We’d walked in from the west where Daughters lined the main pathway, waiting, chatting with each other in low tones, looking expectantly down the dirt street.
Looks like a parade route.
Ahead, I could see women rushing in and out of the Great Yurt. Arms full of apples and pears, others carrying buckets of water. At Nana’s yurt, the flap was down. I walked toward it, intending to enter.
“Best not to,” Auri catching me by the arm, “I think she’s probably talking with whomever she’s chosen as her Pua. We shouldn’t interrupt.”
“Oh right,” I said, “but I was going to ask her if there was anything I could help with.”
Auri looked around, “Looks like things are under control. How about we wait along the pathway for the Aurochs’ arrival? Seems like any Daughters who aren’t busy preparing food are waiting to greet them.”
“Who are the Aurochs anyways?” I asked.
“We saw one of the high bovine priestesses in your photo,” Auri recalled, “and we know what Maddalena did to her.”
I nodded. I hadn’t looked at the photo in awhile, but I was pretty sure there was only scary Maddalena in it now.
“The bovine part I get,” I said, “Cows are members of the bovine family. But a high priestess? They aren’t generally given that much regard where I’m from.”
“It’s too bad that your people don’t know the representatives of the goddess that live among them,” Auri said, “and to be clear, she is, or was, a high bovine priestess.”
“Bovine instead of what?”
“Well there’s bovine, feline, canine, ermine, serpentine…” Auri counted off on her fingers.
“Ok, got it - cows, cats, dogs, snakes, uh...ermine?” I asked.
“Skoats, weasels, that family.”
“In some kind of hierarchy?”
“For the bovine, it is only in title. In reality, they consider themselves equal among all Aurochs,” Auri said, “How bovine feel about their priestesses versus feline priestesses or ermine priestesses is another matter.”
“Drama?”
“A little drama and a long story,” Auri responded, “and they really roll their eyes when anyone talks about human priestesses. Nobody likes the human ones. Nobody meaning most other animals. Though the old Daughters of Aradia - and there were some very good priestesses at one time - were thought of highly. They worked with the other priestesses to improve things, to have peace between them all.”
“What happened? No priestesses among the Daughters now?”
“This, unfortunately, is another very long story,” Auri said, “the Malefici, the Maleficarum, even the phallas were involved one way or another in the way things turned out.”
“The Malefica-what-um?” I asked.
“The Maleficarum. Oh hey! I see them,” Auri said pointing down the pathway.
“The Maleficarum?”
“No! The Aurochs!” Auri said.
There were shouts and clapping from Daughters near the beginning of the path. Unnecessarily standing on tiptoe, I waived to Isobeau riding on Arion at the front of a procession of large, white or brown, four-legged animals.
Those must be the Aurochs.
They moved slowly, young women by their sides, wearing elaborate garlands of woven grasses and flowers. The color of flowers matched the color of the clothing of the woman at each one’s side. Their horns were wrapped in what looked like silver ribbon, their shapes were drawn-out “S” shapes and reminded me of the frame of a lyre you might see on the frieze of a Grecian urn. Each Auroch had a polished silver disc held between their horns. The look was familiar - those “S” shapes and the disc - but I couldn’t quite place the resemblance.
“They are the priestesses of Bat,” Auri said reading my mind, “She Whose Milk Feeds All Of Life.”
“Bat?” I asked.
“She is a goddess who appears as a cow,” Auri stated, “which is why she’s known as the Giver of the Milk of Life.”
“Oh! Sort of like Hathor, the Egyptian goddess,” I said.
“If Hathor is a cow goddess, then yes,” Auri said.
“Well how many cow goddesses could there be?”
Auri chuckled, “Well there’s only one of importance to these priestesses.”
I felt the rhythmic vibration of the ground beneath us as the priestesses took each deliberate step.
“You see the young women walking alongside the high bovine priestesses?” Auri pointed out, “these young ones are Daughters given by their mothers to the Aurochs.”
“What for? Why would the Aurochs need human children?” I asked.
“Not just any humans - Daughters. These girls were taken while young, before they came into their moons, but after they’d learned the language of the Daughters,” Auri said, “They were taken back to the bovine herds - their villages - and were educated in the language of the Aurochs.”
“The Aurochs can speak?” I asked.
“I have heard they are superb orators,” Auri continued, “but no one among the Daughters nor among the Orders has spoken their tongue in a very long time. That’s why they rely on the young women. They are translators.”
“What about Daughters who shape-shift?” I asked, “Isn’t there someone who can shift into being an Auroch? Wouldn’t they understand the Auroch language?”
“They were chosen to go with the Aurochs because they are the only ones who can shift. That makes it easier for them to learn the language. But the more time they spend with the Aurochs, and the less they spend being human girls, the more difficult it is for them to remember who they are - Daughters of Aradia.”
“But the Aurochs have disdain for humans,” I said, “so why would they even consider such a relationship?”
Auri explained, “The high bovine priestesses have disdain for human priestesses, most of whom are Malefici now. Not sure whether all bovine feel the same. Although the translators will sometimes play a verbal joke - or worse - not tell the whole truth - when they are working with Daughters. Whether intentionally or not, they can cause hard feelings.”
“They’re translators, not diplomats,” I said.
Auri nodded. We continued to watch the procession make its way down the path.
“So these are the Kyr,” I affirmed.
“No, these are the high bovine priestesses,” Auri corrected, “the Kyr are a bit more…”
Thundering hoofbeats cut off the sound of Auri’s voice. Running on each side of the bovine priestesses were other cows. They kicked up their hind quarters, throwing mud on the crowd. Their hair was ruddy and shaggy. Locks fell down their foreheads into their eyes. They charged and kicked and ran back and forth alongside the slower-moving priestesses. The priestesses bellowed, much like a mother might chastise a noisy, rebellious child. The wild ones bellowed in return but did not stop their theatrics.
“Like I said, a bit more wild,” Auri ended. She stretched both arms wide toward the long-haired Aurochs in front of us, “they - as you can now see - are the Kyr.”
With the priestesses and their translators now passed us, I saw other young women, running up to the Kyr, leaping onto their backs and grabbing fistfuls of hair on the Kyr’s strong necks. These girls ululated, leaning over the sides of the great beasts as the Kyr ran past the crowd, stretching out their arms as they went by to high-five the hands of young Daughters.
“And these are the translators for the Kyr,” Auri said with no small amount of admiration.
One woman came close and I could see her clothing. She reminded me of paintings I’ve seen of Genghis Khan’s daughters - the Mongol Queens - wearing a thigh-length brocaded robe of brilliant red and violet, trimmed with fur, over red riding pants. A belt buckle detailed with the head of a cow, whom I now assumed was Bat. A shoulder coat of fur-trimmed red wool. And a rounded fur hat, with the tails of fox or some other animal hanging down in front of their ears. Their boots - glossy red, despite the mud being kicked up.
“I bet they aren’t so popular with any of the Daughters who shift into foxes, are they?” I asked Auri.
“I think they’re a little scary to everyone,” she replied, “but their ferocity matches that of the Kyr. Otherwise, they couldn’t keep up. You’ll see how dramatic they can be when translating. Come, let’s go find a good place in the Great Yurt. I want to be up close.”
We ran after the Kyr, and just ahead of the crowd, all of us going into the great hall of the Daughters to listen to the priestesses tell their story.