"Obligation? I don't understand," Jondalar said.

"He's in terrible pain, though he'll never let you know it. I want to help him, I want to set that leg. I don't know how they're going to get back to their clan, but we can worry about that later. First I need to fix his leg. But he is already in our debt, and he knows that if I can understand his language, I understand the obligation. If he believes we saved his life, it's a kinship debt. He doesn't want to owe us more," Ayla said, trying to explain a very complex relationship in a simple way.

"What's a kinship debt?"

"It's an obligation…" Ayla tried to think of a way to put it that would make it clear. "It's usually between hunters of a clan. If one man saves another man's life, he 'owns' a piece of the other's spirit. The man that would have died gives up a piece to be restored to life. Since a man doesn't want any pieces of his spirit to die – to walk the next world before he does – if another man owns a piece of his spirit, he will do anything to save that man's life. That makes them kin, closer than brothers."

"That makes sense," Jondalar said, nodding.

"When men hunt together," Ayla continued, "they have to help each other, and they often save each other's lives, so a piece of each one's spirit usually belongs to each of the others. It makes them kin in a way that goes beyond family. Hunters in a clan may be related, but the kinship of family cannot be stronger than the bond between the hunters, because they cannot favor one over the other. They all have to depend on each other."

"There is wisdom in that," Jondalar said thoughtfully.

"That's called a kinship debt. This man doesn't know the customs of the Others, and he doesn't think much of what he does know."

"After Charoli and his band, who can blame him?"

"It goes much beyond that, Jondalar. But he's not happy about being in our debt."

"He told you all this?"

"No, of course not, but the language of the Clan is more than signs made with the hands. It's the way a person sits, or stands, expressions on the face, small things, but they all have meaning. I grew up with a clan. Those things are as much a part of me as they are of him. I know what's bothering him. If he could accept me as a medicine woman of the Clan, it would help."

"What difference would that make?" Jondalar said.

"It means I already own a piece of his spirit," Ayla said.

"But you don't even know him! How can you own a piece of his spirit?"

"A medicine woman saves lives. She could claim a piece of the spirit of everyone she saves, could 'own' pieces of everyone before many years have gone by. So when she is made a medicine woman, she gives a piece of her spirit to the Clan, and receives a piece of every Clan person in return. That way, no matter who she saves, the debt is already paid. That's why a medicine woman has status in her own right." Ayla looked thoughtful, then said, "This is the first time I'm glad the Clan spirits were not taken back…" She paused.

Jondalar started to speak. Then he noticed that she was staring into the empty air, and he realized she was looking inside herself.

"… When I was cursed with death," she continued. "I've worried about that for a long time. After Iza died, Creb took all the spirit pieces back, so they would not go with her to the next world. But when Broud had me cursed, no one took them back from me, even though to the Clan I am dead."

"What would happen if they knew that?" Jondalar asked, indicating with a discreet twist of his head the two Clan people who were watching them.

"I would not exist to them any more. They would not see me; they would not let themselves see me. I could stand right in front of them and scream, and they would not hear it. They would think I was a bad spirit trying to trap them into the next world," Ayla said, closing her eyes and shuddering with the memory.

"But why did you say you were glad that you still had the spirit pieces?" Jondalar asked.

"Because I can't say one thing and mean something else. I can't lie to him. He would know it. But I can refrain from mentioning. That's allowed, out of courtesy, for the sake of privacy. I don't have to say anything about the curse, even though he would probably know I was holding something back, but I can talk about being a medicine woman of the Clan, because it's true. I still am. I still own the spirit pieces." She frowned then, with worry. "But someday I will really die, Jondalar. If I go to the next world with the spirit pieces of everyone in the Clan, what will happen to them?"

"I don't know, Ayla," he said.

She shrugged, putting the thought aside. "Well, it's this world I need to worry about now. If he will accept me as a medicine woman of the Clan, then he won't have to be so concerned about owing a debt to me. It's bad enough for him to owe a kinship debt to one of the Others, but worse if it's a woman, especially one who used a weapon."

"But you hunted when you lived with the Clan," Jondalar reminded her.

"That was a special exception, and only because I survived a moon-cycle curse of death for hunting and using a sling. Brun allowed it because my Cave Lion totem protected me. He thought of it as a testing, and I think it finally gave him a reason to accept a woman with such a strong totem. He's the one who gave me my hunting talisman and called me the Woman Who Hunts."

Ayla touched the leather bag she always wore around her neck, and thought of her first one, the simple drawstring pouch that Iza had made for her. As her mother, Iza had put the piece of red ochre inside it when Ayla was accepted by the Clan. That amulet was nothing like the finely decorated one she wore now, which had been given to her at her Mamutoi adoption ceremony, but it still held her special tokens, including that original piece of red ochre. All the signs her totem had given to her were in it, as well as the red-stained oval from the tip of a mammoth tusk that was her hunting talisman, and the black stone, the small chunk of black manganese dioxide that held the spirit pieces of the Clan, which had been given to her when she became the medicine woman of Brun's clan.

"Jondalar, I think it would help if you would talk to him. He's unsure. His ways are very traditional, and too many unusual things have been going on. If he had a man to talk to, even one of the Others, rather than a woman, it might ease his mind. Do you remember the sign for a man to greet a man?"

Jondalar made a motion, and Ayla nodded. She knew it lacked finesse, but the meaning was clear. "Don't attempt to greet the woman yet. It would be in bad taste, and he might consider it an insult. It is not customary or appropriate for men to talk to women without a good reason, especially strangers, and you will need his permission even then. With kin, there are fewer formalities, and a close friend could even relieve his needs – share Pleasures – with her, though it's considered polite to ask his permission first."

"Ask his permission, but not hers? Why do the women allow themselves to be treated as though they are less important than men?" Jondalar asked.

"They don't think of it that way. They know, within themselves, that women and men are just as important, but men and women of the Clan are very different from each other," Ayla tried to explain.

"Of course they are different. All men and women are different… I'm glad to say."

"I don't just mean different in the way you can see. You can do anything a woman can do, Jondalar, except have a baby, and although you are stronger, I can do almost everything you can do. But men of the Clan cannot do many things that women do, just as women cannot do the things that men do. They don't have the memories for it. When I taught myself to hunt, many people were more surprised that I had the ability to learn, or even the desire, than that I had gone against the way of the Clan. It wouldn't have astounded them any more if you had given birth to a baby. I think the women were more surprised than the men. The idea would never occur to a Clan woman."