He was an abomination precisely because they saw his humanity, but degraded it and would not recognize it.
At a bend in the river, an upland stream fell into the Middle Mother, which itself came from higher ground. The marrow-chilling air had caught and stilled the waters in the act of falling, and the strong dry winds had sculpted them into strange and grotesque shapes. Caricatures of living creatures captured by frost, poised to begin a headlong flight down the course of the long river, seemed to be waiting impatiently, as if knowing the turning of the season, and their release, was not far off.
A frown creased Ayla’s forehead. She remembered he had used that word to describe her when she used her sling, and she wasn’t sure if she understood the word the way he used it. “Are you artist?” she asked. He made a wry grimace. Her question had touched at the heart of an issue about which he had strong feelings.
His people believed that the Mother had first created a spirit world, and the spirits of all things in it were perfect. The spirits then produced living copies of themselves, to populate the ordinary world. The spirit was the model, the pattern from which all things were derived, but no copy could be as perfect as the original; not even the spirits themselves could make perfect copies, that was why each was different.
When such single minded strength of will and purpose is directed to reach its goal, no boundary can resist.
They are lazy, worthless men who contribute nothing, unless they’re shamed into it, and they have little shame.
The men compete in what they do; the women in what they make,’ she said, then smiled, ’including babies, though that is a very subtle competition, and nearly everyone thinks she is the winner.
Hablan con sombras en la lengua.
Sorry. That is courtesy, right? Custom? Jondalar, what good are words like sorry? It doesn’t change anything, it doesn’t make me feel any better.” He pulled his hand through his hair. She was right. Whatever he had done – and he thought he knew what it was – being sorry didn’t help.
La mano y la vista hacen al artista.
But as more memories built up, crowding and enlarging the storage capacity of their brain, changes came harder. There was no more room for new ideas that would be added to their memory bank, their heads were already too large. Women had difficulty giving birth; they couldn’t afford new knowledge that would enlarge their heads even more.
Even smoke had beneficial properties; the smell alone evoked a feeling of safety and home.
She didn’t think anything could ever spoil her happiness as she filled her gathering basket with nuts.
Works of art were not just the finished product, but the thought, the action, the process that created them.
The test is not just something hard to do, the test is knowing you can do it.
When you don’t know if there is anyone in the world like you, you seek contact with something living however you can.
But even with that tremendous reservoir of information at her disposal, she had recently seen some vegetation that was completely unfamiliar, as unfamiliar as the countryside. She would have liked to.
Can only women have babies?” she asked, warming to her subject. “Yes,” he nodded.
You must learn to understand with your heart and mind, not your eyes and ears, then you will know.
She realized how much she had missed the company of friendly people who behaved in a normal way.
Ayla had grown accustomed to quiet and solitude over the past years. The mere presence of another person, while relished, required some adjustment and accommodation, but the emotional upheavals of the day had left her drained and exhausted. She did not want to feel, or think about, or react to, the man who shared her cave. She only wanted to rest.