At the Edge of the World

by Avi

  Bear, meanwhile, bent over, scooped up some dead leaves, and pressed them against his bleeding arm. It staunched the blood somewhat.

  “Will … will you be all right?” I managed to say.

  “As God wills it,” he growled. “I’ve seen worse for men that lived. We need make haste. I’m sure we’ll be pursued.” That said, he held out a hand. I helped him up. After shaking himself like a wet dog, he plunged deeper into the forest.

  I hurried after, but kept glancing back.

  The forest was without tracks or trails. The more we stumbled on, the more I lost my sense of time and place. Stout oak, elm, and ash grew beyond any number I could count. The warp of branches hid the sky. The air was humid, thick with the stench of decay. Tangled bushes clutched our feet. Here and there were boggy mires. All in all, it was an uninviting world, with not the slightest trace of human life.

  Bear was constantly clutching his arm, increasingly a-sweat with struggle. Even I was short of breath.

  “Shouldn’t we seek a path?” I asked after we had labored long.

  “The more marked the path,” said Bear between heavy panting, “the more likely it will take us to a place others will know. Didn’t someone say, ‘New lives require new paths’? This way’s best.”

  In faith, I’m not sure who led the way, Bear or I. It might have been the occasional ray of sunlight that gave us direction—fingerposts set down by God on high.

  After we had gone for what felt like many leagues, Bear began to falter increasingly until he abruptly halted. “God’s heart,” he exclaimed. “I can go no more.”

  All but falling, he sat with his back propped against an oak. His face was drawn, paler than normal. Shivering, he wrapped his cloak tightly round while holding his wounded arm in such a way I knew it was giving him much pain.

  “You said the wound was not bad,” I said.

  “No such thing as a good wound,” he muttered, shutting his eyes.

  I stood there dismayed. “What shall I do?” I asked.

  “All I need is some food, warmth, and a term of peace.” He turned toward me without opening his eyes. “If you have any to spare, I would be willing to share.”

  Not fooled by his raillery, I sat down opposite and waited anxiously for him to do something. Alas, he continued to sit in a state of collapse, breathing deeply, as if he had run a race and lost.

  The more he remained there, the more unnerved I became. With the two of us, Bear had always taken the lead. Great in soul, size, and voice as he was, I had never had to wait on him. What kind of freedom had I gained, I wondered, to be so soon on the edge of calamity?

  “Are you hungry?” I asked, somewhat lamely.

  “I can’t remember when I’ve eaten last,” he confessed.

  “I can set a trap,” I said. He had taught me how. “I’ll catch a hare.”

  “Good lad,” he murmured, his breath labored, his eyes still closed. Then he said, “I’m cold.”

  I stood up. “While I’m gone,” I said, “this might help.” I set his split hat back on his bald head, and tied it round his cheeks. A poor thing, that hat, but I knew he cherished it as an emblem of his being. When I set it on him, the bells that hung from the two points tinkled; in the forest they made an empty, mocking sound.

  I gathered some fallen leaves and spread them over him from his feet to his chest.

  “Does that make you any warmer?”

  “I’m well planted,” he replied. “Just don’t let it become an early burial.”

  “Bear!” I said.

  “I jest,” he said, but, in faith, it didn’t seem that way to me.

  “I’ll be quick,” I said, and started off.

  “Crispin!” he called.

  “I’m here.”

  “I’m not prepared to die.”

  His words struck hard. “What … what do you mean?” I said, upset that he should speak that way.

  “In Jesus’s name, I’m weak. And I’ve sinned much.”

  “I’ve … I’ve never seen you sin,” I said.

  He took a deep breath and started to speak, but seemed to change his mind. Instead he whispered, “Just don’t abandon me.”

  “By all that’s holy, Bear,” I returned, “you know I never would. Call with any need. I’ll be no farther than a shout.”

  I stood there, afraid to leave. But when he said no more, I made myself set off in search of a likely spot to place a snare. As I went, I kept thinking how painful it was for me to hear Bear speak of weakness on his part.

  For if he was weak, what did that make me?

