THE SHELTERS OF STONE

Sitting at the low table, the young woman untied the leather-wrapped package and tried to shake the wrinkles out of the tunic and leggings that had been carried across a continent through every season for the past year. Marthona examined the outfit and quickly saw past the creases as she realized what magnificent garments they were. Ayla would most definitely stand out at the Mating Ceremonial wearing this.

First of all, the style was utterly unique. Both men and women of the Zelandonii, with some differences and variations related to gender, usually wore rather loosely bloused pullover tunics, belted at the hips, with various embellishments of bone, shell, feather, or fur and fringes of leather or cordage. Women's clothing, particularly the clothes they wore for special occasions, often had long hanging fringes that swayed as they walked, and a young woman quickly learned how to make the dangling decoration accentuate her movements.

Among the Zelandonii, a naked woman was an ordinary sight, but fringes were considered very provocative. It wasn't that women didn't usually wear clothing, but removing clothes to wash or change or for whatever reason in their close-knit society with relatively little privacy was hardly given a thought. On the other hand, a fringe, especially a red fringe, could give a woman an allure so tantalizing, it could drive men to extremes, on rare occasions even violence because of a particular association.

When women took on the role of donii-women-when they were making themselves available to teach young men about the Great Earth Mother's Gift of Pleasure-they wore a long red fringe dangling around their hips to denote their important ritual status. On hot days of summer, they often wore little more than the fringe.

While donii-women were protected by custom and convention from inappropriate advances and, in any case, they tended to stay in certain areas when they wore the red fringe, it was believed dangerous for a woman to wear such a fringe at any other time. Who could tell what it might drive a man to do? Though women often wore fringes of colors other than red, any fringe invariably had some erotic implications.

As a result, the word "fringe," in subtle innuendo or crude jokes, often carried the double meaning of pubic hair. When a man was so captivated by a woman that he couldn't stay away from her or stop looking at her, it was said that he was "snared by her fringe."

Zelandonii women wore other decorations or sewed them to their clothing, but they particularly liked to wear fringes that moved sensuously when they walked, whether they decorated a warm winter tunic or a naked body. And though they avoided explicitly red fringes, many women chose colors that contained a strong hint of red.

Ayla's Mamutoi outfit had no fringes, but there was no doubt that a tremendous amount of effort had been put into making it. The leather, which was of the finest quality, was a rich, earthy, golden yellow hue that almost matched the color of her hair, the result primarily of yellow ochres mixed subtly with reds and other colors. The hide had probably come from deer of some variety, or perhaps saiga antelope, Marthona thought, though it wasn't the usual velvety soft buckskin of a well-scraped hide. Instead, although it was very soft, the leather had a burnished, shiny finish that was somewhat waterproof.

But the quality of the basic garments was only the beginning; it was the exquisite decoration that made the outfit so extraordinary. The long leather tunic and the lower part of the leggings were covered with elaborate geometric designs made predominantly of ivory beads, some sections solidly filled in. The designs began with downward pointing triangles, which developed horizontally into zigzags and vertically into diamonds and chevrons, then evolved into complex geometric figures such as rectangular spirals and concentric rhomboids.

The ivory beaded designs were highlighted and defined by many small amber beads in shades both lighter and darker than the leather, but of the same tone, and with embroideries of red, brown, and black. The tunic, which fell to a downward-pointing triangle at the back, opened down the front, with the section below the hips tapering so that when it was brought together, another downward-pointing triangle was created. It was tied closed at the waist with a finger-woven sash in a similar geometric pattern made of red mammoth hair with accents of ivory mouflon wool, brown musk ox underdown, and deep reddish-black woolly rhinoceros hair.