The Earth's Children Series 6-Book Bundle

by Jean M. Auel

  “I’d better let you finish getting ready,” Jondalar said, opening the drape to leave. He leaned over to kiss her again, then got up. After the leather drape closed, he stood looking at it for a moment, and a frown creased his brow. He wished he could have stayed with her and not had to worry about other people. When they were in her valley they could do what they wanted whenever they wanted to. And she wouldn’t be getting ready to be adopted by people who lived so far from his home. What if she wanted to stay here? He had a sinking feeling that after this night, nothing would ever be the same.

  As he turned to go, Mamut caught his eye, and beckoned him. The tall young man walked toward the tall old shaman.

  “If you are not busy, I could use your help,” Mamut said.

  “I’d be glad to help. What can I do?” Jondalar asked.

  From the back of a storage platform, Mamut showed him four long poles. On close inspection, Jondalar realized they were not wood, but solid ivory; curved mammoth tusks that had been shaped and straightened. Then the old man gave him a large, hafted, stone maul. Jondalar stopped to examine the heavy hammerlike tool since he had not seen one quite like it before. It was completely covered with hide. He could feel that a circular groove had been nicked around the large stone, and a flexible willow withe wrapped around the groove, then bound to a bone handle. The entire maul had then been wrapped with wet, unprocessed hide, which had only been scraped clean. The rawhide shrunk tight as it dried, encasing both stone maul and handle in hard, tough leather, thus holding them firmly together.

  The shaman led him toward the firepit, and lifting up a grass mat, Mamut showed him a hole, about six inches across, that was filled with small stones and pieces of bone. They removed them, then Jondalar brought one of the ivory poles and dropped the end in the hole. While Mamut held it straight, Jondalar wedged the stones and bones around the pole, tamping them down firmly with a stone maul. When the post was firmly embedded, they put another post in, and then another, in an arc around, but somewhat away from, the fireplace.

  Then the old man brought out a package and carefully, with reverence, unwrapped it and withdrew a neatly rolled sheet of thin membranous material of a parchmentlike quality. When it was opened, Jondalar saw that several animal figures—a mammoth, birds, and a cave lion among them—and strange geometric designs had been painted on it. They fastened it around the upright ivory poles creating a translucent painted screen set back from the hearth. Jondalar retreated a few steps to absorb the overall effect, then he looked closer, curious. Intestines, after they were cut open, cleaned, and dried, were usually translucent, but this screen was made of something else. He thought he knew what the material was, but he wasn’t sure.

  “That isn’t made of intestines, is it? They would have had to be sewn together, and that is all one piece.” The Mamut nodded agreement. “Then it has to be the membrane layer from the inner side of the hide of a very big animal, somehow removed in one piece.”

  The old man smiled. “A mammoth,” he said. “A white female mammoth.”

  Jondalar’s eyes opened wide, and he looked again at the screen with awe.

  “Each Camp received a part of the white mammoth, since she gave up her spirit during the first hunt of a Summer Meeting. Most Camps wanted something white. I asked for this; we call it the shadow skin. It has less substance than any of the white pieces, and it cannot be displayed for all to see its obvious power, but I believe that which is subtle can be more powerful. This is more than a small piece; this encircled the inner spirit of the whole.”

  Brinan and Crisavec suddenly burst into the space in the middle of the Mammoth Hearth, running down the passageway from the Aurochs and Crane hearths, chasing each other. They tumbled together in a heap, wrestling, and almost ran into the delicate screen, but stopped when Brinan noticed the thin shank of a long leg barring their way. They looked up, directly at the drawing of the mammoth, and both gasped. Then they looked at Mamut. To Jondalar, the shaman’s face showed no expression, but when the seven-and eight-year-old boys turned their gaze on the old shaman, they quickly got up, and carefully sidestepping the screen, walked toward the first hearth as though they had been severely scolded.

  “They looked contrite, almost scared, but you didn’t say a word and they’ve never been frightened of you before,” Jondalar said.

  “They saw the screen. Sometimes, when you look upon the essence of a powerful spirit, you see your own heart.”

