The Quest Begins (3 page)

“You should always treat anything from nature with respect,” Stella said, “even when you eat it. You never know when it might have the spirit of a bear inside it.”

“Oh, no!” Lusa cried, pretending to act horrified. “A bear spirit! I don't want to eat any of those. I'll never be able to eat
apples again.” She flounced back to the log. Stella and Yogi laughed.

A few stars came out as the sun went down, but most of them were hard to see in the orange glow from the flat-face lights. King ambled back to the boulders, where he slept outside. The other bears preferred the dens of white stone at the back of the Bowl, where they could be sure they wouldn't be rained on suddenly in the middle of the night. King was the only one who didn't like being indoors. Ashia had explained to Lusa that he didn't like the walls' straight edges, or the feeling of being trapped, but Lusa didn't understand. Inside the den it was quiet and warm. Out there, you could hear the grizzly bear grunting and the white bears snoring and insects buzzing around your ears all night long.

She rolled onto her back and looked up at the sky through the clear, hard square in the roof. One bright star hung there, always watching her, night after night. It was the only one she could always see, and it never seemed to move.

“Stella?” Lusa asked. “Do you know anything about that star?”

“That is the Bear Watcher,” Stella murmured sleepily. “Like us, it has found a good place and it stays there, never wandering.”

“Tell us more,” Yogi prompted. “Is it the spirit of a bear?”

“Don't be silly,” Stella said. “Bear spirits live in the trees. But my mother did once tell me the story of a little bear cub in the sky.”

“A bear cub in the sky?” Lusa echoed.

“Yes.” Stella wrinkled her nose as if she was trying to remember. “She keeps the bright star in her tail, but there's a big brown bear who wants that star for his own. So he chases the little black bear around and around the sky…but he never gets the star, because black bears are too clever, even if they are smaller than other bears.”

“So the little bear gets to keep the star,” Lusa said, pleased. She was sure she could be fast and clever, too. Certainly more clever than Yogi or the fat brown bear next door.

Stella had fallen asleep, making drowsy buzzing noises through her nose. Yogi was licking his paws, digging his teeth in between his claws to get at the last sticky bits of fruit.

Lusa didn't feel tired. She scrambled to her paws again and padded outside, hoping she could see the little black bear and the big brown bear running around and around. She padded over to the Mountains and stood on the tallest boulder, craning her neck to look up at the night sky.

The only star she could see was the motionless bright one, twinkling down at her.

Lusa sat on her haunches and gazed up at it—the little bear watching the Bear Watcher.

Toklo crouched in the long grass
. All around him the trees waved softly, and he could feel the breeze ruffling his shaggy brown coat.

Toklo opened his mouth and breathed in the musky smell of prey. He twitched his ears at the sound of snapping pine needles and let his breathing slow down until it matched the sighing of the wind. Then, with lightning quickness, he charged, sinking his claws into rabbit flesh. The creature squirmed and flailed, trying to get away, but Toklo's long, razor-sharp claws pierced its fur and pinned it to the ground. With a fierce snarl, the grizzly bear cub sank his teeth into the rabbit's neck.

“Toklo! Toklo, MOVE!”

His mother's voice jerked Toklo's attention back to the real world. He let go of the log he'd been pretending was a rabbit and looked up.

A firebeast was charging straight at him!

Toklo scrambled backward as fast as he could, making it to the nearby grass just as the firebeast roared past, missing him by only a few pawlengths. Horrible black smoke filled the air as it shot by, spraying brown slush from the puddles over his fur.

“Blech!” Toklo spat, rubbing his face with his paws. The taste of the firebeast's fumes was all over his tongue and up his nose. For a moment he couldn't smell anything except the beast and burning.

“Toklo, you troublesome cub!” His mother lumbered over and cuffed him on the head, making his ears ring. “How many times have I told you to stay away from the BlackPath? You could have been killed!”

“I could have scared away the firebeast,” Toklo muttered. “I've been working on my angry face, see?” He raised himself on his back legs and bellowed, baring his sharp teeth.

“
Nothing
scares the firebeasts,” Oka snarled. “And you'll never be as big as they are, so don't even think about fighting them.”

Toklo wished he could be that big. Then nobody would ever scold him or tell him what to do or make him eat dandelions. He'd been following his mother through the valley all day, and they had barely found anything to eat. Although the season of fishleap was almost here, drifts of snow still covered the ground around the mountains, looking from a distance like piles of white fur on the rocks. But here and there it was melting, revealing patches of dirt and feeble bits of grass where snowdrops and dandelions poked through.

“Why can't you be quiet and obedient like your brother?” Oka grumbled. She swung her head around to look at her younger son, huddled beneath a tree.

“Obedient?” Toklo scoffed. “You mean weak.”

“Tobi's sick,” Oka growled. “He needs food. Gather some dandelions for him, and eat some yourself instead of rolling into the BlackPath like a blind deer.”

