The Plains of Passage (Earth's Children 4)

Ayla smiled wryly. She couldn't blame her for doubting. "Yes. He was a Mamutoi, and his name was Ranec. The first time I saw him, I couldn't help staring at him. I'm afraid I was very impolite. I was told that his mother was as dark as ... a piece of that burning stone. She lived far to the south, across a great sea. A Mamutoi man named Wymez made a long Journey. He mated her, and her son was born to his hearth. She died on their way back, so he returned with only the boy. The man's sister raised him."

Madenia gave a little shiver of excitement. She thought the only thing south was the mountains, and that they went on forever. Ayla had traveled so far and knew so much. Maybe someday she would make a Journey like Ayla, and meet a brown man who would carve a beautiful horse for her, and people who would give her beautiful clothes, and find horses that would let her ride them, and a wolf that loved children, and a man like Jondalar, who would ride the horses and make the long Journey with her. Madenia was lost in daydreams of great adventure.

She had never met anyone like Ayla. She idolized the beautiful woman who led such an exciting life, and she hoped she might be like her in some way. Ayla spoke with a strange accent, but that only added to her mystery, and hadn't she suffered a forced attack by a man when she was a girl, too? Ayla had gotten over it but understood how someone else felt. In the warmth, love, and understanding of the people around her, Madenia was beginning to recover from the horror of the incident. She began to imagine herself, mature and wise, telling some young girl, who had suffered such an attack, about her experience, to help her overcome it.

While Madenia daydreamed, she watched Ayla pick up a neatly tied package. The woman held it but didn't open it; she knew exactly what was inside it, and she had no intention of leaving it behind.

"What's that?" the girl asked, as Ayla put it aside.

Ayla picked it up again; she hadn't seen it herself for some time. She looked around to make sure Jondalar was not in sight, then untied the knots. Inside was a pure white tunic decorated with ermine tails. Madenia's eyes became big and round.

"That's as white as snow! I've never seen any leather colored white like that," she said.

"Making white leather is a secret of the Crane Hearth. I learned how to make it from an old woman, who learned it from her mother," Ayla explained. "She had no one to pass the knowledge down to, so when I asked her to teach me, she agreed."

"You made that?" Madenia said.

"Yes. For Jondalar, but he doesn't know it. I'm going to give it to him when we reach his home, I think for our Matrimonial," Ayla said.

When she held it up, a package fell out if it, too. Madenia could see it was a man's tunic. Except for the ermine tails, there were no decorations; no embroidered patterns or designs, no shells or beads, but it needed none. Decorations would have detracted. In its simplicity, the pure whiteness of the color made it stunning.

Ayla opened the smaller package. Inside was the strange figure of a woman with a carved face. If she hadn't just seen wonder after wonder, it would have frightened the girl; dunai never had faces. But somehow it was all right for Ayla to have one.

"Jondalar made this for me," Ayla said. "He told me he made it to capture my spirit, and for my womanhood ceremony, the first time he taught me the Mother's Gift of Pleasure. There was no one else to share in it, but we didn't need it. Jondalar made it a ceremony. Later he gave this to me to keep because it has great power, he says."

"I believe it," Madenia said. She had no desire to touch it, but she didn't doubt that Ayla could control any power it held.

Ayla sensed her uneasiness and wrapped the figure back up again. She tucked it inside the carefully folded white tunic and wrapped that in the fine, thin sewn-together rabbit hides that protected it, then tied it with the cords.

Another wrapped package held some of the gifts she had received at her adoption ceremony, when she was accepted into the Mamutoi. She would keep them. Her medicine bag would go with her, of course, firestones and fire-making kit, her sewing kit, one change of inner clothes, and felt boot liners, sleeping rolls, and hunting weapons. She looked over her bowls and cooking implements

and eliminated all but the absolute essentials. She would have to wait for Jondalar to decide about the tents, ropes, and other gear.

Just as she and Madenia were about to go out, Jondalar came into the dwelling space. He and several others had just returned with a load of brown coal, and he had come in to sort through his things. Several other people came in then, too, including Solandia and her children with Wolf.

"I've really come to depend on this animal, and I'm going to miss him. I don't suppose you'd like to leave him," she said.

Ayla signaled Wolf. For all his love of the children, he came to her immediately and stood at her feet looking at her expectantly. "No, Solandia. I don't think I could."

"I didn't think so, but I had to ask. I'm going to miss you, too, you know," she added.

"And I will miss you. The hardest part of this Journey has been making friends, then leaving and knowing that I would probably never see them again," Ayla said.

"Laduni," Jondalar said, carrying a piece of mammoth ivory with strange markings incised on it. "Talut, the headman of the Lion Camp, made this map of the country far to the east, showing the first part of our Journey. I had hoped to keep it as a remembrance of him. It's not essential, but I would hate to throw it away. Would you keep it for me? Who knows, someday I may come back for it."

"Yes, I'll keep it for you," Laduni said, taking the ivory map and looking it over. "It looks interesting. Perhaps you can explain it to me before you go. I hope you do come back, but if not, perhaps someone going that way may have room for it and I can send it to you."

"I'm also leaving some tools behind. You can keep them or not. I always hate to give up a hammerstone I'm used to, but I'm sure I'll be able to replace it once we reach the Lanzadonii. Dalanar always has good supplies around. I'll leave my bone hammers and some blades, too. I'll keep an adze and an axe to chop ice, though."

After they had walked over to their sleeping area, Jondalar asked, "What are you taking, Ayla?"

"It's all here, on the bed platform."

Jondalar saw the mysterious package among her other things. "Whatever is in that must be very valuable," he said.

"I will carry it," she said.

Madenia smiled slyly, pleased to know the secret. It made her feel very special.