THIS WAS THE FOUKTH MORNING of the westward march, the pilgrimage back to the Place of Three Rivers. A dry cold wind had been blowing steadily out of the north ever since Silver Cloud had given the order to turn around and retrace their long path across the barren plains. Sometimes new gusts of thin, hard snow came whistling by, dancing in wild milky swirls overhead-and this in mid-summer! Truly, the Goddess must be angered. But why? What had they done?

By night the People huddled in crannies and crevices under a white moon that drenched the sky with rivers of chilly light. There were no caves here to crawl into. Some of the most enterprising ones found twigs and branches and flung little lean-tos together for themselves, but most were too weary after a day's marching and foraging to make the effort.

The day of the Summer Festival had come and gone, and-for the first time in memory-no Summer Festival had been held. Goddess Woman didn't care for that at all.

"We will have famine when the cold months come," she said gloomily to Keeps The Past. "To neglect the Summer Festival is a serious thing. Has there ever been a year when we allowed the day to go by without the proper observances?"

"We aren't neglecting the Summer Festival," Keeps The Past rejoined. "We're simply postponing it until we can seek the guidance of the Goddess."

Goddess Woman spat. "The guidance of the Goddess! The guidance of the Goddess! What does Silver Cloud think he's up to? I am the one who provides the guidance of the Goddess. And I don't need to return to the Place of the Three Rivers in order to provide it."

"Silver Cloud does," said Keeps The Past.

"Purely out of cowardice. He's become afraid of the Other Ones and he wants to run away from them, now that he knows that they're ahead of us."

"Ahead of us and behind us both. We can't hide from them any longer. They're all around us. And there aren't enough of us to fight them. What are we to do? The Goddess must tell us how to deal with them."

"Yes," Goddess Woman conceded sullenly. "I suppose that's true."

"So unless you can advise us yourself, in the name of the Goddess, concerning the tactics we ought to follow-"

"Enough, Keeps The Past. I see your point."

"Good. Try to keep it in mind, dien."

Goddess Woman uttered a sulky sniff and walked away by herself, over to the fire. She stood close, arms huddled against her sides.

She and Keeps The Past had been bickering for more years than Goddess Woman cared to think about, and they were not coming to like each other any more as the time went along. Keeps The Past thought she was something special, with her long memory (supplemented by her bundles of record-sticks) and her deep knowledge of tribal traditions. Well, she was special in her way, Goddess

Woman grudgingly supposed. But she is not holy. I am holy. She is just a chronicler; but I speak with the Goddess, and sometimes the Goddess speaks with me.

Still, Goddess Woman admitted, as she opened her fur wrap to allow the warm pink glow of the fire to rise up and around her lean, stocky body, Keeps The Past did have a point. The Other Ones were a tremendous problem-those tall, agile, maddening flat-faced people who had come out of nowhere and seemed to be spreading everywhere, appropriating the best caves for themselves, the finest hunting grounds, the sweetest springs. Goddess Woman had heard horrifying tales occasionally from tribeless wanderers who had crossed the People's path, tales of clashes between the Other Ones and bands of the People, of hideous massacres, of horrifying routs. The Other Ones had better weapons, which they seemed to be able to manufacture in incredible quantities, and they were more swift afoot in battle too, it appeared: they moved like shadows, so it was said, and when they fought you it was as though they were on all sides of you at once. So far Silver Cloud had been able to avoid any of that, deftly steering the tribe this way and that across the great open plains to keep them away from collisions with the dangerous newcomers. But how long could he go on managing to do that?

Yes, best to make this pilgrimage and see if the Goddess had any advice, Goddess Woman told herself.

Besides, Silver Cloud had been very persuasive when it came to the religious side of the argument. The Summer Festival marked the high point of the year, when the sun was warm and the day was long. It was a celebration of the kindness of the Goddess, of Her grace and favor, a giving of thanks in advance for the benefits that She would bestow during the remaining weeks of the summer hunting and food-gathering season.

How could they hold the Summer Festival, Silver Cloud had wanted to know, when the Goddess was so plainly displeased with them?

More to the point, Goddess Woman thought: how could they hold the Summer Festival when Silver Cloud flatly refused to perform it? It was a rite that required the participation of a man, and only the most powerful man of the tribe at that. It was he who had to dance the dance of gratitude before the shrine of the Goddess. It was he who had to carry out the sacrifice of the bullock, he who had to take the chosen virgin in his arms and initiate her into the mysteries of the Great Mother. The other holy festivals of the tribe were the responsibility of the three Goddess Women; but there was no way they could carry out this one. The chief had to do it. If Silver Cloud refused to take part, the Summer Festival could not be held. That was all there was to it. Goddess Woman felt uneasy about that; but the decision belonged to Silver Cloud.

