Chapter 33

On the next day the final preparations were finished well in advance, and only those in charge of the food remained busy as they waited to unearth the banquet of vegetables and meats that had been sealed in the cooking pit overnight.

The men went down to the plains to bathe and prepare themselves in private, while the women did the same further up the slope near the caves at the summit of the outcrop.

When they came back together around the central fire that evening, it would be with an eye for partnership. Fern and Netya donned their loose gowns of soft animal skin and each took turns making sure the other looked as appealing as possible.

Netya was not certain how to best make her friend seem more attractive, so she settled for braiding and ornamenting her hair in a way that made use of its fullness, securing Fern’s thick locks atop her head with several pretty pins made of smoothed bone, and then braiding in half a dozen strings of wooden beads that hung down alm