by Claudia King
“A great bear! Great Rook!” Pera grabbed her hand and tugged. “You will never have seen anything like him back in your clan's swamp.”
“We must be careful,” Wren said, still managing to sound excited despite her caution. “He usually sleeps this time of day, but he will be angry if we wake him.”
“Even better. The old beast will never catch us if he's snoring in his den.”
They headed west along the length of the ridge, gradually making their way down the slope until they reached gentler footing. The forest at the end of the valley rose up to meet them, and by the time they reached the valley floor they were surrounded by trees.
The sound of bone chimes prickled Kiren's skin as they crept into the quiet forest. Totems and effigies leered out of the foliage around them, some suspended from the branches like birds while others were lashed to the trunks of trees. She had seen similarly unsettling charms in the forest on the edge of Adel's territory, but these ones were far more grotesquely made. Pera tapped her on the shoulder, then laughed as she spun around and yelped when she found herself face to face with a deer skull. The jaw had been forced open so that a mass of thin branches protruded through it, spilling from the thing's maw and eye sockets like skeletal tendrils. Wing bones had been woven together with twine and splayed out on either side of it, giving the impression of giant claws that trembled in the wind.
She punched Pera in the arm, giving him a turn to yelp as he rubbed at the tender spot.
“You're stronger than you look,” he said.
“You'll find out how strong if you do that again! These things are terrible.”
“They're just totems,” Pera said, walking over to wiggle one of the wing bones playfully. “You'll probably be making them yourself soon.”
Wren slapped his hand down. “They may just be totems, but the dark spirits they call are real.”
“Great Rook seems not to mind them. He chews these things up all the time.”
“Perhaps he is a dark spirit,” Wren said, but her tone had shifted from sincere to teasing. “He'll haunt your dreams if you go and wake him.”
“I'm not afraid. Are you?”
“Kiren is the one who has to prove herself.” She giggled, looking Kiren's way. “When we were younger we used to play a game with the other apprentices. Whoever could get closest to the rock outside Great Rook's den before running away was the bravest. Only me, Pera and Sephonie ever put a paw on it.”
“I can do that,” Kiren said, determined not to be outdone by her rival apprentice. Sephonie might have looked down her nose at Kiren's other accomplishments, but the one thing she refused to concede was her bravery. She had faced down far worse than sleeping bears, after all. If she could not claim to be brave, what else did she have?
Kiren strode ahead of the other two, ignoring the fact that she did not know the way to Great Rook's den. This time she passed by the skeletal totems without flinching, determined to prove her worth to her companions. Wren seemed to know so much about crafting, and Pera's beautiful singing voice spoke for itself. Surely the trials she had faced on her journey had tempered her into something of comparable value, had they not?
“We're close now,” Pera said once they had crossed most of the way across the valley. He nudged Kiren to the left, pointing her in the right direction. “We should call our wolves. If Rook is out wandering, we must be ready to run.”
Kiren nodded, pausing as her spine stiffened and the inner beast rose up to consume her, flavouring her thoughts with its own feral voice. Clothing clung to her body as if suddenly wet, then burst into bristling fur, lending its weight to the follicles already sprouting from her skin. The last of her leathers peeled away with a ripple, then she was staring into the undergrowth on all fours, tasting the scents of the forest with such detail they almost seemed like a second sight. The thick musk of a bear clung to the trees nearby. Both old and new, it had marked this territory as its own many times over the years.
Despite having smelt similar scents before when venturing beyond the swamps of her mother's territory, she had never seen a bear up close. Were they as dangerous as the stories claimed? Surely no beast could rival the strength of a wolf of the moon people. Even the great mountain cats, fierce though they were, lacked the cunning and endurance to stand toe to toe with them.
Her two companions flanked her on either side as she crept forward, following the bear smell where it was strongest. Kiren realised that it had been many days since she hunted, and the rush of elation sharpened her senses afresh. This was where she belonged. This was what came naturally to her. Fear and worry fell away, leaving only the determination of the hunt.
