Jonayla didn't want to go either. After her experience with the men who wanted to hunt her horses, she was worried that someone else might make a try for them, and wanted to stay and guard them. Ayla tried to explain that everyone at the Camp knew they were special horses by now, but Jonayla said she was afraid someone new might come who didn't know about them. Ayla couldn't deny that her daughter had done the right thing before, and Dulana was more than happy to watch the child for Ayla, especially since her daughter was close to the same age. So Ayla let her stay.
The rest of those who wanted to see the painted cave started out. The group consisted of the One Who Was First; Jonokol, her first Acolyte, who was now Zelandoni of the Nineteenth Cave; Ayla, her current Acolyte, and Jondalar. Willamar came, but not his two apprentices; they had found other objects of interest to distract them. In addition, several of the Zelandonia who were at the Summer Meeting wanted to see the site again, especially if they were going to be led through it by the Seventh, who knew it better than anyone alive.
There were ten satellite Caves in the region, each of which had its own painted cave as a sacred site that was complementary to the important one near the Seventh Cave, but many of them had only rudimentary paintings and engravings in comparison. The Fourth Cave of South Land Zelandonii, which they had just visited, was one of the better ones. The group started up a path that traversed its way up the steep hill they had seen when they first saw the valley.
'This is called Blackbird Hill,' the Seventh explained. 'Sometimes the Hill of the Fishing Blackbird. Somebody invariably asks why, but I don't know. I have occasionally seen a raven or a crow up here, but I don't know if that's relevant. The one who was Seventh before me didn't know, either.'
'The reason for names often gets lost in the depths of memory,' the First said. The big woman was out of breath and huffing a bit as she climbed the hill, but continued doggedly on. The zigzagging trail made the ascent a little easier, if longer.
Finally they reached an opening into the limestone hill at a point that was quite high above the valley floor. The entrance was not very exceptional, and if the path had not led to it, it would hardly have been noticed. The opening was high enough to enter without ducking or stooping and wide enough to accommodate two or three people, but a large bush growing in front of it would have made it difficult to find unless one knew exactly where to look. One of the Acolytes brushed away a small spill of rubble spalling off the rocky slope above that had accumulated in front of the entrance. Ayla showed her skill with making fire quickly, which included a promise to show the Seventh how it was done; then lamps and torches were lit.
The Zelandoni of the South Land Seventh Cave led the way into the cave, followed by the First, then Jonokol, Ayla, Jondalar, and Willamar. They were followed by the local zelandonia who chose to come, including a couple of Acolytes. The group numbered twelve in all. The entrance opened into the side of a passageway that required them to turn either right or left. They turned right and after a short distance, the passage widened and split into two tunnels. They had entered a room that had a stone blockage in the middle with a narrow passageway around it on one side and a wider one on the other.
'We could go either way; we'd end up in the same place, at a pile of rocks in the back with no way out except the way we came in, but there are some interesting things to see,' the Seventh said.
They took the narrow right fork and immediately came upon some small red dots on the right wall, which the Seventh pointed out. There were more on the left wall; then a little farther on they stopped to look at a horse painted on the right wall and more dots, and near it a lion with a fantastic tail held up but curled toward the back. Ayla wondered if the person who made the image had perhaps seen a lion with a broken tail that had healed with an odd twist. She knew how strangely broken bones sometimes healed.
Then on the right wall, after a few more paces along the narrow passage, they came to a panel that the Seventh called 'the deer'. The drawing made Ayla think of female megaceroses, and she remembered that they had seen the giant deer painted in the sacred cave near the South Land Fourth Cave. Across from it on the left were two large red dots. More red dots were painted on the wall beyond the deer, and then on the vaulted ceiling ahead were several rows of large dots.
Ayla was curious about the dots, but she was reluctant to ask questions. Finally she ventured a query. 'Do you know what the dots represent?'
