Ice

by Sarah Beth Durst

  As she packed, Dad hovered beside her. Flushed, his face looked like angry lava. He leveled a finger at her. “You’re not going. And that’s final.”

  Cassie examined her MSR stove and tested the fuel pump. She wasn’t going to fight with him.

  “I won’t let you ruin your life.”

  “It’s my choice to make.” She kept her voice calm. She didn’t know when she’d see Dad again. She didn’t want to leave angry.

  He gripped her arm. “Cassie, I only want what’s best for you.”

  Cassie yanked out of his grip. Turning her back on him, she packed quickly with practiced skill—heavy items braced by clothing. “I know I’m not making the choices you would, but—”

  Red nail polish flashing, Gail wrung her hands. “Cassandra, you don’t have to go. You fulfilled my promise. He has no hold over you.”

  She shook her head. She wasn’t going back because of promises or because of Gram’s story or to save her mother. “I want to return to him,” she said.

  Owen wordlessly handed Cassie a stack of printed data. She thanked him and packed it. Scanning her desk, she found an ice screw. She added it to a side pocket.

  “Cassie.” Dad dropped his voice low. “He’s not even human. You told me yourself you don’t know what he looks like when he isn’t a bear. You don’t know what he is.”

  She was not going to fight with him.

  Without a word, she marched through the lab to the bathroom. She slammed the door behind her and shoveled her toothbrush, deodorant, and shampoo into the bag. “I know perfectly well what he is,” she said through the door. “He’s Bear, and he’s my husband.” She rooted through the cabinets until she found one more item: birth control pills, left by an intern who’d worked at the station prior to Jeremy. She packed the pills and zipped the bag.

  Flinging open the door, she added in a low voice, “And isn’t all this a little hypocritical coming from the man who married the North Wind’s daughter?” His jaw fell open, and she brushed past him. “Owen,” she called, “do you have the rest of those maps?”

  “Just a minute here, young lady . . .” Dad strode after her.

  Max emerged from his bedroom. “What’s going on? Cassie-lassie?” He followed Cassie and Dad back to where Gail waited. “What’s she doing?” Max asked.

  “Ruining her future,” Dad said.

  “Following my future,” Cassie corrected. Owen handed her another stack of maps, and then, with a quick glance at Cassie’s father, retreated across the room.

  “You have a future here,” Dad said. “You have family and friends here. You’re giving up everything to be with this ‘husband.’ You’re giving up college. You’re giving up your goals. What about your plans to be a professional tracker? You always said that’s what you wanted.”

  Cassie put on her hat and zipped her parka. Sweat heated in her armpits. “I shouldn’t have expected you to understand. After all, you left your wife in a troll castle.”

  “Dammit, Cassie, I did that for you! You’d been born. I had to keep you safe! I couldn’t go traipsing off to the ends of the earth. I had to be a father to you!” He thumped a desk with his fist for emphasis. Papers scattered, and Owen jumped. “Do you think it was an easy choice?”

  It hadn’t been a choice; it had been cowardice. Why else had he lied to her all these years, leaving it to Gram to finally tell her? Shame was a powerful motivator. She knew he wished he had rescued Gail. She’d heard the regret in his voice that first night when she’d eavesdropped on her parents. She slung her pack over her shoulder.

  “I forbid it.” Dad blocked the exit. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

  Cassie turned to her mother. “You talk to him.”

  “But I don’t . . . ,” Gail began.

  “History is repeating itself,” Cassie said. “Your father didn’t want you to leave either.”

  Startled, Gail looked at her husband.

  “It’s not the same thing at all,” Dad protested. But Cassie could see her mother understood. It was the same. Cassie watched her mother’s face as her father blustered. Every night, her mother woke screaming, afraid she would be imprisoned again. Would she let her daughter be kept somewhere against her will? Cassie didn’t know her well enough to be certain, but she was betting not.

  Gail touched his arm with her red fingernails. “Laszlo, let her go.”

  Aghast, he turned to her. “Do you know what you’re saying? You want to send our only child, our baby girl, back to the mercy of a bear?”

