The Fall - (A Young Adult Dystopian Novel) Page 4

  Chapter 3 – The Horned Bear

  Mother and Father are at first annoyed that I’m putting off meeting the first of my betrothal bids until tomorrow, but they don’t really make too big of a deal about it. I suspect they don’t want to see me grow up too quickly, despite the fact I am now considered an adult.

  “I’m not marrying Skye,” I rant. “Not in a million years.”

  “Does she not want to marry you?” Father asks. It’s almost like an accusation, like Skye was snubbing me because she didn’t want to marry me.

  “Of course not,” I say. “We were raised as best friends. It’d be weird marrying her, like I was marrying my sister or something. The whole idea makes both of us feel a little sick.”

  “I never took Skye’s betrothal bid too seriously anyway,” Mother says with a sly grin. “So there’s one less to worry about.”

  “Why is there all this hurry to marry me off?”

  Father looks at Mother and says, “It’s not like you’re going to be married straightaway. You just need to find the right person to be your partner and then when you turn fifteen you will be married. You can then start having children and prepare for your life as mayor.”

  Great, I think. I can’t wait to be mayor.

  The three of us cross the old road as we make our way to the forest, which is a short distance from The Glass Palace. Most of the materials used to build the roads have been pushed aside by weeds and flowers by now but you can still see the odd clump of black in there. I often dream what the roads looked like in their heyday, with the automobiles roaring up and down them. I prefer the roads as they are now, green and verdant.

  There is still a thick, deep crevasse that bisects the road. We step over it, careful not to fall in. It’s been there since the gods flew over two years ago. They had stopped here to fight. The fight may have lasted only a second, and it may only have caused minimal damage, but it had been enough to alter my life forever. My younger sister, Glory, had died that day. The seasons of rain and snow may have washed her blood away but I still knew the exact spot where her tiny, fragile body had been crushed. I’d never forget.

  “When can I start practicing with the bow?” I ask as we trudge through grass sprinkled with ice crystals. The sun is hidden behind a thick band of fluffy white clouds, and I can see my breath. I like winter. Glory had liked the winter, too. My brother Dylan, though, had been more of a summer person.

  “When I have the time,” Brian answers.

  “You’re going to teach me?”

  “Your parents said it would be okay.”

  “When did you speak to them?”

  “The day you spent in bed with a hangover.” I sigh and Brian says, “Don’t worry, we all get a little drunk when we come back from our Journey. I was the same as you.”

  “Right,” I say. I hang on his every word.

  Skye giggles and says, “Great, you get to spend loads more time with my ugly, stinky brother. You are so lucky!”

  I grin, feeling tingly all over, like an electric current is running through my body. I can’t believe that Brian is going to teach me how to use the bow! I’ll get to spend a lot of time with him. How do I feel about that? I’m excited, certainly, but also nervous. What does Brian think of me? Does he think I’m still a child? Well, I will be fifteen in five months, so that might make things better. I’m rambling inside my head, just like Skye does with her mouth. I don’t want to do that.

  We enter the forest. Skye is her usual energized self, clutching her bow like it might flutter away in the wind and her mad, black hair tied back in a ponytail. The quiver attached to her back is made of pigskin, which she has complained about, but she didn’t have much of a choice if she wanted to come. She is a stickler for the rights of animals, though she isn’t a vegetarian. She likes meat too much.

  I’m almost sure Albatross is following us. Every now and again I can hear something snort behind me, but when I look there is nothing there. Skye had insisted she didn’t want the pig to come as it would distract her but I didn’t believe her story. I can see the way she looks at Albatross; they are inseparable.

  “It’s going to snow,” Brian mutters as we stop in a small clearing.

  “How can you tell?” Skye twangs the string on her bow to make sure it is tight enough. It had taken her a good half an hour to thread it.

  There is a weather witch in a village further north who predicts the weather badly but I keep my mouth shut. Brian doesn’t want to hear about her.

  “Sniff up,” he tells us.

  We both inhale, slowly, and feel the air enter our nostrils. An assault of smells drifts our way; the pig leather of our quivers, the grass, the bread from the rations inside Brian’s bag, and something else...coldness.

