As they approached it, Ayla became aware that something important was missing. "Jondalar, where is the donii? There is no figure of the Mother guarding the entrance."

He looked around and nodded. "This must be a temporary summer camp. They did not leave a donii because they did not call upon Her to protect it. Whoever built these doesn't expect them to last the winter. They have abandoned this place, gone and taken everything with them. They probably moved to higher ground when the rains began."

They entered the larger structure and found it was more substantial than the other. There were unfilled cracks in the walls, and the rain leaked through the roof in several places, but the rough wooden floor was raised above the level of the sticky mud, and a few pieces of wood were scattered near a hearth built up with stones to floor height. It was the driest, most comfortable place they had seen for days.

They went out, unharnessed the travois, and brought the horses in. Ayla started a fire while Jondalar went into one of the smaller structures and began tearing wood from the dry inner walls for firewood. By the time he returned, she had strung heavy cordage across the room from pegs she found in the wall, and she was draping wet clothes and bedding over them. Jondalar helped her spread the tent across a rope, but they had to bunch it up to avoid a steady stream from a leak.

"We ought to do something about the leaks in the roof," Jondalar said.

"I saw cattails growing nearby," Ayla said. "It wouldn't take long to weave the leaves into mats that we could cover the holes with."

They went out to gather the tough, rather stiff, cattail leaves to patch the leaking roof, both cutting down an armload of the plants. The leaves that were wrapped around the stem averaged about two feet long, about an inch or more in width, tapering to a point. Ayla had been teaching Jondalar the basics of weaving, and after watching her to see the method she was using to make square sections of flat mats, he began to make one like them. Ayla looked down at her work, smiling to herself. She couldn't help it. She still felt a sense of surprise that Jondalar was able to do woman's work, and she was delighted by his willingness. With both of them working, they soon had as many patches made as there were leaks.

The structures were made of a rather thin thatch of reeds fastened to a basic frame of long tree trunks, not much more than saplings, lashed together. Though not made of planks, they were similar to the A-shaped dwellings made by the Sharamudoi, except the ridgepole did not slope and they were asymmetrical. The side with the entrance opening, facing the river, was nearly vertical; the opposite side leaned against it at a sharp angle. The ends were closed, but they could be propped up somewhat like awnings.

They went out and attached the mats, tying them down with lengths of the tough, stringy cattail leaves. There were two leaks near the peak that were difficult to reach even with Jondalar's six-foot-six-inch height, and they did not think the structure would bear the weight of either of them. They decided to go back inside and try to think of a way to patch them, remembering at the last moment to till a waterbag and some bowls with water for drinking and cooking. When Jondalar reached up and blocked one of the leaks with his hand, it finally occurred to them to fasten the patch from the inside.

After they covered the entrance with the mammoth hide tarp, Ayla looked around the darkened interior, lit only by the fire that was starting to warm the place, feeling snug. The rain was outside and they were inside a place that was dry and warm, though it was starting to get steamy as the wet things began to dry, and there was no smokehole in the summer dwelling. The smoke from fires had usually escaped through the less-than-airtight walls and ceiling, or the ends, which were often left open in warmer weather. But the dried grass and reeds had expanded with the moisture, making it harder for smoke to escape, and it began to accumulate along the ridgepole at the ceiling.

Though horses were accustomed to being out in the elements and usually preferred it, Whinney and Racer had been raised around people and were used to sharing human habitations, even darkened smoky ones. They stayed at the end that Ayla had decided would be their place, and even they seemed glad to be out of the waterlogged world. Ayla put cooking rocks in the fire; then she and Jondalar rubbed down the horses and Wolf, to help them dry.

They opened all the packages and bundles to see if anything had been damaged by the excess moisture, found dry clothes and changed into them, and sat by the fire drinking hot tea, while a soup, made from the compressed traveling food, was cooking. When the smoke began to fill the upper levels of the dwelling, they broke holes through the light thatch of both ends near the top, which cleared it out and added a little more light.

It felt good to relax. They hadn't realized how tired they were, and before it was even fully dark, the woman and man crawled into their still slightly damp sleeping furs. But as tired as he was, Jondalar could not go to sleep. He remembered the last time he had faced the swift and treacherous river called the Sister, and in the dark he felt a chill of dread at the thought of having to cross her with the woman he loved.

Ayla and Jondalar stayed at the abandoned summer camp through the next day, and the next. By the morning of the third day, the rain finally slacked off. The dull, solid gray cloud cover broke up, and by afternoon bright sunlight beamed through the blue patches stitched between fleecy white clouds. A brisk wind puffed and sputtered from one direction and then another, as if trying out different positions unable to decide which would best suit the occasion.

Most of their things were dry, but they opened the ends of the dwelling to let the wind blow through to dry completely the last few heavy pieces and air everything out. Some of their leather items had stiffened. They would need working and stretching, though regular use would probably be sufficient to make them supple again, but they were essentially undamaged. Their woven pack baskets, however, were another matter. They had dried misshapen and badly frayed, and a rotting mildew had developed. The moisture had softened them, and the weight of their contents had caused them to sag and the fibers to pull apart and break.

Ayla decided she would have to make new ones, even though the dried grasses, plants, and trees of autumn were not the strongest or best materials to use. When she told Jondalar, he brought up another problem.

"Those pack baskets have been bothering me, anyway," he said. "Every time we cross a river deep enough for the horses to have to swim, if we don't take them off, the baskets get wet. With the bowl boat and the pole drag, it hasn't been much of a problem. We just put the baskets in the boat, and as long as we're in open country, it's easy enough to use the drag. Most of the way ahead is open grassland, but there will be some woods and rough country. Then, just like in these mountains, it might not be so easy to drag those poles and the boat. Sometime we may decide to leave them behind, but if we do, we need pack baskets that won't get wet when the horses have to swim a river. Can you make some like that?"

Now it was Ayla's turn to frown. "You're right, they do get wet. When I made the pack baskets, I didn't have to cross many rivers, and those I did weren't very deep." She wrinkled her forehead in concentration; then she remembered the pannier she had first devised. "I didn't use pack baskets in the beginning. The first time I wanted Whinney to carry something on her back, I made a big, shallow basket. Maybe I can work out something like that again. It would be easier if we didn't ride the horses, but…"