She joined in the conflict, was quick to defend,
And drove the dark shadow away from Her friend.
But the pale face of night. Let Her son out of sight.
Trapped by the whirlwind, Her bright fiery son,
Gave no warmth to the Earth, cold chaos had won.
The fertile green life was now ice and snow,
And a sharp piercing wind continued to blow.
The Earth was bereft. No green plants were left.
The Mother was weary, grieving and worn,
But She reached out again for the life She had borne.
She couldn’t give up, She needed to strive,
For the glorious light of Her son to survive.
She continued the fight. To bring back the light.
Suddenly something caught Ayla’s eye, something that made her shiver, and gave her a frisson of not exactly fear, but recognition. She saw a cave bear skull, by itself, on top of the horizontal surface of a rock. She wasn’t sure how the rock had found its way to the middle of the floor. There were a few other smaller rocks nearby and she assumed they had fallen from the ceiling, though none of the other rocks had a squared-off flat top surface, but she knew by what means the skull had found its place on the rock. Some human hand had put it there!
As she walked toward the rock, Ayla had sudden memories of the cave bear skull Creb had found with a bone forced through the opening formed by the eye socket and the cheekbone. That skull had great significance to The Mog-ur of the Clan of the Cave Bear, and she wondered if any member of the Clan had ever been in this cave. This cave would certainly have held great meaning for them if they had. The Ancients who made the images in this cave were certainly people like her. The Clan didn’t make images, but they could have moved a skull. And the Clan was here at the same time as the Ancient Painters. Could they have come into this cave?
As she drew closer and looked at the cave bear skull perched on the flat stone, with its two huge canine teeth extended over the edge, in her heart she believed that the Ancient who had put it there belonged to the Clan. Jondalar had seen her shake, and walked toward the center of the space. When he reached the stone, and saw the cave bear skull on the rock, he understood her reaction.
“Are you all right, Ayla?” he asked.
“This cave would have meant so much to the Clan,” she said. “I can’t help but think they knew about it. With their memories, maybe they still do.”
The rest of them were now crowded around the stone with the skull.
“I see you have found the skull. I was going to show it to you,” the Watcher said.
“Do any of the people of the Clan come here?” Ayla asked.
“The people of the Clan?” the Watcher said, shaking her head.
“The ones you call Flatheads. The other people,” Ayla said.
“It’s strange that you should ask,” the Watcher said. “We do see Flatheads around here, but only at certain times of year, usually. They frighten the children, but we have come to a kind of understanding, if you can reach an understanding with animals. They stay away from us, and we don’t bother them if all they want is to go into the cave.”
“First I should tell you, they aren’t animals; they are people. The cave bear is their primary totem—they call themselves the Clan of the Cave Bear,” Ayla said.
“How can they call themselves anything? They don’t talk,” the Watcher said.
“They talk. They just don’t talk the way we do. They use some words, but mostly they talk with their hands,” Ayla said.
“How does one talk with hands?”
“They make gestures, motions with their hands and with their bodies,” Ayla said.