“I don't like dandelions,” Toklo complained. “They're all smushed up and full of dirt and they taste like metal and smoke. Yuck!” He pawed at his nose, wishing he had a real rabbit.

“We can't afford to be picky,” Oka said, digging through the snow with her giant claws. “Food is scarce enough. You have to eat whatever we can find, or you will starve to death.”

Toklo snorted. Tobi ate whatever he was given, and he was doing much worse than Toklo, so Toklo thought being fussy was just fine. He couldn't understand what was wrong with Tobi. All he did was lie around looking sad and moaning.

Toklo dug up a few dandelion stems and padded over to his brother. The damp grass under the tree tickled his paws as he nudged Tobi's side.

“Come on, Tobi, eat these,” Toklo said. “Or else you'll be too tired to keep walking—again—and Mother will probably blame me for not feeding you.”

Tobi opened his dark brown eyes and gazed up at his brother. He pressed his front paws into the ground and lifted himself weakly up to a wobbly standing position. He leaned over and put his mouth around a dandelion, which he chewed
as if it were a chunk of stone.

Toklo sighed. Tobi was useless and he had been his whole life, as far as Toklo could remember. He was too small and too tired to do anything fun. He couldn't hunt. He couldn't feed himself. He couldn't play-wrestle. He couldn't even walk faster than a caterpillar.

If it were just me and Mother,
Toklo thought, forcing himself to eat one of the dandelions,
we could run right across the mountains and chase rabbits and eat anything we wanted.
His fur burned with resentment. Tobi got all the attention and all the praise, but he was nothing but a burden. Toklo was the one who would grow up to be a real bear. He was the one who would take care of them all once he was big enough.

Oka shambled over, sniffing the air and warily eyeing the BlackPath. Toklo could feel the rumble under their paws that meant that another firebeast was coming.

“Let's keep moving,” she said. “I think we've dug up all the dandelions here.”

Finally!
Toklo woofed happily and broke into a run, galloping up the hill into the woods. There were much more interesting smells coming from up the mountain. In the valley where they'd always lived, the smells of the flat-faces and their firebeasts covered everything else.

“Toklo!” his mother said sharply. “Come back here. We're going this way.”

The bear cub's shoulders slumped. “But,
Mother
,” he whined. “I want to go into the mountains and catch a goat. I'm sure I could if you let me try!”

“Tobi will never make it up that slope,” Oka pointed out. “And it will be too cold in the mountains for him. We have to stay low until the snow melts, when it'll be easier for him to travel up there.”

Toklo stood up on his back legs and pawed at his ears, trying to hide his frustration. It wasn't fair! Stupid Tobi. Every decision they made was all about him.

“Let's check the sides of the BlackPath,” Oka said. “If we're lucky, one of the firebeasts might have abandoned some prey.”

“Fine,” Toklo said, sprinting ahead along the edge of the BlackPath. He liked the feeling of leading the others, of being the one who decided where to go, even if he wasn't really in charge. Oka followed, helping Tobi plod along beside her and nudging him forward every few steps with her muzzle. Toklo stayed in the shadow of the trees, keeping at least a bearslength away from the BlackPath. He'd never seen a firebeast leave the BlackPath before, but he thought they probably could if they wanted to.

The roaring and growling from the firebeasts started to hurt Toklo's ears, especially as more and more of them raced past. Toklo couldn't pick up any prey scents, and the sounds of the forest were completely drowned out. The rustling and pattering from under the snow, where mice and other tiny creatures lived, usually made his mouth water and his heart beat faster. Here, there was nothing to get him excited.

After a long time, Oka barked to catch his attention. He turned and saw what she had spotted: a deer carcass lying by the side of the BlackPath. He hadn't noticed it because it
didn't smell like prey or like any kind of food.

But he followed his mother and helped her drag the dead deer off the BlackPath and back into the trees. He sank his teeth into the flesh with a shudder, feeling the frozen meat crunch in his jaws, and dug his paws into the ground to pull it backward. As soon as they were under the tree cover, he dropped the carcass and wiped his tongue with his paws.

“That is disgusting,” he announced.

“We're lucky to find any meat at all,” his mother said. “Here, Tobi, take a bite.” Dutifully, the smaller cub tugged free a piece of ragged flesh and swallowed it.

Toklo tried to do the same. He bit into the deer's haunch, but it was hard to tear apart the frozen, dead meat, and once he did get a mouthful, he couldn't bring himself to swallow it. He spat out the meat and sat up.

“I can't!” he said, backing away from the carcass. “It's the most horrible, awful, disgusting, dreadful thing I've ever tasted in my whole life.”

“Toklo!” Oka snapped. “Stop being so fussy! By the Great Water Spirits, are you a bear or a squirrel?”

“I'm a bear!” Toklo cried.

“Then eat like a bear!” Oka said. “Or don't eat at all; see if I care.”

