by Jean M. Auel
Wolf had raced ahead, following his nose to explore the area, but returned when they stopped. He loped back into sight as they were helping Zelandoni back on the pole-drag; then they got up on their horses. They crossed the stream and followed it north, upstream on the left bank. Ayla noticed cut-marks on trees and knew the trail had been blazed by someone who had gone that way before. When she looked closely at one of the marks used to indicate the path, she could see it was just a fresh renewal of an older blaze that had darkened and was not as readily seen; there was an older mark that was partly grown over and, she thought, another even older one.
Ayla kept the horses at a slow walk so as not to tire them. Zelandoni talked to Jondalar, who felt like walking and had gotten off Racer and was leading the brown horse along the marked trail. It was a rigorous uphill climb and as they ascended, the landscape changed with deciduous trees that became brush that was interspersed with taller conifers. Wolf kept disappearing into the woods, then would materialize from another direction.
After about five miles, the trail led them to the entrance of a large cave high up in the hills of the watershed between The River and West River. It was well into the afternoon by the time they reached the place.
“That was much easier than walking up,” Zelandoni said as she stepped down from her seat on the pole-drag, not even waiting for help from Jondalar this time.
“When do you want to go in?” Jondalar asked, going to the entrance and looking in.
“Not until tomorrow,” Zelandoni said. “It’s a long way in. It will take all day to go in and come back.”
“Do you plan to go all the way in?”
“Oh, yes. All the way to the back.”
“Then we should probably set up camp here since we’ll be staying at least two nights,” Jondalar said.
“It’s still early. After we set up camp, I think I’ll look and see what is growing around here,” Ayla said. “I may find something nice for our evening meal.”
“I’m sure you will,” Jondalar said.
“Do you want to come? We can all go,” Ayla said.
“No. I’ve already seen some outcroppings of flint coming out of the rock walls, and I know there’s some inside the cave, too,” Jondalar said. “I’m going to take a torch and go in and look.”
“What about you, Zelandoni?” Ayla said.
“I don’t think so. I want to meditate a bit about this cave, and I want to check the torches and lamps and think about how many we will need. And what else we should bring in with us,” the One Who Was First said.
“It looks like a huge cave,” Ayla said, stepping inside, peering into the darkness, then looking up at the roof.
Jondalar followed her in. “Look, here’s another piece of flint coming out of the wall, right near the entrance. I’m sure there’s more deeper inside,” he said, his excitement evident from the sound of his voice. “It would be heavy to carry very much of it out, though.”
“Is it this high all the way in?” Ayla asked the woman.
“Yes, more or less, except at the very end. This is more than a cave. It is a huge cavern—actually there are many large rooms and tunnels. There are even lower levels, but we won’t need to explore them this time. Cave bears have come in here in winter; you can see their wallows and scratchings on the walls,” the First said.
“Is it big enough for the horses to walk in?” Ayla asked. “Maybe with a pole-drag, so we could take some of Jondalar’s flint out?”
“I think so,” Zelandoni said.
“We’ll have to make blaze marks on our way in to make sure we can find our way out,” Jondalar said.
“I’m sure Wolf could help us get out if we get turned around,” Ayla said.
“Will he come in with us?” Zelandoni asked.
“If I ask him to,” Ayla said.
The area had obviously been used before; outside the entrance, the ground in places had been leveled, and several fireplaces set up, evident by the ashes and charcoal, and fire-burned rocks around them. They selected one to reuse, but added stones from another one around the edge, and made a spit for roasting using some forked branches wedged in with stones and greenwood sticks that would be used to impale the food. Jondalar and Ayla unhitched the horses, removed their halters, and led them to an open patch of grass nearby. They could take care of themselves, and would come at the sound of their whistles.
