Sharon Irwin

        

         Reynaud fell asleep quickly. Bolrush placed his enormous bulk between her and the mouth of the cave and lay down. He was uncomfortable. The floor was lumpy and his belly was empty and there was an itchy feeling niggling at him, that as much as they'd discussed, they'd still not hit the heart of the matter. He looked wistfully at the girl wishing she had been able to stay awake. Humans could not control their great sleep any more than bears could, he reflected.

         Reynaud had had a major shock yesterday, yet she accepted her new destiny with a calmness that disturbed Bolrush. The child was too dull-eyed for his liking. They'd talked until late last night but irritatingly; Bolrush knew that Reynaud still hadn't fully understood what he was trying to prepare her for.  She began to repeat her questions and her shoulders hunched and drooped lower and lower. Bolrush had recognized these signs and commanded her firmly to sleep. Answers given when the fires of the spirit had burned low were no use to him. Then he too closed his eyes, and despite the cave floor being so bumpy that he would never has chosen it for an over wintering, he slept.

         It was still dark when he awoke, but it had that peculiar quality of darkness that preceded the dawn. He yawned, guessing that the little girl had perhaps only been asleep for two hours as they measured it. He would leave her a while longer. For himself, in summer he slept as little as he had to. His winter sleep was a deep absence, a portion of his life not even accounted for in dreams. Consequently, in summer he only allowed himself to graze the edge of unconsciousness. That way he found his sleep was a living wonder, an extravagance of delight unfolding beneath his lids.

         He had just begun to muse over a particularly coherent set of images when Reynaud sat up abruptly into full, startled awareness.  She drew her breath in sharply and then froze in place as her sleep-dazed eyes registered the polar bear lying in front of her.

         "Hush," he crooned quietly to her. "Remember now. You are safe with me."

         He felt a warmth building inside him as he watched her terrified bones relax and her features soften. She smiled at him.

         "I feel much better now," she said in her slow mumbled way. "You were right. I needed that sleep. You were telling me how Annuin indulges the ravens."

         He shook his head at her determination.

         "Little bear," he found it hard to think of her as anything else, "You have had a hard day."

          He shook his head again at the thought of what might be ahead of her.

         "You will need your rest, lie down again. You have had a false awakening. A dream had catapulted you up through the heavy strands of tiredness. You had a dream, yes?"

         She nodded.

         "A bad one?"

         She nodded again.

         "A bad dream is a good omen," he told her. "It means you are strong for the fight. Now thank it for its message and return to sleep."

         She looked doubtful, but Bolrush put one heavy paw gently on her forehead and pushed her back down.

         He wondered at the size of her. His paw obscured her face completely.

         A delighted giggle came from Reynaud as she realized the underside of his paw was covered in soft creamy fur. It was the first hint any happiness might remain in her poor heart.

         "You have such a soft paw," she said, stroking it so it tickled.

         Bolrush had to restrain a smile. Yesterday she had shown herself remarkably astute at reading his expressions. She was just like a little cub.

         "Among your kind, do not the big ones tell the little ones when to sleep?" he asked.

         "Yes," she admitted.

         "Then sleep. I must think, and you must store your energy. Something I had not considered is troubling me. I must follow this worry to its cave."

         Reynaud blinked tiredly at him as if she might argue, but he frowned sternly at her until she closed her eyes. Sleep had her firmly in its clutches again within minutes. The events of yesterday had exhausted her and she could not be a strong child anyway, not with those injuries.

         Bolrush could not help but shake his head sadly at her disfigurement. One side of her skull had been staved in by a hunter's spear. She had tottered away from her playmates one day. Wrapped in a new grey seal fur, she'd been surprised by the heat of the arctic sun and had lay down to sleep behind a snow bank. A hunter, thinking he'd made a lucky find of a seal had driven the spear deep into her skull and out through her face.

         Her screams had brought the tribe. They had summoned their smoke eater, and casting the bones, he had sensed about her a great but clouded destiny. Thus inclined to give her every chance to live, he had summoned a polar bear.

         When the smoke eater's stunted magic had reached him, Bolrush would have ignored it, as weak as it was, were it not for the clever way the smoke eater had wrapped the story of the child's tragedy within the command. There had been a cry for justice in that call. He had been near, less than a day's journey at the time. When he reached the crude campsite, he hid easily and watched for a few days, gathering an impression that would help him make up his mind. Then he walked into the open and lay down on the snow, less than half a mile from the nearest igloo.

         They'd raised a bonfire that night, sacrificing all the precious fuel they'd gathered. Bolrush had noticed and approved. It was good they fought the death of one of their young this hard. That was also the way of a bear and something he could understand.

         Then they sent the hunter out to Bolrush. The smoke eater and five warriors pushed him out at the point of their spears. Bolrush's nose had wrinkled, as he smelled the bitter scent of poisonous plants coming from the men.

         It is just luck they do the right thing, he'd thought. They are no longer capable of thinking clearly. They would do better to cleanse and fast. This kind of unpredictable, excitable behavior was one of the reasons he avoided humans

         The hunter made no pretence of stoically accepting his fate. He pleaded all the way out to the pole they planned to tie him too. No other animal has such a foolish notion of death, thought Bolrush. Yes, it is something to be avoided. All your life you must run from its shadow and then one day there it is, right in front of you, and you must embrace it as lovingly as you embraced your living.

         The man defecated on himself and Bolrush roared in annoyance. The stench offended his nose and he got up to leave. The smoke eater immediately threw himself into a frenzy of dancing and jabbering.

         Bolrush sat down again, this time with a little bit more respect. The smoke eater had more than a hint of the power, he had to admit. There was something in all his madness. But the hunter stank and it was unbearable.

         Bolrush decided in an instant. After all, that was why they'd called him.  He could see no reason to leave the man alive. An air of unthinking that bordered on evil enveloped him. Perhaps if he were to live a very long time he might learn something, but the suffering he would cause would spread out around him like a cancer.

         Bolrush charged forward, terrifying the smoke eater, as he lunged into a gallop. They had secured the hunter to the pole by then, and Bolrush didn't even grant him the courtesy of a glance before he slapped him powerfully across the head. There was a loud snap as the neck broke. To amuse himself then, Bolrush had chased after the smoke eater. The man's eyes had been wide with fear, but he retained enough composure to jabber his puny spells, even when Bolrush knocked him over and placed one tooth delicately through his earlobe.

