Page 167 of Circle of Days

An added worry was Narod and the Young Dogs. Joia suspected they were biding their time, waiting for an opportunity to sabotage the mission, but she could not stop them in advance. In the farmer society troublemakers were dealt with harshly, but the herder folkwere different, and Joia did not have the authority to send Narod away.

As she got up and pulled on her tunic, it occurred to her that her future held many days when she would wake up anxious and struggle, with others, to do something that had never been done before. She felt both excited and dismayed.

Dee woke up, too, although it was still dark. Joia went to supervise the breakfast, and Dee followed along to help her. With Verila they cut up the remainder of the beef and laid it on the hides. By then a pale light was seeping into the dewy valley.

Seeing Dini, the daughter of Zad and Biddy, Joia asked her to wake up the other children and gather berries.

Joia ate some beef, then went to the stone. Seft was already there, with Tem and other cleverhands, frowning at the stone, contemplating the task in front of them. They did not look unhappy. A challenge such as this energized them.

Joia did not relish the challenge. All she could do was fret about whether they would succeed. Seft had a plan for today, Joia knew. She also knew that he was not sure whether it would work.

The volunteers gathered quickly, some of them munching beef, eager to hear Seft tell them how to achieve the impossible. Seft gave an impression of confidence which, she knew, he did not feel, as he said: “Here’s how we do it.”

Pointing, he went on: “That end of the stone is thicker than the other, and the thicker end will become the base. The thin end is the top. The first thing we’re going to do is dig a hole under the base.” Using an antler pick, he scratched a rectangle in the earthshowing where the hole should be. “The depth of the hole will be half the height of a person.”

Simple enough so far, Joia thought.

Seft stood facing the long side of the stone and stretched both arms out wide. “So, when we lift the thin end of the stone”—he tilted his body so that his right arm went up and his left arm down—“the thick end will tip gently into the hole.”

The volunteers were nodding. Everyone could understand that, especially with the vivid gesture.

Joia was encouraged by Seft’s plan and, even more, by his air of command.

“So, let’s get working.”

Here we go, Joia thought.

Tem had a stock of antler picks and wooden shovels. He pointed to two volunteers, who happened to be Zad and Biddy. He gave the pick to Zad and the shovel to Biddy. Men were usually better at breaking up the soil, women at shoveling it, no one knew why. They accepted willingly, Zad giving his typical grin, and began to dig the hole under the thick end.

Seft moved to the thin end. “The stone is partly buried in the soil, so we need to loosen it,” he said. “We can have a dozen or more people working on this at the same time.”

Tem gave out more picks.

“Dig all around until you can see the bottom edge of the stone. Then scrape away the earth under the stone, especially at the thin end, where we need enough space to insert levers.”

They all went to work energetically. Their enthusiasm heartened Joia. With all these eager helpers, she thought, we can do anything.

Anything humanly possible, at least.

At this point the biggest job was the hole under the thick end. They had to dig directly under the stone so that its end jutted out over the hole. Tem saw that Zad and Biddy were tiring, and replaced them with another couple. They finished the job, so that there was a hole into which the thick end of the stone could slide.

Next, Tem picked out five strong men and one woman, a flint miner called Bax. He gave each of them a stout oak lever about as long as they were tall, then stood them in a line at the thin end and told them to shove one end of the lever under the stone as far as it would go.

Joia realized that this would be the first time they tried actually to shift the stone from its place. If we can’t do this, she thought, we can’t do anything.

Tem told them to push forward and upward on their levers until the thin end of the stone lifted clear of the ground.

They braced themselves and heaved, and nothing happened.

Joia said: “Harder, harder!”

They tried again, grunting with effort. Bax became frustrated and red in the face. The stone did not move.

We’re going to fail right at the start, Joia thought.

Someone in the crowd said: “This will never work.”

That was Narod’s voice, Joia thought in disgust.