by JLipton
Page 1
"Shall I tell you a story?" Tara said. "Please do", mummured Willow, as she wiggled under the blankets, then nestled her head on Tara's shoulder.
Once upon a time, in a land so far from ours that you could fly around the world three times and not be closer than than a gnat's wing, lived a wise old woman and her three daughters. This old woman made a decent living selling potions and spells, being a hedge-wife to the peolpe of the land. But she knew she could not support three daughters, and the idea of them be beholding to anyone was abhorrant.
So, one fine Spring day, she gathered her daughters, gave them each a pack of food, clothes, and leaning and sent them out into the world. And so they went, traveling lightly upon the earth, as their good mother had taught them.
The first, whose name was Gia, went to the east, into the land of bogs and swamps. She took off her boots, and, barefoot, sank her wiggling toes into the mud and the muck of the fens. As she stood there, softly stroking the reeds and the water lilies, her breasts grew large and her hips grew wide. Her ample belly grew to hang over her lap. The mud climbed up her skin, turning her brown, a deep dark earthy color. She bacame Giea, the Earth Mother, and wherever she went, fertility and fercundity followed. Her prescence was courted in the luscious Spring, by farmers anxious for plentiful crops, and by shy young wives, anxious for heathy children. Towns had a festival when she was near.
The second daughter, whose name was Dina, went north into the vast pine forest. Her eyes saw, her ears heard, her nose smelt every animal in the forest form the elk and bear to the termite and the shrew. She put on a shirt and leggings of green leather, soft and supple. She lived in the forest, in harmony with the animals, taking as she needed, and thinning herds of the old and weak. She became Diana, the Hunter, and her skin grew dark red, like a brick left in the sun. She was thin, as thin as her arrows. She never went to towns, but they would have a feast-day if she was in the nearest forest.
The third daughter, Chloe was her name, she went west, into the meadows of the dawn. Her skin became the color of and her hair grew the color of straw. She rolled in cartwheels through the meadows, giggling as her feet flew over her head. She whistled and jigged. She played jokes, and told stories and she bacame Clio, mother of music and song. People were merry when she was around, and the bows of the fiddlers raced across the string, and the people danced until their feet were sore.
So the sisters lived , and thrived, until a day in dark November, on a pink and black twilight, when the three sisters met in a woods. Giea squenched her toes in the mulch of leaves underfoot, Diana sat on a tuft of grass, alert to every sound, and Clio waltzed from tree to tree. They spoke in quiet tones about their lives, and their loves, for each sister had touched, and been touched, by another heart. White, black and red; rotund, angular and curved; each was happy with their lives, and was happy for the others. As darkness fell, the sisters parted, but their spirits bound together, and are still bound to this day.
Tara stroked the hair of the sleeping girl beside her, kissed her forehead and her cheek, and as she, too, drifted off, she thanked all the fates, whatever gods and goddesses there might be, especially Geia, Diana and Clio, for leading her here, to this woman, this heart, this love.
The End