The Burning Horizon (4 page)

Lusa's heart pounded, and she concentrated on staying still and silent. Kallik was trying to balance on three legs to keep her scratched paw off the ground, while Toklo had ended up in a shallow stream that flowed through the thicket. Lusa choked back a snort as she spotted him sinking slowly into the peaty ground. But her amusement faded a moment later as a
spider dropped down on a thread of gossamer and landed on her nose.

It tickles! I'm going to sneeze!

Suddenly the flat-faces broke out into excited yelping. Lusa gasped, afraid she and her friends had been spotted, but just then a bird erupted from a nearby juniper bush, and all the flat-faces cried out in delight. Some of them raised the little black boxes Lusa had seen before.

I wish I knew what they were,
she thought curiously.

She concentrated on keeping still, feeling the spider crawling up her muzzle and through her head fur. Kallik had settled down and was licking her scratched paw, while Yakone peered between two branches to watch the flat-faces. Toklo had a disgusted expression on his face as he sank even farther into the soft ground.

To Lusa's relief, the bird flew off and the flat-faces moved on, following a narrow trail through the trees. The bears waited until the sound of their voices and their clumsy pawsteps had died away into the distance; then they scrambled out of the barberry thicket.

Lusa could feel the spider crawling through her fur, and it felt like her whole body was one huge itch. All the bears' pelts were covered with scraps of debris. Toklo was soaked to halfway up his legs, and he squished as he walked.

“What's wrong with this place?” he demanded. “Why is it crawling with flat-faces?”

“At least they don't have firesticks,” Lusa pointed out.

“And they're not very observant!” Yakone snorted. “How could they miss four bears? Kallik and I are hardly blending in.”

Lusa thought that Kallik and Yakone were probably grubby enough to hide among the brown tree trunks, but she said nothing.

The four bears pressed on up the slope, toward the clearer area that Lusa had seen from the tree. Before long they came upon a trail, stony and covered with the prints of flat-face paws. Flat-face scent hung about it.

“Should we follow it?” Lusa asked.

Toklo hesitated, then shook his head. “We never used paths like these the first time we went to the lake. I wish we could, but there's too big a chance of coming across more flat-faces. I know the ones we've seen so far haven't threatened us, but we can't take the risk.”

Lusa sighed. “Okay.”

Pushing through the undergrowth again, they passed some berry bushes, and Lusa spotted a few bunches of berries that were already ripe. She stripped them off the branches and gulped them down, relishing the sweet taste.

At last they emerged in the clearer area where the undergrowth thinned out between the spindly young trees. They were able to walk more easily without thorns snagging their fur or digging into their pads. Lusa and Toklo enjoyed the warmth of the sunshine on their fur, but Kallik and Yakone kept to the shade as much as they could, panting beneath the spreading branches of a pine tree.

Lusa realized that now that they were clear of the dense forest, they could see for long distances again. Heading to look out from a bare outcrop, she let out a bark when she spotted a huge flat-face denning place spread out in the valley below.

“Look!” she exclaimed. “I thought we were in the wilderness!”

Toklo came to stand beside her. “Well, now we know where all the flat-faces are coming from,” he grunted.

Lusa stared down at the expanse of flat-face dens that seemed to huddle together in the midst of the forest and mountains that encircled them. Light glinted from the surface of a river that looped around the dens. “I hope we don't have to go any closer,” she said.

Kallik left Yakone, who had flopped down under the tree to rest, his eyes closed, and padded over to join Lusa and Toklo. “It might not be so bad,” she said, scanning the valley more closely. “Look, there are a few small BlackPaths, but only one main one leading into the denning place. We just need to cross that and the river, and then we can head toward the sunrise.”

“Now I remember,” Toklo huffed excitedly. “Ujurak and I came this way before, when the Pathway Star guided us to Great Bear Lake the first time. I think it should be okay.”

“Thank the spirits,” Lusa murmured, grateful that she could trust Toklo's memory.
I don't recognize this place at all,
she thought as she looked around.
Toklo and Ujurak must have traveled this way before I met them.

Her optimism rose again as she gazed out across the wide
landscape. Their way stretched out in front of them. Even the denning area couldn't daunt her, now that she could see there was a way around it.

I think Toklo's right,
she told herself.
We will make it to Great Bear Lake in time.

Kallik stood beside Lusa and Toklo
on the outcrop as they examined the terrain ahead and began to plan their route.

“We can't go near those flat-face dens,” Toklo growled. “And we'll have to stay alert to avoid the flat-faces wandering through the trees. I don't know why they can't just stay on the BlackPaths.”

Kallik knew she should concentrate on what the others were planning, but she couldn't stop worrying about Yakone. She kept casting glances back at him where he was resting under the pine tree. His wounded paw had never really healed since the battle with the wolves.

“Are you okay to keep going?” she murmured, padding over to him. “That paw doesn't look too good.”

“It's okay,” Yakone replied.

Kallik grunted and bent her head to sniff at the wound. Her worries increased as she picked up the sweetish scent of infection.

“Toklo! Lusa!” she exclaimed. “Yakone's paw is infected
again. We have to find herbs to treat it.”

“Honestly, it's fine,” Yakone protested, but none of the bears paid any attention to him.

“I'll go find some,” Lusa promised, and darted off into the bushes.

Toklo shifted his paws impatiently. Kallik guessed he didn't want to stay in one place for too long, but they all knew Yakone's health was more important.

A few moments later Lusa reappeared with a mouthful of leaves. Kallik chomped them up, enjoying the clean, bitter taste, and trickled the juices into Yakone's wound.

