The Burning Horizon (20 page)

Lusa set out across the scrubby grass, staying alongside the BlackPath. Her pelt prickled with apprehension, and she kept her ears alert for approaching firebeasts. After a while, realizing how hungry she was, she stopped to nibble berries from a scrawny bush and dug down to find some juicy white roots. Beside the BlackPath she found a puddle and took a drink, curling her lip at the tang of firebeasts in the water.

Yuck!

While Lusa was drinking, she heard a firebeast growl toward her and stop nearby. Looking up, she recognized all three flat-faces peering out from its belly. “No!” Lusa yelped, fear and shock freezing her to the spot. “They've found me!”

The young flat-face scrambled out of the firebeast and pointed at Lusa. Before she could get any closer, Lusa took off, racing across the scrubland toward a huge expanse of glossy green plants that towered above her head. Plunging into the stalks, Lusa spotted yellow kernels underpaw.
Corn! I remember that from the Bear Bowl.

Lusa pushed her way through the thick stems, deeper and deeper. Sharp-edged leaves scratched her face and caught in her fur, but Lusa didn't slow down. She could hear the flat-faces barking at the edge of the corn, their voices high-pitched against the soft rustle of stalks. They didn't seem to be following her in, but Lusa didn't want to risk it so she kept going, trying not to brush against the stems and give herself away by their movement.

On and on Lusa went until she stumbled to a halt, her
cheeks stinging from the leaves, and strained to listen over the rustling sound of the cornstalks. There was no sign of pursuit from the flat-faces.

“Okay!” Lusa blew out a breath of relief. “Now all I need to do is find a way out.”

But as she looked around, Lusa realized that she had no idea which way to go.
I'm lost!

Fighting down panic, she nibbled some of the corn and licked the leaves for moisture to quench her thirst. Then she chose a direction and set out, only to stop again, afraid that she was just heading deeper and deeper into the corn. She turned around, but everywhere she looked, stalks stretched away from her into the distance. Now the noise of the wind in the leaves seemed sinister and hostile, as if the corn was watching Lusa and surrounding her endlessly. . . .
It can't go on forever, can it?

“Ujurak?” she called in a small voice. “Can you see me?”

There was no reply. Feeling desolate and foolish, Lusa curled herself into a tiny ball.

Though she hadn't intended to sleep, she must have dozed, because when she uncurled herself, it was dark. She shivered, spooked by the corn as it whispered all around her. It was nothing like the comforting murmurs of black bear spirits that she could hear in trees.

The cornstalks seemed to be pressing in on Lusa, making it hard to breathe. Desperate for some fresh air, she looked up. At once new courage flowed through her as she spotted Ujurak shining ahead of her, strong and bright, and Arcturus
gleaming down, just as they had on every step of her journey. She gazed at the glittering points of light, overwhelmed by the memory of the time in the cave when Ursa had appeared in all her blazing splendor and guided her son back to his home in the stars.

“Ursa and Ujurak will show me the way!” Lusa exclaimed.

Setting out again, Lusa used the familiar star-shapes to guide her through the corn. The trek seemed to take forever. Lusa's snout grew sore from brushing against the leaves, and her neck got stiff from looking up, but she kept going.

I just have to get out before daylight comes and the stars vanish,
she told herself.

Gradually Lusa began to hear other sounds besides the rustle of the cornstalks. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked. A firebeast coughed and roared away.
I must be close to the edge!

Lusa began to run, forcing her way through the corn. Finally she blundered out and came to a dead stop, her sides heaving as she looked out across a stretch of smooth grassland. The breeze stroked her ruffled fur, and her eyes watered in the cool night air.

“Thank you, Ujurak,” she whispered.

Lusa trekked across the grass in starlight, her body casting a huge shadow beside her. She felt exposed once she left the cover of the corn, but she knew she wasn't alone, because Ursa and Ujurak were watching over her. When she reached a BlackPath, she ducked down into the ditch that ran alongside it and waited until it was clear of firebeasts. Then she ran swiftly across the hard gray stone and headed onward across
another murmuring expanse of grass, following the stars all the while.

As dawn appeared on the horizon, Lusa began to look for somewhere to shelter. She veered away from a flat-face den, then realized that it had been abandoned, with large holes in the walls and the roof beginning to fall in. She was wary of entering the den itself, but she found a dense patch of undergrowth just behind it and crawled into cover beneath the overhanging stems.

At first Lusa found it hard to sleep. Her mind was filled with Taktuq, the young flat-face, and the coyote.
I wish I could have said good-bye to Taktuq. And I hope I didn't scare the flat-face by fighting the coyote. I did it to save her!
But most of all she wondered whether she would be able to find her friends. A dark space seemed to open up inside her when she thought about how far away they might be by now, though she had to believe Ujurak was leading her somewhere important.

Eventually Lusa sank into sleep. Her dreams were full of the clicking feet of caribou, and she hoped that she had understood the sign of the caribou herd Ujurak had sent her.

When Lusa woke, she scavenged some leaves and berries from the patch of undergrowth where she had slept and waited impatiently until the stars appeared so she could set out once again.

The night before, the sky had been clear and the stars easy to follow. But now the tiny silver dots appeared fitfully through clouds, confusing her when she tried to figure out her bearings. Lusa headed in what she thought was the right
direction, only to realize when the sky cleared briefly that she was completely wrong. She let out an annoyed growl as she turned back to face the outlines of Ujurak and Ursa again.

Gradually the grassland gave way to a barren, rocky area, though it was still mostly flat. Lusa plodded up to the top of a low hill and became aware of thickening shadows shifting in front of her. She paused for breath, and at that moment the clouds shifted. Moonlight lit up the land with a cold, silver radiance. Huge shadows were moving toward Lusa. She flinched back, terror coursing through her.