  “Can you smell it?” Brian asks.

  “Yes,” I say, a little excited.

  “I like the snow,” says Skye, gazing up into the heavens. “Although I hope it doesn’t break some of the glass tiles on the roof like it did last year because I really hate it when snow gets inside the House.”

  Brian covers his sister’s mouth with his hand to shut her up. Most people don’t have the patience for Skye’s ramblings, even though it is one of the things I love about her. She is eccentric and there is nothing wrong with that.

  “I see something in the bushes,” Brian whispers.

  Skye and I look where Brian points. I can’t see anything apart from a bush covered with cobwebs and the trunk of a large tree. I try to creep forward to take a closer look but Brian puts a hand on my shoulder to hold me back. His touch makes my legs feel wobbly.

  A branch on the bush quivers slightly, and I see something; a quick reveal of patchy grey fur and a beady yellow eye that glares at us malevolently. I look to Skye and see her eyes wide with fear, though Brian seems quite alert. It certainly is not a deer.

  “What is it?” I whisper.

  “I think it’s a wolf,” says Brian.

  “A wolf?” Skye exclaims, a little too loud. “We have to catch it! Oh, I know it’ll be cruel and everything but its fur coat will come in handy this winter. We’re starting to run out of furs.”

  Brian grits his teeth and says, “I know that. But this is too dangerous for you two. I want you to step back and let me handle this.”

  Skye snorts. “You can’t order me around like I’m a child any more. I’m an adult now! I’ll take this wolf out by myself, see if I don’t.”

  Skye, in what seems a sort of supernatural efficiency, pulls an arrow from the quiver on her back, knocks it on her bow, and fires. The arrow speeds through the air as Brian yells and it hits the bushes. There is an almighty yelp of pain and then silence.

  “You see that?” says Skye, grin huge. “I am a master bowman! Well, bow-woman anyway.”

  “When I tell you to do something you do it,” Brian snarls.

  Skye ignores him and, placing the bow on the ground, she goes over to inspect her kill. I follow close behind, a little in awe myself. I thought I had been an accurate shot with my slingshot but Skye is clearly superior. If Brian becomes unavailable for lessons (though I sincerely hope not), I think that his sister could teach me instead.

  “I wonder if I could claim the wolf pelt as my own,” Skye ponders. “My own winter coat is looking a little tacky these days and I’m sure the tanner wouldn’t mind.”

  We hear a growl. We stop. A single grey paw creeps out of the bushes, followed by another, and the head of a great wolf appears. Its eyes radiate hostility, its mouth is open and growling, its teeth are rotting and its tongue is twisting and tasting. I can’t help but feel admiration. It is a wild beast and we are totally at its mercy but it reminds me of the outside and how uncertain and wild it truly is.

  “Brian,” says Skye, her voice trembling. “I don’t think it’s dead.”

  Then it falls face first onto the ground, its teeth scraping the earth. I watch its eyes flicker shut and the slow steady breathing from its side stop. I can see the arrow now quite clearly; it has pierced the creature between two prominent ribs, though it isn’t bleeding as much as I’d imagined it would.

  “Do you think it’s dead now?” Skye wonders.

  Brian walks up to the corpse and puts a finger to the wolf’s neck. He leaves it there for ten seconds and turns to his sister and announces, “It’s dead.”

  “Yes!” Skye declares, doing a little dance on the spot. “I’m so good at this!”

  While Skye celebrates and Brian berates her for ignoring his orders, I watch as Albatross pads across the ground to join us. It looks like he’s been following us after all and was just waiting for the predator to get out of the way. I stroke the pig and hope the little thing will be careful in the forest.

  Skye puts her hand to her mouth in horror. “Something is wrong with Albatross. He’s very scared.”

  I look at the tiny pig, which is shivering. How are we to know it isn’t shivering because it’s so cold, it could freeze your eyeballs? Though, to be honest, on closer inspection the pig does look frightened. Its eyes are as wide as I’ve ever seen them.

  Branches snap in the distance.

  “The scent of the blood must be attracting more wild animals,” says Brian. His eyes scan the surrounding forest intently. “I’ll grab the wolf and we’ll try and sneak out of here as fast as we can.”

