If he introduced himself to Teal Leadwood, she would be bound to ask him why he was here, and he would have to tell her the truth, because anything else would compound his guilt. Even so, as he and Gentle grubbed for nuggets of sea coal he half-hoped that she might come over, and when they finally packed up and quit the beach and she didn’t so much as glance in their direction, he felt a prick of disappointment that quickly turned to resentment. He told himself that he didn’t need her, or anyone else. He renewed his vow to invest all of his time and energy in his penance. And then he found the map, and everything changed.

15.

It was a goatskin scroll tucked behind stacks of mouldering ledgers in one of the cupboards. When Pilgrim unrolled it on the table it released a brittle crackle of fragments and he saw, with a thrill of delight, a map or chart drawn in black and red and gold inks. It showed a portion of the east coast and the bent-neck isthmus that connected the Union and the New Territories, dotted with miniature illustrations of bear cities. The mounds of traditional cities on the mainland, and along the coasts of the isthmus the pyramids of three new cities. There were pictures of fabulous beasts and monsters too, krakens, merpeople, wyverns, winged panthers and the like scattered across mountains, marshes and the wave-dashed sea, and standing next to one of the cities was a white figure with a blank round head, wielding a spear tipped with a jagged bolt of what might be lightning.

‘My first thought was that it was a visitor,’ Pilgrim told Gentle. ‘But the map must be hundreds of years old, and looks to be a copy of an original made by bears. There are two kinds of writing. You see? Here, and here? Early examples of our script, naming geographical features, set above bear symbols. And some of the fanciful creatures are commonly found in bear murals and carvings.’

Gentle was amused by Pilgrim’s enthusiasm, but listened patiently while he explained that it might mean that the visitors had come here long ago, perhaps before the civilisation of bears had fallen.

‘Looks like it was ready to do battle with them, whatever it was,’ Gentle said, meaning the lightning spear.

‘It might not be a literal depiction,’ Pilgrim said, ‘but an attempt by the artist to show something they did not fully understand. And the resemblance to visitors may be coincidental, of course. I know of no other records of sightings in centuries past. But if it is based on truth, it is immensely valuable.’