When Vargus awoke, he was slightly disappointed to find he was still on the mountain. Someone had covered him with a blanket and he lay close to a cheery blaze that warmed him through. Although the fire was small, he could feel an intense heat coming from somewhere. Looking past the campfire, he saw the glow of a huge blaze not far away in the forest. A thick cloud of grey smoke rose above the trees and small pieces of ash rained down on him.
As he lay there, wiggling his toes, amazed at finding himself still in the flesh, Vargus realised he was breathing normally. The rattle in his chest and dull ache in his side were gone. A brief check revealed all of his other injuries had also been healed but his clothing was still torn and covered with dried blood.
Although he had no wounds, he felt a little stiff as he stumbled to his feet as if he’d been asleep for a long time. As he walked into the forest, he eased the kinks from his muscles by stamping his feet and rolling his shoulders. The heat from the fire intensified until he stepped into a clearing where he found the Maker standing beside a huge pyre for the Gralldire.
The fire must have been burning for quite a while, as deep in the heart of the flames he could see the creature’s skeleton. All of its flesh and fur had already been consumed and now the bones were glowing in the heat. The Maker added more wood before stoking the blaze with a long branch, sending up a flurry of sparks into the night sky. His old friend had noticed he was there but didn’t turn away from the fire. His face was smeared with ash but Vargus could see clean streaks running from his eyes.
“It deserved better than to die like this.” The Maker’s voice was tight with grief.
“At least it died how it lived.”
The Maker grunted, conceding the point. “We need to make sure nothing of it remains. Not one scrap of fur or piece of bone for them to use. Otherwise they will make trinkets and trophies to hang on their walls. Stories will be sung and the hunters will be cast as heroes and the Gralldire an evil beast of legend. That is not how I want it remembered.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Vargus.
“I’ll show you later. Its cave is over that way,” he said, gesturing through the trees on their left. “Bring back anything that looks unusual and it will go into the fire as well.”
Vargus followed the Maker’s directions until he came to the cave which had been partially concealed by a dense mix of holly and brambles. The prickly bush had been pulled across the opening but he was able to drag it aside and slip into the cave. In the light from his smoking torch, he found a small network of caves, most of them too small to house the Gralldire. These were abandoned but at the back he found a large space that it had used as its home. On a natural rocky shelf, he found a small collection of worn figurines carved from different types of stone. Some were ancient and crude, depicting gods that had been dead for centuries whose names had been forgotten by history. Others were more recent including one for the Lady of Light and another denoting the Blessed Mother.
In another corner, he found some pieces of clothing, all of them torn and stained with old blood. There was also a ripped blanket and two pairs of boots. In an old wooden crate, he found a small collection of personal belongings. There were a few pieces of jewellery, a comb made of yellow horn, two necklaces and a gold ring with a severed finger still attached.
There seemed to be little else besides some green branches which it had collected for a bed. Gathering all of the items together, Vargus wrapped them in the blanket and checked again to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. Something made him look up and his mouth fell open in surprise.
The ceiling was covered with tally marks. The Gralldire must have been living in this cave for years and every month, or perhaps every day, it had scratched a line into the rock with its claws. There were too many to count at a glance, but he guessed there were thousands. It made him wonder how old the Gralldire had been and how long it had been living in isolation in the mountains, feared and hunted by humans.
Vargus returned to the blaze and showed his old friend what he’d found. Working together, they smashed the ancient idols between two large rocks until they were reduced to dust. After adding more fuel to the fire, they tossed in all of the clothing found in the Gralldire’s cave. The jewellery and other personal items would be returned to Morgan’s Creek.
“Keep it as hot as you can,” said the Maker. “I’ll be back soon.”
He disappeared into the woods, leaving Vargus to tend the blaze. The heat was already intense but he chopped off low branches and hacked apart small trees, regularly adding fuel. The bones at the heart of the blaze were smouldering and some of the smallest had already been reduced to ash. At this rate, it would take hours for the rest to be consumed by the fire.
A short time later, the Maker returned with a huge ball of dripping mud clutched between his hands. Clearing a space on the ground, he sat down and began to pound and shape the mud like dough. As he worked, Vargus noticed the soil falling away to reveal the clay beneath.
For the next hour, as he looked after the fire, the Maker sculpted with the clay. Slowly the shape began to emerge and Vargus saw that it resembled the head of a large bear. The Maker was incredibly talented as the sculpture appeared so lifelike, but Vargus noticed some of the details had been shaped crudely. A few of the bear’s features were slightly out of alignment, giving it a disfigured appearance. Hopefully it would be enough to convince the villagers in Morgan’s Creek that it had been a bear and nothing more.
Another hour passed without conversation while the Maker worked. The only sounds came from the fire as timbers cracked and the Gralldire’s bones were gradually reduced to ash.
The day had started early and, despite being healed of his wounds, a bone-deep weariness swept through Vargus. The heat of the fire and the flickering light lulled him into a daze where he swayed on his feet. The Maker caught him by the shoulders and guided him a short distance away from the fire where he sat down with his back against a tree.
“Rest. I’ll tend to the fire,” said the Maker, patting him on the shoulder. Vargus tried to say something but his head dipped forward against his chest and he slept.
When he next awoke, a few hours had passed as the sky was pale grey overhead. Dawn wasn’t far away and the bonfire had been reduced to a wide circle of white ash with a glowing core of orange like an angry eye. Sleep pulled at him again but he pushed it away long enough to locate his friend.
Sitting not far away, the Maker was holding up his sculpture between both hands, turning it this way and that. When he’d finished with his inspection, he took a deep breath in and Vargus heard the air whistle past his ears. There was a long pause and a moment of absolute silence before the Maker started to slowly exhale, almost pressing his lips to the sculpture’s mouth.
Colour began to bleed into the brown clay, turning the lifeless earth into flesh, bone and fur. The silent maw was transformed into a mouth full of broken yellow teeth that lolled open. The carved vague imitation of fur became lush and brown, the Maker’s fingers sinking into its depth. Piece by piece, the carving was transformed and when it was done, for the briefest of moments, there was life behind its brown eyes.
But the bear was incomplete. It had been designed to be nothing more than a head that had been savagely detached from its body. The spark faded and the glorious beast became lifeless again, transformed into inert flesh that would immediately begin to decay. The Maker dropped the head into a bag he’d fashioned from a blanket and lay down to sleep beside it.