A growl floated on the mist to my ears. I didn’t have to ask Ri to stop, she immediately pulled up short, her neck raised, her ears standing alert. That wasn’t the growl of a content, full animal. It was one of something who’d spotted prey, signalling a hunt. Something knew we were here. I pulled the reins to the left, urging Ri to the shadow of a large fir tree. Running away would be difficult. There was too much ice and uneven ground.
Seeing nothing, I swung down to the ground again and turned slowly in a circle, taking in the whole of the surrounding forest. The breeze taunted me by lifting the branches of trees and fir needles. Every time I saw movement, it turned out to be harmless. I had almost completed my turn when something caught my attention perhaps twenty paces away. I strained my eyes, confused. The snow seemed to be … moving? Something white was rising over a nearby hilltop, and—
When it reached the top, I nearly stopped breathing. A bear, whiter than I’d ever seen, was staring at us, piercing black eyes standing out against its fur. It tilted its head and growled, its open mouth the size of my head.
We’d seen bears before, back in the village, but they weren’t common. They would pick off a human who was far from anyone else, who was caught alone in the woods, especially in winter. But entire villages made them nervous. The noise, the scent of fire, it pushed them away, keeping us safe. I remembered one thing my father had taught me: never run. Running meant fear, and fear was something they preyed on. Fear meant you were something they could overpower. Also, no one had ever outrun a bear. Their legs were too long, too powerful. If I could establish myself as a threat, he might move on.
Standing as tall as I could, I took a step forward. If I was lucky, such an aggressive move would show intimidation and he’d wander off. The mountains were full of smaller prey, rabbits and foxes and all manner of life that would no doubt prove an easy meal for such a beast. A girl and a horse might be more trouble than we were worth.
The bear didn’t back down. Instead, it moved towards me, letting out another long, reverberating growl that shook my soul. Ri started, her ears pinned to her head. I didn’t know whether the bear wanted me or the horse, but I couldn’t spare either of us. I pulled my knife from its place at my waist, ready to throw if it came any closer. I didn’t want to kill it. Wouldn’t, unless I absolutely had to. A knife would do little more than slow it down, make it bleed, and hopefully establish myself as a force to be feared.
It lumbered forward, those giant paws sinking into the snow with a kind of weight that warned me to run. It was suddenly all I could think about, wanting to turn away and flee through the trees, run until I couldn’t take another step, until I was so far away that the bear and this fear felt like nothing more than a distant, fading memory.
Never run.
Ri backed away slowly, her breath ragged and terrified. The bear, however, seemed more concerned with me, perhaps for my small size. As the distance between us began to disappear, a heavy growl emanating again from deep within its chest, I remembered a time many, many years ago when I’d climbed a tree on a dare to win Ivar’s snowshoes. I’d climbed nearly the whole way to the top, until the branches were too thin to support my weight. I glanced at the tree behind me. It wouldn’t be easy, but if I was fast, I might be able to make it work.
After a quick look at the bear, I shoved the knife into my belt and jumped, latching my arms around the lowest branch and hauling myself upward. I hadn’t anticipated how heavy I’d be, weighed down by warm cloaks and furs, but I fought against my shaking muscles and pulled myself on to the branch. Just as I was reaching for the next branch, a scraping sound below me forced my gaze downward. The bear, seeming to have caught on to my escape, had latched on to the tree in a sort of brutal embrace, the sickeningly large claws protruding from its paws finding easy purchase on the bark.
Could bears climbs trees?
I couldn’t wait to find out. If it could, it almost certainly couldn’t climb as fast as I could, and that needed to be my focus. I needed to reach the higher points of the tree that it wouldn’t be able to get to, where the branches would be too thin. Sooner or later, it would have to give up.
My heart beat so loudly it seemed to overwhelm all other noises as I made my way steadily upward. Small twigs and branches lashed at my face, and I felt a warm trickle on my left cheek, but there wasn’t time to stop and wipe it away. My arms shook, my legs throbbed, and each new branch I reached was a miracle. Pull. Stand. Reach. I worked to find a rhythm, a comforting repetition that would ease the pain, but it only worsened.
