The Mammoth Hunters - Jean M. Auel [196]
Ayla chose the hand that held the plain musk-ox knucklebone, and with a jab of irritation, Crozie marked a third line for Ayla. “The luck is yours, now,” she said. “Since I won a game, and you won a game, we might as well call it even and forget the bets.”
“No,” Ayla said. “We bet skill. You win my skill. My skill is medicine. I will give you. I want your skill.”
“What skill?” Crozie said. “My skill at gaming? That’s what I do best these days, and you already beat me. What do you want me for?”
“No, not gaming. I want to make white leather,” Ayla said.
Crozie gaped in surprise. “White leather?”
“White leather, like tunic you wear at adoption.”
“I haven’t made white leather in years,” Crozie said.
“But you can make?” Ayla asked.
“Yes.” Crozie’s eyes softened with a distant look. “I learned as a girl, from my mother. At one time it was sacred to the Hearth of the Crane, or so the legends say. No one else could wear it …” The old woman’s eyes hardened. “But that was before the Crane Hearth fell into such low esteem that even Bride Price is a pittance.” She looked hard at the young woman. “What is white leather to you?”
“It is beautiful,” Ayla said, which brought an involuntary softening to Crozie’s eyes again. “And white is sacred to someone,” she finished, looking down at her hands. “I want to make special tunic the way someone likes. Special white tunic.”
Ayla didn’t notice Crozie glance toward Jondalar, who happened at that moment to be staring at them. He looked aside quickly, seemingly embarrassed. The old woman shook her head at the young one, whose head was still bowed.
“And what do I get for it?” Crozie said.
“You will teach me?” Ayla said, looking up and smiling. She noticed a gleam of avarice in the old eyes, but something else, too. Something more distant, and softer. “I will make medicine for arthritis,” she said, “like Mamut.”
“Who says I need it?” Crozie snapped. “I’m not nearly as old as he is.”
“No, you are not so old, Crozie, but you have pain. You do not say you have pain, you make other complaint, but I know, because I am medicine woman. Medicine cannot cure aching bones and joints, nothing can make it go away, but can make you feel better. Hot poultice will make easier to move and bend, and I will make medicine for pain, some for morning, some for other times,” Ayla said. Then sensing the woman needed some way to save face, she added, “I need to make medicine for you, to pay my bet. It is my skill.”
“Well, I guess I should let you pay your bet,” Crozie said, “but I want one more thing.”
“What? I will do, if I can.”
“I want more of that soft white tallow that makes dry old skin feel smooth … and young,” she said, quietly. Then she straightened up and snapped, “My skin always did get chapped in winter.”
Ayla smiled. “I will do. Now, you tell me what is best hide for white leather, and I will ask Nezzie what is in cold rooms.”
“Deerskin. Reindeer is good, though it is best to use it as a fur, for warmth. Any deer will do, red deer, elk, megaceros. Before you get the hide, though, you will need something else.”
“What is that?”
“You will need to save your water.”
“My water?”
“The water you pass. Not only yours, anyone’s, though your own is best. Start collecting it now, even before you thaw out a deerskin. It must be left out where it’s warm for a while,” Crozie said.
“I usually pass water behind the curtain, in the basket with mammoth dung and ashes in it. It is thrown out.”
“Don’t go in the basket. Save it, in a mammoth skull basin, or a tight basket. Something that won’t leak.”
“Why is that water needed?”
Crozie paused and appraised the young woman before she answered. “I’m not getting any younger,” she said, finally, “and I have no one, except Fralie