The voice beyond the shelter challenged. “Face me.”
She watched as I pushed the leather flap separating the warm tent with the great outdoors. I disappeared beyond the entrance, shaking my head one last time.
Do not follow.
The imposing presence atop the nearby hill cast a terrifying silhouette against the moon.
Yuka hadn’t listened.
I understood the god’s command, but to the village, a bear had arrived, and they were prepared for attack. Torches were lit. Weapons gleamed. Men and women waited anxiously as I took careful steps forward.
His lips pulled back from his teeth.
His people were afraid, and for the moment, he was the enemy.
Snow crunched beneath my paws as I scrambled for a plan.
I was a dire wolf, but Nanook was twice the size of an already-enormous polar bear. I couldn’t fight him. Not if we were both in animal form. I had no right to his territory. I didn’t belong among his tribes. One foot in front of the other, I knew I’d die before leaving Yuka.
The wind was particularly cruel that night, but it hadn’t kept members of the tribe from bundling their furs around their faces to watch the standoff, hearts in their throats.
If I could hear their worry, so could Nanook.
“Name yourself,” he growled.
Cowardice wouldn’t serve me. I made my way to the top of the hill, close enough for him to reach me with teeth, claws, and weight, should it come to that. “I have no name that would satisfy you.”
“What do they call you?” Nanook’s voice was the powerful eddy of the rocks churning at the bottom of the sea. He spoke mind to mind in the immortal tongue, a booming voice inside my skull, yet threatening snarls to all who watched.
“Mortals have no formal name for me,” I answered honestly.
Though I spoke into his mind, I felt the need to raise my voice above the howling wind. “I am a protector of one. I’m nothing more.”
He planted his feet on the snow dune and sniffed the air around me. I did my best to keep still, though I knew the two of us took mortal shape, his body would be every bit as toweringas the bear was now. Faith was alive and well in the north, and these were no idle gods.
A bluff charge accompanied his growl. “Half-truths.”
“Hell,” I sputtered. “Hell has no relation with the Adlivun pantheon, and with any luck, our paths may never cross again. I know of your gods—I know Sedna, your goddess of the sea, though we’d had no occasion to meet. I’ve met Igaluk, though he was disinterested, and that’s all I can hope for. I mean your people no harm, but I also have no interest in them.”
“Then you know you do not belong.” He towered over me. “And you know you should leave.”
“I have a human,” I said, wondering if I sounded as pathetic as I felt. She was a secret to many, but I had no quarrel with these gods, nor did they deal with any of Hell’s enemies. I could use an ally. “Only one. She’s called Yuka at present, but I’ve followed her for several lifetimes, across continents, realms, and languages. I’m connected to her. Please don’t send me away.”
Please. I’d never prostrated myself before a god like this. But my title, my kingdom, my realm, meant nothing here. I was an intruder, and his word was final.
Nanook huffed, looking over my shoulder to where the villagers watched a wolf the size of a man face off against a bear three times its size. I could only imagine how our growls sounded to human ears.
I lowered my head in my best imitation of a bow. “I swear to you: I lay no claim to your people, save for the girl.”
The people remained statue-still as Nanook descended from the dune.
I—the one they believed to be their protector—remained on the hill, unmoving.
I caught Yuka’s eyes in the torchlight and shook my head once more.
Don’t move.
Nanook looked even larger as he passed the nomadic huts. His hide alone would create an entire home, if not two, had he been a mortal bear.
