Great Bear Lake Page 11

  Then Kallik’s pelt prickled as she asked herself why Nisa’s spirit had appeared to her. She must have been showing me the way to go! She said she would take care of me. Kallik knew that she had to keep going; besides, she wanted to see the lake the she-bear had told her about. Even if she didn’t find Taqqiq, she might hear news of what had happened to him. She heaved herself to her paws and kept on walking.

  A faint breeze sprang up, pulling the fog into thin shreds. Soon Kallik could see where she was going again, following the bear trail through the same bleak, unfriendly expanse of mud and reeds and stunted bushes. Far ahead, she could make out a white dot that she thought was the she-bear; peering past her, Kallik picked out two or three more white dots, moving in the same direction. She headed after them, but didn’t try to catch up. None of them was Nisa or Taqqiq, and she guessed she wouldn’t be welcome to travel with them.

  The breeze stiffened, blowing toward Kallik, until she was fighting for every step against a raw wind that flattened her fur to her sides and blew stinging debris into her eyes. Gray clouds rolled across the sky. Rain began to fall, harder and harder; the wind drove it into Kallik’s face in cold flurries. Soon her pelt was soaked; she waded through a sea of mud that splashed up and streaked her white fur. Head down, she struggled on, almost as blind as she had been in the mist. Every pawstep was more of an effort than the last.

  “I’ve got to find shelter,” she muttered.

  Glancing around, she couldn’t see anything except the sweeping rain; she was almost ready to lie down in the mud and let it wash over her. But she was afraid that if she did that she would never get up again.

  Then she saw something dark looming up, a couple of bearlengths away from her path. She veered toward it. Maybe it’s a cave, like the one where I hid from the insects. But when she reached it she saw it was only an outcrop of rock poking up out of the mud. Sick with disappointment, she turned away, then looked back.

  You won’t find anything better, seal-brain!

  The outcrop wasn’t a real shelter, but at least it blocked out the worst of the wind. Kallik crouched at its base, huddling against the rock wall beneath a shallow overhang. Exhaustion swept over her; she didn’t think she could have gone any farther if she had tried. Letting out a faint moan, she closed her eyes and listened to the buffeting of the wind and the lashing of the rain. She longed to feel the comforting touch of her mother’s fur, to burrow into Nisa’s side, where she would be warm and safe.

  “Nisa, can you hear me?” she whispered. “Please help me. I don’t think I can go on anymore.”

  Kallik was drifting into sleep when she felt movement beside her; something was wriggling between her body and the rock. She started back and opened her eyes; blinking in astonishment, she saw the Arctic fox with the torn ear. Its pelt was drenched, showing every one of its ribs, and it was shivering wretchedly. Its terrified gaze locked with Kallik’s; it was tense with fear and ready to flee if she showed the least sign of a threat.

  A spark of warmth woke inside Kallik at the sight of the pathetic bundle of fur and bones. She wasn’t the only one to be alone and miserable.

  “It’s okay, fox,” she murmured. “You can stay.”

  She didn’t think the fox understood her, but her tone must have been reassuring. It relaxed, and burrowed even deeper into the gap between Kallik’s body and the rock. Kallik shifted protectively to give it as much shelter as she could. It felt good to be helping her companion, who had been with her ever since she first turned her back on the smell of the sea.

  Gradually the fox’s shivering faded; faint grunts and snores told Kallik it was asleep. Its body was a tiny core of warmth in the midst of the storm. Letting out a long sigh, Kallik closed her eyes and let sleep wrap itself around her.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Lusa

  Lusa woke with the sun on her face. Blinking, she parted her jaws in an enormous yawn. She was lying in a hollow among the roots of a small tree; it was too short and prickly for her to climb, but the feel of the trunk against her back was reassuring, as though the tree’s bear spirit was guarding her.

  Lusa wriggled and looked out at the new day.

  The sun was glittering in the sky, drawing out the delicious scents all around her. Her belly rumbled and she silently thanked the Bear Watcher for these long days for hunting and traveling, and for the trees that provided rest and shade.

