THE SHELTERS OF STONE

Before they left, the First spoke to them again. "Most of you know this, but I want to say it now so it is clear. After the Matrimonial, for a period of half of a moon's cycle-approximately fourteen days using the counting words-the newly mated couples are not allowed to speak to anyone except each other. Only in the case of dire emergency are you to communicate with anyone else, and then only to a donier, who will decide if it was important enough to break the ban. I want you to understand why this is done. It is a way of forcing a couple together to see if they can really live with each other. At the end of the time, if they decide that their mating is incompatible, any couple can decide to break the tie with no consequences. It would be as if they had never mated."

The Zelandoni Who Was First knew most of the couples looked forward to the ban, delighted with the idea of spending time together totally involved with only each other. But at the end, she knew, there would likely be one or two couples who would quietly decide to go their separate ways. She looked carefully at each person trying to judge which couples might last. She was also trying to assess which of the couples would not last even fourteen days. Then she wished them all well and told them the Matrimonial would be the following evening.

Ayla and Jondalar were not concerned that their time alone would prove their union incompatible. They had already spent the better part of a year with only each other for company, except for the brief stops at a few Caves along the route of their Journey. They both looked forward to their period of forced intimacy, especially since there would be no pressures to keep traveling.

After leaving the lodge, the four couples walked together toward their camps. Janida and Peridal turned off first. Before they left, Janida held out both hands to Levela. "I want to thank you," she said, "for including us and making us welcome. When we walked in, it felt like everybody was staring at us, and I didn't know what to do. But I noticed when we left, that people were looking at Joplaya and Echozar, and Ayla and Jondalar, and even you and Jondecam. Maybe everyone was staring at everyone else, but you were the one who made me feel a part of something, not separate and outside of it." She leaned forward and brushed Levela's cheek with hers.

"Janida is an intelligent young woman," Jondalar said after they continued on. "Peridal is lucky to get her, and I hope he appreciates her."

"There does seem to be some real affection between them," Levela said. "I wonder why he was resisting the mating?"

"I would guess the resistance was more from his mother than from him," Jondecam said.

"I think you are right," Ayla said. "Peridal is very young. His mother still has a lot of influence on him. But so is Janida. How many years can each of them count?"

"I think both can count thirteen years. She just barely, he is some moons older, closer to a fourteen-year," Levela said.

"I am an old man next to him," Jondalar said. "I can count a double handful more, twenty-three years. Peridal hasn't even had a chance to live in a fa'lodge yet."

"And I am an old woman," Ayla said. "I can count nineteen years."

"That's not so old, Ayla. I can count twenty years," Joplaya said. "What about you, Echozar?" Jondecam said. "How many years can you count?"

"I have no idea," he said. "No one ever told me, or even kept track, as far as I know."

"Have you ever tried to think back and remember each year?" Levela asked.

"I have a good memory, but childhood to me is a blur, each season just fading into the next," Echozar said.

"I can count seventeen years," Levela said.

"I'm a twenty-year," Jondecam volunteered. "And here's our camp. We will see you tomorrow." They waved farewell with the beckoning come-back-to-see-us-again motion to the four who continued toward the combined camp of Zelandonii and Lanzadonii.

Ayla woke early on the day she and Jondalar were to be mated. The faint light that preceded the rising sun glimmered feebly through the cracks between the nearly opaque panels of the lodge, highlighting the seams and outlining the opening. She lay still, trying to distinguish details in the shadowy shapes silhouetted against the walls.

She could hear Jondalar's regular breathing. She raised up quietly and looked at the face of the man sleeping beside her in the dim light. The fine straight nose, the square jaw, the high forehead. She remembered the first time she had studied his face while he slept, in the cave of her valley. He was the first man of her own kind she had seen, that she could recall, and he had been badly wounded. She didn't know if he would live, but she thought then that he was beautiful.