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The tomen walked toward the horse shelter Ayla didn’t expect to find the horses there in the middle of the day, but she checked the container that held their water In winter, when it was below freezing for long periods of tih horses in the wild fended for themselves just fine She put several apples in the kerfed feeding trough

Then she walked to the edge of the stone ledge and looked down at The River, bordered by trees and brush She didn’t see the horses, but she whistled the distinctive signal that the horses had been trained to answer, hoping they were close enough to hear Before long she saw Whinney cli the steep path, followed by Racer Wolf rubbed noses with Whinney when she reached the ledge in a greeting that seemed almost formal Racer nickered at him and received a playful yip and a nose rub in return

When she was confronted with such direct evidence of Ayla’s control over the aniotten used to Wolf, as always around people, and who responded to her But the horses were more skittish, not as friendly, and seemed less tame, except around Ayla and Jondalar, more like the native wild animals she had once hunted

The young wo the sounds that Marthona had heard her use before around the horses as she stroked and scratched the aniht of it as Ayla’s horse language Ayla picked out an apple for each one, and they ate froe way Marthona tried to discern the sounds Ayla h there was a similar feel to soe of the flatheads

“You’re getting a big belly, Whinney,” Ayla was saying, patting her round sto, , after it warms up a bit By then, I should already have uess I’ood for the baby I feel fine, but I don’t want to take chances Jondalar will ride you, Racer, when he gets back”

That hat she meant to say to the horses, and what she did say in her nals and words and the other sounds of her private language would not have translated quite the same—if someone could have translated it It didn’tvoice, the warnals

Winter came unexpectedly Small white flakes started to fall late in the afternoon They turned big and fat, and by evening it was a swirling blizzard The whole Cave breathed a sigh of relief when the hunters who had gone out in the e before dark, empty-handed but safe

“Joharran decided to turn backthenorth as fast as they could,” Jondalar said after greeting Ayla “You’ve heard the saying ‘Never go forth when o north’ It usually means snow is on the way, and they head north, where it’s colder but drier and the snow doesn’t pile up as deep They get mired in deep, wet snow He didn’t want to take chances, but those storht in it The wind shifted north, and before we knew it, the snoas blowing so hard that we could hardly see It’s halfway up to the knees out there already We had to use snowshoes before we got back”

The blizzard lasted through the night, the following day, and the next night Nothing could be seen except thecurtain of white, not even just across The Ri

ven At ti the high cliff and finding no outlet, rebounded against the pri flakes At other ti winds died down, snow fell heavily straight down in a constant hypnotic motion

Ayla was glad for the protective overhang of the abri that extended all the way to the horses’ area, though during the first night she was concerned, not knohether they had found their way to the shelter before the snows became too deep If her horses had found some other shelter, she was afraid she would have been cut off from contact with them and they would be isolated, imprisoned, by the thick white mantle of snow

She was relieved to hear a nicker when she approached their shelter early the next h when she saw both horses, but as she greeted them, she could tell they were nervous They were not familiar with such deep snow, either She decided to spend soroom them with teasel brushes, which usually comforted them and relaxed her

But when she found them safe in their shelter, she wondered where the wild horses were Had they ion to the north and east, where the snoould not be as deep and would not cover the dry, standing hay that was their winter feed?

She was glad now that they had collected piles of grass for the horses, not just grains, to supplee It had been Jondalar’s idea He had kno deep the snow could get, she had not Now she wondered if they had collected enough The horses were adapted to the cold, she wasn’t worried about that Their coats had grown in thick and full, both the downy underlayer and the shaggy outer coat protected their stocky, corass?

Winters in the land where Jondalar’s people lived were cold, but not dry Theirsnow She hadn’t seen so much snow since she lived with the Clan She had become more used to the dry, frozen loess steppes that leached moisture from the atmosphere, farther inland around her valley and the territory of the Mammoth Hunters Here, where the climate was subject to the maritime influences of the Great Waters of the West, the landscape was known as continental steppes Winter etter and snowier, reserew up, theinto an inland sea far to the east