  Leaves crackled underneath her; Ujurak, who was curled up beside her, raised his head, instantly awake. “Hi,” he murmured, stifling a yawn. “Is it time to go on?”

  “Soon,” Lusa replied. “How do you feel?”

  Ujurak got up and stretched each leg in turn. “Much better. The leaves I asked you to gather are really working.”

  “Do you want some more?” Lusa asked. “I know where to find them.”

  Ujurak shook his head. “I’ll be fine now.” Scrambling out of the hollow to look around, he added, “Where’s Toklo?”

  For the first time Lusa noticed that Toklo’s nest in the hollow was empty, only squashed leaves and fading scent showing that he had ever been there. For a moment her heart raced: What if Toklo had abandoned them? He wouldn’t do that, Lusa tried to tell herself, but the big grizzly cub had been silent and grumpy ever since they crossed the bridge, and she couldn’t be sure.

  Lusa caught a faint whiff of his scent. She climbed out of the hollow and looked around, sniffing the air. The sun was rising from behind a ridge of hills in the distance. It cast its bright yellow light on smooth green meadows patterned with the long shadows of bushes and trees.

  Toklo appeared from farther down the bank with a hare dangling from his jaws. He padded over and dropped it beside her and Ujurak.

  “Great! Thanks,” Ujurak yelped, crouching down to eat.

  Toklo settled opposite him, but Lusa hung back. She still felt guilty that she couldn’t hunt; it didn’t seem fair that Toklo had to do all the work. Her mouth watered at the sight of the hare, but she made herself turn aside and take a mouthful of leaves from a nearby bush.

  “What’s the matter?” Toklo called. “There’s enough for all of us.”

  Lusa searched for a reply, but before she could speak, Toklo added, “You’ve earned it, if that’s what’s bothering you. You found the herbs to make Ujurak better, so that’s your way of being useful.”

  Lusa huffed gratefully at him, surprised that Toklo seemed to know what she was thinking. But as she crouched to eat her share of the prey, she couldn’t help wondering how she could go on being useful now that Ujurak was well again.

  The hare was bigger than most of the prey they had found on the mountain, but it didn’t take long for them to finish it.

  “Which way now, Ujurak?” Lusa asked. “Is there a sign?”

  Ujurak stood on his hind legs and looked around, screwing up his eyes as he thought. “Yes!” he exclaimed at last, pointing with his muzzle. “See that cloud, just above the ridge? What does it look like?”

  Lusa studied the cloud. It was squarish, with a pointed bit at one end and four squat clouds hanging just below. The pointed bit looked like a muzzle if she half-closed her eyes, and the little clouds could be short, sturdy legs…. “It’s just like a bear!”

  “Then that’s the way we have to go.”

  Toklo took the lead as they headed toward the ridge. Lusa followed, feeling light on her paws for the first time in days. The sun was hot on her pelt, the air full of warm scents and whispering breezes. A small stream chattered across their path; they dipped their snouts for a drink, then leaped over it and went on.

  Ujurak was padding happily from side to side, stopping to sniff a flower or a bush, then bounding to catch up.

  Toklo halted, looking over his shoulder as the younger cub nibbled a patch of juicy grass. “Are you going to stand there all day?” he called.

  “Coming!” Ujurak launched himself forward and hurled himself at Toklo. “You’re the slowfoot around here!”

  Toklo let out a grow
l, and the two cubs rolled over and over, snapping playfully with open jaws. Lusa hesitated, then jumped forward and threw herself on top of them. She felt Ujurak’s paws pummeling her belly, while Toklo gripped her shoulder gently in his mouth. She knew they were curbing their strength so they wouldn’t hurt her; she wrestled back, slapping them with her front paws and wriggling away when they tried to catch hold of her. Black bears might be small, but that made them slippery as fish!

  Finally Toklo pulled away, slapping a paw at Ujurak as the younger cub tried to burrow into his side with a squeal of excitement. “Be quiet,” he huffed, sniffing the air. “I can smell another bear.”

  Lusa rolled over and sat up. “Where?”

