Great Bear Lake (19 page)

Miki's right,
she thought.
This is like coming home, among other black bears. I'll be a proper bear with them. I'll be able to hunt for the same food and stay under the trees, close to the bear spirits. I've even made a friend,
she added, as Miki let out a little grunt.

As she drifted to sleep, Lusa gazed out through the branches at the lake. The sun was touching the horizon on the far side, staining the water pinkish red like the color of berries. A dark shape was bobbing among the waves, halfway between the shore and a distant island. Lusa blinked, peering at it more closely.
Is that a
bear
out there?
Drowsily, she wondered what it was doing.
I'm glad it's not me
.

She yawned and closed her eyes. The bear in the lake had nothing to do with her. She was safe with her own kind, and that was where she would stay.

I'm going to miss Ujurak and Toklo
.

I am with you, Toklo, the
waves hissed.

“Go away!” Toklo growled. “I don't want to be dead like you. Leave me alone!”

By now he was so far out that the choppy water was buffeting him from both sides, making it hard to swim in a straight line toward the island. He spluttered as a wave broke over his nose, and his head went under. Flailing his paws, he struggled up again; he was so low in the water that he could barely see the island, and the weight of his sodden fur was dragging him down.

I'll never make it,
he thought despairingly.

His limbs felt heavy like lumps of wood. He had never been so tired. It was a massive effort to keep on paddling and kicking out with his hindpaws, and he couldn't tell if he was making any progress.

Maybe Shoteka was right. I
am
weak. Mother? Tobi? Can you see me now?

The voice echoed inside his head.
You are strong, Toklo
.

Toklo felt bulky fur, slick with water, brush against his flank. His head whipped around, but he couldn't see anything except the choppy lake water. The sensation came again, more strongly this time, and with it a once-familiar scent.

Oka was swimming with him.

On his other side he became aware of a smaller shape, stick-frail among the waves, but pressing strongly against his side.
Tobi!
They had come to drown him, just as he knew they would.

Panic gripped Toklo in icy claws. He didn't want to drown! He lashed out with both forepaws, trying to thrust the shapes away from him. Thrashing frantically, he gulped in another mouthful of water and went under again. As the water closed over his head he found that he was trapped in an eerie, gray-brown world of strange shadows and flickering shapes. Faint outlines of two brown bears, one large and one pitifully small, spiraled around him.

You're drowning me!
he raged.
Let me go!

His paws flailed and his limbs grew heavier, and he began to sink down to the bottom of the lake. Pain clawed through his chest as he fought the urge to breathe. It would be a relief to give in.

Okay, you win
.
Oka, Tobi, here I am
.

Toklo shut his eyes and let the black cloud fill him up, first his paws, then his legs, then his body sinking lower and lower, and finally his head, until his ears buzzed with nothingness and he saw nothing but darkness behind his eyelids.
Is this how it felt when you died, Tobi?

There was a jolt, and Toklo's eyes flew open. Water dragged at his muzzle, which was moving steadily up toward a shimmering light. He felt himself being shoved again, harder this time, on both flanks. One push was stronger than the other, so he swerved through the water toward the lighter push. He fought to look back. The two bear spirits were behind him, nudging him with their shoulders.

Up, Toklo! Swim toward the light!

Toklo flailed his front legs, trying to drag himself through the water. The light rushed nearer and nearer, and suddenly his head broke the surface and he was gulping air, the best air he had ever tasted, which filled him up and sent the heavy black cloud spinning out of his head.

That's right, Toklo! Breathe!
The high-pitched voice of his brother rang in his ears.

Swim, Toklo!
his mother urged him, her bulk still supporting him in the waves.

Swim!
Tobi added. He sounded much stronger and happier than he had been when he was alive.
Swim with us, Toklo. I'll help you
.

Their bodies surged underneath Toklo, bearing him up. Some of his exhaustion ebbed away, and suddenly swimming wasn't as hard as it had been before. He stretched out his front paws and scooped the water behind him, sending his body slick as a fish through the waves.