         "Puny man," he breathed into the bleeding ear. "So forgetful."

          The man's face had been blank with fear. He hadn't understood a word.

         The tribes' people watched terrified from their igloos. Satisfied, Bolrush took off in a loping trot back into the snow. The look on the smoke eater's face would amuse him for many a night. The smoke eater, too, would benefit from the retelling of the story, so Bolrush felt it had been a fair trade.

         He knew from all the other times he'd performed this task, they would leave the body there for him to eat, but he would not be coming back for it. His mother had warned him that to eat the meat meant to ingest the character, and it was not something to be taken lightly. Bolrush knew her words were wise and he often spent as much as a day stalking out a particular seal.

         When his decision was made he would swim in mesmerizing circles around it, singing to it of its beauty and goodness. He would promise to make good of the sacrifice and thank it for its gift. Then the large brown eyes would close in remembrance of a bargain made long ago, before either of their kind had swum in the sea, and the seal would often be dead before he touched it. Bolrush found there were no words inside him to express his outrage at a hunter who considered so little the significance of what he did, that he accidentally speared a small child.

         That had been two years ago and Bulrush's wanderings had not taken him anywhere near the tribe where the shattered girl lived since then. Still when Annuin told him to go and bring him the broken child, he knew exactly whom he meant.

         Finding her was easy. Since he had tasted the smoke eater's blood, he always knew exactly where he was. He reasoned that the little girl would be somewhere near. The smoke eaters often traveled with a particular tribe. He ran straight to her, often sleeping only long enough to gain the vigor of one dream before he raced on again. He did not take the time to hunt, instead he fed off the carcasses that the ravens, by their presence, alerted him to. They protested, but he had done them enough favors in the past. It was past time the ravens began to remember all they owed.

         As hungry as he'd been, he was careful to insist the ravens told him all they knew about each dead beast. The ravens knew everyone's business. Sometimes, what he learned decided for him that he would rather go hungry than place such an individual in his mouth. The ravens had no such reservations. That was part of their problem, he thought.

         Bolrush had begged for some advice from Annuin as to how to steal the child away from her family but Annuin had little time for details.

         "Bring her, Bolrush," he had said, as though it were simple, and so it turned out to be.

         She had been all by herself when he found her, again wrapped in sealskins and placed so she could watch the other children at play. Her recovery was only partial. Even smothered in sealskins as she was, Bolrush could see her body was withered and uneven, but her face was the greatest tragedy. On one side, her mouth hung slackly downwards exposing the broken teeth and gummy gaps. She wiped constantly at a trail of drool with a small rag. Her face was sunken in two places, cratered like the face of the moon. Bolrush could only assume the hunter had attempted to remove the spear himself and caused even more damage. He wondered had he been attempting to distance himself from the crime or trying to save her. He knew which was more likely.

         The spear, luckily, had spared her eyes. There were perfect brown ovals with dark full lashes beneath a high creamy forehead. If you looked at her from a certain angle you could avoid seeing the damage altogether. Bolrush loved beauty in all its many forms. It twisted his heart to think that if it had not been for the hunter, this child would certainly have been the most beautiful woman any of the tribes had birthed.

         Bolrush had simply leaned over the snow bank and grabbed the sealskins in his jaws. Then he turned and trotted quickly away. She had stayed silent as the dead the whole time. Bolrush had been told to bring her straight back to Annuin, but the second time he placed her down to rearrange his grip on the seal skins, she had looked so terrified that he spoke to her gently.

         "Hush, little cub. I will do you no harm."

         She exhaled her breath sharply then as if she had been holding it in terror.

         Bulrush wondered. Had it been a coincidence?

         "I am Bolrush. I am bringing you to Annuin. He seeks of you a great service. Annuin will not tell you that you can refuse him. I wish that I could tell you, but I meet so few of your kind who can speak."

         She had been utterly silent then, staring upwards at him for so long, with those beautiful dull eyes that he despaired. It had just been a coincidence after all. Maybe the sealskins had been restricting her breathing. What did you expect? He berated himself. That this little battered one would understand? He bent to take her up again and she spoke.

         Her voice was mumbled and low, the words rolling in her misshapen mouth so he had to lean in closely to hear, but the language was definitely his own.

         "Is Annuin a bear too?" she asked him, and he wanted to place her back down on the snow and do a dance of happiness, despite the fact that he had been an adult for ten seasons now. A child who talked bear? She was a gift from Father Bear himself.

         There and then Bolrush decided that he would not bring Reynaud to Annuin until he had explained to her as much as she could understand. How could he explain what Annuin was to this little child? Her kind no longer spoke of him. He suspected none of them, not even this little gifted one could grasp what Annuin was, or even one part of what he would request of her. But he would do his best to tell her as much as he could, so that her decision could be made by the largest part of her spirit.

         All day yesterday and far into the night they had talked. Bolrush swelled with pride at how quickly she had grasped the most difficult concepts, yet there was much he could only hint at.

         Now here at the cusp of dawn, Bolrush wondered what niggled him. She was so much better informed now. She was keen. Why did he not just wrap her up and deliver her swiftly to Annuin? Then his part might be over, and he could just sit and tremble in a cave somewhere and hope that it would all work in the way Annuin predicted.

         Reynaud reached out in her sleep looking for someone to cuddle to. Without thinking Bolrush scooped her into the warmth between his chest and forelegs. There, he could not see the ruin of her face at all, and her perfect beauty moved him. Annuin was right, he thought. She is dying in any case.  Across the ice, Annuin had felt her shame and despair. He had tasted the loss that surrounded her, her lost health, her beauty, the boy who instead of loving her would look away, the children she would never bear, the poems she would never inspire.

         "But there is a way for her to channel her agony," Annuin had told Bolrush. "Let her give her life to me. It will be worth it in any case, whatever the outcome."

         But it was all different now. He hadn't known her then. She had just been a name and a history. Now Bolrush loved her. Some loves are quick and deep, he thought. You do not expect them, but you wake up one morning and before you go to sleep, another creature's name is written on your soul. Now I owe her the care I would give to my mother or my sisters or my own cubs if I had any, he thought. And yet any of those may have chosen to accept Annuin's will. It was a noble plan after all in so many ways.