  4

  ISEARCHED FOR an open glade where grass grew, knowing that was where rabbits and hares most liked to feed. As God would have it, I soon found a likely spot close by. There, the sun, finding a rent in the canopy of leaves, had kissed the earth as sweetly as a blessing. It was but a few paces across, a soft green sward of bright green grass that invited rest. Respite, however, was not my mission.

  As taught by Bear, I found some thin, flexible willow wands and twisted them into a spring trap much like a noose. Trying to touch the twigs as little as possible—lest the beasts sniff out my scent—I set the snare down in the middle of the glade, then took myself off the immediate spot and waited, rock in hand.

  Bear had instructed me not to move, to breathe softly; merely, in fact, to think, and to do so silently. But how difficult to wait when you are wanting food and that food is not yet caught—nay, not even visible. For the sound of waiting is full of noise: every creak was hope, every rustle expectation.

  I kept mulling over Bear’s words—that he had sinned much. I, who loved him as a father, thought of all I knew of him, but could not imagine what forgiveness he might need, save for some small measure of anger or vanity, his daily faults. I could not help but think of how truly short a time I had known Bear, how—save some fragments he’d revealed—little I knew regarding the full measure of his life. Still, Bear’s condition made me aware how large was my dependence on him, how small I was alone. What, I kept asking myself, if he grew worse? How I cursed myself for urging him to stop at the alestake!

  Then and there I swore—by my Saint Giles—a sacred vow: As Bear had taken care of me I would care for him. I could not be a boy. I must be a man!

  “Lord Jesus!” I prayed with all my heart, my eyes full of tears. “Give me the strength to help Bear. Give Bear the strength to live.”

  Despite my intent, exhaustion caused me to nod off only to wake with a start, brought back from sleep by the frantic thrashing of a small hare tangled in my snare. I leaped up and grabbed the rock that had fallen from my lap. Diving flat out onto my belly, I snatched the beast, and despite its frantic kicking, brained it. It died with the stroke.

  With pride in my triumph, I took the hare by its bloody ears and carried it back to Bear. I found him asleep, the leaves I’d provided for cover scattered. But at least his wound had clotted.

  Not wanting to disturb him, I removed flint and tinder from our sack and began a fire. It wasn’t long before the hare was roasting on a spit. The smell caused my hunger to gnaw at me.

  Bear stirred, then woke but only stared at me with glazed eyes. “You did well,” he whispered.

  “As you taught me.”

  “You were gone so long … I thought you had snared trouble, or that—God protect us—trouble … had snared you.” His face glistened with sweat.

  “Does your wound hurt?”

  “It throbs.”

  My heart tightened. I touched fingers to his brow. It was very hot. “Is it a fever?”

  “Merely hunger,” he said as if to tease me, but his unusual mildness undercut his levity.

  Wanting to hasten the cooking, I threw more wood onto the fire. The flame flared. The meat turned dark, the smell of it making my mouth water. When the hare was cooked I tore the carcass apart and gave Bear the pieces.

  At first he ate—one-handed—with rapacious hunger, which pleased me. Alas, he soon stopped. “You must fe
ed me,” he said.

  Though it upset me to do it, I nonetheless did as he bid, like some chick stuffing food into the maw of its much larger parent.

  “Yourself, too,” he murmured.

  “I’m fine.” In truth, I was famished, but I allowed myself just one mouthful. I made him take the rest.

  When he’d done, I said, “Do you feel better?”

  “Somewhat.”

  I knelt by his side and studied him. He was dreadful pale. His breathing was thick.

  I could see for myself that he was sinking. So was my heart.

  Not knowing what else to do, I said, “I’ll try and get another hare.”

  “As you will,” he mumbled.

  I stood up.

  “Crispin,” he whispered. “There are private things I need to say.”

  God’s truth: I didn’t want to know such things. But the pain in his voice held me. “You need your sleep,” I said in haste.

  “Yes,” he said. “I do.” And drifted off to what I hoped was only sleep.

  I wanted to get help but hardly knew where to take my first step, much less which way to aim. In the end, unwilling to leave him, I stayed by his side.

