Toklo was thinking instead about carving out his own territory. He stayed alert for scratch marks on trees that warned of the presence of other grizzlies, but he didn’t see any. Pretty soon, he thought as he clawed some berries from a bush and gulped them down, as soon as I’ve found the right place, I’ll set some scratch marks of my own.

As he wandered further into the forest, he realised that he didn’t feel as if he was exploring. Instead his surroundings had a strange familiarity. That’s it! he thought, halting in surprise. I feel as if I’ve come home.

‘Fluff-brained or what?’ he muttered to himself, even while a warm sensation of comfort and safety was coursing through him from his snout to his tail. He had moved around so much with his mother and Tobi that he had never felt that he was at home before. They were always moving on, always padding restlessly from den to den, trying to find a place where they wouldn’t be disturbed by bigger bears who didn’t want them on their territory. This place felt more familiar, more reassuring than anywhere Toklo had been for a long time.

I remember that kind of bush, he thought as he ambled on, passing a thick shrub with dark, glossy leaves. Oka told us it’s no good to eat.

His ears pricked as he heard the sound of a bird hopping on a branch above his head. ‘Look at the bird over there.’ Oka’s voice seemed to sound in Toklo’s head. ‘That means there’ll be juicy maggots at the bottom of the tree, if we can get there first.’

Toklo padded over to the tree and sniffed, turning over the scraps of bark and twigs that littered the ground. Soon he exposed a cluster of fat white grubs, wriggling in the light. He licked them up with his tongue and crunched them. Delicious!

Further on, he heard the splash of a stream, and he stood on a jutting grey rock to gaze down into the peat-brown water. He remembered Oka teaching him and his brother not to stand on the green, mosscovered rocks. They’re too slippery. You could fall.

Toklo took a drink from the stream, then leaped across it and journeyed on. Memories were crowding in on him now, and he began to run, feeling sheer joy in the bunching and stretching of his muscles and the sensation of wind in his fur. Bushes slapped lightly against his pelt, and his ears filled with the song of the forest. He could almost sense two bears running alongside him, one large, the other much smaller.

Oka! Tobi! I’ve come home!