The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [38]
“Yes, that’s a good idea. The horses would rather be behind everyone, anyway,” she said, lifting Jonayla up and patting her back. She had finished nursing, but seemed to want to play around at her mother’s breast. She was awake and lively, and giggled at Wolf, who happened to be behind them. He reached out and licked her face and the milk dribbling down her chin, which made her giggle more. Ayla, too, had seen the signal pass between Joharran and Jondalar, and like Joharran, she had noticed that Marthona seemed to be slowing as the day progressed. She had noticed that Zelandoni, who had just arrived, had been falling back also, but she wasn’t sure if it was because she was tiring, or if she was slowing down to keep pace with Marthona.
“Is there some hot water to make tea?” Zelandoni said when she reached them, pulling out the pouch in which she kept her medicines, and bustling around preparing to make her tea. “Have you had any tea yet, Marthona?” Even before the woman shook her head from side to side to indicate that she hadn’t, the Donier continued, “I’ll make some for you along with mine.”
Ayla watched them both closely and quickly realized that Zelandoni had also noticed that Marthona seemed to be having some difficulty with the hike, and was preparing some medicinal tea for her. Marthona knew it, too. Many people seemed to be concerned for the woman, but they were keeping it at a subtle undercurrent. Ayla could tell, however, that no matter how they tried to minimize it, they were genuinely worried. She decided to see what Zelandoni was doing.
“Jondalar, will you take Jonayla? She’s fed and wide awake and wants to play,” Ayla said, giving the baby to him.
Jonayla waved her arms and smiled at him and Jondalar smiled back as he took her. It was obvious that he adored this baby girl, this child of his hearth. He never seemed to mind taking care of her. To Ayla he seemed more patient with her than she was. Jondalar himself was a little surprised at the strength of his feeling for her, and wondered if it was because for a time, he had doubted that there would ever be a child of his hearth. He feared he had offended the Great Earth Mother when he was young by wanting to mate with his donii-woman, and wasn’t sure She would ever choose a piece of his spirit to mix with the spirit of a woman to create a new life.
That was what he had been taught. The creation of life was caused by the spirits of women mingling with the spirits of men with the help of the Mother, and most people he knew, including those he had met on his Journey, believed essentially the same thing … except for Ayla. She had a different view of the way new life came to be. She was convinced that there was more to it than just the mixing of spirits. She had told him that it wasn’t only his spirit that had combined with hers to create this new person, but his essence when they shared Pleasures. She said Jonayla was as much his child as hers, and he wanted to believe her. He wanted this child to be as much his as hers, but he didn’t know.
He knew Ayla had come to that belief when she lived with the Clan, though it wasn’t what they believed either. She had told him that they thought it was totem spirits that caused a new life to start growing inside a woman, something about the male totem overpowering the female totem spirit. Ayla was the only one he knew who thought that a new life was begun by something more than spirits. But Ayla was an acolyte, training to become a Zelandoni, and it was the zelandonia that explained Doni, the Great Earth Mother, to Her Children. It made him wonder what would happen when the time came for her to explain how new life began to the people. Would she say that the Mother chose the spirit of a particular man to combine with her spirit the way the other Zelandonia did, or would she insist that it was a man’s essence, and what would the zelandonia have to say about it?
When Ayla approached the two women, she noticed Zelandoni looking through her bag of medicinal herbs, and Marthona sitting