The Caves of Périgord: A Novel

wait to try this new thing, to paint you. How could we never have done this, thought of this, before now? This changes everything I thought I knew about our work.”
    He turned and looked at her with wonder, his eyes scanning her face, his hand reaching up to touch her hair. Amid his awe, amid his love for this woman, which was filling him and swelling his chest, he was looking with a painter’s eye at the planes of her face, thinking how to catch the forms and colors.
    “That is why I left that great space to the side,” she said. “I knew, or I hoped, that you would want to paint me.”
    “But you have left more space on each side,” he said.
    “Yes, for there will be children,” she said, smiling and putting his hand on her belly. “I have been thinking of painting your face for a long time. It was taking place in my head, and then last night I started making the sketches when I was sure that we will have a son to look at his father’s likeness on the wall.”
    “Or a daughter to look at her mother’s,” he said, his delight huge as he hugged her to him. “I cannot wait to start painting you, young mother.”
    “Not just yet,” she said, loosening the thongs at her shoulder to let her tunic fall to the floor, and slipping her hand to his thigh. “There’s time for everything.”

    He knew not what it was that woke her, but he felt her hand tighten on his shoulder and sat up, reaching for his ax, and thrusting her back into the passageway toward the cave. She moved clumsily, the babe heavy in her belly, but scooped up her spear and his pack as she scrambled into shelter. He saw nothing but the night stars and the trees rocking gently in the autumn wind, but he felt the presence of others nearby in the night just as surely as he felt the loom of the rock behind him. He groped for his bow and quiver of arrows, biting his lip in anger at himself at the scraping sound his bow made as he caught it on the passage wall.
    Moon was safe behind him, her spear ready. He had his bow, his ax, and his knife. He could hold this passage against any beast, and most men, unless they had the patience to starve them out. He and Moon had rehearsed their defenses. There were water skins and smoked meats in the cave, and rocks with which to build a wall that could block the passage and give him cover to shoot. He craned his ears and heard a whispering outside. Men. Then he heard nothing, but saw a glow as they stirred the embers of his fire into life and settled around it to wait until dawn. They could be strangers who had caught sight of their fire and would move on. But strangers would not be out at night, and if they were, they would call out and seek the hospitality of the hearth. The dread began to build with the realization that somehow, finally, the Keeper of the Bulls had caught up with them. Moon came and held him tightly. He took off his knife, slipping the thong around her neck, and they waited.
    “Daughter—Little Moon.” It was the voice of her father, the Keeper of the Horses.
    “Father.” Her reply was instinctive. Angry with herself for breaking silence she called out, “Why are you here. What do you want?”
    He showed himself, standing alone at the cave mouth, his arms stretched out a little from his body to show that his hands were empty.
    “I mean you no harm,” he called, and walked up the passage toward them.
    “Far enough, old friend,” said Deer, as the Keeper reached the low wall of stones. The older man’s eyes darted to the sketches on the passage walls as the dawn outside strengthened into day. “How many are outside with you?”
    “Many,” he said. “The Keepers, the hunters, the leaders of the woodsmen and flint and fishermen. And your mother, Moon.”
    “So many?” she said.
    “We have lost our cave. We have lost everything that made us.”
    “There are other caves,” said Deer, an arrow notched in his bow. He kept looking at the empty passage behind Moon’s father. “The storm took your cave, not me. Not us.”
    “The storm came in anger at what you did. That is what the Keepers have decided. You must come back and make everything as it was.”
    “You would give me to the Keeper of the Bulls?” spat Moon. “He would not want a woman heavy with Deer’s child. And you would not want a daughter who would be a Keeper and paint with your fellowship.”
    “You are having a child?” he said gently. “My grandchild.”
    “Look beside you, Father,” said Moon.