The Melting Sea (27 page)

“As for
you
—” Kallik halted as she passed Taqqiq, swinging around to face him threateningly. “Stay here at the den and start rebuilding it. And I'd better see some progress when I get back.”

Toklo realized that even though Kallik had defended Taqqiq to Sakari, she was still furious with her brother.

Taqqiq was clearly fuming, but he just trudged resentfully over to the collapsed den and started to scrape at the snow. As Toklo watched him shove the heaps around, he felt a stab of sympathy for the white bear.

Hunger drives bears to do crazy things
, he thought.
What Taqqiq and the others did was wrong, but I can't be sure I wouldn't have done something stupid, too, if I were starving
.

Turning away from Taqqiq, Toklo gazed around at the ice, hostile and white and creaking. He couldn't imagine wanting to live out here forever.
But then, I'm not a white bear
.

Tonraq and Pakak bounced up to Lusa, their eyes wide with curiosity as they stared up at her.

“You're a funny color,” Pakak said.

“Yes, we've never seen a bear like you before,” his brother added.

“Well, where I come from, there are lots of bears like me,” Lusa told them, with an amused glance at Toklo.

The little cubs gave her an interested sniff, then seemed to accept what she said. “Are we going to fight the bad bears?” Tonraq asked.

“You're not,” Lusa told them. “You're too little. But the rest of us—yes, we're ready to fight.”

“We're not too little!” Tonraq protested.

“We want to fight now!” Pakak agreed. “We're
fierce
!”

Lusa exchanged another glance with Toklo. “Okay, I'll teach you a move or two,” she said, adding in a lower voice to Toklo, “If things go badly, they might need to defend themselves.”

Toklo didn't think there was much hope for the cubs if Salik and his bears won the fight, but he didn't say so. He settled down to watch as Lusa began to teach the cubs.

“The first thing you need to learn,” Lusa began, “is how to dodge your enemy. You have to watch very carefully so you know which side the first blow is coming from.” She pointed with her snout at Tonraq. “Run at me and try to hit me.”

The little cub gave a bounce of excitement and then dashed straight at Lusa. Toklo could see that he was signaling quite clearly with the curve of his body and the direction of his gaze which paw he would strike with. Lusa sidestepped quickly so the blow never landed.

“You moved!” Tonraq protested.

“Yes, that's the point,” Lusa said with a huff of laughter. “You'll soon get the idea. Pakak, now you try.”

Pakak had learned from watching his brother, and Toklo could tell that he was trying to hide his intentions as he charged at Lusa, but she was still able to dodge.

“Now I'll show you,” she went on.

As she ran at the cubs, feinting before striking out at them—though she checked herself before her blow could fall—Toklo realized that she was copying moves he always used.
Has she really learned how to fight from watching me?
She was using her weight in the same way that he did, and balancing in the same way to give herself the best use of her forepaws.
She almost looks like a brown bear!

“You need to remember white bears are bigger than you,” he called out to Lusa. “Try diving in
under
the blow and attacking that way.”

“Thanks, Toklo!” Lusa responded.

“We can do that!” Tonraq squealed. “We're
really
small!”

Both of the cubs at once rushed at Lusa, who staggered backward, her paws slipping on the ice.

“You're a big white bear!” Pakak growled. “We're going to
get
you!”

Suppressing laughter, Toklo thought it was just as well that the hunters returned at that moment. Kallik and Yakone were dragging a seal, while Sakari had a huge fish clamped in her jaws. As soon as the cubs saw their mother, they bounded over to her, and Lusa was able to get up, shaking snow off her pelt.

“Save me from the fierce little bears!” she laughed.

That night, Toklo found it hard to sleep. However he lay down, there seemed to be a hard lump of snow or a spike of ice underneath him. He tossed and turned but couldn't get comfortable.

I guess I'd be okay teaching the white bears how to hunt on land. But there's so much they need to learn
.

“Hey, you're squishing me!” Lusa complained.

“Sorry,” Toklo grunted.

He rested his nose on his paws and forced himself to stay still, resigning himself to a sleepless night.

The next thing he knew, Toklo found himself in a sunlit forest clearing. Something about the way the trees grew seemed familiar, and so was the gurgling of the stream that ran along in front of his paws.

A rustling in the undergrowth made Toklo draw back into the shade of a clump of bushes. A moment later a brown bear cub emerged into the open, followed by a smaller cub. It took a couple of heartbeats for Toklo to recognize himself and Ujurak.

I look so young!

Ujurak was gazing happily around the clearing, following the flight of a butterfly and jumping up in a vain attempt to catch it.

“Concentrate!” Young Toklo growled. “I'm supposed to be teaching you stuff.”

“Okay.” Ujurak looked up expectantly.

“You have to keep your claws sharp,” Young Toklo told him. “You do it by scratching a tree, like this.” He stood on his hindpaws and scored his claws down the bark of the nearest tree. “Now you try.”

Ujurak tottered a bit as he got up on his hindpaws, but he clawed vigorously at the bark, and Young Toklo gave him an approving nod. “When you're a full-grown bear,” he went on, “you'll mark your territory like this, by making clawmarks on the trees.”

I remember this
, Toklo thought.
It was soon after I met Ujurak. We didn't have Lusa or Kallik with us then
.

“Okay,” Young Toklo said. “Are you hungry?”

“Starving!”

“Then we'll catch a salmon. Do you remember what I told you last time?”

Ujurak nodded. “We stand in the water and wait.”

“Right. Let's do it.”

Toklo watched as both cubs waded into the stream and stood facing upstream, concentrating hard on the glittering water.

“Remember to pounce on the fish where it's going to be, not where it is,” Young Toklo said.