Then they all set up a traveling tent that was bigger than usual. They had put two together and tried it out before they left to make sure it would be comfortable for all of them. They had dried traveling food with them, plus some cooked leftovers from their early meal, but they had also brought some fresh meat from a red deer kill that had been made by Solaban and Rushemar. Leaning the poles from the pole-drags together, Jondalar and Ayla made a high tripod construction fastened at the top from which they suspended rawhide-wrapped packages of food to keep animals from getting it. To leave it in the tent would have been to invite a carnivore in to search for it.
They collected fuel for the fire, mostly deadwood from downed trees, and brush, but also the dried twigs and branches of the coniferous trees, low down on the trunks below the last living ones, dried grasses, and the dried droppings of the animals that ate grass. Ayla started a fire and banked it to make coals for later. They all had a lunch of leftovers, and even Jonayla mouthed the end of a bone after she nursed. Then they went to their separate tasks. Zelandoni began checking the bundles that had been on Racer’s pole-drag, looking for torches and lamps, bags of fat for lamp fuel, and lichen, dried mushroom, and various other wick materials. Jondalar picked up his bag of flint-knapping tools, lit a torch from the fire, and went into the large cavern.
Ayla put on her haversack, the Mamutoi carrrying bag that was worn over one shoulder, somewhat softer than Zelandoni backframes, though still roomy. She wore it on her right side along with her quiver with its spear-thrower and spears. She tied her baby high up on her back with the carrying blanket on the other side, but Jonayla could be easily shifted around to sit on her left hip. In front on her left side, she shoved her digging stick under the sturdy leather thong she wore around her waist, while the sheath with her knife hung down the right. Several pouches hung from her waist band, too. She wore her sling around her head, but she carried the stones for her weapon in another pouch fastened to her waist thong. Another pouch was for general things like eating dishes, a fire-starting kit, a small hammerstone, a sewing kit that included thread of various sizes, from fine twists of sinew to sturdy cord that fit through the holes of the larger ivory needles. She also had some coils of larger cordage, and a few other odds and ends. The last object was her medicine bag.
She carried her medicine bag attached to her waist thong. The otter-skin pouch was something she seldom went anywhere without. It was very unusual; even Zelandoni had never seen one like it, although she immediately grasped that it was an object of spiritual power. It was made like the first one Iza, Ayla’s Clan mother, had made for her out of a whole otter skin. Instead of cutting through the stomach in the usual way of field-dressing an animal, the throat had been cut not quite all the way around, so that the head, with the brains removed, was attached at the back by a flap of skin. The innards, including the backbone, had been carefully drawn out of the neck opening, while the feet and tail were left in place. Two red-dyed cords were threaded around the neck in opposite directions making the closure secure, and the head, dried and somewhat compressed, was used as a cover flap.
Ayla checked the quiver, which held four spear-darts and her spear-thrower; then she picked up her collecting basket, signaled Wolf to come with her, and started down the trail back the way they had come. When they were approaching the cave, she had seen and evaluated most of the vegetation that was growing along the way and had assessed its uses. It was something she had learned as a girl, and was, by now, second nature. It was an essential practice for people who lived off the land, whose survival depended on what could be hunted or gathered
or found as they foraged each day. Ayla always categorized the medicinal as well as the nutritional properties of what she saw. Iza was a medicine woman, and had been determined to teach her knowledge to her adopted daughter along with her own daughter. But Uba was born with memories inherited from her mother, and she only needed to be reminded once or twice to know and understand what her mother showed or explained.
Since Ayla didn’t have the Clan memories, Iza discovered it was much more difficult to train her. She had to teach her by rote; only by constant repetition could the girl of the Others be made to remember. But then Ayla surprised Iza because once she did learn, she could think about the medicine she had been taught in a new way. For example, if one medicinal plant wasn’t available, she was quick to think of a substitute, or a combination of medicines that would bring together similar properties or actions. She was also very good at diagnosis, at being able to determine what was wrong when someone came with a vague complaint. Although she couldn’t explain it, it gave Iza a sense of the differences in the way the Clan and the Others thought.
