The Shelters of Stone (Earth's Children 5)

Ayla heard something that chilled her blood and set her heart racing: the thundering roar of a cave lion—and a human scream. Jondalar was there with her, inside her, it seemed; she felt the pain of a leg being mauled by the lion, then he lost consciousness. Ayla stopped, her blood pounding in her ears. It had been so long since she had heard a human sound, yet she knew it was human, and something else. She knew it was her kind of human. She was so stunned that she couldn’t think. The scream pulled at her—it was a cry for help.

With Jondalar’s presence unconscious, no longer dominant, she could feel the others there. Zelandoni, distant but powerful; Mejera, closer but vague. Underlying everything was the music, voices and flutes, faint but supporting, comforting, and the drums, deep and resounding.

She heard the growling of the cave lion and saw its reddish mane. Then she realized Whinney had not been nervous, and she knew why … “That’s Baby! Whinney, that’s Baby!”

There were two men. She pushed aside the lion she had raised and knelt to examine them. Her main concern was as a medicine woman, but she was astonished and curious as well. She knew they were men, though they were the first men of the Others she could remember seeing.

She knew immediately that the man with the darker hair was beyond hope. He lay in an unnatural position, his neck broken. The toothmarks on his throat proclaimed the cause. Though she had never seen him before, his death upset her. Tears of grief filled her eyes. It wasn’t that she loved him, but that she felt she had lost something beyond value before she ever had a chance to appreciate it. She was devastated that the first time she saw people of her own kind, one was dead.

She wanted to acknowledge his humanity to honor him with a burial, but a close look at the other man made her realize that it would be impossible. The man with the yellow hair still breathed, but his life was pumping out of him through a gash in his leg. His only hope was to get him back to the cave as quickly as possible so she could treat him. There was no time for a burial.

She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t want to leave the man there for the lions.… She noticed that the loose rock at the back of the blind canyon looked very unstable—much of it had piled up behind a larger boulder that was none too stable itself. She dragged the dead man to the back of the blind canyon near the slide of loose rock.…

When she finally got the other man wrapped into the travois, she returned to the stone ledge with a long sturdy Clan spear. She looked down at the dead man and felt sorrow for the fact of his death. With the formal silent motions of the Clan, she addressed the World of the Spirits.

She had watched Creb, the old Mog-ur, consign the spirit of Iza to the next world with his eloquent flowing movements. She had repeated the same gestures when she found Creb’s body in the cave after the earthquake, though she had never known the full meaning of the holy gestures. That wasn’t important—she knew the intent.…

Using the sturdy spear as a lever, in much the same way as she would have used a digging stick to turn over a log or extract a root, she prised free the large stone and jumped back out of the way asacascade of loose rock covered the dead man….

* * *

When they neared an opening between jagged rock walk, Ayla dismounted and examined the ground. It held no fresh spoor. There was no pain, now. It was a different time, much later. The leg was healed, a large scar was all that remained of the wound. They had been riding double on Whinney. Jondalar got down and followed her, but she knew he didn’t really want to be there.

She led the way into a blind canyon, then climbed up on a rock that had split from the wall. She walked to a rockslide at the back.

“This is the place, Jondalar,” she said, and, withdrawing a pouch from her tunic, gave it to him. He knew this place.

“What is this?” he asked, holding up the small leather bag.

“Red earth, Jondalar. For his grave.”

He nodded, unable to speak. He felt the pressure of tears and made no effort to check them. He poured the red ochre into his hand and broadcast it on the rocks and gravel, then spread a second handful. She waited while he stared at the rocky slope with wet eyes, and when he turned to go, she made a gesture over Thonolan’s grave.

