Blue Mountain (7 page)

“I have never seen creatures like you before,” said the otter. “It is boring in a bog. Nothing happens, nothing at all. Oh, you know, your usual death by predator, but other than that— No female otter will come be my mate in such a boring place. But if I help you cross the bog, what a story it would make.”

“We would be grateful for your help,” Dall said.

“Follow me. I know where the water is shallow and the footing easier,” the otter said. “You won't have to swim much, and I hope I won't lead you through quicksand.”

“Are you ready?” Dall asked the band.

Each one nodded.

The otter slid off his twiggy ark and into the water, light as a leaf. “Not a single female otter nearby to see this,” he complained.

Dall stepped into the bog to follow him.

The otter chattered ceaselessly, and somehow the dark bog seemed less forbidding because of it. Sometimes he would stop to fish or to float. Once in a while he got a little too far ahead, but still Tuk could hear him chattering: “… all the river females will want to hear about this, all of them, even the prettiest…”

Mostly they were in the water only to their knees, and at times only to the tops of their feet. Twice they had to swim, but only a short way.

As late afternoon became evening, Tuk had almost reached his limit, and he knew Sham and Mouf would be exhausted. When dark began to fall, they were still a distance from the opposite side of the bog.

The otter had swum far ahead.

“Otter, come back!” Tuk called.

“It is time for sleep,” the otter called in reply. “I will come back at first light and lead you the rest of the way. Don't worry, you're safe here. That is, you are safe if you don't move. One step to the left or the right, and you could be caught in the weedy bottoms or the quicksand.”

“Otter, please…” Dall called, but he was gone.

In the day the bog had been dark and driftwood floated like bones beneath the surface, but in moonlight the water shone white and flat as a field of snow. After a time the wind came with shrill whistles that fell into Tuk's ears like burrs, a wind with teeth and wings. He swung his head to fight it.

“Bats,” Dall said quietly.

When the moon was almost directly overhead, a chilling howl echoed out of the dark, followed by a watery moan floating over the surface of the water.

“It is the white wolf,” Tuk said after a silence. “He has made a kill.”

“It's good we came by way of the bog so the wolf cannot reach us,” Dall said.

Somehow it helped Tuk to know that, though they were cold and stiff and sore and tired, at least the wolf could not get at them in the bog.

The band stood trapped on their sunken island, hour after hour, starting when beavers smacked the water with their heavy tails, then sinking into a soggy near-sleep.

Once Sham said, “Wen is brave.”

Later Mouf fell into the deeper water to her right and came up sputtering and scrambling for their underwater island. “I fell asleep,” she said. “Now I am awake.”

Mostly the night was long and silent. Tuk could hear, in their silence, everyone hoping the otter really would come back. Still the reeds rattled in the wind. Still the stars swelled and shrank and burned cold.

Finally, when Tuk thought he must sleep in the water whether he drowned or not, he saw in his side vision a gleam of pale light.

“Dawn,” Rim said with relief. “We've made it through the night.”

Soon the otter came swimming to them. “You're still here!” he called.

“Where did you think we would be?” Tuk asked sharply.

“I wondered if I had imagined you,” the otter said. “Come along, come along. I am cheerful today. I slept so well, dreaming of my mate. I have named my bog ‘bighorn bog.'”

And so he chattered as they followed him to the west shore of the bog.

When at last they reached firm soil they stood trembling and weary.

“Try not to thank me,” the otter said as they fell to grazing.

“I shall try not to butt you,” Tuk said.

“Do you know a good way for a bighorn to go up meadow mountain, otter?” Dall asked.

The otter said grandly, “Yes, I do. And I will tell
you
and not
him
. That twisty path there is the long way. And that broad avenue through the trees is the hard way, also called the bee path. And now it is best I go before you get boring.”

The otter slipped into the water and emerged again far out in the bog. “I am off to find a mate!”

 

REST

 

Spring had deepened on the other side of the bog. Bees and black butterflies rose from the high grasses. The herd dried their coats in the shy warmth of the spring sun, then bedded down as far from the bog as they could make their weary bodies go. They slept most of the day away.