  Gail lifted her chin and did not back down. Max, wide-eyed, looked back and forth among the three of them like he was watching a convoluted Ping-Pong game. Owen ducked behind the doorway of his workshop. Dad broke first. Lowering his eyes, he said, “Cassie, please, don’t do this. It isn’t safe. It isn’t smart. You’re rushing in again. Wait for a while and then decide. Don’t leave so soon.”

  Gail reached toward Cassie and then let her hand fall. “Cassandra . . . Cassie . . . I was just getting to know you.” Cassie looked at her mother. What could she say? That no matter how much time she spent here, it wouldn’t be enough to bridge the lost years? Cassie couldn’t say that. Better just to leave.

  “Stay with us,” Dad said. “We’re your family. This is your home. Please, think about this. Think of what you’re giving up.” Max’s eyes were overbright, and Gail had tears in hers.

  Looking at them, Cassie started to blink fast. Her eyes felt hot. “Tell Gram I’m sorry I didn’t get to see her.”

  She went outside quickly—before she could change her mind, or have it changed for her. Silence slammed down on her as she closed the outer door. She inhaled deeply, and cold bit her throat. Feeling her way along the perimeter of the station, Cassie raised the U.S. flag in the blinding white darkness of an Arctic blizzard.

  TWELVE

  Latitude 79° 48’ 44” N

  Longitude 153° 37’ 58” W

  Altitude 6 ft.

  AS BEAR CARRIED HER NORTH, Cassie laid her cheek against the soft fur of his neck. She breathed in his scent—sea salt and damp fur. Above, the northern lights played between the stars as Bear ran across the endless ice. She thought of the last time Bear had carried her away from the station. Same ride, but now she knew what waited at the end of it.

  Or at least she hoped she did. What if Bear rejected her plan?

  After many hours, they reached the castle. Cassie saw the spires, luminous in the light of the moon. Bear slowed to a walk, his paws crunching on granules of ice.

  “We’re home,” Cassie said softly.

  Bear paused, and she knew he’d heard her. She wrapped her arms around his broad neck, and then she dismounted and walked through the shimmering castle gate with her hand resting on her Bear’s back.

  She led him to the banquet hall and removed her pack. She unzipped it and began to pull out maps, binders, and notebooks and pile them on the banquet table. Frost curled around a map as she unrolled it. “Can you tell the table not to eat this?”

  Bear focused on the table, and the frost retreated. “What is all this?” he asked.

  Cassie took a deep breath. Time to see if she truly had a future here. For all her fine words to Dad, Bear could squash everything without even knowing he was doing it. If he was unwilling . . . I’ll have to convince him, she thought. She pointed to a section of the map. “Here’s the coast. And here are this season’s dens. One bear per triangle.” Cassie flipped open a three-ring binder. “This is a record of the denning dates with the predicted dates of birth, which I can use to plot routes for you that will bring you closest to the most likely births at any given time for the rest of the birth season. Predictive modeling. We can use it to change the odds.”

  Bear furrowed his broad forehead.

  She plunged on. “Eventually, with enough data points, I should be able to be precise . . . within an order of magnitude, of course.” Thanks to Owen, she had printouts of all the files from all the cooperating research stations.
It wasn’t a complete record of the full bear population by any means, but it was a start. “Look,” she said, “I’ve already plotted a preliminary course. We can test it out tomorrow.”

  She watched him, waiting for his reaction and trying to read his glass black eyes.

  “You wish to come with me out onto the ice? Out to the births?”

  “I have to,” she said firmly. “For this to work, we need to record more data, and you can’t do both jobs. Besides, you won’t know what data we need.” She tried a grin. “And you won’t have opposable thumbs.”

  His laugh was a familiar and welcome soft rumble that washed over her, and then he was serious again. “All munaqsri travel alone. We must avoid detection—”

  “All munaqsri miss delivering souls,” she interrupted. “You’ve told me that yourself. I can help. Maybe we won’t make all the births, but we can improve the odds.”

  He nodded slowly.

  Cassie felt her shoulders unknot. He wanted to save the cubs badly enough. He’d agree. Together, they could save bears.