The tall man with the full brown beard smiled at the attractive Acolyte, whose lovely features had a bit of a foreign aspect, which appealed to him. 'They don't necessarily mean the same thing to everyone, but to me, when I am in the right state of mind, they seem to be pathways leading to the next world and, more importantly, they show the way back.' She nodded at his answer, then smiled. He liked her look even better when she smiled.
They continued around the middle-section blockage through the narrow passage, which then opened wider. They kept veering toward the left until they were headed in the direction that led back to the place from which they started, through a much larger room that had obviously been used by bears, probably hibernating bears. The walls bore the traces of their claws as they raked them down the limestone. When they approached the opening through which they had entered the cave, the Seventh kept going straight ahead, the direction they would have been going if they had turned left when they first entered the cave.
They walked some distance, staying close to the right wall, through a long tunnel. It wasn't until they reached an opening to the right that they saw more markings; on the low vaulted ceiling of the passage were four red negative handprints, somewhat smeared, three red dots, and some black marks. Across the opening were a series of eleven large black dots and two negative handprints that had been made by placing a hand on the wall and spattering red colour on and around it. When the hand was taken away, a negative impression of the hand remained surrounded by the red ochre. The Seventh then turned right into the opening of the vaulted passage.
Beyond the smeared negative handprints, the stone on the wall became soft, as though covered with clay. The cave was high above the river valley floor, and reasonably dry inside, but it was calcareous rock, which was naturally porous, and water saturated with calcium carbonate constantly seeped through it. Sometimes, drip by infinitesimal drip, over millennia, huge stalagmite pillars formed, which seemed to grow from the floor of a limestone cave below stalactite icicles of equal size but different shape suspended from the ceiling. But sometimes the water accumulated in the limestone and left the surface of the cave walls softened enough that marks could be made with only the fingers. Significant areas of the softened stone had formed in the small room to the right, which seemed to invite visitors to mark. Portions of the walls were covered with a scrawl of fingermarks, which for the most part were unorganised scribbles, although one area included the partial drawing of a megaceros defined by a huge distinctive palmate antler and a small head.
There were other signs and dots painted in red or black colour where the surface was hard enough, but except for the megaceros, Ayla felt the room was filled with disorganised marks that were meaningless to her. But she was beginning to learn that no one knew what everything in the painted caves meant. It was likely that no one actually knew what anything meant, except the person who put it there, and perhaps not even then. If something painted on the walls of a cave made you feel something, then whatever you felt was what it meant. It might depend on your state of mind, which could be altered, or how receptive you were. Ayla thought about what the Seventh said when she asked him about the rows of large dots. He put it in very personal terms and told her what the dots meant to him. The caves were sacred sites, but she was beginning to think it was a personal, individual sacredness. Maybe that's what she was supposed to be learning on this trip.
When they left the small room, the Seventh crossed to the left side of the main passageway that led to it. The tunnel at that point turned toward the left and they walked along the left wall for a short distance. Then the Seventh held up his lamp. It illuminated a long panel filled with animals painted in black, many superimposed on others. At first she saw the mammoths — there were many of them — then she saw the horses, the bison, and the aurochs. One of the mammoths was covered with black marks. The Seventh said nothing about the panel; he just stayed there long enough for everyone to see what they wanted to see. When he saw most people starting to lose interest, except Jonokol, who could probably have stayed much longer just to study the painting, the Seventh moved on. He next showed them a cornice on which were painted bison and mammoths.
There were several more markings and a few animals that the Seventh pointed out as they moved slowly through the cave, but the next place he stopped was truly remarkable. On a large panel were two horses painted in black, back-to-back, and the inside of the outlines of their bodies was filled with large black dots. In addition there were more dots and handprints around the outside of the horse outlines, but the most unusual aspect was the head of the right-facing horse. The painted head was quite small, but it was painted inside a natural contour of the rock that resembled the head of a horse and framed the painted head. The shape of the rock itself had told the artist that a horse needed to be painted there. All the visitors were very impressed. The First, who had seen the horse