  Skye picks up Albatross and I help Brian lift the dead wolf into his arms. He is very strong. I wonder what else he could lift up with those arms of his.

  The pig starts to squeal like a mad thing, struggling in Skye’s arms. She hugs him closer to her chest, gives him words of encouragement, strokes him as gently as she can, but he just snaps out and bites her hand. Skye drops him with a loud wail of pain and an echoing swear word, and Albatross tro
ts back into the trees, probably to go straight back home.

  “He’ll get himself lost!” Skye cries, running off after him. “Come back! Albatross!”

  Brian sighs. “Stop screaming so loud!”

  She stops by a copse of bushes as something large and powerful rears up in front of her. It gives a roar like the clashing of lightning and thunder, Skye screams in terror and the air around us seems to vibrate with the sound of utter panic. I can only stare with horror.

  I don’t know whether it has a name or not. It’s definitely not a creature I’ve seen or heard of before. It’s odd looking. It resembles a bear in most ways and is the size of a grizzly, with thick white fur, more like those polar bears I’d seen in a book back home. Except, unlike polar bears, this creature has hard ridges on its forehead made from what looks like bone, and it has a long horn that sticks out from that ridge. This thing could gore somebody in seconds.

  It just stares at us, motionless. It appears to be as shocked by our presence as we are with its.

  “What is it?” Skye mumbles, slowly backing away to stand near her brother. “I’ve never seen anything like it in my life!”

  “Stay perfectly still,” Brian whispers. “Don’t startle it.”

  “I wasn’t planning to,” I mutter.

  Its eyes are yellow, and I can see small thick tusks protruding from its mouth like those of a boar. When it waves a paw at us I see what look like webs between each of its toes, and its toenails resemble the blade of knives. It’s more of a weapon than an animal.

  “I think it’s very scared,” utters Skye. She looks at me, gives a huge sigh and says, “Yes, it’s scared. I wonder what scared it?”

  I do not want to escape death by gods only to be mauled by some mutant creature out in the forest. Mutant creature! What if it is a mutant? That would explain why it looks so odd and why I’ve never seen anything like it before.

  “It’s called a horned bear,” says Skye. She giggles. “It’s hungry. Oh dear, it’s been starved as well! How could someone do that to an animal? Poor thing.”

  The creature doesn’t look starved; it looks fat and big, though I do notice some bare patches on its fur and deep scars under them. Either it is a fighter among its own kind or it’s been abused.

  “How do you know all that?” I ask Skye, as usual my own curiosity overcoming my deep fear.

  “She’s just clever, that’s all,” snaps Brian. “Forget it.” He gives Skye a look that I’m not sure I like. A look that ultimately reveals what I can only assume is a shared secret.

  Skye holds her hands out and says, “I’m trying to see if it’ll harm us.”

  The horned bear roars again. Its wide-open mouth reveals a massive wet purple tongue. There is also a black collar around its neck.

  The creature makes a sudden charge forwards. The three of us pale and make a run for it into the trees. Brian drops the dead wolf before its weight holds him back. I stop wondering, though, when without warning, I feel a huge mouth snap at my back, catching the edge of my coat tails. I pull to the left, hoping to cause confusion, and instead the bear rams straight into the trunk of a tree.

  I look back and see the horned bear gawking at me, disoriented. I grin and start running again, hoping that the flight is over; but the bear gives another almighty roar and it starts to pursue me again.

  I skid past a small clearing. I don’t see Brian or Skye anywhere around me. I wish I knew where they were, and whether they were safe. I need to focus on myself, for the bear seems intent on following me.

  I turn my head slightly as I run to gauge how far away the bear is and I see it; it’s running a lot faster than I am, and it’s gaining on me. If I don’t find some way to get away it will soon catch up. I do have my knife to use as self-defense, but what could my tiny weapon do against this enormous creature?

  I’m not looking in front of me, and end up tripping over a tangle of exposed tree roots. I slide into some bracken and feel my hands scrape against small stones on the ground. I panic and start to climb to my feet, when the horned bear somersaults over me and lands a meter away. I start crawling through the dense shrubbery, hoping to conceal myself. Concealed by the tree roots is a small nest hidden under the ground. There isn’t an animal there at the moment, which I’m thankful for, but I hear small bones crunching under my knees as I head further into the burrow.