“I'm swimming!” he shouted.

Yes, you are,
said his mother. She sounded proud and sad at the same time.

Toklo tried to look around, but waves splashed in his eyes and he couldn't see the bear spirits anymore. “You saved me!” he barked. “You didn't let me drown!”

“You are my son, and I love you. I want you to live for a long, long time. Tobi and I will be waiting for you, always. But not before it is your time to join us. Go carefully, precious Toklo.”

“I will,” Toklo replied, with a strange choking feeling in his throat that made it hard to speak. “Good-bye, Mother. Good-bye, Tobi.”

Good-bye!

Good-bye!

Toklo faced ahead again, and felt his mother and brother fade away from his sides. He didn't need them to help him swim now. He was pulling himself through the water, keeping his muzzle above the waves and breathing steadily. Oka and Tobi hadn't wanted to drag him down with them, and now he missed them even more.

He was leaving the open water behind at last; the waves stopped splashing over his muzzle, and the surface flattened enough for him to catch a glimpse of the pine-clad island ahead. It loomed above him, a dusty mound of earth and brittle grass, dotted with tall skinny trees.

“Pawprint Island!” he whispered.

Toklo felt his forepaws scrape on shingle. He dug in with his claws and stood up, bracing himself against the waves rolling in behind him. The water reached up to his shoulders. He began to wade to the shore. As the water grew shallower, he turned once more and looked back at the rippling black lake.
The silence pressed around him, deafening him. Suddenly, he didn't want to be alone.

“Mother! Tobi! Don't leave me!”

With water washing around his paws, he wondered whether he should go back into the lake to look for them.

No, Toklo,
whispered the waves.
It is not your time
.

Toklo swung around and trudged up the shelving lake bottom until he could clamber onto a boulder. He shook the water out of his pelt and looked around.

“I've done it,” he said aloud.

The sun had dropped below the horizon but there was still a pale light in the sky, and the night wasn't entirely dark. Only the lake was black and the hills around it, silhouetted against the gray sky. On the distant lakeshore he could just make out the shapes of brown bears, and farther around the lake where the forest reached down to the water, he spotted the shadows of black bears under the trees. He wondered if Lusa was among them, but the bears were too far away for him to make out one particular cub.

Toklo turned away from the lake.
I have to spend the Longest Day here, so I might as well explore
.

The ground sloped gently up from the water. The shingle beach gave way to grass, and then to shrubs and a few stunted trees. Toklo pushed his way into the undergrowth. It felt dry and crackly, as if it hadn't rained for a long, long time. There were no bear scents here, no pawmarks or droppings to suggest that he was not alone.
This is
my
territory,
he reminded himself, pushing down the empty feeling inside him. He reared up on
his hindpaws and scored his claws on the trunk of the nearest tree. They left deep, satisfying scratches behind. Even if there were no other bears to see them, Toklo knew they were there, and knew they meant that this place belonged to him.

Padding farther into the undergrowth, he spotted a weasel slinking under the bushes, its body low as it searched for prey. Instinctively Toklo began to stalk it; saliva filled his mouth as he crept forward, setting his paws down one at a time on the brittle pine needles. The weasel was scratching the ground underneath the bush. Toklo paused; the breeze was blowing in his face, carrying the creature's scent into his jaws and over his tongue. Toklo lunged under the bush and slammed his paws down on the weasel, snapping its neck. He scooped it up with his claw then crouched low, sinking his teeth into its warm flesh, savoring the juices as they filled his belly.

Oogrook had told him that the fate of all the bears rested on his shoulders. Toklo didn't know how swimming to the island would help, but he had done it. Perhaps the sight of the weasel was an omen of more prey for all the bears, not just him. He stood up and began to climb the low, scrubby hill in the center of the island. He felt the tingle of renewed strength in his limbs, and as he padded along he wondered if this was what Shesh had meant by the spirit of Arcturus coming to him on the ancient Paw Print.

