Fell (The Sight 2) (8 page)

Fell paused, thinking of those words about a Guardian, but hunger was wrestling inside the wolf, his own instincts for survival. The black wolf padded closer.

“Survive,” Fell whispered to himself as he had often done. “I must survive. That is the law of the untamed wolf.”

With that, the beaver sensed him and swung round. It didn’t flinch or startle though, nor dive back into the water. It just stood staring back defiantly at Fell, with enormous brown eyes and shining, quivering whiskers. Then the beaver cocked its head and opened its dripping mouth, to show a set of quite gigantic square teeth. But rather than speak, it just yawned. Fell was amazed at the creature’s reaction in the face of a wolf. His tail came down slowly.

“Aren’t you frightened of me?” he growled.

At that the beaver tilted its head, and Fell could see the surprise in its eyes.

“Not
of
you,” it answered in a strange accent, “but zat I can understand you, yah.”

“It is the Sight,” whispered Fell. “Something is happening; something in nature, I think.”

The beaver nodded.

“And vat doo you vant?” he asked.

“What do you think I want?” growled Fell.

“To kill and eat me,” answered the beaver coldly. “Zen vat are you vaiting for?”

Fell was even more surprised at this remark. The beaver didn’t seem frightened of him at all.

“Vell?” he went on scornfully. “You expect me to give you permission, perhaps? Try or don’t try, but don’t vaste my time looking at me like zat.”

Fell was struck dumb. As a wolf, his instincts were trained to two basic responses in the wild—fight or flight—but Fell had never met a creature before that seemed to take the attitude of talk or be rude.

“But aren’t … aren’t you afraid of me at all?” he whispered.

At Fell’s question the beaver sat back on his haunches, propped himself up on his bizarre tail, and pulled his little front paws through his whiskers.

“Afraid of vat?” he almost snorted. “Of being eaten? Every day a creature like me faces zat threat. If I spent all my time vorrying about all zee zings zat could happen to me in life, I’d never leave zee hide, let alone finish my lodge.”

“Oh,” said Fell, almost ashamed that he had failed so miserably to make any impression on the beaver whatsoever.

“Father told me never to vaste time on fear,” said the beaver. “Get on vith it and don’t complain, zat vas Father’s motto. Mates to care for, and hungry kits to feed. Zat’s real life, and have zum fun doing it, I zay. It all ends zee zame vay in zee end, anyhow, vether it’s in a stomach or in zee ground. Besides, I have zings to guard.”

Fell suddenly wondered if he was in a dream—a beaver talking to him so philosophically like this about life and death. But it was the last thing that the beaver had said that had stuck in his mind, and again he thought of that voice and Larka’s face.

“Tell me,” he said, “you seem to know much. Then what do you know of the Guardian?”

“Zee Guardian!” said the beaver immediately, looking frightened despite all he had said. “Doesn’t one vith zee Zight know of him already?”

“No, tell me.”

“Zee Guardian is a great and terrible myth,” said the beaver with a shiver, “and in legend is zaid to know all zee deepest zecrets of zee Zight.”

Fell’s yellow gold eyes narrowed. Perhaps this Guardian could tell him how a child could be important to all of nature. Besides, when he had become a Kerl had he not promised himself to hunt for meaning and track down lies? “Who is this Guardian?” he asked. “Where is he? What is his name?”

“None know zat grave zecret,” answered the beaver, “except if he is real, zee Guardian valks alone, shielding his identity from all, zey zay, and zpeaks vith a mouth of stone.”

Fell had never heard anything so ridiculous in all his days. He felt rather embarrassed for having asked. But the beaver went on.

“Zey zay zome pretend to be him. Zome of zee Lera. For zere are many tricksters in zee lands beyond zee forest!”

Fell had relaxed, for the black wolf had decided not to eat the impudent animal after all, and he rather liked the twinkle in its cheeky eyes. The beaver had caught the meaning in Fell’s body too, but he didn’t relax quite so much as the wolf.

“And who are you then?” asked Fell.

“Ottol,” answered the beaver, lifting his head boldly, “from zee great black forests to zee vest.”

Fell knew his own country as the lands beyond the forest, and he had no way of knowing that the beaver meant the region that one day men would call Bavaria.

“And you?” asked Ottol abruptly.

“Fell,” answered the wolf.

Ottol dropped his paws immediately.

