Mammoth Hunters (26 page)

There was a lull in the activities of the Lion Camp in the early afternoon. Though their largest meal of the day was usually around noon, most people skipped the midday meal, or picked at leftovers from the morning, in anticipation of a feast that promised to be delicious for all that it was unplanned. People were relaxing; some were napping, others checked on food now and then, a few were talking quietly, but there was a feeling of excitement in the air and everyone was looking forward to a special evening.

Inside the earthlodge, Ayla and Tronie were listening to Deegie, who was telling them the details of her visit to Branag’s Camp, and the arrangements for their joining. Ayla listened with interest at first, but when the two young Mamutoi women began speaking about this relative or that friend, none of whom she knew, she got up, with a comment about checking the ptarmigan, and went out. Deegie’s talk of Branag and her coming Matrimonial made Ayla think of her relationship with Jondalar. He had said he loved her, but he had never proposed a joining to her, or spoken of Matrimoniais, and she wondered about it.

She went to the pit where her birds were cooking, checked to make sure she could feel heat, then noticed Jondalar with Wymez and Danug off to the side, where they usually worked, away from the paths people normally used. She knew what they were talking about, and even if she hadn’t, she could have guessed. The area was littered with broken hunks and sharp chips of flint, and several large nodules of the workable stone were lying on the ground near the three toolmakers. She often wondered how they could spend so much time talking about flint. Certainly they must have said everything there was to say by now.

While she was not an expert, until Jondalar came Ayla had
made her own stone tools, which adequately served her needs. When she was young, she had often watched Droog, the clan toolmaker, and learned by copying his techniques. But Ayla had known the first time she watched Jondalar that his skill far surpassed hers, and while there was a similarity in feeling toward the craft, and perhaps even in relative ability, Jondalar’s methods and the tools he produced far outstripped the Clan’s. She was curious about the methods Wymez used, and had meant to ask if she could watch sometime. She decided this was a good time.

Jondalar was aware of her the moment she came out of the lodge, but he tried not to show it. He was sure she had been avoiding him ever since her sling demonstration on the steppes, and he didn’t want to force his attentions on her if she didn’t want him around. When she started in their direction, he felt a great knot of anxiety in his stomach, afraid she would change her mind, or that she only seemed to be coming toward them.

“If not disturb, I like to watch toolmaking,” Ayla said.

“Of course. Sit down,” Wymez said, smiling a welcome.

Jondalar visibly relaxed; his furrowed brow smoothed and the tightness of his jaws eased. Danug tried to say something when she sat down next to him, but her presence rendered him speechless. Jondalar recognized the look of adoration in his eyes, and stifled an indulgent smile. He had developed a real fondness for the youngster, and he knew calf-eyed young love was no threat to him. He could afford to feel a bit like a patronizing older brother.

“Is your technique commonly used, Jondalar?” Wymez asked, obviously continuing a discussion that Ayla had interrupted.

“More or less. Most people detach blades from a prepared core to make into other tools—chisels, knives, scrapers, or points for smaller spears.”

“What about bigger spears? Do you hunt mammoth?”

“Some,” Jondalar said. “We don’t specialize in it the way you do. Points for bigger spears are made out of bone—I like to use the foreleg of deer. A chisel is used to rough it out by cutting grooves in the general outline and going over them until it breaks free. Then it is shaved to the right shape with a scraper made on the side of a blade. They can be brought to a strong, sharp point with wet sandstone.”

Ayla, who had helped him make the bone spear points they
used, was impressed by their effectiveness. They were long and deadly, and pierced deep when the spears were thrown with force, particularly with the spear-thrower. Much lighter weight than the ones she had used, which were patterned after the heavy spear of the Clan, Jondalar’s spears were all meant for throwing, not thrusting.

“A bone point punctures deep,” Wymez said. “If you hit a vital spot, it’s a quick kill, but there’s not much blood. It’s harder to get to a vital spot on a mammoth or rhinoceros. The fur is deep, skin is thick, if you get between ribs, there is still a lot of fat and muscle to go through. The eye is a good target, but it’s small, and always moving. A mammoth can be killed with a spear in the throat, but that’s dangerous. You have to get too close. A flint spear point has sharp edges. It cuts through tough skin easier, and it draws blood, and that weakens an animal. If you can make them bleed, the gut or the bladder is the best place to aim. It’s not quite as quick, but a lot safer.”

