Jondalar had often been told, by Those Who Served the Mother, that he was favored by the Great Earth Mother and all women knew it. No woman could refuse him, not even the Mother Herself. That was his gift. But even Doni would turn her back on him now. He hadn't asked, not Doni, not Ayla, not anyone. He had forced her, taken her against her will.
Among Jondalar's people, any man who committed such a perversion was shunned – or worse. When he was growing up, young boys talked among themselves about being painfully unmanned. Though he never knew anyone who was, he believed it was a fitting punishment. Now, he was the one who should be punished. What could he have been thinking of? How could he have done such a thing?
And you worried about her not being accepted, he said to himself. You were afraid she would be rejected, and you weren't sure if you could live with that. Who would be rejected now? What would they think of you if they knew? Especially after… what happened before. Not even Dalanar would take you in now. He would strike you from his hearth, turn you away, disclaim all ties. Zolena would be appalled. Marthona… he hated to think how his mother would feel.
Ayla had been talking to Mamut. She must have told him, that must have been why she was crying. He leaned his forehead against his knees and covered his head with his arms. Whatever they did to him, he deserved. He sat hunched over for some time, imagining the terrible punishments they would impose on him. He even wished they would do something terrible to him, to relieve the burden of guilt that weighed him down.
But eventually reason prevailed. He realized that no one had said a word to him about it all evening. Mamut even spoke to him about the Spring Festival and never brought it up. Then what had she been crying about? Maybe she was crying about it, but just never said anything. He lifted his head and looked across the darkened hearths in her direction. Could that be? Of all people, she had more right than anyone to claim redress. She had already had more than her share of unnatural acts forced on her by that brutal flathead… What right did he have to speak ill of that other man? Was he any better?
Yet, she had kept it to herself. She did not denounce him, did not demand his punishment. She was too good for him. He didn't deserve her. It was right that she and Ranec should Promise, Jondalar thought. Even as the thought entered his mind, he felt a tight knot of pain, as he understood that would be his punishment. Doni had given him what he had wanted most. She had found him the only woman he could ever love, but he couldn't accept her. And now he had lost her. It was his own fault, he would accept his punishment, but not without grieving.
As long as he could remember, Jondalar had fought for self-control. Other men showed emotion – laughed, or angered, or wept – far more easily than he, but above all, he resisted tears. Since the time he had been sent away and lost his tender credulous youth in a night of crying for the loss of home and family, he had wept only once: in Ayla's arms for the loss of his brother. But once again, on that night, he grieved. In the dark earthlodge of people who lived a year's Journey away from his home, he wept silent, unstoppable tears for the loss he felt most keenly of all. The loss of the woman he loved.
The long-awaited Spring Festival was both a new year's celebration and a festival of thanksgiving. Held not at the beginning, but at the height of the season when the first green buds and shoots were well established and could be harvested, it marked the start of the yearly cycle for the Mamutoi. With fervent joy and unspoken relief, that could only be fully appreciated by those who lived on the edge of survival, they welcomed the greening of the earth, which guaranteed life for themselves and the animals with whom they shared the land.
On the deepest, coldest nights of the harsh glacial winter, when it seemed the air itself would freeze, doubt that warmth and life would ever return again could arise in the most believing heart. Those times when spring seemed most remote, memories and stories of previous Spring Festivals relieved deep-seated fears and gave renewed hope that the Earth Mother's cycle of seasons would indeed continue. They made each Spring Festival as exciting and memorable as possible.
For the big Spring Feast, nothing left over from the previous year would be eaten. Individuals and small groups had been out for days fishing, hunting, trapping, and gathering. Jondalar had put his spear-thrower to good use and was pleased to contribute a pregnant bison entirely by himself, thin and gaunt though she was. Every edible vegetable product they could find was collected. Birch and willow catkins; the young unfolding stems of ferns as well as the old rootstocks which could be roasted, peeled, and pounded into flour; the juicy inner cambium bark of pines and birch, sweet with new rising sap; a few purplish-black curlewberries, filled with hard seeds, growing beside the small pink flowers on the ever-bearing low shrub; and from sheltered areas, where they had been covered with snow, bright red lingonberries, frozen and thawed to a soft sweetness, lingered with the dark leathery leaves on low tufted branches.
Buds, shoots, bulbs, roots, leaves, flowers of every description; the earth abounded with delicious fresh foods. Shoots and young pods of milkweed were used for vegetables, while the flower, full of rich nectar, was used for sweetening. New green leaves of clover, pigweed, nettles, balsam root, dandelion, and wild lettuce would be cooked or eaten raw; thistle stalks and, especially, sweet thistle roots were searched out. Lily bulbs were a favorite, and cattail shoots and bulrush stems. Sweet, flavorful licorice roots could be eaten raw or roasted in ashes. Some plants were collected for sustenance, others mainly for the flavor they imparted, and many were used for teas. Ayla knew the medicinal qualities of most of them, and gathered some for her uses, as well.
On rocky slopes, the narrow tubular new shoots of wild onion were picked, and in dry, bare places, small leaves of lemony sorrel. Coltsfoot was collected from damp open ground near the river. Its slightly salty taste made it useful for seasoning, though Ayla gathered some for coughs and asthma. Garlicky-tasting ramson greens were picked for taste and flavor, as were tart juniper berries, peppery tiger lily bulbs, flavorful basil, sage, thyme, mint, linden, which grew as a prostrate shrub, and a variety of other herbs and greens. Some would be dried and stored, some used to season the recently caught fish and the various kinds of meats brought back for the feast.
The fish were plentiful, and favored at this time of year, since most of the animals were still lean from the ravages of winter. But fresh meat, including at least one, symbolic, spring-born young animal – this year a tender bison calf – was always included in the feast. To make a feast of only the fresh products of the earth showed that the Earth Mother was offering Her full bounty again, that She would continue to provide for and nurture Her children.
With the foraging and collecting of foods for the feast, the anticipation of the Spring Festival had been building up for days. Even the horses could sense it. Ayla noticed they were nervous. In the morning she took them outside, some distance from the earthlodge, to curry and brush them. It was an activity that relaxed Whinney and Racer and that relaxed her, and it gave her an excuse to get off by herself to think. She knew she should give Ranec an answer today. Tomorrow was the Spring Festival.