Jondalar turned to listen. Though he was accustomed to her speaking to the horse that way, he had no idea what she was saying. She had an uncanny ability to reproduce the sounds the animals made – she had learned their language when she lived alone, before he had taught her to speak verbally again – and he thought the language had a strange, otherworldly quality.
Racer shifted his feet and tossed his head, squealing anxiously. Jondalar spoke to him in soft tones while he stroked and scratched him. Ayla watched, noticing how the tall man's wonderfully sensitive hands had an almost instant calming effect on the skittish young horse. It pleased her to see the closeness that had developed between them. Then her thoughts turned for a moment to the way his hands could make her feel, and she flushed slightly. He didn't calm her.
The horses were not the only nervous animals. Wolf knew what was coming and was not anticipating the cold swim. Whining and pacing up and down the bank, he finally sat down and pointed his nose up, voicing his complaint in a mournful howl.
"Come here, Wolf," Ayla said, stooping down to hug the young animal. "Are you a little frightened, too?"
"Is he going to give us problems again, crossing this river?" Jondalar said, still feeling annoyed at the wolf for bothering him and Racer earlier.
"It's not a problem for me. He's just a little nervous, like the horses are," Ayla said, wondering why Wolf's perfectly understandable fears seemed to annoy Jondalar, especially when he was so understanding of the young stallion.
The river was cold, but the horses were strong swimmers, and once they were coaxed in, they had no problem reaching the opposite shore, leading the humans as much as being led by them. Even Wolf was no trouble. He danced and whined on the bank, advancing on the cold water and retreating a few times, then finally he plunged in. With his nose held high, he struck out after the horses that were piled high with packs and bundles, and the humans swimming alongside.
Once they gained the other side, they stopped to change and dry off the animals, then continued on their way. Ayla remembered previous river crossings she had made when she had traveled alone after leaving the Clan, and she was grateful for the sturdy horses. Getting from one side to the other of a river was never easy. At the least, when traveling on foot, it usually involved getting wet. But with the horses, they could cross many smaller watercourses with little more than a splash or two, and even big rivers posed far less difficulty.
As they continued traveling southwest, the terrain changed. The hills of the uplands, that were graduating into higher foothills as they approached the mountains to the west, were crossed with the deeply cut narrow valleys of rivers they had to cross. Some days Jondalar felt that they spent so much time going up and down, they made little progress forward, but the valleys offered sheltered campsites out of the wind, and the rivers supplied the necessary water in a land that was otherwise dry.
They stopped at the top of a high hill within the central area of the hilly upland plains that ran parallel to the rivers. A vast panorama commanded their view in all directions. Except for the faint gray shapes of mountains far to the west, the expansive vista was uninterrupted.
Though the windy, arid land could not have been more different, the steppes, spread out before the two riders in a monotone of endless waving grass flowing over low rolling hills, evoked the sea with its featureless regularity. The analogy went deeper. For all the monotonous uniformity, the ancient grassland rippling in the wind was deceptively rich and varied, and like the sea, supported a profuse and exotic array of life. Outlandish creatures, displaying a flourish of biologically costly social adornments in the form of luxurious horns and antlers, shags, ruffs, and humps, shared the great steppes with other animals grown to magnificent size.
The woolly giants, mammoths and rhinoceroses, resplendent in dense double furs – long flowing hair trailing over warm downy underlayers – with thick layers of sustaining fat, flaunted extravagant tusks and exaggerated nose horns. Giant deer, bedecked with stately racks of immense palmate antlers, grazed alongside aurochs, the splendid wild forerunners of herds of placid domestic cattle, which were nearly as huge as the massive bison that sported such enormous horns. Even small animals displayed the size that was the result of the richness of the steppes; there were great jerboas, giant hamsters, and ground squirrels that were among the largest found anywhere.
The extensive grasslands also supported a bounty of other animals, many with remarkable proportions. Horses, asses, and onagers partitioned space and food on the lowlands; wild sheep, chamois, and ibex divided higher ground. Saiga antelopes raced across the flatlands. Gallery forests along river valleys, or near ponds and lakes, and the occasional wooded steppes and tundra played host to deer of all varieties, from spotted fallow and gentle roe deer to elk, red deer, and reindeer – called moose, elk, and caribou when they migrated to other lands. Hares and rabbits, mice and voles, marmots, susliks, and lemmings abounded in huge numbers; toads, frogs, snakes, and lizards had their place. Birds of every shape and size, from large cranes to tiny pipets, added their voice and color. Even insects had a role to play.
The tremendous herds of grazers, as well as the browsers and seed eaters, were culled and kept in check by the ones who ate meat. Carnivores, who were more adaptable in their range of environment and could live wherever their prey lived, also reached tremendous size because of the abundance and quality of their food supply. Gigantic cave lions, up to twice the size of their later southern descendants, hunted the young and old of even the largest grazers, though a woolly mammoth in its prime had little to fear. The usual choice of the great cats were the huge bison, aurochs, and deer, while packs of oversize hyenas, wolves, and dholes selected from more middle-size game. They divided the plentiful prey with lynxes, leopards, and small wildcats.
Monstrous cave bears, essentially vegetarian and only limited hunters, were twice the weight of the smaller brown or black bears, which also preferred an omnivorous diet that often included grass, though the white bear of the icy coasts subsisted on meat from the sea. Vicious wolverines and steppe polecats took their toll of smaller animals, including the vast number and variety of rodents, as did the sinuous sables, weasels, otters, ferrets, martens, minks, and stoats that became ermines in snow. Some foxes also turned white, or the rich gray called blue, to match the winter scenery and hunt in stealth. Tawny and golden eagles, falcons, hawks, crows, and owls snatched unsuspecting, or unlucky, small prey on the wing, while vultures and black kites cleaned up the leavings of others on the ground.
The great diversity and size of the animals that lived on those ancient steppes, and their bonus of exaggerated and richly enhanced appendages and supplementary growths, could only be sustained by an environment of exceptional quality. Yet it was a frigid, sere, demanding land surrounded by mountain-high barriers of ice and bleak oceans of frozen water. It seemed a contradiction that such a harsh environment could provide the richness that was necessary for the lavish growth of the animals but, in fact, the environment was entirely right for it. The cold, dry climate fostered the growth of grass and inhibited the growth of trees.
Trees, such as oaks or spruces, are luxuriant growths, but they take a long time and ample moisture to mature. Woodlands may feed and support a range of other plants and animals, but trees need resources to maintain themselves, and they do not encourage the development of multitudes of large animals. A few animals may eat nuts or fruits and others may browse leaves, or even twig tips from a tree, but bark and wood are largely inedible, and grow back slowly once destroyed. The same energy and soil nutrients put into an equal weight of grass will feed many, many more, and the grass will constantly renew itself. A forest may be the quintessential example of rich, productive vegetable life, but it was grass that gave rise to the extraordinary and abundant animal life, and it was the complex grassland that supported and maintained it.