River of Lost Bears (17 page)

Chenoa paddled hard and kept her grip on Lusa's scruff while Lusa found a pawhold.

“Ready!” Lusa planted herself firmly, and Chenoa let go.

Lusa braced herself against the current. It buffeted her legs and dragged at her fur.

“Watch me!” Chenoa let the swirling water grab her.

Lusa gasped as the river swept the other bear downstream, fast as a leaf. Powerful eddies swirled Chenoa this way and that until she flipped over and began to swim back to Lusa. “Try it!”

Lusa swallowed. “How do I stop?” What if the currents carried her all the way back to the Melting Sea?

Chenoa pointed her nose along the fast-moving channel. “Do you see where the fast water turns to slow water?”

Lusa narrowed her eyes. The frothing channel Chenoa had ridden was edged by smoother waves. “I see!”

“Swim toward the slow water when you want to stop.” Chenoa nudged Lusa off the rock. “I'll keep up with you!”

Lusa hardly heard Chenoa's words. A blast of water shot her downstream. Her legs swept beneath her, held stiff by the current. Water rushed up her nose. “Help!” She fought to stay upright, but the river twirled her around, dunking her snout beneath the waves. She splashed out blindly. “Chenoa!”

A black shape surfaced beside her. Lusa pushed against the current and reached out a paw, thankful to feel Chenoa's warm pelt. She grabbed it. Relief swamped her as she felt Chenoa's steady paddling.

“Relax!” Chenoa shouted above the rumble of the water.

Lusa forced her stiff legs to move with the flow. Suddenly the water seemed to cradle her instead of fighting her. It carried her so smoothly that Lusa relaxed even more. The sensation of floating at the same speed as the river was breathtaking.
This is how eagles must feel when they soar.
Tentatively, she loosened her grip on Chenoa and floated free. Sticking out her paws, she lay on her back and let the river weave her around eddies and swoop her up and down, through waves and troughs.

“Come on!” Chenoa held out a paw and guided Lusa toward smooth water.

Released from the current, Lusa slowed and began swimming, her legs churning beneath her. “That was great!”

“Let's swim back and do it again!” Chenoa turned and headed upstream. Excited, Lusa splashed after her.

By the time they'd reached the start, Toklo was standing on the shore. Lusa swam for the shallows till her paws hit the riverbed. Standing up, she called to Toklo, “We're river riding!”

“What?” Toklo padded to the water's edge.

Chenoa bounded out to meet him. “Come and play!”

Toklo followed her into the water, frowning. “What's river riding?”

Lusa splashed back toward the racing currents. “You'll love it. Chenoa taught me.” She swam through the smooth water to the edge of the rapids. Chenoa and Toklo caught up.

“Do you see the fast current?” Chenoa pointed out the frothing channel to Toklo.

“You swim in that?” Toklo looked uncertain.

“You don't
have
to swim!” Lusa spluttered as she swallowed a mouthful of river water.

Chenoa puffed a warning at her. “Careful, Lusa. Don't forget the river's way bigger than us, and it doesn't care if you sink or swim.”

Lusa spat out the water, undaunted. “Can we try a faster channel?” She looked beyond the one they'd already ridden. Another current swept even more swiftly beyond it.

“Let Toklo try this one first.” Chenoa nudged the brown bear forward. “I know you're a good swimmer, Toklo, but it's easier if you don't try to swim at all. The river thinks it's fighting you and makes it hard. Just trust the water to carry you.”

Toklo blinked at her, water washing around his scruff. “You mean float?”

“Exactly!” Chenoa flicked her snout, drops spraying from her muzzle.

With a grunt, Toklo launched himself into the fast-moving stream. The current snatched him away. With a yelp of surprise, he was swept downstream.

Lusa watched his paws flail. “Will he be okay?” Alarm flashed though her as she watched him struggle against the current. Then she saw his head rise above the frothing waves. He stopped floundering and slid fast over the water.

“He's got it!” Chenoa huffed as Toklo sailed smoothly away.

“My turn!” Lusa dove forward, through the fast channel and beyond. The river snatched her and dragged her downstream, so fast that she gasped.

“Lusa!” Chenoa's shout alarmed her. It was edged with panic.

Lusa jerked her head around, fighting the current. Was Chenoa all right? She glimpsed a wide yellow shape at the corner of her vision.

“Rafts!” Chenoa bellowed.

Lusa twisted, fighting the current to see behind her. Huge yellow shapes were racing across the top of the water. Flat-faces peered over the sides, bundled up in colorful pelts. They were dipping broad-ended sticks in and out of the water, steering the yellow rafts. One of them was heading straight toward her.

Lusa floundered, struggling to escape the channel. Paws churning wildly, she pushed for smoother water, but the current was ferocious. She couldn't break free. The raft was gaining on her.

“Toklo!” Chenoa's roar sounded faint through the rumbling of the river.

Lusa's heart pounded in her ears. The raft bore down on her till all she could see was water and yellow. Terrified, she took a gulp of air and dove underwater. The raft thumped her spine as she pulled herself down. She spun, dazed. Water rushed up her nose and into her mouth. It filled her ears and dragged at her fur. Lusa struggled for the surface, but it had disappeared in a storm of bubbles.

Her lungs ached for air.
River spirits, help me!

Strong teeth pinched her scruff. Firm claws snagged her pelt. She felt fur swirl softly against hers. She let herself fall limp. In a moment she was above the surface as stout paws pushed her through the churning channels into smooth water.
Ujurak?

