Becoming Bird

Illu was trying to become a bird. 

She sat in silence, her inner eye gazing into the dark. 

It was no good. All she saw and felt was darkness. 

“Do nothing, and let the spirit take flight. The sparrow is easier to assume than the hawk. Do not force it — let it come,” her teacher had said. 

While others her age were becoming women, she was trying to become a bird. 

The priestesses had come for her after her fourteenth year, when she still had not had her blood. 

Her mother had caressed her cheek, and gazed lovingly into her eyes. “It is a great honor to walk the way of the red priestesses. Serve well, and do me honor.”

She left her mother’s house that day, and could take nothing she owned. 

She would never become a mother, never have a household, never take a trade. Her work was now that of the priestesses, who served as the emissaries between life and death, the known and unknown, the spirits and people. 

They stopped at a bathhouse at the entrance to the temple. The priestesses shed their red robes, and asked her to do the same. Underneath they were all normal women, young and old. When they were clean, they entered the temple. 

An old woman sat on a stone chair. Her eyes were grey and clouded. She reached her hands out and passed them over Illu’s face. “Illu… child of water, song. I feel the shape of a great bird in you, like a heron, or hawk. But start with a sparrow. Her spirit comes easier.” 

That was how Illu had received the task of becoming bird. 

Now she sat on a stone bench, in sitting position. Her knees and ankles ached. 

Her mind drifted. To her mother, to the river. Catching frogs in the rushes. To her brothers, quick with the spear and sword. How tall they must be now, practicing in their armor. To her sister, radiantly happy with her first child. 

She was neither man, nor woman. She was the guardian in between. Or she would be, if she could ever leave her form and walk with the spirits. 

Illu felt heavy and sunken in her body, like a settled sack of grain. 

The horn was blown. One single, resonant note hung on the air, like the sound of creation. 

“That is enough for today,” her teacher said softly. 

Illu retired to her cell. Stone benches, stone beds. All she had for padding was a mat of rushes. She was alone. “Solitude quiets the mind and loosens the spirit,” they said. 

She was loneliness itself. She slept, and nothing visited her dreams. 

---

Work was her solace. She had tasks to do in the garden, in the kitchen, in the herbery. And she cleaned the floors. Outside could be swept, but inside the temple she had to scrub for hours on her hands and knees. Visitors came and went without looking at her, and she kept her eyes to the floor. She was not to look anyone in the eyes, or speak. Even in work, her solitude was complete. 

A group of young soldiers entered the temple. She could not avert her ears, and heard their movement and voices. Out of the corner of her eyes, she could see their bare feet. They kneeled and asked for strength, for swiftness, for victory. That was proper. And they talked amongst themselves and laughed. That was not proper. 

A pair of feet detached themselves from the group and began moving towards where she kneeled. She turned away as they stopped in front of her. A low voice asked, “Priestess, may I make an offering?” It had been a long time since she had heard a man’s voice. She looked up into his eyes before she could stop herself. 

Her breath caught in her throat. He was the kind of soldier that made the city proud. Like a statue made of bronze, lit from within. His eyes shone under dark curls. In his outstretched hand lay a desert rose. He smiled. “I came to make an offering to Istar, but her most beautiful form is over here. Please take this, and honor my gift.” 

She was not a priestess yet, not really. But she could not turn away, and it seemed right to accept an honest gift. Most of all, she wanted to remember him. She reached out to take the rose, and allowed her hand to lightly brush his. 

“Thank you. I am at peace. I will be back to worship this time next week,” he said, and bowed. He turned his head and looked at her as he walked away, and she stared back, forgetting that she was not supposed to look people in the eyes. 

She tucked the rose in her robe. Since she had already broken the rules, she might as well go on breaking them. Just this one time.

By nightfall, when she removed the rose from her robe, the petals had wilted. She turned the flower over in her hands. She was not supposed to have things to hold and cherish during this period, when she was leaving her old life behind. But this was a gift to Istar, part of her new life. And the goddess would not mind. She was love, and she was war. 

“Please, Istar,” she asked in her mind, “hold him for me. Let him wait. Make him strong and fast, and bring him victory. And make me a bird, so I can fly to him.” 

She tucked the flower under the mat made from rushes, and her dreams were full of him. 

---

The next week passed like an eternity. She tried harder than ever to become a bird, and scrubbed the floors for hours, imagining him there.

The day of his return, she glanced up every time someone entered the temple. Finally he came. Alone this time. He was solemn, and his eyes were deep. 