  Toklo’s eyes were wary. “I’m not sure. Stay there.”

  Lusa and Ujurak watched as Toklo padded across the hillside, his neck stretched out to sniff the plants that edged the trail. Finally he halted beside a bush that grew on the bank of another stream. “A brown bear has been here,” he said.

  Ujurak bounded across to see what he had found, and Lusa followed more slowly. Close to the bush, she could make out the distinctive brown-bear scent, and spotted a single pawmark on the damp earth. It looked as if a full-grown bear had made it.

  Toklo was examining the bush. “There are no clawmarks,” he reported, “so we aren’t in his territory. But we still need to be careful.”

  They padded on quietly, alert for any more signs of the strange bear. Lusa spotted a few chewed-up berries, and Ujurak found a dent in the earth under a rocky overhang. The bear scent hung around it, and there were more pawprints.

  “All the prints are pointing the same way,” Toklo said. “That means the bear was just passing through. If we’re lucky, we might not meet him.”

  “Are all the marks from the same bear?” Lusa asked.

  Toklo replied, “Probably,” but he looked uneasy.

  Sunhigh came and went as the cubs plodded up to the top of the ridge. Lusa thought the brown-bear scent was growing stronger—so strong that she kept looking around, expecting to see the bear heading toward them. Then as she drew closer to the ridge she realized that it wasn’t only one bear she could smell; there were a lot of them!

  “Toklo…” she began.

  Toklo signed her to be silent with one paw. His eyes were watchful, flicking from side to side as he took in the bent twigs at the side of the path that suggested bigger bears had gone this way. Ujurak’s eyes were huge and round, as if he couldn’t imagine that many bears following the same trail as they were. Lusa’s paws began to tremble.

  They kept on climbing, veering toward a rocky outcrop at the summit, where they could hide until they saw what lay on the other side. As they reached the top Lusa’s ears pricked at the sound of voices growling or calling out, and the excited yelps of cubs. She peered out from behind the rocks.

  On the other side of the ridge the ground fell away more steeply. At the bottom was a huge lake. It was so wide that Lusa could only just make out the far shore, a dark smudgy line. Many bearlengths toward where the sun rose, thick woodland grew right up to the water’s edge, but the rest of the lakeshore was bare ground, dotted with rocks and occasional clumps of spiky dark green grass. The water reflected the blue sky and glittered in the rays of the sun.

  Between Lusa and the lakeshore was a huge mass of brown bears. She could see bears so old that their muzzles had turned gray, and cubs even smaller than Ujurak, bouncing around excitedly until their mothers drew them back and made them stay close to their side.

  “So many bears!” Ujurak whispered, peering over Lusa’s shoulder.

  “I thought brown bears lived alone,” she gulped.

  Toklo was staring down with an unreadable expression in his eyes. “They do.”

  “Then why are all these bears here?” Lusa asked. “What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know,” Toklo snapped. “I never heard of anything like this.” He gazed down in silence for a few heartbeats, then added, “Which way now? Can we get around this lake without meeting all those bears?”

  “If we can, I think we should,” Lusa said, hoping her voice wasn’t shaking too much.

  “No,” Ujurak protested. “This is the place. This is where the signs have been leading us.”

  Toklo snorted. “Brown bears don’t follow the sorts of signs you’re talking about. There must be prey here. There must be salmon in the lake.”

  “I think we should go down there,” Ujurak said.

  Lusa wasn’t so sure. She flinched as two young males reared up on their hind legs, batting at each other with their forepaws, their jaws wide as they roared ferociously. “If they’re friendly, I’m a squirrel,” she muttered.

  “They’re only playing,” Ujurak pointed out, watching the bears break apart and butt each other in the shoulder with their heads. Their slow, shambling movements weren’t meant to hurt, just show off their size and strength. “Come on!”

  “Okay….” Toklo still sounded doubtful. “But we should—”

  “Great!” Ujurak shot off without waiting for him to finish, bounding down the slope toward the gathering of brown bears.

  “Bee-brain,” Toklo muttered as he followed, and added to Lusa, “Keep close to me. Your black pelt will stand out here like a pine tree on a bare mountain.”