You are not making prey of a bear, she tried to remind herself, but her feral side nosed the thought aside playfully. Could she not dwell in the moment just this once?
The scent of bear became thickest where the slopes rose on the northern side of the valley. The trees gradually thinned as rocks broke up the forest floor. Kiren's ears twitched, but she heard no sounds of movement nearby. Her eyes widened in wonder when she saw long claw marks gouging earth and tree alike. Claws big enough to cleave flesh from bone.
A flutter of movement caught Kiren's attention up ahead. She hunched down with Wren and Pera simultaneously, flattening her ears and forcing her tail to hold still. Then a tickle of amusement rose in her breast.
So that is why they call him Great Rook.
A low cave entrance loomed ahead, dark and deep, and gathered on the short rock shelf outside were a parliament of black-feathered birds. Rooks, quietly pecking over the leftovers of the bear's last meal, arrayed in a line like worshippers. Perhaps Great Rook really was a spirit, to have gathered such an orderly congregation outside his den.
Kiren flicked her tail in the air and voiced a low bark. Hopefully it had not been loud enough to wake the slumbering bear, but it had its desired effect. One of the birds noticed and leaped into the air, its panicked flap of wings prompting a simultaneous reaction from the rest of the flock.
The three wolves held still, waiting to see whether the den's occupant had been disturbed. When Wren and Pera did not move, Kiren took the lead once again. Prowling forward, she crept to the base of the shelf, then hopped up on silent paws.
Every muscle in Kiren's body tightened. Blocking out the cave passage it had emerged from, Great Rook's monstrous bulk swelled like a fur-clad boulder before her. The bear was awake, bristling and angry, stomping forward on paws large enough to crush a wolf's skull.
Dark eyes staring into Kiren's, he parted his jaws and roared.
—7—
Tempting Fate
Kiren did not move. She knew her first instinct should have been to run. Deep in her belly she could feel that innate panic lashing about, trying to force her body into action. She ignored it. Controlling the fear, a warrior's numb calm descended over her instead.
Great Rook's enormous paws crashed down upon the rock so hard Kiren felt the stone tremble beneath her. Still she did not move. The bear's hot breath huffed into the air between them, his muzzle no more than a body length from hers. Without moving her eyes, Kiren saw a large stone between them. That must have been the one the other apprentices dared each other to put a paw on.
As slowly as she could, Kiren took a step forward. Great Rook's fur bristled, and he roared again. Her legs wanted to leap out from under her. She told them not to. The bear could have lunged the moment he saw her, but he had not. He wanted to scare this intruder away, not fight them. Beasts and warriors were not so different sometimes.
The rock was almost within Kiren's reach. Somewhere behind her she heard a desperate whine from Wren's wolf. Kiren bared her teeth slightly. The other two must have thought her mad. Had Sephonie faced down the bear like this when she crept up to touch the rock? She did not think so.
As she started to reach out with her forepaw Great Rook's fur suddenly bulged. A gargantuan shoulder rolled beneath his heavy coat, bringing up his claws to strike. Kiren allowed h
er coiled tension to finally snap loose, batting her paw against the rock an instant before her hind legs straightened and sent her leaping back.
She felt the air rush inches from her fur as Rook's claws swiped past, scoring marks across the rock she had been touching less than half a breath earlier. The beast bellowed a third time, but Kiren was already in the air, leaping from the lip outside his den back down to the forest floor. Earth thudded and branches crashed behind her as Rook gave chase, snarling after the three young wolves as they streaked away into the undergrowth. His loping strides sounded so heavy that Kiren was sure he must be at their heels. She pushed her body with pure force of will, throwing herself through whipping twigs and patches of nettles like an arrow flung from a bow.
Wren and Pera were just ahead of her, bounding through the trees to her left and right. One of the bone totems clattered to the ground as Kiren slammed its pole with her shoulder, spilling animal ribs and bird skulls into the ferns. The grisly ornaments snapped and crunched a moment later as Great Rook's paws pounded them into the earth, his momentum completely unbroken.