Over the pounding of my heart and the rustle of my clothing against the bark of the tree, I heard a loud thud. Cautiously allowing myself to look down, dizzy from the height, I saw the bear had dropped to the ground. Surely it hadn’t yet reached its limit. What had urged it away?
It lifted its head into the air, sniffing, and then turned and ran. As it retreated, it paused once to look behind it, as though it were running from … something.
What would scare a bear? Something much, much bigger than me, I realized with a sense of mounting dread, as thundering footsteps reached my ears.
Chapter 19
The silence of the cave was both suffocating and beautiful. It was an hour-long trek south of Neska, and Ivar was supposed to be hunting to add to the food stores the village was building up so that there wouldn’t be cause to leave. So that all of the focus could be poured into preparing for the Ør’s invasion. But his feet had led him here, because the quiet familiarity of the cave welcomed him in a way he couldn’t deny. There was little to be gleaned from the sparse scratchings on these walls, and yet he’d somehow formed a strange attachment to the person who’d written it. Perhaps, he thought, as his eyes fell on the marks, it was because the writer had left their signature. Isól. It could have been a man or a woman, but knowing their name seemed to break down the years and years of separation between them, as though, if he said the name out loud, they might hear him. Perhaps part of them still haunted this cave, the cave that had at one time been their refuge. Their place of peace.
Ósa didn’t know about this cave, or if she did, she’d never said. Close as they were, there seemed to be some level of importance in having a place of one’s own, of having somewhere to go to be dead to the world and to allow oneself to become lost in the windings of one’s own thoughts. There was a beauty in isolation, but also renewal.
He dug his palms into his eyes, the realization of just how tired he truly was settling into his bones. During the day, while helping others train and throwing knife after knife in demonstration, he could keep up the appearance of strength, even while others wailed, panicked when in close proximity to anyone else in the village. He could try to be the voice of reason when others acted irrationally, but when he was alone, those walls began to crumble, and pure, unhindered exhaustion crept into the very core of his being. He slept at night, at least for a few hours, but his dreams were dark and frightening, his sleep often fitful. The light of dawn was a welcome sight, even if it was the start of another wretched day of waiting. It meant that at least he didn’t have to sleep again for hours.
Footsteps crunched in the snow outside the cave. He leaped to his feet as quietly as he could, knives in hand. He crept to the mouth of the cave, keeping to the shadows as he peered outside. A trail of people were moving by, headed north with boxes and carts and piled with belongings. With a sinking of his stomach, he recognized a few faces. When he emerged from the cave, a familiar boy stopped and stared at him. They were from Sjørskall. It looked like most of the village was trekking north, towards Neska, no doubt.
“What brings you to the north?” he asked, sheathing one knife but still gripping the other.
The boy gestured to those around him, many of whom continued their journey with nervous glances in his direction. “We’ve come to join you,” he said, his voice full of hope. “With Areld gone, many of us are happy to get away. We wanted to apologise for what happened in our village by bringing you
our added numbers and whatever weapons we could gather.” He pointed to a cart rumbling by, carrying old knives and crudely-carved arrows. “Please accept our help.”
Ivar watched the cart roll by, remembering the heat of the flames beneath him, the certainty he’d felt that those were his last few moments. No one in the village had helped him, and without the sudden arrival of his father, he might not be alive today.
And yet.
How could he deny them safety? Their very presence here was an apology. Their willingness to join a fight such as this said something, and he could not turn them away to certain death. “You will have to speak to my father and our leaders,” he told them. “I cannot guarantee that they will have you after what happened, but I will do my best to convince them.”
It took the better part of an hour for the villagers to plead their case, but at long last, with the promise of new hands and weapons, Sigvard and Eldór agreed to let the newcomers stay.
