Chapter 3 Auria
The bear was taller than me, even while standing on all four legs. If I stretched, I might have been able to reach the lowest part of its shoulder with my fingertips. We faced each other on opposite sides of the grotto, and my heart started pounding again.
I usually waited for animals to give me a reason to fear them. A great big, white bear with a spiral horn on its head (a horn!) might just be here for a drink. Or maybe its horn needed the magical water? Or maybe it, too, was hiding from someone.
But as the moments passed, I began to worry about getting caught between soldiers who were strong enough to grab me and carry me back to Hemlit and an unusually large bear that I was not willing to hide behind to avoid the soldiers.
And my toes were turning numb.
A soft rumble came from the bear, as if it were clearing its throat, and the horn on its head disappeared.
While I tried to make sense of that (Was it a magical illusion? Did the bear…retract it somehow?), the bear shocked me even more by speaking. “Why have you invaded my privacy?”
The bear…spoke?!
I clutched my skirts closer to my waist to keep from flailing my arms and screaming. Did this grotto belong to the bear? Was the bear really a bear or was it some cursed human? Or elf? Or…something else? Was there a punishment for invading its privacy?
My mind only spiraled for a few seconds before the bear huffed. Clouds formed where the heat from his nostrils hit the frigid air. “Well?” he asked, his voice rumbling deep and low as if it had never been used before.
He did not sound pleased. I was tempted to curtsy to convince him I wasn’t trying to be rude, but I didn’t want to lose my balance on the uneven stream bed. So, no polite gestures. Just words.
“I’m sorry for invading your privacy, sir.” My voice was more winded than I’d expected, but I didn’t have time to do anything about it. “I’m running for my life, and I was hoping to hide inside these cliffs. I didn’t realize you would be here.”
Should I have realized he’d be here? Hopefully my ignorance wasn’t as offensive as my presence—
“Explain,” his low, grinding voice demanded.
“Explain what, sir?” I didn’t want to be insolent, but I wasn’t sure what he meant.
“Why are you running for your life?” His unhurried answer contrasted with my rushed, breathy one.
“Ah.” Would a bear care that I’d stolen food? Or that the elves were merciless in their punishments? Or would he be upset if I lied? Truth would have to do, though perhaps twisted just a little in my favor. “I’ve upset some elves, and they’re coming to…punish me.”
His eyes narrowed. “Your punishment will be death?”
“I— don’t know.” I dropped my gaze to the skirts in my hand as I debated what to tell him.
His blue eyes looked like they would cut through any lies if I looked at them.
But, he didn’t seem likely to eat me, and if he could be convinced to growl a little at the soldiers behind me, they might leave me alone too.
And I didn’t want to lose any toes from standing in cold water.
I rubbed my forefinger across the ring on my thumb and lifted my gaze to his.
“The last time I felt their wrath was fourteen years ago, and I thought I would die then. One of them helped me escape their confinement—I think he took pity on me because I was a child. I am not a child anymore, and I do not imagine any of them will spare any sympathy for me now.”
The bear tipped his head and scanned me. “You are human.”
“Yes.” A wry chuckle escaped me. “I have no idea what you are.”
He blew a long, slow breath out his nostrils, making another cloud of steam at the same height as my head. “I am fae,” he finally said as the cloud disintegrated, “cursed to wear the form of a dyrakongur during the day.”
My eyes widened. Cursed then. But what was dyrakongur?
As if reading my mind, he added, “but I can hide the horn so I look like a simple bear instead.” So… a dyrakongur was a bear with a unicorn horn? And what exactly was fae?
My thoughts were interrupted by the soldiers. Again. They’d found the slot canyon, and their discussion about me hiding inside carried easily.
I stepped closer to the bear, but stopped when the stream bed dropped into a deeper pool in the middle of the grotto. I’d have to edge around the outside to reach him without soaking my entire body. Instead of moving any more, I met his blue eyes. “Hide me! Please!”
He studied me, tipping his head again. “Would you—”
One of the soldier’s voices came much closer now. “You know she’s human. I wouldn’t have expected her to survive this cold water.”