         He placed her back down carefully and paced. It always settled his nerves.

         The dawn had finally won its battle against the darkness. He moved to the mouth of the cave and looked out. Shafts of light from the rising sun raced across the icy tundra like arrows from a bow. They struck randomly off the frozen snow and scattered into tiny sparks, glittering as if the ground was ablaze with a million earth-fallen stars. The brightness stung his dark-adapted eyes. An early raven, no one he knew, was startled from a carcass by his appearance, and flung itself into flight. The sun at once transformed it, sliding off its ebony feathers in a cascade of emerald and amethyst light. Bolrush inhaled deeply. Now this was beauty. If only he could feed on it he would never again touch another seal.

         And that was when he knew what he could do for Reynaud. It was a terrible decision for himself. It would cost him but that was the way of love. It demanded as much as it gave.

         He went back inside and almost as if she had known that something enormous concerning her had been decided, she was awake and sitting up staring at him.

         "I will make you whole again, little one, and then you can decide," he announced. "Now it is despair that guides your heart. I wish for joy and hope to beat there. Then I will know your true decision."

         It had been difficult at first to convince her it could be done, and in order not to be disappointed she had shown no hope or interest.

         "You can't," she said, touching the deep indents in her face with tiny fingers.

         She was mumbling worse than ever, and he had to listen hard to understand her.

         "No, not I," he agreed "but I can have you healed."

         "Heal this?" she said, pushing her fist sickeningly deep into the indent beneath her ear.

         "Yes," he answered, puzzled. "Why would I torment you if I could not do it?"

         Suddenly, her eyes sparkled for the first time.

         "I can be healed?" she asked incredulously.

         "Completely," he agreed.

         Reynaud seemed dazed. She was unable to speak for several moments and then suddenly she turned on him with a sharpness he had not expected.

         "What will it cost you?" she asked.

         "What do you know of cost?" he countered quickly.

         "Among my people, there is nothing free," she said. "What will you pay?"

         When he didn't answer immediately she jumped to a horrible conclusion.

         "Not with your life, not with your beautiful fur, no Bolrush, I will not accept it."

         "Not my life," he assured her, though he allowed a little too much sadness to creep into his voice.

         "What then?"

         She was standing in front of him. He knew she would not rest until she got an answer, and he suspected she would know if he lied, so he told her the truth.

         "My cubs."

         "Your cubs," she repeated, and slapped him.

         It felt like a tickle. Even so it was rude.

         "Uncalled for, Reynaud," he said. "You do not have the whole story. My cubs are not born. They are in no womb. They will never be born."

         Reynaud sat down slowly.

         "I don't understand," she admitted.

         He rubbed his large head against her smooth forehead. Human skin was so hot and polished. It felt unexpectedly good.

         He explained.

         "I will bring you to Maimee. At first, perhaps, she may not show herself to you or you may only be able to see her as a floating ice island. She is the mother of all seals. Polar bears before me have gone to her to ask for great boons. She has always acceded, but she extracts always the same price. She thinks to save her little ones. It is noble I suppose." His voice trailed off.

         "But would you be sad without little ones?" she asked him.

         "Not sad, no," he shook his head," but..." he thought of the word "unfinished maybe."

         "Is Maimee trying to wipe out polar bears?" asked Reynaud.

         "She couldn't. Its part of the bargain made long ago."

         "But if your cubs are not born?"

         Bolrush interrupted her.

         "They will be born, just not to me.  Maimee extracts a foolish price for her kind, yet a savage price for each bear that must go to her."

         He had said too much. Reynaud looked grim.

         "I won't go. The cost is too high."

         Bolrush sighed.

         "Reynaud, there is more at stake than a few cubs who will live anyway," he told her. "I have killed four men in my life. I believe I did the right thing, but who can say? I have consumed the flesh of a thousand seals, ending their lives so that mine may continue. Was this right?"

         Reynaud opened her mouth in confusion.

         "I don't know," she said at last.

         "No one knows," Bolrush comforted her. "All I know, Reynaud, is that I feel my debts. I would gladly repay them."

         He nudged her ruined face gently.

         "Let me offer this for you."

         She surprised him by deciding as swiftly as a bear.

         "I will accept if you will tell me what Annuin wants. You warn he will remind me of things I have never heard of and I will remember, but why will you not say what it is he wants? You will not even tell me what Annuin is."

         "Do you trust me Reynaud?" he asked her.

         "I do."

         "Then believe me when I tell you that you cannot understand what Annuin is. Your kind no longer communes with him. The tribes are lost in a haze of smoke and lies. The closest I can say in terms you might understand, is that Annuin is the heart of the world."

         He was silent for a moment, breathing heavily. Then he spoke again.

         "And as for what he wants, how can I tell you? I am only a bear. I can not sing the song of Annuin."

         "Will he kill me?" she asked quietly, looking at the floor.

         Once again he shivered at her astuteness. Annuin had chosen well.

         "No," he told her gently, "but you might die all the same, for love of him."

         He turned away then and left her to think it out. Later in the day, when the sun had risen high, she came to him and placing her arms around his enormous skull, she whispered,

         "I accept your offer, and afterwards, I have a mind to meet this Annuin."

         She looked fierce. It warmed him to see that side of her.

         "Come then," he said, "climb on my back, it will be more fitting."

         She began climbing up, giggling as she slid down at the first attempt so Bolrush had to grab her clothes in his teeth, and straining behind him, haul her on to his back while she laughed.

         Children, he thought, they take their joy where they find it.

         Locating Maimee took three long, worrying days. Bolrush managed to smash a hole in thin ice twice and caught Reynaud fish, which she ate raw. At night he tried to find her shelter, but it was not always as good as he'd have liked for her. She never complained though. As darkness fell and the intensity of the cold bit deeper, he'd wrap her up in his warmth and attempt to shelter her from the worst of it. But each day a little bit of her strength was leeched away by the harshness of the journey. A seed of doubt began to grow in his mind that he'd done the right thing. If he'd headed straight to Annuin, they might be there by now, and who knew how long it would take to find Maimee? She had a habit of being found by only the most persistent.