The next morning, the sky was just beginning to hint at an approaching dawn. The stars overhead began to fade, losing their vibrancy as the sky eased from black to grey. Ivar stood just outside the village, his hands buried inside pockets within his cloak, his breath creating bursts of white fog. Sleep had refused to come to him, and the walls of his home had never felt so close. So confined. Some small part of him felt pangs of guilt. If Ósa can’t have the comfort of home, neither should I.
Where was she now? Safe? Warm? Alive?
He’d known it would take time, but as days slipped away, day giving way to night giving way to day, the Ør were coming ever closer. While his hope in Ósa remained, the more logical part of Ivar’s mind began to take over. Even if she did make it, even if she did survive, she would almost certainly be too late. And that understanding sat in the pit of his stomach like a rock.
A bird departed a nearby branch and snow fell to the ground with a gentle patter. The forest was just beginning to come alive, awakening to start a new day. Colours began to bloom, chasing away the dull grey of the night as the sun fought to regain control of the sky. There was something sacred in this hour, when night began to die and day was born again. New snow had fallen, stretching almost entirely unbroken around him in hills and valleys of white.
It was at times like these that Ivar struggled the most. The village was still asleep. He could slip into a stable and steal a horse before anyone else knew. He could be a few kilometres away before anyone woke up, riding north to find her. If he rode night and day, eventually he would catch up to her. A small smile pulled at his lips as he imagined that reunion, so far from home and so unexpected.
He could do it. He could do it right now.
But then he saw smoke rising from a few chimneys, and in the village voices carried to him on the breeze. Gregor and the other leaders would soon meet again to continue their discussions and preparations. One figure, shorter than the others, emerged from a house and looked about, his eyes finally settling on Ivar.
Móri.
Ivar wanted to be alone, but it was too late now to avoid being seen. The boy made his way to him through the snow, pulling his cloak tighter around his slight form. He was still thin, not quite tall enough to be a man, but not that far off, either. Ivar couldn’t remember his exact age, but reckoned it had to be somewhere around thirteen.
“Hunting?” his cousin asked when he was close enough.
“No, just standing here. It was quiet.”
“I’m sorry.” Móri looked down, clearly disappointed with himself.
“Don’t be. I was just about to come back. I couldn’t sleep.” Ivar sighed and turned to face the woods once more.
“My father is going hunting later and I’m going with him. He said it will be good practice with my bow. I get to shoot whatever we find.” Móri gently patted the bow strung across his back. “I’ve practised almost every—” He stopped short and sniffed. “Do you smell that?”
Ivar lifted his head and breathed deeply, facing into the breeze. Sure enough, it carried with it a subtle but distinct smell.
Smoke, thick and pungent.
Without stopping to think, Ivar bolted back into the village, where he hammered on the door of his home. “Father! Get out here!” Without waiting for an answer, he ran to Arvid’s house. Aside from the horse he’d given to Ósa, Ivar knew there were three more in his stables. He pounded on the man’s door and kept pounding until it opened.
“What has got into you?” Arvid hissed, his eyes still glassy with sleep.
“We need to borrow your horses. Something’s happened in the north, something’s on fire.” Ivar turned and flung open the doors to the stables, Móri following close behind him. Behind them, Sigvard hurried in, pulling on his cloak, his eyebrows knitted together in confusion.
“What is the meaning of this?” he asked, grabbing his son by the shoulder until he stopped to face him.
“There’s smoke coming from the north,” Ivar said. “Ask Móri. You can smell it in the trees.”
Sigvard glanced at the younger boy, who nodded solemnly.
“We need to hurry,” Ivar said, untying one of the horses and leading him from the stable.
“Grab a knife and a horse. We’ll explain on the way,” Ivar shouted to Eldór, who had emerged from his home to investigate the commotion. When he turned to ride into the trees, Móri stood in his path.
“I discovered the smoke,” he said, chin held high. “I deserve to come with you.”