Many in Brun’s clan believed that the girl of the Others who lived in their midst wasn’t very smart because she couldn’t remember as quickly or as well as any of them. Iza had realized that she wasn’t less intelligent, but that she thought differently, in another way. Ayla had come to understand it as well. When people of the Others would make comments about the people of the Clan being none too bright, she would try to explain that they were not less intelligent, but differently intelligent.
Ayla walked back along the trail to a place she distinctly remembered, where the trail through the woods they had been following went over a slight rise and opened out to a field of low-growing grass and brush. She had noticed it when they passed by before, and as she approached it again, she detected the delicious fragrance of ripe strawberries. She untied the carrying blanket and spread it out on the ground, then put Jonayla in the middle of it. She picked a tiny berry, squashed it a little to bring out the sweet juice and put it in her baby’s mouth. Jonayla’s expression of surprise and curiosity made Ayla smile. She put a few in her own mouth, gave another to her baby, then looked around to see what she could use to bring some back to camp.
She spied a stand of birch trees nearby and signaled Wolf to watch Jonayla while she went to examine them. When she reached the trees, she was glad to see that some of the thin bark had started to peel. She pulled several wide strips off and brought them back with her. From the sheath that was attached to her waist band she withdrew a new knife, which Jondalar had recently given to her. It was made of a flint blade he had knapped and inserted into a beautiful handle of yellowing old ivory shaped by Solaban with some carvings of horses done by Marsheval. She cut the birch bark into symmetrical pieces, then scored them to make it easier to fold into two small containers with lids. The berries were so tiny, it took a long time to pick enough to give three people a reasonable taste, but the flavor of the wild strawberries was so luscious, it was worth it. From the pouch in which she carried her personal drinking cup and bowl, she always carried a few other items, including coils of twine. Cordage of various sizes was always useful. She used some to tie the birch-bark containers together, then put them in her gathering basket.
Jonayla had fallen asleep, and Ayla covered her with a corner of the soft buckskin carrrying blanket, which was getting a little tattered at that end. Wolf was lying beside her, his eyes half closed. When Ayla looked over at him, he thumped his tail on the ground, but stayed close to the newest member of his pack. Ayla got up, picked up the gathering basket, and walked across the grassy field toward the woods on the fringe.
The first thing she saw in a hedge bank were the star-like whorls of the narrow leaves of cleavers, growing abundantly up and through other plants, aided by the tiny hooked bristles that covered them. She pulled out several of the long, trailing stems by the roots, bunching them up together easily because the bristles made them stick together. In that state they could be used as a strainer and for that quality alone they were useful, but they had many other properties, both nutritional and medicinal. The young leaves made a pleasant spring green, the roasted seeds an interesting dark beverage. The pounded herb mixed with fat into an ointment was helpful for women whose breasts were swollen with caked milk.
She was drawn to a sunny dry, grassy place, detected a delightful aromatic fragrance, and looked for the plant that liked to grow there. She quickly found hyssop. It was one of the first plants Iza had taught her about and she remembered the occasion well. It was a woody little shrub that grew something more than a foot high, with narrow evergreen leaves, small and dark green, crowding together along the branching stems. The intense blue flowers, circling the stem among the upper leaves on long spikes, had just started to appear and several bees were buzzing around them. She wondered where the hive was, since honey flavored with hyssop was especially tasty.
She picked several of the stalks, planning to use the flowers for tea, which was not only delicious, but especially good for coughs, hoarseness, and deep chest conditions. The leaves when bruised were also good for relieving cuts and burns, and for reducing bruises. Drinking the tea of the leaves and soaking the limbs in a bath of it were a good treatment for rheumatism. Thinking of that brought a sudden thought of Creb, which made her smile even as it brought a memory of sadness. One of the other medicine women at the Clan Gathering had explained that she also used hyssop for the swelling of the legs caused by retaining too much fluid. Ayla glanced up and saw Wolf still lying beside her sleeping baby, then turned and went more deeply into the woods.