“Lusa!” Toklo's growl sounded in her ear. “Are you okay?”

Lusa blinked water from her eyes. Chenoa and Toklo were bobbing around her, their gazes anxious. Slowly she began to stroke her paws through the water, swimming gently, relieved by the smoothness of the water washing around her. Chenoa let her go, then Toklo.

“Thanks,” Lusa gasped.

“I thought the flat-faces had drowned you!” Toklo's eyes were round with horror.

Lusa gazed downriver, feeling dizzy. The yellow rafts were bobbing away over the rapids. The flat-faces stared back, openmouthed as the river washed them downstream.

“Come on.” Chenoa nudged Lusa toward the shore.

Lusa paddled in, relieved as her paws scraped pebbles. She waded from the river and shook out her pelt. Toklo circled her anxiously. “Are you sure you're okay?”

“She's fine.” Chenoa nosed him away. “It was an adventure, wasn't it, Lusa?”

Lusa looked into Chenoa's sparkling gaze. It hadn't felt like an adventure when she'd been fighting for her life. But now that she thought back, it did seem exciting. She'd been out in the rapids and escaped a flat-face raft. The exhilaration of being swept along by the current sent a fiery tingle through her paws.

Toklo pushed past Chenoa. “She won't be doing it again.”

“Doing what again?” Kallik's call surprised Lusa. The white bear was hurrying along the beach toward them, Yakone at her heels. “You look half-drowned. What's happened?”

“Lusa just escaped a flat-face raft,” Chenoa told her proudly.

“What?” Kallik stopped beside Lusa and sniffed her. “Are you hurt?”

Lusa realized that her wolverine bites were throbbing. Had she grazed them on the riverbed when the river had tossed her around? “I'm okay,” she reassured Kallik. She didn't want to be fussed over.

But Kallik was already hustling her toward the trees. “Let's get you tucked in your nest.” She growled under her breath. “There are too many flat-faces around here.”

“I'm fine,” Lusa insisted.

“She's been riding the river,” Chenoa announced.

Kallik paused. “Doing
what
?”

Toklo nudged Lusa on. “It doesn't matter,” he muttered. “She's safe, and she won't be doing it again.”

“Why not?” Chenoa sounded offended as Kallik led them through the bracken. “She was a natural. And I was there to look after her.” She touched Lusa's head with her snout. “I won't let you get washed away, little one.”

Lusa shook her off. “I'm not little!” she snapped.

Kallik scrambled down into the sleeping hollow and started brushing pine needles to make a nest for Lusa. “Snuggle down here before you get cold,” she ordered.

Lusa met her gaze, ready to argue. She didn't need to be treated like a cub! But tiredness pulled at her paws. Her fur felt heavy and her wound throbbed. “Okay.” Sighing, she slid into the nest that Kallik had made. She looked up at Chenoa. “I don't always need rescuing,” she told her firmly. Chenoa had saved her from the wolverines, and now she'd helped save her from drowning. “I've traveled a long way.”

Chenoa's gaze grew serious. “I know, Lusa.” The young she-bear padded down into the hollow and curled around Lusa. “You're way braver and stronger than I'll ever be. You've seen more things than I could imagine.”

Lusa nestled into the warmth of Chenoa's thick pelt. “I have, haven't I?” she murmured, closing her eyes. She rested her muzzle on Chenoa's flank. How much more was she going to see before the journey was over? And when it was, what would happen next? With her thoughts growing hazy with exhaustion, she let herself drift into sleep.

Toklo glanced up at the sky
. White clouds were sailing across a sea of blue. Beside him, sunshine shimmered on the crystal river. In the days since Lusa had recovered enough to walk, the weather had grown steadily warmer. Toklo relished it. For the first time since leaving the Melting Sea, he felt warm to his bones. Lusa and Chenoa were clearly enjoying the sunny weather, too, charging ahead on the grassy slope that threaded between the forest and shore.

“Don't wear yourselves out!” Toklo called as they dodged back and forth, play-hunting each other to break up the monotony of walking. “I want to keep going till sundown.”

Behind him, Kallik and Yakone were wading into the river. Toklo glanced at their dripping pelts as they sent water spraying up around them. He knew that the sun was hard on the two white bears, and it was not even at its strongest. They should be traveling in the shade of the forest, but Yakone still resented the snagging roots and branches and the angry buzzing of flat-face beasts that hummed in the distance as though colonies had built hives deep in the forest.

So they followed the river. Its constant murmur was reassuring. Besides, Kallik and Yakone could cool off when they chose. Toklo heard them now, splashing through the shallows. Soon they were swimming against the current in deep water.

Toklo saw their white heads bobbing through the waves. He checked upstream for yellow rafts. His belly still fluttered with fear as he remembered Lusa disappearing under the flat-face raft. For a moment he thought she'd drowned. He pushed the memory away. They were so close to the end of their journey; they had survived so much already. Nothing bad could happen now.

Chenoa scrambled down the grassy slope and stopped beside a thick clump of weed. “Look, Lusa!”

Lusa hurried down to see. “It's just sedge.”

“No, it's not.” Chenoa pulled out a pawful. She wafted it under Lusa's nose.

Lusa's eyes brightened. “What a strange scent! Can I eat it?”

“Yes.”

Lusa chewed on a stalk, ears twitching with surprise. “That tastes weird, but nice.”

Chenoa waved a few leaves at Toklo. “Do you want some?”

“No, thanks,” Toklo called back.

“It's delicious,” Chenoa promised.