  “You are certain you wish to do this?” he said. “It is not without risk. Once outside these walls, if I am not touching you, I cannot magic you. If we are separated . . .”

  “I’ll have my gear,” she said, patting her pack. “If necessary, I can survive an entire week on the ice with this equipment.” All her training, her skill, her education, had led to this. She’d be directly helping the polar bears instead of writing papers and securing grants. If he agreed.

  Swinging his massive head over the documents, he studied the maps, the files, the lists of numbers. “If this helps . . . all polar bears will thank you. I thank you.” He leaned his head against her stomach, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. In a lighter voice, he added, “It is, though, quite unnatural.”

  “So says the talking bear,” she said.

  His fur shook as he laughed again. “I had no one to mock me for days.”

  “Vacation’s over,” she said. “Cassie’s home.”

  Softly, he said, “You have no idea how happy that makes me.”

  She felt her cheeks warm. She felt as if she could float to the ceiling. “Romantic,” she said.

  He covered his muzzle with his paw, miming embarrassment.

  Cassie opened another binder. She wanted to show him everything. “Look, here are all the current tagging numbers from the Polar Bear Specialist Group of the IUCN.”

  “Come,” he said, nudging her with his nose. “We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

  Cassie grinned. Out on the ice, together. Leaving the IUCN binder, she walked alongside him, past the carvings in deep blue ice and up the staircase lit by candlelight. “You know I had a number all picked out for you: A505, Alaskan ID.”

  “A505,” he repeated.

  “I think you’d look nice with a tag. Just like an earring.” She tugged on his furry ear. She couldn’t get enough of touching him. It reminded her that he was real. “Not to mention the green ink on your gums. Very attractive.”

  As always, he waited in the hall while she prepared for bed. Once she slid under the covers, she blew out the candle. Everything descended into darkness, and she heard the pad of bear paws and then the footsteps of a man. The mattress sank as he climbed into bed beside her.

  For the first time in five nights, she slept well.

  * * * * *

  Cassie woke first. Her cheek lay against his bare chest, smooth and human. Her arm was draped across his stomach. She lay there for a long moment, feeling him breathe. Her husband. She reached up in the darkness and lightly touched his face. Her fingers traced his chin and lingered over his lips. She’d never kissed him. She wondered what it would be like.

  She felt him stir, and she pulled her hand away quickly. She rolled to her side of the bed. “Ready to patrol?” she asked him.

  She felt the sheets shift and the mattress rise as he stood.

  “We’re going together, right?” she asked.

  Cassie felt a wisp of wind in her face. When he spoke, it was with his deeper, polar bear voice. “Of course, O Intrepid Leader.”

  She grinned.

  Cassie heard the door open. She waited until she heard it click closed before finding her flashlight and turning it on. She dressed quickly in full expedition gear—Gore-Tex pants, mukluks, all of it—and then she met Bear at the front archway to the castle. Soon, she was riding him across the ice.

  The Arctic spread before them, blue-shadowed and as broad as the Sahara. Cassie leaned over Bear’s neck as the wind slapped her face. This was wonderful. This was magnificent. This was . . . far too slow. She shouted a dog sledding call into his ear: “Mush, mush, mush!”

  “Very amusing,” he said, but he sped into a blur. She whooped as the deep night-winter blue stretched into a single sheet of ice and sky. Yes! She was flying! The midday moon hung low and fat on the southern horizon. She waved to it.

  Bear leaped over a pressure ridge. Laughing, Cassie grabbed his fur and clamped her thighs around his middle to keep from falling off. She loved this! They should have done this months ago.

  She squinted into the dark whiteness. She saw the aurora borealis curling around the fringes of her vision, green and white flashes. According to Inuit legend, the northern lights were the dancing spirits of the dead. Cassie wondered if that was where the unclaimed souls went, the ones munaqsri missed, the ones that should have gone to newborns. Don’t be ridiculous, she told herself. The aurora was caused by electrically charged particles from the sun hitting the upper atmosphere, not floating souls. The souls went . . . She had no idea where missed souls went. She supposed they could go to the aurora. Bear had said once that they were lost. Maybe eventually, she’d have enough data to map paths for deaths as well as births. Wouldn’t that be something? But she shouldn’t get ahead of herself. First she had to see whether her plan would work at all.

