THE SHELTERS OF STONE

This year, Jondalar had finally returned, but with a foreign woman, who insisted on having animals around her and didn't even care if she wore boys' underwear. Now they were mated, and she was pregnant, already Blessed. It wasn't fair. And where did she get that outfit she was wearing, open, and showing off her breasts? Marona wouldn't have hesitated to wear an outfit like that, if she had thought of it first, but she never would now, even if all the other women did, and she knew they would. Someday, Marona said to herself. Someday I'll find a way to show them. Someday he'll be sorry, they'll both be sorry. Someday.

There were others who were not particularly pleased with the pairing. Laramar just didn't like either one of them. Jondalar always looked at him with disdain, even when he was drinking his barma, and that woman Ayla, with that wolf, who made such an issue about Tremeda's youngest and had Lanoga thinking she was so wonderful. Lanoga wasn't even there to fix him a meal half the time anymore. Instead she was sitting around with those other women just like that baby was hers, and she wasn't even a woman yet, but she was getting there. She might even turn out to be a decent-looking woman someday, a lot better looking than that slovenly old woman who was her mother. I just wish that Ayla would stay away from my lodge, Laramar thought. Then he smirked, unless she wants some honoring. I wonder what she'd be like full of barma at a Mother Festival? Who knows? Someday.

There was another person who was watching that wished the couple less than happiness. My name is Madroman now, the acolyte thought, and I wish they'd remember, especially Jondalar. Look at him, so smug, all dressed up in that white tunic, making all those newly mated women smile. He was surprised when he found out I am part of the zelandonia now. He never expected it, he didn't think I could do it, but I'm a lot smarter than he thinks. And I will become Zelandoni, in spite of that fat woman who's been playing up to Jondalar's foreign woman like she's already Zelandoni.

She is beautiful, though. I could have found someone like that if he hadn't knocked my teeth out. He had no reason to hit me like that. All I did was tell the truth. He wanted to mate Zolena, and she would have agreed if I hadn't let them know. I should have let them mate, then that smiling face would be mated to a fat old woman instead of that foreigner he brought back. She plays at being a Zelandoni, but she isn't. She's not even an acolyte, and she can't even talk right. I wonder how many women would think he was so wonderful if someone knocked his teeth out? That would be something to see. I'd really like to see that, someday.

A fourth pair of eyes had watched the mating of the favored pair with less than pleasant feelings of goodwill. Brukeval couldn't stop looking at the golden woman with her hair tumbling around her shoulders and her large, beautiful breasts exposed. She was pregnant, they were a mother's breasts, and he wanted more than anything to reach out and touch them, fondle them, suckle them. They were so perfect, he began to feel that she was flaunting those perfect breasts, taunting him on purpose with their fullness, their hard pink nipples begging to be sucked.

Jondalar is going to touch those breasts, hold them, take those nipples in his mouth and suck them. Always Jondalar, always the favored one, always the lucky one. He even had the best mother. Marona's mother never cared about me, but Marthona was always there when I couldn't stand it anymore. She would always talk to me, explain things to me, let me stay with them for a while. She was always kind. Jondalar wasn't so bad, but that was because he felt sorry for me, because I didn't have his mother. Now he is mating a mother, a woman golden as Bali, the great golden son of the Mother, with beautiful breasts, who is going to be a mother.

She had been so happy to see him coming for her with his torch to lead her out of that cave, and she had said if it weren't for Jondalar, she would consider him, but she didn't mean it. When Jondalar and that flathead came, she made it known that she thought he was a flathead just like that one from the Lanzadonii. I don't know how Dalanar could even allow that flathead to look at the daughter of his mate, much less to mate her. That's wrong. He is an abomination, half animal, half human. It shouldn't be allowed. Joplaya seemed like a decent young woman, she was quiet, and she'd always been nice to him, but how could she consider mating that flathead? It's just not right. Someone should stop it, Brukeval thought.

Maybe I should. If Ayla thought about it, she would know I was doing the right thing. It might make her appreciate me. I wonder if she really would consider me if something happened, if Jondalar wasn't there anymore? If something happened to Jondalar, I wonder, would she consider me, someday?

Chapter 32