The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [156]
They were introduced to several of the people who were standing around watching them, looking rather proud. They were no doubt pleased to show off their stunning home, and Ayla didn’t blame them. It was very impressive. After she had carefully looked over the engravings, Ayla began to take in the rest of the shelter. It was obvious that quite a few people lived there, though there weren’t very many at the moment. Like all the rest of the Zelandonii, in summer people traveled; visiting, hunting, gathering, and collecting various other materials that they used to make things.
Ayla noticed an area that had been left recently by someone who was working with ivory, judging from the material scattered around. She looked more closely. There were pieces in different stages of production. The tusks first had been scored over and over again to detach rod-shaped sections, and several small rods were stacked together. A couple of rods had been divided into sections of pairs, which were then worked into two round segments attached together. The flattened piece between was pierced just above each round, then scored and cut through to create two beads, which then had to be smoothed into the final form, a rounded basket-shape.
A man and a woman, both middle aged, came and stood beside her as she was hunkered down to look closely; she wouldn’t dream of touching the beads. “These are remarkable—did you make them?” Ayla said.
They both smiled. “Yes, bead-making is my craft,” they said together, then laughed at their inadvertent timing.
Ayla asked how long it took to make the beads, and was told one person would be lucky to complete five or six beads from first light until the sun was high and they stopped for a midday meal. Enough beads for one necklace, depending upon how long it was, took anywhere from several days to a moon or two. They were extremely precious.
“It looks like a difficult craft. Just looking at the various steps it takes makes me appreciate my Matrimonial outfit even more. There are many ivory beads sewn on it,” Ayla said.
“We saw it!” the woman said. “It was beautiful. We went to see it afterward, when Marthona had laid it out on display. The ivory beads were expertly made, by a somewhat different process, I think. The hole seemed to go all the way through the bead, perhaps working from both sides. That is very difficult to do. If you don’t mind my asking, where did you get it?”
“I was a Mamutoi—they live far to the east—and the mate of the leader gave it to me; her name was Nezzie of the Lion Camp. Of course, that was when she thought I was going to mate the son of her brother’s mate. When I changed my mind and decided to leave with Jondalar, she told me to keep it for my mating with him. She was very fond of him, too.” Ayla explained.
“She must have been fond of him, and you,” the man said. He thought, but didn’t say, that the outfit was not only beautiful, it was extremely valuable. To give so much to someone who would take it away meant she must have cared a great deal for the young woman. It made him better understand the status the foreign woman had been accorded, though she was not born a Zelandonii, as her speech certainly attested. “It is without doubt one of the most stunning outfits I have ever seen.”
The Zelandoni of the Fifth Cave added, “They also make beads and necklaces out of seashells from both the Great Western Waters and the Southern Sea, and they carve ivory pendants, and pierce teeth. People especially like to wear fox teeth and those special shiny eye-teeth of deer. Even people from other Caves want their work.”
“I grew up near a sea, far to the east,” Ayla said. “I’d like to see some of your shells.”
The couple