CIRCLES OF STONE (THE MOTHER PEOPLE SERIES) (20 page)

Kalar watched them
go, smiling.  To have this opportunity to mate with men and women from
another tribe was good.  Mating was a gift from the Mother, one She wanted
them to use often.  It also gave much pleasure, especially to the
women.  Often, the tingling sensations and the warm glow lasted for many
hours.  Men tired more quickly, and she did not think their pleasure was
as great.  But mating calmed them, and that was important.  It was
the Mother's way of reducing the fighting that occasionally broke out between
males, even those like Bran and Lett who were usually peaceful.  Mating pulled
a fluid from them, a fluid that made them aggressive if it stayed too long
within them.  Kalar had often observed this, and she was grateful to the
Mother for providing a solution.

Once, she too had
eagerly sought out men from other tribes for mating, but now only Lett seemed
to spark desire.  A ripple of remembered delight coursed through her body,
and she rubbed Lett's leg and touched her lips to his, considering whether or
not to leave the warm fire and seek the privacy of the bushes.  Lett
looked into her eyes, understanding her perfectly.  Without speaking, they
decided they were too lazy and content to move.  They settled back against
a fire-warmed rock, touching often, rubbing their faces together in a gentle
rhythm.  There would be other times, and they could wait.

The children
followed the mating couples, eager to peer at them through the bushes. 
Sima and the two little boys watched with great interest, but Zena had seen
this many times before and quickly became bored.  Mating seemed a silly
activity to her, and she could not understand why the adults spent so much time
doing it.  Even Kalar did it, especially with Lett.  She had often
watched them.  Zena had asked her about it, and Cere, too, but neither had
provided a satisfactory answer. 

"It gives
great pleasure to those who do it,"  they had told her, but she had
not believed them.  The groans they uttered, and the grimaces on their
faces, made her think that mating must be a very uncomfortable process. 
She was certain she would never do it.

She wandered away
from the fire.  Darkness would come soon, and she wanted to explore while
the light remained.  Handing her infant to Kalar, Cere followed. 
Zena liked to be independent, and she was old enough now to stay out of danger,
but Cere still worried when she went off by herself.  She stayed a short
distance behind, so Zena would not see her.  

The sun was
approaching the western horizon, and Zena stood to watch the colors. 
Always, they astonished her with their beauty.  She had asked Kalar why
the colors came, but this answer had not satisfied her, either.

"The Mother
makes the colors,"  Kalar had said.  But Zena thought the sun
itself made the colors when it was squeezed behind the earth, just as berries
let out color when they were squeezed.  Still, she was not sure.  The
sun reappeared each morning, full and round, while the berries stayed flat.

Antelopes of many
kinds grazed in the distance.  Some were tall, higher than the zebra that
grazed among them.  Others were small, graceful creatures with pointed horns. 
All of them suddenly leaped straight into the air, as if to see better over the
tall grasses, then  ran out of sight.  Probably a lion was chasing
them, Zena thought, glad to be far away.

She froze.  A
rustling sound had come from the grasses beside her.

Nothing sprang,
and Zena relaxed enough to turn her head to look.  The rustling came
again, so faint she would not have heard it had she not been listening
hard.  She raised her arm, her fist clenched around the rock she always
took with her, and bent down to look more closely. 

At first, she
could see nothing, so well did the small creature blend with its
surroundings.  Then a gasp of surprise escaped her; she quelled it quickly
lest she startle the tiny gazelle that lay huddled almost under her feet. 
She would have stepped on it had she not heard the rustling.

Why had it not
run?  And where was its mother?  Although gazelles had little fear of
creatures like themselves who did not prey on them, they  usually ran if
any
animal came too close.  There must be something wrong with this one, to
lie so still even when she knelt directly beside it.  But it was not
dead.  Breath went in and out of its body, and that stopped when death
came.  Could it be hurt? 

The calf's eyes
were closed, and its muzzle lay along its front feet.  As Zena leaned
closer, the fringed lids slowly opened, and the baby gazelle turned its head to
stare at her. She stared back, entranced.  The limpid brown eyes seemed to
her to contain everything she had ever seen in the savannah - the beauty as
well as the fear, the enormity of the sky and grasses, the incredible intricacy
of the many living forms.  Zena could not find words to express the
immensity of her thoughts, but still she saw it all in the tiny creature's
eyes.

Her arm dropped,
and she placed the stone silently on the ground.  Slowly, with infinite
caution, she reached out to touch the calf.  It moved slightly, but did
not try to rise.  Her hand came closer.  A long shudder of anxiety
rippled through the fawn-colored body when her fingers made contact, but still
it did not run.  Zena rubbed it gently, then more vigorously, as if her
hand were its mother's tongue.  Over and over, she stroked the soft fur,
from neck to rump, with smooth, strong gestures.

