Glade and Ivory Ch. 27

Ivory was consumed by the flames of jealousy.

All through the night her moist vagina was repeatedly stimulated by Glade's fingers. She shuddered many times over with the warm pleasure her older lover had orchestrated and it was into Glade's arms she collapsed, but the object of her jealousy wasn't the shaman. It was Ptarmigan who at that moment was in the chief's company and no doubt also in the throes of passion. Now that Chief Cave Lion had returned his wife would from henceforth sleep by his side only and her love for Ivory would become just a memory.

When Glade at last collapsed into exhausted slumber, a restless Ivory stared into the dark shadows and reviewed her situation. She recognised now how happy she'd been during the time Glade and Chief Cave Lion were absent. She'd enjoyed the regular evening camaraderie with the other villagers around the blazing fires. She'd risen well to the challenge of being the village shaman and Ptarmigan had done well as the Chief's deputy. And now what did the rest of her life have to offer? Would she and Ptarmigan once again be compelled to share the Chief's semen together? Would Glade continue to share her body with whomsoever she fancied? Was this the best she could ever expect in her life?

When Ivory's fitful sleep was broken by the milky suggestion of daylight from the morning sun, she became aware that Glade had already arisen and was no longer by hers side. Ivory slipped out from under the blanket of furs that shielded her from the icy cold and grasped her clothes tightly to her bosom as she ventured out into the open air. Snow was coming down thick and fast. The bushes, shrubs and rocks that had been peeking through the shallow snow the day before were now hidden beneath a deep white coat.

Where was Glade?

Ivory stomped through the snow as she sought her lover and soon spotted the shaman in the well-constructed shelter the Cave Painter had erected in the shadow of a cedar. She was lying peacefully beside Ochre whose arm was slumped over her shoulder.

Despite her pain of rejection, Ivory knew better than to make her presence known so she strode over to the shelter where she and Ptarmigan had slept every night when the Chief and his warriors were exploring the hillsides above the Mountain Valley. Chief Cave Lion was sharpening flint blades by a small fire while Ptarmigan was caring for her children. A pang of resentment stabbed into Ivory's chest. It was obvious that the Chief's wife had made love with her husband during the night. Could she bear to look her lover in the face?

"Good morning," Ptarmigan said sweetly before Ivory could take the opportunity to slip away unnoticed. "Did you sleep well?"

"Not at all," Ivory admitted. "All night I was thinking about you and the Chief."

"The Chief is my husband," said Ptarmigan.

"Did you make love together?"

"He tried to," Ptarmigan confessed. "He wasn't very successful. My husband is very ill."

"And yet he wants to march us up the hills to the new hunting grounds."

"What choice have we got?" said Ptarmigan. "My husband says that there will be an abundance of game, nuts and berries. We are privileged to be granted such lands and honoured by the presence of the Cave Painters' ambassador. My husband sees only good fortune ahead."

"The shaman isn't so enthusiastic."

"Really?"

"She doesn't believe that the hunting grounds allocated to us by the Cave Painters will be enough to sustain the village."

"How can she say that in total contradiction to my husband who is as much her chief as he is yours and of all the villagers?"

"She can speak the Cave Painters' language," said Ivory. "The Chief can't. It was Glade who negotiated with the Cave Painters. Not the Chief."

"Oh."

——————————

The snow fell unceasingly through the rest of the day. From now on, the trek through thick freshly fallen snow to the new hunting grounds could only be arduous. Ochre was the only one who knew the route and he displayed no enthusiasm to head out in such conditions. However, as Grey Wolf reminded the Chief, it was necessary to make haste before the worst of Winter set in.

"It will be much more difficult to establish our camp when the snow hardens and the flowing water freezes," Grey Wolf said. "We must hurry. Too much time has been wasted."

"Wasted?" Chief Cave Lion wondered accusingly. "Who's been wasting time?"

Grey Wolf was flummoxed by the riposte. It was unusual for the Chief to be so sensitive. As usual, it was Glade who rescued the situation. "Your good friend, the great warrior Grey Wolf, is right to advise haste, my lord. There is several days trek to the plains of the Great Tongue Glacier. Any delay will be costly. If we tarry, we risk greater misfortune than if we stride forth."

"Can we all climb the hillside in this snowstorm?" the Chief asked as he gazed up at what could be seen of the hills.

