Clan of the Cave Bear (22 page)

Ayla looked around her, wondering at the omnipresence of spirits. She could not see any, but if Creb said they were there, she believed it.

“Can any man’s spirit get inside the woman?” she asked next.

“Yes, but only a stronger spirit can defeat hers. Often the totem of a woman’s mate asks another spirit to help. Then the other spirit may be allowed to leave its essence. It’s usually the spirit of a woman’s mate that tries most; it’s the closest one, but it often needs help. If a boy has the same totem as his mother’s mate, it means he will be lucky,” Creb explained carefully.

“Can only women have babies?” she asked, warming to her subject.

“Yes,” he nodded.

“Does a woman have to be mated to have a baby?”

“No, sometimes she swallows a spirit before she is mated. But if she doesn’t have a mate by the time the baby is born, the baby may be unlucky.”

“Could I have a baby?” was her next hopeful query.

Creb thought about her powerful totem. Its vital principle was too strong. Even with the help of another spirit, it was not likely it would ever be defeated. But she will find that out soon enough, he thought.

“You’re not old enough, yet,” he evaded.

“When will I be old enough?”

“When you are a woman.”

“When will I be a woman?”

Creb was beginning to think she would never run out of questions. “The first time your totem’s spirit battles with another spirit, you will bleed. That is the sign that it was wounded. Some of the essence of the spirit that fought with it is left behind to make your body ready. Your breasts will
grow, and there will be some other changes. After that, your totem’s spirit will fight with other spirits regularly. When the time for blood to flow comes and there is none, it means the spirit you swallowed has defeated yours and a new life has started.”

“But
when
will I be a woman?”

“Perhaps when you have lived through the cycle of all the seasons eight or nine times. That’s when most girls become women, some as early as seven years,” he replied.

“But how long will that be?” she insisted.

The patient old magician heaved a sigh. “Come here, I’ll see if I can explain,” he said, picking up a stick and taking a flint knife from his pouch. He doubted that she would understand, but it might still her questions.

Numbers were a difficult abstraction for people of the Clan to comprehend. Most could not think beyond three: you, me, and another. It was not a matter of intelligence; for example, Brun knew immediately when one of the twenty-two members of his clan was missing. He had only to think of each individual, and he could do it quickly without being conscious of it. But to transfer that individual into a concept called “one” took effort few could master. “How can this person be
one
and another time that person also be
one
—they are different people?” was the first question usually asked.

The Clan’s inability to synthesize and abstract extended into other areas of their lives. They had a name for everything. They knew oak, willow, pine, but they had no generic concept for all of them; they had no word for tree. Every kind of soil, each kind of rock, even the different kinds of snow had a name. The Clan depended on their rich memory and their ability to add to that memory—they forgot almost nothing. Their language was replete with color and description but almost totally devoid of abstractions. The idea was foreign to their nature, their customs, the way they had developed. They depended on Mog-ur to keep track of those few things that needed to be counted: the time between Clan Gatherings, the ages of the members of the clan, the length of isolation after a mating ceremony, and the first seven days of a child’s life. That he could do so was one of his most magical of powers.

Sitting down, Creb held the stick firmly wedged between his foot and a rock. “Iza says she thinks you are a little older than Vorn,” Creb began. “Vorn has lived through his
birth year, his walking year, his nursing year, and his weaning year,” he explained, cutting a slash in the stick for each year as he said it. “I will make one more mark for you. This is how old you are now. If I take my hand and fit it in each mark, I will cover all of them with one hand, see?”

Ayla looked with concentration at the slash marks, holding out the fingers of her hand. Then she brightened. “I am as many years as this!” she said, showing him her hand with all the fingers extended. “But, how long before I can have a baby?” she asked, far more interested in reproduction than reckoning.

Creb was thunderstruck. How had the girl been able to grasp the idea so quickly? She hadn’t even asked what slash marks had to do with fingers or what either had to do with years. It had taken many repetitions before Goov had understood. Creb made three more slash marks and put three fingers over them. With only one hand, it had been especially difficult for him when he was learning. Ayla looked at her other hand and immediately held up three fingers, folding down her thumb and forefinger.