Ayla was fascinated. Toolmaking was interesting enough, but she had never hunted mammoth.

“You are right,” Jondalar said, “but how do you make a big spear point straight? No matter what technique you use to detach a blade, it’s always curved. That’s the nature of the stone. You can’t throw a spear with a curved point, you’d lose accuracy, you’d lose penetration, and probably half your force. That’s why flint points are small. By the time you pressure flake off enough of the underside to shape a straight point, there isn’t much left.”

Wymez was smiling, nodding his head in agreement. “That’s true, Jondalar, but let me show you something.” The older man got a heavy hide-wrapped bundle from behind him and opened it up. He picked up a huge axe head, a gigantolith the size of a sledgehammer, made from a whole nodule of flint. It had a rounded butt, and had been shaped to a rather thick cutting end that came to a point. “You’ve made something like this, I’m sure.”

Jondalar smiled. “Yes, I’ve made axes, but nothing as big as that. That must be for Talut.”

“Yes, I was going to haft this to a long bone for Talut … or maybe Danug,” Wymez said, smiling at the young man. “These are used to break mammoth bones or to sever tusks. It takes a powerful man to wield one. Talut handles it like a stick. I think Danug can do the same by now.”

“He can. He cut poles for me,” Ayla said, looking at Danug with appreciation, which brought on a flush and a shy smile. She, too, had made and used hand axes, but not of that size.

“How do you make an axe?” Wymez continued.

“I usually start by breaking off a thick flake with a hammerstone, and retouching on both sides to give it an edge and a point.”

“Ranec’s mother’s people, the Aterians, make a spear point with bifacial retouch.”

“Bifacial? Knapped on both sides like an axe? To get it reasonably straight, you’d have to start with a big slab of a flake, not a fine, thin blade. Wouldn’t that be too clumsy for a spear point?”

“It was somewhat thick and heavy, but a definite improvement over an axe. And very effective for the animals they hunted. It’s true, though. To pierce a mammoth or a rhino, you need a flint point that is long and straight, and strong, and thin. How would you do it?” Wymez asked.

“Bifacially. It’s the only way. On a flake that thick, I’d use flat pressure retouch to remove fine slivers from both sides,” Jondalar said thoughtfully, trying to imagine how he would make such a weapon, “but that would take tremendous control.”

“Exactly. The problem is control, and the quality of the stone.”

“Yes. It would have to be fresh. Dalanar, the man who taught me, lives near an exposed cliff of chalk that bears flint at ground level. Maybe some of his stone would work. But even then, it would be hard. We’ve made some fine axes, but I don’t know how you’d make a decent spear point that way.”

Wymez reached for another package wrapped in fine soft leather. He opened it carefully and exposed several flint points.

Jondalar’s eyes opened in surprise. He looked up at Wymez, then at Danug, who was smiling with pride for his mentor, then he picked up one of the points. He turned it over in his hands tenderly, almost caressing the beautifully worked stone.

The flint had a slippery feel, a smooth, not-quite-oily quality, and a sheen that glistened from the many facets in the sunlight. The object had the shape of a willow leaf, with near perfect symmetry in all dimensions, and it extended the full length of his hand from the base of his palm to his fingertips. Starting at one end in a point, it spread out to the breadth of four fingers in the middle, then back to a point at the other
end. Turning it on edge, Jondalar saw that it did indeed lack the characteristic bowed shape of the blade tools. It was perfectly straight, with a cross section about the thickness of his small finger.

He felt the edge professionally. Very sharp, just slightly denticulated by the scars of the many tiny flakes that had been removed. He ran his fingertips lightly over the surface and felt the small ridges left behind by the many similar tiny flakes that had been detached to give the flint point such a fine, precise shape.

“This is too beautiful to use for a weapon,” Jondalar said. “This is a work of art.”

“That one is not used for a weapon,” Wymez said, pleased by the praise of a fellow craftsman. “I made it as a model to show the technique.”