Another noise made
her look up in alarm.  But it was only Cere, coming to see what Zena had
found.  Fear showed in the calf's eyes as Cere approached, and it
struggled to rise to its feet.  But its legs would not hold it, and it
fell back against the ground, bleating piteously.

"Quiet,"
Zena whispered.  "It is hurt, I think."  

Slowly, almost
imperceptibly, she moved her hand down the calf's rump until she was touching a
leg.  Again, a shudder ran down its body, but it stayed still. 
Returning her hand to its back, she stroked it slowly, over and over.  The
calf relaxed and breathed more calmly.  Zena tried again, stroking first
one leg, then another.  It did not move.  But when she tried to touch
the third leg, the calf stiffened and butted her fingers with its head. 
Zena stopped, and returned her hand to its back.

Cere watched,
unmoving.  She had noticed before that animals did not seem to fear
Zena.  They did not run, and sometimes, like this one, they allowed her to
touch them.  She sighed, sorry for the small creature.  Before the
night was over, it would be dead.  A lion would come, or the hyenas.

She rose to leave,
but Zena stopped her with an imperative gesture.  "We must heal
it," she said.

Cere stared at
her.  How could they make an animal's leg work again?  That was impossible. 
But Zena would not be deterred.  She was certain she could fix the calf,
with Kalar's help.  Surely, there were herbs for this, too.

She drew the small
creature into her arms, murmuring low bleating sounds all the while.  At
first it struggled to escape, but when she rubbed her face gently along its
flank, in the same way her hands had moved, it lay still again.  Cradling
it in her arms, she walked slowly toward the fire.

The others were
already sleeping.  There were many now, for the visitors had stayed so
they would not have to walk in the darkness.  Zena was glad they were
asleep.  The flames and the smell of many bodies made the little gazelle
tremble and squirm, but at least there were no voices to frighten it
further. 

She lay down
beside it, a little away from the others, and soothed it with her hands, with
low, cooing noises.  It settled beside her.  Slowly, as she watched,
its deeply fringed lids drooped over its eyes.  As long as it felt her
hands on its back, it was still.  But as soon as she stopped stroking, its
eyes opened again, and it tried to rise.

Zena stroked and
stroked, trying to stay awake, but the warmth and her full belly conspired
against her, and her eyes finally closed.  Twice, she awoke when the calf
moved against her and she stroked it until sleep claimed her once again. 
But when she awoke in the morning, just as light began to filter through the
trees, the tiny creature was gone.

CHAPTER
ELEVEN

Apprehension
turned Zena's stomach into a hard knot.  Pictures flashed through her
mind: she saw the calf dead, killed by a hungry animal that had managed to
creep up in the night without waking her, or by one of the visitors, for
food.  But the others were still sleeping, and she saw no footprints of
animals. She sprang to her feet and began to search through the sleeping
bodies, all around the area of the fire, and beyond, in the bushes. 
Perhaps the calf had managed to struggle to its feet and had hobbled away,
frightened by the smell of many people.

Kalar sat up and
rubbed her eyes.  She watched curiously as Zena leaned down to look under
a bush.

"What do you
look for?" she asked sleepily.

"My
gazelle," Zena replied, her voice tremulous.

Kalar sighed, and
almost laughed.  The child had such strange ideas.  But the laugh
died in her throat when Zena raised her face.  She was truly distressed,
Kalar saw.

Cere woke, hearing
the voices.  She jumped up and began to help Zena.

"Zena found
it in the grasses," she explained, seeing Kalar's perplexed face.  "A
young one."

Kalar frowned. 
"But it must go back to its mother," she said firmly. 
"Only the mother can feed a young one."

"Its mother
cannot help it,"  Zena said, peering into a clump of small
trees.  "Its leg is hurt.  We must heal it."

Sympathy sprang
into Kalar's eyes, but her voice was still firm. 

"That is for
the Mother to do," she said.  "The gazelle is the Mother's
creature, for Her to care for."

A stubborn
expression came into Zena's face.  "
I
must care for this
one," she stated, and resumed her search.

Kalar and Cere looked
at each other with raised eyebrows.  When Zena had made up her mind, there
was little anyone could do to change it.  They, too, began to look for the
little gazelle.

The others woke,
disturbed by the noises. Zena had disappeared to search near the place where
she had found the calf, so Cere tried to explain. Bran and Agar grinned at yet
another of Zena's strange behaviors. But when Zena returned, her downcast face
aroused even their sympathy.

"I will
help," Agar said. 