Ivory guessed the Chief's main concern was his own physical ability, but also that he didn't want to admit to any weakness.

"The snowstorm will soon subside," said Grey Wolf. "Then we can set off. We are all ready, my lord. As soon as you say, we shall leave."

"The Chief is right to be cautious, Grey Wolf," said Glade diplomatically. "The trek will be arduous and long. There are many in the village who won't survive the journey."

"Such as?"

"There are some who are ill and injured. There are babies, young children and their mothers. There are women who are pregnant."

"Pregnant? Who's pregnant in the village?"

"I am," said Ptarmigan suddenly and unexpectedly.

"You are?" asked the Chief who seemed as astonished as anyone by this news.

"Yes, my lord," said his wife. "I meant to tell you but I forgot to do so in my great joy at seeing you again. I am pregnant. I may be too weak to accompany you on the trek."

"You can't stay here," said Grey Wolf indignantly. "The Chief's wife should stay always by her husband's side."

"The question is not the duty of the Chief's wife, but the welfare of the Chief's unborn child," remarked Glade. "We know that the Mountain Valley doesn't provide enough game and sustenance for the whole village and for this reason we need to trek to the new hunting grounds. However, the valley is sufficient to sustain half the village. It would be a safe refuge for those who are ill, injured or pregnant and who may not survive the ordeal of several days' slog through thick snow and freezing wind. We risk taking up the hill those who are least able not to their salvation but to their grave."

"Should my wife stay behind?" wondered the Chief.

"It is advisable, my lord," said Glade.

"She can't survive by herself."

"She would be attended by the injured, the ill and the children. There will also be the River People who shan't be accompanying us anyway."

"The pregnant, the ill and the wounded all need the ministrations of a shaman," objected the Chief. "You more than anyone must accompany us on our trek."

This confession of weakness regarding the need for a mere woman perceptibly shocked those who heard, but no one dared comment.

"You are right as you always are, my lord, to be mindful of the spiritual and material wellbeing of the tribe," said Glade. "You are right to be anxious that when I come with you to the plains with the Cave Painters' Ambassador that those left behind in the Mountain Valley will suffer. However, you need have no such fear. My apprentice has proven her worth in the days when we were parleying with the Cave Painters in the mountains. She can deputise for me in my absence during the long winter months."

"She can?" asked the Chief who hadn't considered this option before.

"I have heard nothing but good report of the care she took in our absence of the tribe's spiritual welfare, my lord," said Glade. "She treated the ill. She placated the spirits that protect us all. She will be able to care for your pregnant wife and even act as midwife when she gives birth to what I predict will be a son you shall be proud of."

"You propose that one in three of the village remain behind in this valley whilst the rest of us march onwards into the mountains?"

"It is what I recommend, my lord," said Glade. "It is not advice I give lightly. A village should stay together and a wife should stay with her husband, but these are perilous times. It is better that the village survives as two parties than that one party should perish in the bitter winter snows."

Ivory said nothing during the debate. As the shaman's apprentice, it wasn't appropriate for her to do so. Glade was only permitted to speak because she was the shaman and also because she was the only person able to communicate with the Cave Painters on whose mercy the village's survival now so humiliatingly depended. Ptarmigan had been allowed to speak because of her privileged position as the Chief's wife, although this wasn't a privilege she'd ever taken advantage of before. However, Ivory could see that it was Glade who was really directing the debate and that Chief Cave Lion was uncharacteristically feeble. The Chief could state no opinion that Glade couldn't overrule. Neither could any of the warriors who'd accompanied the Chief on his initial expedition. Grey Wolf was the only man with a more robust opinion and he was clearly irked at being so consistently ruled against.

"I didn't know you were pregnant," said an indignant Ivory when she was later able to snatch a hurried word or two with Ptarmigan.

"I'm not," said her lover with a conspiratorial smile.

Ivory shook her head in disbelief. "Then why did you say you were?"

"I spoke to the shaman," Ptarmigan replied. "I was troubled by what you said about the wisdom of the village settling in the hunting grounds allocated by the Cave Painters. She said that her reservations were very real and that she seriously questioned whether the village could survive at all. She told me that she thought that perhaps one in three villagers would die within the cycle of a single moon and that most of those would die on the journey. She said that the hunting grounds mightn't be adequate for even one half of the village. She said that she didn't trust the Cave Painters to give land to our village that could adequately sustain us."

