Plains of Passage (103 page)

“Well, I did say he could stay,” she said.

Ayla walked Wolf inside, led him to an out-of-the-way corner, and signaled him to stay. She stayed with him for a while, knowing it would be particularly difficult for him, but just having children to watch seemed to satisfy him for the moment.

His behavior calmed Solandia, and after serving her guests a warming hot tea, she introduced her children, then went back to preparing the meal she had started. The presence of the animal slipped to the back of her mind, but the children were fascinated. Ayla studied them, trying to be unobtrusive. The oldest of the four youngsters, Larogi, was a boy of about ten years, she guessed. There was a girl of perhaps seven years, Dosalia, and another of four or so, Neladia. Though the baby was not yet walking, that did not limit his mobility. He was at the crawling stage and was fast and efficient on all fours.

The older children were wary of Wolf, and the elder of the girls picked up the baby and held him while they watched the animal, but
after a while when nothing happened, she put him down. While Jondalar spoke with Losaduna, Ayla began to set out their things. There was spare bedding for guests and she hoped she would have time to clean their sleeping furs while they were here.

Suddenly there was a peal of babyish laughter. Ayla caught her breath and looked in the corner where she had left Wolf. There was absolute silence in the rest of the dwelling space as everyone stared in wonder and awe at the baby, who had crawled to the corner and was sitting beside the large wolf, pulling on his far. Ayla glanced at Solandia and saw her staring transfixed as her precious baby boy proceeded to poke and prod and pull at the wolf, who simply wagged his tail and looked pleased.

Finally Ayla walked over, picked up the child, and brought him to his mother.

“You’re right,” Solandia said with amazement, “that wolf loves children! If I hadn’t seen it myself, I would never have believed it.”

It wasn’t long before the rest of Solandia’s children approached the wolf who liked to play. After a small problem with some teasing by the oldest boy, which Wolf responded to by taking the child’s hand in his teeth and growling, but not biting down, Ayla explained that they had to treat him with respect. Wolf’s reaction frightened the boy just enough to make him pay attention. When they went outside, all the children of the community watched Solandia’s four and the wolf with fascination. Solandia’s children were envied for their special privilege of living with the animal.

Before it got dark, Ayla went out to check on the horses. When she stepped outside the cave, she heard Whinney nicker in greeting, and she felt that her friend had been a little worried. When she nickered back, causing several heads to turn in her direction and stare in surprise, Racer responded with a somewhat louder neigh. She walked across the field, heavy with snow nearer the cave, to give the horses some attention and make sure they were both all right. Whinney watched her coming with her tail raised, looking alert and responsive. As the woman neared, she dropped her head, then flipped it high and described a circle in the air with her nose. Racer, just as happy to see her, pranced and reared up on his hind legs.

It was a new situation for them to be around so many people again, and the familiar woman brought reassurance. Racer arched his neck and pricked his ears forward when Jondalar appeared at the mouth of the cave, and he met the man halfway across the field. After hugging and petting and talking to the mare, Ayla decided she would comb Whinney the next day, for the relaxation it would give them both.

Led by Solandia’s four, all the children had clustered together and
were edging toward them and the horses. The fascinating visitors allowed the children to touch or pet one or the other of the horses, and Ayla let a few ride on Whinney’s back, which many of the adults watched with a little envy. Ayla planned to let any adults ride who wanted to try it, but she felt that it was too soon for that. The horses needed rest, and she did not want to put too much strain on them.

With shovels made from large antlers, she and Jondalar began to clear heavy snow away from some of the pasturage nearer the cave, to make it easier for the horses to forage. Several others joined in, making it fast work, but shoveling snow reminded Jondalar of a concern he had been trying to resolve for some time. How were they going to find food and forage, and, more important, enough drinkable water for themselves, a wolf, and two horses while crossing a frozen expanse of glacial ice?

   Later in the evening everyone gathered in the large ceremonial space to listen to Jondalar and Ayla tell about their travels and adventures. The Losadunai were particularly interested in the animals. Solandia had already begun to rely on Wolf to keep her children distracted, and watching the wolf playing with them even distracted the adults. It was hard to believe. Ayla didn’t go into detail about the Clan, or the death curse that had forced her to leave, though she did hint at differences that had arisen.