  When I’ve hidden myself a good distance inside, I turn around. It’s murky and a little musty in here, but I’m safe. There is no way the horned bear can climb through a tunnel this small.

  The ground above me trembles, the horned bear roars. Soil, worms and beetles start to rain down on me. It’s trying to force me out by burying me! What kind of smart creature is this? But I’m wrong; it isn’t trying to force me out. I realize this when its huge lethal paw punches through the ground just inches from my head. Its bladed claws sweep around trying to locate me. It keeps almost catching my face, but I manage to push myself further back into the burrow. It’s going to have to do a lot better than that.

  The paw whips back up, and I give a huge sigh of relief. I hope the creature is giving up. Another paw pummels down, and a claw catches my arm. I yelp as it tries to grab hold of my neck. I instinctively reach for the knife in my belt, which is tricky in the confined space, but I manage to grab my weapon and plunge the blade into the horned bear’s paw. The creature shouts in pain and I’m praying I made the right decision. I begin crawling forward as fast as I can. I need to get out of this burrow. It isn’t quite the safe haven I was hoping it would be.

  I poke my head out of the burrow very cautiously. The bear’s bellowing and screaming has died down and now the only thing I can hear is the odd bird that hasn’t migrated for the winter. Have I killed it? I don’t think so. I’ve only stabbed it in the paw.

  “RUN!” a voice screams. It sounds like Skye, but I can’t see her anywhere.

  I hear the bear again, giving out an almighty yell of rage and pain. I can hear it moving behind me, getting ready for the chase once again. So I run.

  I pause when I reach a small running stream. I see Brian and Skye, who are at the other side. Brian turns to give me a smile and I can’t help but be pleased that he’s worried about my welfare. That’s when I hear a tree behind me screech in protest and topples over. I turn around and shoot to the side just in time as the tree crashes to the ground. A squirrel pops out of the now grounded branches and scampers off back into the forest. The horned bear lumbers out and stampedes straight towards me.

  A massive paw swings in the direction of my face. I duck and grab a rock from the riverbank. When the bear roars and charges again, I swing the rock against its jaw. I hear a crack and the creature spits a bloody tusk from its mouth. Now even angrier than ever, the horned bear swipes at me again and again, hoping to slash me open with its claws.

  An arrow suddenly sprouts in the bear’s head. It shrieks in pain, seems to make a lazy spin and then crawls towards the edge of the stream. It goes still.

  I creep cautiously up to the great strange beast and peer down. I feel a little sorry for it. Now that I know it wears a collar I realize that this was somebody’s pet, somebody’s possession. They have obviously mistreated it. I feel hatred against these cruel people.

  “Are you alright?” Brian asks, walking up to me. Skye is touching the horned bear’s fur, inspecting it. “I thought it was going to rip you to shreds.”

  My arms still tremble. “It very nearly did.”

  Skye pats the horned bear’s head and says, “Poor creature. All it wanted was something decent to eat and instead it gets killed. Look at the beatings it’s had as well! Oh, the poor little thing.”

  “That poor thing tried to kill us!” I protest.

  “Where do you think it came from?” Skye ponders. “You’d think if someone around here was keeping it as a pet we’d have heard about it by now. You could hardly keep something this big a secret.”

  “Yet they did,” I point out.

  We leave the horned bear where it has fallen, half in the stream. It seems a sacrilege to skin such a rare creature for its fur.

  I notice that both Brian and Skye are missing their bows. They must have left them back at the clearing with the dead wolf. Who shot that arrow at the bear and saved my life?

  “Who fired the arrow?” Skye wonders just a second later.

  Brian looks at me, and then at his sister. “Whoever it was, we owe them our thanks.”

  I inspect our surroundings, wondering who is hiding out there right now, and why they have they saved us.

  At the clearing, we find Albatross asleep on the ground near to the wolf carcass as if nothing had happened. I wish I could be that nonchalant.

  “Time to skin the wolf,” says Brian. “Skye?” He plucks a spiky knife out of his belt pack and holds it out for his sister to take. She hesitates.

