The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [335]
“The two parts are separate? I always thought of them as inseparable,” the woman unknown to Ayla said.
“You might also be surprised to know that only men were allowed to contact the spirit world, to be mog-urs, and only women were healers, medicine women,” Ayla said.
“That is surprising.”
“I don’t know about the other mog-urs, but The Mog-ur had a special ability in the way he called upon the spirit world. He could go back to their beginnings and show others the way. He even took me back once, although he wasn’t supposed to, and I think he was very sorry that he did. He changed after that; he lost something. I wish it had never happened.”
“How did it happen?” the First asked.
“There was a root they used only for the special ceremony with all the mog-urs at the Clan Gathering. It had to be prepared a particular way, and only the medicine women of Iza’s line knew how.”
“You mean they have Summer Meetings, too?” the Zelandoni of the Eleventh asked.
“Not every summer, only once in seven years. When it was time for the Clan Gathering, Iza was sick. She couldn’t make the trip, and her daughter was not yet a woman, and the root had to be prepared by a woman, not a girl. Although I didn’t have the Clan memories, Iza had been training me to be a medicine woman. It was decided that I would have to be the one to prepare the root for the mog-urs. Iza explained how I would have to chew the root and then spit it out into a special bowl. She cautioned me not to swallow any of the juice while I was chewing. When we got to the Clan Gathering, the mog-urs were not going to allow me to make it. I was born to the Others, not to the Clan, but finally at the last moment Creb came for me and told me to prepare myself.
“I went through the ritual, but it was difficult for me and I ended up swallowing some, and I had made a little too much. Iza had told me it was too precious to be wasted, and by then I wasn’t thinking clearly. I drank what was left in the bowl so it wouldn’t go to waste, and without meaning to, I went into the cave nearby and deep inside I found the mog-urs. No woman was ever supposed to participate in the men’s ceremonies, but I was there, and had also swallowed the drink.
“I can’t really explain what happened after that, but somehow Creb knew I was there. I was falling into a deep black void; I thought I would be lost in it forever, but Creb came for me, pulled me back. I’m sure he saved my life. The people of the Clan have a special quality to their minds that we don’t, just as we have a quality that they don’t. They have memories; they can remember what their ancestors knew. They don’t really have to learn what they need to know, like we do. They only have to need to know it, or to be ‘reminded’ to remember. They can learn something new, but it’s more difficult for them.
“Their memories go back a long way. In certain circumstances they can go back to their beginnings, to a time so long ago, there were no people and the earth was different. Perhaps back to the time when the Great Earth Mother gave birth to her son and first made the land green with her birth waters. Creb had the ability to direct the other mog-urs and lead them back to those times. After he saved me, he took me with him and the other mog-urs back into the memories. If you go back far enough, we all have the same memories, and he helped me to find mine. I shared the experience with them.
“In the memories, when the earth was different, so long ago it is hard to imagine, those who came before people once lived in the depths of the ocean. When the water dried and they were stranded in the mud, they changed and learned to live on land. They changed many times after that, and with Creb, I was able to go there with them. It was not quite the same for me as it was for them, but still, I was able to go there. I saw the Ninth Cave before the Zelandonii lived there; I recognized the Falling Stone when I first arrived. And then I went someplace Creb was not able to go. He blocked out