“Priestess, I have a prayer.” He held out a scroll of paper. “Can you read it to the goddess for me, then burn it?” 

She nodded, and took the scroll without lowering her eyes. 

He hesitated, then asked, “I’m going to battle. May I have your name, so I can carry it with me for strength?” 

She nodded slowly, and dipped her finger in the bucket. With the water, she wrote her name on the dry tiles.

“Illu,” he said, and smiled. “Water, and song. I will remember this song.” 

When he left, her heart was also filled with song. 

---

That night she unrolled the scroll by candlelight in her room. Eddin Gamilu. His name, his unit number, and the address of his mother’s house. I ask for protection, victory, and the love of a beautiful woman. May she come to me when she completes her training. 

She committed the words to memory and burned the scroll. In her heart, she redoubled the prayer winding its way up on wings of smoke. 

---

He was gone. No news came to her in the depths of her silence, and she was filled with distraction. 

She forgot herself and sighed again while sitting. Her teacher spoke. “You are pining.” 

She kept her eyes closed, but the teacher continued. “You are in love with a man. To become a priestess, you cannot join a man until you have completed your training and had your blood bound. As long as you accept this, you may stay. Do you understand and accept this? Nod if you do, speak if you do not.” 

Was her choice to go to him, or to stay? Her duty was to become a priestess. Her duty to her city, to her mother, and to him. Illu nodded. 

“Then stay. But you may let yourself love him, as love has overtaken you. Even in your sitting, as you will be doing it waking and sleeping. Let yourself love him, and take whatever form lets you go to him.” 

Illu nodded, and sank back into the sit. Released from the burden of her guilt, she found an ease in it she’d never known. The hours floated by as she drifted through a darkness full of joy and fear. 

Work and sitting came easier after that. But as the days passed, and no throngs of people poured into the temple to give thanks, her joy became more and more filled with fear. 

She woke from a dream with the sound of his voice calling her name. “Illu, illu.” He was thirsty, he needed water. 

She wouldn’t go to her work today. If they asked, she’d say she was sick. She left the curtain to her cell drawn, and plunged into a sit. 

Darkness. She felt running water. The running water turned to running blood. Steel, and red water running into sand. 

Suddenly she was above a battle. She was a bird, on dark wings. There was no longer a battle. There were men on the ground. She circled, and descended. One of them had called her name. 

She hopped among men on the ground. Some were still, some were moaning. Someone screamed near her. She flapped, cried out, and fled the sound. 

Where was she? She was looking for him. Who needed water? “Eddin,” she tried to cry out, but her voice was hoarse. 

She knew him by his skin. He was the color of living bronze. He was lying still on his back, and he smelled like death. 

“Eddin,” she croaked again, and hopped up on his arm. “Eddin.” 

His eyes opened. “Illu,” he said, and tried to smile through dry, cracked lips. “Illu, take me home.” 

He could not return to the city. He was already too close to his final home. 

She sat with him, and sailed by his side up to the bridge that crossed over. “Goodbye, Eddin,” she said as she took flight there. He did not speak any longer, but the water said her name.  

---

Illu awoke slumped against the wall. In her cell she could not tell morning from night. She wanted to tell someone what had happened, but she was weak and parched. Her face felt crusted with dried tears. She did not have the strength to get up. Eddin had crossed over, and she had become a bird. 

She slipped down to her mat, and fell into a dreamless sleep. 

Sometime later someone woke her. There was candlelight, a pitcher of water, and her teacher sitting beside her. She drank deeply, and spoke. 

“I became a bird.”

“Where did you go?”

“There was a battlefield. I saw Eddin. He called me. I helped him go.” She paused, and stared into space. “I had dark wings. I was the raven.” 

The teacher brushed her hand over her hair. “Illu, your first flight, into such darkness. Perhaps you are no longer Illu. You’ve become Illusu — lamentation, laughter. You will help many others cross over, and hold them when they return.” 

Illu still stared into space. “What good is it? Now that I can have him, he’s gone.” 

“There will be more men. There will always be more men, if you want them. Any love, however brief, is eternal. You can hold it before you forever, like a candle to a vigil, or bury it in the soil of your soul to make room for others, and it will enrich you.” 

Illu said nothing, but took the words into her heart to turn over later. 

“It’s been a full day and night,” said her teacher. “It’s morning, and we’ve had a victory. Come greet the day with me?” She offered her hand. 

Illu nodded, making her way to her feet with the help of the hand, and followed her teacher into the morning light.