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Iza saw the worried concentration on the girl’s earnest face More than once, especially this past winter, she had been grateful for Ayla’s willing help She wondered if Ayla had been given to her while she was pregnant so she could be a second mother to the baby she had so late in life It was h she brushed off references to her failing health, and never mentioned the pain in her chest or the blood she so spell, she knew Creb are that she was far ht This winter has been hard on him, too He sits too much in that little cave of his with only a torch to keep him warm

The old y mane was shot with silver His arthritis, coupled with his la trial His teeth, worn down fro hand, had begun to ache But Creb had long ago learned to live with suffering and pain His mind was as powerful and perceptive as ever, and he worried about Iza He watched the wo how Iza’s robust body had shrunk Her face was gaunt, and her eyes were sunk into deep hollows that ees Her array, but it was her persistent cough that bothered hiht She needs some warmth and sun

The winter finally released its frozen grip on the land, and the warht torrents of rain Ice floes fro streaone at the elevation of the cave The runoff from the melted accumulation turned the saturated soil that fronted the cave into a soggy, slippery sink of oozing mud Only the stones that paved the entrance kept the cave reasonably dry as the groundwater seeped inside

But the sucking quag winter confinereet the first warm rays of sun and softer sea breezes Before the snoere entirely h the cold ooze or slogging in soaked boots that not even the extra layer of rubbed-in fat could keep dry Iza was busier treating colds in the war winter

As the season waxed and the sun soaked up the moisture, the pace of the clan’s life increased The slow quiet winter spent telling stories, gossiping,implements and weapons, and in other sedentary activities to pass the ti Woreen shoots and buds, and men exercised and practiced to prepare for the first major hunt of the new season

Uba thrived on her new diet, only nursing out of habit or for the warh she eak and had little energy to range too far afield, and Creb began to take his shaain She loved the springtime better than any other season

Since Iza had to stay close to the cavethe hillsides looking for plants to replenish Iza’s phar off alone, but the other wo for food, and row in the same places as food plants Iza ith Ayla occasionally, mostly to show her new plants and to identify fae so she would knohere to look for the for her Reluctantly, she allowed the girl to go alone more and more

Ayla found that she enjoyed the solitude of ranging the area by herself It gave her a sense of freedo with the woathered, too; but whenever she could, she hurried through the tasks that were expected of her so she could have tiht back not only plants she knew, but anything unfamiliar so Iza could tell her about it

Brun made no open objections; he understood the need for soic Iza’s illness had not escaped his notice either But Ayla’s eagerness to go off by herself disturbed hi alone Whenever Iza had gone to look for her special materials, she did it with reservations and a little fear, always returning as quickly as possible if she went alone Ayla never shirked her duties, always behaved properly, there was nothing she did that Brun could identify as wrong It was , a sense that her attitude, her approach, her thoughts were, not wrong, but different, that kept Brun on edge about her Whenever the girl went out, she always returned with the folds of her wrap and her collecting basket full, and as long as her forays were so necessary, Brun could not object

Occasionally, Ayla brought back more than plants Her idiosyncrasy, that had so ah they had become accustomed to it, the clan was still a little surprised when she returned with a wounded or ailing animal to nurse back to health The rabbit she had found shortly after Uba’s birth was only the first of many to come She had a ith animals; they seemed to sense she wanted to help them And once the precedent had been set, Brun felt disinclined to change it The only tiht in a wolf cub The line was drawn at carnivorous animals that were competition for the hunters More than once an animal that had been tracked, perhaps wounded, and finally within reach, was snatched at the last irl to help an aniht someday steal a kill from his clan

Once, when Ayla was down on her knees digging up a root, a rabbit with a slightly crooked hind leg bounded out of the brush and sniffed at her feet She re no sudden moves, she slowly extended her hand to pet the anirown into a big, healthy man-rabbit Did that close call teach you to be more wary? You should be wary of people, too, you know You ht end up over a fire, she continued to herself as she stroked the rabbit’s soft fur So headlong in one direction, then e back the way he had come

“You move so fast, I don’t understand how anyone can catch you How do you turn around like that?” she hed Suddenly, she realized it was the first tihed when she was around the clan anys humorous that day

“Ayla, this wild cherry bark is old It’s just not any good anyo out today, why don’t you get so to the west, across the stream Do you knohere I mean? Get the inner bark, it’s best this time of year”

“Yes, mother, I knohere they are,” she replied

It was a beautiful springThe last of the crocus nestled white and purple beside the tall graceful steht yellow jonquils A sparse carpet of new green grass, just beginning to shoot its tiny leaves through the moist soil, painted a thin watercolor wash of verdancy on the rich brown earth of clearings and knolls Flecks of green dotted the bare branches of bushes and trees with the first buds straining to begin life anew, and pussy hite-tipped others with their fake fur A benign sun beas

Once she was out of sight of the clan, Ayla’s carefully controlled walk and deait She skipped down a gradual slope and ran up the other side, s unconsciously with her freedoetation she passed with an apparent casualness that belied her actively working orized and filed away for future references the growing plants

There’s the new pokeweed coht as she passed the athered its purple berries the previous autu some roots on the way back Iza s

ays the roots are good for Creb’s rheuh She’s getting better, I think, but she’s so skinny Uba’s getting so big and heavy, Iza shouldn’t lift her at all Maybe I’ll bring Uba with ive her to Oga She’s really starting to talk now It’ll be fun when she gets a little bigger and we can go out together Look at those pussy s Funny how they feel like real fur when they’re sreen The sky is so blue today I can s The water should be warh to swim in soon I wonder why no one else likes to swim? The sea tastes salty, not like the streao fishing I think I love sea fish best of all, but I like eggs, too And I like cliood way up high on the cliff There’s a squirrel! Look at him run up that tree! I wish I could run up a tree

Ayla wandered over the wooded slopes until , she headed purposefully toward the clearing to get the cherry bark Iza wanted As she neared, she heard activity and an occasional voice, and caught a gli She started to leave, but remembered the cherry bark and stood undecided for a moment The ht Brun o out alone anymore, but Iza needs the cherry bark Maybe they won’t stay long I wonder what they’re doing, anyway? Quietly, she crept in closer and hid behind a large tree, peeking out through the tangled bare brush

Thewith their weapons in preparation for a hunt She re theht young trees, stripped the it in a fire, and scraping the burnt end to a point with a sturdy flint scraper The heat also hardened the point so it would resist splintering and fraying She still cringed when she re one of the wooden shafts

Females did not touch weapons, she was told, or even any tools that were used to h Ayla could see no difference between a knife used to cut the leather toand a knife used to cut the leather to make a cloak The newly made spear, offended by her touch, had been burned, much to the irritation of the hunter who estured lectures in an effort to instill in her a sense of the abohast that she would consider such a thing, and Brun’s glower left no doubt of his opinion But, most of all, she hated the look of malicious pleasure on Broud’s face as the recri