The Ravens were loathe to surrender their prize, but there were only three of them, and Aleksia was willing to share. With the Bear's massive claws she made short work of some crude butchery, and shortly she was feasting on the hindquarters that she had dragged some little distance off, while they were back to enjoying the rest of the deer.
She tried not to think about what she was doing when the Bear ate, because to be honest, it was pretty horrific, even when it was something like a fish. When it was something like this — well, it was better to take a little absence from reality. She just sat back and thought about other things while the Bear instinct took over the body. When her stomach was full, she cleaned herself off in the snow, put her head down and headed off at the Bear's best pace to find the place she had seen from the air where she would intercept Urho and the two women. It was a stroke of luck that it was only a few furlongs away; she could easily reach it before they did.
This would have to be set up carefully, because although she knew that the two Sammi women needed her as much as she needed them, all that they would know, when they first saw her, was that here was a woman appearing in the middle of the wilderness — when, in fact, the North Wind had told them that the terrible creature that had stolen their son and beloved was a powerful Sorceress — who could, of course, appear out of nowhere in the middle of the wilderness. Even her appearance would tell against her; at this point she looked every inch the Snow Queen, and so…
She would have to set things up so that there was enough doubt for her to convince them that she was not the enemy. With luck all The Traditional forces now moving sluggishly in favor of her putting together a Questing Party would work to keep the women from rejecting her and her overtures outright.
She arrived at the site not even winded. Really she was fortunate in the lay of the land here. It was perhaps the most perfect place for a secluded campsite; another cave, where they would be able to get away from possible watchers. This one was more than big enough to hold all of them and the reindeer. Once again, she used the Bear's enormous strength to drag some wood inside, and break it apart. She transformed to human again to clean out the rubbish, make a fire pit in the middle of the sandy floor and start the fire. Unfortunately, she had nothing with her to make things more inviting than that — not without using magic, and that, she was not going to do. Not only might that draw attention from the false Snow Queen, it might well make the women more wary. She needed to appear as ordinary as possible until they were convinced. When she was certain she could do all that was possible with the little that she had, she took out her mirror to watch for the trio to approach. And then she waited.
This was going to be very interesting.
Annukka could scarcely believe the difference that having the Bear with them made in their journey. They had crossed more land in the course of a morning than they had in two days with just the reindeer pulling. The White Bear's great strength meant that there was nothing that would hang the sledge up for very long. And rather than having to feed him out of their stores, they found that the shoe was on the other foot. By evening of the first day after he joined them, he was feeding them with his hunting. He could easily dig a hare out of its burrow, or find both ends and dig at one end while the women waited with a net-snare at the other. Annukka had the feeling that if he chose to, he could pull down a deer.
Of course, when they came to the first dead village, that all became moot.
When they had heard about the three villages, it had not really come home to Annukka, nor to Kaari, just what that meant.
It meant a silent cluster of houses, with nothing moving. It meant dead animals and birds everywhere — not just the livestock, but the wild birds dropped out of the eaves, frozen in the bushes. It meant a quiet that was so nerve-racking that you wanted to do anything to break it.
Still, with the entire village dead, that meant that everything here was pretty much at their disposal. She and Kaari didn't exactly talk about it — but it looked as if the men had already done something of the sort, helping themselves to some gear and supplies, and that made it easier to go ahead and follow their example. It did give Annukka a bit of an odd feeling, as she and Kaari went meticulously through peoples' belongings….
But these weren't people she had known. They were strangers whose faces she didn't have to remember. She could only tell herself that surely the former owners approved. After all, she and Kaari were here to do something about the thing that had killed them. Surely that would be what they would want; surely they would be happy to see their things going to serve that purpose.
Both of them needed more warm clothing. It was bitterly, bitterly cold, and it was not going to get better. If they did not help themselves to clothing and bedding, they might freeze.
They picked one house and completely rearranged it, got it warmed and set things up to their liking. They slept the night in that house with a fire and in real beds and with the Bear sleeping like a mound of fur across the door, just in case. They cooked real food — and in fact, they decided to stay over a second day in order to bake bread and cook meats to add to their provisions. The one thing they didn't have to worry about now that they were in weather suited to the heart of Winter was that anything would spoil. Not in this cold, packed on the sledge.
The deer appreciated the extra day, too, and dozed in the sunlight and ate the grain that Kaari spilled out on the snow for them. The Bear dragged the frozen carcasses that had been in the paddock away so they would not be disturbed by their presence. Annukka did not go to look to see what the Bear did with them; she presumed he was eating them. Frankly, frozen hard as they were, it was too much trouble to try to butcher them. Better to make use of the smoked meats already in storage.
Annukka had made a decision during that day, and as they finally left the village, they left behind them a growing plume of smoke. She and Kaari had packed the house that held all the dead bodies of the villagers with oil-soaked hay, had made the prayers for the dead, and set fire to it as they left. They didn't know when, or even if, anyone would be back here, and something needed to be done. Annukka couldn't bear to leave the sad corpses to the vermin, the scavengers, and sooner or later, that was exactly what would happen to them. Since Annukka was a Wise Woman, she had the right to make that decision and to see the dead off with the proper rites. Neither of them looked back.
Later, they came to the second village, where they did essentially the same thing. The Bear seemed to approve. He was no ordinary beast, that was certain. Annukka was pretty sure he was one of the Great Beasts, the creatures able to think like humans, and sometimes talk like them. So far, he hadn't actually spoken to either of them, but that might just be a matter of time.
It was at the third village that they found some very odd signs of depredation. There were a few doors broken in, with the same signs as if a Bear had done the work, and yet if it was a Bear, it was an oddly intelligent one, and it had not done the kind of destruction she would have expected from a wild creature.
Which might just mean it was not a wild creature at all….