         On the morning of the third day, Reynaud woke up stiff and pale. She struggled to keep her eyes open or hold her place on Bolrush's back as he ran.

         What can I do? thought Bolrush. I did what I thought was right and yet it is working out for wrong.

         He worried that Reynaud might die before they reached Maimee. Perhaps Annuin is angry I am doing this, he considered. With all his strength he reached out towards Annuin, hoping to find some hint of his will on the wind, but there was nothing, and it was left to Bulrush himself to decide whether to persevere.

         If I turn now and bring her straight to Annuin, as broken as she is, she will survive, he argued with himself.

         But then she will just agree without thinking, she so little values her life.

         And so he argued it back and forth, but all the time he kept running, looking for Maimee, knowing that he had to give Reynaud the chance to make the right decision.

         Later that afternoon, the sky darkened ominously and the ever-present scent of snow intensified until Bolrush could no longer smell which way was North.

         Their pace slowed to a laborious crawl. His breath, even though it was coming in great gasps, seemed barely half of what he needed to fill his lungs.  Reynaud held on tightly, her face buried into his thick fur. It took all of Bolrush's concentration to push his legs forward into the wind, to keep sweeping his awareness in an arc in front of them to prevent them both crashing through a weak point in the ice, to fight the wind for breath, and then he heard Reynaud speak.

         "Hello, who are you?"

         He froze in place. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Reynaud stretching out an arm to a hooded, almost human figure, standing in the snow beside her.

         "Maimee," he breathed,

         She acknowledged him with the barest incline of her head.

         "Why do you take this form?" he asked.

         "For the child," Maimee gave what passed for a shrug, although perhaps due to her unfamiliarity with the form, it appeared she rotated her hips more than she flexed her shoulders.

         "She promises to be an interesting case. I thought I might greet her in kind, whatever I choose to do after that.  Follow me," she said and quickly took up the lead, striding through the snowstorm as if the wind and the pelting snow and the treacherous condition of the ice were all a figment of Bolrush's imagination.

         "How long was she there?" he asked Reynaud, breaking into a swift trot to keep up with Maimee.

         "A while," answered Reynaud tiredly. "I forgot where I was. At first I thought she was my mother."

         And you saw her of course, thought Bolrush, when you shouldn't have been able to, and speak bear when all the tribes have forgotten.

         His thoughts were brought up short when he realized Maimee had stopped in front of them. Bolrush had to halt abruptly to avoid colliding with her, and the sudden change of speed flung Reynaud off his back.

         She landed in a crumpled pile. Bolrush heard the sharp crack as her forehead made contact with something hard beneath the snow.

         "Reynaud," he bellowed.

         For a moment she lay motionless on the ice while Bolrush snuffed and poked frantically around her. Then she sucked in a breath and whimpered. Slowly, Bolrush assisting however he could, she pulled herself up into a sitting position. There she looked around her dazed. Her wounded jaw hung slacker than ever. She had not even the strength left to hold it closed.

         "Best stand up," he told her gently, "it's not good to have so much of your body in contact with the snow."

         She looked over at Maimee as if she was expecting help. Maimee regarded them both with indifference.

         "She's not human," Bolrush said, "don't look for help there."

         "You're not human," said Reynaud.

         "She's not animal either," said Bolrush, "don't be fooled by the name. Now grab hold of my fur and use it to climb up."

         The snowstorm was starting to thin, and Bolrush could see that Maimee had led them to the edge of the ocean. Strange how he had not smelled the salt, but then everything that happened here was under Maimee's control, and he supposed she must not have wanted him to. An enormous ice float speckled with resting seals was just visible off shore.

         "I know what you want Bolrush, and what you are willing to pay," Maimee said, turning from where she had been looking at the ice float, a look of fierce joy on her face.

         "For your part in the deed that is a fair price, and I am willing to accede."

         "For my part," he echoed her.

         "Yes."

         Maimee's voice was clipped.

         "But what you ask for, has far reaching consequences. What you desire," she hissed the word as if it disgusted her, "may change the whole world."

         "The consequence of any action could change the world," he argued.

         "Fools say that," she answered "but you and I know it is not true. Most actions fall into the world like raindrops into the ocean. But an act such as this, why," she smiled at them, "one might as well compare a raindrop to a meteorite."

         The seals on the ice float had seen them, and the surface of the island boiled with excited seals whipping back and forth, colliding with each other and calling out to Maimee.

         "They are glad to see me," she said, "let's not keep them waiting. This is my deal. If she makes it to the island without your help, I will grant the boon, if she fails, well," she shrugged, "the sea will take care of her. Any attempt to intervene on your part, Bolrush and I kill her. Don't think you can turn tail and run either. You've brought her to me Bolrush, and here we swim or we die. The same rules now apply to Reynaud as to my little ones. Attempt the swim Reynaud, or I'll kill you myself."

         Both Bolrush and Reynaud startled at that. Reynaud looked up at him, her eyes wide with confusion. In a rage that his actions had somehow led her into danger he turned on Maimee.

         "Annuin will not allow this," he snarled at her.

         "Annuin will allow it," she spoke calmly. "You broke the spirit of his command. Annuin did not say, find her and consider.  He said, bring the child. You forget Bolrush, death and time mean nothing to Annuin. What lives is his, what dies is his, but to you and I, and to her," she turned to indicate Reynaud but she was no longer there. She was limping silently away from them, to the water's edge, pulling off her sealskins as she went. She placed them in a pile on the snow and stood, naked and bent, the withered half of her body painfully apparent.

         "Will you bring my clothes Bolrush?" she said looking back at him.

         Bolrush could not reply, so struck was he by the horror of what he had done.

         "She won't make it," he whispered to Maimee.

         "Come now," she said, "Annuin would not have chosen just anyone, let's see her try. And, you forget, it means more to her than it does to you, it's her life."

         "What does that mean?" he asked, but Maimee had already slipped into the water.

         The seals roared with delight, and any who were left on the float entered the water. The sea was a heaving mass of sleek grey bodies jostling for space.

         "Bolrush," Reynaud called him.

         "Will you take them?" She pointed with her toe to her skins. "If I wear them they will just drag me down"

         Bolrush walked over to her and nudged his face into hers.

         "No," he said, "leave them there. They will be dry for you when you return."

