The Shelters of Stone (41 page)

A hunter stepped out from behind a panel and attempted to stop him with a spear. The weapon found its mark, but it wasn’t a mortal wound and the momentum kept the bison going. The hunter jumped back and tried to get out of the way by ducking back behind the panel, but it was a flimsy barrier against the mighty bull. Enraged by the pain of the wound, the huge shaggy animal ignored the panel and knocked it aside. The man fell with it, and in the confusion, the bison trampled him.

Ayla, watching in horror, had her spear-thrower out and was reaching for a spear when she saw one thud into the bison. She threw her spear also, then urged Whinney forward, disregarding the danger of the other stampeding animals, and jumped off the horse’s back even before she stopped. She pulled the panel out of the way and knelt beside the man who was lying on the ground not far from the fallen bison. She heard him moan. He was alive.

W
hinney was prancing nervously, sweating heavily, as the rest of the bison swept by and into the surround. When the woman reached for her medicine bag from one of the carrier baskets, she stroked the horse for a moment to comfort her, but her mind was already focused on the man and what she might be able to do for him. She wasn’t even aware when the gate to the surround was closed, trapping the bison inside, or when some of the hunters began to methodically dispatch the ones they wanted.

The wolf had enjoyed chasing the animals, but even before the gate was closed he had suddenly stopped running after them and begun searching for Ayla. He found her kneeling beside the wounded man. Some people began to form a circle around her and the man on the ground, but with the wolf there, they kept their distance. Ayla was oblivious to the people watching her as she began to examine him. He was unconscious, but she could feel a slight beating in his neck, under his jaw. She opened his clothing.

There was no blood, but a large blue-black smudge was already forming on his chest and abdomen. Carefully, she felt his chest and stomach around the darkening bruise. She pressed in once. He flinched and made a cry of pain, but did not wake up. She listened to his breathing and heard a soft
gurgling, then noted that blood dribbled from the side of his mouth and knew he was injured internally.

She looked up and saw Jondalar’s piercing blue eyes and his familiar frown of concern, and then a second, nearly identical frown, with a questioning look. She shook her head at Joharran.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “That bison stepped on him.” She looked down at the dead animal beside him. “His ribs are broken. They are piercing his lungs and I don’t know what else. He is bleeding inside. I’m afraid nothing can be done. If he has a mate, someone should send for her. I’m afraid he will walk the world of the spirits before morning.”

“Nooooo!” came a cry from the crowd. A young man pushed his way forward and threw himself down beside the man. “It’s not true! It can’t be true! How does she know? Only a Zelandoni knows. She’s not even one of us!”

“It’s his brother,” Joharran said.

The young man tried to hug the man on the ground, then turned the wounded man’s head to try to make his brother look at him. “Wake up, Shevonar! Please wake up,” the young man wailed.

“Come on, Ranokol. You’re not helping him.” The leader of the Ninth Cave tried to help the young man up, but was fought off and pushed away.

“It’s all right, Joharran. Let him stay. A brother has a right to say farewell,” Ayla said, then, noticing the man starting to stir, she added, “A brother might cause him to wake up, though, and he will be in pain.”

“Don’t you have some willow bark or something for pain in your medicine bag, Ayla?” Jondalar said. He knew she was never without a few basic medicinal herbs. Hunting always posed some danger, and she would have anticipated that.

“Yes, of course, but I don’t think he should have anything to drink. Not with such severe injuries inside.” She paused, then said, “But, maybe a poultice would help him. I could try it. First, we need to get him to someplace comfortable, and we’ll need wood for a fire, and water to boil. Does he have a
mate, Joharran?” she asked again. The man nodded. “Then someone should go for her, and for Zelandoni, too.”

“Of course,” Joharran said, suddenly aware of her strange accent, though he had all but forgotten it until then.

Manvelar stepped in. “Let’s get some people looking for a place to take this man, where he can be comfortable, away from this hunting field.”

