Ghost Hunter

by Michelle Paver

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  [Image: Wolf and a cub.]

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  The cub woke with a start. Those were wolf howls! No they weren't. It was only the ravens making wolf noises. They did that a lot. They laughed when the cub raced about, searching for his pack.

  Crossly, he slumped down and flipped his tail over his nose. But he couldn't get back to sleep. He was too hungry.

  Crawling out from under the rock, he stood at the mouth of the Den and snuffed the air.

  The Light had come, but not the ravens; so no chance of any meat. It was warmer, and the Bright Soft Cold was

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  deeper. From where the cub stood, the white hill dropped steeply, then rose again to make the Mountain. Even that looked kinder. Once, the cub had tried to reach it, but the ravens had driven him back. He'd been annoyed. Then he'd heard the baying on the Mountain: dreadful, angry dogs who sounded as if they ate wolf cubs. He hadn't tried again.

  Blinking in the glare, the cub padded out into the Bright Soft Cold--and sank to his belly. Anxiously, he scanned the Up for the terrible owl. Nothing. Maybe the big tailless had scared it away.

  The big tailless had come in the Dark, when the cub--who'd been trying to hunt lemmings--had fallen into a hole and couldn't get out. The cub had been yowling for a long time when the big tailless had peered in. He had a rich, reassuring smell, so the cub had wagged his tail. The big tailless had scooped him out, tossed him a scrap of beautiful slimy meat, and shambled off.

  It was very quiet on the hill. Even the wind was gone. The stillness was frightening.

  The cub barked. I'm here!

  Nothing replied. The cub began to whimper. He missed his pack so much that it hurt.

  Suddenly, he stopped whimpering. In the distance he heard the deep, echoing croaks of ravens. He swiveled

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  his ears. Those were his ravens!

  He yowled.

  They didn't come.

  Well, then, he would go to them.

  Eagerly, he bounded through the Bright Soft Cold. It broke beneath him and he tumbled down the hill.

  At the bottom, he righted himself and sneezed. The Den was high above, unclimbably high. Now what to do?

  Somewhere in the hills, a wolf howled. The cub sprang alert. This wasn't a raven trick, this really was a wolf. It was his mother!

  Frantically, the cub barked. I'm here! I'm here! The howling stopped.

  The cub barked and barked as he floundered through the Bright Soft Cold. I'm here!

  He was beginning to tire when a dark shadow came rushing down the hill--and suddenly his mother was pouncing on him and they were rolling together and she was whining and nuzzling and he was mewing and burying himself in her wonderful warm fur, snuffling up her beloved, strong, meaty mother smell. Then she sicked up some food and he gulped it down, while she gave him a thorough licking all over. After that they leaned against each other and howled their happiness to the Up.

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  The cub was still howling when his mother gave a whine and shot away.

  The cub stopped in midhowl and opened his eyes.

  And there was his father, racing toward them over the Bright Soft Cold.

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  FORTY-ONE

  It's summer, and Renn walks with Torak under the murmuring trees. "Don't go," she says.

  Torak turns to her and smiles, and she sees the little green flecks in his eyes. "But Renn," he says. "The Forest goes on forever. I saw it from the Mountain."

  "Please. I can't bear it."

  He touches her cheek and walks away.

  Renn bit her knuckle and curled deeper in her sleeping-sack.

  It might never happen, she told herself. Everything is fine.

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  Lying on her side, she watched the firelight rippling over the cross-beams. She was back in the Forest, in the big shelter where the Raven Clan lived together in midwinter. All was familiar: the tree-trunk walls plugged with moss, the reindeer-hide roof open to the stars above the fire. She smelled woodsmoke. She heard the crackle of flames and the low hum of voices.

  You are safe with your clan, she told herself. The Dark Time is over, the sun has come back. The Red Deer are camped nearby, and Torak is ...

  She sat up. In the gloom, she couldn't see him.

  But that wasn't unusual. With the days still very short, most hunting was done at night, by the light of the moon and the First Tree.

  Around her, people sat calmly sewing or knapping flint. Three moons had passed since Souls' Night. To the clans of the Open Forest, Eostra and the shadow sickness were only a memory.

