Jean M. Auel - 4 - Plains of Passage

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file:///F|/rah/Jean%20M.%20Auel/Auel,%20Jean%20M%20-%20EC4%20-%20Plains%20Of%20Passage.txt

BY THE AUTHOR OF

The Clan of the Cave Bear

The Valley of Horses

The Mammoth Hunters

JEAN M. AUEL

E A R T H ' S CHILDREN™

Crown Publishers, Inc. New York

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THIS BOOK IS PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER.

or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or

mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any

information storage and retrieval system, without permission

in writing from the publisher.

Published by Crown Publishers, Inc., 201 East 50th Street,

New York, New York 10022. Member of the Crown

Publishing Group.

Earth's Children is a trademark of Jean M. Auel.

CROWN is a trademark of Crown Publishers, Inc.

Manufactured in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Auel, Jean M.

The plains of passage/Jean M. Auel.--1st ed.

p. cm.--(Earth's children)

I. Title. II. Series: Auel, Jean M. Earth's children.

PS3551.U36P57 1990

813'.54--dc20 90-38330

CIP

ISBN 0-517-58049-7

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

First Edition

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For LENORE,

the last to come home,

whose namesake appears in these pages,

and for MICHAEL,

who looks forward with her,

and for DUSTIN JOYCE and WENDY,

with love.

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TESg

ta^sa^e

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Ahe

The woman caught a glimpse of movement through the dusty

haze ahead and wondered if it was the wolf she had seen loping in front

of them earlier.

She glanced at her companion with a worried frown, then looked for

the wolf again, straining to see through the blowing dust.

"Jondalar! Look!" she said, pointing ahead.

Toward her left, the vague outlines of several conical tents could just

be seen through the dry, gritty wind.

The wolf was stalking some two-legged creatures that had begun to

materialize out of the dusty air, carrying spears aimed directly at them.

"I think we've reached the river, but I don't think we're the only

ones who wanted to camp there, Ayla," the man said, pulling on the

lead rein to halt his horse.

The woman signaled her horse to a stop by tightening a thigh mus

cle, exerting a subtle pressure that was so reflexive she didn't even

think of it as controlling the animal.

Ayla heard a menacing growl from deep in the wolf's throat and saw

that his posture had shifted from a defensive stance to an aggressive

one. He was ready to attack! She whistled, a sharp, distinctive sound

that resembled a bird call, though not from a bird anyone had ever

heard. The wolf gave up his stealthy pursuit and bounded toward the

woman astride the horse.

"Wolf, stay close!" she said, signaling with her hand at the same

time. The wolf trotted beside the dun yellow mare as the woman and

man on horseback slowly approached the people standing between

them and the tents.

A gusty, fitful wind, holding the fine loess soil in suspension, swirled

around them, obscuring their view of the spear holders. Ayla lifted her

leg over and slid down from the horse's back. She knelt beside the

wolf, put one arm over his back and the other across his chest, to calm

him and hold him back if necessary. She could feel the snarl rumbling

in his throat and the eager tautness of muscles ready to spring. She

looked up at Jondalar. A light film of powdery dirt coated the shoulders

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and long flaxen hair of the tall man and turned the coat of his dark

brown mount to the more common dun color of the sturdy breed. She

and Whinney looked the same. Though it was still early in the sum

mer, the strong winds off the massive glacier to the north were already

desiccating the steppes in a wide band south of the ice.

She felt the wolf tense and strain against her arm, then saw someone

new appear from behind the spear holders, dressed as Mamut might

have dressed for an important ceremony, in a mask with aurochs's

horns and in clothes painted and decorated with enigmatic symbols.

The mamut shook a staff at them vigorously and shouted, "Go away,

evil spirits! Leave this place!"

Ayla thought it was a woman's voice shouting through the mask, but

she wasn't sure; the words had been spoken in Mamutoi, though. The

mamut dashed toward them shaking the staff again, while Ayla held

back the wolf. Then the costumed figure began chanting and dancing,

shaking the staff and high-stepping toward them quickly, then back

again, as though trying to scare them off or drive them away, and

succeeding, at least, in frightening the horses.

She was surprised that Wolf was so ready to attack, wolves seldom

threatened people. But, remembering behavior she had observed, she

thought she understood. Ayla had often watched wolves when she was

teaching herself to hunt, and she knew they were affectionate and loyal

to their own pack. But they were quick to drive strangers away from

their territory, and they had been known to kill other wolves to protect

what they felt was theirs.

To the tiny wolf pup she had found and brought back to the Ma

mutoi earthlodge, the Lion Camp was his pack; other people would be

like strange wolves to him. He had growled at unknown humans who

had come to visit when he was barely half-grown. Now, in unfamiliar

territory, perhaps the territory of another pack, it would be natural for

him to feel defensive when he first became aware of strangers, espe

cially hostile strangers with spears. Why had the people of this Camp

drawn spears?

