by Jean M. Auel
For a woman, her days spent alone away from the safety of the clan were no less a test of bravery, though more subtle. In some ways, it required more courage to face those days and nights alone, knowing that no matter what happened, she was on her own. From the time she was born, a girl always had other people around her, protecting her. But she had no weapons to bring to her own defense, and no weapon-bearing protective male to save her during her rites of passage. Girls, as well as boys, did not become adults until they had faced and overcome fear.
For the first few days, Ayla had no desire to wander far from the cave, but after a while she became restless. In winter she had no choice and accepted her confinement to the cave with the rest, but she had grown accustomed to roaming freely when the weather was warm. Ambivalence tormented her. When she was alone in the forest away from the security of the clan, she was uneasy and apprehensive; when she was with the clan near the cave, she longed for the privacy and freedom of the forest.
One foraging expedition when she was out alone brought her close to her private retreat, and she climbed the rest of the way to the high meadow. The place had a soothing effect on her. It was her private world, her cave, her meadow, she felt possessive about the small herd of roe deer that frequently grazed there. They had become so tame, she could get close enough to almost touch one before it pranced out of range. The open field gave her a sense of security, lacking now in the dangerous woods that hid lurking beasts. She hadn’t visited the place at all this season and memories came flooding back. This was where she first taught herself to use the sling, where she hit the porcupine, and where she had found the sign from her totem.
She had her sling with her-she didn’t dare leave it in the cave for Iza to find- and after a while she picked up a few pebbles and made a few practice shots. But that was far too tame a sport to interest her for long now. Her mind went back to the incident with the lynx.
If only I’d had another stone in the sling, she thought. If I could have hit him right away, right after the stone that missed, I might have gotten him before he had a chance to jump. She had two pebbles in her hand and looked at them both. If there was only a way to throw one right after the other. Had Zoug ever said anything like that to Vorn? She racked her brain trying to remember. If he had, it must have been when I wasn’t around, she decided. She pondered the idea. If I could get a second stone in the pocket on the downstroke after the first hurl, without stopping it, I could throw it on the next upstroke. I wonder if that would work?
She began making a few tries and felt as clumsy as she had the first time she tried to use a sling. Then she began to develop a rhythm: throw the first stone; catch the sling as it comes down, with the second stone ready; get it in the pocket while it is still moving; throw the second stone. The pebbles dropped often, and even after she began to lob them her accuracy on both shots suffered. But she was satisfied that it could be done. She returned every day after that to practice. She still felt uneasy about hunting, but the challenge of working out the new technique renewed her interest in the weapon.
By the time the forested hillsides were ablaze with the turning season, she was as accurate with two stones as she had been with one. Standing in the middle of the field hurling stones at a new post she had pounded into the ground, she felt a warm sense of accomplishment when a satisfactory thwack, thwack told her both stones had hit the mark. No one told her it was impossible to rapid-fire two stones from a sling, because it had never been done before, and since no one told her she couldn’t, she taught herself to do it.
Early one warm day in late fall, nearly a year from the time she first made her decision to hunt, Ayla decided to climb to the high pasture to collect the mature hazelnuts that had fallen to the ground. As she drew near the top, she heard the whooping and cackling and snuffling of a hyena, and when she reached the meadow, she saw one of the ugly beasts half buried in the bloody entrails of an old roe deer. It made her mad. How dare that noisome creature defile her meadow, attack her deer? She started to run toward the hyena to scare him off, then thought better of it. Hyenas were predators, too, with jaws strong enough to crack the large leg bones of grazing ungulates, and not easily chased from their own prey. She quickly shrugged off her basket and reached to the bottom of it for her sling. She scanned the ground for stones as she edged toward an outcrop near the rock wall. The old stag was half devoured, but her movement caught the attention of the scraggly spotted animal, nearly as large as the lynx. The hyena looked up, found her scent, and turned in her direction.
She was ready. Stepping out from behind the outcrop, she hurled a missile, followed quickly by a second. She didn’t know the second was unnecessary-the first had done the job-but it was good insurance. Ayla had learned her lesson. She had a third stone in her sling and a fourth in hand, prepared for a second series if it proved necessary. The cave hyena had crumpled on the spot and didn’t move. She looked around to make sure there were no more nearby, then cautiously moved toward the beast, her sling ready. On her way, she picked up a leg bone, a few shreds of red meat still clinging to it and not yet broken. With a skull-cracking blow, Ayla made sure the hyena would not rise again.
She looked at the dead animal at her feet and let the club fall from her hand.
Awareness of the implications of her deed came slowly. I killed a hyena, she said to herself as the impact hit her. I killed a hyena with my sling. Not a small animal, a hyena, an animal that could kill me. Does that mean I’m a hunter now? Really a hunter? It wasn’t exultation she felt, not the excitement of a first kill or even the satisfaction of overcoming a powerful beast. It was something deeper, more humbling. It was the knowledge that she had overcome herself. It came as a spiritual revelation, a mystical insight, and with a reverence deeply felt, she spoke to the spirit of her totem in the ancient formal language of the Clan.
