It was a responsibility that I felt was beyond me, to choose which items to keep. We had traded a year’s furs for these items and I knew I had to get it right to change the weather. Though I felt honoured that Ikaseraz should think I was more suited to choose than he was himself, it seemed to me he was taking a gamble on an unknown. I sat and stared at them for a long time, but couldn’t decide.
"I don’t know, Ikaseraz. Suppose I get it wrong."
"It’s not in your hands, the spirits always guide us if we want them to. So whatever you choose will be right just by the fact that you have chosen it. Look, we’ll get out the northern bear’s claw. I’m here if there should be any danger."
He brought it out from behind his drum and put it in my hands, giving them an encouraging squeeze as he did so. I held the black claw in my right hand, closed my eyes and held my bear’s tooth for strength in my left. It was not long before I felt better. Confidence had come from somewhere. I opened my eyes again and saw Ikaseraz sitting perfectly still watching me. He smiled and I wondered if he had done something to ask the spirits’ help.
"The narwhal’s tusk and the bird’s skull." I told him. He smiled more widely.
"That is good. They are what I would have chosen, but I was unsure. Just those two?"
I studied everything closely again. The horns of the musk ox and some of the carved whale bones were attractive. But I analysed my feelings for them and decided that it was a personal liking and nothing to do with the spirits.
"Yes, just them."
"I want to keep the wolf skins anyway. We will need extra sleeping-furs this winter if it gets as cold as I think it will."
It came to me then that he was treating me as an adult and I couldn’t tell if I was pleased or not.
"Let’s attach the narwhal’s tusk to the central pole of the shelter, shall we? It’s an awkward thing to store. We might feel then that it was supporting and blessing our home too." He seemed pleased with his idea so I agreed and smiled at him.
"Which bird is the skull from?"
"It could be a goose, but I’m fairly certain it’s a swan."
The sound of their wings as they flew over came to me when I looked at it now, so I was sure he must be right.
When we had stacked up the rest of the things ready for trading with the sea traders he said "We should get some good things for those carvings, there are no whales in the south where they come from. But we shall have a long wait, they won’t risk the sea again until Spring."
"What do you think they will have?"
"It’s different every time. Part of the excitement. What I need most is some spikenard.
There’s enough for the next hunting ceremony, but after that I don’t know, I shall have to improvise until they come. Even then they may have already traded all they had. They never set out without it, everyone knows of its intermediary power with Sky Father and wants it."
"When will the hunting ceremony be now?" "No knowing, the spirits will send signs. You must get the paints ready though. You stay here and do that, yes you can try out your new purple. I’ve got a patient to see".
The purple colouring was a temptation, but I knew that the only way I would be able to enjoy it was to do the ordinary paints first. They were all simple enough. Red and yellow were prepared in the same way, crush up the ochres in the pestle and mortar then add whatever binders we had available, various saps, oils from seeds or I could chew up bark linings. Blood works well too, but we hadn’t got any. For a really special paint I would have bled myself, but not today. For black paint I would use charcoal instead of the ochres, and for white, chalk. As I finished each I put it in its own special bowl and covered it.
Then I was free to think about my purple. I had to use a few granules to test what it would dissolve in. Almost anything, so that was lucky, and I had more luck with the binder to make a paint. The first one I tried was pine resin and it held really well and - I had almost been holding my breath - the colour was glorious, exactly what I had hoped for. I couldn’t get on with trying for a dye, always more complicated, for interrupting myself to gaze at that colour. In the end I found a new bowl for it, there was no bowl for purple, and covered it telling myself I wouldn’t look at it again. I was wrong, I did but at least not so often.
When Ikaseraz came back I had not succeeded with the dye. He looked at all the bits of discarded rag and made a sympathetic gesture, so I triumphantly showed him the bowl of paint. He was nearly as pleased with it as I was.
"How’s your patient?"