Yet Kiren sensed the beast was falling behind. He ran with the force of a rolling boulder behind him, but his long strides could not keep pace with the quickness of a wolf. The thud of his paws softened, slowed, and finally stopped. One final angry roar stirred the nearby birds from their roosts, then the bear was gone.
The three of them kept on running, putting more and more distance between themselves and Rook's den until they were almost at the southern side of the valley again. When they finally came to a stop Pera half-tumbled out of his wolf's body, falling back against a mossy slope with a groan as Wren tripped over him. Kiren dropped to the ground at his side. Her wolf receded, and then all three of them were laughing.
“I cannot believe you!” Pera gasped breathlessly. “Now the game is ruined! No one else will ever brave Rook's den like that. Never ever.”
“I thought he would get you for sure,” Wren said. “I don't think I've ever seen a wolf move that fast!”
Kiren laughed with them. Laughed until she felt her hands trembling. For some reason, she could not stop.
I always manage to slip away. Is that not my fate? Even when everyone else...
A moment of panic gripped her as she looked at Wren and Pera. They were still safe, weren't they? No harm had come to them? Her laughter choked in her throat, and for an instant she was back in a dark forest, her face pressed against Vaya's flank as she sobbed in the light of a fallen torch.
No, she was not there. This was different. This time she had a reason to be laughing. Kiren forced herself to smile again as the three of them picked themselves back up, but the sudden flash of the past had unsettled her. Maybe an echo of the dark spirits that dwelt in this forest? The anger of that destroyed totem lashing out at her?
“We shouldn't have done that,” Wren giggled, brushing a few leaves out of her ochre hair. “They told us not to.”
“The elders don't have to know everything,” Pera replied. “Sometimes you must do as your heart wills—and what a will Kiren has! Oh, by this winter I'll be singing such a song about you and that bear. This was a good day.”
Kiren's smile grew a little more comfortable. It had been quite a day, hadn't it? She had learned of the plants on the southern valley slopes, faced down a bear, and made her first new friends. That was more than she had managed when she was staring at dried herbs with Netya looking over her shoulder. Her spirit felt sharp and raw, her heart pounding in her chest, but more than anything her body thrummed with the essence of life. If there were more days like this to come, then perhaps her years among the witches would not be so difficult after all.
By the time they had said goodbye to Pera and walked back through the forest it was well into the afternoon. Kiren was hungry, and neither she nor Wren had remembered to bring any food with them.
“There are usually some seed cakes in the mentor's hollow,” Kiren said, gesturing toward the place she had spent the last few days with Netya. “Those can keep us going until we get back to the den.”
“What if someone is there? We aren't allowed to interrupt the apprentices when they are learning.”
Kiren shrugged. “I think I am the only one who has been learning in there lately.”
The two girls crept out of the forest and peered across to the hollow. It was as quiet and gloomy as always. Kiren dusted off her palms as they approached, realising that they had become stained with the colours of the various plants she had been handling earlier. It was much easier to remember their names when she could feel which ones oozed with residue, stung her skin, or made her nose itch when she smelt them. With a little luck, Sister Netya might actually be impressed with her progress today.
Unfortunately, the day's luck seemed to have run out for Kiren. As she ducked into the hollow and began rummaging through the bags she felt a hand come down on her shoulder. Jumping in surprise, she spun around and sent the contents of nearest herb rack scattering across the ground. Netya stood there, a frown etched into her features, the long-beaked heron skull at the tip of her staff framed by the light spilling in through the entrance.
“It is well past noon,” she said.
Kiren gave a sheepish shrug, bending down to pick up the mess she had made. Wren peered in behind Netya, but Kiren gestured for her to stay out of sight. She didn't need to get her new friend into trouble too.
“I thought you were determined to become a seer?” Netya said.
“I am!”
“Then why are you already avoiding your duties? You must remain disciplined, Kiren, or you will never learn what I am trying to teach you.”
