The Mammoth Hunters - Jean M. Auel [275]
“But there are evil ones among them with great power,” Crozie said. “Power to destroy an entire Camp.”
“The force of male and female in one body is very powerful. Without guidance, it can become perverted and malicious, and may want to cause illness and misfortune, even death. Even without such power, a person wishing misfortune on another can cause it to happen. With it, the results are almost inevitable, but with proper guidance, a man with both forces can become just as powerful a shaman as a woman with both forces, and is often more careful to use it only for good.”
“What if a person like that doesn’t want to be a shaman?” Ayla asked. She may have been born with her “gifts” but she still had feelings of being pushed into something she wasn’t sure she wanted.
“They don’t have to,” Mamut said. “But it’s easier for them to find companionship, others like themselves, from among Those Who Serve the Mother.”
“Do you remember those Sungaea travelers we met many years ago, Mamut?” Nezzie asked. “I was young then, but wasn’t there some confusion about one of their hearths?”
“Yes, I remember, now that you mention it. We were just returning from the Summer Meeting, several Camps still traveling together when we met them. No one was quite sure what to expect, there had been some raiding, but finally we had a friendship fire with them. Some Mamutoi women got upset because one Sungaea man wanted to join them in their ‘mother’s place.’ It took a lot of explaining to make it understood that the hearth which we thought consisted of one woman and her two co-mates was really one man and his two co-mates, except that one of them was a woman, and one of them was a man. The Sungaea referred to him as ‘she.’ He was bearded, but dressed in women’s clothes, and though he had no breasts, he was ‘mother’ to one of the children. He certainly acted like the child’s mother. I’m not sure if the child had been given to him by the woman of that hearth, or by another woman, but I was told that he experienced all the symptoms of pregnancy, and the pain of delivery.”
“He must have wanted to be a woman very much,” Nezzie commented. “Maybe he didn’t steal some woman’s life force. Maybe he was born in the wrong body. That can happen, too.”
“But did he have stomachaches every moon time?” Deegie asked. “There’s the test of a woman.” Everyone laughed.
“Do you have moon time stomachaches, Deegie? I can give you something to help, if you want,” Ayla said.
“I may ask, next time.”
“Once you have a child, it won’t be so bad, Deegie,” Tronie said.
“And when you’re carrying, you don’t have to worry about absorbent packing, and disposing of it properly,” Fralie said. “But you do look forward to having them,” she added, smiling at the sleeping face of her small but healthy daughter, and wiping away a dribble of milk from the corner of her mouth. She looked up at Ayla, suddenly curious. “What did you use when you were … younger?”
“Soft leather straps. They work well, especially if you need to travel, but sometimes I folded them over, or stuffed them with mouflon wool, or fur, or even bird down. Sometimes soft fluff from plants, crushed together. Never with dried mammoth dung, before, but it works, too.”
Mamut had the ability to efface his presence and fade in the background when he chose, so that the women forgot he was there and spoke freely in a way they would never have done if another man had been there. Ayla was aware of him, however, and observed him quietly observing them. Finally, when the conversation slowed down, he spoke