“Isn’t there a small cave in that cliff over there?” Thefona said.

“There’s bound to be one somewhere nearby,” Kimeran said.

“You’re right,” Manvelar said. “Thefona, why don’t you get some people and go look for a place to take him.”

“We’ll go with her,” Kimeran said, and called over the people from the Second and Seventh Caves who had joined the hunt.

“Brameval, perhaps you could organize a few people to get wood and water. And we’ll have to make something to carry him. Some people brought sleeping rolls, we’ll get some for him, and whatever else he needs,” Manvelar continued, then he called out to the hunters, “We need a good runner, to take a message back to Two Rivers Rock.”

“Let me go,” Jondalar said. “I can take the message, and Racer is the best ‘runner’ here.”

“I think you’re right about that.”

“Then maybe you could go on to Ninth Cave to get Relona here, and Zelandoni, too,” Joharran said. “Tell Proleva what happened. She’ll know how to get everything organized. Zelandoni should be the one to tell Shevonar’s mate. She may want you to explain to Relona what happened, but leave it up to her.”

Joharran turned to face the hunters that were still standing around the wounded man, most of them from the Ninth Cave. “Rushemar, the sun is high and getting hotter. We have paid dearly for this day’s kill, let’s not waste it. The bison need to be gutted and skinned. Kareja and the Eleventh Cave have started, but I’m sure she could use some help. Solaban, maybe you could take a few people and help Brameval get
wood and water, and whatever else Ayla needs, and when Kimeran and Thefona find a place, you can help move Shevonar.”

“Someone should go to the other Caves and let them know we need help,” Brameval said.

“Jondalar, can you stop on your way back and let them know what happened?” Joharran asked.

“When you get to Two Rivers Rock, tell them to light the signal fire,” Manvelar said.

“Good idea,” Joharran said. “Then the Caves will know something is wrong and will be expecting a messenger.” He went to the woman, the foreigner, who would likely be a member of his Cave one day, and probably a Zelandoni, and was already contributing every way she could. “Do what you can for him, Ayla. We’ll get his mate and Zelandoni here as soon as we can. If there is anything you need, ask Solaban. He will get it for you.”

“Thank you, Joharran,” she said, then turned to Jondalar. “If you tell her what happened, I’m sure Zelandoni will know what to bring, but let me check my bag. There are a couple of herbs I’d like if she has them. And take Whinney with you. Then you can use the pole drag to bring things here, she’s more used to it than Racer. Zelandoni could even ride here on it, and Shevonar’s mate on Whinney’s back, if they’re willing.”

“I don’t know, Ayla. Zelandoni’s pretty heavy,” Jondalar said.

“I’m sure Whinney can handle it. You just have to come up with a comfortable seat.” Then she looked at Jondalar with a wry expression. “But you’re right, most people aren’t used to using horses for traveling. I’m sure the women would rather walk, but they will need tents and supplies. The pole drag will be good for that.”

Ayla removed the carrying baskets before she put the halter on Whinney and gave the rope attached to it to Jondalar. He fastened the other end of it to the back of Racer’s halter with enough lead so she could follow, and started out. But the mare was not accustomed to trailing behind the
stallion she had borne. He had always followed her. Even though Jondalar was sitting on Racer’s back, guiding him with a rein attached to his halter, Whinney stayed slightly ahead of them, yet she seemed to sense which way the man wanted to go.

Horses were willing to do the bidding of their human friends, Ayla thought, smiling to herself as she watched them leave, so long as it didn’t upset their own sense of the proper order of things. She saw Wolf was observing her when she turned around. She had signaled him to stay when the horses left, now he was waiting patiently.

Her ironic inner smile at the behavior of the horses was quickly dispelled when she looked at the man lying where he fell. “He’ll need to be carried, Joharran,” she said.

The leader nodded, then called on some people to help. They improvised a carrying device by first binding together a couple of spears to make a sturdy pole, then fastening pieces of clothing across two of them. By the time Thefona and Kimeran returned with news of a small shelter nearby, the man had been carefully moved to the stretcher and was ready to be carried. Ayla called Wolf to her as four men each lifted one end of a pole.

