The clan of the cave bear_ a novel - Jean M. Auel [194]
The baby was crying when she got back to the cave. It was cool and damp and he missed her warm closeness. She picked him up and held him, then remembered the waterbag she had left by the creek. She had to have water. She put her son down and dragged herself out of the cave again. It was starting to rain. When she returned, she sunk down, exhausted, and pulled the damp heavy fur over them. She was too tired to notice the sharp edges of fear nicking away at the corners of her mind as sleep overwhelmed her.
“Didn’t I tell you she was insolent and willful?” Broud gestured self-righteously. “Did anyone believe me? No. They took her side, made excuses, let her have her way, even let her hunt. I don’t care how strong her totem is, women are not supposed to hunt. The Cave Lion didn’t lead her to it, it was just defiance. See what happens when you give a woman too much freedom? See what happens when you’re too lenient? Now she thinks she can force her deformed son into the clan. No one can make excuses for her this time. She deliberately disobeyed the customs of the Clan. It’s inexcusable.”
At last Broud had been vindicated and he gloried in his chance to say “I told you so.” He rubbed it in with a vengeance that made the leader wince. Brun didn’t like losing face and the son of his mate didn’t make it any easier.
“You’ve made your point, Broud,” he signaled. “There’s no need to keep on about it. I’ll take care of her when she comes back. No woman has ever forced me to do anything against my will and gotten away with it, and no woman will start now.
“When we search again tomorrow morning,” Brun said, going on to the reason he called the meeting, “I think we should look at places we seldom go. Iza said Ayla knew of a small cave. Has anyone ever seen a small cave nearby? It can’t be too far, she was too weak to get very far. Let’s forget about the steppes or the forest and search where caves are likely to be. With this rain her trail has been washed away, but there might be a footprint left. Whatever it takes, I want her found.”
Iza waited anxiously for Brun’s meeting to end. She had been trying to work up courage to speak to him and decided the time was now. When she saw the men leave, she walked to his hearth with bowed head and sat at his feet.
“What do you want, Iza?” Brun asked after tapping her shoulder.
“This unworthy woman would speak to the leader,” Iza began.
“You may speak.”
“This woman was wrong not to come to the leader when she learned what the young woman planned to do.” Iza forgot to use the formal form of address as her emotions overcame her: “But Brun, she wanted a baby so much. No one thought she would ever conceive life, least of all her. How could the Spirit of the Cave Lion be overcome? She was so happy about it. Even though she suffered, she never complained. She almost died giving birth, Brun. Only the thought that her baby would die gave her strength at the end. She just couldn’t bear to give him up, even if he was deformed. She was sure it was the only baby she would ever have. She was out of her head from the shock and the pain, she wasn’t thinking straight. I know I have no right to ask, Brun, but I beg you to let her live.”
“Why didn’t you come to me before, Iza? If you thought begging for her life would do any good now, why didn’t you come to me then? Have I been so unkind to her? I was not blind to her suffering. A man can avert his eyes to avoid looking into another man’s hearth, but he cannot close his ears. There is not a person in this clan who does not know the pain Ayla suffered to give birth to her son. Do you think me so hardhearted, Iza? If you had come to me, told me how she felt, what she planned to do, don’t you think I would have considered allowing her baby to live? I could have overlooked her threat to run and hide as the ravings of a woman out of her head. I would have examined the child. Even without a mate, if the deformity is not too gross, I might have allowed it. But you gave me no opportunity. You assumed to know