"What is it, Wolf?" Ayla said. Looking more closely, she found a brown stain on one of the logs and felt a touch of panic drain her face. It was dried blood, she was sure, probably Jondalar's blood. She patted the canine's head. "We'll find him," she said, to reassure herself as much as the wolf, but she wasn't at all sure that they would find him alive.

The trail leading from the landing ran between fields of tall dry grass intermixed with brush and was much easier to follow. The problem was that it was so well used that she couldn't be sure it had been taken by the ones she was pursuing. Wolf was in the lead, for which Ayla was soon more than grateful. They had not been on the path long when he stopped in his tracks, wrinkling his nose and baring his teeth in a snarl.

"Wolf? What is it? Is someone coming?" Ayla said, even as she turned Whinney off the path and headed for some thick brush, signaling Wolf to follow. She slid off the mare's back as soon as they were screened by the tall, bare branches and grass, grabbed Racer's lead rope to guide him behind the mare, since he was wearing the pack, and hid between the horses herself. She knelt on one knee and put an arm around Wolf's neck to keep him quiet, then waited.

Her assessment was not wrong. Before long, two young women ran past, obviously heading for the river. She signaled Wolf to stay and then, using the stealth she had learned when tracking carnivores as a girl, she followed them back, creeping close through the grass, then hiding behind some brush to watch.

The two women talked to each other as they uncovered the raft, and though the language was unfamiliar, she noticed a similarity to Mamutoi. She wasn't quite able to understand them, but she thought she caught the meaning of a word or two.

The women pushed the log platform almost into the water, then retrieved two long poles that had been underneath it. They fastened one end of a large coil of rope around a tree, then climbed on. As one began to pole across the river, the other played out the rope. When they were near the other side, where the current was not as swift, they started poling upstream until they reached the docking place. With ropes fastened to the raft, they secured it to the poles sticking up from the water and stepped off to the logs stuck into the bank. Leaving the raft, they started running back the way Ayla had just come.

She returned to the animals, thinking about what to do. She felt sure the women would be returning soon, but "soon" could be this day, or the next, or the one after. She wanted to find Jondalar as soon as possible, but she didn't want to continue following the trail and have them catch up with her. She was also reluctant to approach them directly until she knew more about them. She finally decided to look for a place to wait for them where she could watch them coming without being seen.

She was pleased that her wait was not too long. By afternoon she saw the two women returning, along with several other people, all carrying litters of butchered meat and sections of horse. They were moving surprisingly fast in spite of their loads. When they drew nearer, Ayla realized there was not a single man in the hunting party. All the hunters were women! She watched them load the meat on the raft, then pole across using the rope for a guide. They hid the raft after unloading it, but they left the guide rope strung across the river, which puzzled her.

Ayla was again surprised at how fast they traveled as they started up the trail. Almost before she knew it, they were gone. She waited some time before she followed, and she kept well behind.

Jondalar was appalled at the conditions inside the fence. The only shelter was a rather large, crude lean-to, which offered scant protection from rain or snow, and the fence of posts, itself, which blocked the wind. There were no fires, little water, and no food available. The only people within the Holding were male, and they showed the effects of the poor conditions. As they came out of the shelter to stand and stare at him, he saw that they were thin, dirty, and ill-clad. None of them had sufficient clothing for the weather, and they probably had to huddle together in the lean-to in an attempt to keep warm.

He recognized one or two from the walk up to the funeral, and he wondered why the men and boys were living in such a place. Suddenly several puzzling things came together: the attitude of the women with spears, the strange comments of Ardemun, the behavior of the men walking to the funeral, the reticence of S'Armuna, the belated examination of his wounds, and their generally harsh treatment of him. Maybe it wasn't the result of a misunderstanding that would be cleared up as soon as he convinced Attaroa that he wasn't lying.

The conclusion he was forced to seemed preposterous, but the full realization struck him with the force to shatter his disbelief. It was so obvious that he wondered why it had taken him so long to see it. The men were kept here against their will by the women!

But why? It was such a waste to keep people inactive like this when they could all be contributing to the welfare and benefit of the entire community. He thought of the prosperous Lion Camp of the Mamutoi, with Talut and Tulie organizing the necessary activities of the Camp for the benefit of everyone. They all contributed, and they still had plenty of time to work on their own individual projects.

Attaroa! How much was her doing? She was obviously the head-woman or leader of this Camp. If she wasn't entirely responsible, at the least, she seemed determined to maintain the peculiar situation.

These men should be hunting and collecting food, Jondalar thought, and digging storage pits, making new shelters and repairing old ones; contributing, not huddling together trying to keep warm. No wonder these people were out hunting horses this late in the season. Did they even have enough food stored to last through the winter? And why did they hunt so far away when they had such a perfect hunting opportunity so close at hand?

"You're the one they call the Zelandonii man," one of the men said, speaking Mamutoi. Jondalar thought he recognized him as one whose hands had been tied when they marched up to the funeral.

"Yes. I am Jondalar of the Zelandonii."

"I am Ebulan of the S'Armunai," he said, then added sardonically, "In the name of Muna, the Mother of All, let me welcome you to the Holding, as Attaroa likes to call this place. We have other names: the Men's Camp, the Mother's Frozen Underworld, and Attaroa's Man Trap. Take your pick."

"I don't understand. Why are you… all of you, here?" Jondalar asked.

"It's a long story, but essentially we were all tricked, one way or another," Ebulan said. Then, with an ironic grimace, he continued, "We were even tricked into building this place. Or most of it."

"Why don't you just climb over the wall and get out?" Jondalar said.

"And get pierced by Epadoa and her spear-stickers?" another man said.

"Olamun is right. Besides, I'm not sure how many could make the effort, any more," Ebulan added. "Attaroa likes to keep us weak… or worse."

"Worse?" Jondalar said, frowning.

"Show him, S'Amodun," Ebulan said to a tall, cadaverously thin man with gray matted hair and a long beard that was almost white. He had a strong, craggy face with a long, high-bridged beak of a nose and heavy brows that were accented by his gaunt face, but it was his eyes that captured the attention. They were compelling, as dark as Attaroa's, but rather than malice they held depths of ancient wisdom, mystery, and compassion. Jondalar wasn't sure what it was about him, some quality of carriage or demeanor, but he sensed that this was a man who commanded great respect, even in these wretched conditions.

The old man nodded and led the way to the lean-to. As they neared, Jondalar could see that a few people were still inside. As he ducked under the sloping roof, an overpowering stench assaulted him. A man was lying on a plank that might have been torn from the roof, and he was covered with only a ripped piece of hide. The old man pulled back the cover and exposed a putrefying wound in his side.