Toklo scratched crossly at the ground. This wasn't eating like a bear! This was eating like a scavenging wolverine. A real bear wouldn't eat the long-dead carcasses killed by something else. He'd be out there chasing goats and rabbits and anything else with a heartbeat, slaying them with his
long claws, powerful paws, and fierce teeth. A real bear would go anywhere he pleased and he wouldn't have to drag a useless lump of fur like Tobi along behind him.

Well, Toklo was not going to eat this vile, stinking deer. Tobi could have the whole thing, not that he was strong enough to take more than two bites. Toklo sulked off to the nearest tree and sat behind it, rubbing his nose and making just enough grumbling noise so that his mother and brother could hear how upset he was.

Oka had only brought Toklo and Tobi out of their BirthDen two moons ago, and in that time they had wandered in circles up and down the valley, going from one feeding site to the next. At first it had seemed huge to Toklo, but now he felt bored and trapped, especially with the mountains surrounding them on all sides. They ate meat if they could find it, but mostly they had to make do with green plants, termites, and roots they could dig up with their long, straight claws.

Their mother always kept them close to the BlackPath of the firebeasts, which ran through the heart of their range. There was another path that crossed it higher up the valley, but that was a SilverPath, harder and shinier than the BlackPath, and the firebeasts that ran along it were much longer and larger than the regular firebeasts. Toklo's mother called them snakebeasts, because they ran back and forth along the narrow SilverPath like big roaring snakes, making strange, high-pitched whistling and hooting noises that sounded like giant birds. Toklo could remember the place
where the two paths crossed. They had found a grain spill there, piles and piles of grain just lying on the ground for them to eat. He hated the noise along the SilverPath, but at least the grain had filled him up.

He perked his ears. A long, mournful sound wailed in the distance. He recognized it, and he knew if they followed it, it would lead them to the track-crossing place. “Mother!” he called, bounding to his paws and scrambling through the snow to her side. She looked at him wearily, pausing with her claws buried in the deer's neck.

“Do you remember the grain spill we found?” Toklo prompted. “I think we're close to where it was. I bet I could find it again.”

“Toklo,” Oka said, shaking her head, “the grain will be long gone by now.”

“I know,” Toklo argued, “but maybe there's been another spill. Maybe there's more to eat there. Shouldn't we at least look?” He was so sick of being told he was wrong, of having to live his life limited by Tobi's weakness. This was a good idea, and he was going to make his mother see that.

To his surprise, Oka looked at him thoughtfully, the long brown fur rippling across her shoulders. Then she bent her muzzle to Tobi, sniffed him once, and looked up at her older cub.

“All right, Toklo,” she said. “Lead the way.”

 

Toklo's heart swelled with pride as they climbed over a low ridge and spotted the SilverPath crossing in a dip below them.
He'd found it! All on his own, he had tracked his way back to a food source, just like a grown-up grizzly bear.

When they had still been under the snow in the BirthDen, Oka had told them stories about her life before she had cubs. She told them about one caribou that she had tracked through the deep earthsleep snow for three days until it was too exhausted to continue and she killed it. That prey had provided her with food for many days.

She also spoke of the places where rocks and snow charged down the mountains, roaring like bears. She would often dig for squirrels along these paths during fishleap season. Toklo's belly rumbled at the thought of fresh squirrel meat. He shook his head, trying not to think about it. Grain would be good enough for now.

He wished they could hunt in the mountains, but he knew better than to ask his mother again. He'd only get the same answer he always did: “Tobi isn't strong enough yet. Mothers with cubs have to make do as best they can. Only adult males are strong enough to eat wherever they want.”

Toklo couldn't wait to be full grown. He'd kill so much prey, he'd be able to feed his mother and brother, too. He glanced back at Tobi, shambling along with a weaving, dizzy walk. Oka touched her muzzle gently to her younger cub's head, encouraging him forward. Why did she waste so much attention on him? Tobi would never be a great hunter. Not like Toklo.

The smell of the grain reached Toklo's nose, and he picked up speed, running down the slope ahead of the others. When he reached a pile of the tiny yellow seeds, he bent his head and
began to eat without waiting for his mother and Tobi. His belly felt like an empty cave. He didn't care that the grain tasted dry and dustier than it had the last time they were here. At least it wasn't rotten deer that had been trampled by firebeasts.

Tobi and Oka nosed around the pile, crunching through the scattered grain. Something rumbled under the ground, and Toklo leaned down to listen. The trembling shook his paws, and he stepped back, looking up to see one of the long snakebeasts charging along the SilverPath. The sound of its rattling paws hurt his ears, and as it went by it let out a long, mournful wail. Toklo buried his face in his paws, batting at his ears to clear out the ringing. As the noise was fading into the distance he heard something else—the snapping of branches under large paws. With a fierce grunt, Toklo spun around.

A huge male grizzly was walking toward them. It was twice Oka's size, with a jagged scar across its flank and a wild look in its eyes. It didn't speed up when it saw them, but it kept coming straight in their direction, as if it knew they couldn't fight him.