Island of Shadows (32 page)

Toklo relaxed his grip, intending to let the white bear stand up, but before he could, he heard Nanulak shriek.

“Don't let him go! Kill him!”

At the sound of Nanulak's voice, the white bear let out a gasp. He turned his head to see Nanulak running up, his lips drawn back in a snarl and a gloating look in his eyes. Toklo hardly recognized him.

“Kill him!” Nanulak repeated.

Toklo opened his jaws, but the white bear spoke first.

“Nanulak! Son!”

“What?” Toklo staggered back. “Nanulak, this white bear is your
father
?”

“No!” Nanulak spat the word out. “He's
nothing
to me. I'm a brown bear now.”

The white bear staggered to his paws and shook the snow from his pelt. His eyes were full of sorrow. “I am his father,” he told Toklo. “His mother is a brown bear. We love Nanulak very much, but he—”

“You never loved me!” Nanulak growled. “You never understood me. My mother kept telling me that I was different and special because I was half white bear. But I'm
not
! I
won't
be! I'm a
brown
bear.”

The white bear shook his massive head, scattering lumps of snow and scarlet drops onto the ground. “I don't understand this,” he said. “Who are these bears? Where have you been? We all thought you were dead!”

“As if you care!” Nanulak sneered.

“You know we care.” The white bear's voice was quiet. “Your mother and your half brother and sister have been looking for you. So have I, and my white-bear kin here were helping me. We were worried about you.”

“What?” Lusa bounded up behind Nanulak, gazing at him with wide, disbelieving eyes. “You told us your family drove you away!”

Nanulak's father glanced at her, looking faintly surprised at the sight of a black bear. “None of us would do that,” he said. “We took care of Nanulak while he was with us. Until now we've been grieving for him.”

Toklo felt as though the white bear's words were clawing into his heart, more painful than any of his wounds from the fight. Kallik and Yakone padded up, with the other white bears behind them.

Nanulak didn't stop staring at his father with hatred in his eyes. “You know
nothing
about me!” Suddenly he whirled to confront Toklo. “I thought you were going to help me,” he snarled. “But you let me down. I wanted you to kill him for me!”

Toklo blinked through the blood clotting in the fur around his eyes. “You lied to me,” he said hoarsely. “Over and over again. You told me your family had driven you away. You told me this bear had attacked you. You would have made me kill your own father!”

Nanulak flattened his ears, fury giving way to confusion. “But we're friends, Toklo. We're both brown bears, right? Isn't that what friends do for each other?”

Toklo felt a surge of anger rise in his belly.
Nanulak can't even see that what he did is wrong!
“Friends tell each other the truth,” he growled. “Instead you used me. You're no friend of mine.”

“But … we're going to travel together,” Nanulak stammered. “We're going to find territories side by side. You said so.”

“I made that promise to another bear,” Toklo murmured, sorrow welling up inside him. “A bear who really did need me. Not one who lied to me and tried to make me kill an innocent bear. An innocent bear who is his
father
.”

Nanulak took a pace back. “I get it now,” he said, his voice hardening again. “You're against me, like all the others, because I'm half white bear and half brown.”

“That's not true,” Toklo said.

“He's always been like this.” It was the younger male white bear who spoke. “Right from when we were little cubs. My sister and I tried to play with him, but he never wanted anything to do with us.”

The young she-bear nodded. “He always went off by himself instead.”

Nanulak raked the group of white bears with a cold gaze. “You're all against me,” he hissed. “It's not my fault that I'm half white and half brown.”

The old white she-bear stepped forward until she stood in front of Nanulak, looking down at him. She was scrawny with age, and her fur was patchy, but Toklo could see wisdom in her cloudy eyes. She reminded him of Aga, the ancient she-bear on Star Island.

“No bear cares about that but you,” she told Nanulak.

“It's true.” Nanulak's father padded to his son's side and bent his head to touch his shoulder with his muzzle, only to leave the movement unfinished. “Your mother and I love each other,” he said. “And we want to love you. Can't you let us?”

Nanulak turned a look of freezing contempt on his father. “I don't care about you,” he snarled. “I'm better than any of you. I'll live alone, like a true brown bear. Will you travel with me, Toklo? You promised, remember? Just you and me, brown bears together.”

Toklo stood rigid, unable to reply.
He wondered if Nanulak really meant what he was saying.
After all that's happened, does he really think I'll leave my friends and go with him?

Before he managed to find words, a yelp came from behind him.

“Nanulak!”

Toklo spun around to see three brown bears approaching over the rim of the valley: a full-grown she-bear and two cubs about his own age. One of the white bears was with them.

It was the she-bear who had called out. She raced down the slope and thrust her way through the crowd of bears until she stood facing Nanulak.

“My son!” she cried. “I thought I'd never see you again.”

Toklo exchanged a shocked glance with Lusa and Kallik. Here was more proof that Nanulak's brown-bear family had never driven him away.

“You let your mother think you were dead,” Lusa hissed. “How could you do that?”

Nanulak whirled around to look at her, his teeth bared in a snarl. “You have no right to question me, you … you
black
bear! You don't even belong here, but they all accept you, more than they've ever accepted me!”

“I've always accepted you,” Nanulak's mother said.

