The Plains of Passage (Earth's Children 4)

"Thank you, Roshario," he said, giving the woman a hug. "We may need your good wishes before we are through."

"I need to thank you, Jondalar, for bringing Ayla. I don't even want to think about what would have happened to me if she hadn't come." She reached for Ayla's hand. The young medicine woman took it, and then the other hand still in the sling, and squeezed both of them, pleased to feel the strength in the grip of both hands in return. Then they hugged.

There were several other goodbyes, but most of the people planned to follow along the trail for at least a short way.

"Are you coming, Tholie?" Markeno asked, falling into step beside Jondalar.

"No." Her eyes glistened with tears. "I don't want to go. It won't be any easier to say goodbye on the trail than it will be right here." She went up to the tall Zelandonii man. "It's hard for me to be nice to you right now, Jondalar. I've always been so fond of you, and I liked you even more after you brought Ayla here. I wanted so much for you and her to stay, but you won't do it. Even though I understand why you won't, it doesn't make me feel very good."

"I'm sorry you feel so bad, Tholie," Jondalar said. "I wish there was something I could do to make you feel better."

"There is, but you won't do it," she said.

It was so like her to say exactly what she was thinking. It was one of the things he liked about her. You never had to guess what she really meant. "Don't be angry at me. If I could stay, nothing would please me more than to join with you and Markeno. You don't know how proud you made me feel when you asked us, or how hard it is for me to leave right now, but something pulls me. To be honest, I'm not even sure what it is, but I have to go, Tholie." He looked at her with his startling blue eyes full of genuine sorrow, concern, and caring.

"Jondalar, you shouldn't say such nice things and look at me like that. It makes me want you to stay even more. Just give me a hug," Tholie said.

He bent down and put his arms around the young woman, and he felt her shaking with her effort to control her tears. She pulled away and looked at the tall blond woman beside him.

"Oh, Ayla. I don't want you to go," she said with a huge sob as they fell into each other's arms.

"I don't want to leave, I wish we could stay. I'm not sure why, but Jondalar has to go, and I have to go with him," Ayla said, crying as hard as Tholie. Suddenly the young mother broke away, picked up Shamio, and ran back toward the shelters.

Wolf started to go after them. "Stay here, Wolf!" Ayla commanded.

"Wuffie! I want my Wuffie," the little girl cried out, reaching toward the shaggy, four-legged carnivore.

Wolf whined and looked up at Ayla. "Stay, Wolf," she said. "We are leaving."

20

Ayla and Jondalar stood in a clearing that commanded a broad view of the mountain, feeling a sense of loss and loneliness as they watched Dolando, Markeno, Carlono, and Darvalo

walking back down the trail. The rest of the large crowd that had started out with them had dropped back by twos and threes along the way. When the last four men reached a turn in the trail, they turned and waved.

Ayla returned their wave in a "come back" motion with the back of her hand toward them, suddenly overcome by the knowledge that she would never see the Sharamudoi again. In the short time she had known them, she had come to love them. They had welcomed her, asked her to stay, and she could have lived with them gladly.

This leaving reminded her of their departure from the Mamutoi early in the summer. They, too, had welcomed her, and she had loved many of them. She could have been happy living with them, except that she would have had to live with the unhappiness she had caused Ranec, and when she left, there had been the excitement of going home with the man she loved. There were no undercurrents of unhappiness among the Sharamudoi, which made the parting all the more difficult, and though she loved Jondalar and had no doubt that she wanted to go with him, she had found acceptance and friendships that were hard to end with such finality.

Journeys are full of goodbyes, Ayla thought. She had even made her last farewell to the son she had left with the Clan ... though if she had stayed there, someday she might have been able to go with the Ramudoi in a boat back down the Great Mother River to the delta. Then, perhaps, she could have made a trek around to the peninsula, to look for the new cave of her son's clan ... but there was no point in thinking about it any more.

