THE SHELTERS OF STONE

"I'm sure that's true," Jondalar said with a wry smile, "but for me, I think I like the looking more. I must admit, I'm not exactly waiting eagerly for this… ceremony. I'm willing, of course, and I think it may be interesting, but for the most part, I'm happy to let the zelandonia have the experience."

Jonokol grinned at his admission. "You are not alone in that feeling, Jondalar. Most people would rather stay firmly in this world. Come, let me show you something else before we have to get serious."

The artist acolyte led them to another area on the right side of the passage, where many more stalagmites and stalactites than usual had formed. The wall was covered with the calcareous formations, but on top of the concretions had been painted two horses that incorporated them to create the effect of a long shaggy winter coat. The one behind was leaping in a very animated way.

"These are very lively," Ayla said, quite intrigued. She had seen horses behave in similar ways.

"When boys first see it, they always say this one in back is 'leaping for Pleasure,'" Jondalar said.

"That is one interpretation," the woman acolyte said. "That could be a male attempting to mount the female in front, but I believe it is purposely ambiguous."

"Did your teacher paint these, Jonokol?" Ayla asked.

"No. I don't know who made them," Jonokol said. "No one does. They were done long ago, when the mammoths were painted. People say they were made by the ancestors, the forebears."

"There is something I want to show you, Ayla," the woman said.

"Are you going to show her the vulva?" Jonokol said with some surprise. "That is not usually shown on a first visit."

"I know, but I think we should make an exception for her," the other acolyte said, holding up the lamp and leading the way to a place not far from the horses. When she stopped, she lowered the torch to throw light down on a very unusual formation of rock that extended out from the wall and parallel to the floor, but raised up from it.

When Ayla first looked, she noticed an area of stone that had been enhanced with red, but it was only after looking carefully that she understood what it was, and then perhaps only because she had assisted more than one woman who was giving birth. A man might have recognized it before a woman. By accident-or supernatural design-the concretion had naturally formed an exact replica of a woman's sexual organ. The shape, the folds, even a depression that matched the entrance to her vagina, everything was there. Only the red color was added, to highlight it, to make sure they could find it easily.

"It is a woman!" Ayla said, astonished. "It is exactly like a woman! I have never seen anything like it."

"Now do you understand why this cave is so sacred? The Mother herself made this for us. It is proof that this cave is the Entrance to the Mother's Womb," said the woman who was training to serve the Great Earth Mother.

"Have you seen this before, Jondalar?" Ayla asked.

"Only once. Zelandoni showed it to me," he said. "It is remarkable. It is one thing for an artist like Jonokol to look at a cave wall, see the figure that is in it, and bring it to the surface for everyone to see. But this was here just as it is. The added color only makes it a little easier to see."

"There is one more place I want to show you," Jonokol said.

He went back the way they had come, and when they reached the enlarged area where everyone was waiting, he hurried past and turned right, back into the main corridor. At what appeared to be the end, on the left was a circular enclosure, and on the wall were concave depressions, the reverse of rounded-out bumps. In some of these, mammoths had been painted in a way that created an unusual illusion. At first glance, they didn't appear to be depressions; instead, they took on the characteristic of a mammoth's stomach, rounded outward. Ayla had to look twice, then reach to touch to convince herself that they actually were concave, not convex, dips and not bumps.

"They are remarkable!" Ayla said. "They are painted so that they seem to be opposite of what they are!"

"These are new, aren't they? I don't recall seeing them before," Jondalar said. "Did you paint them, Jonokol?"

"No, but I'm sure you'll meet the woman who did," he said.

"Everyone agrees, she is exceptional," the woman acolyte said. "As is Jonokol, of course. We are lucky to have two artists who are so talented."

"A few small figures are just beyond here," Jonokol said, looking at Ayla, "a woolly rhinoceros, a cave lion, an engraved horse, but it's a very narrow passage and hard to reach. A series of lines marks the end."

"They are probably ready for us. I think we should go back," the woman said.