  Reluctantly Lusa padded beside him, following Ujurak down into the crowd of brown bears.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Lusa

  Lusa stuck as close as she could to Toklo. There were so many bears, huge adult males pacing the ground, adult females watching over their cubs, older bears picking fleas out of their fur, and young bears play-fighting.

  She caught scraps of their talk, or brief snatches of stories as they passed.

  “The river has dried up completely where we live,” one skinny she-bear fretted, looking down at her two cubs. “I can’t remember the last time we ate salmon.”

  “Nor can I,” an old male bear replied. “There’s still a river in my territory, but all the fish have gone.”

  “I just hope there’s food here,” the mother bear sighed. She nudged her cubs with her muzzle until they began to trot toward the lake.

  Just beyond them was another male bear with a wary look in his eyes. “Where do I come from?” he echoed to a younger she-bear who was questioning him. “Uh…over the mountains. There are slim pickings in my territory now. Too many flat-faces.”

  Is every bear short of food? Lusa wondered.

  A little farther on her attention was caught by another female, frail and grizzled with age, who was pushing a stick toward two small cubs. “Now, imagine this is a salmon. What are you going to do?”

  “This!” one of the cubs squealed, leaping for the stick.

  But the old she-bear pushed the stick rapidly forward so that it slid underneath the cub as he jumped, and his paws came down on the bare ground.

  “Hey, that wasn’t fair!” he complained.

  “Let me try,” his sister begged. “I think I get it.”

  The old bear retrieved the stick and pushed it toward the she-cub. The cub leaped and Lusa shook her head, expecting her to land short of the mock prey. But the old bear kept the stick sliding forward at the same pace, and the cub landed exactly on top of it. She let out a squeal of triumph as her claws closed over it. “See, squirrel-brain!” she taunted her brother.

  “Well done,” said the old bear. “Remember that the salmon won’t lie there and wait for you to catch it. You have to jump where it’s going to be.”

  “Can we try it for real now?” the male cub asked. “Please?”

  “Soon, but first—”

  “Hey, you!” a rough voice exclaimed.

  Startled, Lusa looked up to see a half-grown male grizzly standing right in front of her, his eyes glittering with hostility.

  “Yes, you, black bear,” he went on. “What are you doing here? This is our place.”

  “I—I’m sorry,” Lusa stammered. “I’m with my friends.” Sh
e looked around anxiously, but she couldn’t spot Toklo and Ujurak among the mass of furry brown bodies. She tried not to panic.

  “Your friends aren’t here.” Another voice joined in: it belonged to a young male, even bigger than the first, with a freshly healed scar stretching from his ear to his muzzle. He gave Lusa a shove that nearly knocked her off her paws. “They’re over there.” He jerked his head in the direction of the trees near the waterline. “So get out.”

  “Go now.” The first grizzly raised a threatening paw. “You don’t belong here.”

  Lusa looked at the trees. Toklo and Ujurak hadn’t said anything about going into the woods. And anyway, how did this brown bear know who her friends were?

  “Okay, I’ll go and look for—” she began, breaking off in confusion as Toklo appeared from the crowd of bears.

  “Come on, Lusa,” he said quietly, and added to the two young males, “Leave her alone. She’s with me.”

  The two grizzlies muttered to each other, still looking hostile, but didn’t say any more to Lusa. She followed Toklo toward the lakeshore.

  “I told you to stick close to me,” Toklo grunted, though he sounded more anxious than angry.

  “Sorry. I was watching some cubs.”

  Lusa stayed close to Toklo until they came to the water’s edge. There she spotted Ujurak talking to an old, toothless bear with white whiskers.

  “The ceremony will take place at the next sunrise,” the old bear was saying to Ujurak, “when the Longest Day begins.”

  “What’s the longest day?” Ujurak asked.

  “You don’t know? You’ve not heard of the Longest Day?”

  “No,” Ujurak replied.

  The old bear huffed. “In my day cubs were taught the old ways by their mothers,” he grumbled. “Cubs these days—”