Authors: Jane Lindskold
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The conversation ended shortly after Griffin’s pained admission that he was stranded. Adara could smell exhaustion coming off the man in waves. If she could, so could Bruin. Bears had an excellent sense of smell and Honeychild was much better than Sand Shadow at sharing her impressions with her partner.
Griffin was tucked away in a small room up under the eaves. He was snoring before Bruin thumped down the stairs. Adara, combing out her hair before the fire in the main room, was surprised when Bruin tapped her lightly on the shoulder.
“While your catch is dead to the world,” Bruin said softly, “tell me what you’ve been doing with him.”
“I’ve been doing nothing!” Adara replied more hotly than she had intended. “I saved his life, fed him, answered his questions as best I could, and safely brought him here, but I’ve done nothing more.”
“And you should be doing nothing more,” Bruin said solemnly.
“Why?” Adara asked, hurt and offended.
Bruin reached out a blunt-fingered hand and patted her on one shoulder. “Because, ladybug,” he answered, using a childhood nickname, “this Griffin Dane is two things, unalike as rain and fire, but two things nonetheless. First, he is so very vulnerable. I think the tales he told us brought home to him what a lost creature he is. To take advantage of that weakness … it would not be good for either of you.
“I suspect you would only be looking to scratch an itch against an interesting new tree, but this Griffin might go further and fall in love with you. That would be no good thing if you could not answer his need—or worse, if you answered from pity. Weakness can call to weakness, but it cannot make strength.”
Adara was hurt that Bruin didn’t think she had the good sense to figure this out for herself. “And the other reason?”
“We see this Griffin Dane as he was tonight, a man alone, lost to his very world. He is very polite, all too strongly reminded just how ill-prepared he is to survive. However, you and I cannot forget that Griffin Dane is a seegnur, a man from beyond this world, descendant of a people who broke planets as easily as I can use a hammer to smash rock into gravel.”
When Adara did not reply, Bruin went on. “Griffin Dane is an unknown factor. We cannot forget that and we must act with due prudence.”
“I have not been imprudent,” Adara replied. “Sand Shadow would tell you.”
“Sand Shadow has told me, or rather she has told Honeychild, which is much the same. Catlike, Sand Shadow has sniggered quite a bit. Catlike, she admires your patience in what she sees as a hunt.”
They stood in silence. Then Adara bent at the waist and began braiding her hair so it would not become tangled during the night’s sleep.
“But why must you warn me?” she asked, her voice slightly muffled from the upside-down bend of her neck. “Am I suddenly such a mad kitten that I cannot figure these things out for myself?”
Bruin snorted. “I warned you because Griffin Dane is personable—quite handsome, really. You would find it easy to make excuses along the road to give in to his charms.”
“Road?” Adara asked, flipping herself upright so fast that her braid smacked against her back.
“Road or river,” Bruin continued placidly. “You do not think we are done yet with this Griffin Dane? You cannot think he will be content to stay here in Shepherd’s Call?”
“I have tried not to think much beyond getting him to you,” Adara admitted, “but when I did … No. I did not think he would be content.”
“I am thinking of sending Griffin to my own teacher,” Bruin said, “to the Old One Who Is Young at his home in Spirit Bay. I thought, too, to have you be Griffin’s guide.”
Adara was astonished. She had only met the Old One Who Is Young once before. Spirit Bay was a long journey and she had always preferred the wilds to the city.
“You would come with us,” she said, hoping that by making this a statement Bruin’s reply would be a certainty. “Right?”
“I would not,” Bruin countered. “I am a fat old bear, not fit for long journeys. And have you forgotten? Within a few days I am expecting new students. One boy, so his parents think, may be as you were—adapted, a potential hunter. How would you have felt if you had arrived here to find me gone?”
Adara, some part of her never too far away from the scrawny little girl-child who had been brought to this very house so many years before, knew the answer without reflection.
“Devastated.” She nodded. “So you must stay, but me as guide? Bruin, I know nothing of Spirit Bay. I know nothing much of the towns downriver from here. Oh, I’ve been to Blue Meadow and Moonrise Cove often enough, and, of course, to the small settlements and sheepfolds. But beyond that? You would send me into the villages and towns, with a seegnur to watch over?”
