Free Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel

a leader, it was the failing of his race. He could not have anticipated finding a wounded child who was not Clan and he could not foresee the logical consequencesof rescuing her. Her life had been saved; the only alternative to letting her stay with them was to turn her out to wander alone again. She could not survive alone—that did not take foresight, it was fact. After saving her life, to expose her to death again he would have to oppose Iza, who, although she had no power personally, did have a formidable array of spirits on her side—-and now Creb, the Mog-ur who had the ability to call upon any and all spirits. Spirits were a potent force to Brun, he had no desire to find himself at odds with them. To give him full credit, it was just that eventuality that bothered him about the girl. He hadn’t been able to express it to himself, but the thought had been hovering. He didn’t know it yet, but Brun’s clan had increased to twenty-one.
    When the medicine woman examined Ayla’s leg the next morning, she could see the improvement. Under her expert care, the infection was nearly gone and the four parallel gashes were closed and healing, though she would always carry the scars. Iza decided a poultice was no longer needed, but she made a willow-bark tea for the child. When she moved her off the sleeping fur, Ayla tried to stand. Iza helped her and supported her while the girl gingerly tried to put her weight on the leg. It hurt, but after a few careful steps, it felt better.
    Standing up at her full height, the girl was even taller than Iza thought. Her legs were long, spindly with knobby knees, and straight. Iza wondered if they were deformed. The legs of Clan people were bowed in an outward curvature, but, except for a limp, the child had no problem moving around. Straight legs must be normal for her too, Iza decided—like blue eyes.
    The medicine woman wrapped the cloak around her and lifted the child to her hip as the clan got under way; her leg wasn’t healed enough yet for her to walk any great distance. At intervals during the day’s march, Iza let her down to walk for a while. The girl had been eating ravenously, making up for her long hunger, and Iza thought she could notice a weight gain already. She was glad to be relieved of the extra burden occasionally, especially since traveling was becoming more difficult.
    The clan left the broad flat steppes behind and for the next few days traversed rolling hills that grew progressively steeper. They were in the foothills of the mountains whoseglistening ice caps drew closer every day. The hills were thickly forested, not with the evergreens of boreal forest, but with the rich green leaves and thick gnarled trunks of broad-leafed deciduous trees. The temperature had warmed much faster than the season usually progressed, which puzzled Brun. The men had replaced their wraps with a shorter leather hide that left the torso bare. The women didn’t change to their summer wear; it was easier to carry their loads with a full wrap that eased chafing.
    The terrain lost all resemblance to the cold prairie that had surrounded their old cave. Iza found herself depending more and more on knowledge of memories more ancient than her own as the clan passed through shaded glens and over grassy knolls of a full temperate forest. The heavy brown barks of oak, beech, walnut, apple, and maple were intermixed with supple, straight, thin-barked willow, birch, hornbeam, aspen, and the high brush of alder and hazelnut. There was a tang to the air Iza couldn’t readily identify that seemed to ride on the warm soft breeze from the south. Catkins still clung to fully leafed birches. Delicate petals of pink and white drifted down, blown blossoms of fruit and nut trees, giving early promise of autumn’s bounty.
    They struggled through brush and vines of the dense forest and climbed exposed faces. As they mounted rocky outcrops, the hillsides around them were resplendent with greens of every