I stand under falling water and it is warm. Not river warm. Not sun-on-a-flat-rock warm. Warm like blood, and it never stops, and no one carried it here in skins on their back. A small silver flower on the wall breathes rain, and the rain is tame.
There is fire hiding somewhere. Fire is heating this water, I know it, I feel its work, but I see no flame and I smell no smoke. This frightens me more than any beast. A beast I can hear. A beast I can strike. But fire with no flame is a spirit, and spirits do not bargain.
I take a smooth stone that smells of flowers and I rub it on my skin and it weeps white foam. The dirt leaves me. The old hunt leaves me, the mud, the smell of my own days. I watch it swirl down a small dark mouth in the floor. The mouth drinks it. The mouth is always hungry and never full.
I could stay here until my skin softens like a river-drowned thing. I understand now why my tribe hides in this small stone cave every morning. Not for cleaning.
They come to be held by warmth that asks for nothing back.