  Pulling on her clothes, Renn went to find Dark.

  His white hair glowed at the other end of the shelter, where he sat on the edge of the sleeping platform, intent on a carving. Durrain, the Red Deer Mage, was talking to him as she marked out a jerkin on a reindeer-hide with a piece of charcoal.

  Renn asked if they'd seen Torak. Dark said he thought he'd gone to find the wolves. Abruptly, Renn turned her

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  back on him and pretended to warm her hands at the fire.

  "What's wrong?" said Durrain. "Nothing," lied Renn.

  She wouldn't have thought it possible that she could miss the Mountains, but she did. She missed those first days in Dark's cave; and later, with the Swans and the Mountain Hare Clan. Torak had healed slowly in body and spirit, but she had been with him. He'd told her how Wolf had brought him back from the dead, and about his father. She'd told him about the Walker, and Saeunn's last gift to her in the Mountain. They had discussed Eostra's Magecraft, and decided that it was the earthblood from his mother's medicine horn which had protected his world-soul. They had been together when he'd left his father's seal amulet as an offering for the Hidden People; and when she'd helped the Mountain Mages chase the demons back to the Otherworld--and then stayed to perform a rite for the souls of the tokoroth children; because if things had been different, she too would have been a tokoroth.

  Through it all, they had been side by side. But since they'd got back to the Forest, that had changed.

  "Renn?" said Dark.

  "What?" she snapped.

  "Shall we go and look for him?"

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  "Oh, leave me alone!"

  Ignoring Dark's hurt smile and Durrain's reproachful glance, she stomped off to fetch her bow.

  "Ah, Renn." Fin-Kedinn sat on the other side of the fire, making arrows. "Help me with these, will you?"

  "I'm going hunting."

  "Do this first."

  Blowing out a long breath, she threw down her bow.

  Her uncle had already smoothed the alderwood shafts and secured the flint heads with sinew. Piles of halved wood-grouse feathers lay beside him, sorted into left and right wing, and he was binding them in threes to the shafts. A large dog leaned companionably against his calf.

  Fin-Kedinn asked why Renn was angry, and she said she wasn't.

  Why, she thought, does he want me to say it? He knows what's wrong. Torak never seems to be around. And people keep bowing to me as if I was already the new Raven Mage--which I'm not, not till I say yes.

  As if he'd guessed her thoughts, Fin-Kedinn said, "You've been back some time, yet you've never asked how the ancient one died."

  Ignoring him, Renn trimmed an arrow with her knife, leaving just enough feather to make it fly straight.

  "It was just after I'd returned from the fells," began the Raven Leader. "She'd waited till she knew I was

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  back to keep the clans together. She chose a still, cold day; a grove of hollies half a day walk from camp. We laid her in the snow in her sleeping-sack, and she drank the potion she'd prepared to make her drowsy. We sang to the ancestors to tell them she was coming, then she told us to leave. She made a good death."

  Renn set down her knife. "I know why you're telling me this. The same reason you got Durrain to stay. To make sure I take her place."

  Fin-Kedinn regarded her steadil
y. "Is that why you're scared?"

  "I'm not scared!" she flung back.

  The dog flattened his ears and pressed against Fin-Kedinn.

  Renn glowered at the fire. "It's not fair!" she blurted out. "They bow to me and call me Mage, but they're frightened of him. Some even make the sign of the hand to ward him off."

  "He came back from the dead, Renn. Of course they're uneasy. But they do know what they owe him."

  "Oh, yes," she said drily. "They've even started telling stories about him: the Listener who talks with wolves and ravens. They just don't want him living with them."

  "And Torak. What does he want?"

  As always, he'd sensed what really troubled her. "I don't know," she said miserably.

  Fin-Kedinn ran his thumb along an arrowshaft.

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  "They say that in the Beginning, all people were like Torak, and knew the souls of other creatures. Now it's only him. Durrain thinks he may be the last. That in times to come, there will be no more spirit walkers; and all that remains will be the friendship between man and dog: a memory of what once was." He paused. "Torak is one apart, Renn. The clans know it. He knows it."

  Renn sprang to her feet. "Even you? You want him gone?"