“Ah yes, zee lone black voolf,” he said rather more warily. “Vee have heard rumours of you, Fell, though I zought zem stories. You are almost a legend, roaming zee forests and scaring zee Lera vith your cries. Vy do you do it?”

Fell was strangely pleased by his own reputation, but his lips curled up.

“You wouldn’t understand,” he answered darkly. “You’re no Putnar, Ottol the beaver.”

“And zat I’m not, zanking zee Great One,” said the beaver. “I eat zee bark and delicious berries. Having to hunt and kill all zee time, and to eat varm meat, it’s deeeeesgusting.”

“Is it?” growled Fell, getting his appetite back almost immediately. “Perhaps I should teach you just how disgusting it can be.”

“Spring and jump at me, vould you?” cried the beaver sharply. “Vell, doo it. Go on, zen, and zee just vat happens, you fool.”

This was too much for Fell. Almost faster than you can say “river beaver,” he sprang at the creature with a snarl, but Ottol launched himself off his powerful tail and dived back into the water to safety. On land his little feet made him slow, but in the water he was master of his own world.

Fell, on the other hand, landed on the spot on the lodge where Ottol had been perched, and as soon as he reached the slippery logs, he felt his paws scrabbling hopelessly and the ground beneath him moving. The logs in the dam wall had begun to slide, and it was all the wolf could do to stop himself being hurled into the river, or pulled down between the powerful branches.

Two logs caught his front right paw, so painfully that it felt like a human trap—the metal teeth they left in the forest—and part of the lodge wall fell away in a noisy cascade. Fell thought he would be caught and crushed, but as they went on rolling, his injured paw was released again, and the wolf managed to get purchase with his back legs. He gave another leap, and just as a part of the lodge fell in on itself with an almighty crash, landed on the bank, safely.

He felt a bad pain in his right paw though, and as he looked down he saw blood staining the snow. Fell whimpered bitterly and began to lick at the deep cut on his leg.

“Now zee vat you’ve done,” came an angry, scornful voice, and Fell looked up to see Ottol glaring at him from the far bank. “I knew zat vood happen. It vill take me two whole days to rebuild it.”

Fell snarled, but the beaver, far out of reach now, held his ground.

“Vy do you zink I didn’t run ven I first zaw you? I knew you’d spring and damage my lodge.”

“I thought you zed you veren’t frightened,” snorted Fell angrily, mocking Ottol, and licking his paw again.

“No, zo I’m not,” said Ottol proudly, “for vee are from a family of vorriors, and one zing my father alvays zaid to me, ‘Don’t be afraid, Ottol, courage my boy. And remember, strike upwards. Strike upwards, if you strike at zee stars.’ But I’m not stupid, and I’m not ready yet to be zee meal for a zilly voolf, legend or not.”

“If the river weren’t so cold, you’d be a meal soon enough, bold beaver,” growled Fell dangerously, his breath smoking in the air, and hiding the fact that he feared the water too.

“And how vood you catch me with a voonded paw?” asked Ottol scornfully.

The beaver paused though, and something kindly came into his intelligent eyes. “Yet vee are even now, are vee not, Fell?” he said. “You damaged my lodge and it damaged your paw. You’d better doo zumthing for it. It vill be dangerous in zis vether.”

Fell eyed him slyly. It was absurd for a beaver in the wild to be trying to help a wolf like this, and the Putnar suspected some ulterior motive. In fact Ottol did have an ulterior motive, for quite apart from wanting to protect the new lodge, of which he was so extremely proud, his hide was deep below it and inside it was the beloved family he was guarding. He wanted Fell’s focus away from his home.

Yet Ottol, for all his Bavarian beaver bluster, was not an unkind animal, and he had seen something in Fell that he liked too.

“I can bring you zum plants I know to help it heal.”

Fell looked up.

“I’m all right,” he growled proudly, “and I don’t need any help from you.”

“Don’t you indeed?” said Ottol. “And vere are you going?”

Fell’s eyes narrowed. How could he tell the beaver of the voice, and his vision of a human with a mark on his arm, that he had been told he must help. In truth Fell had still not accepted the mad injunction, and although the voice had said the child was close, he had no idea where he was going at all.

“I wander,” he answered sullenly.

“And all alone, vithout a mate and a family of little ones to care for?” said Ottol. “I can’t zink of anyzing more terrible.”

