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(I like writing wee fantasy stories...ye can get awa` wi` an awfy lot wi` them...and I love snow, and am still disappointed that we didnae really hae ony this last winter. When I was a wee lassie we had MONTHS o` the white stuff and it was proper snow, that squeaks like polystyrene when ye walk on it. I miss proper snowy winters. As a wee girl I built snowmermaids and snow horses wi` nae necks ...or legs..because if I made them wi` necks, the heids fell off, and if I made them wi` legs, they wouldnae stand up.....nooadays, I would just like the chance tae build a bog standard snowman, if we ever got the snow....)



Puffing and panting, she managed to get to the space between the firs through the deep, foot-sucking snow. In the thin moonlight her breath misted and spiralled in the air before her face. She paused for a moment to catch her breath.
Behind her, the track of her journey here was already covered by the soft, fat flakes of snow falling with increasing thickness. She could see cloud moving down from the North, getting ready to blot out the moon and knew that shortly she`d have only the light of the snow itself to see by.
On each side of her stretched the young forest, short fir trees made round and soft looking with the snowfall and throwing scant shadows out around them.
She was cold. Shouldn`t have stopped. Already her furs were icing up around the hood and neck, the moisture of her breath freezing and becoming icy. If she could have seen herself, she`d have seen an ice maiden, one of the Mountain Women maybe, a creature made out of blue light and ice, frosted eyebrows and lashes and the tears she had cried frozen like diamonds upon her cheeks.
Feeling the tingle of pain from the cold in her hands and feet, she pressed on.
The snow fell thicker, and with it came the hush such snow brings, the blanket of silence it throws over forest and earth, and she could hear her breath in the thin air and the thing that followed her too.
She knew it was a young black bear. Had seen the shadow and shape of it when she had turned to look back an hour ago.
She knew it would be hungry, should have been sleeping, but wasn`t, should have been further south but wasn`t, should have attacked and eaten her, but hadn`t.....
So she pressed on. And her mind worked on what to do. She had nowhere to go in mind. Ahead was North. That was all. Mountains, should she reach so far. Thickening forest and wolf and cat, all hungry, all cold and winter-angry for food.
But for now here she was, in the young part of the forest, small trees and much snow, and plenty cold to spur her on.

And on she went.

In a small hollow ringed by the young firs she had to halt. Her breath was ragged and though cold, she was unbearably tired. She knew she had to stop, to rest. And if she left it too long she would not be able to make the fire she needed.
Kneeling, she scraped a patch of snow away to reach the ground. It was deep, that snow, and taking a cold hand from fur glove she touched
the earth beneath. It was frozen, hard and brittle and for a space, felt soulless. But she kept the hand there, and slowly felt the beat of the earth beneath, the soft thrum of life locked in the soil, slumbering beneath the dark and cold of winter.
She stood and put her glove back on. Her breathing was settling now, which made it easier to see. Sharp eyes picked out deadfalls of wood, and though she knew it would spit, rich with sap and tar, she needed heat. So struggling to the rim, she picked up clumsily the branches and twigs, armfuls of it she carried back to the pit and laid down, three journeys she made to gather firewood.

With cold, numb hands she struck the spark which caught the tinder of dried moss, lit the small fire, carefully crouched over it, blowing softly, and when it caught the heat melted the frozen tears and wet her face, melted the frosted lashes and brows and gave her the look of the sauna.
She knelt beside the growing fire.
Looked around. The flames threw increasing darkness around the hollow, the light making it hard to see outside the circle of it. But she knew what was there....the trees, the snow, the bear...
The snowfall began to lessen and the cloud cleared a little, and she looked at the moon. A thin sliver of scimitar he was, a knife edge to cut the darkness, nothing more.
Clumsily she scraped a hollow in the snow beside the fire and laid herself down in front of the flames. She did not care if the sparks caught her furs. Did not care if she slept and did not tend the fire. With the growing warmth feeling was returning to frozen limbs and with it came pain. Weeping quietly, she wrapped her arms around her and crawled into the position of the babe, and watching the fire, slept the sleep of exhaustion.

And in the night the bear came, a scrawny, hungry, confused beast. He had followed the girl because he knew no other thing to do. He had no memory of before. Had no notion of what he should be doing. The wound on his head, made at the point of a spear, had stolen his wits.
And in the dark he saw the flicker of light and flame the girl made. And he retreated a pace, back into the darkness among the trees and snow and moonlight.
He could smell her own wounds. The raw blood of them. Could smell the fatigue and fear and pain on the human. Hunger and need rose up in him. Blood and meat would help his failing strength.
He watched the girl lie down and sleep. He waited, pacing back and forth on silent pads amid deep and smothering snow.
When he heard the regular beath of sleep, he crept forward.
Pacing on silent pads amid deep, soft snow, he scented the blood on the girl, smelled the tracks she had made, followed the thread of her work as she gathered the firewood, lit the fire, scraped the hollow to lie in.
Snuffling quietly, he nosed her fur hood.....

The hunters shout broke the silence of dawn as they spotted the mound of fur. The curve of the bear echoed that of the girl beside the dead fire. With the caution of hunters who know the arts of the bear, the changeling nature of them, the trickster cunning of them, they toed the beast to make sure he was dead before examining what they found.
The bear lay facing North, as if to keep the wind from the girl. At some point in the night, she had turned and made to burrow into the thick, soft black fur, seeking warmth.
The dead fire mocked them both.
Her face was pale and perfect, only the tracks of frozen tears upon her cheeks, the glitter of frozen lashes laying soft against skin.
A hunter reached down, pulled her hood back....they all looked, all backed away, ancient superstitions and fears arising in harsh, warrior minds.

Black, thick hair cascaded out of the hood, like a shadow against the snow. In one part of it though, a wound, a spear wound, bright still with blood and sticky around the raw opening. This wound echoed that of the black bear. And they knew that this bear would not return home with them, the pelt would rot here in the cold Northern air, the bones lie here forever under the uncaring skies. Wordlessly, they turned for home.

And around their hearthfires the children listened to the story of the witch who kept her soul in the form of a young black bear. And when the brave hunters killed the bear, the evil witch also died, wrapped around it like a lover. But when the night wind howls in the coldest winters the children hear a snuffling, enquiring snort outside their hut doors, and the bright and brittle laughter of a young girl, and they scent the heavy musk of bear and glimpse the shadow of a furclad girl upon the walls in the lamplight.