When they arrived, Ayla helped several people who had begun cleaning out the hollowed-out space at ground level in the nearby limestone wall, protected by a small overhanging ledge. The dirt floor was littered with dried leaves and debris blown in by the wind, and dried hyena droppings left sometime before by the scavenging carnivores who had used the place for a lair.

Ayla was pleased to find that water was close by. There was a smaller cave at the back of the sheltered depression and just inside it was a spring-fed pool of fresh water that ran off in a ditch that had formed along the cliff wall. She told Solaban where to set up a fireplace with the wood he and Brameval, and a few others, had brought.

When Ayla asked, several people volunteered their sleeping rolls, which were piled on top of each other to create a slightly raised bed. The injured man had awakened when
they moved him onto the stretcher, but was unconscious by the time he arrived at the shelter. He moaned in pain when they moved him to the bed and awoke again, grimacing and struggling to breathe. Ayla folded another bedroll and propped him up on it to try to make him more comfortable. He tried to smile his thanks, but coughed up blood instead. She wiped his chin with a piece of soft rabbit skin, an item she usually kept with her medicinals.

Ayla went through the limited supplies in her medicine bag and tried to think if there was anything she might have forgotten that would help allay his pain. Gentian roots might help, or a wash of arnica. Both could relieve the internal pain of bruises and other aches, but she had neither with her. The fine hairs on the fruit of hops could be used as a sedative to help him relax, just by breathing the air near them, but they were not readily available. Maybe something in smoke would help, since swallowing liquid was not going to be possible. No, it would probably make him cough, which would be worse. She knew it was hopeless, it was just a matter of time, but she had to do something, at least for his pain.

Wait, she thought. Didn’t I see that plant from the valerian family on the way here? The one with the aromatic roots? One of the Mamuti at that Summer Meeting called it spikenard. I don’t know the name in Zelandonii. She looked up at the people around her and saw the young woman that Manvelar seemed to have a lot of respect for, the lookout from the Third Cave, Thefona.

Thefona had stayed to help clean out the small shelter she found and was still there, watching Ayla. The foreign woman intrigued her. There was something about her that made people pay attention to her, and she seemed to have gained the respect of the Ninth Cave in the short time she had been there. Thefona wondered how much the woman really knew about healing. She didn’t have any kind of tattoo marks like the zelandonia did, but the people she came from might have different ways. Some people tried to fool others about what they knew, but the stranger didn’t seem to be trying to impress anyone by bragging or talking big. Instead, she did
things that were genuinely impressive, like the way she used that spear-throwing thing. Thefona had been thinking about Ayla, but was surprised when the woman called her name.

“Thefona, may I ask you something?” Ayla said.

“Yes,” Thefona said, and thought, She does have a strange way of talking. Not her words, but the way they sound. Maybe that’s why she doesn’t talk much.

“Do you know much about plants?”

“Everyone knows something about plants,” Thefona said.

“I’m thinking about one whose leaves resemble foxglove, but it has yellow flowers, like dandelions. The name I know it by is ‘spikenard,’ but that’s a Mamutoi word.”

“I’m sorry. I know some food plants. I don’t know much about medicine plants. You would need a Zelandoni for that,” Thefona said.

Ayla paused, then said, “Would you watch Shevonar, Thefona? I thought I noticed some spikenard on my way here. I’m going back the way we came and look for it. If he wakes up again, or if there is any change at all, would you send someone to find me?” Ayla said. Then she decided to add an explanation, though explaining her actions as a medicine woman was not something she usually did. “If it is what I think it is, it could be helpful. I’ve used the mashed roots as a poultice to help mend bone fractures, but it is easily absorbed and has soothing powers. If I mix it with a little datura and maybe some pulverized yarrow leaves, I think it might help ease his pain. I want to see if I can find it.”