At the Mouth of the River of Bees: Stories

by Kij Johnson

  She looked up and he saw again the flash of absolute wildness in her eyes, lamplight reflected flat and gold as she stared at the trap on the table.

  “Nothing,” she said finally. “Nothing at all.” She lay down and wrapped herself in one of the sleeping bags, face to the cold wall.

  He watched her, but she didn’t move and she didn’t relax into sleep. She said nothing more, even when he powered up the transmitter to call Jeff and make a time for him to fly them out the day after the next.

  Richard woke to a gust of cold air. He pushed his sleeping bag away and looked around. The cabin had gotten cold in the night, and his breath was visible, thick as smoke. Predawn gray seeped through the small window. A puff of unmelted snow lay just inside the door. Addie was gone.

  Outside, the sky over the cabin was just brightening with the cold blue of dawn. The wind had died in the night, and the air was sharp, perfectly still. To the far north Richard saw the first streamers that presaged storm clouds.

  The snow on the ground gleamed softly, and Addie’s footprints were nearly invisible. Cold air needling his lungs with each breath, he followed the prints due south across the meadow, toward the ridge where Genna had been hurt. He found the stains on the snow where the trap had been, but Addie’s footprints slogged past. The sky was gold and delicate pink by the time he found her. He crested a hill by a half-grown fir, where Addie’s footprints ran to the right along the bowl of a small valley. He saw her halfway down the slope, a flash of dirty red nylon behind three small trees.

  The pack was on the opposite side of the valley, apparently undisturbed by the arrival of Addie and Richard. Genna was there, absently licking her paw. She didn’t appear to be in pain. The young, darker wolf, Murie, lay curled beside her with his head pillowed on her ribcage. Primadonna, the alpha female, stood in place, pressed close by half-grown cubs licking her face and tugging at her ears and tail. When the alpha male, Black, trotted down through the firs at the valley’s head, the pack rose and converged on him. He lowered his head and regurgitated meat for the three cubs, which they attacked with growls that were audible even across the valley.

  Black started the howl. ’Donna joined in, then one by one the other wolves until even the cubs sang. Richard leaned against a tree, weak-kneed as he always was at the sound, the knots of pitch and overtone. The voices seemed many more than seven. Richard closed his eyes: so much of what he did was intellectual, rational; but there was always this, the woods and the smell of cold air and the loose twining braid of the howl.

  The last voice to join came from his side of the valley. He opened his eyes. The wolves were all visible, but Black stared toward the brush below Richard. He could just see Addie behind the young firs: crouched on all fours in the snow, her chest pressed against one knee, her head tilted back and her eyes closed. Her voice was different, higher and rougher, lacking the fluid drop of the wolves’ song. He could not stop watching her, even after the howl died and the pack moved off. She half-ran, half-slid down the hill and stumbled a few steps after them. The trailing wolf, Murie, turned to look at her and continued on.

  Only when the wolves were gone could Richard move. He walked down to stand beside her.

  “They never let me run with them,” she said softly. “Sometimes I trap for them and they’ll eat what I leave, but they never let me run with them.”

  “You howled,” he said, half angry, half in wonder.

  “Why didn’t you?” She squinted at the interlaced trails of the wolves. “I’m going to follow.”

  “You’ll never catch up with them,” he said with a certain satisfaction and then felt ashamed.

  “But you’ll try, too, won’t you?” Addie burst into a run, snow kicking up under her feet. Richard followed.

  She traveled quickly despite the lack of snowshoes or other equipment. The trail went northwest for several miles, heading back toward Lake Juhl, to the western arm a couple of miles from the cabin. She moved at a quick constant trot, plowing without pause through the calf-deep snow. How can she do it? he wondered as he stumped after her, laboring in places, until he dropped behind and had to hurry to overtake her before the next hill’s crest.

  She rose suddenly in front of him, her finger to her lips. Richard stopped. She approached until they stood within a few feet of one another. “Moose over the hill on Lake Juhl, and the wolves have vanished. They’re stalking.”

  “You don’t—” he began in annoyance, but she was already gone, back up the slope to settle on her belly in the snow at the crest. He crept up to lie beside her.