Ayla thought there was something familiar about the chant; then she

realized what it was. The words were in the sacred archaic language

that was understood only by the mamuti. Ayla didn't understand all

of it, Mamut had just begun to teach her the language before she left,

but she did gather that the meaning of the loud chant was essentially

the same as the words that had been shouted earlier, though cast in

somewhat more cajoling terms. It was an exhortation to the strange

wolf and horse-people spirits to go away and leave them alone, to go

back to the spirit world where they belonged.

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Speaking in Zeiandonii so the people from the Camp wouldn't understand,

Ayla told Jondalar what the mamut was saying.

"They think we're spirits? Of course!" he said. "I should have

known. They're afraid of us. That's why they're threatening us with

spears. Ayla, we may have this problem every time we meet people

along the way. We are used to the animals now, but most people have

never thought of horses or wolves as anything but food or pelts," he

said.

"The Mamutoi at the Summer Meeting were upset in the beginning.

It took them a while to get used to the idea of having the horses and

Wolf around, but they got over it," Ayla said.

"When I opened my eyes that first time in the cave in your valley

and saw you helping Whinney give birth to Racer, I thought the lion

had killed me and I had awakened in the spirit world," Jondalar said.

"Maybe I should get down, too, and show them I am a man and not

attached to Racer like some kind of man-horse spirit."

Jondalar dismounted, but he held on to the rope attached to the

halter he had made. Racer was tossing his head and trying to back

away from the advancing mamut, who was still shaking the staff and

chanting loudly. Whinney was behind the kneeling woman, with her

head down, touching her. Ayla used neither ropes nor halters to guide

her horse. She directed the horse entirely with the pressures of her legs

and the movements of her body.

Catching a few sounds of the strange language the spirits spoke, and

seeing Jondalar dismount, the shaman chanted louder, pleading with

the spirits to go away, promising them ceremonies, trying to placate

them with offers of gifts.

"I think you should tell them who we are," Ayla said. "That mamut

is getting very upset."

Jondalar held the rope close to the stallion's head. Racer was alarmed

and trying to rear, and the mamut with her staff and shouting didn't

help. Even Whinney looked ready to Spock, and she was usually much

more even-tempered than her excitable offspring.

"We are not spirits," Jondalar called out when the mamut paused for

a breath. "I am a visitor, a traveler on a Journey, and she"--he pointed

toward Ayla--"is Mamutoi, of the Mammoth Hearth."

The people glanced at each other with questioning looks, and the

mamut stopped shouting and dancing, but still shook the staff now and

then while studying them. Maybe they were spirits who were playing

tricks, but at least they had been made to speak in a language everyone

could understand. Finally the mamut spoke.

"Why should we believe you? How do we know you are not trying

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to trick us? You say she is of the Mammoth Hearth, but where is her

mark? She has no tattoo on her face."

Ayla spoke up. "He didn't say I was a mamut. He said I was of the

Mammoth Hearth. The old Mamut of the Lion Camp was teaching me

before I left, but I am not fully trained."

The mamut conferred with a man and a woman, then turned back.

"This one," she said, nodding toward Jondalar, "he is as he says, a

visitor. Though he speaks well enough, it is with the tones of a foreign

tongue. You say you are Mamutoi, yet something about the way you

speak is not Mamutoi."

Jondalar caught his breath and waited. Ayla did have an unusual

quality to her speech. There were certain sounds she could not quite

make, and the way she said them was curiously unique. It was per

fectly clear what she meant, and not unpleasant—he rather liked it—

but it was noticeable. It wasn't quite like the accent of another lan

guage; it was more than that, and different. Yet it was just that: an

accent, but of a language most people had not heard and would not

even recognize as speech. Ayla spoke with the accent of the difficult,

guttural, vocally limited language of the people who had taken in the

young orphan girl and raised her.

"I was not born to the Mamutoi," Ayla said, still holding Wolf back,

though his growl had ceased. "I was adopted by the Mammoth Hearth,

by Mamut, himself."

There was a flurry of conversation among the people, and another

private consultation between the mamut and the woman and man.

"If you are not of the spirit world, how do you control that wolf and

make horses take you on their backs?" the mamut asked, deciding to

come right out with it.

"It's not hard to do if you find them when they are young," Ayla

said.

"You make it sound so simple. There must be more to it than that."

The woman couldn't fool a mamut, who was also of the Mammoth

Hearth.