Zena's eyes lit up
in relief.  Agar knew more of animals even than Kalar.  Bran was big
and gentle, but Agar was a small, quick-tempered male who often aroused the
wise woman's wrath because he struck out or yelled at one of the others. 
Then she stared at him until he retreated to cool his anger.  He went to
the animals at these times, and watched them for long hours.  He knew how
they behaved, what they ate, and where they hid.

Agar asked her to
describe the calf and where she had found it.  Nodding, he went
immediately to a small area of brown grass she had not noticed.

"It could be
here," he told Zena, "where it can hide.  It looks for grass of
this color."

He was
right.  The gazelle was lying just as she had found it, its small muzzle
stretched on its feet.  It was almost invisible against the brown
stalks.  Zena looked up at Agar in immense gratitude.  Never again
would she provoke him, as she and the other children sometimes did, to watch
him lose his temper.

The calf's eyes
opened a little when Zena bent over it, but it barely resisted when she picked
it up. 

"It needs
food," Agar said.  "It is weak."

"What does it
eat?"  Zena had often watched gazelles feeding, but she was not
certain which of the many grasses they liked best.

"It eats from
its mother," he replied.  Seeing the dismay on her face, he added, 
"but it is old enough to eat grasses, too, and leaves.  We can
try."

He strode quickly
toward the plains where Zena had found the calf and began to pull up the
smallest, most tender shoots he could find.  There were not many, for the
grass became high and tough at the end of the dry season.  He held the
pieces flat on his hand and placed it under the small animal's nose.

It roused, and
nibbled a little.  Agar put the rest of the grass in Zena's hand and went
to a nearby tree.  Miraculously, even before the rains came, this
particular tree always managed to produce new growth.  The small leaves
were pale green and tender.  When the little gazelle smelled them, its
nose twitched, and it raised its head eagerly and ate.

"Good,"
Agar said.  "Perhaps it will live."

Zena watched,
astonished, as the calf gained strength before her eyes.  She called to
Sima and the two boys.  They had been watching from a distance, warned by
Cere not to go too close lest they frighten the small animal.   

"Find
more," she instructed, showing them the grass and the tender leaves. 
Thrilled with the task, they scurried off and soon returned with a big
bundle.  Zena let them offer some to the calf, and they giggled as its
rough tongue scraped their palms.

"Water?"
she asked Agar.

He shook his
head.  "It needs little," he replied.  Still, she offered
it water and it drank a small amount.

When it stopped
eating, she laid the gazelle gently on the ground to examine its leg.  The
calf turned its head toward her, bleating, and tried to get back into her
arms.  It seemed to feel safe there, and nowhere else. 

Kalar came to
watch.  "It needs herbs to pull out the hurt," Zena told
her.  The slender leg, hardly thicker than her finger, was discolored and
had a deep cut.  Nodding, Kalar went to find some of the leaves she had
shown Zena the day before.  Together, they prepared a poultice.  They
began to wrap the leg in the crushed leaves, but the old wise woman from the
other tribe stopped them.

"Wait,"
she said.  She shuffled away and returned with two slender sticks, very
straight, and some supple vines.

"It is
broken," she said, indicating the leg. "This holds it straight. 
I have done this before, on a young one."

Gently, she
straightened the leg and bound the sticks to it with vines.  The calf
flinched when she touched the leg, but she spoke to it soothingly, and stroked
it as Zena had done.  It submitted to her ministrations, seeming to sense
the old female's calm and long experience. 

"Place the
poultice over this," she told Zena.  "It must have the sticks
for many moons, until the leg heals."

Under her watchful
eyes, Zena placed the poultices around the sticks and bound them.

"Good,"
the old wise one said, and rose painfully to her feet.  "We go
now."   She touched Zena softly on the shoulder, and took
Kalar's hand.

"Go with the
Mother," she said, looking straight into Kalar's eyes.  Kalar
returned the long, deep look.  The two women understood each other now
without words, for they had joined so many times in the long wait for death to come,
or life if the Mother willed it, that their minds worked as one.  The old
one was bidding her good-bye, Kalar knew, for she might not live until the next
meeting.

"May the
Mother take you gently," Kalar replied.

The wise woman nodded,
and turned away, signaling to the others of her tribe to follow.  Zena
watched her go, impressed by her courage and dignity.

"She is very
wise, I think," she remarked to Kalar.  "More wise than any I
know but you."

Kalar smiled
gravely in agreement.  "We have learned much from the old one,"
she replied.  "She is of the Mother."

When the time came
to resume their journey, Zena set the calf on its feet, hoping it would be able
to walk now that its leg was supported.  It hobbled a short way, then lay
down, bleating.  She sighed, and picked it up again.  Somehow, she
would have to carry it.

