The Plains of Passage (Earth's Children 4)

As they approached, bearing their baskets, Attaroa turned to face them. "Since you wanted to share this feast with the men, it seemed right to eat out here, so you can watch them," she said. S'Armuna translated, although Ayla understood the woman perfectly, and even Jondalar knew enough of their language to get the meaning of her words.

"But it is hard to see them in the dark. It would help if you built another fire on their side," Ayla said.

Attaroa paused a moment, then laughed, but she made no move to comply with the request.

The feast seemed to be an extravagant affair with many dishes, but the food was primarily lean meat with hardly any fat, very few vegetables or grains or filling starchy roots, and no dried fruit or hint of sweetness, not even from the inner bark of a tree. There was some of the lightly fermented brew made from birch sap, but Ayla decided she would not drink it, and she was pleased to see a woman coming around and pouring hot herb tea into cups for those who wanted it. She'd had experience with Talut's brew and knew it could cloud her judgment; tonight she wanted all her wits about her.

All in all, it was a rather meager feast, Ayla thought, although the people of the Camp would not have agreed. The food was more like the kind that might be left at the end of the season, not what should have been available in the middle of winter. A few furs had been scattered around Attaroa's raised platform near the large fire for the guests. The rest of the people were bringing their own to sit upon while they ate.

S'Armuna led Ayla and Jondalar toward Attaroa's fur-covered platform, and they stood waiting until the headwoman swaggered to her place. She was dressed in all her wolf-fur finery and necklaces of teeth, bone, ivory, and shell, decorated with bits of fur and feathers. Most interesting to Ayla was the staff she held, which was made from a straightened mammoth tusk.

Attaroa commanded that the food be served and, with a pointed look at Ayla, ordered that the share set aside for the men be taken into the Holding, including the bowl Ayla and Jondalar had provided. Then she sat down on her platform. Everyone else took it as a signal to sit down on their furs. Ayla noticed that the raised seat put the head-woman in an interesting position. She was above everyone else, which enabled her to see over the heads of the others and also to look down on them. Ayla recalled that there had been times when people had stood on logs or rocks when they had something to say to a group that they wanted everyone to hear, but it had always been a temporary position.

It was a powerful placement Attaroa had created, Ayla realized, as she observed the unconscious postures and gestures of the people around. Everyone seemed to express toward Attaroa the attitude of deference that the women of the Clan did when they sat in silence in front of a man, waiting for the tap on the shoulder that gave them the right to make their thoughts known. But there was a difference that was hard to characterize. In the Clan, she never sensed resentment from the women, which she felt here, or lack of respect from the men. It was just the way things were done, inherent behavior, not forced or coerced, and it served to make sure that both parties were paying close attention to the communication between them, which was expressed primarily with signs and gestures.

While they were waiting to be served, Ayla tried to get a better look at the headwoman's staff. It was similar to the Speaking Staff used by Talut and the Lion Camp, except the carvings were very unusual, not at all like Talut's staff, yet they seemed so familiar. Ayla recalled that Talut brought out the Speaking Staff for various occasions including ceremonies, but particularly during meetings or arguments.

The Speaking Staff invested the one who held it with the right to speak, and allowed each person to make a statement, or express a point of view without interruption. The next person with something to say then asked for the staff. In principle, only the one holding the Speaking Staff was supposed to talk, although at Lion Camp, especially in the midst of a heated discussion or argument, people didn't always wait their turn. But with some reminding, Talut was usually able to get the people to abide by the principle, so that everyone who wanted to was given a chance to have a say.

"That is a most unusual and beautifully carved Speaking Staff," Ayla said. "May I see it?"

Attaroa smiled when she heard S'Armuna's translation. She moved it toward Ayla and closer to the firelight, but she did not give it up. It was soon obvious that she had no intention of letting it go at all, and Ayla sensed that the headwoman was using the Speaking Staff to invest herself with its power. As long as Attaroa held it, anyone who wanted to speak had to request permission from her, and by extension, other actions—when to serve the food, or when to begin eating, for example —waited on her permission. Like her raised platform, Ayla realized, it was a means of affecting, and controlling, the way people behaved toward her. It gave the younger woman much to think about.

The staff itself was quite unusual. It was not newly carved, that much was obvious. The color of the mammoth ivory had begun to turn creamy, and the area where it was usually held was gray and shiny, caused by the accumulated dirt and oils of the many hands that had held it. It had been used by many generations.

