Page 4 of Salvation

Wolves?

“Never heard anything like it,” Cynthia said. “But old man Haggerty swears he saw a pack of wolves mauling the bear right beside the fire. They ran off when the fire trucks arrived.”

“Can I see him?” she asked in a warbly, barely-holding-back-tears voice.

The tears were for her cousin and aunt and uncle, but somehow, that bear became a surrogate for them. From one breath to the next, all her desperate hopes jumped over to him. He had to survive. He had to!

“We doubt he’ll last another night,” Cynthia said as she led Anna to his cage.

That had been her first night back in town, and she’d spent it beside the bear. The folks at the rescue center had taken pity on her, bending the rules so that she could stay.

She’d cried when she saw him, a mess of blood and burns. Every breath the bear took was a pained wheeze. Every tiny movement came with a pitiful moan. Only a few patches of fur remained unmarred, but those were glossy and thick. A grizzly in the prime of his life. What had he been doing at the Boone place? How was he connected to the fire?

The giant lay close to the bars of the cage. Anna slumped down beside it, listening to his labored breath.

“Don’t die. Please don’t die,” she whispered, letting her tears fall freely once Cynthia left for the night.

The bear, of course, didn’t say anything, but she could see his ears twitch.

“Stay with me,” she said, slowly reaching a hand through the bars to stroke his fur.

It was coarse and so dense, her fingers caught in it. A light, sandy shade of brown — as light as she’d ever seen a grizzly. She’d seen a few up in the mountains on summer hikes with her cousin, albeit from far away.

“Don’t die,” she urged when his breathing stuttered and weakened. “Not now. Not like this.”

Tears streamed down her face as she pictured her relatives, trapped inside the house as it burned. No one deserved to die like that. Not a person nor an animal.

“Don’t die,” she whispered.

Her fingers swept softly over the one patch of fur that wasn’t matted with blood or burns, and her voice shook. “Please.”

Her eyes slid shut, and when she opened them, she remembered it was just a bear there and not her cousin in a hospital bed. But it wasn’t just a bear. It was an innocent life. Surely he deserved to live, too?

She was desperate for him to survive, but God, what could she do to help the beast that the vet hadn’t already tried? Human chatter probably didn’t do much for a wild bear, but she kept talking anyway, imagining what might appeal to a bear and infusing her voice with those things. It felt a little silly, but she had to dosomething.

She closed her eyes and made sure she didn’t just say the words. She thought them, too.

“Think of mountain meadows in spring,” she whispered, imagining waist-high grasses dancing and swaying. “Think of a clear, cool summer creek.” This part of Montana was full of them, and she and Sarah had splashed in plenty, jumping from rock to rock then swimming in the deepest sections to cool off.

“Think of berries growing thick in the fall.” That was one of the things she’d missed most after moving to Virginia, so it wasn’t hard to summon the feeling that went with it. That semi-urgent, semi-sleepy, winding-down-to-winter feeling. The sweet pop of berry after berry in her mouth, the juice sticky on her hands. The succulent scent, wafting on a breeze.

“Just think of all the things you’ll live to enjoy again,” she pleaded. “Stay with me.”

Such a beautiful animal couldn’t — shouldn’t — die in a cage. He should live. Thrive. Find a mate, make sandy-furred cubs, and live to a ripe old age somewhere way out in the deepest, densest forest where nobody would ever bother him again.

“Don’t die…” Her voice grew drowsy. At some point, she withdrew her arm but continued mumbling until she’d dozed off in a heap next to the bear. The creak of a door startled her awake in the wee hours of morning when Cynthia and the vet came to make their rounds.

“Still alive?” Cynthia asked in surprise.

Anna studied the bear closely, terrified at how still he’d become. But then his chest expanded with a breath that was slightly less rattly than before, and hope seeped back into her soul. He was alive, thank goodness. But for how much longer?

The folks at the wildlife center let her keep visiting, and she spent days alternating between her vigil at the bear’s side and wandering around town, trying to piece together the truth about the fire.

“My cousin didn’t have any enemies. Why would someone want to burn her house down?”

The police shook their heads sadly. “A lot of crazy folks out there. You never know.”

Looked like they’d never know, either. Not at the snail’s pace of their investigation.

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