“I am only a girl, Great Cave Lion, and the ways of the spirits, are strange to me. But I think I understand a little more now. The lynx was a test even more than Broud. Creb always said powerful totems are not easy to live with, but he never told me the greatest gifts they give are inside. He never told me how it feels when you finally understand. The test is not just something hard to do, the test is knowing you can do it. I am grateful you chose me, Great Cave Lion. I hope I will always be worthy of you.”
As the brilliant polychrome autumn lost its luster and skeletal branches dropped withered leaves, Ayla returned to the forest. She tracked and studied the habits of the animals she chose to hunt, but she treated them with more respect, both as creatures and as dangerous adversaries. Many times, though she crept close enough to hurl a stone, she refrained and merely watched. She developed a stronger feeling that it was a waste to kill an animal who did not threaten the clan and whose pelt she could not use. But she was still determined to be the best sling-hunter in the clan; she didn’t realize she already was. The only way she could continue to increase her skill was to hunt. And hunt she did.
The results were beginning to be noticed, and it made the men uneasy.
“I found another wolverine, or what was left of it, not far from the practice field,” Crug motioned.
“And there were pieces of fur, looked like a wolf, over the ridge halfway down the hill,” Goov added.
“It’s always the meat eaters, the stronger animals, not female totems,” Broud said. “Grod says we should talk to Mog-ur.”
“Small and middle-sized ones, but not the big cats. Deer and horses, sheep and mountain goats, even boars are always hunted by the big cats and wolves and hyenas, but what’s hunting the smaller hunters? I’ve never seen so many of them killed,” Crug remarked.
“That’s what I’d like to know, what’s killing them? It’s not that I mind a few less hyenas or wolves around, but if it’s not us…Is Grod going to talk to Mog-ur? Do you think it could be a spirit?” The young man quelled a shudder.
“And if it is a spirit, is it a good spirit who is helping us or an evil spirit who is angry at our
totems?” Goov asked.
“Leave it to you, Goov, to come up with a question like that. You’re Mog-ur’s acolyte, what do you think?” Crug returned.
“I think it will take deep meditation and consultation with the spirits to answer that question.”
“You already sound like a mog-ur, Goov. Never give a direct answer,” Broud quipped.
“Well, what’s your answer, Broud?” the acolyte countered. “Can you give one any more direct? What’s killing the animals?”
“I’m not a mog-ur, or even training to be one. Don’t ask me.”
Ayla was working nearby and repressed a desire to smile. So now I’m a spirit, but they can’t figure out if I’m a good one or a bad one.
Mog-ur approached unnoticed, but he had seen the discussion. “I don’t have an answer yet, Broud,” the magician motioned. “It will take meditation. But I will say this, it is not the normal way of spirits.”
Spirits, Mog-ur thought to himself, might make it too hot or too cold, or bring too much rain or snow, or drive herds away, or bring disease, or make thunder or lightning or earthquakes, but they don’t usually cause the death of individual animals. This mystery has the feel of a human hand. Ayla got up and walked to the cave and the magician watched her go. There’s something different about her, she has changed, Creb mused. He noticed Broud’s eyes had followed her, too, and they were filled with frustrated malice. Broud’s noticed the difference, too. Maybe it’s just that she’s not really Clan and walks differently, she is growing up. Something nagged at the edge of his mind that made Creb feel that wasn’t the answer.
Ayla had changed. As her hunting skill grew, she developed an assurance and sinewy grace unknown to Clan women. She had the silent walk of an experienced hunter, a tight muscular control of her young body, a confidence in her own reflexes, and a farseeing look in her eye that clouded over imperceptibly whenever Broud began to harass her, as though she wasn’t really seeing him. She jumped just as quickly to his commands, but her response lacked the edge of fear no matter how he cuffed her.
Her composure, her confidence, was far more intangible, but no less apparent to Broud, than the near-open rebellion of earlier times. It was as though she was condescending to obey him, as though she knew something he didn’t. He watched her, trying to discern the subtle shift, trying to find something to punish her for, but it eluded him.
Broud didn’t know how she did it, but every time he tried to assert his superiority, she made him feel below her, inferior to her. It frustrated him, infuriated him, but the more he kept after her, the less control he felt over her, and he hated her for it. But gradually, he found himself harassing her less, even staying away from her, only occasionally remembering to demonstrate his prerogatives. As the season came to an end, his hatred intensified. Someday he would break her, he vowed to himself. Someday he would make her pay for the wounds she inflicted on his self-esteem. Oh, yes, someday she would be sorry.
13
Winter came, and with it the diminished activity they shared with all living things that followed the cycle of the seasons. Life still pulsed, but at a slower pace. For the first time, Ayla looked forward to the cold season. The rushed and active warm seasons allowed little time for Iza to continue training her. With the first snows, the medicine woman began her lessons again. The pattern of the clan’s life repeated itself with only minor variations, and winter again drew to a close.
