Chronicles of Ancient Darkness
Chapter 24 : Torak bowed his head. He couldn't go on. He didn't belong here. This was the

Torak bowed his head. He couldn't go on. He didn't belong here. This was the haunt of spirits, not of men.

When he opened his eyes, the Mountain was gone, once more shrouded in clouds.

Torak sat back on his heels. I can't do it, he thought. I can't go up there.

Wolf sat in front of him, his tear-shaped eyes as pure as water. Yes you can. I'm with you.

Torak shook his head.

Wolf gazed steadily back at him.

Torak thought of Renn and Finn-Kedinn and the Ravens, and of all the other clans that he didn't even know about. He thought of the countless lives in the Forest. He thought of Fa: not Fa as he lay dying in the wreck of their shelter, but Fa as he'd been just before the bear attacked: laughing at the joke Torak had made.

Grief rose in his chest. He drew his knife from its sheath, and slipped off his mitten to lay his hand on the cold blue slate. 'You can't stop now,' he said out loud. 'You swore an oath. To Fa.'

He unslung his quiver and bow and laid them against the tree. Then he did the same with his pack, his sleeping-sack, waterskin and axe. He wouldn't need them; just his knife, the Nanuak in the ravenskin pouch, and Renn's little birch-bast bundle in his medicine pouch.

With a last glance at the Forest, he followed Wolf up the trail.

THIRTY-ONE.

As soon as Torak set foot on the trail, the cold grew intense. The breath crackled in his nostrils. His eyelashes stuck together. The Spirit was warning him back.

The ice under his boots was brittle, and each step rang out across the ravine. Wolf's soft paws made no sound. He turned and waited for Torak to catch up: his muzzle relaxed, his tail wagging faintly. It was as if he was glad to be here.

Panting, Torak drew level with him. The trail was so narrow that they only just had room to stand side by side. Torak glanced down and wished he hadn't. Already, the bottom of the ravine was far below.

They climbed higher. The sun cleared the other side of the ravine, and the glare became blinding. The ice turned treacherous. When Torak stepped too close to the edge of the trail, the ice crumbled, and he nearly went over.

About forty paces ahead, the trail widened slightly beneath a rocky overhang. It was too shallow to make a cave: merely a hollow where the black basalt of the ravine's side showed through. At the sight of it, Torak's spirits lifted. He'd been hoping for some kind of shelter. He would need it if his plan - Beside him, Wolf tensed.

He was looking down into the ravine, his ears forwards, every hair on his back standing up.

Shading his eyes, Torak peered over the edge. Nothing. Black tree-trunks. Snow-covered boulders. Puzzled, he turned to go and the bear appeared suddenly, as bears do. First a movement at the bottom of the ravine then there it was.

Even from this distance fifty, sixty paces below him it was enormous. As Torak stood rooted to the spot, it swayed from side to side, casting for a scent.

It didn't find one. Torak was too high up. The bear didn't know he was here. He watched it turn and move off down the ravine, towards the Forest.

Now he had to do the unthinkable. He had to lure it back.

There was only one sure way of doing that. He slipped off his mittens and blew on his fingers to warm them; then he unfastened the ravenskin pouch from his belt. Untying the hair cord that bound it, he opened the rowan-bark box, and the Nanuak stared up at him. The river eyes, the stone tooth, the lamp.

Wolf gave a low grunt-whine.

Torak licked his cold-cracked lips. From his medicine pouch, he took Renn's little birch-bast bundle. He stuffed the purifying herbs and birch-bast wrapping into the neck of his parka, and looked down at what Renn had made for him in the night. A small pouch of knotted wovengra.s.s: the mesh so fine that it would hold even the river eyes, but let the light of the Nanuak s.h.i.+ne out; the light that Torak couldn't see, but the bear could.

Taking care not to touch the Nanuak with his bare hands, he tipped the lamp, the stone tooth and the river eyes into the wovengra.s.s pouch. Then he drew it shut, and looped its long drawstring over his head. He was wearing the Nanuak unmasked on his chest.

Wolf's eyes threw back a faint, s.h.i.+mmering gold light: the light of the Nanuak. If Wolf could see it, so could the demon. Torak was counting on it.

He turned to face the bear. It was some distance down the ravine, moving effortlessly through the snow.

'Here it is,' said Torak, keeping his voice low so as not to anger the World Spirit. 'This is what you're after: the brightest of those bright souls that you hate so much that you long to snuff out for ever. Come for it now.'

The bear halted. A ripple ran through its ma.s.sive shoulder-hump. The great head swung round. The bear turned and began moving back towards Torak.

A fierce exultation surged through him. This monster had killed Fa. Ever since then, he'd been on the run. Now he wasn't running any more. He was fighting back.

It was faster than Torak expected; soon it was beneath him. Man-fas.h.i.+on, it rose on its hind legs. Although Torak stood fifty paces above, he saw it as clearly as if he could reach out and touch it.

It raised its head and met his eyes and he forgot about the Spirit, he forgot about his oath to Fa. He was not standing on an icy mountain trail, he was back in the Forest. From the ruined shelter came Fa's wild cry. Torak! Run!

He couldn't move. He wanted to run to race up the trail to the overhang, as he knew he must but he could not. The demon was draining his will pulling him down, down . . .

Wolf snarled.

Torak tore himself free and staggered up the trail. Staring into those eyes had been like staring at the sun: their green-edged image stayed stamped on his mind.

He heard the cracking of ice as the bear began to claw its way up the side of the ravine. He pictured it climbing with lethal ease. He had to reach the overhang, or he wouldn't stand a chance.

Wolf loped up the trail. Torak slipped and went down on one knee. Struggled to his feet. Glanced over the edge. The bear had climbed a third of the way.