"It’s Hankagorri. He’s got the lung disease. I’ve done what I can, if the spirits help him he will survive, but he is rather old, as you know. We’ll have to start you coming with me soon to healings. Not yet, I want you to concentrate on the hunting ceremony for now." I showed him all the ordinary paint I had made and he thought it was enough. Although almost everyone liked the red the best, and it signified life so was the most important as well, we had to be sparing because the red ochre came from a place a long journey from here.
"During Hankagorri’s healing the spirits showed me that four days from now we can hold the hunting ceremony. When I’ve had a rest and a drink I’ll go round and tell all the hunters. They need to prepare and some of them will need purification. Why don’t you go and tell your father, you can see how they’re all getting along?"
I fingered the pearl in my waist-pouch as I walked across to their shelter.
"Hello dear" Mother said as I entered. Father looked up from the work he was doing and smiled.
"I’m just renewing the lashing on this spear. It looked as if it might fail. Any news of when the ceremony will be?"
"Yes, that’s why I came over. It’s to be four days from today. Ikaseraz is going round now. I shall be going too, but he says I must stay back and keep quiet."
"Your respect is due to him, and to the hunters as well during the ceremony."
"But I’ve got to learn as much as I can."
"It’ll be strange for you at a men’s ceremony. I wouldn’t want to go." Mother said.
"My whole life has suddenly turned strange."
They nodded sympathetically, but at that moment Oskol shrieked as Eraminpe pulled his hair. As they pulled them apart I waved "Goodbye" and went home.
The four days until the hunting ceremony passed quickly for me because I was busy with the preparations for winter. Ikaseraz had little time to teach me as he was concentrating on his work for the ritual. He became more and more withdrawn as the evening of the fourth day, the time of the ceremony, approached until it became impossible to get a word out of him. I understood, this was the most important hunt of the year and he felt stressed by the responsibility of bringing willing reindeer to the hunters before the herds moved south. The meat from this hunt would go into the cold caches on the tundra - it was cold up there already - and would have to see us all through the winter until the reindeer returned.
Mother helped me with my salting down of both fish and meat, and then I helped with hers while Father sharpened his weapons and looked after the children. We also had stocks of both dried and smoked meat and fish. I could manage the fruit and berry preserving in honey myself. Nuts and seeds were already stored away, but our preserved eggs were nearly finished. There would be no more eggs until Spring.
When it came time to set out for the cave Ikaseraz seemed calmer. I had to help him carry some things, though his drum and mask he carried himself. It would have been disrespectful of me to touch them. The bones and our extra furs were left to me. He gave me the essence of spikenard and the smoking mixture, which he said it was essential that I should carry as a trainee weathermonger. I didn’t follow that at the time but thought it better not to interrupt his concentration. It was not far to the cave but we had a couple of rests due to the awkwardness of carrying so much. The cave had been stocked with food and drink for everyone earlier in the day. The hunters were coming along behind us carrying all their weapons. They caught us up at the entrance and we all went in together.
The cave entrance is low and though it was easy for me to just bend down, some of the bigger men had to crawl in on all fours. The first thing was to get the fire lit and then torches lit from it and set in stands. Only then could we see the cave properly. A little light came in from the entrance but most of the cave was dark without the fire and torches. It is big enough for all our group, even when the women and children are here too. More than big enough, it would hold many more. The last time I had been in the cave the paintings had rather frightened me but I wanted to see them with an apprentice’s eyes so I took up a torch and walked round the walls studying them all. They were all so real looking and depending on how the torchlight caught them some seemed to be moving out of the walls towards us. There were several horses, a bison, two aurochs and many birds, but the one that really gripped me was a mammoth. That day was the first time I had the chance to really look at it. What an animal. The painting made the mammoth seem to be thinking. There was plenty of time to look, nothing would happen for hours. The hunters were setting up a roasting spit over the fire, they had a small boar and some birds to roast. Others were seeing to the drink.