  "Want?" Fin-Kedinn's blue eyes blazed. "You think I want him to leave?"

  "Then tell him to stay!"

  "No," said the Raven Leader. "He has to find his own way."

  Fin-Kedinn caught Torak as he was heading off to find Wolf, and told him to come with him up-valley to check the snares. Torak was about to protest, but something in his foster father's voice made him think better of it.

  Dawn was still far off, but the moon was bright, and the trees threw long blue shadows across the frozen river. Torak and Fin-Kedinn crunched over the ice in a haze of frosty breath. On the opposite bank, a reindeer stopped pawing the snow to watch them pass, then went back to munching lichen.

  Belatedly, Torak noticed that Fin-Kedinn carried a food pouch and bedding roll; he asked if he should have

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  brought his too. Fin-Kedinn said no. Some time later, he turned up a side gully.

  "But the snares are upriver," said Torak.

  Fin-Kedinn continued to climb.

  The snow was deeper in the gully. Trees which had been snapped in the ice storm cast weird, humped shadows in the moonlight.

  The Walker sat beneath a broken holly, retying his foot-bindings.

  Torak halted. It seemed impossible that this ragged ruin of a man had once been a great Mage. Only Fin-Kedinn had seen deep into the Walker's heart, and perceived that he still possessed the skill and the spark of sanity which would drive him to cross the fells and find Eostra's lair. The Raven Leader's faith had not been misplaced.

  Fin-Kedinn put his fists to his chest in sign of friendship. "Narrander," he said quietly. The Walker ignored him.

  Cautiously, Torak went to squat beside him. "Walker," he said. "You saved my life. Thank you."

  "What? What?" snapped the old man.

  "You carried me out of the Mountain. You covered my hands and feet so I wouldn't get frostbite."

  The Walker clawed a louse from his beard, squashed it between finger and thumb, and ate it. "Hidden Ones saved the wolf boy. The Walker just pulled him out."

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  Munching another louse, he gave a spluttery laugh. "A rock cut the Masked One in two, like a wasp! Now where's Narik?"

  Fin-Kedinn approached. "Come with us to camp, Narrander. You'll be warm. We'll look after you."

  The Walker drew his moldering hides around him and waved the Raven Leader away. "Narik and the Walker are off to their beautiful valley. They look after themselves."

  Fin-Kedinn sighed, and set down his bundles. "Clothes. Food. They're yours, old friend."

  "Clothes, food," mimicked the Walker. "But where's Narik?"

  Fin-Kedinn hesitated. "Narik died in the great fire," he said gently. "You remember. Your son died." Torak stared at him.

  "Ah, here is Narik!" cried the Walker, pulling a sleepy-looking snow-vole from his cape.

  Torak said slowly, "Walker. You told me once that you lost your eye in an accident, knapping flint. But did you lose it in the great fire, when my father shattered the fire-opal?"

  The old man stroked the vole with a grimy finger. "It popped right out," he crooned, "and a raven ate it. Ravens like eyes."

  Fin-Kedinn regarded him gravely. "You've avenged Narik's death. You helped end the terror of the Eagle

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  Owl Mage. Come with us. Be at peace."

  The old man went on crooning as if he hadn't heard.

  Fin-Kedinn indicated to Torak that they should leave. To the Walker he said, "Farewell, Narrander. May the guardian swim with you."

  As they rose to go, the Walker flashed out a claw and dragged Torak back. His grip was strong. Torak caught a blast of foul breath, and saw something flicker in the single eye, like a minnow in a murky pond. "The wolf boy's troubled, eh? Bits of souls sticking to his spirit? The Great Wanderer, the Forest, the Masked One? He's like the Walker, yes, he got too close, so he has to keep moving!"

  With a cry, Torak pulled free. The Walker gave a bubbling laugh which ended in a cough.

  They left him in the moonlight among the broken trees, clutching the snow-vole to his breast.

  Neither of them spoke on their way to the snares. When they got there, they found three willow grouse and two hares stiffening in the snow. Fin-Kedinn plucked one of the grouse, while Torak woke a fire and set a flat stone to heat. Fin-Kedinn split the grouse and laid it on the stone. When they'd eaten, he took an antler point from his belt and started sharpening his knife.