Goddess Woman turned away from the fire. It was time to set up the shrine for the morning rites.

"Goddess Women!" Goddess Woman called. "Both of you! Let's get to work!"

They had all had individual names, once. But now each one of the three priestesses was simply known as Goddess Woman. You gave up your name when you entered Her service. The Goddess had no name, and Her servants had no names either.

Goddess Woman was still able to remember the name of the youngest Goddess Woman, for she was Goddess Woman's own daughter, and Goddess Woman had named her herself: Bright Sky At Dawn. But it was years since she had spoken that name out loud. To her, and to everyone else, her daughter who had once been Bright Sky At Dawn was simply Goddess Woman now. As was the second-oldest Goddess Woman, whose earlier name was starting to slip from Goddess Woman's memory-it was either Lonely Bird or Runs Like The Fox, Goddess Woman was not sure which. Those two had looked very much like each other, Lonely Bird and Runs Like The Fox. One of them was dead and the other had become a priestess, and over the years Goddess Woman had come to confuse their identities in her mind.

As for her own birth-name, Goddess Woman no longer had any idea what it might have been. She had forgotten it years ago and she rarely gave it any thought now. She was Goddess Woman and nothing but Goddess Woman. Sometimes as she lay waiting for sleep she found herself wondering despite herself what her old name could have been. Something with sunlight in it? Or golden wings? Or shining water? There was brightness in it somewhere, she was fairly sure of that. But the name itself had slipped away forever. She felt guilty for even trying to think of it. Certainly there was no one that she could ask. It was a sin, a Goddess Woman using her birth-name in any way. Whenever she started to think about it she immediately made a sign of purification and asked forgiveness.

She was the second-oldest woman in the tribe. This was her fortieth summer. Only Keeps The Past was older, and by no more than a season or two. But Goddess Woman was strong and healthy; she expected to live another ten years, perhaps fifteen, maybe as many as twenty if she was lucky. Her mother had lived to a great old age, even beyond her sixtieth year, and her grandmother as well. Long life was a characteristic of her family.

"Will we do the full rite this morning?" the youngest Goddess Woman asked her, as they moved the stones about, assembling the shrine.

Goddess Woman gave her an irritated glance. "Of course we will. Why shouldn't we?"

"Because Silver Cloud wants us to leave here right after morning meal. He says we have to travel farther today than we've been doing the last three."

"Silver Cloud! Silver Cloud! He says this, he says that, and we hop like frogs to his commands. Maybe he's in a hurry, but the Goddess isn't. We do the full rite."

She lit the Goddess-fire. The second Goddess Woman produced her little wolfskin packet of aromatic herbs and sprinkled them on the blaze. Colored flames flared high. The youngest Goddess Woman brought the stone bowl of blood from yesterday's kill and poured a little onto the offering-altar.

From the furry bear-skin in which they were stored, Goddess Woman brought forth the three holy bear-skulls that were the tribe's most sacred possession, and put them out on three flat stones to shield them from contact with the ground.

The skulls had been in the tribe's possession for more generations than even Keeps The Past could say. Great heroes of long ago had slain those bears in single combat, and they had been handed down in the tribe from one Goddess Woman to the next. The bear was the Father-animal, the great kindling force that brought forth life from the Great Mother. That was why Goddess Woman had to take care not to allow the skulls to touch bare soil, for then they would fructify the Mother, and this was not the season for doing that. Any children who were kindled into life now, in mid-summer, would be born in the dark days of late winter, when food was at its scarcest. The rime to kindle young ones was in autumn, so that they would come forth in the spring.

Goddess Woman laid her hands on each of the skulls in turn, lovingly stroking its upper vault, polished smooth and ice-bright by the hands of many Goddess Women of years gone by. She felt shivers running through her hands and arms and shoulders as the power of the elemental Father-force tingled upward out of the skulls and into her body.

She caressed the shining fangs. She fingered the dark eye-sockets.

The Father-force opened the way for her, admitting the Mother-force to her soul. One force necessarily led to the other; one could not invoke one without feeling the presence of the other.

"Goddess, we thank Thee," murmured Goddess Woman. "We thank Thee for the fruit of the earth and for the flesh of the beasts and most deeply do we thank Thee for the fruit of our wombs." Briefly she touched her breasts, her belly, her loins. She crouched and dug her fingertips into the hard frosty soil. Cold as it might be today, it was still the breast of the Mother, and she fondled it with love. Beside her, the other two Goddess Women were doing the same.