  Jondalar smiled and nodded, but he wasn’t sure he understood what the old shaman meant. He’s talking like a zelandoni, the young man thought, talking with a shadow on his tongue, like those of his calling so often did. Still, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to see his own heart.

  As the boys walked through the Hearth of the Fox, they nodded at the carver, who smiled back. Ranec’s smile grew bigger when he turned his attention back to the Mammoth Hearth, which he had been observing for some time. Ayla had just appeared, and was standing in front of the drape tugging on her tunic to straighten it. Though it didn’t show under his dark skin, his face flushed at the sight of her. He felt his heart pound and a tension in his loins.

  The more he saw her, the more exquisite she was. The long rays of the sun, streaming in through the smoke hole, directed its shimmering light on her on purpose, or so it seemed to him. He wanted to remember that moment, to fill his eyes with the sight of her. He thought of her in ardent hyperbole. Her rich, luxuriant hair falling in soft waves around her face, was like a golden cloud playing with sunbeams; her unself-conscious movements embodied ultimate grace. No one knew the anxiety he had suffered while she was gone, or the happiness he felt that she was becoming one of them. He frowned when Jondalar saw her, walked toward her and put an arm around her possessively, then stood between them, blocking his view.

  They walked together toward him on their way to the first hearth. She stopped to look at the screen, with obvious awe and admiration. Jondalar fell in behind her as they came to the passageway through the Fox Hearth. Ranec saw Ayla flush with warm feeling when she saw him, before she looked down. The tall man’s face flushed red when he saw Ranec, too, but the look in his eye made it clear that there was no pleasure in his emotion. Each man tried to stare the other down as they passed by—Jondalar’s hard anger and jealousy apparent, Ranec trying very hard to seem self-confident and cynical. Ranec’s eyes automatically went next to the steady stare of the man behind Jondalar, the man who was the essence of spirituality to the Camp, and for some reason he felt a little abashed.

  They approached the first hearth, and went out through the entrance foyer. Ayla began to understand why she had not noticed hectic preparations for a feast. Nezzie was supervising the removal of wilted leaves and steaming grass from a roasting hole in the ground, and the smells that arose from the cooking pit made everyone’s mouth water. Preparations had begun before they went to get clay from the river, and the food had been cooking all the while they worked. Now, it only needed to be served to the Camp of hungry people.

  A certain variety of round, hard starchy roots that took well to long cooking came out first, followed by baskets of a mixture of bone marrow, blue bearberries, and a variety of cracked and ground seeds—pigweed, a mixture of grains, and oily pignon seeds. The result, after hours of steaming, had a heavy, puddinglike consistency that retained the shape of the basket after it was removed, and while not sweet, though the berries gave it a light fruit flavor, was deliciously rich. A full haunch of mammoth meat was brought out next, self-basted by the steam and the thick edge of fat, and falling apart with tenderness.

  The sun was setting and a sharp wind hurried everyone back inside the lodge, carrying the food with them. This time, when Ayla was asked to select first, she wasn’t as shy. This feast was in her honor, and though being the center of attention was still not easy for her, she was happy for the reason.

  Deegie came to sit with her, and Ayla caught herself staring. Deegie’s thick reddish-brown hair was pulled back from her face an
d wrapped into a coil that was piled high on her head. A string of round ivory beads, each one carved and pierced by hand, had been coiled in with her hair and stood out as contrasting highlights. She wore a long, loose dress of pliable leather—Ayla thought of it as a long tunic—that draped in soft folds from the belted waist, dyed deep brown with a rather shiny, burnished finish. It was sleeveless, but wide at the shoulders, giving the appearance of short sleeves. A fringe of long, reddish-brown mammoth hair fell from her shoulders in back and from a V-shaped yoke in front, and hung to just below her waist.