         They were silent for a moment, standing there with their faces close to each other and then Reynaud gave him a tiny smile and whispering a quiet "thank you," she set off for the island.

         At once the seals surrounded her. Thousands of them buffeted her from every side. Bolrush roared at them, but the voice of Maimee came clearly across the water.

         "No interference Bolrush. You may swim too but stay away from her."

         He joined them in the water. The seals kept their distance and he swam in silent isolation.

         Reynaud had dropped out of sight and he realized she must have dived.

         Good, if she can hold her breath in this cold, he thought, she will make better distance.

         He dived too and was able to catch a glimpse of her, swimming strongly despite the seals all around. She ignored them and picked her own path, kicking through them stronger than he would ever have given her credit for. Like the seals, she was possessed of a nimbleness beneath the water that seemed unlikely on land. Her paler body was easily visible, almost glowing amongst the darker coated seals. Now she is that meteorite, he thought grimly. Now she really is a star of the sea.

         Reynaud rose to the surface to take a breath and an enormous seal bull suddenly swam on top of her, holding her down with his weight. She kicked and thrashed, trying to break free, but the seal held grimly to his task and forced her beneath the water again.

         Bolrush surfaced with a roar.

         "Maimee," he yelled. "You break the rules. I will kill him, and spit out his blood, and keep on killing if you do not call them off."

         Her response was instantaneous. The water hissed with the sound of seals cutting through it in response to some silent command. In seconds the sea was empty, only the bobbing water bearing testimony to their departure.

         Reynaud broke the surface, gasping for air.

         Maimee shouted, "He will be disciplined." Her voice was tight. "I would give him to you to eat, but I understand your reluctance. I have sent the rest away as contrition for his actions. She has an excellent chance now, except," she paused and sighed as though sad; "there are worse things in these waters than seals."

         Bolrush felt a quiver as something narrow and long slid beneath him. Reynaud had sensed trying to recover her breath was useless in these waters, and she had set off again for the ice float. Loving her as he did, Bolrush had never guessed she was, or required her to be this brave. He felt cold at the thought that all her vitality might be stilled by the harshness of the ocean, or by this new threat that moved beneath them.

         He dived to see what it was. It moved through the water like a spear. It was as long as a killer whale with a thick sinuous body like an eel. Fully one third of its length was composed of a mouth it opened and closed slightly as if in anticipation. Each time the jaw snapped closed, rows of claw length teeth interlocked along the length of its snout. Bolrush looked in vain for a bulge behind the eyes that might tell of some kind of brain. Its absence indicated that this creature existed only to hunt and feed. This creature was the original beast. The one that predated all hunters, bears and man included. Where had Maimee found it?

         He surfaced, roaring in anger and desperation.

         "You woke that," he roared at Maimee. "Creatures from the beginning of time have no place here."

         "This concerns us all," she hissed, "even that Annuin favors human though they have turned their back on him, we still have our say."

         "Annuin favors none," he said but he had lost interest in persuading Maimee. Instead he stared hopelessly at the ripple of water that tracked the progress of the beast. Reynaud had surfaced and she turned to meet it. Her eyes were fearless with cold. The sea was killing her. She had nothing left.

         She was not going to make it in any case, he thought, at least the beast will be quick, and though he felt an emptiness inside he knew would always be there, he dived and swam towards them, not to save her, Maimee would kill her if he tried, but to prevent the beast from eating her body.

         Underwater, he could see Reynaud had sunk. The beast hit her in the stomach at top speed and propelled her backwards and up out of the water.

         She landed heavily and sank again and the beast once again struck into her.

         He's playing with her, thought Bolrush and a cold killing rage possessed him. He charged, intending to crush the beast, when through the water he heard Reynaud mumbling, her voice snappy with annoyance, "all right, all right, I'll swim, I'll swim but I'm tired and I'm cold. It's all right for you. You live in the ocean."

         The beast answered, but the language was older than Bolrush could understand.

         This time it nudged Reynaud with its nose, pushing her towards the surface to breathe.

         "Ok, I'll hold on," he heard her say, and she rolled her arms around its snout while it swam her gently to the island.

         As they approached, the beast accelerated in order to push Reynaud up on the bank and out of the water. Then it allowed itself to slide back into the sea again and was gone with one powerful flick of its lower body.

         "It says it's as tired as I am," said Reynaud, still half in the water, "All it wants to do is sleep."

         She laughed.

         "It kept saying, swim, swim, live, hold. It never stopped."

         "Time has spoken." That was Maimee. She had left the water and stood beside them. She sounded disbelieving, as if she had never anticipated this outcome.

         Bolrush's head was spinning. Seconds ago he had given Reynaud up for dead. Now she had survived the crossing and earned her boon. He turned to Maimee.

         "You have done everything in your power to kill her even though Annuin seeks her out. Heal her now."

          "Heal her?" Maimee said bitterly. "Look at her Bolrush. The rules are harsh but fair and they bind me as much as any other. The ocean would have eaten her if I hadn't been obliged to heal her the moment she entered it. The rest was up to her."

         Reynaud stood up on hearing that and looked down at herself. Her body glowed with health; it looked older, changed, as if bringing a creature as old as the beast here had upset time so much it had lost track of the pattern. She looked more a woman than a child now. Her wet hair hung around her face and body, but even through its cloying strands, Bolrush could see that Maimee spoke the truth. Reynaud's jaw was firm and pert; her lips curved upwards into a perfect bow, the skin of her cheeks stretched smooth and perfect back towards her glossy hair.

         "Oh Reynaud, I wish you could see yourself," he breathed, "you feed my heart with your beauty."

         "Do I really?" She still spoke with the innocence of a child. She raised her hands to her face, her eyes sparkling as she realized the injuries were gone.

         "Bolrush," she started to say, but Maimee interrupted.

         "I'm weary of humans. Take her off my island now, bring her to Annuin." Maimee was working herself into a fury.

         "And you bear, do you betray your own with this one? Will her kind do you good? Will Annuin's plan work for us, do you think? Far better to give up on them all. Look at her."

         She indicated Reynaud with a vicious sweep of a clawed limb.

         "She is beautiful now, yes, but her kind breed hatred and evil under their skins. She is most likely rotten to her center. Far, far better to have left her as she was, with the stain of her evil clearly visible.