  Night came with lowering clouds enough to hide all stars. The only light was the smoldering cinders of our dwindling fire. I took it to be an augury of Bear’s life.

  Heart full of pain, I went on my knees and prayed to my patron, Saint Giles, that he might help Bear. I pledged I’d do anything and everything if he blessed Bear with strength. Even so, in the heart of my being, my fear was growing that Bear was fated—it choked me just to give it name—to die.

  With that fear came a greater fear: if Bear died I didn’t know what to do. Where could I go? What would I be?

  Unable to answer, I felt that the freedom I’d so recently won was melting like a spent candle.

  What followed was a long and doleful night. The forest creaked and groaned as if an encircling doom was laying siege to Bear. When I slept—which I did but fitfully—my frightful dreams were equal to my waking worries. I took the dreams as dismal warnings. Sure enough, by dawn’s first light, I could see that Bear had turned worse.

  Though exhausted, I knew I should act quickly. Yet, despite new and desperate prayers, I had no notion what to do. I stirred up the fire, but beyond that I could only wait and watch my friend, my heart raw with naked helplessness.

  But as I sat there, I began to realize that the forest had grown uncommon still—as if it held its breath. Gradually, I began to sense something amiss, as though something was slithering near.

  I leaped up and searched about but saw nothing save the creeping shadows of the dawning forest. Even so, I was convinced a thing was there, a thing drawing nigh.

  The hairs on the back of my neck began to prickle. My heart pounded. I could hardly breathe. For I recalled a notion I’d heard: that when the Angel of Death slips in to snatch a soul, all sounds, all movements, cease.

  Next moment I realized that there were eyes, eyes peering out of the woods, eyes gazing right at us, large eyes, dark and brown, fixed and staring. Nothing but eyes, detached from any corporal body, as if part of some advancing ghost.

  Oh, blessed Lord who gives all life—I thought—it’s Death, Death himself who has come for Bear!

  5

  GRADUALLY, DIMLY, I perceived a figure hidden by the leaves. Even so, it was only eyes that held me with an unblinking gaze. Was what I saw of this world or another?

  Greatly shocked, I turned toward the sleeping Bear, then shifted hastily back. Slowly, I realized it was a small person looking out at us. The next moment I grasped that it was a child—but whether a human or not, I was uncertain.

  The face was obscured by grime and long, snarled brown hair. Impossible, too, to distinguish clothing, muted and rent as it was, as if part of the foliage.

  I returned the stare, but the child did no more than remain still, eyes steady as stone upon us. The longer the gaze held, the greater grew my fright. I tried desperately to think what Bear would do.

  “Be off with you!” I cried, raising an arm and taking a step forward.

  When the child made no response, I asked, “Who are you?”

  No answer.

  Seeing a stout branch upon the ground, I snatched it up and held it like a club that I might defend myself and Bear—if it came to that.

  The child remained in place.

  Brandishing the stick as if to strike, I took another step. This time the child retreated, noiselessly, as if floating above the earth.

  “Are you of this world?” I shouted. “In God’s name tell me who and what you are!”

  Abruptly, the child turned and scampered off among the trees, and, for all that I could see, vanished.

  My fears grew. If what I saw was human, and he went to tell others about us, matters could turn worse. But if what I saw was a spirit, what devilish harm might he bring down upon us?

  I knelt by Bear’s side.

  “Bear,” I said. “We’ve been found. There may be danger coming. We need to move!”

  He opened his eyes. It was, at best, a foggy gape and conveyed no understanding. I was not even sure he knew I had spoken.

  I put my hand to his face: hot and sticky with sweat. I had no doubt he was being consumed by the rankest of humors. The wound had taken full hold, poisoning his whole body.

  “Bear!” I cried. “We must move!”

  His reply was a moan of such despair it struck terror to the deepest regions of my soul. Distraught, I stood up and looked into the forest in hopes I’d see a sign of the strange child. The child was gone. Belatedly, I knew I should have begged for help.

  I tried to pull at Bear, to make him stand, but his weight and bulk proved too great.

  In panic, I searched round for a heavier stick with which, if came the need, I could make some defense. Finding one, I stood on guard before Bear, my heart pounding.