“When I am this many?” she asked, holding out her eight fingers again. Creb nodded affirmatively. Her next action caught him completely by surprise; it was a concept he had spent years mastering himself. She put down the first hand and held up only the three fingers.

“I will be old enough to have a baby in this many years,” she gestured with assurance, positive of her deduction. The old magician was rocked to his core. It was unthinkable that a child, a girl child at that, could reason her way to that conclusion so easily. He was almost too overwhelmed to remember to qualify the prediction.

“That is probably the earliest time. It might not be for this many, or possibly this many,” he said, making two more slashes on the stick. “Or, perhaps even more. There is no way of knowing for sure.”

Ayla frowned slightly, held up her index finger, then her thumb. “How do I know more years?” she asked.

Creb eyed her suspiciously. They were getting into a realm with which even he had difficulty. He was beginning to be sorry he had begun. Brun would not like it if he knew this girl was capable of such potent magic, magic reserved only for mog-urs. But his curiosity was piqued too. Could she comprehend such advanced knowledge?

“Take both your hands and cover all the marks,” he instructed.
After she had carefully fitted her fingers over all the slash marks, Creb made one more and put his little finger on it. “The next mark is covered by the small finger of my hand. After the first set, you must think of the first finger of the other person’s hand, then the next finger of the other person’s hand. Do you understand?” he motioned, watching her closely.

The child hardly blinked. She looked at her hands, then at his hand, then made the grimace that Creb had come to understand meant she was happy. She nodded her head vigorously to indicate that she did understand. Then she made a quantum leap, a jump almost beyond Creb’s powers of comprehension.

“And, after that, another person’s hands, and then another person’s, isn’t that right?” she asked.

The impact was too much. His mind reeled. With difficulty, Creb could count to twenty. Numbers beyond twenty blurred into some indistinct infinity called
many
. He had, on a few rare occasions after deep meditation, caught a bare glimpse of the concept Ayla comprehended with such ease. His nod was almost an afterthought. He had a sudden understanding of the gulf between the mind of this girl and his own, and it shook him. He struggled to compose himself.

“Tell me, what is the name of this?” he asked to change the subject, holding up the stick he had been using to mark. Ayla stared at it, trying to remember.

“Willow,” she said, “I think.”

“That’s right,” Creb answered. He put his hand on her shoulder and looked directly into her eyes. “Ayla, it would be best if you refrain from mentioning anything about these to anyone,” he said, touching the marks on the stick.

“Yes, Creb,” she replied, sensing how important it was to him. She had learned to understand his actions and expressions more than anyone’s, except Iza’s.

“It’s time to go back now,” he said. He wanted to be alone to think.

“Do we have to?” she pleaded. “It’s still nice out.”

“Yes, we do,” he said, pulling himself up with the help of his staff. “And it’s not proper to question a man when he has made a decision, Ayla,” he chided gently.

“Yes, Creb,” she responded, bowing her head in acquiescence as she had learned. She walked silently beside him as they headed back to the cave, but soon her youthful exuberance
took over, and she was running ahead again. She ran back holding out sticks and rocks, telling Creb the names, or asking him if she couldn’t remember. He answered absentmindedly, finding it hard to pay attention for the tumult in his mind.

The first light of dawn scattered the enveloping darkness of the cave, and the fresh crispness in the air smelled of snow on its way. Iza was lying in her bed watching the familiar contours of the cave overhead take shape and definition in the gradually increasing light. This was the day her daughter would be named and accepted as a full member of the clan, the day she would be recognized as a living, viable human. She looked forward to the relaxation of her mandatory confinement, though her association with other members of the clan would still be limited to the women until she stopped bleeding.

