“Stay back! You heard him,” Talut shouted with a booming voice that silenced everyone. When the people and horses settled down, Talut continued in a more normal tone. “The woman is Ayla. I promised her that no harm would come to the horses if they came to visit. I promised as headman of the Lion Camp. This is Jondalar of the Zelandonii, and a kinsman, brother of Tholie’s cross-mate.” Then, with a grin of self-satisfaction, he added, “Talut has brought some visitors!”
There were nods of agreement. The people stood around, staring with unfeigned curiosity, but far enough away to avoid the horse’s kicking hooves. Even if the strangers had left that moment, they had brought enough interest and gossip to last for years to come. News that two foreign men were in the region, living with the river people to the southwest, had been talked about at Summer Meetings. The Mamutoi traded with the Sharamudoi, and since Tholie, who was a kinswoman, had chosen a river man, the Lion Camp had been even more interested. But they never expected one of the foreign men to walk into their Camp, particularly not with a woman who had some magic control over horses.
“Are you all right?” Jondalar asked Ayla.
“They frightened Whinney, and Racer, too. Do people always talk at once like that? Women and men at the same time? It’s confusing, and they are so loud, how do you know who is saying what? Maybe we should have gone back to the valley.” She was hugging the mare’s neck, leaning against her, drawing comfort as well as giving it.
Jondalar knew Ayla was almost as distressed as the horses. The noisy press of people had been a shock for her. Maybe they shouldn’t stay too long. Perhaps it would be better to start with just two or three people at a time, until she became accustomed to her kind of people again, but he wondered what he’d do if she never really did. Well, they were here now. He could wait and see.
“Sometimes people are loud, and talk all at once, but mostly one person talks at a time. And I think they’ll be careful around the horses now, Ayla,” he said, as she started to unload the pack baskets tied on both sides of the animal by a harness she had made out of leather thongs.
While she was busy, Jondalar took Talut aside and quietly told him the horses, and Ayla, were a little nervous, and needed some time to get used to everyone. “It would be better if they could be left alone for a while.”
Talut understood, and moved among the people of the Camp, talking to each one. They dispersed, turning to other tasks, preparing food, working on hides or tools, so they could watch without being so obvious about it. They were uneasy, too. Strangers were interesting, but a woman with such compelling magic might do something unexpected.
Only a few children stayed to watch with avid interest while the man and woman unpacked, but Ayla didn’t mind them. She hadn’t seen children in years, not since she’d left the Clan, and was as curious about them as they were about her. She took off the harness and Racer’s halter, then patted and stroked Whinney, then Racer. After giving the colt a good scratching and an affectionate hug, she looked up to see Latie staring at the young animal with longing.
“You like touch horse?” Ayla asked.
“Could I?”
“Come. Give hand. I show.” She took Latie’s hand and held it to the shaggy winter coat of the half-grown horse. Racer turned his head to sniff and nuzzle the girl.
The girl’s smile of gratitude was a gift. “He likes me!”
“He like scratch, too. Like this,” Ayla said, showing the child the colt’s special itchy places.
Racer was delighted with the attention, and showed it, and Latie was beside herself with joy. The colt had attracted her from the beginning. Ayla turned her back on the two to help Jondalar and didn’t notice another child approach. When she turned around, she gasped and felt the blood drain from her face.
“Is it all right if Rydag touches the horse?” Latie said. “He can’t talk, but I know he wants to.” Rydag always caused people to react with surprise. Latie was used to it.
“Jondalar!” Ayla cried in a hoarse whisper. “That child, he could be my son! He looks like Durc!”
He turned, and opened his eyes in stunned surprise. It was a child of mixed spirits.
Flatheads—the ones Ayla always referred to as Clan—were animals to most people, and children like this were thought of by many as “abominations,” half-animal, half-human. He had been shocked when he first understood that Ayla had given birth to a mixed son. The mother of such a child was usually a pariah, cast out for fear she would draw the evil animal spirit again and cause other women to give birth to such abominations. Some people didn’t even want to admit they existed, and to find one here living with people was more than unexpected. It was a shock. Where had the boy come from?
Ayla and the child were gazing at each other, oblivious to everything around them. He’s thin for one who is half-Clan, Ayla thought. They are usually big-boned and muscular. Even Durc wasn’t this thin. He’s sickly, Ayla’s trained medicine woman’s eye told her. A problem since birth, with the strong muscle in the chest that pulsed and throbbed and made the blood move, she guessed. But those facts she stored without thinking; she was looking more closely at his face, and his head, for the similarities, and the differences between this child and her son.
His large, brown, intelligent eyes were like Durc’s, even to the look of ancient wisdom far beyond his years—she felt a pang of longing and a lump in her throat—but there was also pain and suffering, not all of it physical, which Durc had never known. She was filled with compassion. This child’s brows were not as pronounced, she decided after careful study. Even at just three years old, when she left, the bony ridges above Durc’s eyes had been well developed. Durc’s eyes and protruding brow ridges were all Clan, but his forehead was like this child’s. Neither was pushed back and flattened like the Clan, but high and vaulted, like hers.
Her thoughts strayed. Durc would be six years now, she recalled, old enough to go with the men when they practiced with their hunting weapons. But Brun will be teaching him to hunt, not Broud. She felt a flush of anger remembering Broud. She would never forget how the son of Brun’s mate had nursed his hatred of her until he could take her baby away, out of spite, and force her out of the clan. She closed her eyes as the pain of remembering tore through her like a knife. She didn’t want to believe that she would never see her son again.
She opened her eyes to Rydag, and took a deep breath.
I wonder how old this boy is? He’s small, but he must be close to Durc’s age, she thought, comparing the two again. Rydag’s skin was fair, and his hair was dark and curly, but lighter and softer than the bushy brown hair more common to the Clan. The biggest difference between this child and her son, Ayla noted, was his chin and neck. Her son had a long neck like hers—he had choked on his food sometimes, which the other Clan babies never did—and a receding but distinct chin. This boy had the Clan’s short neck, and forward-thrusting jaw. Then she remembered. Latie said he couldn’t talk.
Suddenly, in a moment of understanding, she knew what this child’s life must be like. It was one thing for a girl of five, who had lost her family in an earthquake and who had been found by a clan of people not capable of fully articulate speech, to learn the sign language they used to communicate. It was quite another to live with speaking people and not be able to talk. She remembered her early frustration because she had been unable to communicate with the people who took her in, but even worse, how difficult it had been to make Jondalar understand her before she learned to speak again. What if she had not been able to learn?
She made a sign to the boy, a simple greeting gesture, one of the first she had learned so long ago. There was a moment of excitement in
his eyes, then he shook his head and looked puzzled. He had never learned the Clan way of speaking with gestures, she realized, but he must have retained some vestige of the Clan memories. He had recognized the signal for an instant, she was sure of it.
“Can Rydag touch the little horse?” Latie asked again.
“Yes,” Ayla said, taking his hand. He is so slight, so frail, she thought, and then understood the rest. He could not run, like other children. He could not play normal rough-and-tumble games. He could only watch—and wish.
With a tenderness of feeling Jondalar had never seen on her face before, Ayla picked the boy up and put him on Whinney’s back. Signaling the horse to follow, she walked them slowly around the Camp. There was a lull in conversation as everyone stopped to stare at Rydag sitting on the horse. Although they had been talking about it, except for Talut and the people who had met them by the river, no one had ever seen anyone ride a horse before. No one had ever thought of such a thing.