“A family?” said Fell softly, thinking of Huttser and Palla, and their cubs—his brothers and sisters—Khaz and Kipcha, Skop and little Larka, whom his parents had named after
her
. “What point in a family, Ottol? They grow to face the same pain and darkness as everything else, and then to die too.”

At this the beaver dived into the water again and swam back towards Fell, who marvelled at the creature’s lack of fear of the water. He pulled himself out on the lodge once more and shook his coat.

“You’re dark indeed, voolf,” he said. “Why zo, Fell ZlipPaw?”

“Because I’m a Kerl and have seen much darkness. Because it’s my nature.”

“Is it indeed?” said Ottol, “and vould you doo zomething for me, Fell?”

“What?” asked the wolf in surprise.

“Vould you turn zat log for me vith your good paw? Zee one on top of zee smaller, over zere. It vill free zee first, and help me get back to vork.”

Fell was surprised by the request, but for some reason he got up and limped over to the log. He began to nudge it with his muzzle towards the lodge, but as he did so felt something warm and pleasant on his back. A shaft of hot sunlight had come slanting through the winter trees, and after sitting in icy shade, he now felt warmth on his back. It was exactly as the clever beaver had intended.

“Zere,” cried Ottol, “you zee?”

“See?” said Fell, rolling the log and looking back.

“You know zee zunlight too, voolf, and you like it.”

“I didn’t mean that,” snapped Fell coldly, but very much liking the sunlight on his back. “I meant …”

“Zee darkness of zee world,” said Ottol, “I know. Zee darkness of zee wild Putnar and zee fighter. Zee darkness of dreams and nightmares.”

“Yes,” growled Fell.

“I too know zee darkness, I know zee warm, zafe darkness of an earthy hide and zee misty, curling darkness of zee endless flowing vorters, and a vorld of strangling veeds beneath. I know zee darkness of leaves and zee musty, zecret places of zee forest.”

“But that’s not …”

“Not?” snapped the beaver, “not zee zunlight, no. Not vot you zink is black in your nature either. But it is zee darkness, as zee zun on your back, or zee glitter of corn in a field, is zee light. But is one any better zan zee other?”

“What do you mean?” growled Fell.

“Look at mushrooms of zee forest,” said Ottol thoughtfully. “Beds of fungus and lichen. Fields of gorse and bracken, vere a million living zings breed and grow in zecret. Do not zee other Lera feed on zem to live? Has darkness not a power too?”

Fell was silent.

“But if you zink it zee only power, you’re wrong,” said the philosophical beaver, “for it is zunlight zat draws zee dark power from zee earth, and zo makes zee trees grow tall. Zo from vere doo you draw your power, voolf, zee darkness or zee light? And can’t you hear it, Fell?”

“Hear it?”

“Zomething is happening, as you zaid. Zee voice of zee Great One, my kind call it. Talking through all nature.”

Fell blinked. Was that what the squirrels had meant? Did a mysterious Guardian really exist, to give him an answer to this madness?

“Zee miracle comes again, as does zee spring. And if you zink darkness your only power, vill you not stay in zee shadows like a guilty zing, hiding away forever?”

“I …”

“Zere,” said the beaver smugly, “perhaps you have been too long in zee dark, Fell ShadowTail. Look to zee light.”

Fell took a step forwards.

“You don’t understand,” he growled again. “Besides, you build your dam, and hunt for your mate and cubs, but you do not have what I have. The freedom of the untamed wolf.”

The beaver cocked his head questioningly.

“Freedom without responsibility? What freedom is zat? None at all.”

With that there was the most extraordinary sound, a kind of barking and then a swishing and two tiny heads popped out of the water, followed by a third, as large and handsome as Ottol’s. It was his mate and her kits.

“What’s zee racket, Ottol?” the female beaver snapped irritably.

“Stay back, children,” cried Ottol to his kits, for the little baby beavers were scrabbling up the bank towards their father, and thus closer to the wolf.

Ottol suddenly wished with all his heart that they had waited till early summer to have children, but the journey to this strange land had disrupted their natural rhythms. The look of terror from Ottol’s mate was evident too, as she rose from the water and saw the black wolf on the riverbank. She started to slap her huge tail on the surface of the water in desperate warning.

“It is all right, Ottol,” growled Fell softly, feeling rather amused. “I’ll not harm you, or your family. I swear it.”

The female beaver blinked in astonishment that she understood Fell, then stopped slapping the water, for she realised there was no one else to warn anyway. Fell was suddenly surprised at himself for making so many promises.