Plains of Passage (55 page)

Ayla was smiling along with everyone else.

“By the time the fish finally lost enough blood and died, I was pretty far upstream,” Jondalar continued. “The boat was almost swamped, and
I ended up swimming to the shore. In the confusion, the boat went downstream but the fish ended up in a backwater next to the land. I pulled it up on the shore. By then I was pretty cold, but I’d lost my knife and couldn’t find any dry wood or anything to make fire. Suddenly a flathead … a Clan … youngster appeared.”

Ayla’s eyes opened with surprise. The story had taken on a new meaning.

“He led me to his fire. There was an older woman at his camp and I was shivering so much that she gave me a wolfskin. After I warmed up, we went back to the river. The fl … the youngster wanted half the fish and I was glad to let him have it. He cut the sturgeon in half, longways, and took his half with him. Everybody who saw me go by came looking for me, and just about then they found me. Even if they laugh about it, I was more than happy to see them.”

“It’s still hard to believe that only one flathead carried off half that fish by himself. I remember it took three or four men to move the half fish he left behind,” Markeno said. “That was a big sturgeon.”

“Men of the Clan are strong,” Ayla said, “but I didn’t know there were any Clan people in this region. I thought they were all on the peninsula.”

“There used to be quite a few on the other side of the river,” Barono said.

“What happened to them?” Ayla asked.

The people in the boat were suddenly embarrassed, looking down and away. Finally Markeno said, “After Doraldo died, Dolando got a lot of people together and … went after them. After a while, most of them … were gone … I guess they went away.”

   “Show that to me again,” Roshario said, wishing she could try it with her own hands. Ayla had put the birchbark cast on her arm that morning. Though it was not quite dry, the strong, lightweight material was already rigid enough to hold the arm securely, and Roshario was enjoying the greater mobility it allowed her, but Ayla did not want her to attempt to use the hand yet.

They were sitting with Tholie out in the sun amidst several soft chamois hides. Ayla had her sewing case out and was showing them the thread-puller she had developed with the help of the Lion Camp.

“First you have to cut holes with an awl into both pieces of the leather you want to sew together,” Ayla said.

“The way we always do,” Tholie said.

“But you use this to pull the thread through the holes. The thread goes through this tiny hole at the back end, then when you put the point into the cuts in the leather, it pulls the thread with it through
both pieces that you want to join together.” A thought occurred to Ayla as she was demonstrating the ivory needle. If it was sharp enough, I wonder if the thread-puller could make the hole, too? Leather can be tough, though.

“Let me see it,” Tholie said. “How do you get the thread through the hole?”

“Like this, see?” Ayla said, showing her, then gave it back. Tholie tried a few stitches.

“This is so easy!” she said. “You could almost do it with one hand.”

Roshario, watching closely, thought Tholie might be right. Though she couldn’t use her broken arm, if she could use her hand just to hold the pieces together, with a thread-puller like that, she might be able to sew with her good hand. “I never saw anything like that. Whatever made you think of it?” Roshario asked.

“I don’t know,” Ayla said. “It was just an idea I had when I was having trouble trying to sew something, but a lot of people helped. I think the hardest part was making a drill out of flint small enough to make the tiny hole at the end. Jondalar and Wymez worked on that.”

“Wymez is Lion Camp’s flint knapper,” Tholie explained to Roshario. “I understand he is very good.”

“I know Jondalar is,” Roshario said. “He worked out so many improvements on the tools we use to make boats that everyone was raving about him. Just little things, but it made a big difference. He was teaching Darvo before he left. Jondalar’s good at teaching youngsters. Maybe he’ll be able to show him more.”

“Jondalar said he learned much from Wymez,” Ayla said.

“That may be, but you both seem to be good at thinking up better ways to do things,” Tholie said. “This thread-puller of yours is going to make sewing a lot easier. Even when you know how, it’s always hard to push a thread through holes with an awl, and that spear-thrower of Jondalar’s has everyone excited. When you showed how good you are with it, you made people think that anyone could do it, though I don’t think it’s as easy as you made it seem. I think you must have practiced more than a little.”