"I was there when she brought the wolf pup to the lodge," Jondalar

tried to explain. "He was so young that he was still nursing, and I was

sure he would die. But she fed him cut-up meat and broth, waking up

in the middle of the night as you do with a baby. When he lived, and

started to grow, everyone was surprised, but that was only the begin

ning. Later, she taught him to do what she wished—not to pass water

or make messes inside the lodge, not to snap at the children even when

they hurt him. If I hadn't been there, I would not have believed a wolf

could be taught so much or would understand so much. It's true, you

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must do more than find them young. She cared for him like a child.

She is a mother to that animal, that's why he does what she wants."

"What about the horses?" the man who was standing beside the

shaman asked. He'd been eying the spirited stallion, and the tall man

who was controlling him.

"It is the same with the horses. You can teach them if you find them

young and take care of them. It takes time and patience, but they will

learn."

The people had lowered their spears and were listening with great

interest. Spirits weren't known to speak in ordinary language, although

all the talk of mothering animals was just the kind of strange talk that

spirits were known for--words that were not quite what they seemed.

Then the woman of the Camp spoke. "I don't know about being a

mother to animals, but I do know that the Mammoth Hearth doesn't

adopt strangers and make them Mamutoi. It's not an ordinary hearth.

It is dedicated to Those Who Serve the Mother. People choose the

Mammoth Hearth, or are chosen. I have kin in the Lion Camp. Mamut

is very old, perhaps the oldest man living. Why would he want to

adopt anyone? And I don't think Lutie would have allowed it. What

you say is very difficult to believe, and I don't know why we should."

Ay la sensed something ambiguous in the way the woman spoke,

or rather in the subtle mannerisms that accompanied her words: the

stiffness of .her back, the tension in the set of her shoulders, the

anxious frown. She seemed to be anticipating something unpleasant.

Then Ayla realized that it wasn't a slip of the tongue; the woman

had purposely put a lie in her statement, a subtle trick in her question.

But because of her unique background, the trick was blatantly

transparent.

The people who had raised Ayla, known as flatheads, but who called

themselves Clan, communicated with depth and precision, though not

primarily with words. Few people understood they had a language at

all. Their ability to articulate was limited and they were often reviled

as less than human, animals that could not talk. They used a language

of gestures and signs, but it was no less complex.

The relatively few words the Clan spoke--which Jondalar could

hardly reproduce, just as she was not quite able to pronounce certain

sounds in Zeiandonii or Mamutoi--were made with a peculiar kind of

vocalization, and they were usually used for emphasis, or for names of

people or things. Nuances and fine shades of meaning were indicated

by bearing, posture, and facial aspects, which added depth and variety

to the language, just as tones and inflections did in verbal language.

But with such an overt means of communication, it was almost impos-

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sible to express an untruth without signaling the fact; they could not

lie.

Ayla had learned to perceive and understand the subtle signals of

body movement and facial expression as she was learning to speak with

signs; it was necessary for complete comprehension. When she was

releaming to speak verbally from Jondalar, and becoming fluent in

Mamutoi, Ayla discovered that she was perceiving the inadvertent

signals that were contained in the slight movements of face and posture

even of people who spoke with words, though such gestures were not

intentionally meant to be a part of their language.

She discovered that she was understanding more than words, though

it caused her some confusion and distress at first, because the words

that were spoken did not always match the signals that were given, and

she did not know about lies. The closest she could come to untruth

was to refrain from speaking.

Eventually she learned that certain small lies were often meant as

courtesies. But it was when she gained an understanding of humor—

which usually depended on saying one thing but meaning another—

that she suddenly grasped the nature of spoken language, and the

people who used it. Then her ability to interpret unconscious signals

added an unexpected dimension to her developing language skills: an

almost uncanny perception of what people really meant. It gave her an

unusual advantage. Though she wasn't able to lie herself, except by

omission, she usually knew when someone else was not telling the

truth.

"There was no one named Lutie in the Lion Camp when I was

there." Ayla decided to be direct. "Tulie is the headwoman, and her

brother Talut is the headman."

The woman nodded imperceptibly as Ayla went on.

"I know that a person is usually dedicated to the Mammoth Hearth,

not adopted. Talut and Nezzie were the ones who asked me, Talut

even enlarged the earthlodge to make a special winter shelter for the

horses, but the old Mamut surprised everyone. During the ceremony,

he adopted me. He said that I belonged to the Mammoth Hearth, that

I was born to it."

"If you brought those horses with you to Lion Camp, I can under

stand why old Mamut might say that," the man said.

The woman looked at him with annoyance and said a few words

under her breath. Then the three people spoke together again. The

man had decided the strangers were probably people and not spirits

playing a trick—or if they were, not harmful ones—but he did not

believe they were exactly who they claimed to be. The tall man's

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