Leif flicked his eyes to the canoe upside down on the beach. Impossibly far to get to, to escape into the water. Without moving his head – something in his thinking strongly suggested it was best to not move – he let his gaze swing up into the trees. No help there – he would never reach them. Then back out to the water. He could move in that direction – try to dive in and swim away but if the bear only half tried it would have caught Leif before the water was past his waist.

The bear was too close.

Too close.

If the bear wanted him, there was simply nothing Leif could do to stop him. And a strange thing happened: he relaxed.

There was really nothing to worry about – it was like the weather. Worrying did no good at all. The bear was like a possible storm and if it took Leif it would be the same as if a squall wind had come and blown the boy away.

The Sick had not killed him. He had not starved to death. The whirlpool had puked him up like eel meat. He had been in violent storms on the ships that held him work-captive. If Odin wanted him, there had been many opportunities to take him.

The same now.

It wasn’t up to the bear, really. It was up to fate, Odin, Leif’s luck.

So he relaxed. The hair went down on his neck. His breathing returned to normal and he relaxed. Then, still without moving, he waited.

And studied the bear. It moved towards the drying blanket, the canoe, whuffling the ground with its nose as it moved and Leif was astonished at how little sound it made. It must have weighed as much as many men together and yet there wasn’t even the tiniest sound when its paws hit the ground.

And it was incredibly fat with amazingly thick and luxurious fur that seemed to ripple when it walked, pushed by the fat just under the skin. When the fur caught the sun it shone with a near-gold colour – as the seal furs shone – and when the bear grew closer Leif could see insects flying about the long hairs of the fur.

It stopped at the blanket and with one long claw – with careful, impossible dexterity – it lifted the blanket, smelled beneath it, and flicked it to the side.

Then the smaller pieces – the ball of cord, the hand axe, the pouch with his steel and flint, it examined carefully, turning them over with tiny motions from the enormous claw – it smelled, then snorted and moved to the canoe.

Here the bear smelled the inside, idly licked at a stain, used one paw to flip the canoe over, and smelled the bottom and when that was done, turned, and stood at the edge of the water and looked at Leif, who was standing knee-deep about five paces from the bear.