Great spirits!

The shadows drew closer, and an ominous rumbling, clicking sound came to Lusa's ears. For a moment she was even more frightened until she realized what it was.

Caribou! I found them!

Even though night had fallen, the animals were still moving, quiet and patient in the shadows. The herd was passing below Lusa, around the bottom of the rise. Lusa ran down toward them, getting as close as she dared and taking cover behind a scatter of rocks. The caribou took no notice of her, as if they didn't even sense she was there. On and on they passed; there were more of them than Lusa could possibly count. She peered into the throng of animals, wondering whether her friends could be hidden inside the herd, like Ujurak had been in her dream.
No, that's impossible,
she told herself.
Caribou would never travel with bears so close.

Finally the last of the caribou passed by, leaving a trail behind them that stretched back into the darkness. Lusa
waited, hoping breathlessly for her friends to appear, following the trail. As the moments dragged by, she called out, “Toklo! Kallik! Yakone!” but there was no reply.

I found the caribou, but now which way do I go?

With such a momentous decision in front of her, Lusa settled down in the grass beside the trail and let her thoughts turn over. She knew that if she made the wrong decision, she might lose her friends forever.

Should I follow the caribou and hope they'll take me to the others? Or follow the trail back and look for them that way?

As Lusa crouched there in an agony of indecision, she remembered how in her dream Ujurak had made her turn around and look back along the caribou trail. She sat up, suddenly alert, her heart beating faster. “Ujurak wanted me to follow the caribou trail in the opposite direction!” she exclaimed aloud, so excited to have pieced the signs together.

Taking a deep breath, Lusa rose to her paws, squared her shoulders, and turned to follow the hoofprints back the way they had come.

I found the caribou, Ujurak!
she thought.
Now you have to help me find my friends!

“Caribou! Look!” Kallik halted in front
of the others and looked down at the ground. Lots and lots of hoofprints were pressed into the soft mulch of the forest floor, and there was a strong scent of caribou.

The bears had been traveling through the forest for a day. They had followed the direction of the stars down a steep, rocky incline, narrowly managing to keep their footing on the loose scree. Kallik felt a huge sense of relief at finding the caribou trail again. It looked like they were traveling through the forest in the same direction but must have taken a detour because of the steep slope. Kallik was beginning to feel even more certain that the stars and the caribou would bring them to Lusa.

Toklo padded up beside her and gave the tracks a sniff. “Yes, we're certainly going the right way,” he said with satisfaction. “It's great that our two signs have come together again. We
must
be close to finding Lusa.”

They pressed on over the soft mossy ground. Even Kallik
and Yakone, who were used to the ice, found the going easier than the rough surface of the glacier.

And there are no crevasses to fall down!
Kallik thought.

She soon realized that the light up ahead was growing brighter. “We're coming to the edge of the forest!” she barked.

All three bears paused at the tree line and gazed out across the vast open landscape, a gently rolling expanse of rippling green and gold. The horizon shimmered like smoke in the heat of the day.

Kallik felt dread churn in her belly. The hot sun weakened her and Yakone so much. She longed to stay in the shade of the trees. But they had no choice. That was where the trail led, so they had to strike out into the vulnerable emptiness and find Lusa.

“We'll have to leave the caribou trail,” Yakone decided. “We know we're going in the right direction, and we have the stars to guide us. Right now it's more important for us to choose a route that gives us some cover.”

“Let's head for those trees,” Toklo suggested. “I don't like being out here like a bug on a leaf.”

He led the way across the open ground until they reached a copse, but the trees were so spindly they hardly cast any shade. Kallik couldn't see any more cover in the direction they had to go if they were going to follow the caribou trail, but her belly still churned as they turned away from the hoof marks pressed into the brittle grass.

The bears didn't feel much better protected when they were among the tree trunks.

“Even if we don't follow the caribou trail, it still feels very exposed,” Toklo grumbled, trying to hide under a scrubby bush.

“Maybe we should travel at night,” Yakone murmured thoughtfully. “We'd be able to see Ujurak's mother, and the darkness would keep us hidden.”

“I think that's a great idea!” Kallik said. “It'll be cooler, too.”

“But think of the time we've already wasted!” Toklo exclaimed with a flash of fury. “We won't have any hope of finding Lusa if we keep stopping.”

“We also won't find Lusa if we get caught by flat-faces,” Yakone said gently.

“Yakone's right,” Kallik agreed. “We want to find Lusa just as much as you do, Toklo.”

Toklo gave a reluctant grunt of agreement, then began pacing up and down among the thin trees, as if he still wanted to be on the move.

“Settle down and rest,” Kallik urged him. “We'll make much better time at night if we get some sleep now.”

Toklo looked as if he wanted to argue, but he said nothing and curled up at the foot of a tree. He fell asleep quickly, and Kallik wondered whether he had slept at all the night before.

Kallik exchanged a glance with Yakone. “This heat is awful,” she said, feeling like she was burning up as the hot sun struck her fur though the measly tree cover. “I don't think I'll be able to sleep.”

“Let's see if there's more shade that way.” Yakone nodded
down a slope where the trees seemed to grow more thickly.

“Okay.”

Kallik rose to her paws and padded after Yakone, though she doubted they would find anywhere to escape the merciless sun. Then, at the bottom of the slope, she spotted a tiny pond with trees and long grasses growing around it.

Together she and Yakone slid into the pool. Kallik felt blissful relief from the heat as the water soaked into her fur, even though there wasn't quite enough to cover her.