Jondalar and Ayla had demonstrated the spear-thrower. It took a great deal of skill and patience to get close enough to a chamois to make a kill, and when the Shamudoi hunters saw how far a spear could be thrown with it, they were eager to try it on the elusive mountain antelopes. Several of the Ramudoi sturgeon hunters were so enthusiastic about it that they decided to adapt a harpoon to it, to see how it would work. In the discussion, Jondalar brought up his idea of a spear in two parts, with a long back shaft fletched with two or three feathers, and a smaller detachable front end tipped with a point. The potential was
immediately understood, and several approaches were tried by both groups over the next few days.

Suddenly there was a commotion at the far end of the field. The three women looked up and saw several people hauling up the supply basket. Some youngsters were running toward them.

“They caught one! They caught one with the harpoon-thrower!” Darvalo shouted as he approached the women. “And it’s a female!”

“Let’s go see!” Tholie said.

“You go ahead. I’ll catch up as soon as I put my thread-puller away.”

“I’ll wait for you, Ayla,” Roshario said.

By the time they joined the others, the first part of the sturgeon had been unloaded and the basket sent down again. It was a huge fish, too much to bring up at one time, but the best part had gone up first: nearly two hundred pounds of tiny black sturgeon eggs. It seemed propitious that the large female was the result of the first sturgeon hunt with the new weapon developed from Jondalar’s spear-thrower.

Fish-drying racks were brought out to the end of the field, and most of the people there were beginning to cut the great fish into small pieces. The great mass of caviar, however, was brought back to the living area. It was Roshario’s responsibility to oversee its distribution. She asked Ayla and Tholie to help her, and she dished out some for all of them to taste.

“I haven’t eaten this in years!” Ayla said, taking another bite. “It’s always best when it’s fresh from the fish, and there’s so much.”

“And a good thing, too, or we wouldn’t get to eat much of it,” Tholie said.

“Why not?” Ayla asked.

“Because sturgeon roe is one of the things we use to make the chamois skin so soft,” Tholie said. “Most of it is used for that.”

“I’d like to see how you make that skin so soft sometime,” Ayla said. “I have always liked to work with leather and furs. When I lived with the Lion Camp, I learned how to color skins and made a really red one, and Crozie showed me how to make white leather. I like your yellow color, too.”

“I’m surprised Crozie was willing to show you,” Tholie said. She looked significantly at Roshario. “I thought white leather was a secret of the Crane Hearth.”

“She didn’t say it was a secret. She said her mother taught her, and her daughter wasn’t too interested in working leather. She seemed pleased to pass the knowledge on to someone.”

“Well, since you were both members of Lion Camp, you were the same as family,” Tholie said, though she was quite surprised. “I don’t think she would have shown an outsider, any more than we would. The
Sharamudoi method of treating chamois is a secret. Our skins are admired and have a high trade value. If everyone knew how to make them, they would not be as valuable, so we don’t share it,” Tholie said.

Ayla nodded, but her disappointment showed. “Well, it is nice, and the yellow is so bright and pretty.”

“The yellow comes from bog myrtle, but we don’t use it for its color. That just happens. Bog myrtle helps to keep the hides soft even after they get wet,” Roshario volunteered. She paused, then added, “If you stayed here, Ayla, we could teach you to make yellow chamois skin.”

“Stayed? How long?”

“As long as you want; as long as you live, Ayla,” Roshario said, giving her an earnest look. “Jondalar is kin; we think of him as one of us. It wouldn’t take much for him to become Sharamudoi. He has even helped to make a boat already. You said you weren’t mated yet. I’m sure we could find someone willing to cross-couple with you, and then you could be mated here. I know you would be welcome among us. Ever since our old Shamud died, we’ve needed a healer.”

“We would be willing to cross-couple,” Tholie said. Although Roshario’s offer was spontaneous, it seemed entirely appropriate the moment she mentioned it. “I’d have to talk to Markeno, but I’m sure he’d agree. After Jetamio and Thonolan, it’s been hard to find another couple we wanted to join with. Thonolan’s brother would be perfect. Markeno has always liked Jondalar, and I would enjoy sharing a dwelling with another Mamutoi woman.” She smiled at Ayla. “And Shamio would love having her ‘Wuffie’ around all the time.”