Spring was late, and wet. The melt from the highlands, abetted by heavy rains, swelled the stream to a surging turbulence overflowing its banks and sweeping along whole trees and brush in its headlong flight to the sea. A logjam downstream diverted its course, taking over part of the path the clan had made. A brief reprieve of warmth, just long enough to unfold tentative blossoms on fruit trees, was reversed by late spring hailstorms that ravaged the delicate blooms, dashing hopes of the promised harvest. Then, as though nature had a change of heart and wanted to make up for the offer of fruits withheld, the early summer crop produced vegetables, roots, squashes, and legumes in bountiful profusion.
The clan missed their accustomed spring visit to the sea-coast for salmon, and everyone was pleased when Brun announced they would make the trip to fish for sturgeon and cod. Though members of the clan often walked the ten miles to the inland sea to gather molluscs and eggs from the multitude of birds that nested on the cliffs, catching the huge fish was one of the few clan activities that was a community effort of both men and women.
Droog had his own reason for wanting to go. The heavy spring runoff had washed down fresh nodules of flint from the chalk deposits of higher elevations and left them stranded on the floodplain. He had scouted the coast earlier and seen several alluvial deposits. The fishing trip would be a good opportunity to replenish their supply of tools with new ones of high-quality stone. It was easier to knap the flint at the site than to carry the heavy rocks back to the cave. Droog hadn’t made tools for the clan for some time. They’d had to make do with their own rougher implements when the brittle stone of their favorite ones broke. They could all make usable tools, but few compared with Droog’s.
A lighthearted spirit of holiday accompanied their preparations. It wasn’t often that the entire clan left the cave at one time, and the novelty of camping on the beach was exciting, especially for the children. Brun planned for one or two of the men to make daily excursions back to make sure nothing was disturbed in their absence. Even Creb looked forward to the change of scene. He seldom wandered very far from the cave.
The women worked on the net, repairing weakened strands and making a new section from cords of fibrous vines, stringy barks, tough grasses, and long animal hairs to lengthen it. Although it was a strong, tough material, sinew was not used. As with leather, water made it hard and stiff and it didn’t absorb the softening fat well.
The massive sturgeon, often upward of twelve feet in length and weighing over a ton, migrated from the sea, where it spent most of the year, into freshwater streams and rivers to spawn in early summer. The fleshy feelers on the underside of its toothless mouth gave the ancient, sharklike fish a fearsome appearance, but its diet consisted of invertebrates and small fish foraged from the bottom. The smaller cod, usually no more than twenty-five pounds, but ranging up to two hundred pounds and more, migrated seasonally northward into shallower water in summer. Although mostly a bottom feeder, it sometimes swam near the surface and into freshwater outlets when migrating or chasing food.
For the fourteen days of the sturgeon’s summer spawning, the mouths of the streams and rivers were full. Though the fish that chose the smaller waterways did not reach the size of the giants that churned their way up the great rivers, the sturgeon that found their way into the clan’s net would be more than enough for them to beach. As the time for the migrations neared, Brun sent someone to the seacoast every day. The first of the mighty beluga sturgeon had just broached the stream when he gave the word. They would leave the next morning.
Ayla woke up full of excitement. She had her sleeping fur tied into a bundle, food and cooking gear packed in her collecting basket, and the large hide that would be used as a shelter loaded on top even before breakfast. Iza never left the cave without her medicine bag, and she was still packing it when Ayla ran outside the cave to see if they were ready to leave.
“Hurry, Iza,” she encouraged, running back in. “We’re almost ready to go.”
“Settle down, child. The sea isn’t going anywhere,” Iza replied after she pulled the drawstring tight.
Ayla lifted the collecting basket to her back and picked up Uba. Iza followed, then turned to look back, trying to remember if she had forgotten anything. She always felt as though she was forgetting something when she left the cave. Well, Ayla can come back for it, if it’s important, she thought. Most of the clan were outside and shortly after Iza fell into her proper place, Brun gave the signal to start. They had barely gotten under way when Uba squirmed to get down.
“Uba not baby! Want to walk mys
elf,” she motioned with childish dignity. At three and a half, Uba had begun to emulate the adults and older children and to reject the pampering that infants and babies received. She was growing up. In something close to four years, she would likely be a woman. She had much to learn in four short years, and through an inner sense of her rapid maturation she was beginning to prepare herself for the added responsibilities that would be hers so soon.
“All right, Uba,” Ayla motioned as she let her down. “But stay close behind me.”
They followed the stream down the side of the mountain, working around its altered course along a new path that had already been formed near the logjam. It was an easy hike-though the trip back would take more exertion-and before noon they reached a broad stretch of beach. They set up temporary shelters well back from encroaching tides using driftwood and brush for supports. Fires were started and the net rechecked. They would begin fishing the next morning. After camp was set up, Ayla wandered toward the sea.
“I’m going in the water, mother,” she motioned.
“Why do you always want to go in the water, Ayla? It’s dangerous, and you always go out so far.”
“It’s wonderful, Iza. I’ll be careful.”