Mammoth Hunters Read Online Free PDF Page B

groove cut in the knee joint of an upright leg bone of a mammoth calf, sunk into the ground. A fork from a large branching antler of a deer had been fashioned into a crank and a boy was turning it. He was one of the children who had stayed to watch her and Whinney. Ayla recognized him and smiled. He grinned back.
    She was surprised by the spaciousness of the neat and comfortable earthlodge, as her eyes became accustomed to the dimmer light indoors. The fireplace was only the first of a row of hearths extending down the middle of the longhouse, a dwelling that was over eighty feet in length and almost twenty feet wide.
    Seven fires, Ayla counted to herself, pressing her fingers against her leg inconspicuously and thinking the counting words Jondalar had taught her.
    It was warm inside, she realized. The fires warmed the interior of the semisubterranean dwelling more than fires usually warmed the caves she was accustomed to. It was quite warm, in fact, and she noticed several people farther back who were very lightly clad.
    But it wasn’t any darker at the back. The ceiling was aboutthe same height throughout, twelve feet or so, and had smoke holes above each fireplace that let in light as well. Mammoth bone rafters, hung with clothing, implements, and food, extended across, but the center section of the ceiling was made of many reindeer antlers entwined together.
    Suddenly Ayla became aware of a smell that made her mouth water. It’s mammoth meat! she thought. She hadn’t tasted rich, tender mammoth meat since she left the cave of the Clan. There were other delicious cooking odors, too. Some familiar, some not, but they combined to remind her that she was hungry.
    As they were led along a well-trodden passageway that ran down the middle of the longhouse next to several hearths, she noticed wide benches with furs piled on them, extending out from the walls. Some people were sitting on them, relaxing or talking. She felt them looking at her as she walked past. She saw more of the mammoth tusk archways along the sides, and wondered where they led, but she hesitated to ask.
    It is like a cave, she thought, a large comfortable cave. But the arching tusks and large, long mammoth bones used as posts, supports, and walls made her realize it was not a cave that someone had found. It was one they had built!
    The first area, in which the roast was cooking, was larger than the rest, and so was the fourth, where Talut led them. Several bare sleeping benches along the walls, apparently unused, showed how they were constructed.
    When they had excavated the lower floor, wide platforms of dirt were left just below ground level along both sides and braced with strategically placed mammoth bones. More mammoth bones were placed across the top of the platforms, filled in with matted grass between the spaces, to raise and support pallets of soft leather stuffed with mammoth wool and other downy materials. With several layers of furs added, the dirt platforms became warm and comfortable beds or couches.
    Jondalar wondered if the hearth to which they were led was unoccupied. It seemed bare, but for all its empty spaces, it had a lived-in feeling. Coals glowed in the fireplace, furs and skins were piled up on some of the benches, and dried herbs hung from racks.
    “Visitors usually stay at the Mammoth Hearth,” Talut explained, “if Mamut doesn’t object. I will ask.”
    “Of course they may stay, Talut.”
    The voice came from an empty bench. Jondalar spun around and stared as one of the piles of furs moved. Then two eyes gleamed out of a face marked, high on the right cheek, with tattooed chevrons that fell into the seams and stitched across the wrinkles of incredible age. What he had thought was the fur of a winter animal turned out to be a white beard. Two long thin shanks unwound from a cross-legged position and dropped over the edge of the raised platform to the floor.
    “Don’t look so surprised, man of the Zelandonii. The woman knew I