CIRCLES OF STONE (THE MOTHER PEOPLE SERIES) (51 page)

He saw it then, wedged
between two rocks at the edge of the river.  Zena's bag.  Conar's
heart leaped with joy, then fell abruptly as he realized what the bag
meant.  If Zena's bag was here, she must have been in the river, and if
she had been in the river...

"No!" 
Conar said the word aloud, to the Mother, to the animals, to any creature that
would hear.  "No!  She cannot be dead.  That is
impossible.  It cannot be."  Frantically, he picked up the bag
and held it close to his heart, as if his possession of it would make Zena
return.  His eyes searched the water for any sign of her, for her garment
perhaps.  Then he realized both furs were in the bag.  She must have
removed the one she usually wore.  But why would she do that?

They were heavy,
water-logged.  The bag could not have come far, for the weight would sink
it after a while.  Perhaps she had dropped it when she went to the river
to drink, and was still searching for it somewhere upstream.  

Conar plowed along
the riverbank, calling Zena's name.  He no longer cared if she heard
him.  This was a sign from the Mother, and it must mean he was supposed to
find her, be with her.  It meant she was still alive too.  Surely,
that was what it meant. Conar did not allow himself to think otherwise, even as
his eyes scoured the river for the horror of her body.  Zena could not
have drowned.  The Mother would not let such a thing happen, not to
Zena.  He clung to the thought, stubbornly ignoring any objections his
mind tried to raise. 

The sun was close
to the western horizon when he reached the hill where Zena had stared down at
the huge herds of animals, run to the wide-crowned trees to gather fruit and
nuts. Conar's eyes were moist as he looked out at the herds. The view made him
think of his small sister, Lilan.  Next to Zena, he cared for her more
than any other.  Often, he had brought her to places like this, where
there were many animals to watch.  Like him, she loved to scratch in the
earth with a sharp stick, trying to capture the fluid shapes and graceful movements
of the big creatures.

A long time might
pass now before he saw her again.  Conar imagined her face twisting with
sadness when she realized that he had disappeared, and wished he had been able
to speak to her - but there had been no time.

The light changed
suddenly as thick clouds blustered across the face of the sun.  Conar
glanced up, startled.  In moments, storm clouds had poured out from behind
the horizon and covered the sky.  He hurried on.  Zena had no tools,
no flints, not even a fur.  The night would be cold, too cold to
survive.  He had to find her by the end of the day.

A memory came to
him suddenly.  He stopped and stared at the mountains.  The
dream...the dream she had told him about, when they had been walking near the
mountains, in long, twisting tunnels beneath the earth.

That was where she
would go.  He was sure of it suddenly.  He had been there with her in
the dream; she had told him that.  He remembered her face, eager with the
pleasure of her vision, amazed at the caves, the tunnels that wound between
them, the open space beyond where something waited.

Conar began to
run.  But now the river was going the wrong direction.  He stopped,
frustrated.  Why had it suddenly changed course?  Perhaps it would
turn again, if he kept going.

Again, recognition
came suddenly.  She had taken off her fur to cross.  He must do it
too.  Conar went back to the place where the river doubled back and stared
down at the muddy bank.  Her footprints were there.  How had he
missed them before?  She had been there, not too long ago.

He pulled off his
fur and waded in, holding both bags high over his head.  Just a little
taller than Zena, he was able to touch bottom all the way, but by the time he
had reached the other side, he was so numb he could barely breathe.  Wind
laced with freezing rain hit his wet skin.  Shaking uncontrollably,
fearful that he might find nothing, he examined the bank for footprints. 
Relief flooded him when he saw that they were there.  She had crossed; she
had not drowned - but she would be cold, too cold.

Joy and fear
mingled uneasily in his heart.  He hurried on, stopping only long enough
to drape a fur across his body.  Over and over, he called Zena's name as
he ran through the long, pale grasses.  If he did not find her soon, she
would surely freeze.  A huge herd of bison filled the valley ahead. 
Never had he seen so many.  As he stared, the last glimmerings of light
faded.  Slowly, the animals lost their individual contours and merged into
a single enormous brown blotch against the earth.  Conar called again, but
now the hope had gone from his voice.  The lowing and stamping of the herd
would make it impossible for Zena to hear him.

