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By Root 2253 0

time they began to see a ceiling. As they neared the end of the passage, they entered an area where the ceiling was so low, Jondalar’s head almost brushed it. The surface was almost, but not quite, level and very light colored, but more than that, it was covered with paintings of animals in black outline. There were mammoths, of course, some almost completely drawn, including their shaggy fur and tusks, and some showing just the distinctive shape of their backs. There were also several horses, one quite large that dominated its space; many bison, wild goats, and goat-antelopes; and a couple of rhinoceroses. There was no order to their placement or size. They faced all directions, and many were painted on top of others, as though they were falling out of the ceiling at random.

Ayla and Jondalar walked around, attempting to see it all and trying to make sense of it. Ayla reached up and brushed her fingertips across the painted ceiling. Her fingers tingled at the uniform roughness of the stone. She looked up and tried to take in the entire ceiling the way a woman of the Clan learned to see an entire scene with a quick glance. Then she closed her eyes. As she moved her hand across the rough ceiling, the stone seemed to disappear, and she felt nothing but empty space. In her mind a picture was forming of real animals in that space coming from a long distance, coming from the spirit world behind the stone ceiling and falling to the Earth. The ones that were larger or more finished had almost reached the world she walked in; the ones that were smaller or barely suggested were still on their way.

Finally she opened her eyes, but looking up made her dizzy. She lowered her lamp and looked down at the damp floor of the cave.

“It’s overwhelming,” Jondalar said.

“Yes, it is,” Zelandoni said.

“I didn’t know this was here,” he said. “No one talks about it.”

“The zelandonia are the only ones who come here, I think. There is a little concern that youngsters might try to look for this and lose their way,” the First said. “You know how children love to explore caves. As you noticed, this cave would be very easy to get lost in, but some children have been here. In those passages we passed on the right near the entrance, there are some fingermarks made by children, and someone lifted at least one child up to mark the ceiling with fingers.”

“Are we going any farther?” Jondalar asked.

“No, from here, we’ll head back,” Zelandoni said. “But we can rest here for a while first, and while we’re here, I think we should fill the lamps again. We have a long way to go.”

Ayla nursed her baby a little, while Jondalar and Zelandoni filled the lamps with more fuel. Then, after a last look, they turned around and began to retrace their steps. Ayla tried to look for the animals they had seen painted and engraved on the walls along the way, but Zelandoni was not constantly singing, and she wasn’t making her bird calls, and she was sure she missed some. They reached the junction where the large passage they were in reached the main one, and continued south. It was quite a long walk, it seemed, before they reached the place where they had stopped to eat and then turned in to the place of the two mammoths facing each other.

“Do you want to stop here to rest and have a bite to eat, or go around the sharp bend first?” the First asked.

“I’d rather make the turn first,” Jondalar said. “But if you are tired, we can stop here. How do you feel, Ayla?”

“I can stop or I can go on, whatever you want, Zelandoni,” she said.

“I am getting tired, but I think I’d like to get past that sinkhole at the turn before we stop,” she said. “It will be harder for me to get going once I stop, until I get my legs used to moving again. I’d like to have that hard part past me,” the woman said.

Ayla had noticed that Wolf was staying closer to them on the way back, and he was panting a little. Even he was getting tired, and Jonayla was more restless. She had probably done her share of sleeping, but it was still dark and it confused her. Ayla shifted her from her back to her hip,