They arrived at the blind canyon strewn with huge, sharp-angled boulders and started in, drawn to the slope of loose gravel at the far end. Time had passed again. They were living with the Mamutoi now, and the Lion Camp was going to adopt her. They had gone back to her valley, so Ayla could get some of the things she had made to give as gifts for her new people, and were returning. Jondalar stood at the foot of the slope, wishing there was something he could do to acknowledge this burial place of his brother. Perhaps Doni had already found him, since She called him back to Her so young. But he knew Zelandoni would try to find this resting place of Thonolan’s spirit and help guide him to the spirit world, if she could. But how could he tell her where this place was? He couldn’t even have found it without Ayla.

He noticed Ayla had a small leather pouch in her hand, one similar to the kind she wore around her neck. “You have told me his spirit should return to Doni,” she said. “I don’t know the ways of the Great Earth Mother, I only know of the Spirit World of the Clan totems. I asked my Cave Lion to guide him there. Maybe it is the same place, or maybe your Great Mother knows of that place, but the Cave Lion is a powerful totem and your brother is not without protection.”

She held up the small pouch. “I made an amulet for you. You, too, were chosen by the Cave Lion. You don’t have to wear it, but you should keep it with you. I put a piece of red ochre in it, so it can hold a piece of your spirit and a piece of your totem’s, but I think your amulet should hold one more thing.”

Jondalar was frowning. He didn’t want to offend her, but he wasn’t sure if he wanted this Clan totem amulet.

“I think you should take a piece of stone from your brother’s grave. A piece of his spirit may stay with it, and you can carry it back in your amulet to your people.”

The knots of consternation on his forehead deepened, then suddenly cleared. Of course! That might help Zelandoni find this place in a spirit trance. Maybe there was more to Clan totems than he realized. After all, didn’t Doni create the spirits of all the animals? “Yes, I’ll keep this and put a stone from Thonolon’s grave into it,” he said.

He looked at the loose, sharp-edged gravel sloping against the wall in a tenuous equilibrium. Suddenly a stone, giving way to the cosmic force of gravity rolled down amid a spattering of other rocks and landed at Jondalar’s feet. He picked it up. At first glance, it appeared to be the same as all the other innocuous little pieces of broken granite and sedimentary rock. But when he turned it over, he was surprised to see a shining opalescence where the stone had broken. Fiery red lights gleamed from the heart of the milky white stone, and shimmering streaks of blues and greens danced and sparkled in the sun as he turned it this way and that.

“Ayla, look at this,” he said, showing her the opal facet of the small rock he had picked up. “You’d never guess it from the back. You’d think it was just an ordinary stone, but look here, where it broke off the colors seem to come from deep inside, and they’re so bright, it almost seems alive.”

“Maybe it is, or maybe it is a piece of the spirit of your brother,” she said.

Ayla became aware of Jondalar’s warm hand and the stone pressing against

her palm. Its heat increased, not enough to cause discomfort, but enough to make her notice it. Was it Thonolan’s spirit that was trying to be noticed? She wished she’d had a chance to get to know the man. The things she’d heard about him since she arrived indicated that he had been well liked. It was a shame that he’d died so young. Jondalar had often said that Thonolan was the one who had wanted to travel. He had gone on the Journey only because his brother was going, and because he didn’t really want to mate Marona.

“O Doni, Great Mother, help us to find our way to the other side, to your world, to the place beyond and yet within the unseen spaces of this world. As the dying old moon holds the new within its slender arms, the world of the spirits, of the unknown, holds this world of the tangible, of flesh and bone, grass and stone, within its unseen grasp. But with your help it can be seen, it can be known.”

Ayla heard the plea, sung in a strange muted chant by the huge woman. She had noticed that she was getting dizzy, though that was not quite the word to describe her sensations. She closed her eyes and felt herself falling. When she opened them again, lights were flashing from within her eyes. Though she had not really paid attention to them when she was looking at the animals, she realized now that she had seen other things, signs and symbols marked on the walls of the cave, some of which matched the visions in her eyes. It didn’t seem to matter now whether her eyes were open or closed. She felt that she was falling into a deep hole, a long dark tunnel, and she resisted the sensation, tried to keep control.