raised platform piled high with soft furs. Someone’s sleeping space, she thought. Another sleeping space was loosely denned by screens, dividing it from the room they occupied and from the first sleeping room.
The draped entrance was part of the wall of wood-framed hide panels opposite the stone wall, and on the side across from the sleeping spaces was a fourth room, where Marthona was preparing food. Along the entry wall near the cooking room, freestanding wooden shelves held artfully arranged baskets and bowls, beautifully decorated with carved, woven, or painted geometric designs and realistic depictions of animals. Larger containers were on the floor next to the wall, some with lids while others openly revealed their contents: vegetables, fruits, grains, dried meats.
There were four sides to the roughly rectangular dwelling, though the outside walls were not perfectly straight nor the spaces entirely symmetrical. They curved somewhat unevenly, tending to follow the contours of the space under the overhanging shelf, and made allowances for other dwellings.
“You’ve changed things around, mother,” Jondalar said. “It seems roomier than I remember.”
“It is roomier, Jondalar. There’s only three of us here now. Folara sleeps in there,” Marthona said, indicating the second sleeping space. “Willamar and I sleep in the other room.” She motioned toward the room against the stone wall.“You and Ayla may use the main room. We can move the table closer to the wall to make room for a bed platform, if you like.”
To Ayla, the place seemed quite roomy. The dwelling was much larger than the individual living spaces of each hearth—each family—in the semisubterranean longhouse of the Lion Camp, although not as big as her small cave in the valley, where she had lived alone. But, unlike this living area, the Mamutoi lodge was not a natural formation; the people of the Lion Camp had made it themselves.
Her attention was drawn to the nearby partition that separated the cooking space from the main room. It bent in the middle, and she realized it was two translucent screens connected in an unusual way. The wooden poles that made up the inside of the frame and legs of both panels were inserted in circles of transversely cut hollow bison horn. The rings formed a kind of hinge near the bottom and top that allowed the double screen to fold back. She wondered if other screens were made the same way.
She looked into the cooking space, curious about the facilities. Marthona was kneeling on a mat beside a hearth circled with stones of similar size; the paving stones around it were swept clean. Behind the woman in a darker corner lit by a single stone lamp were more shelves that held cups, bowls, platters, and implements. She noticed dried herbs and vegetables hanging and then saw the end of a frame with crosspieces to which they were tied. On a work platform beside the hearth were bowls, baskets, and a large bone platter with pieces of fresh red meat cut into chunks.
Ayla wondered if she should offer to help, but she didn’t know where anything was kept, or what Marthona was making. It was less than helpful to get in someone’s way. Betterto wait, she thought.
She watched Marthona skewer the meat on four pointed sticks and place them over hot coals between two upright stones, notched to hold several skewers at once. Then, with a ladle carved out of an ibex horn, the woman scooped liquid out of a tightly woven basket into wooden bowls. With a pairof springy tongs made of wood bent all the way around, she fished a couple of smooth stones out of the cooking basket and added another hot one from the fire, then brought the two bowls to Ayla and Jondalar.
Ayla noticed the round globes of small onions and some other root vegetables in the rich broth, and realized how hungry she was, but she waited and watched to see what Jondalar did. He took out his eating knife, a small, pointed, flint blade inserted into an ander handle,
The draped entrance was part of the wall of wood-framed hide panels opposite the stone wall, and on the side across from the sleeping spaces was a fourth room, where Marthona was preparing food. Along the entry wall near the cooking room, freestanding wooden shelves held artfully arranged baskets and bowls, beautifully decorated with carved, woven, or painted geometric designs and realistic depictions of animals. Larger containers were on the floor next to the wall, some with lids while others openly revealed their contents: vegetables, fruits, grains, dried meats.
There were four sides to the roughly rectangular dwelling, though the outside walls were not perfectly straight nor the spaces entirely symmetrical. They curved somewhat unevenly, tending to follow the contours of the space under the overhanging shelf, and made allowances for other dwellings.
“You’ve changed things around, mother,” Jondalar said. “It seems roomier than I remember.”
“It is roomier, Jondalar. There’s only three of us here now. Folara sleeps in there,” Marthona said, indicating the second sleeping space. “Willamar and I sleep in the other room.” She motioned toward the room against the stone wall.“You and Ayla may use the main room. We can move the table closer to the wall to make room for a bed platform, if you like.”
To Ayla, the place seemed quite roomy. The dwelling was much larger than the individual living spaces of each hearth—each family—in the semisubterranean longhouse of the Lion Camp, although not as big as her small cave in the valley, where she had lived alone. But, unlike this living area, the Mamutoi lodge was not a natural formation; the people of the Lion Camp had made it themselves.
Her attention was drawn to the nearby partition that separated the cooking space from the main room. It bent in the middle, and she realized it was two translucent screens connected in an unusual way. The wooden poles that made up the inside of the frame and legs of both panels were inserted in circles of transversely cut hollow bison horn. The rings formed a kind of hinge near the bottom and top that allowed the double screen to fold back. She wondered if other screens were made the same way.
She looked into the cooking space, curious about the facilities. Marthona was kneeling on a mat beside a hearth circled with stones of similar size; the paving stones around it were swept clean. Behind the woman in a darker corner lit by a single stone lamp were more shelves that held cups, bowls, platters, and implements. She noticed dried herbs and vegetables hanging and then saw the end of a frame with crosspieces to which they were tied. On a work platform beside the hearth were bowls, baskets, and a large bone platter with pieces of fresh red meat cut into chunks.
Ayla wondered if she should offer to help, but she didn’t know where anything was kept, or what Marthona was making. It was less than helpful to get in someone’s way. Betterto wait, she thought.
She watched Marthona skewer the meat on four pointed sticks and place them over hot coals between two upright stones, notched to hold several skewers at once. Then, with a ladle carved out of an ibex horn, the woman scooped liquid out of a tightly woven basket into wooden bowls. With a pairof springy tongs made of wood bent all the way around, she fished a couple of smooth stones out of the cooking basket and added another hot one from the fire, then brought the two bowls to Ayla and Jondalar.
Ayla noticed the round globes of small onions and some other root vegetables in the rich broth, and realized how hungry she was, but she waited and watched to see what Jondalar did. He took out his eating knife, a small, pointed, flint blade inserted into an ander handle,
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