Bruin gently tugged her braid. “Adara the Huntress, trust my judgment. In some things, I know you better than you do yourself.”
Adara retrieved her braid automatically, but her mind was spinning.
“Will you accept my challenge, Huntress?” Bruin prompted, the very word a reminder of Adara’s achievements. “Or shall this old bear be forced to drag himself over the long road to Spirit Bay and leave you to train the students…”
He trailed off, but the twinkle in his eye told Adara that he already knew her decision.
“I’ll go,” she said. “But, I think, not first thing in the morning.”
“No,” Bruin agreed. “Griffin Dane deserves a day or two to rest and to accept his changed situation. Then, too, seeing how our fellow villagers react to him may give you some idea of what to expect on the way to Spirit Bay.”
Adara’s thoughts flitted to Terrell. How would he react when, come morning, word began to spread of what she’d brought down from the mountain? Not kindly, she suspected, not very kindly at all.
“We’ll need to get Griffin some changes of clothing,” she said, “and decide our best route. Because of the falls, the river cannot take us all the way into Spirit Bay.”
“Time enough to plan out a route come morning,” Bruin said. “Now go, sleep. Try not to dream.”
Adara hugged her mentor impulsively. “Not to dream? No chance of that. Sleep well yourself…”
She sped up the stairs to her small room. Sand Shadow was already sprawled over most of the bed, very reluctant to give even an inch. As Adara climbed into the narrow slot beneath the eaves which was all the puma had left to her, she was reminded of the last several nights sharing the cramped tent with Griffin Dane.
He was just across the hall … But Bruin was right. He was an unknown factor.
What a thing is love or lust,
she thought as she drifted off to sleep, one arm thrown over Sand Shadow’s back,
more dangerous than a puma’s claws.
Interlude: A …
Dire need detected.
Emergency action implemented.
Error: Routine interrupted. Instructions?
Conundrum: If a tree falls alone in the forest, does it make a sound?
Analysis: It must. Sound is predicated upon human ears only in human minds.
6
Invader from the Mountains
Griffin’s first sight upon awakening was a slanting wall smelling of freshly painted plaster only an arm’s length over his head. If he had not slept the last few nights in a cramped tent and many nights before that in an even more tightly fitting ship’s berth, doubtless he would have sat upright and cracked his head.
The sheets on which he lay were rough woven, soft with washing, and scented with something fragrant. The quilt that covered him was stuffed with down and ornamented in a patchwork pattern.
No, he realized after closer examination. Not a patchwork pattern, real patchwork, the slight unevenness of the stitching revealing it to be handmade. With that awareness, memory returned. He was in the house of Bruin, itself on the edge of the small village of Shepherd’s Call, this in the foothills of the Starwood Mountains, alongside the Racing Rapids River. All of this was on the planet Artemis.
Rolling from his bed, Griffin set his bare feet on the rag rug—again, a real such rug, made to get the last bit of use out of valuable cloth—and looked about for his coverall. Currently, he wore a long nightshirt which he vaguely remembered Bruin taking out of a large chest the night before.
“I keep extra clothing,” the big man had explained, “for the students. They grow so fast and often are hard on what they’ve brought with them.”
After several nights sleeping in his clothing, the nightshirt had felt indecently luxurious, even if it did itch a little. His coverall was nowhere to be seen, but on a low table was stacked a neat heap of clothing, all dyed in shades of tan and brown. Set on the floor was a pair of soft-soled shoes.
The clothing was simple enough: underpants, trousers held up by a belt, a loosely tailored shirt, a pocketed vest. The socks were lumpy but welcomingly warm. Their bulk made the shoes fit once Griffin figured out how to tighten the laces. Indeed, the fastenings on the clothing were the most troublesome part of getting dressed. They made him appreciate for the first time the convenience of elastic and pressure-sensitive clasps. With an anthropologist’s eye, Griffin had studied Bruin’s attire the night before. He now used that information to put himself into the clothing.
The house was very quiet, but light came in through the small, opaque window set in the wall near the foot of the bed. Griffin thought this was the quiet of a household letting its guest rest rather than that of a house asleep, so he thumped down the stairs as a way of announcing himself.