The Losadunai thought the Clan were just a group of people who lived far to the east, and though she tried to explain that the process of making animals accustomed to people was not anything supernatural, no one quite believed her. The idea that just anyone could tame a wild horse or wolf was too hard to accept. Most people assumed that her time of living alone in a valley was a period of trial and abstinence that many who felt called to Serve the Mother endured, and to them her way with animals verified the appropriateness of her Calling. If she wasn’t One Who Served yet, it was only a matter of time.

But the Losadunai were distressed to learn of their visitors’ difficulties with Attaroa and the Sarmunai.

“No wonder we’ve had so few visitors from the east during the past several years. And you say one of the men who was held there was a Losadunai?” Laduni asked.

“Yes. I don’t know what his name was here, but there he was called Ardemun,” Jondalar said. “He had hurt himself and was crippled. He couldn’t walk very well, and he certainly couldn’t run away, so Attaroa let him move around the Camp freely. He’s the one who set the men free.”

“I remember a young man who went on a Journey,” an older woman
said. “I did know his name once, but I can’t recall … let me think—he had a nickname … Ardemun … Ardi … no, Mardi. He used to call himself Mardi!”

“You mean Menardi?” a man said. “I remember him from Summer Meetings. He was called Mardi, and he did go on a Journey. So that’s what happened to him. He has a brother who would be glad to know he’s alive.”

“It’s good to know that it’s safe to travel that way again. You were lucky you missed them on your way east,” Laduni said.

“Thonolan was in a hurry to get as far along the Great Mother River as we could. He didn’t want to stop,” Jondalar explained, “and we stayed on this side of the river. We were lucky.” When the gathering broke up, Ayla was glad to go to bed in a warm, dry place with no wind, and she fell asleep quickly.

   Ayla smiled at Solandia, who was sitting beside the fireplace nursing Micheri. She had awakened early and decided to make the morning tea for herself and Jondalar. She looked for the pile of wood or dried dung, whatever fuel they used, that was usually kept nearby, but all she saw was a pile of brown stones.

“I want to make some tea,” she said. “What do you burn? If you tell me where it is, I’ll go get it.”

“Don’t have to. Plenty here,” Solandia said.

Ayla looked around and, still not seeing the fireplace burning material, wondered if she had been understood.

Solandia saw her puzzled look and smiled. She reached over and picked up one of the brown stones. “We use this, burning stone,” she said.

Ayla took the stone from her hand and examined it closely. She saw a distinctive wood grain, yet it was definitely stone, not wood. She had never seen anything quite like it before; it was lignite, brown coal, a material between peat and bituminous coal. Jondalar had awakened, and he walked up behind her. She smiled at him, then gave the stone to him. “Solandia says this is what they burn in the fireplace,” she said, noticing the smudge it left on her hand.

It was Jondalar’s turn to examine it and look puzzled. “It does look something like wood, but it’s stone. Not a hard stone like flint, though. This must break up easily.”

“Yes,” Solandia said. “Burning stone breaks easy.”

“Where does it come from?” Jondalar asked.

“South, toward the mountains, are fields of it. Still use some wood, start fires, but this burns hotter, longer than wood,” the woman said.

Ayla and Jondalar looked at each other, and a knowing expression
passed between them. “I’ll get one,” Jondalar said. By the time he returned, Losaduna and the eldest boy, Larogi, were awake. “You have burning stones, we have a firestone, a stone that will start a fire.”

“And it was Ayla who discovered it?” Losaduna said, more a statement than a question.

“How did you know?” Jondalar said.

“Maybe because he discovered the stones that burn,” Solandia said.

“It looked enough like wood that I thought I would try burning it. It worked,” Losaduna said.

Jondalar nodded. “Ayla, why don’t you show them,” he said, giving her the iron pyrite and flint along with the tinder.

Ayla arranged the tinder, then turned the metallic yellow stone around in her hand until it felt comfortable and the groove worn into the iron pyrite from continued use faced the right way. Then she picked up the piece of flint. Her motion was so practiced that it almost never took more than one strike to draw off a spark. It was caught by the tinder, and, with just a few blows of air, a little flame burst forth. There was a collective sigh from the watchers, who had been holding their breaths.

