The Shelters of Stone (117 page)

“The problem is knowing how much to stop those feelings without perverting them. In my opinion, I think that is really at the bottom of Joharran’s concern over the knowledge you have brought us, Ayla. As long as most people believed your Clan were only animals, we could kill them without thinking about it. It’s harder to kill people. The empathy is so much stronger that the mind must invent new reasons. But, if we can somehow link it to our own survival, the mind will
make the devious twists and turns necessary to rationalize it. We’re very good at that. But it changes people. They learn to hate. Your wolf doesn’t need to hate what he kills. It would be easier if we could kill without compunction, like your wolf does, but then, we wouldn’t be human.”

Ayla thought for a time about what Zelandoni said. “Now I know why you are First Among Those Who Serve The Mother. It is hard to kill. I know how hard it is. I remember the first animal I killed with my sling. It was a porcupine. I felt so bad, I didn’t hunt again for a long time, and then I had to find a reason. I decided to kill only carnivores because they sometimes stole the meat from the hunters, and because they killed the same animals the Clan needed for food.”

“That is truly the loss of innocence, Ayla, when we understand what we must do in order to live. That is why a young hunter’s kill is so important. It is not only changes in the physical body that make a person an adult. The first hunt is the most difficult, and it is more than overcoming fear. A man and a woman must show that they can survive, that they can do what must be done to live. That is also the reason we have certain ceremonies to honor the spirits of the animals we kill. It is one way we show honor to Doni. We need to remember and appreciate that their life is given so that we may live. If we don’t, humans can become too hardened, and that can turn against us.

“We must always show appreciation for what we take, we need to honor the spirits of the trees and grass and other foods that grow, too. We must treat all Her Gifts with respect. She can become angered if we ignore Her, and She can take back the life She has given us. If we ever forget our Great Earth Mother, She will no long provide for us, and if the Great Mother should decide to turn Her back on Her children, we will no longer have a home.”

“Zelandoni, you remind me of Creb in many ways. He was kind and I loved him, but more than that, he understood people. I could always go to him. I hope that doesn’t insult you. It’s not meant to,” Ayla said.

Zelandoni smiled. “No, of course I’m not insulted. I
would like to have known him. And, Ayla, I hope you know, you can always come to me.’ ”

Ayla thought about her conversation with the First as she prepared to grind the red ore. But when she began the hard work of crushing the lumps of iron ore with the roundish rock against a flat, saucer-shaped stone, she tried to bury herself in the job to forget about the incident with Brukeval. The exertion did help to wear off tension, but the repetitive physical activity left her mind free to think, and Zelandoni had given her much to think about. She is right, Ayla thought. I think I have made an enemy of Brukeval. But what can I do about it now? It’s done. I don’t think there was ever anything I could have done about it. He will think what he wants to think, no matter what I do or say.

It didn’t occur to Ayla to lie and tell him that she didn’t really think he had the look of the Clan. It wasn’t true. She did think he was a mix. She began to wonder about his grandmother. The woman had been lost. When she was found again, she talked about being attacked by animals, but the animals she referred to must have been the ones she called flatheads. They must have found her, how else had she survived? But if they took her in, fed her, they would have expected her to work, like their own women. And any man of the Clan would then feel he could use her to relieve his needs. If she objected, someone may have forced her, the same way Broud had forced her. It was unthinkable for a woman of the Clan to resist. She would have been put in her place.

Ayla tried to imagine how a woman born a Zelandonii would respond in a situation like that. To the Zelandonii, it was the Gift of Pleasure from the Great Earth Mother, and it was never supposed to be forced. It was for sharing, but only when both the man and the woman wanted to share it. Without doubt, Brukeval’s grandmother would have considered it an attack. How would it feel to be assaulted by someone you thought of as an animal? To be forced to share the Gift of Pleasure with such a creature? Would it be enough to affect the mind? Perhaps. Zelandonii women were not used
to being ordered around. They were independent, as independent as the men.

Ayla stopped grinding the red stone. It had to be true that a man of the Clan had forced Brukeval’s grandmother to couple with him, because she was pregnant, and that was what started the Ufe growing inside her. And Brukeval’s mother was born as a result. She was weak, Jondalar said. Rydag was weak, too. Perhaps there is something about the mixture that sometimes produces weakness in the offspring.

Her Dure was not weak, though, and Echozar was not weak. Neither were the S’Armunai. They were not weak, and many of them had the look of the Clan. Perhaps the weak ones died young, like Rydag, and only the strong ones lived. Could the S’Armunai be the result of such a mixture that began long ago? They were not so upset about mixtures, perhaps because they were more used to them. They seemed to be ordinary people, but they did have some Clan characteristics.

Was that why Attaroa’s mate tried to dominate the women before she killed him? Was something about the way men of the Clan thought about women passed down, like some of their looks? Or was it just something he learned when he lived with them? But there was much that was good about the S’Armunai. Bodoa, the S’Armuna, had discovered how to take clay from a river and burn it into stone, and her acolyte was a fine carver. And Echozar, he is really very special. The Lanzadonii, just like the Zelandonii, think it was the mixing of spirits that gave him the look of both lands of people, but his mother had been attacked by one of the Others.

Ayla began grinding stone again. How ironic, she thought. Brukeval hates the people who started the life that gave birth to him. It is men who start life growing inside a woman, I’m sure of it. It needs both. No wonder that Cave of S’Armunai were dying out when Attaroa was their leader. She couldn’t force the spirits of women to blend to make life. The only women who had babies were those who sneaked in at night to visit their men.

