"Marthona, do you know where her birthing blanket is? I think she's getting close," Zelandoni said.

"So soon? I didn't think it would go so quickly, especially since she seemed to be having so much trouble in the beginning," Proleva said, putting her infant down to sleep on her blanket.

"But she does seem to have it under control now," Marthona said. "I'll get the birthing blanket. Is it where you showed me before, Ayla?"

"Yes," she answered quickly, feeling another muscle-clenching, all-encompa.s.sing convulsion coming on. When it was over, Zelandoni directed Proleva and Folara to spread the leather birthing blanket, marked with drawings and symbols, on the floor, then beckoned to Marthona.

"It's time to help her up," she said. Then to Ayla, "You need to get up and let the pull of the Great Earth Mother help the baby out. Can you get up?"

"Yes," she said between panting breaths. She had been bearing down hard with each pain, and felt an urge to push again, but was trying to hold back for a moment. "I think so."

They all helped Ayla to her feet and led her to the birthing blanket. Proleva showed her the squatting position to take, then she got on one side of her while Folara supported her other side. Marthona was in front, smiling and offering moral support. Zelandoni got behind her and clasped the young woman to her ma.s.sive breast, wrapping her arms around her, above the bulge of her stomach.

Ayla felt enveloped by the softness and warmth of the huge woman; it was comforting to lean back on her. She felt like Mother, like all mothers combined in one, like the soft bosom of the Earth itself. But there was something else, too. Enormous strength lay hidden underneath the mounds of flesh. Ayla felt sure this woman could display every mood of Mother Earth Herself, from the gentleness of a warm summer day to the fury of a driving blizzard. If she felt so moved, she could lash out with the devastating power of a raging storm, or comfort and nourish like a soft mist.

"Now, at the next pain, I want you to push," Zelandoni said. The two women on either side of her were each holding a hand, giving her something to grip.

"I feel it coming," Ayla said.

"Then push!" Zelandoni said.

Ayla took a deep breath and bore down as hard as she could. She felt the donier helping her, pushing down on the baby with her. A gush of warm water spilled on the blanket.

"Good. I was waiting for that," Zelandoni said.

"I wondered when her waters were going to break," Proleva said. "Mine seem to break so early, I'm almost dry by the time the baby comes. This is better. Here she goes again."

"Now, again, push, Ayla," Zelandoni said.

Ayla bore down again and felt movement.

"I can see the head," Marthona said. "I'm ready to catch the baby." She knelt down closer to Ayla, just as another strong contraction started. As Ayla took a deep breath and pushed.

"Here it comes!" Marthona said.

Ayla felt the pa.s.sage of the head. The rest was easy. As the baby slid out, Marthona reached out and caught it.

Ayla looked down and saw the wet infant in Marthona's arms, and smiled. Zelandoni smiled, too.

"One last push, Ayla, to get out the afterbirth," Zelandoni said, helping her again. She pushed and watched a ma.s.s of b.l.o.o.d.y tissue fall on the birthing blanket.

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 small crying sound, hardly more than a mewling at first, but it grew as the lungs became accustomed to sustaining 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 from the still engorged tube. With a sharp flint blade she cut the cord between the tie and the afterbirth, separating the infant from the placenta that had provided nourishment and a place to grow until birth. Ayla's infant was a separate ent.i.ty, a unique and individual human being.

Marthona and Zelandoni cleaned the baby with a velvety soft rabbitskin that Ayla had made for the purpose. Marthona had a small blanket ready, again 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 from the Clan. After working with her on one, he understood how much effort it took, even starting with a tender foetal skin. Zelandoni laid the baby on the blanket, then Marthona wrapped the newborn in it and brought the child to Ayla.

38.

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 examined her new daughter, half-fearful in spite of the rea.s.suring 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'm so glad she's a girl. Look, she's trying 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 absorbent leather between her legs. "There was no tearing, Ayla, no damage. Only the bleeding to cleanse. It was a good 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 name. I will make a symbol for it on this stone, and exchange 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 remaining 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.

"No! Don't say it out loud, just whisper it to me," Zelandoni said.

As the donier bent close, Ayla whispered in her ear. Then she left quickly. Marthona, Folara, and Proleva sat beside the new mother, admiring the baby and talking quietly. Ayla was feeling tired, but happy and relaxed, not at all as she had after Durc was born. Then she had been exhausted and in pain. She dozed off a little and was awakened when Zelandoni returned and gave her the small stone that now held enigmatic marks in red and black paint.