“That is amazing,” Losaduna said.

“No more amazing than your stones that burn,” Ayla said. “We have a few extra. I’d like to give you one, for the Cave. Perhaps we can demonstrate it during the Ceremony.”

“Yes! That would be a perfect time, and I will be happy to accept your gift for the Cave,” Losaduna said. “But we must give you something in return.”

“Laduni has already promised to give us whatever we need to get over the glacier and continue our Journey. He owes me a future claim, though he would have done as much anyway. Wolves broke into our cache and got our traveling food,” Jondalar said.

“You plan to cross the glacier with the horses?” Losaduna asked.

“Yes, of course,” Ayla said.

“What will you do for food for them? And two horses must drink much more than two people—what will you do for water when everything is frozen solid?” the One Who Serves asked.

Ayla looked at Jondalar. “I’ve been thinking about that,” he said. “I thought we could take some dry grass in the bowl boat.”

“And perhaps burning stones? If you can find a place to start a fire on top of the ice. You don’t have to worry about getting them wet, and it would be much less to carry,” Losaduna said.

Jondalar looked thoughtful, and then a big happy grin warmed his face. “That would do it! We can put them in the bowl boat—it will slide across the ice even with a heavy load—and add a few other stones to use
as a base for a fireplace. I’ve been worrying about that for so long … I can’t thank you enough, Losaduna.”

   Ayla discovered by accident, when she happened to overhear some of the people talking about her, that they considered her unusual speech mannerism to be a Mamutoi accent, although Solandia thought it was a minor speech impediment. No matter how hard she tried, she could not overcome the difficulty she had with certain sounds, but she was glad that no one else seemed very concerned about it.

Over the next few days, Ayla became better acquainted with the group of Losadunai who lived near the hot well—the group was called a “Cave” whether they lived in one or not. She particularly enjoyed the people whose dwelling space they shared, Solandia, Losaduna, and the children, and she realized how much she had missed the company of friendly people who behaved in a normal way. The woman spoke the language of Jondalar’s people reasonably well, with some Losadunai words mixed in, but she and Ayla had no trouble understanding each other.

She was even more drawn to the mate of the One Who Served when she discovered they had a common interest. Although Losaduna was the one who was supposed to have learned about plants, herbs, and medicines, it was actually Solandia who had picked up most of the lore. The arrangement reminded Ayla of Iza and Creb, with Solandia treating the Cave’s illnesses with practical herbal medicine, leaving the exorcism of spirits and other unknown harmful emanations to her mate. Ayla was also intrigued by Losaduna with his interest in histories, legends, myths, and the spirit world—the intellectual aspects she was forbidden to know when she lived with the Clan—and she was coming to appreciate the wealth of knowledge he possessed.

As soon as he discovered her genuine interest in the Great Earth Mother and the nonmaterial world of the spirits, and her quick intelligence and amazing ability to memorize, he was eager to pass on the lore. Without even understanding them completely, Ayla was soon reciting long verses of legends and histories and the precise content and order of rituals and ceremonies. He was fluent in Zelandonii, though he spoke it with a strong Losadunai flavor in the expression and phrasing, making the languages so close that most of the rhythm and meter of the verses were retained although some of the rhyme was lost. Even more fascinating to both of them were the minor differences, and many similarities, between his interpretation and the received wisdom of the Mamutoi. Losaduna wanted to know the variations and divergences, and Ayla found herself being not only an acolyte, as she had been with Mamut, but a teacher of sorts, explaining the eastern ways, at least those she knew.

Jondalar was also enjoying the Cave of people, and becoming aware of how much he had missed having a variety of individuals around. He spent quite a lot of time with Laduni and several of the hunters, but Solandia was surprised at the interest he showed in her children. He did like children, but it wasn’t so much her offspring that interested him, as watching her with her youngsters. Especially when she nursed the baby, it made him long for Ayla to have a baby, a child of his spirit, he hoped, but at least a son or daughter of his hearth.