The offer caught Ayla by surprise. When she fully grasped the meaning, she was overwhelmed. She felt tears begin to sting. “Roshario, I don’t know what to say. It has felt like home here since I first came. Tholie, I would love to share with you…” The tears overflowed.

The two Sharamudoi women felt the contagion of tears and blinked them back, smiling at each other as though they had conspired in a wonderful plan.

“As soon as Markeno and Jondalar come back, we’ll tell them,” Tholie said. “Markeno will be so relieved…”

“I don’t know about Jondalar,” Ayla said. “I know he wanted to come here. He even gave up taking a shorter way just to see you, but I don’t know if he will want to stay. He says he wants to go back to his people.”

“But we are his people,” Tholie said.

“No, Tholie. Even though he was here as long as his brother, Jondalar is still Zelandonii. He could never quite let go of them. I thought that might have been why his feelings for Serenio were not as strong,” Roshario said.

“That was Darvalo’s mother?” Ayla asked.

“Yes,” the older woman said, wondering how much Jondalar had told her about Serenio, “but since it’s obvious how he feels about you, maybe, after all this time, his ties to his own people are weaker. Haven’t you traveled enough? Why should you make such a long Journey when you can have a home right here?”

“Besides, it’s time for Markeno and me to choose a cross-couple … before winter, and before … I didn’t tell you, but the Mother has blessed me again … and we should join before this one comes.”

“I thought as much. That’s wonderful, Tholie,” Ayla said. Then her eyes unfocused in a dreamy look. “Maybe, someday, I’ll have a baby to cuddle…”

“If we are cross-mates, the one I’m carrying would be yours, too, Ayla. And it would be nice to know there was someone around who could help, just in case … although I didn’t have any trouble at all birthing Shamio.”

Ayla thought that she would like to have a baby of her own someday, Jondalar’s baby, but what if she couldn’t? She had been careful to drink her morning tea every day, and she had not gotten pregnant, but what if it wasn’t the tea? What if she just wasn’t able to make a baby start? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to know that Tholie’s children would be hers and Jondalar’s? It was true, too, that the area nearby was so much like the region around the cave of Bran’s clan, that it felt like home. The people were nice … although she wasn’t sure of Dolando. Would he really want her to stay? And she wasn’t sure about the horses. It was nice to be able to let them rest, but would there be enough feed to last the winter? And was there a big enough place to ran?

Most important, what about Jondalar? Would he be willing to give up his Journey back to the land of the Zelandonii and settle here instead?

T
holie walked to the front of the large fireplace and stood silhouetted against the red glow of dying embers and evening sky framed by the high side walls of the embayment. Most of the people were still in the gathering space just under the sandstone overhang, finishing the last of their blackberries or sipping a favorite tea or slightly foaming, newly fermented berry wine. Their feast of fresh sturgeon had begun with their first, and only, taste of caviar from the female caught earlier. The balance of the oily fish eggs would be put to more mundane use in the making of soft chamois skins.

“I want to say something, Dolando, while we’re all gathered together here,” Tholie said.

The man nodded, although it wouldn’t have mattered. Tholie continued without waiting for his acknowledgment.

“I think I can speak for everyone when I say how glad we are to have Jondalar and Ayla here,” she said. Several people spoke out in agreement. “We were all worried about Roshario, not only because of the pain she was suffering, but because we feared she would lose the use of her arm. Ayla changed that. Roshario says she feels no more pain and, with luck, there is a good chance that she will have full use of her arm again.”

There was a chorus of positive comments expressing gratitude and invocations for good luck.

“We owe our kinsman, Jondalar, thanks too,” Tholie went on. “When he was here before, his ideas for changes in the tools we use were a big help, and now he has shown us his thrower, and the result is this feast.” Again the group made vocal expressions of affirmation. “In the time he has lived with us, he has hunted both sturgeon and chamois, but he has never said whether he prefers the water or the land. I think he would make a good River man…”

“You’re right, Tholie. Jondalar’s a Ramudoi!” one man shouted out. “Or at least half of one!” Barono added, to an uproar of laughter. “No, no, he’s been learning about the water, but he knows the land,” a woman said. “That’s right! Ask him! He threw a spear before he cast his
first harpoon, he’s a Shamudoi!” an older man added. “He even likes women who hunt!”