He plodded on,
determined to keep searching even in the dark.  Zena would not walk toward
the bison.  She must have crossed the valley behind them.  Bison
could be mean if they were disturbed.  They were beautiful, though, with
their massive heads and shoulders, their graceful, swinging gallop.  For a
brief moment, Conar forgot his distress as the wonder of their shape and
movement caught his imagination.  A sudden sharp blast of wind and a
spatter of icy rain brought Zena back to the forefront of his thoughts. 

Fire!  That
was it.  Why had he not thought to make a fire before now?  She would
be able to see a fire for a long distance, or at least smell the smoke. 
Hurriedly, Conar pulled out his flint and a bundle of grass he had stuffed in
his bag earlier.  Sparks flew out and caught in the dry grass, but
everything else around him was wet, and he could not keep the blaze
going.  Finally, on his third try, he found some dry wood in a crevice
under a rock and managed to build a meager fire. 

He crouched near
the tiny blaze, his body slumped in discouragement.  The fire was small,
too small for Zena to see.  It was not even big enough to keep him
warm.  Shivering convulsively, he pulled his extra fur around him, but the
shivering did not stop.  Should he use Zena's furs?  He had dried
them in the sun as he walked, but to use them would feel like a betrayal, as if
he were stealing the warmth Zena should have.

The fire sputtered
and went out as the rain turned to heavy, drenching sleet.  Conar jumped
up and down to keep warm, but as soon as he sat down again, the shivering
resumed.  Three more times, he forced himself to jump around, then the
cold began to grip his body, numb his mind, and he could not make himself get
up again.  Soon, nothing had meaning for him except the desire to be
warm.  Slowly, he brought out Zena's furs and wrapped them around his
head, his legs and feet.  Tears dribbled down his cheeks, from the icy
wind that chilled him despite the coverings, from his despair.  He wiped
them on the furs and felt the thin layer of moisture freeze against his
face. 

The hours passed;
dumbly, he endured them, waiting for the night to end so he could search
again.  As soon as there was light enough to see, he jumped up and began
to scour the valley.  He called Zena's name endlessly, with increasing
desperation, but  there was no response.  By nightfall, the rocky
foothills loomed before him, and he felt a spurt of hope.  Perhaps she had
traveled faster than he had and was there already.  She might even have
found one of the caves she had described in her dream.  There, the icy
rain would not reach her, at least.  One part of him knew such a thing was
impossible.  He had barely survived the night, even with many furs. 
She could not have survived.  But another part of him was not yet ready to
admit Zena was dead.  This part of him insisted that if he could find a
cave like the ones she had described, Zena would have to stay alive to see it
with him.  That was what she had dreamed, so it must be. 

The thought
crystallized in his mind.  He must find a cave.  Then she would
surely appear.  Conar pushed his worries aside, lest they distract him
from his purpose, and set about locating the cave that would bring Zena to
him.  All that evening, all the following day, he searched the
foothills.  Just before sunset, when the rain had finally stopped, he
found one, tucked beneath an overhanging ledge.  He stepped cautiously
through the entrance and stared in awe.  The cave was huge,
encompassing.  Tumbled boulders littered the floor, giving it a forbidding
aspect.  The impression disappeared as he spotted patches of earth between
the rocks, smelled the tiny white flowers that still bloomed there.

Entranced, he
ventured further, and immediately felt warmer.  The air was soft and
moist, without the chill of the air outside.  A small stream bubbled up
from an invisible source and traversed the back of the cave, then emptied into
a tiny pond.  Around its edges were more flowers, pink this time. 
Conar knelt to examine them, and as he straightened, the last slanted rays of
the sun entered the cave.  He gasped in wonder, for in the shape of the
curved rock he seemed to see the bison.  There, in that bulbous
outcropping was the outline of a massive shoulder, below, the shape of a
haunch.  Avidly, he traced the lines, saw them taper into hoofs and horns,
swell again into rounded backs.  Then the sun sank below the horizon and
the bison disappeared.