“Didn't you care that you made your mother grieve for you?” Kallik asked. “Did you really hate her so much?”

“Yes!” Nanulak's voice had risen to a shriek. “She betrayed me! I didn't ask to be half a bear, not white and not brown.”

Nanulak's mother shook her head. “But your father and I were so proud to have you. You are not the only bear like this on the island. How can you hate us for having you?”

Nanulak let out a yelp of rage. “I hate you! And I hate them!” he growled, jerking his head at his fully brown half brother and sister. His voice suddenly shaking, he added, “I just wanted to be one type of bear.”

“You are one type of bear,” his mother responded. “You are yourself. You are my son, and I love you. We are your family, and always will be.”

Suddenly Toklo understood what Ujurak had meant when he'd said,
Remember what truly matters.
Family was the most important thing in the world, but it didn't have to be the family you were born into. He and the others had created a family for themselves: this ragtag band of bears, thrown together by luck or by the spirits, yet trusting one another with their lives.

Toklo knew what he had to do. He padded up to Nanulak, who was still glaring at his mother, still quivering with anger and hatred. “Nanulak, don't do this,” he urged. “Come with us, if that's what you want. Your anger will destroy you, and if you go off alone, you won't survive.”

“What?” The sharp exclamation came from Lusa. “You'll let this … this liar come with us?”

She crowded up to Toklo on one side, while Kallik pressed against him from the other.

“Toklo, what are you doing?” Kallik asked. “Nanulak might look like a brown bear, but he's not a replacement for Tobi or Ujurak.”

“I know,” Toklo replied quietly. “But we've always found room for bears to join us, however difficult they might seem to be at first. We forgive mistakes—that's what makes us the family we are. Nanulak,” he went on, turning back to the younger bear, “you can belong with us if you really want to. We'll give you all the help you need.”

Nanulak swiveled to glare at Toklo. “You're not a true brown bear,” he retorted. “If you were, you'd come with me and leave these others behind. No wonder Ujurak left you!”

Toklo heard a gasp from Lusa and Kallik; he knew they expected him to explode with anger, but he made himself stay calm.

“I hope you find peace on your travels,” was all he said. “Or you're going to come to a nasty end.”

“Are you threatening me?” Fury flared in Nanulak's eyes. “If I have to fight to prove what I am, then I will.”

Drawing his lips back in a snarl, Nanulak aimed a blow at his mother, who leaped out of range, not trying to defend herself. Nanulak whirled and lashed out again, at Toklo this time; Toklo blocked the blow with a firm paw.

“Nanulak, this is ridiculous,” he sighed. “There's no need for fighting.”

“It's what brown bears do, isn't it?” Nanulak growled. “We fear nothing, accept nothing but victory.”

Toklo suddenly felt as if he were adrift in a rough sea. He had no idea how to get through to this troubled bear. He didn't even recognize Nanulak now, all fury and vengeance.

“You tricked me!” Nanulak spat. “You never wanted me to come with you. You changed your mind, and now you want me to stay with these bears.”

“That's not true—” Toklo began.

“I can survive on my own!” Nanulak declared. “If no bear wants me, then I don't want them, either.”

“Wait,” his mother said, stepping forward again. “I want you.”

“You're dead to me,” Nanulak sneered. “You betrayed me by making me neither a white bear nor a brown bear. Can't you see that?”

There was a muffled gasp from his brown and white kin. Nanulak's mother bowed her head, and the white bear who was Nanulak's father padded to her side and pressed himself against her.

“Let him go,” he whispered. “It's what he wants.”

Nanulak had already turned away, thrusting himself between the bears who surrounded him. Toklo started after him, but Kallik stepped into his way.

“No,” she said, her voice quiet but firm. “Nanulak has made his choice.”

Reluctantly Toklo nodded, watching as Nanulak shouldered his way through the crowd and began to climb the slope. His mother gazed after him, her eyes full of regret and longing.

Toklo faced Nanulak's father. “I am truly sorry,” he said. “If I hadn't believed Nanulak's lies, I would never have attacked you.”

The white bear dipped his head. “It wasn't your fault. Thank the spirits that no great harm has been done.”

But Toklo found it hard to accept his forgiveness.
I might have killed this bear. And I've lost Nanulak.

No. I've lost the bear I thought he was.

He stood in the midst of the blood-stained snow, staring at Nanulak as he trudged up the hillside, growing smaller and smaller until he reached the ridge and disappeared. Grief tingled in Toklo's fur, and he had no idea what he was supposed to do now.

Lusa drew his attention by pressing her muzzle into his shoulder. “This is why Ujurak sent us back,” she murmured. “We had to discover the truth about Nanulak.”

“It wasn't his destiny to travel with us,” Kallik said.

A faint warmth began to seep into Toklo's fur. He felt as if Ujurak was somewhere close to him, gazing at him with stars in his eyes.

You were so brave, Toklo, and so loyal to the bear you thought was your friend. You were right to offer him forgiveness. Now you can journey on, knowing that you did all you could for Nanulak.

Journey on?
Toklo wondered.
Can I?
Even Ujurak's praise wasn't enough to heal the wounds Nanulak had dealt to his spirit, so much deeper than those he had taken from Nanulak's father.