“Thanks,” Yakone said. “I'm sorry for slowing you down.”

Kallik nuzzled his shoulder briefly. “You're not,” she responded. “The undergrowth is doing that all on its own.”

As soon as the bears set out again, they had to head back into denser forest where once again the undergrowth hampered their pawsteps. Toklo fell in beside Kallik, an anxious expression in his eyes. “Is Yakone really okay to travel?” he asked in a low voice.

“I think so. As long as we don't overdo it,” Kallik replied.

“No chance!” Toklo snorted, halting to tear away a trailing vine from around his neck.

They had gone only a few bearlengths when once again they heard the sound of flat-face voices, along with a clattering noise they hadn't heard before. Peering around a juniper bush, Kallik saw another stony trail stretching across their path. The clattering sound was made by hooves: a long string of horses, with flat-faces on their backs.

“Flat-faces are so lazy,” Kallik muttered.

There was a large group of riders, and some of the horses had another animal tied to them with a long tendril. The second kind was smaller than the horses, but looked similar, though those animals had much longer ears and a long face.

“Are those horses, too?” Kallik asked.

No bear replied, though Kallik noticed that Toklo seemed to be thinking hard, with a distant look in his eyes.

“I saw animals like them once when Oka and I raided a flat-face den for corn,” he murmured. “What did she call them?” He relapsed into deep thought for a moment; then his face lit up and he exclaimed, “Mules! They're mules!”

All four bears peered through the bushes as the horses and their flat-faces filed past. The mules had lumpy packages fastened to their backs, wrapped in pelts bare of fur. The creatures had small eyes, their expressions cross and stubborn.

“I don't think I'd like to get mixed up with one of
them
,” Lusa declared.

As she spoke, one of the mules started to skitter sideways, dragging on the tendril that tied it to the horse ahead of it.

“Uh-oh! I think it's picked up our scent,” Toklo muttered.

The flat-face on the horse leading the mule turned around to bark at it, and the mule fell into line once more. As the flat-face turned, Kallik spotted a long firestick slung over his shoulder, and her fur prickled.

“What do you think they're doing?” Yakone whispered.

“Who knows what flat-faces do?” Toklo responded irritably. “Who cares? All we have to do is stay away from them.”

“Then they should stay away from us,” Kallik said. “The woods are for us, not them!”

When the line of horses had disappeared into the trees, the bears hurried across the stony trail. Kallik bristled again at the strange scents that filled the air, but Toklo and Yakone both started sniffing appreciatively.

“I wonder what horse tastes like,” Toklo said.

“Or mule,” Yakone added. “There's a lot of meat on one of those.”

“The flat-faces wouldn't like it if you started hunting their animals,” Lusa warned them.

Toklo and Yakone glanced at each other, then shrugged. “They're only flat-faces,” Toklo said.

“They have firesticks!” Kallik exclaimed, stepping forward to block the two males' path. “Have you two got cloudfluff between your ears, or what?”

Yakone sighed. “I guess you're right.”

Kallik headed off with determined pawsteps, glad to hear that the others were following her. The ground in front of them fell away into a steep slope, and farther down she spotted the walls of a flat-face den. As she veered away, dogs started barking, sounding uncomfortably close. All the bears picked up the pace; Kallik's heart started to thump harder as she waited for the crack of a firestick.

But no flat-faces appeared, and as Kallik and her friends plunged into deeper undergrowth once again, the sound of barking faded into the distance.

By this time, they were getting used to traveling through
the dense forest. Yakone and Toklo would hold vines and brambles out of the way so that Lusa could wriggle through and begin making a path. Then Kallik would stamp down the surrounding branches.

“We've come a long way like this,” Kallik commented at last, “but any creature passing this way would be able to see our trail.”

“But nothing is tracking us,” Toklo pointed out. “And there are so many flat-faces around here, I doubt there are any hunting packs of wolves or coyotes.”

Kallik realized that Toklo was right. She looked at the other bears, noticing that their fur lay flat on their necks and they seemed relaxed, almost cheerful, in spite of the difficult ground. Though they didn't talk much because they wanted to travel quietly, they made their way with good humor.

“You expect me to get through there?” Kallik murmured as Lusa squeezed underneath some low-growing thorn branches. “Do you think I'm a mouse?”

“Yeah, a really big mouse!” Lusa responded, her eyes twinkling with amusement.

“Wriggle on your belly,” Toklo suggested, managing to hold the branches a little higher to make room for Kallik. “And Yakone, watch out for that root. You don't want to bang your injured paw.”

Yakone took the lead after they had negotiated the thornbushes. The slope was flattening out, and from somewhere ahead Kallik could hear the sound of running water.

Suddenly Yakone stopped. While Kallik glanced around for any signs of danger, he stalked forward again, then plunged into the lush vegetation that edged the stream. A moment later he stood up, holding a grouse in his jaws.

“Good catch!” Lusa exclaimed.

“Yeah, nicely done,” Toklo added. “Let's rest for a bit and eat.”

Before they settled down to share the grouse, all the bears took a drink from the stream. Standing beside Yakone, Kallik nudged his shoulder with her muzzle. “That was great,” she said. “I'd never have known there was a grouse there.”

“I got lucky,” Yakone responded, though Kallik could hear the satisfaction in his voice. She was glad that he'd had a chance to provide food for them.
Now maybe he'll stop worrying that he's holding us back.

Yakone tore the grouse apart, dividing it between himself, Kallik, and Toklo. Lusa was already digging up ferns and crunching the roots.

“Tell me more about the Longest Day Gathering,” Yakone said through a mouthful of prey. “What happens there?”