Her eyes lit on
the big basket she had made.  She laid the gazelle in it, on top of the
dried meat, for she did not want to leave that behind, and raised the basket to
her shoulders.  The calf sniffed delicately at the strips and wrinkled its
nose, then settled itself against her warm belly. 

The group set off,
heading south along the river.  Zena felt her body bend under the
unaccustomed weight of the calf.  She straightened quickly, determined not
to ask for help.  But when Agar took it from her later in the day, she did
not object.  Her shoulders were raw from the straps, and her back was
terribly sore.  The way was harder now too.  They had left the wide
track made by elephants, and had entered terrain unlike any she had seen
before.  Tall trees festooned with vines and ghostly clumps of moss closed
in thickly all around them, hiding the sky, and the spongy undergrowth was warm
and damp beneath their feet.  The air was hot and thick with moisture.

Zena
shuddered.  She felt uncomfortable in this place.  Everything around
her was shadowy, indistinct.  The thick canopy reverberated with bird song
and other noises, but she could see neither birds nor any other animal in the
dark mass of leaves.  She clutched Cere's hand for reassurance, but soon
the foliage became so dense they had to creep through it single file, and she
had to let go again.

They came to a
small clearing among the vegetation, and decided to rest.  A shallow pool
of dank brown water tempted the children.  They ran to it and bent down to
drink.

"No!" 
It was Lett shouting.  Once before, he had been in a place like this, and
he knew the pools could be dangerous.  There was something in them that
hurt the belly, so that those who drank became hot, and all moisture fled from
their bodies.

The children
leaped back.  Lupe had already swallowed some, but he spat out what was in
his mouth.  The others drank sparingly from the gourds they had brought,
and looked around them nervously.  There could be other harmful things in
this strange, damp forest, but they did not know what to fear, for none but
Lett had been in such a place before.  Kalar especially felt anxious,
almost as if she were being watched.  She stared into the impenetrable
green that surrounded the clearing, but she could see nothing.

Zena took the calf
out of the basket, so it could stretch, and went to look for some broad leaves
to place on her shoulders, where the strap rubbed.  The little gazelle
followed her, hobbling on its three good legs. 

"Three-Legs",
she decided suddenly.  "It is called Three-Legs."

She reached for a
large, thick leaf, and examined it curiously.  It was larger than any she
had seen before, and downy white hairs clung to its underside.  It might
be good to heal skin, she thought, since skin, too, had hairs.  She
reached for another one, to show to Kalar, and jumped in astonishment. 
Behind the leaf was a face, the face of a Big One.  Its eyes met hers for
a moment, then they turned.  Zena followed its gaze and called out
sharply.  It was staring straight at Three-Legs.

Kalar and the
others ran over to Zena.  The Big One emerged from the leafy brush, and as
he moved, many others also emerged.  The females were no bigger than
themselves, but the males were massive creatures.  Dark hair covered most
of their bodies, and their jaws were huge, though their heads were relatively
small.  They shuffled rather than walked, but still they moved with
surprising agility. 

They had been all
around the clearing, Kalar realized, watching them.  Her skin began to
crawl in apprehension.

But the big male
who had emerged first made no move that signified aggression.  Instead, he
continued to stare at the little gazelle.  He and his tribe had not seen meat
for many moons.  The herds had gone south, following the rains, and other
animals were hard to catch in the dense foliage.  This small animal would
make a tasty meal.  His mouth began to water, and he went toward it, to
catch it before it leaped away.  Guessing his intention, Zena ran to the
calf and pulled it into her arms.

The big male
stopped, surprised, and gestured to her to put it down.  Zena shook her
head.  He made motions, as if eating it.  She shuddered and held
Three-Legs closer.  He frowned, and looked at the others in his group, as
if asking them what he should do next.  They regarded each other closely,
and seemed to decide something without words, for the whole group moved closer
to Zena, surrounding her as they reached for the calf.

Lett and Bran and
Agar broke through the group, raising their clenched fists to signify that they
would defend Zena.  Puzzled, the Big Ones backed away.  Again, the
big male made gestures, as if eating.  To keep an animal and not eat it
was incomprehensible to him, and neither he nor the others could understand why
these strange ones were defending it.

He became
impatient, and began to pound his chest angrily.  His urge for meat was
strong, and these others were preventing him from satisfying it.  The
other males copied him; soon the small clearing resounded with their
drumming.  The females did not pound, but they screeched over and over in
high-pitched voices.  The noise became deafening.  Kalar's skin
prickled as she felt the danger escalate.  She signaled to her tribe-mates
to retreat, but the Big Ones would not let them go.  They surrounded them,
gesturing repeatedly toward the frightened calf.