The Plains of Passage - Jean M. Auel [346]
For Ayla, the trek back was much faster—she was not trying to follow a trail over difficult terrain—but Jondalar was surprised at the distance they had to travel before reaching the river. He hadn’t realized how far north they had been. He guessed that the S’Armunai Camp was not far from the Great Ice.
His speculation was correct. If they had gone north, they could have reached the massive frontal wall of the continental ice sheet in a walk of a handful or two of days. In early summer, just before they started on their Journey, they had hunted mammoths at the frozen face of the same vast northern barrier, but far to the east. Since then, they had traveled down the full length of the eastern side of a great curved arc of mountains, around the southern base, and up the western flank of the range almost to the land-spanning glacier again.
Leaving behind the last outliers and flysch foothills of the mountains that had dominated their travels, they turned west when they reached the Great Mother River and began approaching the northern foreland of the even larger and loftier range to the west. They were retracing their steps, looking for the place where they had left their equipment and supplies, following the same route they had begun earlier in the season, when Jondalar thought they had plenty of time … until the night that Whinney was taken by the wild herd.
“The landmarks seem familiar—it should be around here,” he said.
“I think you’re right. I remember that bluff, but everything else looks so different,” Ayla said, surveying the changed landscape with dismay.
More snow had accumulated and settled in this vicinity. The edge of the river was frozen, and, with the snow blown into drifts and filling every depression, it was hard to know where the bank ended and the river began. Strong winds and ice, which had formed on branches during an alternate freezing and thawing earlier in the season, had brought down several trees. Brush and brambles sagged under the weight of the frozen water clinging to them; covered with snow, they often appeared to the travelers to be hillocks or mounds of rocks until they broke through when they attempted to climb them.
The woman and man stopped near a small stand of trees and carefully scanned the area, trying to find something that would give them a hint of the site of their stashed tent and food.
“We must be close. I know this is the right area, but everything is so different,” Ayla said, then paused and looked at the man. “Many things are different from what they seem, aren’t they, Jondalar?”
He looked at her with a puzzled expression. “Well, yes, in winter things look different than in summer.”
“I don’t mean just the land,” Ayla said. “It’s hard to explain. It’s like when we left, and S’Armuna told you to tell your mother that she sends her love, but she said Bodoa sends it. That was the name your mother called her, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, I’m sure that’s what she meant. When she was young she was probably called Bodoa.”
“But she had to give up her own name when she became S’Armuna. Just like the Zelandoni you talk about, the one you knew as Zolena,” Ayla said.
“The name is given up willingly. It’s part of becoming One Who Serves the Mother,” Jondalar said.
“I understand. It was the same when Creb became The Mog-ur. He didn’t have to give up his birth name, but when he was conducting a ceremony as The Mog-ur, he was a different person. When he was Creb, he was like his birth totem, the Roe Deer, shy and quiet, never saying much, almost as though he were watching from a hiding place. But when he was Mog-ur, then he was powerful and commanding, like his Cave Bear totem,” Ayla said. “He was never quite what he seemed.”
“You’re a little like that, Ayla. Most of the time you listen a lot and don’t say much, but when someone is hurting or in trouble, you almost become a different person. You take control. You tell people what to do, and they do it.”
Ayla frowned. “I never thought of it that way. It’s just that I want to help.”
“I know that. But it