         Reynaud looked upset by Maimee's words. She drew her arms around herself.  Bolrush moved to stand in front of her.

         He spoke angrily to Maimee. "There is evil in the heart of many a creature Maimee, although they do not wear it on their faces. And there is evil in yours. I see it there, and still Annuin keeps faith with you, although I wouldn't have."

         "Leave my island now," she screamed at him "and may her kind hunt yours into extinction."

         "I place my trust in Annuin," he said. "Come Reynaud. Get on my back and I will swim you back."

         They made good time after that. Reynaud's health made a difference. Sometimes she ran beside Bolrush, sometimes she rode on his back. At night when they laid down to rest, he no longer worried she might die of the cold. They talked long into the nights, deep satisfying conversations about seals and Maimee first of all, and then the first creatures and time, stars and meteorites, earth and space and ravens and death and meaning. She seemed to need little sleep now, and it was with extreme reluctance that Bolrush would turn from her to take the least amount he needed.

         She would always be awake before him. One morning he woke to find her staring at him.

         "Annuin is close," she said. "Is he in the earth?"

         "Often," Bolrush replied, "but he could be anywhere. Look for an opening; it might be in the rocks, or the ice. It might be something strange about the sea, or even a twitch in the wind."

         He smiled at her bewildered face. Quick student as she was, she still had things to learn.

         "It will be most likely in the rocks," he consoled her. "You search there. I will quickly scan the sea and air just in case."

         She turned hesitantly away, all the confidence she had gained in the last few days evaporated at the prospect of meeting Annuin.

         "What if I find it? I won't fall in?" she asked.

         He laughed at the question. "Someday, but not today. Today it will be a squeeze."

         She looked even more confused, but set off to look.

         Bolrush joined her in a while. A quick check of the sea and the wind convinced him the opening was in the earth. Reynaud settled in behind him, suddenly too nervous to strike out by herself. She kept one hand on his back as they walked.

         Suddenly she stiffened.

         "Here? Yes. I think so," he agreed.

         He looked around. Ahead of them was a small rock front, coated in packed snow and ice. There was no visible opening but they could both feel it, something ominous that pulled at them, tantalizing them with its promise yet warning them of the finality of that decision.

         "Come Reynaud, it is here," he said. "A few steps more."

         She looked grim, like each step was a personal battle to comply, but she managed to keep moving forward.

         "Here," Bolrush whispered to her. He could see it, an opening that looked like it had been cut with a knife, yet Bolrush knew it would expand to allow them enter.

         "I'll go first," he said. He could tell by her expression she thought passage was impossible.

         "Follow me and do not lose heart, no matter what," he said.

         Suddenly he realized, what he was going to do to her would be no different from what Maimee had done. If she lacked courage now, she would be as dead to him as if he had left her behind in the ocean. He shook away the thought—what choice had they now—and pushed into the gap.

         The familiar panic hit him instantly, the fear that he might be trapped, unable to ever move again, to breathe or see. He pushed on regardless, his own voice screaming in his head, go back, pull back now while you still can, this is darkness and claustrophobia and death, but he had used his momentum to push him past the point of no return and now, with the rock so tight around him he could no longer tell whether he was bear or stone he forced herself to make the final thrust. There came a moment when he knew for certain he was rock. He felt its power, its responsibility, the way it stretched to encircle the world, out of the cold and into the rainforests and the hot deserts and back again, and then suddenly he was out, gasping for breath in a dimly lit corridor and struggling to remember his name.

         She was not long after him. One look at her face told him she had endured a similar trial, but unlike him she seemed to have develop a fondness for the rock she had passed through. She turned back to it for a moment, placing one hand gently upon it.

         "Bolrush?" she questioned, her voice startled, "why does no one in the tribes know of these things? They do not even dream of them."

         "Who knows? Perhaps they do dream and remain silent," he told her. "Come. We are almost there. The great hall is just ahead."

         Walking through the rock face had changed her again. She skipped in front of him and led the way. The narrowness of the passage slowed him and he was still some way from the hall when he heard her cry of wonder. He smiled to himself thinking of the first time he had seen the Hall.

         By the time he joined her she had fallen into silence. Her hands were drawn up beneath her chin like an overawed child.

         "Bolrush," she gasped on seeing him, "look!"

         The roof of the great hall stretched high over their heads. Made out of a golden translucent rock, sunlight poured through, flooding the hall with amber light.

         Ringing the circumference of the hall, pedestals bore the forms of creatures carved out of precious stone or metal. When he had first seen them he had not recognized the creatures. Over time Annuin had told him the names and the story of each one. Now, he could easily pick out the elephant and the raccoon, the badger and the lion. Others he had always known, the seals of course, and the artic fox and the whales. Each creature was carved in a different color, silver or gold, crystal clear diamond or the mottled gold and blue of lapis lazuli. There were shapes the translucent purple of ametrine and the mottled skewbald of variscite. Reynaud was lost in wonder, and still she quickly noticed what it had taken him many years to question.

         "Some pedestals are empty," she said, her voice echoing in the hall. She walked its circumference slowly. Halfway around she turned to him.

         "I see none of the tribespeople. We are not here. Why are we not here, Bolrush? What have we done?"

         "You are here," said a voice. "All are carved, but some will not come out of the clay." 

         Reynaud arched an eyebrow and walked off in search of the voice. Bolrush followed behind.

         "Where are you?" Reynaud called after a while. The hall was huge. Anyone who wanted to remain hidden could flit from pedestal to pedestal and hide forever.

         "Here," the voice replied.

         Reynaud stopped. The owner of the voice was close. She looked questioningly at Bolrush.

         "Annuin," he called "where are you?"

         "Here," the voice was getting impatient. "Why can't you see me? Oh."

         A face peeped out from behind a pedestal at about knee height. Perhaps for her sake, he looked like one of the tribes people, a young man of maybe fifteen winters, long black hair hanging over his face, which he brushed away with a dirt-covered hand.

         "Sorry", he smiled, "I was so caught up in what I was doing. Come and see." 

         He moved back in behind the pedestal again and Bolrush and Reynaud followed.  Annuin had been digging in the clay and a small pile of excavated dirt lay to one side. On this a raven perched, eyeing the three humans with nonchalant curiosity.