When Tuk awoke in the evening, the sun was low and gold and a warm breeze ruffled the surface of the bog. The rest of the herd was feeding on unflowered buffalo beans when Tuk joined them. As he grazed, he searched out the two paths up the mountain that the otter had shown them.

“So one path is hard and one is long,” Rim said, joining him.

“It is hard to go long,” Tuk said.

“It is long to go hard,” Rim said.

“He said the broad path was the bee path. What do you think he meant by that?” Tuk asked.

“I don't know. We can stay here for a few days and think about it.”

Mouf, overhearing them, said, “That is a good idea, Rim. I like that plan better than Tuk's plans, which have bogs and blue mountains in them.”

“Mouf,” Sham said, “are you forgetting Wen?”

“Oh, yes,” Mouf said sadly. “Wen. The most important one.”

“We will take one path or the other at dawn,” Dall said.

Then, from the north side of the bog, a wolf howl rose and took a bite out of the sky.

The band bunched together. “He hasn't given up. He's going around the bog,” Ovis said.

Again the wolf howled, long and slow and hungry.

“He's traveling faster than we are,” Ovis said. “Even going around the bog, he could close in tomorrow.”

The band stood quietly for a long time. Finally Tuk swallowed a mouthful of dry sedge.

“We have to split up. Dall, you and the band go up one trail. I will go up the other. He will follow me, and you can get away…”

Tuk's words were braver than his heart, but he was glad he said them.

“It is a good idea,” Dall said to the ground, “for the safety of the band and Wen.”

Mouf said, “But—!”

“We will take the long way,” Dall said firmly.

“You should leave now and sleep higher on the mountain,” Tuk said. “I will leave in the morning to be sure my scent is the easiest to find and follow. Wait for me one full day and one full night. If I don't come, go to blue mountain without me.”

Mouf looked at Tuk and then Dall and then Tuk again. Dall laid her head on Tuk's neck for a moment, then slowly turned away. She led the band toward the narrow twisty path.

Rim stayed behind. “If you insist on making new stories,” he said, “I want to be in them.”

Again the wolf howled, and the air shivered like water in a cold breeze.

 

BEE TREES

 

In the morning, Tuk and Rim laid down heavy scent at the beginning of the hard trail so the wolf would know which way they had gone. Then they began the climb up meadow mountain.

As the otter had promised, the path was wide and rocky at first, and they progressed quickly. Still, it felt slow, given that they had a wolf on their heels. The wolf's scent became stronger as the day wore on, he was traveling so swiftly.

Tuk wished he had big horns to fight the wolf. Also he was grateful for the companionship of his peaceable friend and wished he could be more like him.
What kind of animal are you?
Balus had asked. Tuk felt like there were two paths to the answer: one was the long way, and one was the hard way, but he didn't know which was the better way. He reminded himself of Kenir's counsel to trust the mountain.

Late in the afternoon, the wood began to close in and the way narrowed until Tuk and Rim had to walk single file. They came to a part of the wood that was diseased, the tree branches gray as shed antlers. Scattered along the trail were the remains of a rabbit kill. It was an unhealthy place, and gloom followed them like the cloud of gnats that had discovered them in the heat of the day.

Tuk stopped in the path before a curtain of thick brush. “Do you hear that, Rim?”

“Hear what?”

Tuk peered into the brush. “I think I see a way that the wolf could be reasoned with.”

“It's a wolf, Tuk. They don't reason with us. They eat us.”

“Kenir says the bighorn live in the high places where no other animal wants to live,” Tuk said. “We survive on the steeps and on the bare-rock outcrops, and we escape our predators with speed and agility. We go into places others cannot follow. I think we've found such a place.”

He stepped aside so Rim could see through the curtain of brush.

The wood and overgrowth opened up to a meadow thick with clover and bright with wildflowers. But rising up from the clover and flowers were many leafless trees, their trunks black with old sugar, having long ago died with honey in their hearts. Droning between the trees were bees, thicker than the mosquitoes on the bog.