  The neckline was outlined by a triple row of ivory beads, and around her neck she wore a necklace of conical seashells, spaced by cylindrical lime tubes and pieces of amber. Around her right upper arm was an ivory armband incised with an alternating chevron pattern. The pattern was repeated in colors of ochre reds, yellows, and browns in the belt, which was woven of animal hair, some of it dyed. Attached to the belt by a loop was an ivory-handled flint knife in a rawhide sheath, and suspended from another loop, the lower section of a hollow black aurochs horn, a drinking cup that was a talisman of the Aurochs Hearth.

  The skirt had been cut on the diagonal, starting at the sides above the knee, to a point both in front and back. Three rows of ivory beads, a strip of rabbit fur, and a second strip of fur that had been pieced together from the striped backs of several ground squirrels accented the diagonal hemline, and hanging from it was another fringe of the long outer guard hairs of the woolly mammoth, reaching to her lower calf. She was not wearing leggings, and her legs showed through the fringe, as well as dark brown high boots, moccasinlike at the feet, burnished to a waterproof shine.

  Ayla found herself wondering how they made leather shine. All of her hides and pelts had the soft natural texture of buckskin. But mostly she just stared at Deegie in awe, and thought she was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen.

  “Deegie, that is beautiful … tunic?”

  “You could call it a long tunic. It’s really a summer dress. I made it for the Meeting last year, when Branag first declared for me. I changed my mind about the outfit I was going to wear. I knew we’d be inside, and with all the celebrating, it will get warm.”

  Jondalar came to join them, and it was obvious that he thought Deegie was quite attractive, too. When he smiled at her, the charisma that made him irresistibly appealing not only communicated his feeling but somehow intensified it, and provoked the invariable response. Deegie smiled warmly and invitingly at the tall handsome man with the intense blue eyes.

  Talut approached them with a huge platter of food in his hand. Ayla gaped, staring. He wore a fantastic hat that stood so high on his head it brushed the ceiling. It was constructed of leather dyed in various colors, several different kinds of fur, including a long, bushy squirrel tail hanging down his back, and the front ends of two relatively small mammoth tusks jutting straight up from both sides of his head, and joined together at the tips like the entrance archways. His tunic, which fell to his knees, was a deep maroon—at least the parts of it she could see were maroon. The front of it was so richly decorated with a complex pattern of ivory beads, animal teeth, and various shells, it was difficult to see the leather.

  In addition, around his neck was a heavy necklace of cave lion claws and a canine tooth, interspersed with amber, and suspended from it down his chest was an ivory plaque incised with enigmatic marks. A wide black leather belt, worn low, circled his waist and fastened in front with ties that hung down in tassels. Hanging from it by loops was a dagger, made by sharpening the tip of a mammoth tusk, and crosshatching the grip for better purchase, a rawhide sheath with an ivory-handled flint knife, and a round, wheel-shaped object with spokelike divisions from which were suspended, by thongs, a pouch, some canine teeth, and most prominent, the brushy tip of a cave lion tail. A fringe of long mammoth hair that nearly swept the ground, revealed when he moved that his leggings were as ornamented as his tunic.

  His shiny black footwear was particularly interesting, not for its decoration, because it had none, but for its lack of any visible seam. It appeared to be a single piece of soft leather shaped exactly like his foot. It was one more of several puzzles Ayla Wanted to find answers to, later.

  “Jondalar! I see you’ve found the two most beautiful women here!” Talut said.

  “You’re right,” Jondalar said, smiling.

  “I wouldn’t hesitate to wager that these two could hold their own in any company,” Talut continued. “You’ve traveled, what would you say?”

  “I wouldn’t argue with that. I’ve seen many women, but nowhere have I seen any more beautiful than right here,” Jondalar said, looking directly at Ayla. Then he smiled at Deegie.

  Deegie laughed. She enjoyed the byplay, but there was no doubt where Jondalar’s heart lay. And Talut always paid her extravagant compliments; she was his acknowledged offspring and heir, the daughter of his sister, who was the daughter of his mother. He loved the children of his hearth and provided for them, but they were Nezzie’s, and the heirs of Wymez, her brother. She had adopted Ranec, as well, since his mother was dead, which made him both the child of Wymez’s hearth and his legitimate offspring and heir, but that was an exception.

