The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [149]
The Fifth Cave, on the other hand, thought of themselves as being very self-sufficient in every way. They counted themselves as having extremely skilled hunters, fishers, and artisans of every kind. They even made their own rafts, and claimed to be the Cave that invented them in the first place, though that claim was disputed by the Eleventh. Their Doniers were well respected and had always been. Several of the stone shelters in the small valley were decorated with paintings and carvings of animals, some in high relief.
However, most of the Zelandonii thought of the Fifth Cave as specializing in the making of jewelry and beads as personal decorations and ornamentation. When someone wanted a new necklace, or various kinds of beads to sew on clothing, they often went to the Fifth Cave. They were especially skilled at making beads out of ivory, and each single bead was a long and painstaking process to make. They also carved holes through the roots of the teeth of various animals for pendants and distinctive beads—fox teeth and red deer canines were favorites—and they managed to acquire seashells of various kinds from both the Great Waters of the West and the large Southern Sea.
When the travelers from the Ninth Cave reached the Fifth Cave’s little valley, they were quickly surrounded. People were coming out of several stone shelters in the cliffs on both sides of the small river. Several were standing in front of the large opening of a shelter that faced southwest. Others emerged from another shelter just to the north of it, and on the other side of the valley more people were coming out of shelters. The travelers were surprised to find so many people, more than they expected. Either a large proportion of the Cave had decided not to go to any Summer Meeting, or they had come back early.
The people approached with curiosity, but none came too close. They were held back a little by fear and awe. Jondalar was a familiar figure to all the Zelandonii, except for the younger people who had come of age while he was gone. And everyone knew about his return from a long Journey and had seen the woman and animals he had brought with him, but the unusual procession of Jondalar and the foreign woman with her baby, the wolf, three horses, including a foal, and the One Who Was First sitting on a seat dragged by one of the horses made quite an impression. To many there was something eerily supernatural about animals behaving so docilely when they should be running away.
One of the first who saw them had run to tell the Zelandoni of the Fifth Cave, who was waiting for them. The man, who was among those in front of the shelter on the right, approached, smiling cordially. He was middle aged, but on the young side of the range. He had long brown hair pulled back and wrapped around his head in a complicated coiffure, and the tattoos on his face that announced his important position were more elaborate than they needed to be, but he wasn’t the only Zelandoni who had embellished his tattoos. There was a soft roundness about him, and the fleshiness of his face tended to make his eyes look small and gave him an air of shrewd cleverness, which wasn’t entirely incorrect.
In the beginning, Zelandoni had reserved judgment of him, not sure if she could trust him, not even sure if she liked him. He could argue his opinions very strongly, even when they were opposed to hers, but he had proven his reliability and loyalty, and in meetings and councils, the First came to rely on the shrewdness of his advice. Ayla was still withholding her complete trust of him, but when she learned that Zelandoni thought well of him, she was more inclined to give him credence.
Another man followed him out of the stone shelter, one whom Ayla had distrusted the first time she met him. Madroman had been born to the Ninth Cave, though later he moved to the Fifth Cave, and obviously became an acolyte from that group. The Zelandoni of the Fifth Cave had several acolytes, and