  “Well?” says Brian. “This is your kill after all. You can have the honor of skinning the creature.”

  Skye backs away, her face turning an odd shade of green. She picks up Albatross and hugs him tight to her as if protecting him from harm.

  Then she retches on the ground.

  I offer to skin the wolf as Skye moves toward the edge of the clearing with the pig cradled in her arms. I’ve skinned smaller animals before, but never anything as big as a wolf. I have to do this. Not only will Brian be impressed of my bravery, but my parents would be proud of me.

  “Give me the knife,” I demand, cool and confident.

  Skye mouths the words “thank you” to me.

  “Okay,” says Brian, a little hesitant. “I can do this if you want. I know it’s a lot to ask.”

  “I can do this,” I interrupt. “Give me the knife.”

  He relucta
ntly leaves me to it, and Brian, Skye and Albatross watch as I skin the wolf. When I’m finished I’m covered in blood and my hands ache. The smell makes me want to vomit. As the flies buzz around the corpse, I truly feel like an adult.

  We make a little fire to warm us up as we eat our lunch, which consists of bread and some wolf meat. Wolf meat turns out to be tender and juicy and I can’t get enough of it, but we have to ration it. There are hungry people at the House, some of them too ill to go out hunting for themselves. I imagine that they’ll enjoy this wolf meat.

  We eat in silence for a while, which is close to a miracle in Skye’s case. But she looks upset. I think she sees her refusal to skin the wolf as an exposure of weakness.

  “I’m sorry,” she mutters between mouthfuls. It’s the first word she’s spoken in over an hour. I’m just glad the silence has been broken. I’ve wanted to strike up a conversation with Brian a number of times, but found that every time I tried to form a word, my mouth refuses to open. Instead, I find myself watching Albatross, who keeps sniffing the wolf pelt that hangs on a tree branch.

  “I know you like animals,” says Brian, giving his sister a friendly smile. “It must have been hard for you even to kill it.”

  Skye wipes her eyes. “It was, especially because it... Well, I’ll do better next time. I promise.”

  “You’re a very good shooter,” Brian praises her. “You’ve picked up on what I taught you very quickly.”

  “I think it’s more natural talent than your teaching methods.” Skye grimaces, realizing she was being rude. “Not that you aren’t the best archery teacher in the whole world, it’s just that some people are better at some things than others.”

  “Like skinning wolves for instance,” Brian mutters.

  “Rotter!” Skye shouts, before bursting into laughter. Brian just smiles. His smile is enough to make my stomach lurch in a good way.

  We continue to eat and watch the fire until Brian reveals the story of the first time he went out to hunt deer. He claims he’d almost shot an arrow in his father’s arm he was so incompetent with the bow, but I think he’s just making it up to make Skye feel better, and fortunately it does. After hearing about her brother’s near fatal mishap, she seems to revert back to her old self again, which is talking all the time. After a while, none of us even notice the sun starting to dip. Skye suddenly jumps up.

  “I’m going to do it!” she announces. Brian and I glare at her in confusion. Even the pig seems curious. It does occur to me I should have been back to The Glass Palace by now to meet the first of my betrothal bids, but I honestly don’t care.

  Brian, a little perplexed, says, “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to start my own House!” She picks up Albatross and starts to walk around the campfire. Her face is more joyful than I’ve ever seen it. “It will be hard, and it will be tough, and it might take a while, but I will persevere and the House of Skye will be the most envied House in all the lands!”

  “You’re not still on about that are you?” Brian complains. “I thought it was just some childish whim that you’d get over once you turned into an adult.”

  “Childish whim?” Skye scoffs. “Building a great House is hardly childish fancy. What would you know, you’re just content to do whatever it is you’re told and you never do anything interesting. But I’m going to do this. Oh, I can’t wait! I better go home now, and start packing.”

  Before either of us have a chance to stop her, she’s marching off back to The Glass Palace. After ten seconds, she turns around and heads back in the right direction. I can’t help but laugh.

  Brian turns his intense eyes towards me. His sister’s skylarking doesn’t amuse him anymore. I feel ill at ease and I suddenly realize Skye is deadly serious.