Ayla's smile widened. "You're right, Jondalar. I don't know if I could stand it if I couldn't see ahead." She understood that he had been worrying about following the trail left by the horses, just as she had, and had even considered her feelings. Tears suddenly filled her eyes with the love she felt overflowing inside her, and then the tears overflowed to match.

"Don't cry, Ayla. We'll find Whinney."

"I wasn't crying about Whinney. I was thinking how much I love you, and the tears just came out."

"I love you, too," he said, reaching for her, feeling a constriction in his own throat.

Suddenly, she was in his arms, sobbing on his shoulder, and the tears that came were for Whinney as well. "Jondalar, we've got to find her."

"We will. We'll just keep looking until we do. Now, how about fixing up a backpack for me. Something that can hold the spear-throwers and some spears on the outside, where they will be easy to reach."

"That shouldn't be too hard. We'll have to take dried traveling food, of course," Ayla said, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

"How much do you think we'll need?" he asked.

"It depends. How long will we be gone?" she asked.

The question stopped them both. How long would they be gone? How long would it take them to find Whinney and get her back?

"It probably won't take more than a few days to track the herd and find her, but perhaps we should take enough for half a moon cycle," Jondalar said.

Ayla paused, thinking of the counting words. "That's more than ten days, maybe as much as three hands, fifteen days. Do you think it will take that long?"

"No, I don't think so, but it's best to be prepared," Jondalar said.

"We can't leave this camp alone for that long," Ayla said. "Some kind of animal will come and tear it apart, wolves or hyenas or wolverines or bears… no, bears are sleeping, but something. They'll chew up the tent, the bowl boat, anything leather, and the extra food. What will we do with everything we have to leave behind?"

"Maybe Wolf could stay behind and watch the camp?" Jondalar said, wrinkling his forehead. "Wouldn't he stay if you told him to? He's hurt, anyway. Wouldn't it be better for him not to travel?"

"Yes, it would be better for him, but he won't stay. He would for a while, but he'd come looking for us if we didn't get back within a day or so."

"Maybe we could tie him close to the camp…"

"No! He would hate that, Jondalar!" Ayla exclaimed. "You wouldn't like to be made to stay someplace that you didn't want to be! Besides, if wolves or something did come, they could attack him and he wouldn't be able to fight, or run out of their way. We'll just have to think of some other way to protect our things."

They walked back to their camp in silence, Jondalar a little chagrined and Ayla worried, but both of them still trying to resolve the problem of what to do with their gear while they were gone. As they approached the tent, Ayla remembered something.

"I have an idea," she said. "Maybe we could put everything in the tent and close it up. I still have some of that wolf repellent I made to keep Wolf from chewing on things. I could soften it up and spread it on the tent. That might keep some animals away."

"It might, for a while at least, until the rains washed it away, and that could take some time, but it wouldn't keep out the ones that tried to dig or burrow under it." Jondalar paused. "Why couldn't we gather everything together and wrap it up with a tent? Then you could put your repellent on it… but we shouldn't just leave it out."

"No, I think we have to get it up, off the ground, like we do with the meat," Ayla said, then more excited, "Maybe we could put it up on the poles. And cover it with the bowl boat, to keep the rain away."

"That's a good idea!" Jondalar said, then paused again. "But those poles could be knocked over by a cave lion, or even a determined pack of wolves or hyenas." He looked around trying to think, and he noticed a large clump of brambles with long leafless canes full of sharp thorns spreading out from the middle. "Ayla," he said, "do you think we could poke the three poles through the middle of those brambles, tie them together about halfway up, put our tent bundle on top of that, and cover it all with the bowl boat?"

Ayla's smiled broadened as he talked. "I think we could carefully cut some of those canes so we could get close enough to get the poles in and tied, and put everything on top, then weave them back in with the others. Small animals would still be able to get to it, but most of them are sleeping, or staying in their nests, and those sharp thorns would probably keep the bigger animals away. Even lions will avoid sharp thorns. Jondalar, I think it would work!"

Selecting the few items they could take required thought and consideration. They decided to take a little extra flint and a few essential tools to work it with, some extra rope and cordage, and as much food as they could pack. In sorting through her things, Ayla located the special belt and the mammoth-tusk dagger that Talut had given to her at the ceremony when she was adopted by the Lion Camp. The belt had thin leather thongs threaded through it that could be pulled out into loops for carrying things, in particular the dagger, although the carrying belt could also be used to hold many other useful objects close at hand.

She tied the belt around her hips, over her outer fur tunic, then took the dagger out and turned it over in her hands, wondering if she should take it. Though its point was very sharp, it was more ceremonial than practical. Mamut had used one like it to cut her arm, and then, with the blood he had drawn, to mark the ivory plaque that he had worn around his neck, counting her among the Mamutoi.

She had also watched a similar dagger used to make tattoos, by cutting fine lines in the skin with the point. Black charcoal from ash wood was then put into the resulting wounds. She didn't know that ash trees produced a natural antiseptic that inhibited infection, and it was unlikely that the Mamut who told her knew exactly why it worked. She only knew that it had been strongly impressed on her never to use anything but burned ash wood to darken the scar when making a tattoo.

Ayla put the dagger back in its rawhide sheath and left it there. Then she picked up another leather sheath that protected the extremely sharp flint blade of a small ivory-handled knife Jondalar had made for her. She put it through a loop in her belt, and then she put the handle of the hatchet he had given her through yet another loop. The stone head of the small axe was also wrapped in leather to protect it.

She decided that there was no reason the belt couldn't hold her spear-thrower. Then she tucked her sling through it, and she finally tied on the pouch that held stones for her sling. She felt weighted down, but it was a convenient way to carry things when they had to travel with very little. She added her spears to the ones Jondalar had already put in the carrier of the backpack.

It took longer than they had thought to decide what to take, and even more time to safely stow everything they were leaving behind. Ayla felt anxious over the delay, but by noon they were finally mounted and leaving.

When they started out, Wolf loped along beside them, but he soon lagged behind, obviously in some pain. Ayla worried about him, not sure how far or how fast he could travel, but she decided she would have to let him follow at his own pace, and if he couldn't keep up, he would have to catch up when they stopped. She was torn by concern for both animals, but Wolf was nearby and, though injured, she felt confident that he would recover. Whinney could be anywhere, and the longer they delayed, the farther away she might be.

They followed the trail of the herd more or less northeast for some distance; then the tracks of the horses inexplicably changed direction. Ayla and Jondalar overshot the turn and thought for a moment that they had lost the trail. They turned back, but it was late afternoon by the time they found it again, going east, and it was near nightfall when they came to a river.