"That's rather more than she said to me," said Ivory. "At least not in so many words. So the shaman suggested that you should claim to be pregnant?"

"Yes," said Ptarmigan. "It was her idea. She said that a mother needs to be with her children and that my children should remain in the valley."

"Well, it's not advice the shaman's ever taken seriously for herself," said Ivory who recalled with bitterness that Glade had abandoned her children when she left her husband.

"Sorry?"

Ivory bit her tongue. "I believe that the shaman's advice is sound," she said. "That's why the Chief has agreed to it so readily. It is better that the village break into two for it to survive. If neither the distant hunting grounds nor the Mountain Valley are able to support us all separately, then the best decision must be that one large village becomes two smaller ones."

"And that you and I can stay together," added Ptarmigan who again flashed her conspiratorial smile.

Ivory was torn how to respond. "Yes," she said. "We shall stay together, but only until your husband and the shaman to whom we are both attached return again in the Spring and we trek back to our ancestral home in the north."

"It is a temporary solution," said Ptarmigan who was less able than Ivory to disguise the emotion in her voice. "But if we can spend every night together during the winter moons then it is a solution I very much welcome."

——————————

It was Ochre who made the decision as to when the Chief and the greater proportion of the village should set out for the hunting grounds. He was eager to depart mostly, Glade told Ivory, because he wanted to return to the comfort and security of his home in the caves. Nevertheless, through Glade, Ochre advised caution. The snowstorm would pass in the following day or so and that was when they should set off.

In the meantime, the Mammoth Hunters had the opportunity to decide who should stay and who should go. It was already decided that the Chief, the shaman and all the hunters should leave, just as it was decided that those to remain behind should include Ivory, Ptarmigan and those too weak to risk the journey. This comprised the younger children, the ill and those nursing wounds. For the rest the decision was determined by allegiance. The hunters' wives whose children were old enough chose to accompany their husbands up the mountains. Those men of lesser hunting skills whose wives or children had to remain behind also chose to stay. At the end of this process, there were about a dozen Mammoth Hunters who chose to remain behind. The majority chose to leave. This was a secret relief for Ivory who had serious doubts about the Mountain Valley's ability to feed many more mouths.

While the tribe waited for the snowstorm to subside, they retreated to their shelters, pulled their furs around them and huddled together. The two busiest people in the village were Glade and Ivory whose medical skills were needed more than ever. The bitter cold made toes and fingers dangerously numb, but although the toes of some villagers were an unpleasant blue colour Glade made the decision that they weren't so frostbit as to require amputation. This was a relief to Ivory because this was the surgical operation she dreaded more than any other. Those most afflicted by the cold were the same warriors who'd accompanied the Chief up the hillside but such hardy men would hide any evidence of frostbite until it became gangrenous. As wounds were dressed, medicines distributed and prayers sung, a warm feeling returned to Ivory for Glade, her first lover. This was almost like the days before the winter migration.

However, when Glade was dragged away to administer to Ochre's sexual needs Ivory was abruptly reminded of how very different the relationship between them was now. And when Glade returned with the news that the Chief requested Ivory and her to come to his shelter at nightfall, she cursed the snowstorm for delaying Glade's departure.

Glade and Ivory trudged through the fresh deep snow to Chief Cave Lion's shelter when the sun finally dipped below the mountains and it was too dark to minister to the needy. Their steps forward were hindered by the sleet that pasted a mask of freezing ice on what small part of their faces was exposed to the elements. Ivory knew what the Chief wanted and she wished there was some way it could be otherwise.

Chief Cave Lion was weary and tired. His broken arm was bound in deer hide and supported by strong vines. He was not the man he used to be, but he was determined to have one last night with both Ptarmigan and Ivory, while Glade performed the duty of keeping his penis as erect as she could.

It was a tricky exercise for many reasons. The Chief's struggle to maintain an erection was just one reason. It was dark. It was cold. And the three women and the Chief were snuggled up together beneath a heavy pile of rhinoceros and mammoth furs that allowed them to be naked but made free motion especially awkward. Indeed, the most passionate love made under the furs was between Ivory and Ptarmigan that the Chief hardly noticed, but which Ivory was sure would make Glade pause for thought.