  Moose had paired off for the rut season, so there were two animals here. The bull looked large, over eight feet tall at the shoulders and very healthy, though still young, judging by the size of his antlers: it made no sense for the pack to waste its effort on so healthy an animal. The small female looked weaker and kept shaking her head as though to dislodge something, screw worm probably. The bull held his head high, wary. Richard suspected that the smell of the wolves—or perhaps the humans—was making him nervous.

  Richard leaned over until his mouth was a few inches from Addie’s ear. His breath touched her in a fog. “They can’t win this one. The bull can fight them off.”

  Addie gestured impatiently.

  The bull nosed at the air, trying to pull scents from it. He shifted restlessly from foot to foot, dropped his head and thrust his antlers into the snow.

  Murie and Black and one of the cubs broke from cover just above the pair, vocalizing in sharp yelps. The cow backed across the ice as the bull bellowed, a huge sound that seemed to fill the valley, and charged the three wolves. They evaded him easily and began running south along the shore, just out of reach of his huge hooves, turning to jump at his hocks and pendulous nose whenever he slowed.

  The rest of the wolves—Richard saw Genna with them, favoring her leg—broke cover a short distance south of the first ambush, neatly cutting the cow’s route to the bull. The cow sank back on her haunches, for a moment meeting the eyes of the gray female, ’Donna. The cow wheeled and ran north, calling as she fled, but the bull was still hampered by Black, who jumped at him whenever he tried to turn and follow.

  ’Donna got in front of the running cow and jumped at her nose, sinking jaw-deep into the fleshy tip. The cow wailed and threw her head upward, ’Donna flopping into the air like a half-filled bag, still clinging. The cow shook again and ’Donna flew twenty feet to slam into a boulder.

  Addie leapt up and ran down the hillside.

  “Addie!” Richard grabbed for her ankle as she passed. His hands came down empty in the snow. He sank to his elbows, struggling to get free.

  The bull moose roared and kicked at the circling wolves. Murie shied away and the bull galloped through the gap that left. He charged toward the wolves harassing the cow—toward ’Donna, inert.

  Addie screamed as she ran toward ’Donna and the cow, and the running bull and wolves. She had her hatchet in her hand.

  “Addie!” Richard shouted again.

  The bull moose had seen Addie and veered to charge her, his head low. Richard pulled the rifle free and squeezed off two shots. He missed, so he emptied the Winchester. The bull kept running, but each bullet slowed him until he was staggering, and he collapsed to his knees, blood pumping onto the snow around him, twenty yards from Addie. ’Donna lifted her head at the sound of the shots, stood and shook herself. All the wolves appeared to make an instantaneous and unanimous decision. They streamed past Addie toward the bull.

  The bull staggered upright. Before the pack could close the circle, he feinted again at Murie, and again ran out the gap. The bull fled north across the lake, and even at this distance Richard could see the bloody trail like red ribbons unfurled against the snow. The wolves ran after him, and the cow followed, as though uncertain where else to go.

  When they were past, Richard ran to where Addie stood in the bloody snow. She dragged heavy breaths into her lungs, her arms wrapped tight around herself.

&nb
sp; “What were you doing?” he shouted.

  “He would have killed her.”

  “You’re fucking with them when you do this!” Richard stopped shouting, out of breath in the cold air.

  Without speaking, Addie thrust her axe in her pocket and walked quickly off the lake ice, back toward the cabin. She maintained the day’s pace, but by the time they got there, she was staggering with exhaustion. Only after the cabin warmed a bit and Richard placed porridge and beef jerky and hot sugared tea in front of her, did they speak again.

  “Addie, what the hell was that about?”

  She was eating ravenously but automatically, but now she looked up. “I’m not supposed to help them? I can’t let them die.”

  “Wolves dying is a part of things. Like moose, like rabbits.” He pointed at her snare and the axe on the table, where she had cleared her pockets. For a moment he had a visceral memory of the moose he’d shot, the way it had staggered and then fallen to its knees at the bullets’ impact, the ribbons of blood.

  As though reading his mind, she said, “So why did you shoot the bull, then? Why didn’t you let him kill her?”