  The first route Cassie had planned took them down into Lancaster Sound to Hudson Bay and then east to Davis Strait. At the opening to the sound, Bear shouted that he felt a call. Cassie hung on as Bear leaped and crashed through pressure ridges and over creaking ice pans.

  Bear braked without warning, and Cassie flew into his neck. “Hold on,” he told her. “We’ll take it slow this first time.” Gripping his neck fur, Cassie opened her mouth to ask what he meant.

  He walked into a snowbank.

  Snow melted like a mirage around them. Cassie shuddered as it slid through her. A few seconds later, she felt warm wet air on her face. Half her body was within the bear’s den; the rest was immured in the hard-packed snow. She listened to the sow pant in the darkness. She’d never been so close to a birthing polar bear in the wild. She didn’t think anyone ever had. This was amazing, she thought. This was impossible.

  This was the power of a munaqsri. This was why he had power: to reach the bears as they were born or died. All the magic existed to make this moment possible.

  “It is time. It is coming,” Bear whispered.

  “Can’t see,” she whispered back. Suddenly, she could. She saw white: fur and ice. Bear, she guessed, had altered her eyes. He’d changed her body, in the same way he did when he kept her warm on the ice.

  Bear inched forward and laid his face next to the sow’s stomach. Cassie wiggled closer too. “Do you have the soul?” she whispered.

  “Watch,” he said. Bear opened his mouth, and a shadow fell like a drop of water. It sank into vast mounds of fur. Cassie didn’t breathe. A tiny wet shape, the cub, slid out of its mother and squirmed. In a soft voice, Bear said, “And that is how we make babies.”

  “It’s . . . a miracle.” She had no other word for it. Bear created miracles.

  The cub mewled. Blind, it wormed through its mother’s fur, and the sow licked it with a tongue that covered it in one swipe.

  Silently, Bear retreated. They slid through the solid snow. Cassie felt as if she were being smothered, and she fought to stay calm. Bear would never hurt me, she told herse
lf. She gasped in air as they emerged. Her muscles shook. “Are you all right?” Bear asked.

  “Love the night vision,” she said. “Hate the walking through walls.” She took a deep breath to calm her racing heart.

  Hands shaking, she took out her GPS: latitude 63° 46’ 05” N, longitude 80° 09’ 32” W. She marked it in a notebook, then tucked pencil, notebook, and GPS back into her inner layers. “We should head toward Churchill next. There are a couple mothers overdue west of Hudson Bay.”

  “As you wish, O Glorious Leader.”

  She snorted. “Cute.”

  * * * * *

  That night, Cassie lay beside Bear. “You awake?”

  “Don’t kick me,” he said into his pillow.

  She smiled and reached over in the darkness to touch his human shoulder. “It’s going to work,” she said. “That cub’s birth proved it.” She had a place here, not just as Bear’s wife. She had a future.

  “Yes,” he said. She felt him shift. He was facing her now, she guessed.

  “We’re a team now,” she said.

  “Yes,” he said.

  She reached out again, and her fingers touched his smooth cheek. She wondered briefly what he’d look like in the light. Not that it mattered. He was her Bear. Cassie shifted closer.

  He stilled, like a polar bear by a hole in the ice, but she was hyperaware of how human he was right now. She felt him waiting. He said nothing. Cassie tilted her head up, and in the darkness, she kissed him. Not moving his body, as if afraid she’d flee, he kissed her back, soft and sweet.

  THIRTEEN

  Latitude 83° 35’ 43” N

  Longitude 123° 29’ 10” E

  Altitude 4 ft.

  AS LIGHT RETURNED to the southern Arctic, Cassie and Bear spent more and more time out on the ice. Every day under the blue-purple-pink sky, they patrolled the snowbanks of Alaska, Canada, Siberia, Greenland, and Norway. Every evening under the eyes of Bear’s ice carvings, Cassie refined her maps and plotted their route for the next day. And every night in the dark, she kissed her husband until she fell asleep, curled in his arms. She’d never been happier.