         "Another one, one by one," said Bolrush in annoyance. "You are too easy on them."

         Annuin laughed. "But its such a treat to see one winging it's way towards me. Now Reynaud," he said, "you asked about the tribespeople. See, I carved one long ago, from Azeztulite."

         From his kneeling position he recommenced brushing at the covered figure. His fingers momentarily uncovered something white and polished and then falling particles of clay hid it once more.

         Reynaud gasped.

         "I see it," she said and kneeled down to help.  The two of them began discussing the difficulties of uncovering the stone as if they'd been friends for years.

         "The clay keeps falling back in."

         "Look, you've got a bit."

         "Is that the forehead, the eyes must be here then."

         "Are the eyes open?"

         "No."

         "Is it sinking, we don't seem to be getting anywhere."

         Bolrush left them to it and walked a little way off. Sometime, while they were digging, Annuin would explain to Reynaud what he wanted of her. He didn't want her to look to him for guidance then. Something made the two of them laugh and the sound of their happiness carried across the hall. He found the statue of the Polar bear and went to sleep beneath it. Annuin had carved it from chalcedony, white with the faintest tinge of pink. It appeared to be breathing. Bolrush slept beneath it and dreamed of Reynaud's children, welding roaring metal beasts that rode the wind as easily as they rode the ice. They chased his kind across the snow, the ice caps glowing pink with their blood, until eventually, the only bears left were old and tired and insane with despair, trapped in caves made of glass and steel, in a country where there had never been snow.

         He awoke with a start. The roof of the hall seemed to be ringing gently as if someone had been singing, and the echoes were gradually quietening. He sighed, thinking what that song might have been of.

         He had only once before had a bad dream in Annuin's hall, and that had been the night before Annuin had told him to bring the girl. Now she was here and the dreams were no better.

         Annuin and Reynaud were sitting with their backs to the empty pedestal that should have held the azeztulite figure.

         Reynaud was stroking the sleeping raven while Annuin talked intently to her. Her face looked strained and grave. She struggled to keep tears from her eyes.

         Bolrush walked over with a heavy heart and sat beside them. At the sound of his approach, Reynaud looked up.

         "I can't stay, Bolrush. I have to go back," she said. "We couldn't uncover it. We tried all night, or day or..." she looked perplexed. The light was always amber in the hall.

         "A very long time," she concluded. "We couldn't uncover it and we couldn't wake it." She sounded frustrated.

         "Don't be so harsh on yourself," said Annuin. "There is more uncovered than there has ever been. Look Bolrush."

         Bolrush took a peak behind the pillar. The face and some of the neck of a tribeswoman rose from the soil. Her ears and hair were still buried. He looked closer. The eyes appeared to be fluttering, like a dreamer on the brink of wakefulness.

         Bolrush was confused. He looked at Annuin.

         "I don't understand," he said. "You have never been able to uncover so much before. Well" he amended, "you have, but the clay has always reclaimed it."

         Annuin nodded his agreement.

         "I think I may have been going about it the wrong way."

         He sighed although he didn't seem a bit unhappy.

         "I've learned a little something from the ravens I think."

         Bolrush raised his eyebrows at that.

         "Yes. I will say no more of that now, only that Reynaud has agreed to do as I ask."

         And that was it. She had agreed. Deep down in his heart, when Bolrush had brought her to Maimee, he had hoped that through being healed she would find the courage to resist Annuin. He had tried his best to thwart Annuin's plan, first out of love for Annuin and then out of love for Reynaud.

         Now Bolrush felt lost. He let his head sink to the ground in despair.

         "Why are you so sad?" asked Reynaud.

         She got up hurriedly, handing the disgruntled raven back to Annuin and went to Bolrush. She cuddled up to him as she had done so many times on their journey.

         "Annuin's request is not so bad. It is a good one for my people."

         Annuin came and joined them. The raven eyed Bolrush malevolently and Annuin scolded it in a hushed voice. It bent its head in acknowledgement of the censure.

         "Bolrush has bad dreams," Annuin explained to Reynaud.

         "When he first came to me, his head was on fire with them."

         He smiled fondly, stoking Bolrush's fur. 

         "Oh you wouldn't believe looking at this sensible old bear here, that he was once young and crazy would you?"

         Reynaud shook her head. "Bolrush is so wise," she said.

         Annuin agreed, "Bolrush is much wiser now. But then, every time he dreamed, the dream would come true. It might be days or weeks or sometimes years later, but it would always happen. So Bolrush learned to fear his dreams. But what did I teach you of bad dreams?" he asked quietly.

         "They mean you are strong for the fight," Bolrush answered. All the lessons he had learned at Annuin's side were coming back to him, here in his presence.

         "That's what you said to me," Reynaud said to him, "and I was strong for the fight, and for this one too."

         "So you are going to do it?" Bolrush said to Annuin.

         Annuin waited for a second before he answered.

         "Bolrush, your dreams, do they always tell you the whole truth? Are they clear or are they confused? Has a happy dream sometimes soured? Cannot great happiness follow sorrow?"

         "Yes," agreed Bolrush. These were old lessons, and yet he seemed to need to keep relearning them.

         "Bolrush had a dream," Annuin turned to Reynaud.

         "He dreamed I would trap myself within human form and then, powerless, I would be killed. He dreamed of betrayal and rejection. He saw the sky turn black and the earth tremor and the rocks crack open. He dreamed of the great sorrow of my mother. He saw her outcast and scorned for her part in bearing me and her heart pierced with sorrow at my death. He saw dark armies marching in my name, burning and destroying, seeking out those who truly love me and killing them. This is how Bolrush sees my plan coming to pass."

         Annuin was silent for a second.

         "But great happiness can follow sorrow," Bolrush said, determined now to trust Annuin.

         He looked across at Reynaud though, wishing there was some way to save her from what she would have to endure.

         Annuin saw the look that passed between them.

         "You trust your dreams too much Bolrush. Haven't I told you the future is like the past? It is a snake that wriggles and twists."

         "Are you saying it won't happen?"

         Annuin was silent for a long moment.

         "On the contrary Bolrush. This time I do believe you have dreamed it right. What you saw may yet be necessary. Except," he held up a finger as a caution, "this may not be the time."

         Bolrush's heart leapt.

