The Plains of Passage (Earth's Children 4)

Whinney had been agitated ever since they had seen the horses in the distance, which in turn made Ayla nervous. She decided to put the halter on her mare that evening, and she fastened it with a long tether to a sturdy pine. Jondalar tied Racer's lead rope to a tree near her. Then they collected deadfall and snapped off the dead branches still attached to the trunks of the pine trees underneath the living branches; "women's wood" Jondalar's people had always called it. It was available on most coniferous trees, and even in the wettest of conditions it was usually dry. It could be collected without having to use an axe or even a knife. They built the fire just outside the entrance of the tent and left the flap open to heat it inside.

A varying hare, already turned white, dashed through their camp when, by sheer chance, Jondalar happened to be checking the heft of his spear-thrower with a new spear he'd been working on for the past few evenings. He threw almost by instinct, but he was surprised when the shorter spear with a smaller point, made out of flint not bone, found its mark. He walked over, picked up the hare, and tried to pull out the shaft. When it didn't come easily, he took out his knife, cut out the point, and was pleased to see that the new spear was undamaged.

"Here's meat for tonight," Jondalar said, handing the hare to Ayla. "It almost makes me wonder if this one didn't come by just to help me test the new spears. They're light and easy. You'll have to try one out."

"I think it's more likely that we camped in the middle of his regular run," Ayla said, "but that was a good throw. I would like to try the light spear. Right now, though, I think I'll start this cooking and see what I can find for the rest of our meal."

She cleaned out the entrails but did not skin the hare, so the winter fat would not be lost. Then she skewered it on a sharpened willow branch and propped it up over the fire between two forked sticks. Next, through she had to break the ice to dig them out, Ayla collected several cattail roots, and the rhizomes from some dormant licorice fern. She pounded both of them together with a rounded stone in a wooden bowl with water to extract the tough, stringy fibers, then let the white starchy pulp settle in the bottom of the bowl while she looked through her supplies to see what else she had.

When the starch had settled and the liquid was almost clear, she carefully poured off most of it and added dried blue elderberries. While she waited for them to plump up and absorb more of the water, she stripped away the outer bark of a birch tree, scraped off some of the soft, sweet, edible cambium layer underneath, and added it to her root-starch-and-berry mixture. She gathered cones of the stone pines, and when she put them on the fire, she was pleased to see that several of them still had large, hard-shelled pine nuts in them that the heat had helped to crack.

When the hare was cooked, she broke off some of the blackened skin and rubbed the inside on a few stones she had put in the fire, to spread some fat on them. Then she took small handfuls of the doughy root starch, mixed with the berries, the sweet, flavorful licorice-fern root stalk, and the sweetening and thickening sap from the birch cambium, and dropped them on the hot rocks.

Jondalar had been watching her. She could still surprise him with her extensive knowledge of growing things. Most people, particularly women, knew where to find edible plants, but he had never met anyone who knew so much. When she had several of the doughy, unleavened biscuits cooked, he took a bite out of one.

"This is delicious!" he said. "You really are amazing, Ayla. Not very many people can find growing food to eat in the cold of winter."

"It's not the cold of winter, yet, Jondalar, and not so hard to find things to eat now. Wait until the ground is frozen solid," Ayla said, then took the hare off the spit, peeled back the crispy charcoaled skin, and put the meat on the mammoth-ivory platter, from which they both would eat.

"I think you could find something to eat even then," Jondalar said.

"But maybe not plants," she said, offering him a tender leg of hare.

When they finished the hare and the cattail-root biscuits, Ayla gave the leftovers to Wolf, including the bones. She started their herb tea steeping, adding some birch cambium for the wintergreen flavor, then took the pine cones out of the edge of the fire. They sat by the fire for a while, sipping their tea and eating pine nuts, cracked with rocks or sometimes with their teeth. After their meal, they made preparations for an early start, checked to make sure the horses were all right, then settled into their warm furs for the night.

Ayla looked down the corridor of a long, winding cave, and the line of fires that were showing the way cast light upon beautiful draped and flowing formations. She saw one that resembled the long flowing tail of a horse. As she approached, the dun-yellow animal nickered and swished its dark tail, seeming to beckon her closer. She started to follow, but the rocky cave grew dark, and the stalagmites crowded in.

She looked down to see where she was going, and when she looked up, it wasn't a horse that was beckoning, after all. It seemed to be a man. She strained to see who it was, and was startled to see Creb stepping out of the shadows. He motioned her on, urging her to hurry and come with him; then he turned and limped away.

She started to follow him, then heard a horse whinny. When she turned around to look for the yellow mare, the dark tail disappeared into a herd of dark-tailed horses. She ran after them, but they turned into flowing stone and then into a jumble of stone columns. When she looked back, Creb was disappearing down a dark tunnel.

She ran after him, trying to catch up with him, until she came to a fork, but she didn't know which branch Creb had taken. She was in a panic, looking at one and then the other. Finally she started up the right fork, and she found a man standing in the middle of it, blocking her way.

It was Jeren! He was filling the entire passage, standing with his legs apart and his arms crossed in front of him, shaking his head no. She pleaded with him to let her get by, but he didn't understand. Then, with a short, carved staff, he pointed toward the wall behind her.

When she turned to look, she saw a dark yellow horse running and a yellow-haired man running after. Suddenly the herd surrounded the man, hid him from sight. Her stomach churned into a knot of fear. As she ran to him, she heard horses whinnying, and Creb was at the mouth of the cave, beckoning with great urgency, telling her to hurry, before it was too late. Suddenly the pounding hooves of horses were louder. She heard whinnying, neighing, and, with a sinking feeling of horror and panic, the sound of a horse screaming.

Ayla bolted awake. Jondalar was up, too. There was a commotion outside the tent, horses neighing and hooves stamping. They heard Wolf snarling, then a yelp of pain. They threw back their covers and rushed out of the tent.

It was very dark, with only a sliver of a moon, which shed little light, but there were more horses in the pine woods than the two they had left there. They could tell from the sounds, though they couldn't see anything. As she ran toward the sounds of horses, Ayla tripped on an exposed root and fell heavily to the ground, knocking the wind out of her.

"Ayla! Are you all right?" Jondalar said, searching for her in the dark. He'd only heard her fall.

"Here I am," she said, her voice hoarse, trying to catch her breath. She felt his hands on her, and she tried to get up. When they heard the sounds of horses racing off into the night, she pulled herself up and they ran toward the place where the horses were tied. Whinney was gone!

"She's gone," Ayla cried. She whistled and called her name. There was an answering whinny in the distance.

"That's her! That's Whinney! Those horses, they've taken her. I have to get her back!" The woman started after the horses, stumbling through the woods in the dark.

Jondalar caught up to her in a few strides. "Ayla, wait! We can't go now, it's dark. You can't even see where you're going."

"But I have to get her back, Jondalar!"

"We will. In the morning," he said, taking her in his arms.

"They'll be gone by then," the woman wailed.

"But it'll be light then, and we'll see their tracks. We'll follow them. We'll get her back, Ayla. I promise, we'll get her back."