  “I would have,” he said. “But I was saving you.”

  She rocked forward and grabbed the side of the bed frame. Her bare hands were clenched white on the metal. “You would let one die. They’re, we’re, not all just pieces in a puzzle, fit them in and they’re just part of the picture. They’re individuals. Do you have any idea who these wolves are? How they feel when they play or howl? What it’s like for them to babysit the cubs?”

  Richard rubbed his eyes. “No one can know that.”

  “I will.” Addie pushed the tin bowl onto the floor and pulled the blankets around her.

  Richard jerked awake, already losing the dream that had awakened him. He was slumped fully dressed over the table, so that his face rested in an open notebook a few inches from the jumble of metal that was the wolf trap, the rabbit snare, the handcuffs, and Addie’s hand axe. The stove had burned down and the cabin was frigid. He was alone again.

  He walked outside. It was after midnight and nearly pitch dark. There was a full moon somewhere overhead, but heavy clouds concealed most of the sky. The wind was stronger, pushing loose snow along the ground in needling waves. There would be no way to follow her tonight. She would have to find her own way home.

  “Addie,” he yelled. “Addie, goddammit, where are you?” The wind swallowed the noise. Richard yelled again; the shout lengthened, rose in pitch; and then he was howling, hoarse and not wolf-like at all, but his voice carrying in the way a shout could not.

  He was surprised at the power of his lungs, at the volume he could produce when unhampered by the need to make words and sense. He did not stop until his anger had drained from him and his throat hurt from the icy air. Only then did he hear, far to the northwest, the pack howling in response, their interwoven voices muddied by the wind. He could not tell if Addie’s was among them.

  Morning light gleamed through the cabin’s window when Richard heard the sound of her feet outside. The door flew open in the wind, flakes whirling to settle everywhere. Addie was silhouetted in the doorway. “I thought you’d be gone by now.”

  “Jeff will land right out here.” Richard had spent most of the morning hauling the crates he was taking out with him down to the ice; he slammed a notebook into a last half-filled pack. “You shouldn’t have gone, Addie. We can’t make him wait, not with the weather like this.”

  “I was with the wolves.” She stepped forward into the room. Light from the lamp and the window fell on her face. It was masked in gouts of blood and sinew.

  “You’re covered in blood,” he said with horror.

  She rubbed at the gelled stains that darkened her parka. “I’m fine. It’s from the moose. They accepted me. They got the male they were chasing, the one you shot. The alpha saw me, he let me feed off the kill. I came back for my axe.”

  “The wolves let you approach?”

  “They let me in.” She reached across him for the hatchet and the snare and dropped them into her pocket. “I followed them. The kill smelled good and I’ve been hungry, so I crawled down to it. The alpha watched and let me feed. He was three feet from me. I could smell his fur. It was just dawn. He accepted me.” Through the blood, she smiled at him, radiant, beautiful in that moment with her mad golden eyes.

  “The pack accepted you?” he repeated.

  “I ate so much and then we slept together,” she continued, not hearing. She was stuffing packs of food into her pockets. “I could reach out and touch one of the cubs, the pale red one, I was that close. I have to go back now. As soon as the moose is done, we’re going to the south end of the range, by the foot of Horsehead Mountain.”

  One of the sores on her cheek was beginning to ooze. She rubbed it absently, smearing moose blood into the pus there, apparently without pain. “There are caribou by the mountain. We’ll—”

  “Addie,” Richard said. “You’re imagining it all.”

  She looked at him for a moment. “You’ll never dance with us. You’ll never feel the cubs’ noses against your face.”

  “There is no ‘us.’ It’s not real, Addie. Jeff will take us—us, you and me, the humans—to Yellowknife, and we’ll get help there.”

  She turned away. “They’re waiting.”

  “They’re not. You’re sick. You need help.” Richard reached for her hand, but she brought the heel of her palm up to his chin hard, and punched him twice under the ribs.

  Richard lunged for Addie. She jumped back and cracked the back of her knees against the bed frame. Before she could regain her balance, he caught both her wrists. For a moment they stood toe to toe. She glared into his eyes, her teeth bared and the cords of muscle in her jaw sharp beneath her blistered skin.

