The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [181]
Zelandoni watched him, wondering how he would respond. She knew he had been asked by many to train a youngster, but he was very selective. He already had three apprentices and couldn’t possibly take on all who asked. But this was his mate’s Donier Tour and it wouldn’t be inappropriate for him to contribute something to make it easier.
“A girl? I doubt that a woman could become a fully trained flint-knapper,” a man from one of the western Caves commented. He had traveled with them from the Summer Meeting. “I’ve had a little training in working with flint, and it takes both strength and precision to make good tools. We all know of Jondalar’s reputation as a flint-knapper. Why should he waste his time trying to train a girl?”
Ayla had become quite interested in the conversation. She didn’t at all agree with the man. In her experience, women could knap flint as well as men, but if Jondalar took on a woman apprentice, where would she stay? He couldn’t put her in with the young men apprentices, especially when her monthly bleeding came. Although the Zelandonii were not as strict about it as the Clan, where a woman couldn’t even look at a man at that time, a woman did need privacy. That meant she would have to live in their dwelling with them, or some other arrangement would have to be made.
Jondalar had obviously been thinking the same thing. “I’m not sure we can take in a young woman, Kareja,” he said.
“Are you saying a woman cannot learn to knap flint?” Kareja said. “Women make tools all the time. A woman isn’t going to run to a flint-knapper every time a tool breaks when she’s scraping a hide or butchering a kill. She reworks it or makes a new one herself.”
Kareja appeared calm, but the First knew she was struggling to control herself. She wanted to tell the man from the west outright how absurd he was, but it seemed to her that Jondalar was agreeing with him. Zelandoni was watching the exchange with interest.
“Oh, I know a woman can make tools for her own uses, a scraper or a knife, but can a woman make a hunting tool? Spear points and darts have to fly straight and true, or you miss the kill,” the man said. “I don’t blame the flint-knapper for not wanting to take a woman as an apprentice.”
Kareja was incensed. “Jondalar! Is he right? Do you think women can’t learn to knap flint as well as any man?”
“That has nothing to do with it,” Jondalar said. “Of course women can knap flint. When I was living with Dalanar and he was teaching me, he taught my close cousin, Joplaya, right alongside me. We were rather competitive, and when I was younger I’d never tell her, but now I wouldn’t hesitate to say that in some ways she’s better than I am. It’s just that I don’t know where a young woman would stay. I can’t put her in with the three apprentices I have. They’re men and a woman needs some privacy. We could take her in with us, but an apprentice needs a place to keep her tools, and her samples, and flint chips are sharp. Ayla gets upset if any have stuck on my clothes when I come in. She doesn’t want them around Jonayla, and I don’t blame her. If I took on your young woman, we’d have to build an addition to the apprentice dwelling, or a separate one.”
Kareja immediately calmed down. That the young woman from the Eleventh Cave should have privacy was a reasonable response. With a woman like Ayla for a mate, who was a credible hunter besides being a Zelandoni acolyte, she should have known Jondalar wouldn’t share the ludicrous views of that man from the west. After all, Jondalar’s mother had been a leader. But he did bring up a good point, the tall, thin woman thought.
“A separate one would be better, I think,” Kareja said. “And the Eleventh Cave will help you build it, or if you tell me where you want it, we can build it while you are gone on