Rim stumbled backward at the sight, and that small sound caused the bees to swarm. The earth and air thrummed as the bees readied themselves to guard their ancient treasure.

Rim made a low, guttural sound in his throat, half fear, half fascination.

“Look beyond the trees, Rim,” Tuk whispered at his flank, “to that steep rocky rise beyond the field. There—you see the waterfall? After we run through the field, we'll climb the rock tumble at the side of the waterfall all the way up to that cave under the upper falls. The wolf cannot climb that. We'll hide from the bees in the cavity until they go away. From there we'll reach the top and make our way south to meet the others.”

Rim whispered, “To go through that field would be to die.”

“If we are fast, if we run through the meadow as only the bighorn can, we can make it through in four leaps. If we're fast. And if we don't fall.”

“Bighorn can't outrun a wolf,” Rim said.

“No, but we can outclimb him. That rock wall west of the bee field is the mountain's gift to us.”

“Would white wolf be so foolish as to follow us into the meadow?” Rim asked. “Or do you mean not to tell him? That would not be … peaceable.”

“I will tell him about the bee trees,” Tuk said. He raised his nose. “He's coming.”

Tuk could hear the wolf's footpads now, untiring. He could hear the wolf panting.

“Steady,” Tuk said.

White wolf appeared below them on the path and stopped cold. He stared at the young bighorn.

“You have given up,” he said. “You wish for me to end your fear and suffering.”

“Wolf,” Tuk said, trying to steady his voice, “you must stop following us. We are going to blue mountain where it is too forbidding and wild even for the wolf.”

“Very well. I will follow you no longer. I will eat you instead.”

“We are going to run into the meadow behind us, and there you will not want to follow. It is full of bees.”

“Bees? Wolves do not fear bees.”

“Many bees. You would best turn back.”

“The mountain decrees that some of you must feed me,” white wolf said, the fur on his neck lifting. “And you, who called me dog and got my mate killed, are what I hunger for. I will follow you wherever you go.”

“Goodbye, white wolf,” Rim said.

“Goodbye,” white wolf said, and he ran at them.

“Leap!” Tuk cried.

Tuk and Rim turned. With a single great bound they were a quarter the way through the bee field, a quarter the way to the safety of the rocks.

A silence among the bees. A stillness—a disbelief.

“Leap!” Tuk called again. With the second leap, they were halfway through the bee trees, and the wolf had entered the clearing, drooling, baying triumphantly.

The bees' low steady thrumming became a roar. Tuk heard the wolf cry out with dismay.

The bighorn rams leaped the third time, over and between fallen trees. The bees swarmed Tuk so that he could see Rim only as a shadow beside him. They stung him everywhere, especially on the tender parts of his mouth and eyes and nose. Behind him white wolf howled and snarled in pain and fury.

Leap!

One moment the air was black with bees, and in the next they were on the rock tumble at the side of the fall. Tuk and Rim climbed the fall desperately. As they climbed the air thinned of bees, until finally they were able to duck under the shelf of rock that was the lip of the waterfall. Over the sound of the rushing water they heard white wolf scrambling at the rocks below, falling back, scrambling and clawing again while he howled and whined.

Finally he fell silent.

Tuk and Rim stood behind the waterfall until the field lightened and the bees returned to their honey business.

They didn't speak. They dipped their swollen nostrils and mouths and eyes into the icy water.

When it began to get dark, Tuk said, “Let's go.”

They nimbly climbed the rock tumble beside the waterfall until they reached the top. Far above the bee trees they teetered on little shelves of stone, panting. Their stings burned, and they soothed them again and again in the cold, rushy water.

 

MEADOW MOUNTAIN

 

Tuk and Rim bedded down for the night farther up the river that fed the waterfall. The next morning their stings had swollen their eyes almost shut. It was painful to graze. A mild wind blew through a curved blue sky as they made their way up and south on the mountain, looking for Dall and the others.