From the summit of the hill, he could see the entire island. On the side where he had swum ashore, the ground climbed steadily upward, covered by trees and bushes. On the other side, the hill fell away more steeply, covered by thin, tough
grass. It ended in a cliff, with the lake water washing around sharp rocks far below. Toklo shuddered, glad he hadn't come ashore on that side.

The wind buffeted his fur and stung his eyes as he stood facing into it. It carried the scents of salt, ice, and fish, and the strange scent of bears that seemed to be a mixture of all three. Toklo peered into the gloom; these were bears he had never encountered before, and his pelt tingled with a mixture of curiosity and alarm. On the distant shoreline he could just make out their shapes, huge figures that looked carved out of ice against the gray rocks. The wind carried the sound of roaring to him across the water; they sounded fierce. Toklo was suddenly very glad to be alone on the island, and hoped that the strange bears didn't like swimming.

He trudged back across the stretch of grass and into the trees. He decided to make himself a den, and sleep until the sun rose on the Longest Day. He remembered seeing a comfortable-looking hollow near the beach, with a twisted pine tree hanging over it, shedding its needles on the ground to make a soft nest. He retraced his pawsteps and found the hollow, which was a bit too shallow to shelter him if it rained, but judging by the dust on the ground, that was unlikely. He snapped off some thin twigs that might scratch his eyes when he crawled into the hollow. Then he wriggled in and lay down, shifting around among the pine needles until he was comfortable.

Toklo closed his eyes. The soft lap of the waves on the shore seemed full of spirit-voices as he drifted into sleep.

 

The barking of bears woke Toklo; from his den under the pine tree he could see across the lake to the shore where the brown bears were gathering. They were crowded together at the water's edge, around the parley stone, but they were too far away for Toklo to see exactly what they were doing, or hear their voices clearly. Above his head the sky was flushed with dawn; the glittering disc of the sun was floating into the sky once more, already too bright to look at. Toklo's paws tingled.
This is the Longest Day!

A bird in the branches above his head let out an alarm call. Clambering out of his den, Toklo spotted movement on the beach. Something was bobbing in the waves at the edge of the lake, something far too big to be a bird or a weasel. Toklo ducked behind the pine tree above his sleeping hollow and peered out. Scrambling out of the water, shaking himself dry, was a ragged-pelted grizzly with a distinctive hump between his shoulders. Toklo's heart sank.

Shoteka!

Toklo waited in the cover of
the pine tree as Shoteka scanned the shore in front of him. After a moment's ominous silence, the grizzly opened his jaws in a roar. “Come out!”

Toklo's first instinct was to hide.
But he'll find me. It's a small island. And he can track me by my scent
.

“Come out, coward!” the humpbacked grizzly roared again.

“You shouldn't be here,” Toklo hissed through gritted teeth. “I'm supposed to be
alone
.”

Glancing at the waves, he wondered if Oka and Tobi were watching him, telling him to be brave.
I'll make you proud of me,
he promised as he stepped out onto the shore and faced the humpbacked bear. Just for a heartbeat he caught a glimmer of shock in Shoteka's tiny, hostile eyes.

“What do you want?” Toklo demanded.

The humpbacked bear let out a huff of contempt. “You think
you
can bring the fish back? A useless, weak bear like you?”

“I am
not
weak!” Toklo snarled.

“Weak bears should be killed,” Shoteka said, ignoring him, “before they weaken all of us. I don't know why your mother bothered protecting you. After all, she was weak, too. She couldn't even look after you!”

Toklo's anger erupted in a red flash of rage. “Oka did the best she could,” he growled.

“It was a poor best,” Shoteka sneered.

Letting out a roar, Toklo charged down the pebbly shore. Surprise gave him the advantage. He managed to rake his claws down Shoteka's side as he dashed past, before the other bear could do anything to defend himself.