  All the people of the Camp welcomed the opportunity to show off their finery, and Ayla kept trying to avoid staring at one or another. Their tunics were of various lengths, with and without sleeves, and in a variety of colors, with individual decorations. The men’s tended to be shorter, more heavily decorated, and they usually wore headwear of some kind. Women generally favored the V-shaped hemline, though Tulie’s was more like a belted shirt worn over leggings. It was covered, in intricate and artistic designs, with beads, shells, teeth, carved ivory and, particularly, heavy pieces of amber. Though she didn’t wear a hat, her hair was so elaborately arranged and decorated, she might as well have been wearing one.

  But, of all, Crozie’s tunic was the most unusual. Instead of coming to a point in front, it was diagonally cut all the way across the front, with a rounded point on her right side, and a rounded cutout on her left. Most stunning, though, was its color. It was white, not off-white or ivory, but true white, and fringed and decorated with, among other things, the white feathers of the large northern crane.

  Even the children were dressed for a ceremony. When Ayla saw Latie standing at the edge of the group that was milling around her and Deegie, she asked Latie to come and show her outfit, in effect inviting her to join them. Latie commented on the way Ayla was wearing the beads and shells Deegie had given her, and thought she’d try them that way. Ayla smiled. She hadn’t been able to think of a way to wear them, and finally just twisted them together and wrapped them around her head, across her forehead, the way she carried her sling. Latie was quickly included in the general banter, and smiled shyly when Wymez told her she looked nice—an extravagant compliment from the laconic man. Once Latie joined them, Rydag was quick to follow. Ayla held him on her lap. His tunic was modeled after Talut’s, but much less ornamented. He couldn’t have begun to carry the weight. Talut’s ceremonial outfit weighed several times what Rydag did. Few people could have worn his headdress alone.

  But Ranec was slow to make an appearance. Several times Ayla noticed his absence and looked for him, but when she did see him, it caught her by surprise. Everyone had enjoyed showing Ayla their dress-up clothing just to see her reaction; she was so delighted and impressed and made no pretense about it. Ranec had been observing her and wanted to create an especially memorable effect, so he returned to the Fox Hearth to change. He had been watching from the Lion Hearth, and slipped up beside her while she was involved in conversation. When she turned her head, suddenly he was there, and by her amazed look, he knew he had achieved his desired effect.

  The cut and style of his tunic were unusual; its tapered body and wide flaring sleeves gave it a distinctly different look and betrayed its foreign origin. It was not a Mamutoi tunic. It was one he had traded for—and paid dearly—but he knew he had to
have it from the first moment he saw it. One of the northern Camps had made a trading expedition a few years before to a western people that were distantly related to the Mamutoi, and the leader had been given the shirt as a token of mutual ties and future friendly relations. He was not inclined to give it up, but Ranec had been so persistent, and finally offered him so much for it, he couldn’t refuse.

  Most of the garments worn by the people of the Lion Camp had been dyed shades of browns, deep reds, and dark yellows, and heavily decorated with light-colored ivory beads, teeth, seashells, and amber, enhanced with fur and feathers. Ranec’s tunic was a creamy ivory, nearly as light, but richer than true white, and he knew it made a stunning contrast to his dark skin, but even more stunning was the decoration. Both front and back of the shirt had been used as a background for a picture created with porcupine quills and fine cords which had been dyed strong, bright, primary colors.

  On the front of the shirt was an abstract portrayal of a seated woman, made out of an arrangement of concentric circles in shades of true reds, oranges, blues, blacks, and browns; one set of circles represented her belly, two more were her breasts. Arcs of circles within circles indicated hips, shoulders, and arms. The head was a design based on a triangle, with a pointed chin and a flat top, with enigmatic lines instead of features on the face. In the middle of the breast and stomach circles, obviously meant to represent navel and nipples, were bright red garnets, and a line of colored stones—green and pink tourmalines, red garnets, aquamarines—had been fastened along the flat top of the head. The back of the shirt showed the same woman from the back view, with concentric circles or portions of them representing buttocks and shoulders. The same series of colors was repeated several times around the flared ends of the sleeves.