The clan of the cave bear_ a novel - Jean M. Auel [229]
All sound came to a sudden halt on a final, satisfying beat. As if they had materialized out of thin air, the bearskin-cloaked mog-urs stood nine abreast in front of the cage of the cave bear, with The Mog-ur alone in front of them. The feel of the strong beat still echoed inside the heads of the people in the overpowering silence. The Mog-ur held a flat, long oval of wood attached at one end to a cord. As he spun it round and round, a barely audible whir increased to a loud roar filling the silence. The deep, haunting resonance of the bullroarer raised gooseflesh as much for its significance as for its sonorous timbre. It was the voice of the Spirit of the Cave Bear warning all other spirits away from this ceremony devoted to Ursus alone. No totemic spirits would come to their aid; they had placed themselves entirely under the protection of the Great Spirit of the Clan.
A high-pitched warble penetrated the deep-throated bass; its thin, wailing ululation sent cold shivers down the spines of the most fearless as the bullroarer wound down. Like nothing so much as a disembodied spirit, the eerie, unearthly trill pierced the bright morning air. Ayla, standing in the front row, could see the sound was coming from something held to the mouth of one of the mog-urs.
The flute, made from the hollow legbone of a large bird, had no finger holes. Its pitch was controlled by stopping and unstopping the open end. In the hands of a skillful player, a full five-note pentatonic scale could be drawn from the simple instrument. To the young woman, no less than the rest, it was magic that created the unfamiliar music; it sounded like nothing ever heard on earth. It had come from the world of the spirits at the command of the holy man, for this ceremony alone. As the bullroarer symbolized and imitated the roar of the cave bear in physical form, the flute was the sound of the spiritual voice of Ursus.
Even the magician who played the instrument felt the sanctity of the sound that issued forth from the primitive pipe, though he himself had made it. Making and playing the magic flute was the esoteric secret of the magicians of his clan, a secret which usually brought those magicians to first rank. Only Creb’s unique ability had displaced the mog-ur who played the flute to second, but it was a powerful second. And it was he who most opposed the acceptance of Ayla.
The huge cave bear was pacing his cage. He had not been fed and he wasn’t used to going without food; he had never known a hungry day in his life. Water had been withheld from him as well, and he was thirsty. The crowd, smelling of tension and excitement, the unaccustomed sounds of wooden drums, bullroarer, and flute, all combined to make the animal nervous.
When he saw The Mog-ur limping toward his cage, he hauled his massive, overweight bulk up on his hind legs and roared a complaint. Creb jerked in startled reflex, but recovered quickly and masked it with a normal-seeming jerky step. His face, like the rest of the magicians’ faces, blackened with a paste of manganese dioxide, showed no sign of his rapidly beating heart as he tilted his head back to look up at the unhappy giant. He carried a small bowl of water, the shape and ivory gray color making it obvious that the bowl had once been a human skull. He put the macabre water container into the cage and stepped back while the shaggy bruin dropped down to drink.
While the animal lapped up the liquid, twenty-one young hunters surrounded his cage, each carrying a newly made spear. The leaders of the seven clans not fortunate enough to have a man selected for special honors had each chosen three of their best hunters for the ceremony. Then, Broud, Gorn, and Voord ran out of the cave and lined up outside the securely lashed door of the cage. They were naked except for small loincloths, and their bodies were daubed with red and black markings.
The small amount of water did little to satisfy the thirst of the great bear, but