At the onset of menarche, girls were required to spend the duration of their first period away from the clan. If it occurred during the winter, the young woman stayed alone in an area set aside at the rear of the cave but was still required to spend one menstrual period alone in spring. Living alone was both frightening and dangerous for a young, unarmed woman used to the protection and company of the whole clan. It was a trial that marked the passage of girls into womanhood, similar to the male’s trial of making his first kill, but no ceremony marked her return to the fold. And, though the young woman had fire for protection from carnivorous beasts, it was not totally unknown for a woman never to return—her remains usually found later by some hunting or foraging party. The girl’s mother was allowed to visit her once a day to bring her food and reassurance. But if the girl disappeared or was killed, her mother was forbidden to mention it until a minimum number of days had elapsed.

The battles waged by spirits within the bodies of women in the elemental struggle to produce life were deep mysteries to the men. While a woman bled, her totem’s essence was powerful: it was winning, defeating some male essential principle, casting out his impregnating essence. If a woman looked at a man during that time, his spirit might be drawn into the losing battle. That was the reason female totems had to be less powerful than male totems, for even a weak totem gained strength from the life force that resided
in females. Women drew on the life force; it was they who produced new life.

In the physical world, a man was bigger, stronger, far more powerful than a woman, but in the fearful world of unseen forces, the woman was endowed with potentially more power. Men believed that a woman’s smaller, weaker physical form that allowed them to dominate her was a compensating balance and that no woman must ever be allowed to realize her full potential, or the balance would be upset. She was kept from full participation in the spiritual life of the clan to keep her ignorant of the strength the life force gave her.

Young men were warned at their first manhood ceremony of the dire consequences that could result if a woman even glimpsed the esoteric rites of the men, and legends were told of the time when women were the ones who controlled the magic to intercede with the spirit world. The men had taken their magic from them but not their potential. Many young men looked at women in a new light once they became aware of these possibilities. They assumed their male responsibilities with great seriousness. A woman had to be protected, provided for, and totally dominated, or the delicate balance of physical and spiritual forces would be disrupted and the continuing existence of the life of the Clan destroyed.

Because her spiritual forces were so much more powerful during menses, a woman was isolated. She had to stay with the women, was not allowed to touch any food that might be consumed by a man, and spent her time doing unimportant tasks like collecting wood or curing hides that could only be worn by women. The men did not acknowledge her existence, completely ignored her, did not even reprimand her. If a man’s eye chanced to fall on her, it was as though she were invisible; he looked through her.

It seemed a cruel penalty. The woman’s curse resembled a death curse, the supreme punishment that was inflicted upon members of the Clan if they committed a serious crime. Only the leader could command a mog-ur to call down the evil spirits and lay a curse of death. A mog-ur could not refuse, though it was dangerous for the magician and the clan. Once cursed, the criminal was neither spoken to nor seen by any member of the clan. He was ignored, ostracized; he no longer existed, just as though he were dead. Mate and family grieved his death, no food was
shared. A few left the clan and were never seen again. Most simply stopped eating, stopped drinking, and fulfilled the malediction they, too, believed.

Occasionally a death curse might be imposed for a limited period of time, but even that was often fatal since a criminal gave up living for the duration of the curse. But if he lived through a limited death curse, he was admitted back into the clan as a full member, even to his previous status. He had paid his debt to society and his crime was forgotten. Crimes were rare, though, and such punishment was rarely dealt. Though the woman’s curse ostracized her partially and temporarily, most women welcomed the periodic respite from the unceasing demands and watchful eyes of the men.

Iza was looking forward to the greater contact she would have after the naming ceremony. She was bored with staying within the stone boundary of Creb’s fire and looked with longing at the bright sunshine that streamed in through the mouth of the cave during the last few days before winter snows. She waited anxiously for Creb’s signal that announced he was ready and the clan all gathered. Namings were often held before breakfast, shortly after the sun rose while the totems were still close by after protecting the clan during the night. When he beckoned, she hurried to join them and stood in front of Mog-ur, looking down at the ground while she uncovered her child. She held the babe up while the magician looked over her head making the gestures that called the spirits to attend the ceremony. Then, with a flourish, he began.