At first she found nothing but earth, snow, and debris. But every so often she would stop and listen with her ear pressed to the snow, and at last she heard a groan come faintly from below. Kallik dug even more frantically and let out a cry of relief as she revealed a patch of white fur. Yakone raised his head, shaking off loose twigs and shards of ice.

“Wha’ . . . happened?” he rasped.

“You’re alive!” Kallik exclaimed.

Grunting with pain, Yakone hauled himself upward. Kallik grabbed his shoulder in her jaws and pulled, and at last he managed to free himself from the avalanche and stagger to the solid ground beyond. Looking him over anxiously, Kallik could see that he was battered, that his pelt was filthy, and that his wounded paw was bleeding again. But he didn’t seem badly hurt.

As they stood panting at the edge of the snowfall, Kallik heard a tiny wail coming from farther into the forest. Glancing around, she spotted one of the small brown cubs standing at the edge of the undamaged trees.

“Mother! Yas!” he barked.

Forcing her aching limbs into motion, Kallik bounded down to join the little cub. “What’s the matter?” she asked.

The cub was too upset to be afraid of her. “My mother and my sister, Yas,” he whimpered. “I’ve lost them! They were swept away when the ground started to fall.”

Horror seized Kallik at the thought of more bears being trapped in the devastation. “Don’t worry!” she assured the little cub. “We’ll find them!”

She began scrabbling around among the debris, but that set off another snowslide that almost carried the cub off his paws. Only Yakone, coming up from behind to grab him by the scruff, saved him from being swept away.

“We have to think this through,” Yakone said, setting the cub down gently, well away from the edge of the avalanche. “Little one, do you know where your mother and sister were standing? Can you pick out a tree that was close to them when they fell?”

The cub peered across the waste of snow and ice. “Over there,” he said at last, pointing with his snout toward an uprooted oak that lay half-buried with its roots in the air.

The bark on the part of the tree trunk that Kallik could see looked like an angry bear face. With a sharp pang, Kallik remembered Lusa’s bear spirits, and how distressed the black bear would be that their trees had been destroyed. Take care, spirits, she prayed silently. Travel safely to the stars.

The tree the cub had pointed out was right in the middle of the snowfall.

“How are we going to get out there?” Kallik asked, giving Yakone an uncertain glance. “We’ll just sink back into the snow if we try it.”

Yakone shook his head. “I don’t know, but there has to be a way.”