The Mammoth Hunters

"Is this what you want, Ayla?" he asked, holding up the piercing tool she had made for the special Spring Festival ceremony.

"That's a Clan tool! Where did you get… that's the one I made!" she said.

"I know. I went back and got it that day. I hope you don't mind."

She was surprised, puzzled, and strangely pleased. "No, I don't mind. I'm glad you did, but why?"

"I wanted… to study it," he replied. He couldn't quite bring himself to say he wanted it to remember her by, to tell her he thought he would be leaving without her. He didn't want to leave without her.

She took her tools back to Cattail Camp and asked Nezzie for a piece of soft leather. After she got it, the woman watched her make the simple, gathered pouch.

"They look a little more crude, but those tools really work very well," Nezzie remarked. "What is the pouch for?"

"It's Rydag's amulet, like the one I made for the Spring Festival. I have to put a piece of red ochre in it, and name him the way the Clan does. He should have a totem, too, to protect him on his way to the world of the spirits." She paused, and wrinkled her brow. "I don't know what Creb did to discover a person's totem, but it was always right… maybe I can share my totem with Rydag. The Cave Lion is a powerful totem, difficult to live with sometimes, but he was tested many times. Rydag deserves a strong, protective totem."

"Is there anything I can do? Does he need to be prepared? Dressed?" Nezzie asked.

"Yes, I'd like to help, too," Latie said. She was standing at the entrance with Tulie.

"And so would I," Mamut added.

Ayla looked up and saw almost the entire Lion Camp wanting to help and looking to her for direction. Only the hunters were missing. She was filled with a great warmth for these people who had taken in a strange orphaned child and accepted him as their own, and a righteous anger at the members of the Mammoth Hearth who would not even give him a burial.

"Well, first, someone can get some red ochre, crush it up, like Deegie does to color leather, and mix it in some rendered fat to make a salve. That has to be rubbed all over him. It should be Cave Bear fat, for a proper Clan burial. The Cave Bear is sacred to the Clan."

"We don't have Cave Bear fat," Tornec said.

"There are not many Cave Bears around here," Manuv added.

"Why not mammoth fat, Ayla?" Mamut suggested. "Rydag wasn't just Clan. He was mixed. He was part Mamutoi, too, and the mammoth is sacred to us."

"Yes, I think we could use that. He was Mamutoi, too. We shouldn't forget that."

"How about dressing him, Ayla?" Nezzie asked. "He's never even worn the new clothes I made for him this year."

Ayla frowned, then nodded agreement. "Why not? After he's colored with red ochre, the way the Clan does, he could be dressed in his best clothes, like the Mamutoi do for burials. Yes, I think that's a good idea, Nezzie."

"I never would have guessed red ochre was a sacred color at their burials, too," Frebec commented.

"I didn't even think they buried their dead," Crozie said.

"Obviously, the Mammoth Hearth didn't either," Tulie said. "They are going to be in for a surprise."

Ayla asked Deegie for one of the wooden bowls she had given her as an adoption gift, made in the Clan style, and used it to mix the red ochre and mammoth fat into a colored salve. But it was Nezzie, Crozie, and Tulie, the three oldest women of Lion Camp, who rubbed it on him, and then dressed him. Ayla put aside a small dab of the oily red paste for later, and put a lump of the red iron ore into the pouch she had made.

"What about wrapping him?" Nezzie asked. "Shouldn't he be wrapped, Ayla?"

"I don't know what that means," Ayla said.

"We use a hide or a fur, or something, to carry him out, and then it's wrapped around him before he is laid in the grave," Nezzie explained.

It was another Mamutoi custom, Ayla realized, but it seemed that with dressing him so richly and putting all his jewelry on him, there was already more Mamutoi than Clan to this burial. The three women were watching her expectantly. She looked back at Tulie, then Nezzie. Yes, maybe Nezzie was right. Something should be used to carry him, some kind of bedding or cover. Then she looked at Crozie.

Suddenly, though she hadn't thought of it for some time, she remembered something: Durc's cloak. The cloak she had used to carry her son close to her breast when he was an infant, and to support him on her hip when he was a toddler. It was the one thing she had taken with her from the Clan that had no necessary purpose. Yet, how many nights when she was alone had Durc's carrying cloak given her a sense of co

Ayla noticed Crozie looking at her again, and remembered the white cape, the one that Crozie had made for her son. She had carried it around with her for many years, because it meant so much to her. But she had given it up for a good purpose, to Racer, to protect him. Wasn't it more important for Rydag to be wrapped in something that had come from the Clan, when he was sent on his way to walk in the spirit world, than for her to carry Durc's cloak around? Crozie had finally let the memory of her son go. Maybe it was time for her to let Durc go, too, and just be grateful that he was more than a memory.

"I have something to wrap him in," Ayla said. She rushed to her sleeping place and from the bottom of a pile, she pulled out a folded hide and shook it out. She held the soft, supple, old leather of her son's cloak to her cheek once more, and closed her eyes, remembering. Then she walked back and gave it to Rydag's mother.

"Here's a wrapping," she told Nezzie, "a Clan wrapping. It once belonged to my son. Now it will help Rydag in the spirit world. And thank you, Crozie," she added.

"Why are you thanking me?"

"For everything you've done for me, and for showing me that all mothers must let go sometime."

"Hmmmf!" the old woman said, trying to look stern, but her eyes glistened with feeling. Nezzie took the cloak from Ayla and covered Rydag.

By then it was dark. Ayla had pla

Late the next morning they carried the body outside and laid it out on the cloak. Many people from the Meeting had gathered around, and more were coming. Word had spread that Ayla was going to give Rydag a flathead burial, and everyone was curious. She had the small bowl of red ochre paste and the amulet, and had begun calling the Spirits to attend, as Creb had always done, when another commotion arose. Much to Nezzie's relief, the hunters returned, and with all of the mammoth meat. They had taken turns dragging back the two travois, and were already pla

The ceremony was postponed until the mammoth meat was stored, and Talut and Ranec were told what had happened, but no one objected when it was resumed quickly. The death of the mixed Clan child at the Summer Meeting of the Mamutoi had created a real dilemma. He had been called an abomination an animal, but animals were not buried; their meat was stored. Only people were buried, and they did not like to leave the dead unburied for long. Though the Mamutoi weren't quite willing to grant Rydag human status, they knew he wasn't really an animal, either. No one revered the spirit of flatheads as they did deer, or bison, or mammoths, and no one was ready to store Rydag's body beside the mammoth carcasses. He was an abomination precisely because they saw his humanity, but degraded it and would not recognize it. They were glad to let Ayla and the Lion Camp dispose of Rydag's body in a way that seemed to resolve the problem.