A slim grey cat started up from in front of the fire when Griffin came into the main room, then darted out the nearest window. As if her exit was a signal, Bruin tromped in through the kitchen door, his arms encumbered with a basket from which various bits of greenery spilled.
To this point, Griffin had only seen his host by firelight, but even daylight didn’t completely dismiss the sense that Bruin was both man and bear. Griffin tried to dispel the image, yet though the kitchen was well lit, the windows propped open wide, he could not.
“You’re awake then,” Bruin said cheerfully, somehow managing to bellow without raising his voice. “That’s good. Hungry?”
“I am, rather.”
Bruin began rummaging about, pulling open a bin and retrieving eggs, hauling down something cloth-wrapped that proved to be a smoked ham, using a cleaver to whack off a great hunk. As with his voice, Bruin managed to be large without really being very large at all. Griffin was taller, but felt himself slim and boyish alongside the other man.
“There’s bread in the box there—the one painted with red flowers—and a board and knife with it. Cut us a half-dozen slices, would you?”
Griffin did so, glad that his mother had always enjoyed fresh bread on the table, so he didn’t make too great a muck of this simple job. Even so, the hand-forged bread knife was a far cry from the elegant ceramic cutter his family used.
Griffin had hardly finished when Bruin called for the bread. In a few moments, Bruin had turned ham, eggs, cheese, and onions into something that smelled so savory that Griffin’s mouth watered. Bruin wiped the pan with a couple of the slices of bread, set these on each plate and carried the lot not—as Griffin had assumed he would—over near the fire, but outside.
“There’s a table here,” Bruin called, “in the sun. I’ve a jug of cider chilling in the well. Grab a couple of those green glazed mugs, will you?”
Griffin did so. Although Sand Shadow had brought him in through this door the night before, he had not seen more of the garden than figures of black against grey. Now he realized what a very pleasant place it was. The table Bruin had mentioned was long and rectangular, its surface doubtless serving as a workspace as well as a place to eat. Later in the summer, the trees that surrounded the patio would give shade, but now they were frothing over with pale pink blossoms.
“Cherries,” Bruin said with complacent pride. “A hearty breed that takes the cold well. My cider’s blended with their juice. You won’t have had anything like it.”
He filled the mugs from a jar he pulled from the well. He was right. Griffin had never tasted anything like the cider, sweet and tart both, with a full body and just a small amount of fizz.
“Marvelous!” Griffin exclaimed.
Bruin shoved one of the plates at him. “Talk after you’ve eaten. Eggs are best hot.”
The food was more fully flavored than any Griffin could remember, the ham smoky as well as salty, the eggs blended with the cheese until both were creamy. The bread took a bit of chewing, but that only made it better suited to go with the rest.
Bruin ate his own meal with evident pleasure, finishing well before Griffin.
“Did you wait to eat with me?” Griffin said apologetically. “If so, I’m sorry.”
“Wait?” Bruin laughed. “This is my third meal. I had bread and honey before going out to gather the eggs and milk the goats. Then I ate a real breakfast with Adara. This is a snack to hold me until she comes back for lunch.”
Griffin wanted to ask where Adara was, then thought that seemed impolite, as if he had some right to know. He settled for finishing his meal, a task that made his belly uncomfortably full.
“More?” Bruin suggested. “The hens are laying and I just cut into a new wheel of cheese. We’ve plenty to spare.”
“I’m stuffed,” Griffin admitted. “I don’t think I could manage another mouthful.”
Bruin shook his head in disbelief, then brightened. “Ah, your stomach probably shrunk while you were on the way down with Adara. I forget how thin the pickings are up there in the mountains. It’s practically winter in the heights, as you know all too well yourself.”
“Adara did well by us,” Griffin protested. “We had a hot meal every night and plenty to snack on during the day.”
“Then you still feel my girl was a good guide to you? Even with the avalanche?”
“I couldn’t have asked for better,” Griffin answered. “Even if she hadn’t started the job by saving my life.”
“Good then. You wouldn’t mind her continuing as your guide when you set out again?”
“Mind? Set out? We’ve only just arrived!”
“Yet surely you didn’t think your journey would end in this tiny village,” Bruin said. “If you wish to reach your stars again, you will need to go far from here.”