the others.’
Bo runs along the path to the spring in the growing light. The air is cool, the grass wet from yesterday’s rain. Ansa is propped motionless against the birthing rock, her head slumped forward, and Bo is terribly frightened until she sees Ansa look up with a smile of greeting.
Bo drops to her knees and embraces her friend, her tears making brown tracks through the white ash dust on her cheek. ‘What was it like? Was it terrible?’
Ansa pulls back the ibex skin. The slippery new creature lies quietly now on the mound of her belly, its dark skin smeared with something white, eyes tight shut, limbs weaving slowly. Bo looks up into Ansa’s face — suddenly different, the face of a stranger, a grown woman. Envy twists inside her.
She longs to pick the baby up and cradle it in her arms but perhaps she should wait for Koru and the others. Bringing her face close, she watches, entranced, as the baby’s mouth opens and closes, like a fish. There is a bloody smudge on its forehead and Bo licks her finger and tries to wipe it away. Suddenly, a thought comes to her.
‘Is it a boy or a girl?’ She moves the blue belly rope out of the way so that she can see. ‘It’s a girl!’ She looks up into Ansa’s face. Does she mind?
‘A girl,’ Ansa repeats, and Bo can tell she is not disappointed. In fact, it seems a shadow is lifting from Ansa’s face.
Bo’s gaze is drawn back to the baby. She puts her finger inside one of the hands, astonished at how strongly the tiny fingers grasp her own.
They hear voices and Bo gets to her feet, uncertain what she should do. She has never been with the women after a birth before. Ikomar and Sorne appear, with Esti close behind.
‘It’s a girl!’ she calls to them.
Old Koru comes into sight, leaning heavily on Gashi’s arm. The others fall silent and stand back to make way for them.
The cloud has cleared during the night, leaving a vast, clear sky that speaks of the coming of spring. The only sounds are running water and the call of the birds high overhead. All around, the slopes of the mountain roll down into the plain, a green sky beneath their feet. A new rush of flowers, white and yellow and red stars, has been coaxed from the ground by the last rains. Bo feels the everyday quietness of the morning shift, sliding into a magic silence.
Koru is weak from the chest sickness that comes to her every winter and Gashi has to help her down to the ground. When she is settled on her haunches, the old woman pulls back the ibex skin. Without a word, she lifts the baby off Ansa’s belly, the tiny arms and legs startling out into space. A shrill wailing sets up as Koru places her carefully on the ground. Ignoring the cries, Koru slowly feels the baby all over with practised hands, then traces the belly rope its whole length to the dark afterbirth which lies between Ansa’s legs. She lifts the liver-like mass and carefully feels all around the edges.
The baby’s cries become more frantic, yet no-one is picking her up. Bo watches as the old woman turns her attention to Ansa. Her wrinkled fingers probe Ansa’s belly, pressing with apparent force. Taking no notice of the new mother’s groan, Koru continues her examination. She grasps Ansa’s teats and pulls on them, again and again. Now someone passes her a blade and Bo gasps as the rope is cut, but the baby does not seem to feel any pain; her crying becomes less shrill and urgent. Koru presses some nama leaves against the bleeding stem, then she wraps the baby tightly in a cured kid skin and lays her back on the ground. The warmth of the skin seems to soothe her and she becomes quiet at last. Koru sits stiffly back on her heels, resting, but still no one moves. At last, Koru brushes her palms together, one after the other, to signal that everything is completed. The magic is fading but Bo holds back, watching to see what the others will do. One by one, the women touch Koru’s forehead in respect and then it is over and they crowd round, eager to get a first look at the new child.
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