  The forest was mute. No one came.

  Still wondering what I’d see—someone real or unreal, friend or foe—I stirred the flame but kept looking round. Just how much time passed I don’t know, but as unexpectedly as before, the child—if child it was—returned.

  Again, what first I saw were eyes gazing at me from deep among the bushes.

  I jumped up. When the child did not shift, I called out, “In God’s name will you help us?” and moved forward. Even as I did, I heard another sound. I spun about.

  A second person had appeared.

  6

  THE NEWCOMER was a woman, or so I took her to be, for she was aged to the point of being unsexed. Cronelike, bent almost double as if loaded down with the weight of years, her head was twisted to one side in the manner of a listening bird. Frail and small—smaller than I—her garments were foul rags, tattered and torn. Her skin was begrimed, her long hair gray, greasy, and unkempt, akin to the shredded moss that dangled from the trees. Her nose was beakish, while her mouth, etched round with multiple lines like so many needled stitches, fell in on toothless gums. Fingers were rough and misshapen, with long, clawlike and thick, yellow nails.

  Though her wrinkled face had stiff, white hairs upon her chin, most striking of all was her left eye: glazed over with a lifeless, milky white, a sure sign of blindness. Her right eye seemed the larger, brighter too, with the deepest, most penetrating gaze I ever saw. Is this hag, I wondered, the bearer of the evil eye?

  “Who … who are you?” I cried, backing toward Bear, determined to protect him. “What do you want of us?”

  The old woman slowly lifted an arm and pointed her gnarled fingers at Bear. “Troth says—the man is ill.” She spoke with a clogged and broken voice, her toothless mouth continually munching.

  “Who is Troth?” I asked, bewildered.

  By way of answering, the old woman turned and gestured with a hand. The child I’d first seen stepped into the clearing. I saw now that she was a girl. Though shorter than me and much younger than the crone, she was garbed in similar motley rags. Where
as the woman was old, bent, and ugly, the girl was not misshapen. But her mouth! Dear God! It was cleft—grotesquely disfigured and twisted, shaped like a hare’s mouth.

  The girl’s appearance was so dreadful I must have gawked. In haste, she pulled her tangled hair across the lower half of her face, veil-like, to hide her gross disfigurement.

  I made a quick decision: no matter that these folk were outlandish—there was no one else to whom I could turn. “He’s hurt,” I said, indicating Bear. “Can you aid him?”

  “Aude coaxes man to life,” said the woman, her good eye appraising Bear. “Aude keeps them in life. Bring him.” She turned as if to go.

  “Who is Aude?” I called.

  “Me,” muttered the hag, making finger movements at the girl. The girl edged forward, moving with great skittish-ness, eyes avoiding mine, like a fearful dog.

  I went to one side of Bear. “I can’t move him,” I said. “He’s too big. Heavy.” I spoke loudly, simply, as if the hag were deaf.

  The old woman lifted both hands and clasped them. The girl, with some kind of understanding, went to Bear’s other side.

  Troth—for so I gathered the girl’s name to be—made some guttural sound. It was not human talk—not in any proper sense. It sounded as if it came from her throat, animal-like. While unsettling, I took it to mean we were to lift.

  The girl’s strength surprised me. Between the two of us, we managed to get Bear up. Perhaps Bear also worked, for when upright he opened his eyes a slit. I snatched up our sack, and we began to follow the old woman.

  As we went along, it occurred to me that the woman’s way and manner—slow, shuffling, hunched over—had something witchlike to it. And the girl, with her odd, split mouth and her wariness, was just as odd. But at that moment—may God forgive me!—in order to help Bear, I would have embraced the Devil.

  7

  THE GIRL AND I, supporting Bear from either side, clumsily followed the old woman as she picked her way slowly through the woods. Though I would have never found where they took us on my own, we did not go far. It was not a true dwelling in any sense I knew—rather, it was the crudest of shelters, a space between two boulders over which some boughs had been set to form a roof. A wall of wattle obscured the entryway with bushes, arranged so a passerby would not likely notice what was there. It was well hidden.