Ikaseraz and I found an out-of-the-way corner to put our things. He said it would be a fine place for me to watch from when things got going. The paints I had made were carefully placed against the wall, they wouldn’t be needed until much later. We went over to the fire and joined the men who were sitting cross-legged and passing a bowl of drink round. I was only allowed a sip occasionally. Every time the bowl reached Ikaseraz he spilled a little onto the floor of the cave as an offering. They were all telling stories of old hunts, some of them were quite scary. Ikaseraz told me later that the same story became more hair-raising at each telling. But he was probably teasing me, they really do kill some dangerous prey. Father spoke to me briefly but soon went back to his friends, this was an occasion for the men.
It seemed a long time before the roasting was done, the smell of it had made me hungry long before. But they finally took the animals off the spit. They were broken up with hand tools and the pieces put on large wooden platters which were passed round for everyone to help themselves. But before we could eat Ikaseraz had to bury the best piece of the boar deep in the cave floor as an offering to Earth Mother.
When everything was eaten the singing began. It was accompanied by three or four flutes which the players had made from the long bones of reindeer. I was enjoying it when Ikaseraz asked me to go to our pile of things and bring him the spikenard. The singing stopped as he raised it above the fire then, singing quite loudly but tunelessly, he sprinkled it around the edges of the fire. The scent was intense and very heady, one or two people looked a bit dizzy. He intoned that with this offering to Sky Father we asked for a blessing on tomorrow’s hunt. That was the sign for the ritual to begin and we went to our dark corner for Ikaseraz to get changed. I helped him into his mask, then the attaching of his lion’s tail which is awkward to put on yourself with being behind you. Finally between us we got the aurochs’ hooves attached to his feet and he picked up his drum and a striking-bone and went back to the fire leaving me behind.
The first dance around the fire was just Ikaseraz striking his drum slowly and singing quietly. When that ended all the hunters started to dance and the old men sat further from the fire and played any instruments they had. Ikaseraz returned to me and asked for his pipe and the smoking mixture.
At that time it was just a dried up mixture to me. Later I learned which fungi, lichens and herbs to use for which type of ritual. Then I only wondered if there was any elecampane in it. Perhaps not as Ikaseraz had said that it was me who was affected by it. He scattered dried lavender and rosemary at the edges of the embers so that they would slowly give off their fumes. Those were traded from the south, but he had told me that they used to grow here, it hardly seemed imaginable.
As he smoked he slowly increased the speed of his drumming and varied the rhythm as well. The men with drums speeded up as well but kept to a simple rhythm, their drums were just drums and not objects of power as Ikaseraz’s was. He had finished smoking and was dancing again when he very suddenly fell to the floor and went rigid. It was the first time I had seen him trancing and had to stop myself running to help him. He would have called me a foolish child, this was the whole purpose of the ceremony, that he should enter the spirit-world. I had no idea what he would do when he got there. There was plenty of time for me to think how much there was for me to learn and begin to despair.
The men continued playing and a few danced some repetitive steps but none went near Ikaseraz. The thought that one day it would be me lying on the cave floor made me feel hollow inside. I was not only scared but excited too. A great deal of time passed with nothing happening. The hunters were talking and laughing, nobody took any notice of me. I went round studying the great paintings again. Between them were many symbols that I didn’t understand and what seemed to be random lines carved into the rock. The most common image was of people’s hands, especially near the floor of the cave. I wondered if they were the handprints of the people who had painted the great animals, but as some were so small they must have been children’s I thought that couldn’t be right. There might have been paintings on the roof of the cave but the light didn’t reach that far. The smoke was all going up there so if there were any there they would have to be renewed often unless there were some way to remove soot.