The images
sustained him as he built a fire, prepared tubers and grains for eating. 
He had collected more than he needed.  If he had food for her, Zena was
more likely to come.  He made a tonic, too, from herbs he had found. 
Some he drank himself; the rest he kept warm near the fire for Zena.  But
as the darkness gathered around him and the fire sent strange shadows leaping
across the walls of the cave, the fear he had managed to keep at bay overwhelmed
him.  For four nights, Zena had been without fire or shelter or even a
garment to warm her.  Conar saw her pressed against the cold ground,
weeping with the pain of her freezing toes and fingers, watched her slip into
the merciful numbness that brought death, and grief bent him double.  He
shuddered with it, gasped until he could barely breathe.  The anguish
filled him so completely he could not see or hear or even think.

Hours seemed to
pass before the spasms of grief diminished, and when they did, Conar felt only
exhaustion.  Tears still swelled behind his eyes, rained down his cheeks,
but now he lacked the strength to gasp or even to eat the food he had so
carefully prepared.  Numbly, he reached out to put more branches on the
dwindling fire.  The flames shot up, casting fantastic shadows all around
him.  There were bison in the shadows; he could see them clearly in his
imagination.  They galloped across the walls and ceiling of the cave in
strong, flowing movements.  He watched them listlessly, too desolate now
to take pleasure in their graceful forms.  Another shadow joined them, a
shadow that looked different. 

Conar frowned and
sat up straight.  It looked like a person.  The hands were upraised,
the legs strained, bent sharply at the knee, as if the struggle to move forward
were too great to bear.  The shadow stopped abruptly, then sank down
against the wall of the cave until it was only a small bundle on the
floor. 

Behind him, Conar
heard a soft thump.  He turned his head and stared.

***********************

The animal reached
toward her with an exploratory tongue, puzzled by the strange smell.  Zena
felt the rough tongue pass across her arm, but she was too warm, too content,
to wonder at it.  The animal sniffed again, then closed its eyes, sensing
no danger in the presence of this small creature.  Another animal moved
closer, pressing its woolly shoulders against Zena's back.  She nestled
into it gratefully.  A little one followed and pushed up against her
feet.  All around her, the herd settled into a close bunch, embracing her
with their warm bodies and thick fur.  Zena slept on, unaware of their
presence.  Only when the lump beneath her moved suddenly as dawn broke did
she open her eyes.

Fur was all around
her, woolly, dark brown fur.  Strange rumbling noises came from deep
within the fur, and it had a strong smell, so strong she almost choked.  A
warm, moist nose nuzzled her.  Zena lay perfectly still, trying to
understand.

Vaguely, she
remembered that Lune had been there, lying on the ground, and Menta, and all
the others.  But she did not think they were here now. 

No.  That was
wrong.  They could not have been here.  She had left by herself, and
they could not have followed her.  Why then was she surrounded by fur?

Suddenly, there
was movement all around her.  Legs materialized where before there had
been only fur and warm dark lumps.  They were shaggy legs, festooned with
matted hair.  Zena began to shiver again.  The warmth that had
comforted her all night long had gone.  Slowly, she rose to her feet and
moved close to the animal next to her, so she could huddle against its bristly
hide and be warm again.  It glanced at her and resumed its grazing.

Another animal
approached, eyeing her warily.  Its horns made  sweeping arcs as it
tossed its head.  Zena stood still, strangely unafraid.  It grunted,
a low deep rumble, and moved away.  Others came to examine her.  She
did not move, but only stood there, leaning against the animal that had kept
her warm all night.  After a time, they ceased to notice her.  Then,
moving very slowly, she began to make her way through the throng of
bodies. 

She had slept all
night among a herd of bison.  The thought was strange, a little
frightening.  Never before had she been so close to the huge animals. 
Bakan and the others had told her they could be vicious, but she thought that
was probably only when they were alarmed.  Still, she was eager now to
find her way out, but all she could see in every direction were dark, shaggy
backs.  They were too high to see over, too thickly clustered to give her
a view in any direction.  She spotted a tree with low branches and climbed
up it to try to see where she was, which way she should go to escape the herd.