“Humans are stronger than they look,” the other soldier replied.
The bear had been about to ask me something, but we didn’t have time.
“Yes!” I cried. “Anything you want, I’ll do it.”
He tipped his head again, as if trying to solve a puzzle that came with golden hair and leather boots.
Tears burned the back of my eyes as my most painful memories strangled my throat.
If this bear wouldn’t help me, I was doomed.
Fourteen years of running, cleaning, stealing—fourteen years of trying everything I could to survive all led to this moment.
All my best efforts had been for nothing.
Without the help of a giant, cursed bear, I would return to a prison run by elves.
And what had come from all those years? Some lock-picking skills and wet boots.
Nothing worth the effort I’d put into them.
If this was where it ended, I would have been better off dying the first time they took me.
“Please?” I choked out, too overwhelmed by my impending capture to put any strength into my voice. I couldn’t help asking one last time.
He stared at me, and I stared back, silently begging him to not let them take me as the elves splashed into the grotto behind me.
I blinked, and he was gone. The magic waterfall continued to pour down the cliffs where he’d been standing a moment ago, but he was not there any longer. I didn’t know if he’d truly disappeared or used some magic trick to make it look like he had.
Either way was a clear answer. I should not have expected anything else. Nobody had ever gone out of their way for me before, and there was no reason for a bear-fae to do so now.
I dropped my skirt into the water and braced myself for one last fight. I didn’t have a chance at beating the elves, but I would make it as hard as possible on them.
A deep, grinding voice shook the air around me. “Why are you invading my privacy?”
I spun around, shocked, and threw my hands to my mouth, forcing it to stay silent for once. The monstrous bear now stood between me and the elves, facing them. I nearly hugged his giant back leg! But the elves’ answer kept my boots rooted to the stone.
“A thousand apologies, my lord,” one elf said. “We’ve been tracking a thief. She’s manipulative and dangerous, and we’ve come to restrain her. I’m sorry she’s intruded on your afternoon.”
So much for not telling the bear I broke the law. Would this change his willingness to help me?
A ground-shaking roar answered that question. Literally. He roared so loudly the stones under my feet shook and bits of rock broke off the cliffs around us, clattering into the water. “She’s mine now,” he growled. “And I’m not giving her to you.”
For the first time since meeting the bear, I wondered if I’d made the right choice. I was choosing a bigger, stronger protector than the elves, but he made himself sound more like a captor than a protector. Would it have been safer to go with the elves? I did survive it once—
“She has already stolen enough from the elves in Hemlit to owe us the rest of her life,” one of the soldiers said.
Nope, I did not want that. Please stay with me, Giant Bear, I thought at the great beast. Nothing could be worse than the elves. What had he called himself? Dyra— Something. Maybe I should go with Cursed Fae instead of Giant Bear…
“You would argue with me?” Cursed Fae ground out.
The soldier drew a sword. Instead of throwing it at the bear’s heart, though, he pointed it at the late afternoon sky, and lightning gathered on its tip.
I shuddered. The elves and their stupid magic.
Cursed Fae roared again, shaking the stones and upsetting the water. This time, I lost my balance and toppled into his leg. His fur fell into my face, smelling of fresh forest and…
And ink? Instead of deciphering the smells, I rushed to straighten. Two seconds later, when I was standing by myself again, I realized that the bear had magic too.
Rays of blue light and swirls of black…something…radiated off the bear and flowed toward the elves. The black smothered the lightning on the sword and pressed closer to the elves. They stepped backward, feeling for the slot canyon behind them.
“Is one thief worth your lives?” the bear snarled at them.
They didn’t answer, but they sheathed their weapons and eased themselves into the slot canyon.
The bear followed them. “You lost your thief. I won her. Will you challenge me again?”
They looked at each other, and then one of them shot a scowl at me before answering. “No, we will not. Good luck with her, my lord. Guard your treasures from her.”
I rolled my eyes at him. Neither he, nor any elf in Hemlit, had ever truly been threatened by me.
They bowed at the bear and slunk away, disappearing into the curving path of the slot canyon.
Once we no longer heard their splashing footsteps, the bear turned to me.