Ayla thought about the life growing inside her. It would
be Jondalar’s baby as much as hers. She was sure it started when they got off the glacier. She hadn’t made her special tea, and she was sure that was what kept life from starting inside her during their long Journey. The last time she had bled was shortly before she and Jondalar started across the glacier. She was glad she hadn’t been sick much this time. Not like when she was pregnant with Dure. Children who were mixtures seemed to be harder on women, and on some of the babies. This time she felt wonderful, most of the time, but would she have a girl or a boy? And what would Whinney have?

T
he Ninth Cave built a refuge for the horses under the abri in the lesser-used section to the south near the bridge up to Down River. Ayla had asked Joharran if anyone would object if she and Jondalar constructed something to protect the animals. She had expected to make something simple that would just keep rain and snow from blowing in on them. Instead, when Joharran held a meeting at the Speaking Stone to see how people felt about it, they decided to pitch in and make a real dwelling for them, with low stone walls and panels above to keep out the wind. But there were no drapes at the entrance and no fence to keep them penned in.

The horses had always been free to come and go as they chose. Whinney had shared Ayla’s cave in the valley, and both horses had grown accustomed to the horse shelter the people of the Lion Camp had built onto their longhouse for them. Once Ayla showed Whinney and Racer the place, fed them dried grass and oats, and gave them water, they seemed to know it was theirs. At least, they returned often, using the more direct route from the edge of The River that was nearby. They seldom used the path from Wood River Valley and across the busy ledge in front of the dwelling area, unless Ayla led them.

After the horse shelter was built, Ayla and Jondalar decided to make a watering trough out of wood, a kerfed square
box made in the style of the Sharamudoi containers, and when they started, everyone was interested. It took several days, even though they had many helpers—and even more observers. First, they had to find the proper tree, and settled on a tall pine from the middle of a thick stand. The closeness of the other trees caused each one to grow tall to reach the sunlight, with few lower branches, which avoided knots.

The tree had to be cut down with flint axes, no small chore in itself. A flint axe did not bite deep. Instead, they started high, removing many chips and thin slivers as they worked through the trunk at a shallow angle. The remaining stump looked as though it had been chewed by a beaver. The tree had to be cut through again, just below the lowest branches. The top of the tree would not go to waste; carvers and toolmakers were already eyeing the wealth of wood, and any scraps would be used to feed fires. A feeding trough for the horses was made from the same tree. Following the tradition of the Sharamudoi, pinecone seeds were planted near the fallen tree, in thanks to the Great Mother. Zelandoni was quite impressed with the simple ceremony.

Next, they demonstrated how to extract planks out of the log using wedges and mauls. The resulting wooden boards, tapering to a thin edge from the outside toward the center, found many uses, including as shelves. The kerfed boxes were an ingenious idea. Using a flint burin, or similar chisel-like tool, they carved through a plank to cut off a long section with straight ends. The cut ends were then tapered at an angle along the edge. At three measured distances, they cut a kerf across the wooden board, a wedge-shaped groove that was not cut all the way through. With the help of steam, the plank was bent along the grooves with the uncut side out, allowing the tapered edges of the groove to meet inside to form a rectangular box. With a flint borer, several holes were hand-drilled into the tapering ends. Rubbing with sand and stones gave the plank a smooth finish.

For the bottom, another piece of plank was evened and shaped with knives and sanding stones to fit inside, and eased into a groove cut all the way around the inside lower edge of
the box. When it was all shaped and maneuvered together, the tapered edges of the fourth corner of the box were fastened together with pegs that were pounded through the pre-drilled holes. Although it leaked at first, when soaked in water, the wood swelled, making the box waterproof, which made it a good storage container for liquids or fats and, using hot stones, an effective cooking vessel. They were also good containers to hold water and feed for horses. It was likely that more boxes would be made in the future.

Marthona watched Ayla, cheeks red and exhaling steam with every cold breath, climbing up the path. She wore thick-soled moccasins with attached uppers that wrapped around the calf over her fur leggings, and the fur-lined parka Matagarís mother had given to her. It did not conceal her obvious pregnancy, especially with her belt, worn rather high, from which her knife and some pouches were dangling. The hood was thrown back and her hair was caught up in a serviceable bun, but loose strands were whipping around in the wind.

She still used her Mamutoi carrying bag rather than one in the Zelandonii style, but it was full of something. She had gotten used to the haversack, the pack that was worn over one shoulder, and usually wore it when she went on short trips. It left a shoulder free to carry back her catch. At the moment, three white ptarmigan, tied together by their feathered feet, hung down her back over the other shoulder, balanced by two good-size white hares down the front.

Wolf followed behind her. She usually took him when she went out. He was not only good at flushing out birds or small animals, he could show her where the white birds or hares had fallen in the white snow.

“I don’t know how you do it Ayla,” Marthona said, falling in step beside her when she reached the stone porch. “When I was as far along as you are, I felt so big and awkward, I didn’t even consider hunting anymore, but you are still going out, and nearly always bring something back.”

Ayla smiled. “I feel big and awkward, but it doesn’t take
much to throw a stick or sling a stone, and Wolf helps me more than you know. I’ll have to stay home soon enough.”

Marthona smiled down at the animal padding along between them. Though she had been worried about him when he was attacked by the other wolves, she rather liked his slightly drooping ear. For one thing, it made him much easier to recognize. They waited while Ayla dropped off the game in front of her dwelling area on a block of limestone that was used sometimes as a place to put things and sometimes as a seat.