gave Urrell dried herbs to chew, roots and garlic to eat and the chilblains vanished within days. Such winter afflictions Urrell had known among his own people. He recalled children and women weeping helplessly at their kibed fingers and foot sores.
CHAPTER 16
A s the spell of great cold deepened Agaratz grew torpid. He did not waken for two days, his breathing slowing, till Urrell grew fearful and with difficulty shook him awake. Agaratz woke, unconcerned, merely saying, “I sleep bear.”
“Sleep bear?”
“Sleep like bear, when cold. You sleep bear, Urrell.”
“I can’t sleep like a bear.”
“Yes. I show.”
“But Rakrak can’t. She is a wolf. Wolves don’t sleep in winter.”
“She sleep. I show.”
Agaratz made Urrell lie curled up and still, breathing slowly, emptying his lungs and mind. At the same time he held the lad’s shoulders and looked intently at him till he dozed off.
It must have worked, thought Urrell, when he came to from a dreamless blank. Rakrak slept quietly beside him in the hay and leaves, her snout nuzzling his side, scarcely breathing. He spent several worried minutes rousing her. Agaratz was nowhere to be seen. Boy and wolf unstiffened their limbs and eased themselves out of their hay-filled den, both compelled by an urgent need to urinate before anything else. They hurried down the gallery, accustomed to the route in the dark. Urrell guessed he must have slept for a number of days and nights, such was the pressure on his bladder and the painfulness of its contents’ discharge.
This over, Urrell returned to see where Agaratz might be. Finally, he lifted the hatch flap and looked out on a world frozen into stillness, icier than ever, with all signs of blizzards vanished. On this perfect snow surface Agaratz’s tracks led off, out of the gulch, as though inviting him to follow. He scrambled into his outdoor furs.
The tracks followed the base of the cliff towards the painted cave. Rakrak, in her winter livery, blended with the snowy lower branches of firs, now at surface level. Progress was easy over the frost-crisp surface. It was so cold that Urrell felt his cheeks burn. Even Rakrak seemed subdued, not gambolling as usual but trotting beside him, adding her paw marks beside his footprints, like a fancy stitch along the double seam his made with Agaratz’s tracks.
When they were not more than two spear-casts from the spot in the cliff-face where Urrell remembered the entrance into the painted cave ought to be, the tracks stopped dead in a patch of snow between two vast firs. Urrell stopped too, even looking up to see if Agaratz had taken flight and settled on a bough overhead. So bemused was he in the intense cold that even this might have seemed natural. He could see no explanation for the abrupt end in the tracks. No other prints showed anywhere, human or animal. He circled the area and found nothing. Instead of following him Rakrak sat whimpering, her behaviour adding to his unease. With a growing sense of fear, Urrell set off to return as fast as his double moccassins allowed, his face raw from the cold, the icy air rasping his throat, yet sweat running under his quilted pelts, Rakrak pacing alongside.
The secret place, the acrid weeds
But this was no headlong flight of a small boy down a summery combe to meadows below. Youth and wolf arrived back at the cave as to the safety of a lair.
By the fire crouched Agaratz. He raised his eyes as Urrell and Rakrak tumbled through the flap, but seemed not to notice them both, his look elsewhere as though neither was standing before him, still panting. Then the eyes lit up, focussed, and Agaratz looked intently at Urrell’s face. He touched the lad’s nose and muttered in his own tongue, went to the entrance and came back with a handful of snow. To Urrell’s surprise he rubbed his nose and cheeks with it. Urrell felt nothing.
“Bad,” said Agaratz. “Sit not near fire. Nose get well, but hurt.”
When it warmed it did
CHAPTER 16
A s the spell of great cold deepened Agaratz grew torpid. He did not waken for two days, his breathing slowing, till Urrell grew fearful and with difficulty shook him awake. Agaratz woke, unconcerned, merely saying, “I sleep bear.”
“Sleep bear?”
“Sleep like bear, when cold. You sleep bear, Urrell.”
“I can’t sleep like a bear.”
“Yes. I show.”
“But Rakrak can’t. She is a wolf. Wolves don’t sleep in winter.”
“She sleep. I show.”
Agaratz made Urrell lie curled up and still, breathing slowly, emptying his lungs and mind. At the same time he held the lad’s shoulders and looked intently at him till he dozed off.
It must have worked, thought Urrell, when he came to from a dreamless blank. Rakrak slept quietly beside him in the hay and leaves, her snout nuzzling his side, scarcely breathing. He spent several worried minutes rousing her. Agaratz was nowhere to be seen. Boy and wolf unstiffened their limbs and eased themselves out of their hay-filled den, both compelled by an urgent need to urinate before anything else. They hurried down the gallery, accustomed to the route in the dark. Urrell guessed he must have slept for a number of days and nights, such was the pressure on his bladder and the painfulness of its contents’ discharge.
This over, Urrell returned to see where Agaratz might be. Finally, he lifted the hatch flap and looked out on a world frozen into stillness, icier than ever, with all signs of blizzards vanished. On this perfect snow surface Agaratz’s tracks led off, out of the gulch, as though inviting him to follow. He scrambled into his outdoor furs.
The tracks followed the base of the cliff towards the painted cave. Rakrak, in her winter livery, blended with the snowy lower branches of firs, now at surface level. Progress was easy over the frost-crisp surface. It was so cold that Urrell felt his cheeks burn. Even Rakrak seemed subdued, not gambolling as usual but trotting beside him, adding her paw marks beside his footprints, like a fancy stitch along the double seam his made with Agaratz’s tracks.
When they were not more than two spear-casts from the spot in the cliff-face where Urrell remembered the entrance into the painted cave ought to be, the tracks stopped dead in a patch of snow between two vast firs. Urrell stopped too, even looking up to see if Agaratz had taken flight and settled on a bough overhead. So bemused was he in the intense cold that even this might have seemed natural. He could see no explanation for the abrupt end in the tracks. No other prints showed anywhere, human or animal. He circled the area and found nothing. Instead of following him Rakrak sat whimpering, her behaviour adding to his unease. With a growing sense of fear, Urrell set off to return as fast as his double moccassins allowed, his face raw from the cold, the icy air rasping his throat, yet sweat running under his quilted pelts, Rakrak pacing alongside.
The secret place, the acrid weeds
But this was no headlong flight of a small boy down a summery combe to meadows below. Youth and wolf arrived back at the cave as to the safety of a lair.
By the fire crouched Agaratz. He raised his eyes as Urrell and Rakrak tumbled through the flap, but seemed not to notice them both, his look elsewhere as though neither was standing before him, still panting. Then the eyes lit up, focussed, and Agaratz looked intently at Urrell’s face. He touched the lad’s nose and muttered in his own tongue, went to the entrance and came back with a handful of snow. To Urrell’s surprise he rubbed his nose and cheeks with it. Urrell felt nothing.
“Bad,” said Agaratz. “Sit not near fire. Nose get well, but hurt.”
When it warmed it did
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