Ayla was craning her neck to look at the exquisitely crafted tools nestled in the soft leather on the ground, not daring to touch. She had never seen such beautifully made points. They were of variable sizes and types. Besides the leaf-shaped ones, there were asymmetrical shouldered points that tapered sharply back on one side to a projecting shank, which would be inserted in a handle so it could be used as a knife, and more symmetrical stemmed points with a centered tang that might be spear points or knives of another kind.

“Would you like to examine them closer?” Wymez asked.

Her eyes gleaming with wonder, she picked each one up, handling them as though they were precious jewels. They very nearly were.

“Flint is … smooth … alive,” Ayla said. “Not see flint like this before.”

Wymez smiled. “You have discovered the secret, Ayla,” he said. “That is what makes these points possible.”

“Do you have flint like this nearby?” Jondalar asked, incredulous. “I’ve never seen any quite like it, either.”

“No, I’m afraid not. Oh, we can get good-quality flint. A large Camp to the north lives near a good flint mine. That’s where Danug has been. But this stone has been specially treated … by fire.”

“By fire!?” Jondalar exclaimed.

“Yes. By fire. Heating changes the stone. Heating is what makes it feel so smooth”—Wymez looked at Ayla—“so alive. And heating is what gives the stone its special qualities.” While he was talking, he picked up a nodule of flint that
showed definite signs of having been in a fire. It was sooty and charred, and the chalky outer cortex was a much deeper color when he cracked it open with a blow from a hammerstone. “It was an accident the first time. A piece of flint fell in a fireplace. It was a big, hot fire—you know how hot a fire it takes to burn bone?”

Ayla nodded her head knowingly. Jondalar shrugged, he hadn’t paid much attention, but since Ayla seemed to know, he was willing to accept it.

“I was going to roll the flint out, but Nezzie decided, since it was there, it would make a good support for a dish to catch drippings from a roast she was cooking. It turned out that the drippings caught fire, and ruined a good ivory platter. I replaced it for her, since it turned out to be such a stroke of good fortune. But I almost discarded the stone at first. It was all burnt like this, and I avoided using it until I was low on material. The first time I cracked it open, I thought it was ruined. Look at it, you can see why,” Wymez said, giving them each a piece.

“The flint is darker, and it does have that slick feel,” Jondalar said.

“It happened that I was experimenting with Aterian spear points trying to improve on their technique. Since I was just trying out new ideas, I thought it didn’t matter if the stone was less than perfect. But as soon as I started working with it, I noticed the difference. It happened shortly after I returned, Ranec was still a boy. I’ve been perfecting it ever since.”

“What kind of difference do you mean?” Jondalar asked.

“You try it, Jondalar, you’ll see.”

Jondalar picked up his hammerstone, an oval stone, dented and chipped from use, that fit comfortably in his hand, and began knocking off the balance of the chalky cortex in preparation for working it.

“When flint is heated very hot before it is worked,” Wymez continued while Jondalar worked, “control over the material is much greater. Very small chips, much finer, thinner, and longer, can be removed by applying pressure. You can make the stone take almost any shape you want.”

Wymez wrapped his left hand with, a small rag of leather to protect it from the sharp edges, then positioned another piece of flint, recently flaked from one of the burned hunks, in his left hand, to demonstrate. With his right hand, he picked up a short, tapered bone retoucher. He placed the
pointed end of the bone against the edge of the flint and pushed with a strong forward and downward motion, and detached a small, long, flat sliver of stone. He held it up. Jondalar took it from him, then experimented on his own, quite obviously surprised and pleased with the results.

“I’ve got to show this to Dalanar! This is unbelievable! He’s improved on some of the processes—he has a natural feel for working with the stone, like you, Wymez. But you can almost shave this stone. This is caused by heating?”

Wymez nodded. “I wouldn’t say you can shave it. It’s still stone, not quite as easy to shape as bone, but if you know how to work stone, heating makes it easier.”

“I wonder what would happen with indirect percussion … have you tried using a piece of bone or antler with a point to direct the force of a blow from a hammerstone? You can get blades that are much longer and thinner that way.”

Ayla thought that Jondalar had a natural feel for working with the stone, too. But more than that, she sensed in his enthusiasm and spontaneous desire to share this marvelous discovery with Dalanar, an aching desire to go home.