Page 4 of Polar Destiny
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Islowly blink myself awake.Pale winter sunlight is breaking through a window above me. I don't know this window. I look around. I don't know this room. I'm in some kind of attic, with walls that go up straight to about my hips before turning into roof. It takes me a moment to remember. The frozen sea, the walking, the fish. Especially the fish. I'm hungry again. I look around until I find the ladder going down, hidden behind a low shelf. When I step on the first rug, I notice the voices. Male voices. I can just about make out what they're saying; they must be in the living room. Instinctively, I stay on the ladder. I do love a goodeavesdropping.
"Does she suspect anything?" A deep voice, full of authority. A voice you'd tell everything it wanted youto.
"I don't think so. I told her we're living close to where the bears roam, but that they pose no threat. I think she believed me." Finn'schuckling.
"Good. Let's keep it that way. We don't want her to run off scared. The sea is thawing and it's not safe. The girl will be staying with us for now, and she can't find out. We'll have to start a schedule. How long can you stay in thisform?"
"Six hours." A new voice, a friendly grumble. Like Ràn, but less...dark.
"Five." That'sFinn.
"Also six." Ràn. He actually used one word more than Finn. I can't believeit.
"It's seven for me. That means some of us need to do two shifts a day. I'll go first, but we should introduce ourselves first. She's only met two of us so far. We'll have to come up with some kind of excuse for being away from the house all thetime."
Finn chuckles again. "How about, we shift into bears in our free time and can't stay human for longer than a fewhours?"
I'm beginning to like Finn's sense of humour. He seems slightly obsessed with bears, but there are worsethings.
"I said an excuse, not thetruth."
Not the truth. What? No. Serious-voice is making a joke. A really, really well hiddenjoke.
"Why not?" Finn asks. "It's not that strange, there are loads of stories about werewolves, and we're not thatdifferent."
"Stories. We're real," Ràn grumbles. I don't think Ràn has much of a sense of humour. Oh heavens. Bears. Were-bears. Bears eat humans, right? That's why they want me to stay. A portable food source. And I was so stupid to walk right into theirlair.
I scramble back into the attic and run to the window. If I can't leave through the front door without passing the bears, I'll need to be creative. Luckily the window is easy to open. I carefully drag a chair beneath the opening, trying not to make any noise. Do bears have goodhearing?
The roof is covered in thick snow. The upper layer has formed into ice which cracks into tiny shards when my feet step on it. Carefully, I walk towards the edge of the roof. It's high, but there's snow on the ground which should break the fall. Serious-voice said the sea was thawing, but I am light, and there might still be somewhere I couldcross.
I look down. I’m not a big fan of heights. Actually, they scare me. They are painful - well, the end of the height, where it meets theground.
"FUCK, COME BACK!" Someone yells behindme.
Ijump.
Three
The ground doesn'tlike me. I don't like it,either.
Pain shoots through my right ankle as I land. I can feel something snap. Not good. Somehow, my body doesn't get the message and I try to run away from the hut, but my leg gives out and I end up in the snow. Frustrated, I beat against the fluffiness beneath me. It was supposed to feather my fall. The pain brings tears to my eyes, immediately turning into tiny icicles dripping from mylashes.
Something big drops down next to me, throwing snow into the air. Someone big. Through the pain I see a Viking kneeling by my side. I must behallucinating.
"Don't move. Where does ithurt?"
My head is stuck in the sea, waves crashing against my ears. Everything is blurry, moving. It's scarier than the pain. My ears are filled with roaring, and the world isshaking.
"Can you hear me? Isla?" The emotion in his intense voice has just gone up anudge.
I groan and blink until my vision clears a little. The Viking is still there. His blond hair falls to his shoulders; a few strands have been braided and adorned with wooden beads. A braided beard makes him look older than his smooth skin suggests. Bright blue eyes are looking at me with concern. There's a little fold between his brows that I can't stop looking at. It shouldn't be there; it should be smooth. Is it always there, or just when he scrunches up his face like he doesnow?
"Stop looking like that," I mumble, still trying to shake off the noise in myears.
He stares at me incredulously. "You fall down a roof and tell me what I should looklike?"