"Put this in a safe place, perhaps in the niche behind your donii," Zelandoni said.

Ayla nodded, then saw another head appear. "Jondalar!" she said. He knelt down beside the sleeping platform to get closer.

"How are you, Ayla?"

"I'm fine. It was not a bad delivery, Jondalar. Much easier than I thought it would be. And see the baby?" she said as she unwrapped the blanket so he could see. "She's perfect!"

"You got the girl you wanted," he said, looking at the tiny newborn and feeling a little awed. "She's so little. And look, she even has tiny fingernails." The thought of a woman giving birth to a complete new human being suddenly overwhelmed him. "What have you named your daughter, Ayla?"

She looked at Zelandoni. "Can I tell him?"

"Yes, it's safe now," she said.

"I've named our daughter Jonayla, after both you and me, Jondalar, because she came from both of us. She is your daughter, too."

"Jonayla. I like that name. Jonayla," he said.

Marthona liked the name, too. She and Proleva smiled indulgently at Ayla. It was not uncommon for new mothers to try to rea.s.sure their mates that their children came from their spirits. Although Ayla had not said "spirit," they were sure they understood what she meant. Zelandoni wasn't as sure. Ayla tended to say exactly what she meant. Jondalar had no doubt. He knew exactly what she meant.

It would be nice if it was true, he thought as he looked at the tiny little girl. Exposed to the cool air without her covers, she was beginning to wake up.

"She is beautiful. She's going to look just like you, Ayla. I can see it already," he said.

"She looks like you, too, Jondalar. Would you like to hold her?"

"I don't know," he said, backing off a bit. "She's so small."

"Not too small for you to hold, Jondalar," Zelandoni said. "Here, I'll help you. Sit down comfortably." She quickly wrapped the baby back up in her blanket, picked her up, and placed her in Jondalar's arms, showing him how to hold her.

The infant had her eyes open and seemed to be looking at him. Are you my daughter? he wondered. You are so tiny, you will need someone to watch over you, and help take care of you until you grow up. He held her a little closer, feeling protective. Then, to his surprise, he felt a sudden and completely unexpected flush of warmth and a protective love for the infant. Jonayla, he thought. My daughter, Jonayla.

The next day Zelandoni stopped to see Ayla. She had been waiting and watching for a time when she was alone. Ayla was sitting on a cushion on the floor, nursing her baby, and Zelandoni lowered herself to a cushion on the floor beside her.

"Why don't you use the stool, Zelandoni," Ayla said.

"This is fine, Ayla. It isn't that I can't sit on the floor, it's just that there are times when I prefer not to. How is Jonayla?"

"She's fine. She's a good baby. She woke me up last night, but she sleeps most of the rime," Ayla said.

"I wanted to tell you that she will be named as a Zelandonii to Jondalar's hearth on the day after next, and her name given to the Cave," the woman said.

"Good," Ayla said. "I'll be glad when she's Zelandonii, and named to Jondalar's hearth. It will make everything complete."

"Have you heard about Relona? The mate of Shevonar, the man who was trampled on by the bison shortly after you arrived?" Zelandoni asked, sounding as though she were making friendly conversation.

"No, what about her?"

"She and Ranokol, Shevonar's brother, are going to mate next summer. He started out by helping her to compensate for the loss of her mate, and then they grew to care for each other. I think it may be a good pairing," the older woman said.

"I'm glad to hear that. He was so upset when Shevonar died. It was almost as though he blamed himself. I think he thought he should have died instead," Ayla said. There was a silence then, but she felt a sense of expectancy. She wondered if the First had come for a reason that she hadn't yet said.

"There is something else I want to talk to you about," Zelandoni said. "I'd like to know more about your son. I understand why you never mentioned him, especially after all that trouble about Echozar, but if you wouldn't mind talking about him, there are some things I would like to know."

"I don't mind talking about him. Sometimes I ache to talk about him," Ayla said.

