Kwasa the cliff dweller

by Katharine Atherton Grimes

And then she went down to grind corn for piki, for waiting in idleness is hard.

CHAPTER III
In the Season of Planting

“The door of the Sun-House is open!”

From mouth to mouth flew the word, brought at sunrise from the High Tower far up the cliff where Bimba, the Watcher, kept anxious count of the days till the planting season should begin.

As if by magic the court was filled with busy men, women and children. Waka had come back once more to bring them plenty. It had not been in vain that every morning and evening they had thrown sacred meal toward the rising and the setting Sun, beseeching him to return quickly from his long journey to the south. And now the glad news had come that he had at last touched the peak far away to the east that marked his final favor, and they might get the seeds ready.

Nor was that their only cause of rejoicing. For Kwasa and his companions had returned the night before, worn and weary from their long, swift race to the far-off neighbors at the southwest, but triumphant and proud. They brought word that the Rainbow people and their near kinsmen, the Bear Clan, were ready at a moment’s notice to join them against the dreaded common foe, whether Ute or Apache. Moreover, in the nine days since Sado had left them word had come that in a terrible battle between the Utes and the Pueblo people of the Seven Cities the foe had been repulsed with great slaughter, and had fled, broken and disabled, to their northern mountain fastnesses to nurse their wounds. For the time the danger of attack was over.

So, though the older men of the village still felt some anxiety, the planting was at last to be begun under much more favorable circumstances than they had feared. The women chatted gayly as they brought out the precious seeds to be sorted, sharpened new planting sticks, and baked great sheets of piki to pack in the big food-baskets that were to go with the planters to the distant fields. The children tumbled about on the terraces or played games in the angles of the gray walls, even they noticing the relief in the air which had been so full of dire rumors.

But Kwasa and Wiki, with their two companions, were more excited than any of the rest. For their service as messengers they were to be “adopted,” or consecrated, into the rank of men, and henceforth would take a dignified place in the Clan, though they were some years younger than usual for such an honor. For the first time they were to witness the invocation of the mysterious deities of the cloud and the sun, which took place in the kiva, the sacred underground chamber whose hatchway opened into the court. Mosu, who as head priest was the person of supreme authority on such occasions, had even promised them that they might act as novices at the annual ceremony of the Blessing of the Seeds.

When the boys were not following Mosu about they lingered in fascinated anticipation about the sloping entrance to the kiva, through which protruded the long ends of the ladder leading to the depths below. They had many times descended through the trap-door on the surface to the great, dusky chamber of the kiva, but never had they been allowed to witness any of the sacred rites, except such as were held in the court and were open to women and children. And now that they were to be admitted as men to the significant symbolism of the ancient service, they felt awed and excited by turns.

Kwasa’s grandmother, old Tcua, had long ago told him the mystic tradition of the Creation, whose sacred story was perpetuated by the solemn ceremonies in the dimly lighted chamber. And now, in awed tones, Kwasa repeated it to Wiki and the others as they sat huddled in an angle of the lower terrace near the opening to the kiva.