There would be no more opportunities to return, no more last chances to hope for. Her life took her in one direction, her son's life led him in another. Iza had told her "find your own people, find your own mate." She had found acceptance among her own kind of people and she had found a man to love who loved her. But for all she had gained, there were losses. Her son was one of them; she had to accept that fact.

Jondalar felt desolate as well, watching the last four turning back toward their home. They were all friends he had lived with for several years and had known well. Though their relationship was not through his mother and her ties, he felt they were as much kin as his own blood. In his commitment to return to his original roots, they were family he would never see again, and that saddened him.

When the last of the Sharamudoi that had seen them off moved out of sight, Wolf sat on his haunches, lifted his head, and gave voice to a few yips that led to a full, throaty howl, shattering the tranquility of the sunny morning. The four men appeared again on the trail below and waved one last time, acknowledging the wolf's farewell. Suddenly there was an answering howl from one of his own kind. Markeno looked to see which direction the second howl came from before they started back down the trail. Then Ayla and Jondalar turned and faced the mountain with its glistening peaks of blue-green glacial ice.

Though not as high as the range to the west, the mountains in which they were traveling had been formed at the same time, in the most recent of the mountain-building epochs—recent only in relation to the ponderously slow movements of the thick stony crust floating on the molten core of the ancient earth. Uplifted and folded into a series of parallel ridges during the orogeny that had brought the whole continent into sharp relief, the rugged terrain of this farthest east expansion of the extensive mountain system was clothed with verdant life.

A skirt of deciduous trees formed a narrow band between the plains below, still warmed by the vestiges of summer, and the cooler heights. Primarily oak and beech with hornbeam and maple also prominent, the leaves were already changing into a colorful tapestry of reds and yellows accented by the deep evergreen of spruce at the higher edge. A cloak of conifers, which included not only spruce, but yew, fir, pine, and the deciduous-needled larch, starting low, climbed to the rounded shoulders of lower prominences and covered the steep sides of higher peaks with subtle variations of green that shaded to the yellowing larch. Above the timberline was a collar of summer-green alpine pasture that turned white with snow early in the season. Capping it was the hard helmet of blue-tinged glacial ice.

The heat that had brushed the southern plains below with the ephemeral touch of the short hot summer was already fading, giving way to the grasping clutch of cold. Though a warming trend had been moderating its worst effects—an interstadial period lasting several thousands of years—the glacial ice was regrouping for one last assault on the land before the retreat would be turned to a rout thousands of years later. But even during the milder full before the final advance, glacial ice not only coated low peaks and mantled the flanks of high mountains, it held the continent in its grip.

In the rugged forested landscape, with the added hindrance of hauling the round boat on the pole drag, Ayla and Jondalar walked more than they rode the horses. They hiked up sharply pitched slopes, over ridges, across loose patches of scree, and down the steep sides of dry gullies, caused by the spring runoff of melting snow and ice, and the heavy fall rains of the southern mountains. A few of the deep ditches had water at the bottom, oozing through the mulch of rotting vegetation and soft loam, which sucked at the feet of humans and animals alike. Others carried clear streams, but all would soon be filled again with the tempestuous outflow of the downpours of autumn.

At the lower elevations, in the open forest of broad-leafed trees, they were impeded by undergrowth, forcing their way through or finding a way around brush and briars. The stiff canes and thorny vines of the delicious blackberries were a formidable barrier that tore at hair, clothes, and skin as well as hides and fur. The warm shaggy coats of the steppe horses, adapted for living on cold open plains, were easily caught and tangled, and even Wolf took his share of burrs and twigs.

They were all glad when they finally reached the elevation of evergreens, whose relatively constant shade kept the undergrowth to a minimum, although on the steep slopes where the canopy was not as dense, the sun did filter through more than it would have on level ground, allowing some brush to grow. It was not much easier to ride in the thick forest of tall trees, with the horses having to pick their way around the wooded obstacles and passengers dodging low-hanging branches. They camped the first night in a small clearing on a knoll surrounded by needled spires.