She talked at length to the donier about the son she had when she lived with the Clan, the one of mixed spirits, about her morning sickness that lasted all day and almost for her entire pregnancy, and about her bone-wrenching delivery. She had already forgotten whatever discomfort she had felt giving birth to Jonayla, but she still remembered the pain of giving birth to Durc. She told her about his deformity in the eyes of the Clan, her flight to her small cave to save his life, and her return though she thought she would still lose him. She spoke of her joy at his acceptance, and the name Creb picked out for him, Durc, and the legend of Durc, where his name came from. She talked about their life together, his laughter and her delight that he could make sounds the way she could, and the language they started to make up together, and she talked about leaving him behind with the Clan when she was forced to go. Toward the end of her story, she was finding it difficult to talk for the tears.

"Zelandoni," Ayla said, looking at the large, motherly woman, "I had an idea when I was hiding in the small cave with him, and the more I have thought about it since, the more I believe it is true. It's about the way life begins. I don't think it is the blending of spirits that starts new life. I think life begins when a man and a woman couple. I think men start life to grow inside women."

It was a startling idea coming from the young woman, especially since no one had ever said anything like it to Zelandoni before, but it wasn't an entirely unfamiliar idea, though the only person she knew of who had ever thought of such a thing was herself.

"I have thought about it for a long time since then, and I am now even more convinced that life begins when a man puts his member inside a woman, into the place that a baby comes from, and leaves his essence. I think that is what starts a new life, not the mixing of spirits," Ayla said.

"You mean when they share the Gift of Pleasure from the Great Earth Mother," Zelandoni said.

"Yes," Ayla said.

"Let me ask you some questions. A man and a woman share Doni's Gift many times. There are not that many children born. If a life was started every time they shared Pleasures, there would be many, many more children," Zelandoni said.

"I have thought of that. It's clear that a life doesn't start every time they share Pleasures, so there must be something else besides Pleasures. Maybe they must share Pleasures many times, or maybe at special times, or maybe the Great Mother decides when life will start and when it won't. But it isn't their spirits that She blends, it's the man's essence, and maybe a special essence of the woman, too. I'm certain Jonayla was started right after Jondalar and I got down from the glacier, that first morning when we woke up and shared Pleasures."

"You say you thought about it for a long time. What made you think of it in the first place?" Zelandoni asked.

"I first thought about it when I was in my small cave hiding with Durc," Ayla said.

"They told me I had to take him outside and leave him because he was deformed," tears threatened as Ayla said it, "but I looked at him carefully and he wasn't deformed. He didn't look like them and he didn't look like me. He looked like the Clan and like me. His head was long and big in the back, and he had big browridges like theirs, but he had a high forehead like mine in front. He looked something like Echozar, except I think his body will be more like ours when he grows up. He was never as thick or as stocky as Clan boys, and his legs were long and straight, not bowed like Echozar's. He was a mixture, but he was strong and healthy."

"Echozar is mixed, but his mother was Clan. When would she have shared Pleasures with a man like us? Why would a man like us want to share Pleasures with a flathead woman?" Zelandoni asked.

"Echozar told me his mother had been cursed with death because her mate had been killed when he tried to to protect her from a man of the Others. When they found out she was pregnant, they let her stay, until Echozar was born," Ayla said. Jonayla had let go of the nipple and was fussing a bit. Ayla put her over her shoulder and patted her back. protect her from a man of the Others. When they found out she was pregnant, they let her stay, until Echozar was born," Ayla said. Jonayla had let go of the nipple and was fussing a bit. Ayla put her over her shoulder and patted her back.

"You mean a man like us forced his mother? I suppose such things happen, but I can't understand them," Zelandoni said.

"It happened to one of the women I met at the Clan Gathering. She had a daughter who was mixed. She said she was forced by some men of the Others, men who looked like me, she said. Her own daughter was killed when one of the men grabbed her and her daughter fell from her arms. When she found that she was pregnant again, she wished for another girl, which made her mate angry. Clan women are only supposed to wish for boys, but many women secretly wish for girls anyway. When the girl was born deformed, he made her keep the girl to teach her a lesson."

"What a sad story, to be so badly treated by her mate after being attacked and suffering such a loss," the donier said.

