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“One last push, Ayla, to get out the afterbirth,” Zelandoni said, helping her again She pushed and watched ablanket

Zelandoni let go of her and moved around to the front of the new mother Proleva and Folara supported Ayla while Zelandoni took the baby, turned it over, and patted the tiny back There were little hiccuping sounds Zelandoni thumped the baby’s feet and watched the infant expel breath in a startle response, then breathe in the first gulp of life-giving air There was a s at first, but it grew as the lungs beca life

Marthona held the infant while the donier cleaned Ayla up a little, wiping away blood and fluid, then Proleva and Folara helped her back to the bed Zelandoni tied a piece of sinew around the baby’s navel cord—at Ayla’s request it had been dyed red with ochre—to pinch it off and prevent bleeding froed tube With a sharp flint blade she cut the cord between the tie and the afterbirth, separating the infant frorow until birth Ayla’s infant was a separate entity, a unique and individual hu

Marthona and Zelandoni cleaned the baby with a velvety soft rabbitskin that Ayla had ain velvety soft, and so smooth, it felt like the baby’s skin It was made from the hide of a nearly full-term deer foetus Zelandoni had told Jondalar that it would be especially lucky for the child born to his hearth if he could secure such a hide for the birth, and he and his brother had gone out near the end of winter looking for a pregnant deer

Ayla had helped him make the foetal deerskin into the supple leather blanket He had always been amazed at the softness of her leathers, a skill he knew she had learned fro with her on one, he understood howwith a tender foetal skin Zelandoni laid the baby on the blanket, then Marthona wrapped the newborn in it and brought the child to Ayla

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You should be pleased She’s a perfect little girl,” Marthona said, giving the tiny bundle to her mother

Ayla looked at the tiny likeness of herself “She’s so beautiful!” She unwrapped the swaddling of soft skins and carefully exahter, half-fearful in spite of the reassuring words that she would find some deformity “She is perfect Did you ever see such a beautiful baby, Marthona?”

The woman just smiled Of course she had Her own babies, but this one, the daughter of her son’s hearth, was no less beautiful than her own had been

“The delivery wasn’t very hard at all, Zelandoni,” Ayla said when the donier came and looked at them both “You helped a lot, but it wasn’t really so hard I’ to find my breast” Ayla helped her, with the ease of experience, Zelandoni thought “Can Jondalar come and see her? I think she looks a lot like him, don’t you, Marthona?”

“He can come soon,” Zelandoni said as she examined Ayla and wrapped some fresh abs

orbent leather between her legs “There was no tearing, Ayla, no daood delivery Do you have a name for her?”

“Yes, I’ve been thinking about it ever since you told me I would have to choose the name for my baby,” Ayla said

“Good Tell me the nae it for this,” she said, picking up the birthing blanket wrapped into a bundle around the afterbirth “Then I will take this out and bury it, before the spirit life still re in the afterbirth tries to seek a home close to the life it once held I must do it quickly, then I will tell Jondalar to come in”

“I’ve decided to call her…” Ayla began