The neighborhood dogs are making quite the racket this morning. Whatever is in the street, they are not too happy about. Alerting to an intruder, I better at least look out the window to see what they are protesting today.
Why, look. There are a pair of lionesses in the street. Wait, what?
“Mom! MOM! There are LIONS in the street!” She asks if I was inebriated but comes to the window anyway. “Oh my God! There are lions in the street! The neighbor’s dogs are out!” She runs to the back yard and I follow right behind her, questioning why she is headed outside if there are lions running about.
As we go, we question each other. Did a circus come to town? A derailment of a train perhaps and the lions escaped the transport cars? Many questions back and forth but no answers came.
In the back yard, we both peer over the fence and see two dogs being harassed by the lions. Our own dog was alternately scratching at our legs and running to the far side of the yard. Poor little terrier, he must be so scared by all this.
Wait.
Terrier?
My mother’s dog is a full grown German Shepard.
I look at the small terrier again. His form shimmers for a moment, briefly becoming a cowering large dog, before returning to the hyper terrier form. The shift confirms I am dreaming, and I return to the view of the street with lucid eyes.
Mom calls to the dogs, alternately cajoling and cursing at them. One dog comes swiftly to her. We reach over the fence as it jumps, grabs the front legs, and haul the terrified dog into our yard. This dog, normally hostile to us, is licking her thanks. Our terrier runs to her, and the two dogs stay with each other for comfort.
As I leaned over the short fence, I felt a shimmer of warding. I know then the lions will not be able to jump over the fence into the yard. We are safe here. I say nothing to my mother about this advantage, knowing she will take undue risks. Instead we call to the second dog. He is running around the cul-de-sac, looking for a place to escape the lions. The lions are playing with him, but the play is rough and the dog’s legs are bloody.
I sense a change from one of the two lionesses. The dog is no longer a toy, but dinner. I {call} out to the dog in a different voice, he hears me and races towards us. The lion, sensing her prey is attempting to escape, is in hot pursuit.
The dog jumps onto the fence in a mad scramble. My mother and I both grab front legs, just as the lion grabs a hind leg. Remembering a fight I had in a different dream, I call on the Kenaz rune and throw a wad of fire at the lioness. It singes the fur above her eye and distracts her. She lets go and dog, Mother, and I fall backwards onto the ground in a heap.
The lion is bellowing on the other side of the fence, frustrated at the escape of her prey. The wounded dog is curled in my arms, shivering. While my mother peers over the fence, mocking the lion, I whisper Berkana over the dog’s leg, stopping the bleeding. The dog, also normally hostile, is licking my face and neck in thanks. He runs towards the back of the yard, to join his mate and my dog.
Something about these two lions are familiar. But I can’t quite place where I have encountered them. They have a dry air about them, as if they had just came in from some dusty place.
I ask my mother about the wisdom of taunting an animal that is infamous for hunting humans. She replies the lions are too weak to jump over the fence. Actually, they are not. But the yard and house are warded. It is the warding that prevents them from attacking us on our land.
The lions become bored and wander down the street, out of view. I tell her to go inside the house and call 911 to report escaped lions. The noise of the three dogs behind me distract me. I assumed she was going inside the house now that the lions were gone.
The sound of the fence door slamming corrected my assumption. She had gone outside into the street to see where the lions had gone to. Gone past the wards. I call her from the gate, scream at her to come back. She replies that she was safe because the lions were gone.
A flash of pale tan catches my eye. The lions had jumped onto the roof of a nearby vacant house. They were waiting for careless prey to appear. And they have spotted my mother. One of the pair stands up, and prepares to launch herself off the roof.
My mother sees the launch too late, she turns to run but in her panic runs in the wrong direction. The lion catches up to her easily and sinks her teeth and claws into my mother’s right ankle. The second lion is still on the roof, but is watching with increasing interest.
I am suddenly given a way to end the dream. I can force it to end, right now. I don’t have to stand there helpless, watching my mother being mauled and ripped apart by the lions. I can walk away. I can wake up. All I have to do, is will it.
For a second, I almost do. Her scream of fright and pain is past the limits of what I will allow my dreams to do to those I care about. But a half-remembered name stops me. {Lion-Song}. The dreamtime slows down so that a second of dream is perceived as a minute to me. I know these lions, they are the pridemates of the lioness I killed in the savanna dream. My eyes truly open, and I see a great Lion Spirit over the two lions in the street.
