The Clan of the Cave Bear (Earth's Children, #1)

by Jean M. Auel

The Clan had changed so little in nearly a hundred thousand years, they were now incapable of change, and ways that had once been adaptations for convenience had become genetically set. Both men and women accepted their roles without struggle; they were inflexibly unable to assume any other. They would no more try to change their relationship than they would try to grow an extra arm or change the shape of their brain.

“May Ursus allow that it will always be so.

To the Clan, a new life was formed by the ubiquitous essences of the totems, and any relationship between sexual activity and childbirth was beyond conception.

“What are they, Creb?” Ayla signaled quietly, motioning upward. “Fires in the sky. Each one is the hearth of someone’s spirit in the otherworld.” “Are there so many people?” “They are the fires of all the people who have gone to the world of the spirits, and all the people not yet born. They are the fires of totems’ spirits, too, but most totems have more than one. See those over there?” Creb pointed. “That is the home of Great Ursus himself. And see those?” He pointed in another direction. “They are the fires of your totem, Ayla, the Cave Lion.” “I like sleeping out where you can see the little fires in the sky,” Ayla said.

“You don’t have the memories, child, but you have a way of thinking, a way of understanding what is hurting someone. If you know what’s hurting, then you can help, and you have a way of knowing how to help. I never told you to put snow on Brun’s arm when Oga burned it. I might have done the same thing, but I never told you. Your gift, your talent, may be as good as memories, maybe better, I don’t know. But a good medicine woman is a good medicine woman. That’s what is important. You will be of my line because you are going to be a good medicine woman, Ayla. You will be worthy of the status, you will be one of the best.”

The journey was uneventful.

Yeah no shit

She wanted to hunt for the clan, and when she couldn’t, she tried to find another way to help the clan. She may have been born to the Others, but in her heart she is Clan.

“The leader of this clan is grateful to the girl for saving the life of the son of the mate of the son of my mate.”

Just an incredible sentence to take at face value

The smaller brown bears inhabiting the area near their own cave had been known to break the neck of a stag with one blow of a powerful foreleg; what couldn’t this huge bruin do? Only another male during rutting season, or the female of the species protecting her cubs, would dare to stand up to him. She was invariably successful. But it was more than the tremendous size of the animal that held the clan spellbound. This was Ursus, the personification of the Clan itself. He was their kin, and more, he embodied their very essence. His bones alone were so sacred they could ward off any evil. The kinship they felt was a spiritual tie, far more meaningful than any physical one. It was through his Spirit that all the clans were united into one and meaning was given to the Gathering they had traveled so far to attend. It was his essence that made them Clan, the Clan of the Cave Bear.