"She asked me to talk to Brun, the leader of my clan, to arrange a mating between her daughter, Ura, and my Durc. She was afraid her daughter would never find a mate otherwise. I thought it was a good idea. Durc was deformed in the eyes of the Clan, too, and would have just as much trouble finding a mate. Brun agreed. Now Ura is promised to Durc. After the next Clan Gathering, she is supposed to move to Brun's clan...no, it's Broud's clan now. She must be there by now. I don't think Broud will be very kind to her." Ayla paused, thinking about Ura having to move to a strange clan. "It will be hard for her to leave her clan, and her mother who loves her, and move to a clan where she might not be very welcome. I hope Durc turns out to be the kind of man who will help her." Ayla shook her head, then the baby let out a little burp, and she smiled. She left her propped up on her shoulder for a while longer, still patting her back.

"Jondalar and I heard several other stories on our Journey about young men of the Others forcing women of the Clan. I think it's something they like to dare each other to do, but the people of the Clan don't like it."

"I suspect you're right, Ayla, much as the thought distresses me. Some young men seem to enjoy doing whatever they are not supposed to. But to force a woman, even a Clan woman, that bothers me even more," the One Who Was First said.

"I'm not sure all the mixed children are the result of some man of the Others forcing a woman of the Clan, or the other way around. Rydag was mixed," Ayla said.

"That's the child who was taken in by the mate of the leader of the Mamutoi people you lived with, isn't it?" Zelandoni asked.

"Yes. His mother was Clan, and like them, he couldn't really speak, except for a few sounds that no one could understand very well. He was a weak child. That's why he died. Nezzie said Rydag's mother was alone, and followed them. That's not like women of the Clan. She must have been cursed for some reason, or she would not have been alone, especially not so far along in her pregnancy. And she must have known someone of the Others, someone who treated her kindly, or she would have hid from the Mamutoi, not followed them. Perhaps it was the man who started Rydag."

"Perhaps," was all Zelandoni said. But thinking about those who were mixed, she wondered if Ayla knew any more about Echozar. She was more interested in him, since he had been accepted by Dalanar's people and allowed to mate Jerika's daughter. "What about Echozar's mother? You said she was cursed? I'm not sure what that means."

"She was shunned, ostracized. She was considered a 'bad luck' woman, because her mate was killed when she was attacked, and especially after she gave birth to a 'deformed' child. The Clan doesn't like mixed children, either. A man named Andovan found her alone, ready to the with her baby after she was turned out of her clan. Echozar said he was an older man, living alone for some reason, but he took her and her baby in. I think he was S'Armunai, but he was living on the edge of Zelandonii territory, and he knew how to speak Zelandonii. I think he may have escaped from Attaroa. He raised Echozar, taught him to speak Zelandonii and some S'Armunai. His mother taught him the Clan signs. Andovan had to learn them, too, because she couldn't speak his language. But Echozar could. He was like Durc"

She paused again, her eyes getting misty. "Durc could have learned to talk, if he'd had somebody to teach him. He talked a little before I left, and he could laugh. How could they think Durc would look like the Clan if he was my baby? Born to me? But he didn't look like me, either, not like Jonayla does, and he wouldn't, if it was Broud that started him."

"Who is this Broud?"

"He was Ebra's son, she was Bruns mate. Brun was the leader of the clan. He was a good leader. Broud was the one who made me leave the clan when he became leader. I grew up with him hating me. He always hated me," Ayla said.

"But you say he was the one who started the child you had? And you think that comes from sharing Pleasures. Why did he want to share Pleasures with you if he hated you?" Zelandoni asked.

"There was no sharing of Pleasures with him. No Pleasure in it for me. Broud forced me. I don't know why he did it the first time, but it was horrible. He hurt me. I hated it and I hated him for doing it. He knew I hated it, that's why he did it. Maybe he knew in the beginning that I would hate it, but I know that's why he kept doing it."

"And your clan allowed it!" Zelandoni said.

"Women of the Clan must couple whenever a man wishes, whenever he gives her the signal. That's what they are taught."

"I can't understand that," the donier said. "Why would a man even want a woman if she didn't want him?"

"I don't think Clan women minded too much. They even had little ways to encourage a man to give them the signal. Iza told me about them, but I never wanted to use them. Certainly not with Broud. I hated it so much, I couldn't eat, I didn't want to get up in the morning, I didn't want to leave Creb's hearth. But when I found out I was going to have a baby, I was so happy, I didn't even care about Broud anymore. I just put up with him, and ignored him. He stopped after that. It wasn't fun for him if I didn't resist, if he couldn't force me against my will."