The Plains of Passage - Jean M. Auel [254]
“Ayla! Are you all right?” Jondalar said, searching for her in the dark. He’d only heard her fall.
“Here I am,” she said, her voice hoarse, trying to catch her breath. She felt his hands on her, and she tried to get up. When they heard the sounds of horses racing off into the night, she pulled herself up and they ran toward the place where the horses were tied. Whinney was gone!
“She’s gone,” Ayla cried. She whistled and called her name. There was an answering whinny in the distance.
“That’s her! That’s Whinney! Those horses, they’ve taken her. I have to get her back!” The woman started after the horses, stumbling through the woods in the dark.
Jondalar caught up to her in a few strides. “Ayla, wait! We can’t go now, it’s dark. You can’t even see where you’re going.”
“But I have to get her back, Jondalar!”
“We will. In the morning,” he said, taking her in his arms.
“They’ll be gone by then,” the woman wailed.
“But it’ll be light then, and we’ll see their tracks. We’ll follow them. We’ll get her back, Ayla. I promise, we’ll get her back.”
“Oh, Jondalar. What will I do without Whinney? She’s my friend. For a long time, she was my only friend,” Ayla said, giving in to the logic of his argument, but breaking down into tears.
The man held her and let her cry for a moment, then said, “Right now, we need to see if Racer is gone, too, and find Wolf.”
Ayla suddenly remembered hearing the wolf yelp in pain, and she grew concerned for him and for the young stallion. She whistled once for Wolf, and then she made the sound she used to call the horses.
They heard a whinny first, and then a whine. Jondalar went to find Racer, while Ayla followed the sound of the wolf in pain until she found him. She reached down to comfort the animal and felt something wet and sticky.
“Wolf! You’re hurt.” She tried to pick him up to carry him to the fireplace, where she could restart the fire and see. He yelped in pain as she staggered under his weight. Then he struggled out of her arms, but stayed up on his own legs, and though she knew it cost him some effort, he walked back to their camp on his own.
Jondalar also returned to the camp, leading Racer, while Ayla was stirring up the fire. “His rope held,” the man announced. He had gotten into the habit of using sturdy ropes to hold the stallion, who had always been a little harder for him to handle than Whinney was for Ayla.
“I’m so glad he’s safe,” the woman said, hugging the stallion’s neck, then stepping back to look him over more closely, just to make sure. “Why didn’t I use a stronger rope, Jondalar?” Ayla said, angry with herself. “If I had been more careful, Whinney wouldn’t have gotten away.” Her relationship with the mare was closer. Whinney was a friend, who did what she wanted because the horse wanted to, and Ayla only used a light tether to keep the horse from wandering too far afield. It had always been enough.
“It wasn’t your fault, Ayla. The herd wasn’t after Racer. They wanted a mare, not a stallion. Whinney wouldn’t have gone if the horses hadn’t made her go.”
“But I knew those horses were out there, and I should have realized they might come for Whinney. Now she’s gone, and even Wolf is hurt.”
“Is it very bad?” Jondalar asked.
“I don’t know,” Ayla said. “It hurts him too much when I touch him to be certain, but I think his rib is either badly bruised or broken. He must have gotten kicked. I’ll give him something for pain, and I’ll try to find out for sure in the morning … before we look for Whinney.” Suddenly she reached out for the man. “Oh, Jondalar, what if we don’t find her? What if I’ve lost her forever?” she cried.
25
Look, Ayla,” Jondalar said, bending down on one knee to examine the ground that was covered with the imprint of horse hooves. “The whole herd must have been here last night. The trail is clear. I told you it would be easy to track them once it got light.”
Ayla looked down at the tracks, then up toward the northeast in the direction they seemed to be heading. They were near the edge of the small woods, and she could