The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [142]
“What about the wolf?”
“I set some traps for ermines, and when Deegie—she was my friend—and I went to check them, I discovered that something was stealing them from my snares. When I caught sight of a wolf eating one, it made me angry. I killed her with my sling; then I saw that she was a nursing mother. I didn’t expect it. It was out of season for a wolf to have cubs young enough to still be nursing, so I backtracked her trail to her den. She was a lone wolf, didn’t have a pack to help her, and something must have happened to her mate, too. That’s why she was stealing from my snares. There was only one puppy left alive, so I took him back with me. We were living with the Mamutoi then, and Wolf was raised with the children of the Lion Camp. He never knew what it was like to live with wolves; that’s why he thinks people are his pack,” Ayla said.
“All people?” Shevola asked.
“No, not all people, although he has gotten used to large crowds. Jondalar and I, and now Jonayla, of course—wolves love their young—are his primary pack, but he also counts Marthona and Willamar and Folara among his family, Joharran and Proleva and her children, too. He accepts people I bring to him to sniff, that I introduce to him, as friends, sort of temporary pack members. He ignores everyone else, so long as they offer no harm to those he feels close to, those he considers his pack,” Ayla explained to the avidly interested young woman.
“What if someone did try to harm someone that he felt close to?”
“On the Journey Jondalar and I made to get here, we met a woman who was evil, who took pleasure in hurting people. She tried to kill me, but Wolf killed her first.”
Shevola felt a chill, a rather delicious thrill, like she did when a good storyteller recounted a scary tale. Although she didn’t doubt Ayla—she didn’t think the acolyte of the First would make up something like that—nothing like that had ever happened in her life and it just didn’t seem quite real. But there was the wolf, and she knew what wolves could do.
As they continued along the trail between the cliffs, they came to an offshoot toward the right that led up to a split in the stone face, an entrance into the cliff. It was a rather steep climb, and when they reached it they found that a large block of stone partially closed off the way in, but there was an opening on both sides of it. The left side was narrow but passable; the right side was much larger, and it was obvious that people had stayed there before. She saw an old pad on the ground with grass stuffing sticking out where the leather was split on one side. Scattered around it was the familiar debitage of chips and pieces left from someone knapping flint to make tools and implements. Bones that someone had chewed on had been thrown at the wall nearby and fallen to the ground at the foot of it. They went inside and walked a ways into the cave. Wolf followed them. Shevola led them to some stones, then slipped off her backframe and propped it up on one.
“It will soon be too dark to see,” Shevola said. “It’s time to light our torches. We can leave our packs here, but drink some water first.”
She started looking into her pack for fire-making material, but Ayla already had her fire-starting kit out, and a small unwoven basketlike shape made of dried shreds of bark pushed together. She stuffed it with some of the quick-burning fireweed fluff that she liked to use for tinder. Then she withdrew a piece of iron pyrite, her firestone, with a groove already worn into it from the many times it had been used, and a fragment of flint that Jondalar had shaped to fit the groove. Ayla struck the firestone with the flint and drew off a spark that landed in the flammable fluff. It sent up a faint curl of smoke. Ayla picked up the bark basket and