On a shady bank near some spruce trees Ayla spied a patch of woodruff, a little plant about ten inches high with leaves growing in circles, similar to cleavers, but with a weak stem. She bent down on her knees to carefully pick the plant with its leaves and tiny white four-petaled flowers. It had its own delicious scent and made a tasty tea, and Ayla knew the fragrance would grow stronger when it was dried. The leaves could be used for wounds, and when boiled they were good for stomachaches and other internal disorders. It was useful to disguise the sometimes unpleasant smell of other medicines, but she also liked to spread it around her dwelling, and to stuff pillows with it because of its natural perfume.
Not far away she saw another familiar plant that liked shady banks in woods, this one close to two feet high, wood avens. The toothed leaves, shaped somewhat like wide feathers and covered with small hairs, were sparsely scattered along its wiry stems, which branched slightly. The leaves were not uniform in size or shape, depending upon their position on the stem. On the lower branches, the leaves grew on long stalks and had irregular spaces between the leaflets, with the terminal one large and rounder. The intermediate pairs were smaller and somewhat different in shape and size. The higher-up leaves were three-fingered and narrow, the lower ones rounder. The flowers, which rather resembled buttercups, had five bright-yellow petals with green sepals between, and seemed too small for such a tall plant. The fruits, which appeared together with the flowers, were more conspicuous and ripened into the small, bristly heads of dark-red burrs.
But Ayla dug down for the rhizome from which the plant grew. She wanted the small, wiry rootlets that had the scent and flavor of cloves. She knew they were good for many things, for stomach problems, including diarrhea, for sore throat, fever, and the stuffiness and mucus of a cold, even for bad breath, but she especially liked to use them as a pleasant, mildly spicy, clove-like seasoning for food.
She saw plants some distance away that she thought at first were a patch of violets, but which on closer inspection turned out to be ground ivy. The flowers were different in shape and grew from the base of leaves that grew in whorls of three or four around the stem. The kidney-shaped leaves with rounded teeth and a network of veins grew opposite each other on long stalks on alternate sides of square stems and stayed green all year, but the color varied from bright to dark green. She knew ground ivy was strongly aromatic and sniffed it to confi
rm the identity. She had made a thick infusion along with licorice root for coughs, and Iza had used it to soothe inflamed eyes. One Mamut at the Mamutoi Summer Meeting had recommended ground ivy for humming noises in the ears, and for wounds.
The damp ground led to a marshy area and a small stream, and Ayla was delighted to see an extensive stand of cattails, a tall reed-like plant six feet or more in height and among the most useful of all plants. In spring, the young shoots of new roots could be pulled loose from the rootstalk, exposing a tender young core; the new shoots and the core could be eaten raw or cooked lightly. Summer was the season for the green flower stalks growing at the top of the tall stems, which when boiled and gnawed off the stem were deliciously edible. Later they would turn into brown cattails, and the long pollen spike above each cattail would ripen, making the protein-rich yellow pollen available for harvesting. Then the cattail would burst into tufts of white down, which could be used as stuffing for pillows, pads, or diapers, or as tinder for starting fires. Summer was also the season when the tender white sprouts that represented next year’s plant growth were growing out of the thick underground rhizome, and with such a large concentration, gathering a few would not harm next year’s crop.
The fibrous rootstalk was available all year, even in winter if the ground wasn’t frozen or covered with snow. A white, starchy flour could be extracted by pounding it in a shallow, wide bark container of water so that the heavier flour would settle to the bottom while the fibers floated, or the rhizome could be dried and later pounded to remove the fibers, leaving the dry flour. The long, narrow leaves could be woven into mats for sitting upon or could be turned into envelope-like pouches, or waterproof panels, several of which could be made into a temporary shelter, or into baskets or cooking bags that could be filled with roots, stalks, leaves, or fruits, lowered into boiling water, and easily retrieved, and if they cooked long enough, the leaves could also be eaten. The dried stalk from the previous year’s growth could be used as a fire drill when spun between the palms against a suitable platform to make fire.