Toklo whirled to attack again, in time to see Shoteka rear up on his hindpaws with his forepaws splayed out, his claws tearing at the air. Shoteka bellowed so loudly that a pair of large white birds flapped out of a tree behind Toklo. For a heartbeat he hesitated: This bear was nearly twice his size! His legs were like tree trunks, and his body was almost as big as a firebeast's.

You're smaller, but you're faster,
Oka's voice whispered in Toklo's mind.

Shoteka loomed over Toklo, ready to fall on him and crush him like a beetle. Darting forward, Toklo dodged the outstretched claws and slashed Shoteka's exposed belly. Blood sprang along the line of his claws, and Toklo smelled its hot scent. He leaped out of the way as the grizzly dropped to four paws again.

Toklo felt teeth meet his neck fur. He squealed as Shoteka
lifted all four of his paws off the ground, shook him as if he were a hare, then flung him onto the stones. Toklo lay still, half-stunned, trying to remember how to breathe; pain pierced him as claws raked over his shoulder and down his side.

Through blurred vision he saw the big grizzly standing over him, his teeth bared, ready to bite down on his neck. The reek of his hot breath swept over Toklo. “Are you ready to swim with the spirits, weakling?”

Desperately Toklo wriggled onto his back and battered at the humpback's belly with his hindpaws. He heard a grunt and his opponent moved away, enough for Toklo to scramble to his paws again.

“I'm not swimming with any spirits yet,” he growled.

He rushed in to give one of Shoteka's paws a sharp nip, before springing back out of range. He could feel blood trickling from his wounds, and felt as if his strength was trickling away with it.
I can't keep this up much longer
.

The humpbacked bear was wary now, circling him with hatred in his eyes. Toklo's courage surged up again. “Now who's weak?” he taunted.

Shoteka lunged at him; Toklo dodged at the last moment and managed to get another blow in on the bear's rump. The humpback let out a shriek of frustration.

Before Shoteka could turn to face him again, Toklo scrambled up onto the other bear's back. He raked his claws across the humpback's head, tearing out huge clumps of fur. Shoteka's blood spattered on the pebbles. He started to rear up again; Toklo half-jumped, half-fell off the bear's back and
braced himself for the next blow.

But the grizzly didn't attack. Instead, he dropped his forepaws to the ground and stood shaking his head. Toklo watched him, terrified that Shoteka was gathering his strength for a quick revenge. Panting, he crouched on the stones, feeling them dig into the scratches on his flanks.

But Shoteka turned away and shambled a few paces farther down the beach. Toklo stared after him in startled silence as the humpbacked bear paused for a couple of heartbeats, then began to wade out into the lake.

With water halfway up his legs, Shoteka turned to look over his shoulder. “You are not worthy to honor Arcturus,” he snapped. “I may have spared you today, but there will come a time when you'll wish that I'd killed you. Your mother shamed me, and I will have my revenge. For now, I will let you live. But there are worse times to come, little bear, believe me. This is only the beginning.”

He waded out farther until the water reached his shoulders and he began to swim. Toklo watched his bobbing dark head vanish among the white-tipped waves.

So that's why he came looking for me,
he thought.
Because my mother saved me before. Oka, you were right to save me then. I'll never regret that, never!
He pushed away the memory of Shoteka's last words, about worse times lying ahead. Those were just the words of a defeated bear; they meant nothing. Toklo would never wish he had died!

He waded into the lake until he could lie on one side and let the waves lap against his wounds. He took a few mouthfuls
of cool water.
My first battle,
he thought.
I defended my territory
.

Heaving himself out of the water, Toklo limped back across the foreshore and curled up in the hollow underneath the pine tree. The sun was well above the horizon now, its warm rays soothing his battered body.

This was what it meant to be a brown bear. To live alone, powerful and fierce, so that every other bear would respect and fear him.

I want it to be like this always,
he thought.
I don't want to be responsible for any other bears. Just myself, guarding my territory alone like the star that is chased around the sky
.