If I leave the dream now, that piece of my mother that is in the street will be devoured by the lions. There will be a consequence in the Waking. The Lion Spirit is waiting, watching. It has no interest in my mother. It is watching me.
In a heartbeat, I remember all I had become in that savanna dream. I have a responsibility. A duty. Yes, I’m walking into a trap laid carefully for me. But I will allow no lion to devour that which has been placed in my care. The decision changes me.
I don’t attempt to open the fence gate. I leap over the fence instead. My man’s skirt is short, above the knee. The chest wrapping holds my breasts firmly in place. I am running as I land, my name going before me, {Roars with Lion Soul}.
This strange amalgam I have become, my savanna clothes morph back into my urban jeans and shirt. The dagger {Laughing-Man} had given me remains in my hand. But now, I am able to add the power of Kenaz to the dagger. A Masai shield forms on my left arm. It is not made of leather, but of the ice of Isa.
With inhuman quickness I fall onto the lion that has gripped my mother. The beast releases her to attack me, but is knocked off her feet by a backhand shield to the jaw. Following through, I gut the lion from chest to throat and release her from the dream in seconds.
My back is to her pridemate, who had lept from the roof as I entered the fray. As I turn, I {sing} in the form of a roar. She stops in mid-stride, confused. As {Woman-Become-Man} I approach the lioness. {Singing} my dominance as an Alpha. She cowers and retreats slightly. I {sing} my claim upon this street as my territory. Great masculine roars and bellowing. The lioness gets the hint. She turns and flees down the street. As she does so, she shimmers and leaves this dreaming.
I still sense the Lion Spirit over the area. Watching. Waiting. Humming quietly, I tell the spirit that I have to attend to my mother’s wounds, but I will return to the street. I sense patience from the spirit.
My mother is looking quite confused at all that has happened. My transformations and powers have her questioning if she is dead already. I have to chuckle as I sheathe the dagger. I release my grip on the ice shield, it sublimates into a cool vapor. I hold on to this vapor and wrap it around her ankle. Her ankle is broken, with several deep cuts, but the bleeding has stopped.
As I field dress her ankle, she is screaming at me to tell her what is happening. “Not enough lifetimes to explain it all, Mom.” She refuses to allow me to carry her into the backyard, insisting on hobbling there instead. As we pass through the fence gate, through the barriers and wards, I expected to return to normal human me. But I remain {Lion-Song}. I realize the different dreams are starting to converge on each other, building a new dreamscape. We continue the slow progress into the house, where she sits in the kitchen and starts making phone calls. While she is distracted on the phone, I leave the house, pass through the back yard, and return to the street.
I stand there in jeans and shirt. A leather thong has tied a wrap on my hip, wherein rests the Kenaz empowered dagger that {Laughing-Man} gave me. A leather thong is tied about my left wrist, from which an Isa empowered shield will emerge from by my command. The {Woman-Become-Man}, the {Roars with Lion Soul}, the {Lion-Song} stands in an American street, and calls on the Lion Spirit for whatever may happen.
The spirit manifests itself. I feel the dry winds of the savanna sweep over my street. The spirit takes on the physical form of a huge male lion. His form is that of the Lion Progenitor. The lion’s mane is the color of my nappy hair, his fur the color of ripened wheat. His paw alone is the size of my face. In a physical fight, I am greatly outmatched. He rumbles as he steps towards me and my bones vibrate from the bass.
He stands before me, his face level with my own. My human instinct is to draw my weapons and attack before I am lost. I force that instinct to heel. For several minutes, I stand before the Lion Progenitor. I look no where else but his face, and even then, mostly his eyes. He sniffs at me, and speaks a Thing into my soul that I am unable to place into words.
My gaze remains steady. A sudden movement on his part. A large muscular tongue is rasping the side of my face. The Lion Progenitor is licking my face. I want to reach up with my hands and stroke his glorious mane, but a deep knowledge tells me not to. A complete licking on face and neck, he looks me over. He headbutts the left side of my face, and purrs such a deep purring that my bones jostle.
He turns, becomes the dry savanna wind again, and leaves my street. In the fading whisps of air, I laugh a great and deep hearty laugh of my own. I turn, change shape to the sleek black jaguar of many a dream, and leave the Dreaming entirely.
~~~~
As I greeted my mother for the morning, she mentioned that she had slept on her ankle wrong during the night. Her right ankle was sore for some odd reason, as if something had stabbed into it. I sipped my coffee, and said nothing.