It was a long, a sweaty and, for the Chief, a not wholly satisfying night of love. It was also very bewildering for Ivory. It was easy to tell when it was Chief Cave Lion who was licking, cuddling, nibbling and even fucking her or Ptarmigan. It was more difficult to know which of Ptarmigan or Glade was nibbling at her clitoris or whose fist was in her vagina. And she could see that Ptarmigan made love with the Chief (her husband after all) and Glade at least as much as she did. This foursome of Sapphic love was both erotic and disturbing. How could she be jealous when Ptarmigan was being fucked by the Chief and her clitoris licked by Glade and when it was difficult to know whose affection she was also enjoying?

When morning arrived, Ivory knew that this night of love with Glade and the Chief would be her last. The sun was shining, the snowstorm had abated, and the ground was covered with thick snow that hadn't yet compacted. It was bitterly cold. It was the coldest it had been since last Winter when she'd marched south with her mother to the clan's traditional winter hunting grounds. Her breath didn't blow like smoke: rather it tinkled and sparkled in the clear cold air. Ivory's nose and lips were so cold that they were already blistering. The Chief's beard kept his face warmer in the cold than a woman's naked face would ever be, but it was speckled with ice where his breath froze to the bristles.

However, the sky was now clear of even a single cloud.

"These are the perfect conditions for you to leave," Ivory said sadly to Glade.

"It is," agreed Glade who gripped her apprentice's hand tightly.

"This is it," said Ivory. "You'll be gone for the whole Winter."

"Don't fret," said Glade. "I shall return."

Ivory who a moment ago was almost rejoicing that Glade and Chief Cave Lion were leaving so that she could have Ptarmigan all to herself gazed into the shaman's sad eyes and broke into tears. Glade drew Ivory to her bosom and clung to her as close as she could through the thickness of their furs.

"I hope so," Ivory sobbed. "I hope so!"

Ivory was inconsolable as Glade joined the congregating company of Mammoth Hunters who'd chosen to follow Ochre to their new hunting grounds. Ptarmigan might want to console her but her duties were with her husband and children. Ivory perched on a boulder from which she had shovelled off the snow with a fallen branch and sobbed while all around her there was the flurry of activity as everyone was getting ready.

Chief Cave Lion regarded her with a weak smile. Perhaps he thought that it was because he was leaving that Ivory was so upset. Glade almost certainly concluded that it was her apprentice's love of her that had made her weep so much. Ivory didn't understand why she was so sad. That Glade was leaving was certainly one reason why she couldn't restrain her tears. Ivory knew that despite her older lover's constant infidelities, she loved Glade more than she imagined possible. The love was so deeply ingrained that it couldn't be diminished by even her love for Ptarmigan. But Ivory's chief foreboding was that this might well be the last time she would ever see her lover. Glade had described her potential plight so vividly that Ivory was acutely apprehensive.

Most of the village was dismantled. Possessions were thrown into sacks and bags. Farewells were said and prayers made to the spirits, which Ochre observed with a wry sceptical smile. Then, led by the Cave Painter, the Chief and the shaman, most of the village's population hoisted up their bags or threw them onto their backs. After a final farewell the expedition turned its face away from the Mountain Valley to begin its trek onwards and upwards along the trail upon which rested so many hopes and prayers.

Ivory remained on the same rock for most of the morning and continued to weep. When the last farewell was made and Glade, in particular, turned away, she burst into irrepressible sobs that left her drained and wasted. Ptarmigan sat beside the shaman's apprentice and laid her hooded face on her shoulder. She patted Ivory while her lover sat transfixed at the sight of Glade ascending the sloping hills for the second time in just over a moon cycle.

——————————

It was another few days until Ivory recovered sufficiently from her grief to seriously return to her duties as a shaman. She was perfunctory and distant as she performed the familiar rituals. Neither her heart nor her soul was in true communion with the spirits. This didn't go unnoticed by Ptarmigan or any of the other remaining villagers. Some comforted Ivory by expressing their hopes and prayers that her mistress would return in the spring and advised her to trust in the goodness of the spirits. Other villagers confided to Ptarmigan their doubts whether the apprentice was really up to shouldering her responsibilities.