He ran on. He reached the overhang and threw himself into the rocky hollow, bent double, fighting for breath. Now for the rest of his plan: now to call on the Spirit for help.

Forcing himself upright, he filled his chest with air, put back his head and howled.

Wolf took up the howl, and their piercing cries buffeted the ravine back and forth, back and forth through the Mountains. World Spirit, howled Torak, I bring you the Nanuak! Hear me! Send your power to crush the demon from the Forest!

Below him, he heard the bear getting closer . . . ice clattering into the ravine.

On and on he howled until his ribs ached. World Spirit, hear my plea . . .

Nothing happened.

Torak stopped howling. Horror washed over him. The World Spirit had not answered his plea. The bear was coming for him . . .

Suddenly he realised that Wolf, too, had stopped howling.

Look behind you, Torak.

He turned to see Hord's axe swinging towards him.

THIRTY-TWO.

Torak dodged, and the axe hissed past his ear, splintering the ice where he'd been standing.

Hord wrenched it free. 'Give me the Nanuak!' he cried. 'I have to take it to the Mountain!'

'Get away from me!' said Torak.

From the edge of the ravine came a grinding of ice. The bear was nearing the top.

Hord's haggard face twisted in pain. Torak could barely imagine how he'd brought himself to track them through the demon-haunted Forest; to brave the wrath of the Spirit by venturing up the trail. 'Give me the Nanuak,' repeated Hord.

Wolf advanced on him, his whole body a shuddering snarl. He was no longer a cub; he was a ferocious young wolf defending his pack-brother.

Hord ignored him. 'I will have it! It's my fault this is happening! I have to make it end!'

Suddenly, Torak understood. 'It was you,' he said. 'You were there when the bear was made. You were with the Red Deer Clan. You helped the crippled Soul-Eater trap the demon.'

'I didn't know!' protested Hord. 'He said he needed a bear I caught a young one. I never knew what he meant to do!'

Then several things happened at once. Hord swung his axe at Torak's throat. Torak ducked. Wolf sprang at Hord, sinking his teeth into his wrist. Hord bellowed and dropped his axe, but with his free fist rained blows on Wolf's unprotected head.

'No!' yelled Torak, drawing his knife and launching himself at Hord. Hord seized Wolf by the scruff and threw him against the basalt, then twisted round and lunged for the Nanuak swinging from Torak's neck.

Torak jerked out of reach. Hord went for his legs, throwing him backwards onto the ice. But as Torak went down, he tore the pouch from his neck and hurled it up the trail, out of Hord's reach. Wolf righted himself with a shake and leapt for the pouch, catching it in mid-air, but landing perilously close to the edge of the ravine.

'Wolf!' cried Torak, struggling beneath Hord, who was straddling his chest, and kneeling on his arms.

Wolf's hind paws scrabbled wildly at the edge. From just below him came a menacing growl then the bear's black claws sliced the air, narrowly missing Wolf's paws . . .

Wolf gave a tremendous heave and regained the trail. But then, for the first time ever, he decided to return something Torak had thrown, and bounded towards him with the Nanuak in his jaws.

Hord strained to reach the pouch. Torak wrested one hand free and dragged his arm away. If only his knife-arm wasn't pinned under Hord's knee . . .

An unearthly roar shook the ravine. In horror, Torak watched the bear rise above the edge of the trail.

And in that final moment, as the bear towered above them, as Wolf paused with the Nanuak in his jaws in that final moment as Torak struggled with Hord, the true meaning of the Prophecy broke upon him. 'The Listener gives his heart's blood to the Mountain.'

His heart's blood.

Wolf.

No! he cried inside his head.

But he knew what he had to do. Out loud he shouted to Wolf, 'Take it to the Mountain! Uff! Uff! Uff!'

Wolf's golden gaze met his.

'Uff!' gasped Torak. His eyes stung.

Wolf turned and raced up the trail towards the Mountain.

Hord snarled with fury and staggered after him but he slipped and toppled backwards, screaming, into the arms of the bear.

Torak scrambled to his feet. Hord was still screaming. Torak had to help him . . .

From high above came a deafening crack.

The trail shook. Torak was thrown to his knees.

The crack swelled to a grinding roar. He threw himself beneath the overhang and an instant later, down came the rus.h.i.+ng, rampaging, killing snow, obliterating Hord, obliterating the bear sending them howling down into death.

The World Spirit had heard Torak's plea.

The last thing Torak saw was Wolf, the Nanuak still in his jaws, racing under the thundering snow towards the Mountain. 'Wolf!' he shouted. Then the whole world turned white.

Torak never knew how long he crouched against the rockface, with his eyes tight shut.

At last he became aware that the thundering had turned to echoes and that the echoes were getting fainter. The World Spirit was striding away into the Mountains.

The sound of its footsteps faded to a hiss of settling snow . . .

Then a whisper . . .

Then silence.

Torak opened his eyes.

He could see out across the ravine. He was not buried alive. The World Spirit had pa.s.sed over the overhang, and let him live. But where was Wolf?

He got to his feet and stumbled to the edge of the trail. The dead cold had gone. He saw the Mountains through a haze of settling snow. Below him, the ravine had disappeared under a chaos of ice and rock. Buried beneath it lay Hord and the bear.

Hord had paid with his life. The bear was an empty husk, for the Spirit had banished the demon to the Otherworld. Perhaps the bear's own souls would now be at peace, after their long imprisonment with the demon.

Torak had fulfilled his oath to Fa. He had given the Nanuak to the World Spirit and the Spirit had destroyed the bear.

He knew that, but he couldn't feel it. All he could feel was the ache in his chest. Where was Wolf? Had he reached the Mountain before the snow came down? Or did he too lie buried under the ice?

'Please be alive,' murmured Torak. 'Please. I'll never ask anything again.'