Excerpt
thing I have never seen before.”
All the carvings, with the exception of some monstrous humanoidlooking
creatures, were of animals the people used for food. The old
woman explained that the odd creatures were spirits and she told him
about a world populated by good and evil and shape-shifting spirits.
They made ivory carvings of them less than an inch high that they placed
around the tent and that were used by angacock or shamans. The angacock
was one of the secret parts of their lives that had survived the influx
of Europeans, with all their technology and scientific understanding of
the universe. Ken learned to ask questions that led him to a deeper understanding
of a world where his previous knowledge didn’t fit. He was
a child again, watching, and listening, and writing new information on a
blank slate.
The old woman told teaching stories as harsh as the landscape. Each
story was retold many times, always in the same way. These stories were
repeated from generation to generation, telling of the consequences of
jealousy and possessiveness and other undesirable traits. When the stories
ended, silence wrapped itself around the small community. Time lost
meaning. No one felt the need to speak.
Libros Libertad 