Atalanta and the Arcadian Beast

CHAPTER THREE

BURYING THE PAST

WHEN ATALANTA WOKE IN the morning, she was by her father’s side. For a moment she wondered why he seemed so cold, and then she remembered and wept again.

This time she wept not for him—he looked so peaceful now and free of pain—but for herself. She shook with the spasms and cried out loud. There was no one left to tell her to be brave.

At last, exhausted by all the weeping, she rubbed the tears from her eyes. Then hefting the spear and taking the knife as well, she went outside.

The tracks of the night before were undisturbed and there seemed no new ones, which was a relief. She crouched down to examine them carefully this time.

“I don’t understand,” she whispered, for the tracks were very puzzling. They looked something like a mountain cat’s, only twice the size. The toes were more widely spread, which meant they supported a heavier body. Also the weight seemed concentrated on the front paws, which was not how a cat walked.

She followed the tracks around the house to the window where she had knifed the beast. There was a dark stain on the sill and down the side of the wall. The bloodstains led directly to the clearing where the creature had taken the knife from its paw. And here was the greatest mystery of all, which she had only guessed at the night before. The paw prints simply disappeared.

This time she looked around carefully. The closest tree was surely too far away for the animal to have jumped to. So were the rocks. Yet that was surely what had happened—rock or tree. The soft earth of the clearing showed nothing more.

Atalanta tried to puzzle it out the way her father had taught her. If the beast leaped, with a wounded paw, did he do it to hide his trail? If so, she knew, he was very intelligent.

Big.

Fierce.

Intelligent.

She shook her head. It was the worst of all combinations.

By the time the sun was high, and she had not heard or seen anything more of the beast, Atalanta decided to go to the stream for a basin of water, but she carried her spear, knife in her belt, just in case.

It seemed unnaturally quiet by the water, as if the whole clearing knew of her father’s death and every bird, every little animal, was still in his honor.

“Thank you,” she whispered to the woods about her. Then she brought back a basin full of water to wash her father’s body in preparation for burying him.

Her grief had passed for the present. She would not let it return until she had done her duty.

Resting the flint shovel and the spear on her shoulder, she walked out behind the humble dwelling to where a mound of rocks marked where her mother was buried. Choosing a spot to the left of the simple marker, she anchored the spear, haft end down in the grass, where it would be close at hand should she need it. Then she stabbed the blade of the shovel into the ground and ripped up a tussock of grass and earth.

Soon a heap of earth was piled up at her side and sweat flowed down her face as freely as tears.

Her arms ached with the strain, but she had to keep digging. Having helped bury her mother, she knew that it was important to dig the grave quickly and pile rocks atop. Here in the heart of the forest, death was a lure to creatures both great and small who wished to eat without the bother of having to kill.

At last she stood, red-faced and panting, by the side of the open pit. Now came a harder task. She walked back into the cottage, all the while fighting down the small voice of hope.

Perhaps he’s just sleeping, said that deceptive voice. When you go inside he’ll be there as usual, his strong arms open to greet you. But he lay just as she had left him after she’d washed away the dark blood.

Shrunken as he was, he was still too heavy for her to carry. Instead she hooked her hands under his arms and dragged him wrapped in his blanket across the earthen floor and out onto the grass where her spear stood sentinel. There, with one last effort, she rolled her father into the open grave.

Looking down at his still form tangled in the blanket, she wanted to speak to him, wanted to tell him she was trying to be brave. Instead she bit her lip.

No, she thought, words will lead to tears and there is no time for more-tears.

She drew herself up wearily and began shoveling the loose earth over her father’s body. Slowly it disappeared from view.

Where is he now? Atalanta wondered. A sad shade drifting like smoke through the lightless passageways of the Underworld? Or has he found a route to the Elysian Fields where the blessed souls pass their days in eternal sunshine? She hoped he was there, in Elysia, just on the edge of a little woods because she could not imagine him living forever without a forest to walk in.

She suddenly remembered Papa offering a prayer to the gods to guide and protect Mama on her journey. Atalanta rubbed her sweaty brow. What were their names again? Papa and Mama hadn’t invoked the gods very often, here in their woods.

Then she remembered. There was Demeter, goddess of the earth. And Artemis, goddess of the hunt. Papa always called Atalanta his little Artemis. And Pan, the goat-footed god of beasts and herders. That exhausted her memory.

“Demeter…Artemis…Pan.” How strange the words sounded coming from her lips. “Take care of my papa. Let there be trees and quiet streams where he is now.”

She couldn’t think of anything else to say. How could the gods hear her anyway? If they lived at all, it was in some far-off place. She doubted any of them ever visited Arcadia.

Her eyes rested on the freshly dug earth and, for a moment, she had a brief memory of her father striding ahead of her through the trees, full of strength and confidence.

“He is in the Elysian Fields,” she told herself. “With Mama.”

She would believe that always.

As she began to gather the memorial stones, she had a sudden thought: They’ll have each other. And I…I am now utterly alone. It will be years before I am with them again. She couldn’t think of any way to cure that. Not tears, certainly. If she killed the beast, would that still the pain in her heart?

But surely, she thought, the beast is long gone from here.

Just then there was a loud sound behind her, in the bushes by the side of the cottage, as if something were ripping its way toward her.

She sprang up in a fighting position, grabbing up the spear and holding it pointed at the greenery. The creature was between her and the cottage. She would have to fight it with the spear and knife. And the shovel, too, if necessary.

Suddenly the bushes parted, and a great brown bear twice her size reared up before her.

Atalanta took a startled step back, and the beast dashed the spear from her hands with a mighty sweep of its paw. The impact knocked her to the ground and winded her. Before she could make another move, the bear pinned her down, its round hairy face blocking out the sky, the wide maw parting to expose long wicked teeth. Its breath was awful, like an opened grave, and the vast jaws descended upon her.

Atalanta shut her eyes against the horror. Papa, she thought, I will be with you sooner than I expected.