  After a while, he said, "I told you once that the seventh Soul-Eater had died in the fire. I told you that because I'd sworn to Narrander not to reveal that he'd survived."

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  Torak took this in silence. Then he said, "Narik. His son?"

  Fin-Kedinn paused. Then he told the story which Torak's father had told him the night after it happened.

  "Narik was eight summers old when Narrander joined the Healers. Narrander soon wanted to leave. They wouldn't let him. He was stubborn. To make him obey, the Eagle Owl Mage took Narik." He shook his head. "Souls' Night. Your father summoned them to what would become the Burnt Hill. He woke the great fire. Shattered the fire-opal. The Seal Mage was terribly burned. The Walker lost an eye. All escaped with their lives ... except Narik. Bound, hidden by the Masked One. His father found the body. He went mad with grief."

  Embers spat. A gray owl swept past on its way to hunt.

  Raising his head, Torak watched the lights of the First Tree fade as dawn approached. He thought of Narik and Narrander, and his father and mother; and of the brilliant, flawed Mages who had become the Soul-Eaters. So much suffering. And for what?

  "It's over, Torak," Fin-Kedinn said softly.

  "I know. But I thought--I thought I'd feel better."

  "It takes time."

  "How long?"

  The Raven Leader spread his hands. "After your mother died, it took many winters for my spirit to heal."

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  "What brought you back?"

  "Caring for my clan. Looking after Renn."

  Her name hung between them in the frosty air.

  Torak got up and walked away, then returned. "I know she has to stay. And maybe the Walker's right, maybe I will always be a wanderer. But I can't... I don't want to lose her."

  He needed Fin-Kedinn to make things better; but the Raven Leader's face was hard as he sheathed his knife. "I'll take the prey back to camp," he said brusquely. "You put the fire to sleep and see to the fishing lines on the river."

  Renn had forgotten to take any food with her, so by dawn she was hungry and bad-tempered. She hadn't found Torak, though she'd seen plenty of wolf tracks; and she felt awful about Dark.

  The Mountain clans had only tolerated him because he was with Torak, and they'd made him sleep in a separate shelter at the edge o
f their camp. The Raven Clan, too, had been wary at first, though they'd changed when they'd seen Ark; a boy with a white raven deserved respect. Dark himself had taken instantly to the Forest, and adored being among people. But yesterday, Renn had found him anxiously fingering the small slate musk ox he'd brought from his cave. She'd reminded him that Fin-Kedinn had said he could stay as long as he liked,

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  and he'd nodded politely; but she could see that he didn't really believe it, and dreaded being told to leave.

  And you were nasty to him, she berated herself as she plodded toward camp. Very clever, Renn. Just what he needs.

  Torak was on the river, hacking open ice holes with an antler pick and drawing in the lines. A pile of whitefish lay beside him, rapidly freezing, and Rip and Rek were walking about, pretending they weren't interested.

  Torak glanced at Renn as she approached, then resumed his work.

  Unlike her, he still wore his Mountain Hare tunic, drawn in at the waist by the belt Krukoslik had given him as a parting gift: a broad band of buckskin, sewn with many rows of reindeer teeth. Renn thought he looked good, not like anyone in the Open Forest. She asked him if he didn't mind appearing so different from everyone else.

  "Why should I?" he said with a shrug. "It's what I am."

  She picked up the antler and scratched the ice. "Don't you even care?"

  "What's the point? I can't change it."

  For a moment, he truly seemed a stranger to her: a tall young man in outlandish furs, with an outcast tattoo on his forehead and unsettling light-gray eyes. She thought, Fin-Kedinn's right, he is apart. He always will be.

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  Out loud, she said, "I need you to promise something."

  He threw her a wary look. "What?"

  She'd intended to ask him not to leave the clan, but instead she blurted out, "Don't ever spirit walk in me."

  "What?" He flushed the color of beechnuts. "But-- I'd never ... I mean, why would I? I already know what you think."

  Renn stared at him. "You-- know what I think?" He swallowed. "... Yes. In a way." She flung down the antler and stalked off. "Renn ..."

  The snowball hit him full in the face. "There!" she shouted. "You didn't know I'd do that, did you?"