  The cuffs still lay on the table behind him. Richard grabbed the hoops, snapped one around her thin wrist. She pulled back and fell onto the bed. She kicked him in the thigh and he dropped to his knees. Grabbing the open hoop as it swung, he snapped it shut on the bed frame. He ripped the key from its lock and dropped it into a pocket.

  Addie fell heavily against him. Thinking she’d fainted, he caught her shoulders and tried to rebalance her before he noticed she was scrabbling at his pocket, the one with the key. He knocked it from her hand. It hit the door and fell beside the stove. Addie howled and lunged after it. Caught short by the cuff, she slammed onto her side on the floor, whimpering in pain, her arm wrenched high over her head.

  Richard slid the key into the wrist of the gloves he was wearing, where it settled cold in his palm. He looked down at Addie. Her face lay against the floor, dust and snow catching in the blood and blisters. Tears seeped from her closed eyes. She shook, but he couldn’t tell if it was from sickness or grief. She made a horrible whining noise, like an injured animal.

  “Addie,” he said, afraid of the sound, “I had to.” He crouched beside her. “You know I have to do this, don’t you? I can’t let you kill yourself like this.”

  The whining continued.

  “We’ll get you out of here. You’ll be fine. You’ll be warm, it will be okay.” He reached for her hand, curled close to her face. She snatched it away. Her other hand, still stretched over her head, pulled at the handcuffs.

  “You don’t know,” she said in anguish. “They accepted me. They let me share a kill. They let me sleep with them. They’re waiting for me.”

  “Maybe you’re prey, Addie.”

  “You can’t know what it’s like, to want to be with them—” Her voice broke.

  “Don’t I?” he said softly. “I used to watch the pack in Como Zoo. They paced a dirt path twelve inches from the wire fence, all around. I could see the road on the other side of the enclosure, sometimes cars, sometimes other people watching. The wolves ignored us all, just kept walking. Except once, the alpha, a long-bodied gray, he looked at me, not afraid, just curious. That’s all we get.”

  She raised her face to look at him. The te
ars had cleared tracks through the mask of blood and dirt and pus. “Let me go.”

  Richard turned his head away from the terrible wild eyes that glowed within the mask. “I can’t.”

  She said no more. He packed the rest of his things, then sat staring at the meaningless marks of his writing on the cover of a notebook, trying not to hear her hopeless crying.

  When Richard heard the first sounds of an engine, he ran outside and to the lake shore. The wind snapped heavy flakes in his face. He couldn’t see the plane but the drone grew louder. It was a full minute before the Beaver appeared in the southeast, facing into the wind for a landing. It hit the ice on one ski and bounced sideways before it settled onto both skis and ran smoothly away from him. For a moment, the plane sounded as though it masked a wolf’s howl, but it was only the overtones of the slowing engines. It slowed to a crawl, turned and began taxiing back. Richard waved his arms at the small figure behind the windscreen and ran back toward the cabin.

  “Addie,” he yelled as he approached. “He’s here, we’re getting out.” He scrambled around the rock that hid the cabin.

  There was blood everywhere by the entrance, splashed red against the white snow and the pale walls. Indistinct footprints and a broad trail of bloody marks wove southwest across the meadow into the ribbon forest, toward Horsehead Mountain.

  Richard ran into the cabin. Sheathed in blood, the cuffs still hung from the bed frame, one hoop swinging closed and empty. The chain between the rings had been smashed by something sharp but was unbroken. Blood soaked the bed’s blankets and heavy drops trailed down the walls. In a pool of gelling blood by the bed lay a severed hand, bones extending just past the ragged cut.

  Richard staggered out the door, away from the thick cold smell, to fall vomiting by the cabin, holding a corner until he could stand alone and look again at the path that led into the fir and spruce.

  She couldn’t be far away, losing blood as she was. He’d easily overtake her. He looked at her path, the mountain beyond it, and the clouds dark behind that. New snow was falling, drifting over the stains. After a long moment, Richard turned his back and walked north, to Lake Juhl and the waiting plane.