“I spent all morning learning.” Kiren pointed outside. “I can tell you all about the plants over on the south side of the valley now. Yellow leaf and winter's snare, longthorn and shortthorn, the bush with the black berries—”
“Those aren't plants you will be working with. Most of the ones I have been showing you are out of season. Why do you think we are looking at them dry rather than fresh?”
“I thought I was supposed to learn all of them?”
“I have been trying to make you learn the important ones first. Herbs for teas, medicine. Brews that can dull pain and help sickness. These are the plants you will be using most often as a seer.”
“Well, it taught me more than sitting in here all day did,” Kiren said irritably. She had felt accomplished for the first time since her arrival, and now Netya had dashed those accomplishments aside. The older woman looked almost hurt by her apprentice's response, but her expression firmed up again within moments.
“You are not to address your mentor that way.”
“Why not?”
“Kiren!” Netya slammed the butt of her staff against the work slab. “Must I have the den mother speak with you?”
“Perhaps you should, if you cannot do it yourself.”
Netya jabbed a finger at the ground. “You will sit here and learn your herbs all through the night to make up for this morning.”
“Fine, if I must. I will be back at nightfall.”
“No, that is not what I—”
But Kiren had already darted out of the hollow, leaping into the shape of her wolf before she could finish hearing what her mentor had to say. If she had to endure some punishment for this, so be it. Even if Netya was right, what had she done to earn Kiren's respect? To prove her wisdom? Kiren only trusted herself. Herself and Vaya.
She let her heated thoughts mingle with the spirit of her wolf as she ran south toward the far side of the valley. She did not want to dwell on the way Netya had sounded like her mother when she spoke. Disappointment was the only thing she ever seemed worthy of. Spirit-talkers were all the same.
* * *
“I cannot understand,” Netya said, pacing back and forth on the opposite side of Adel's fire. “I am doing exactly as you did with me. Everything I can remember!”
The den mother steepled her fingers beneath her chin, gazing
into the embers as Netya fretted.
“The difference is not in the teaching, it is in the apprentice. You learned well. Kiren, it seems, cannot.”
“I was afraid of you, so I did everything you said. I can't frighten Kiren into listening to me.”
“Can't you? If a youngster is disobedient, they must be punished. I cannot tolerate undisciplined apprentices in my clan.”
“This was never my calling, Den Mother. I hoped to be Kiren's friend, not her enemy. How will I earn her trust if all can I offer are punishments?”
“I was your enemy before I was your friend, was I not? I told you, Netya, this apprenticeship is as much yours as it is Kiren's. She must learn to be a seer, and you a mentor. Do not pretend that it is beyond you to manage this.”
Netya sighed. “I am not giving up. I only ask for your guidance. You will always be my mentor; teach me, so that I can teach her.”
“Young heads are hot and full of foolish courage. A little curse to bring terror to her dreams should remind Kiren that she still has much to be afraid of. Ask Lyucia for one of her nightmare poisons. It should be no trouble to slip it into the girl's food.”
Netya wrinkled her nose in distaste. “We should not use dark magic upon our own clan.”
“Kiren is not of our clan. Not yet. Something tells me that girl will pay little heed if we simply forbid her from leaving the valley or command her to spend all night studying herbs. She is a wild one. Perhaps a little like me.” Adel grimaced, then shrugged. “Or else threaten to send her home. Remind her that we still hold Vaya's life in our grasp. Those are the things she fears most.”
“You would not really harm Vaya, would you?”
Adel gave her a cold look. “As long as Kiren believes I might, that is all that matters. A little fear now to cool her temper, and she will thank us for it in time.”
Netya shook her head. “No. I won't have my apprentice frightened into obeying me.”
“Then you may have no apprentice at all.” Adel rose to her feet, a frostiness stiffening her features. “Do what must be done, girl. I know you have the fire for it buried somewhere within your soul. You who slew an alpha must be capable of taming one wayward apprentice.”