         Annuin continued.

         "I asked you to bring me a broken child. Is this child broken?"

         He clapped Reynaud across the shoulders and she slapped him back. Bolrush could barely remember how she had looked before she endured Maimee's trial.

         He shook his head, admitting he had disobeyed Annuin.

         "You have changed everything Bolrush," said Annuin, "and yet everything is the way it is meant to be. Reynaud has agreed to go back, although it is always difficult to leave the Great Hall. But I've promised when her time comes to return here, I will fetch her myself.  I have not yet properly explained about the pedestals."

         He turned to Reynaud.

         "I'm afraid you still think that if you tell enough people about me, we will be able to wake and uncover the statue and place it on the pedestal."

         Reynaud looked confused.

         "Unfortunately that is not true. The forms on the pedestals are of the creatures who have chosen a side. Telling your people about me will only mean that we can wake it. There is a battle ahead and there are other paths to follow but asleep, they are no good even to themselves. Wake them Reynaud, remind them of what they have always known and have chosen to forget. Remind them of me."

         "But how will I get them to choose a side?" Reynaud burst out.

         "You can't," Annuin shrugged. "They are like the ravens I think, each one returns alone, having taken the long way, the hard way."

         Bolrush snorted at hearing Reynaud compared to a raven, but Annuin silenced him.

         "The ravens are mine too. Reynaud has a favor to ask you. She knows her work will be difficult and lonely. She may be outcast from her people because of it. Her life may be in danger but she says she would never fear or be lonely if you would watch over her. Do you agree?"

         Bolrush felt tears sting his eyes.

         "Of course I agree."

         He turned to Reynaud.

         "You may even wake me in winter."

         "Come now," said Annuin. "You go to far I think. I woke you in winter once and I didn't have a happy time of it."

         He shook his head warningly at Reynaud. "Try and not wake him in winter, unless it's an emergency."

         They left the great hall later that day. The longer they left it, the harder it would be, Bolrush explained to Reynaud. Annuin had already gone. It would make it that little bit easier. Outside, in a world that seemed lifeless and grey compared to the golden light of the hall, Bolrush sniffed out the smoke eater on the wind and set a course to return Reynaud to her tribe.

         "They won't recognize me though, will they?" she said. She was worried, now that Annuin was gone, about the work that was before her. 

         "They might think I am a shallkree, come from the deep to steal their men."

         "Persuade them by your actions that you are not and remember, I am always here for you."

         He had pierced the skin of her hand earlier and tasted her blood so he would always know what befell her.

         "Remember, I will never be far, and Annuin is always in your heart. But it is up to us now."

         She walked away from him two days later. The settlement of the tribe was barely visible in the distance. They judged it better if she was not seen walking with him. Her face was wet with tears. He lay down in the snow and watched her leave, her figure shrinking into the distance.

         Suddenly he was aware someone was watching him. He jumped to his feet but the watcher was only a young female raven. She stood her ground, unruffled by his actions. Another time he would have shooed her away and not have her intruding on his private sorrow, but Annuin's love for the ravens was still fresh in his mind.

         He sat back down.

         She walked in closer to him.

         "You look sad," she announced. "Me too. I lost my mate some months ago."

         "Why not find another?" he told her, annoyed that her problems were so small and easily fixed and still they saddened her.

         The raven sighed.

         "I've thought of that, but still I don't think it would make me happy again."

         Bolrush looked at her more closely.

         "Well what do you think I can do for you?"

         "The ravens talk about you, you know," she said. "They say you know things."

         "What things?" he growled.

         "Just things," she shrugged "I don't know, but maybe I wouldn't be so sad if I knew things."

         "And you think I will just tell you... things?"

         "No," she said. "I suspect you won't. But I've all the time in the world now, so I thought maybe, if I hung around with you, you might tell me some things, now and then."

         He looked away from her. Her conversation had distracted him and Reynaud was no longer visible. He was annoyed with the raven.

         "If you stay with me, you will have to do as I say at all times," he snapped at her.

         "Even in winter when I am sleeping, you will follow my rules."

         She nodded in agreement.

         "We will start with food. You will only eat what I allow you to. Later we will discuss why this is so."

         She gasped in shock.

         "That's a lot to ask."

         "It's but the beginning of what I will ask."

         She tilted her head to one side as if considering, then said softly.

         "The beginning. Beginning is good."

         She moved in closer to Bolrush and stood under his chin. The tip of her head tickled his fur, and he found himself smiling at her determination.

         "What's the story with the woman?" she said from beneath his chin.

         "What's your name?" he asked instead of answering.

         "Merel."

         "Well Merel, the story of the woman is the story of the world," he said.

         "Really," she breathed.

         They were both silent for a moment, then Merel spoke.

         "You know, I don't think I understand that."

         "I know," he said grimly. "This will be a long summer, and I don't know if I have Annuin's patience."

         "Who's Annuin?" she asked.

         "Later," he said firmly. "Come Merel, I'll catch you dinner. You look hungry."

 

 

Copyright 2007, Sharon Irwin

Sharon Irwin lives in the rainy northwest of Ireland. She occupies her time when it is too wet to venture outdoors writing her first novel. She has also had poetry accepted for publication by Illumen and Beyond Centauri.

 

 

Cover: "Blacksheep Dragon"

Of this illustration, the artist says, "I started this over a year ago, and liked the whimsy of a 'baby' dragon wanting to be a Knight who saves the Princess." 

Copyright 2007, Melinda S. Reynolds 

Melinda Reynolds is a self-taught artist and writer; drawing came first, writing second.  Her writing is printed in "Better Fiction Anthology," and her art appears in "The Bleeding Quill," "The Sword Review," and "Better Fiction Anthology." Her favorite genres are fantasy and sci-fi because of the depth of imagination. She also designs original costumes, some of which were purchased by well-known fantasy artist Larry Elmore as reference for his paintings. She enjoys photography as time permits.

Support The Sword Review 

The Sword Review is a publication of Double-Edged Publishing, Inc., a nonprofit corporation designated as a 501(c)(3) public charity. Double-Edged Publishing believes the written word is a powerful tool, capable of shaping ideas and changing lives.

Mail checks to:

Online donations can be made and more information can be found via The Sword Review or the Double-Edged Publishing websites: