The Valley of Horses (29 page)

I need to hunt a reindeer. And I’d better work it out in a hurry; the bucks will be along soon. That means they should
be crossing here. Whinney smelled the presence of a four-legged predator, snorted, and moved closer to the fire and the woman.

“Is there something out there, Whinney?” Ayla asked, using sounds and signals, words not quite like any the Clan had ever used. She could make a soft nicker that was indistinguishable from the sound Whinney made. She could yip like a fox, howl like a wolf, and was quickly learning to whistle like almost any bird. Many of the sounds had become incorporated in her private language. She hardly thought about the Clan stricture against unnecessary sounds anymore. The normal facile ability of her kind to vocalize was asserting itself.

The horse moved in between the fire and Ayla, drawing security from both.

“Move over, Whinney. You’re blocking the heat.”

Ayla got up and added another stick of wood to the fire. She put an arm around the animal’s neck, sensing Whinney’s nervousness. I think I’ll stay up and keep the fire going, she thought. Whatever is over there is going to be a lot more interested in those reindeer than you, my friend, as long as you stay near the fire. But it might be a good idea to have a nice big fire for a while.

She hunkered down, stared at the flames, and watched sparks fly up to melt into the dark whenever she added another log. Sounds from across the river told her when a deer, or two, had fallen prey to something, probably something feline. Her thoughts turned to hunting a deer for herself. At one point, she pushed the horse aside to get more wood, and she suddenly got an idea. Later, after Whinney was more relaxed, Ayla returned to her sleeping fur, her thoughts whirling as the idea grew and expanded to other exciting possibilities. By the time she fell asleep, the major outlines of a plan had formed, using a concept so incredible that she smiled to herself at the audacity of it.

When she crossed the river in the morning, the herd of reindeer, smaller by one or two, had departed, but she was through following them. She urged Whinney to a gallop back to the valley. There was much to prepare if she was going to be ready in time.

“That’s it, Whinney. See, it’s not so heavy,” Ayla encouraged. The horse she was patiently guiding had an arrangement
of leather straps and cords around her chest and back attached to a heavy log she was dragging. Originally, Ayla had put the weight-bearing thong across Whinney’s forehead, in a manner similar to the tumpline she sometimes used when she had a heavy load to carry. She quickly realized the horse needed to move her head freely and pulled better with her chest and shoulders. Still, the young steppe horse wasn’t accustomed to pulling a weight, and the harness inhibited her movements. But Ayla was determined. It was the only way her plan would work.

The idea had come to her when she was feeding the fire to fend off predators. She had shoved Whinney aside to get at the wood, thinking, with affection, of the full-grown horse who, with all her strength, had come to her for protection. A fleeting thought of wishing she were as strong had burst the next instant into a possible solution to the problem she had been turning over in her mind. Maybe the horse could haul a deer out of a pit trap.

Then she thought about processing the meat, and the novel concept grew. If she butchered the animal on the steppes, the smell of blood would draw the inevitable, and unknown, carnivores. Maybe it wasn’t a cave lion she had heard attacking the reindeer, but it was some cat. Tigers, panthers, and leopards might be only half the size of cave lions, but her sling was still no defense. She could kill a lynx, but the big cats were another matter, especially out in the open. But near her cave, with a wall at her back, she might be able to drive them away. A hard-flung stone might not be fatal, but they would feel it. If Whinney could drag a deer out of the trap, why not all the way back to the valley?

But first, she had to turn Whinney into a draft horse. Ayla thought she would only have to devise a way to attach ropes or thongs from the dead reindeer to the horse. It didn’t occur to her that the young mare might balk. Learning to ride had been such an unconscious process that she didn’t know she would have to train Whinney to haul a load. But in fitting out the harness, she found out. After a few more tries, that included a complete revision in concept and several adjustments, the horse began to accept the idea, and Ayla decided it just might work.

As the young woman watched the filly pulling the log, she thought of the Clan and shook her head. They would have thought I was strange just for living with a horse; I wonder
what the men would think now? But there were many of them, and women to dry the meat and carry it back. None of them ever had to try it alone.

Spontaneously, she hugged the horse, pressing her forehead into Whinney’s neck. “You’re such a help. I never knew you’d turn out to be such a help. I don’t know what I’d do without you, Whinney. What if the Others are like Broud? I can’t let anyone hurt you. I wish I knew what to do.”

Tears filled her eyes as she held the horse; then she wiped them away and unfastened the harness. “Right now I know what to do. I have to keep an eye out for that herd of young bucks.”

The reindeer bucks were not many days behind the does. They migrated at a leisurely pace. Once she spotted them, it wasn’t difficult for Ayla to observe their movements and confirm that they were following the same trail, nor to gather her equipment and gallop ahead of them. She set up camp beside the river downstream of the reindeer crossing. Then, with her digging stick to loosen the ground, the sharpened hipbone to shovel and lift the dirt, and the tent hide to carry it away, she went to the crossing place of the female herd.

Two main trails and two ancillary paths cut through the brush. She chose one of the main trails for her trap, close enough to the river so that the reindeer would be using it in single file, but far enough back so she could dig a deep hole before water seeped in. By the time it was dug, the late afternoon sun was closing with the end of the earth. She whistled for the horse and rode back to see how far the herd had moved, and estimated they would reach the river sometime the next day.

When she returned to the river, light was fading, but the large gaping hole was conspicuously evident. None of those reindeer are going to fall into that hole. They’ll see it and run around it, she thought, feeling discouraged. Well, it’s too late to do anything tonight. Maybe I’ll think of something in the morning.

But morning brought no lightening of spirit or brilliant ideas. It had clouded up overnight. She was awakened by a huge splat of water on her face to a dreary dawn of diffused light. She hadn’t set up the old hide as a tent the
night before, since the sky had been clear when she went to bed and the hide wet and muddy. She had spread it out to dry nearby, but it was now getting wetter. The drop in her face was only the first of many. She wrapped the sleeping fur around her and, after a search of the carrying baskets revealed she had forgotten to bring her wolverine hood, pulled an end over her head and huddled over the black wet remains of a fire.

A bright flash crackled across the eastern plains—sheet lightning that illuminated the land to the horizon. After a moment, a distant rumble growled a warning. As though it were a signal, the clouds above dumped a new deluge. Ayla picked up the wet tent hide and wrapped it around her.

Gradually daylight brought the landscape into sharper focus, driving shadows out of crevices. A gray pallor dulled the burgeoning steppes, as though the dripping nimbus cover had washed out the color. Even the sky was a nondescript shade of nothing, neither blue nor gray nor white.

Water began to pool as the thin layer of permeable soil above the level of the subterranean permafrost became saturated. Still rather near the surface, the frozen earth beneath the topsoil was as solid as the frozen wall to the north. When warming weather melted the soil deeper down, the frozen level was lowered, but the permafrost was impenetrable. There was no drainage. Under certain conditions the saturated soil could turn into treacherous quicksand bogs that had been known to swallow a full-grown mammoth. And if it happened close to the leading edge of a glacier, which shifted unpredictably, a sudden freeze could preserve the mammoth for millennia.

The leaden sky dropped large liquid blobs into the black puddle that had once been a fireplace. Ayla watched them erupt into craters, then spread out in rings, and wished she were in her dry snug cave in the valley. A bone-chilling cold was seeping up through her heavy leather foot coverings in spite of the grease she had smeared on them and the sedge grass stuffed inside. The sodden quagmire dampened her enthusiasm for hunting.

She moved up on a hummock of higher ground when the overflowing puddles cut channels of muddy water to the river, carrying twigs, sticks, grass, and last season’s old leaves along. Why don’t I just go back, she thought, hauling the carrying baskets with her up the rise. She peeked under the
lids; the rain was running off the woven cattail leaves and the contents were dry. It’s useless. I ought to load these on Whinney and go. I’ll never get a reindeer. One of them isn’t going to jump into that big hole because I want it to. Maybe I can get one of the old stragglers later. But their meat is tough and their hides are all scarred up.

Ayla heaved a sigh, then pulled the fur wrap and the old tent hide up around her. I’ve been planning and working so long, I can’t let a little rain stop me. Maybe I won’t get a deer; it wouldn’t be the first time a hunter returned empty-handed. Only one thing is sure—I’ll never get one if I don’t try.

She climbed up on a rock formation when the runoff threatened to undercut the hummock, and she squinted her eyes trying to peer through the rain to see if it was slackening. There was no shelter on the flat open prairie, no large trees or overhanging cliffs. Like the shaggy dripping horse beside her, Ayla stood in the middle of the downpour patiently waiting out the rain. She hoped the reindeer were waiting, too. She wasn’t ready for them. Her resolve faltered again around midmorning, but by then she just didn’t feel like moving.

With the usual erratic disposition of spring, the cloud cover broke about noon, and a brisk wind sent it streaming off. By afternoon, no trace of clouds could be seen, and the bright young colors of the seasons sparkled with fresh-washed brilliance in the full glory of the sun. The ground steamed in its enthusiasm to give back the moisture to the atmosphere. The dry wind that had driven off the clouds sucked it up greedily, as though it knew it would forfeit a share to the glacier.

Ayla’s determination returned, if not her confidence. She shook off the heavy, waterlogged aurochs hide and draped it over high brush, hoping this time it would dry a little. Her feet were damp, but not cold, so she ignored them—everything was damp—and went to the deer crossing. She couldn’t see her hole, and her heart sank. With a closer look, she saw an overflowing muddy pool clogged with leaves, sticks, and debris where her pit had been.

Setting her jaw, she returned for a water basket to bail out the hole. On her way back, she had to look carefully to see the hole from a distance. Then suddenly, she smiled. If I have to look for it, all covered up with leaves and sticks like
that, maybe a reindeer running fast won’t see it either. But I can’t leave the water in it—I wonder if there’s some other way …

Willow switches would be long enough to go across. Why couldn’t I make a cover for the pit out of willow switches, and put leaves on it. It wouldn’t be strong enough to hold up a deer, but fine for leaves and twigs. Suddenly she laughed out loud. The horse neighed in response and went to her.

“Oh, Whinney! Maybe that rain wasn’t so bad after all.”

Ayla bailed out the pit trap, not even minding that it was a messy, dirty job. It was not as deep, but when she tried to dig it out, she found the water table was higher. It just filled up with more water. She noticed that the river was fuller when she looked at the muddy, churning stream. And, though she didn’t know it, the warm rain had softened some of the subterranean frozen earth which formed the rock-hard base underlying the land.

Camouflaging the hole was not as easy as she had thought. She had to range downstream for quite a distance to collect an armload of long switches from the stunted willow brush, supplementing them with reeds. The wide mesh mat sagged in the middle when she laid it over the pit, and she had to stake the edges. When she had strewn it with leaves and sticks, it still seemed obvious to her. She was not entirely satisfied, but she hoped it would work.

Covered with mud, she plodded back downstream, glanced longingly at the river, then whistled for Whinney. The deer were not as close as she thought they would be. Had the plains been dry, they would have hurried to reach the river, but with so much water in puddles and temporary creeks, they had slowed. Ayla felt sure the herd of young bucks would not reach their accustomed crossing place before morning.

She returned to her camp and, with great relief, took off her wraps and foot coverings and waded into the river. It was cold, but she was used to cold water. She washed off the mud, then spread her wraps and footwear on the rock outcropping. Her feet were white and wrinkled from being encased in the damp leather—even her hard calloused soles had softened—and she was glad for the sun-warmed rock. It gave her a dry base for a fire, too.

Dead lower branches of pine usually stayed dry in the
hardest rain, and though dwarfed to the size of brush, the pine near the river was no exception. She carried dry tinder with her, and, using a firestone and flint, she soon had a small starter fire burning. She kept it fed with twigs and small wood until the larger, slower-burning wood, leaned together in a tepee shape over the fire, dried out. She could start and keep a fire going even in rain—so long as it wasn’t a downpour. It was a matter of starting small and keeping at it until the fire was established in wood large enough to dry out as it burned.

She sighed with satisfaction at her first sip of hot tea, after a meal of traveling cakes. The cakes were nourishing and filling, and they could be eaten on the move—but the hot liquid was more satisfying. Though it was still damp, she had set up the hide tent near the fire where it could dry out more while she slept. She glanced at clouds blotting out the stars in the west, and she hoped it would not rain again. Then, giving Whinney an affectionate pat, she crawled into her fur and wrapped it around her.