“We don’t know what it is, Móri. I don’t want you to—”
“I’m coming with you, Ivar. You would wish the same if you were me.”
Ivar stared at the boy for a moment. Yes, he was young, but it was that sort of fire and fearlessness that Skane needed. He was old enough to choose for himself. So, without answer, he reached out a hand and swung the boy up on to the horse behind him. Moments later, they left the village with Sigvard and Eldór.
It was difficult to make good time in the trees, both from the varying depth of snow to the tall trunks constantly having to be avoided. Whenever there was a clearing, they urged the horses forward as fast as they could go, then reined them in again to circle the trees. The further they travelled, the more intense the smell of the smoke became. It began to sicken Ivar’s stomach, hanging thicker and thicker in the air. Even the horse’s pace began to slow, his ears darting around as he sniffed nervously.
Sigvard moved to ride beside them. “Whatever we find up here, it won’t be good,” he said.
Minutes later, the ruins of Is̊avik lay before them. The houses had been burned from the inside out, the snow still hissing and melting away. Anything that would burn lay charred and blackened, smoking and crumbling to ash. Blood sat red against the snow, bodies fallen haphazardly around the village. No one moved. No one breathed.
“Devils,” Sigvard breathed. Eldór remained silent, staring.
“How did they get here?” Móri asked.
Ivar jumped from the horse and walked slowly to the nearest body, which was not yet cold. Motionless. Eyes glazed over with death. Teeth missing. “They might have come in the boat with the others,” he said quietly. “Or on one we haven’t found.” Then, after examining the body more closely, he said, “This is new. Look for tracks.”
“You think four of us can hunt down an unknown number of Ør?” Eldór asked.
“If they don’t know we’re coming we’ll have an advantage,” Ivar said, remounting the horse. “We have to stop them before they reach another village. This must be their plan. They’re going to try to eradicate our people village by village, before we can all stand together, working their way down from the north. Take us out without needing a fight.” He didn’t wait for a reply, only steered the horse away and began searching the snow for tracks.
He swiftly found some, leading out of the village and into the forest headed south, on a different route than Ivar and the others had taken to reach Is̊avik. They must have passed each other with too much distance to notice. The tracks w
ere large and messy, difficult to read, but after a few moments, they all seemed to agree on five. Five Ør. That’s all it had taken to destroy an entire village.
“All right,” said Eldór, finally finding his voice and speaking with his usual air of authority. “We track them down, but when we’re close, we abandon the horses and go on foot. Sigvard and Móri carry bows. That will give us two surprise shots to take two of them down before they realize we’re following them. Do not miss.” He stared into their faces in turn, intimidation causing Móri to nod, but Sigvard only to stare back. “Once they know we’re there, we’ll rush them as fast as we can. Ivar, how many knives do you have?”
He felt at his waist, and answered, “Two.”
“Throw one and don’t miss. Use the other for fighting.”
“Ivar never misses,” Móri said defiantly, then looked quickly to the ground after a silencing look from Eldór.
“Are we all clear?” he asked a moment later. No one replied, but he seemed to take their silence as consent. “Once we find them, Sigvard and Móri will circle ahead for a clear shot. Ivar and I will attack from the rear.”
Ivar rested a hand on the hilt of one knife for comfort, though he found none. They had not come prepared for a fight, Móri least of all. He shouldn’t have to face this, but their group couldn’t afford to lose one man. There was no way around it, they had to find the Ør and stop them before they reached another village.
Eldór remounted his horse. “Keep the horses reined in. We don’t want to to give away our presence.”
With the two other men riding in front, they set out following the tracks. Ivar sat ahead of his cousin Móri, eyes staring into the woods, searching for any sign of the monsters. There was nothing except tree after tree, and a blanket of snow that was broken by the large footprints – and, here and there, droplets of blood, probably from the new teeth they’d stolen. Ivar hoped Móri hadn’t noticed, though judging by the utter lack of colour in his face, he almost certainly had.
A Shiver of Snow and Sky Page 12