“But how do I know that?” Ujurak asked.

“You watch the direction it's moving,” Young Toklo explained patiently. “It takes practice, but you'll soon get the idea.”

Suddenly Ujurak gave a bound, as if he had spotted a fish. But as he leaped he changed, his body shrinking, his brown fur giving way to glittering scales, until he plunged back into the water as a salmon.

Young Toklo let out a groan. “Oh, no! Not again!” He waded over to a rock in the middle of the stream and clambered onto it. “Ujurak!” he bellowed.

Toklo stifled a snort of amusement, remembering how irritated he'd been. A few moments later the foliage overhanging the stream rustled wildly and Ujurak emerged, dripping wet, his fur plastered to his body. “Sorry,” he said.

Young Toklo gave an exasperated sigh. “Honestly, Ujurak, you deserve to be caught and eaten, the way you go on.” As the younger cub looked dejected, he added, “Never mind. Come over here, and we'll try again.”

As his younger self slid back into the water, to meet Ujurak in the middle of the stream, Toklo heard a voice behind him. “You were an excellent teacher.”

Toklo turned away from his dream vision. Though he still stood on the edge of the clearing, the older Ujurak had appeared among the bushes. Stars glimmered in his fur, and his eyes were warm and loving. For a moment the longing for the past, when Ujurak was alive and by his side, rose up and almost choked Toklo. He couldn't speak.

“You saved me,” Ujurak said. “I didn't know who I was, and you taught me how to be a brown bear. You can help these white bears, too.”

Toklo blinked in surprise. “But you were always a brown bear.” When Ujurak didn't respond, he went on, “It's not the same, teaching brown bear skills to other bears,” he confessed. “You said we had to learn to be truly wild,” he reminded Ujurak. “Surely that means being true to our own nature?”

For a few moments Ujurak was quiet, his eyes deep and reflective. At last he said, “Let's walk.”

At first the two bears padded side by side through the trees. But soon Ujurak picked up the pace until they were racing along. Then Toklo realized that his paws had left the ground. The trees dropped away beneath him. With a thrill of terror and excitement he mounted higher and higher into the sky; the sun had gone and stars glittered around him, blazing with an icy fire against the darkness of the night. Faster and faster, until he and Ujurak were pounding along, the wind rushing through their pelts.

At last Ujurak halted. Toklo found himself standing on the air, gazing down at a remote view of the world. The flat-face invasion was revealed in vast tracts of bright light, joined by hot BlackPaths where firebeasts crawled, their glaring eyes shining like beetles. The noise seemed to blast Toklo's fur and ears, even at such a great distance. The dark patches that indicated the unspoiled wild were pitifully small; Toklo imagined they were shrinking as he watched.

“Wildness is a rare and precious thing now,” Ujurak said softly. “All bears must hold on to it, even if that means sharing the wildness of other bears. Or it will be lost like water running into sand.” He touched Toklo's shoulder affectionately with his muzzle. “Sharing skills is a way to survive in spite of the flat-faces. Your spirits can be strong if you stand together.”

Toklo gazed in astonishment as Ujurak's starry body swelled until it filled the sky. Then his bear shape faded, leaving Toklo standing alone beside the flaring stars of his friend's constellation. Air was rushing all around him.

I'm falling!

A jolt ran through Toklo's body; he opened his eyes and found himself in the rebuilt den. An icy wind was blowing through a gap in the wall, ruffling his fur. Toklo gathered together a pawful of snow and shoved it into the hole.

That fish-breath Taqqiq can't even build a decent den!
he thought irritably.

Around him, the other bears were just beginning to stir. Toklo let his gaze travel over each one of them.
Yes, I can help you
, he decided.

“I'm going to find more bears who will help us against Salik,” Sakari announced when all the bears had emerged from the den. She padded off in the pale dawn light, new energy in her pawsteps and the set of her shoulders.

“The rest of us had better hunt,” Kallik said when she had gone. “Lusa, will you look after the cubs again?”

“I'll be glad to,” Lusa replied, while Tonraq and Pakak let out squeaks of excitement. “Just come back quickly, before I end up as a few bits of black fur!”

Toklo joined the hunters, striding out confidently across the ice. He had spent so much time here, he had hunted seals so many times, that he knew he could do this.

Kallik taught me well, just as I taught her
.

Spotting a seal hole in the distance, Toklo padded up to it and crouched at the edge of the ice. As he waited, the ice rumbled and creaked in his ears, sending tingles of alarm through his fur.

Time isn't on our side
, he thought.
How long before we're forced back onto land?

At last a seal nose emerged from the water. Toklo flashed out a paw, sinking his claws into the seal and hauling it out onto the ice, where it flopped helplessly until he killed it with a blow to the head.

“Good catch,” said a voice close behind him.

Toklo whipped around to see two white males standing a bearlength away, watching him closely. For a moment Toklo tensed, wondering if they were about to steal his catch, then relaxed as the bigger of the two dipped his head and spoke.

“Hi. I'm Tartok, and this is my brother, Olikpok. Sakari told us about the brown bear who's going to teach us how to fight and hunt on land. That's you, right?”

Toklo nodded. “Yes, that's me.”

Tartok let out a snort. “I told Sakari I'd come, but I still think she's cloud-brained.” His voice was defiant, and he raised his head proudly. “We don't need any help. Generations of white bears have survived without hunting on land. What's so different now?”

Olikpok shook his head. “The Melting Sea doesn't want us anymore,” he said despairingly. “So what's the point of anything?”

Toklo was taken aback at the white bears' lack of energy. Then he realized that it must be so difficult for them to accept that things were changing.

“I can't argue with you,” he said. “I don't belong here the way you do. But I'll teach you what I know, and it might help.”