When Ikaseraz began to stir I felt that he had been away for hours. Two of the men helped him into a sitting position and gave him a drink of water. He signed feebly to them to give him more. When he had drunk that they gave him some honey and left him with another bowl of water. His exhaustion was plain to everyone and he was left to recover. I started shivering with the cold despite the good fire and put on my extra furs. But you could see that Ikaseraz didn’t need his, he was sweating. It was some while later that he signed to them to gather round and with obvious difficulty spoke of what he had discovered. It was good news, that was clear from the men’s reaction, though I could only hear the occasional word. He told me later that there would be many reindeer and that they should also go south for red deer and possibly even boar. After giving them the news he needed to rest again, but not for so long this time. Then he came over to collect the paints and gave me a small smile to let me know he was alright. I quietly asked if I was allowed to watch him paint. He seemed surprised that I had asked and said that I should. The place to paint seemed to be already decided. He got himself into a comfortable sitting position and I passed him the different colours as he needed them. He said immediately
"It’s going to be a raven." I hadn’t dared ask. He scratched the bird’s outline into the rock very confidently, then filled it with black except for a white eye. It looked like a mad bird at that stage. He hesitated for some time then before giving it yellow eyelids. The paints had to be mixed after that, which he didn’t let me do. Shades of grey produced its nearer three-toed foot with just a hint of a darker fourth toe then white claws. The leg further from us was darker and less well defined, also it didn’t quite join up with the raven’s body. I was learning. He did the eye next in a slightly blue black and letting the white show through just a little. With more blue and just a touch of purple he did its beak. The highlights on its feathers were mostly purple but he finished off with various greens and even a little white. It was so skilful, from his mad looking sketch he had produced a noble creature.
Father and I helped him home between us, even that short distance was a struggle for him. The sun was rising when we got there and Father got him into his sleeping-furs and made sure he was asleep before they all set out for the hunt. I slept until about mid-day. Ikaseraz slept on, so I quietly took our cookbag and went to Mother’s. She was happy to give us food for once and let me cook it at her fire. The camp was very quiet without all the young men. Mother was pleased to hear that the ceremony had been successful, though she worried every time Father went hunting. The baby was sleeping and Oskol and I played while Mother got on with her work. She didn’t ask for details of the ceremony but chatted on about what she would get done while the men were away. We had a good quiet afternoon and I was glad of the rest after all the strange excitement of the cave. Towards evening I carried our hot meal back to our shelter where Ikaseraz was awake and looking better. We ate in companionable silence.
Afterwards neither of us felt up to doing anything, so we just talked. Well, Ikaseraz did the talking I mostly listened. He would fire questions at me though, I couldn’t go a whole day without lessons.
"What is the meaning of the raven that I painted?"
"I wish I could paint like that."
"Application and practice. The meaning?"
"Ravens mean death, that’s because they eat the flesh off bodies. The death of the reindeer? You didn’t foresee the death of a hunter did you?"
"No I didn’t. The raven does signify death, but many other things beside. It is a very clever bird and that is often used symbolically. But it is also the keeper of memories. During this visit to the spirits they allowed me to speak to my ancestors, usually it is forbidden. I painted the raven to have something in this world to hold their knowledge."
"Are your ancestors happy in the spirit-world?"
"I mustn’t speak of it. It is not a secret to be kept from you, don’t think that. But when you trance it is easy to be influenced by what others have told you. It is important that you should enter there with a clean mind and receive what is meant for you to know."
"I’ll make us a hot drink. It’s cold tonight, I hope the hunters have found shelter and got a good fire going."
We warmed our hands at our fire and felt better for the drink.
"My spirit-helper showed me the meaning of your vision with the scarab. That I must tell you about. It is quite simple really. As we know the moon is a servant of Sky Father. The hare is the guardian of the moon in this world. The scarab is a winged creature which therefore belongs to Sky Father. You were the scarab so it means you are welcomed as a servant of Sky Father, passing the moon to its guardian."
I just hoped I would be able to find anything at all to do about the weather.
"Most people think the moon and the sun are discs, but some say it is more likely that they are spheres. This vision of yours of the moon equated with a scarab dung-ball seems to bear out the idea of spheres. But the spirits may not have intended us to make that interpretation."
He always thought I could understand long words.