The design carved into the straightened tusk was a geometric abstraction of the Great Earth Mother, formed by concentric ovals to shape the pendulous breasts, rounded belly, and voluptuous thighs. The circle was the symbol for all, everything, the totality of the known and unknown worlds, and symbolized the Great Mother of All. The concentric circles, especially the way they were used to suggest the important motherly elements, reinforced the symbolism.

The head was an inverted triangle, with the point forming the chin, and the base, curved slightly into a domelike shape, at the top. The downward pointing triangle was the universal symbol for Woman; it was the outward shape of her generative organ and therefore also symbolized motherhood and the Great Mother of All. The area of the face contained a horizontal series of double parallel bars, joined by laterally incised lines going from the pointed chin up to the position of the eyes. The larger space between the top set of double horizontal lines and the rounded lines that paralleled the curved top was filled in with three sets of double lines that were perpendicular, joining where eyes would usually be.

But the geometric designs were not a face. Except that the inverted triangle was placed in the position of a head, the carved markings would not even have suggested a face. The awesome countenance of the Great Mother was too much for an ordinary human to behold. Her powers were so great that Her look alone could overwhelm. The abstract symbolism of the figure on Attaroa's Speaking Staff conveyed that sense of power with subtlety and elegance.

Ayla remembered from the training she had begun with Mamut the deeper meaning of some of the symbols. The three sides of the triangle —three was Her primary number—represented the three major seasons of the year, spring, summer, and winter, although two additional minor seasons were also recognized, fall and midwinter, the seasons which signaled changes to come, making five. Five, Ayla had learned, was Her hidden, power number, but the three-sided, inverted triangles were understood by everyone.

She recalled the triangular shapes on the bird-woman carvings, representing the transcendent Mother changing into Her bird shape, that Ranec had made ... Ranec ... Suddenly, Ayla remembered where she had seen the figure on Attaroa's Speaking Staff before. Ranee's shirt! The beautiful, creamy white, soft leather shirt that he had worn at her adoption ceremony. It had been stunning partly because of its unusual style with its tapered body and wide flaring sleeves, and because the color looked so good with his brown skin, but mostly because of its decoration.

It had been embroidered with brightly dyed porcupine quills and threads of sinew with an abstract Mother figure that could have been copied directly from the carving on the staff that Attaroa held. It had the same concentric circles, the same triangular head; the S'Armunai must be the distant relatives of the Mamutoi that Ranee's shirt had originally come from, she realized. If they had taken the northern route that Talut had suggested, they would have had to

pass by this Camp.

When they had left, Nezzie's son, Danug, the young man who was growing into the image of Talut, had told her that someday he would make a Journey to the Zelandonii to visit her and Jondalar. What if Danug did decide to make such a Journey when he got a few years older, and what if he came this way? What if Danug, or any other Mamutoi, got caught by Attaroa's camp and came to harm? The thought strengthened her resolve to help these people put an end to Attaroa's power.

The headwoman pulled back the staff Ayla had been studying and turned to her with a wooden bowl. "Since you are our honored visitor, and since you have provided an accompaniment to this feast that is collecting so many compliments," Attaroa said, her tone heavy with sarcasm, "let me offer you a taste of the specialty of one of our women." The bowl was full of mushrooms, but since they were cut up and cooked, there was no way to identify the variety.

S'Armuna translated, adding a cautionary, "Be careful."

But Ayla needed neither the translation nor the warning. "I don't want any mushrooms right now," she said.

Attaroa laughed when she heard Ayla's words repeated, as though she had expected such an answer. "Too bad," she said, dipping into the bowl with her hand and lifting out a large mouthful. When she had swallowed enough to speak, she added, "These are delicious!" She ate several more mouthfuls, then handed the bowl to Epadoa, smiled knowingly, and downed her cup of birch brew.

As the meal progressed, she drank several more cups and was beginning to show the effects; she was becoming loud and insulting. One of the Wolf Women who'd been left guarding the Holding—they had exchanged places with other guards so that everyone could share in the feast—approached Epadoa, who then came to Attaroa and spoke to her in a whisper.

"It seems Ardemun wants to come out and bring thanks from the men for this feast," Attaroa said, and she laughed with derision. "I'm sure I am not the one they want to thank. It is our most honored visitor." She turned to Epadoa. "Bring the old man out."

The guard went back and soon Ardemun was limping toward the fire from the gate of the wooden fence. Jondalar was surprised at how glad he was to see him, and he realized that he hadn't seen any men since he had left the Holding. He wondered how they all were.

"So the men want to thank me for this feast?" the headwoman said.

"Yes, S'Attaroa. They asked me to come and tell you."