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of the Arctic. The bears lived much of the year on the sea ice and gave birth to their cubs in snowdrift dens on land. As well as respecting the bears, all Inuit were afraid of them.
    Over the years, Alika had seen a few lumbering along the floe edges in the distance. He had run, fearing they'd scent him. Outside his family's dwelling, buried in snow much of the year, were five honored skulls of bears his papa had killed. The skulls warned other roaming bears not to intrude. So the boys had grown up with reminders of
nanuk.
    Alika knew that with its thick fur, huge paws,
small ears, and stubby tail, a bear could weigh up to fifteen hundred
kabloona
pounds. They were once brown in color, legend said, but became white to blend in with the snow and ice. They dated back millions of winters, Alika had heard.
    Alika and Sulu liked the old stories about
nanuk
best, particularly the ones passed down from the
illupiruq,
the great-grandparents. The boys asked the same things over and over. Papa answered each time as if the questions were new. Mama often nodded.
    When the hunters of Nunatak gathered together in the long darkness, Alika and Sulu listened with the other villagers. The stories were often about
nanuk
and the old times when the people speared the great white nomad, the times before guns. They always spoke of
nanuk
with reverence. When they killed
nanuk,
they asked for forgiveness. When they escaped his wrath and were not eaten alive, they thanked him.
    Old Sipsu said, "A hungry bear kept me inside my hunting
iglu
for five days until I used my knife to dig out the back of it. The bear chased me and took off part of my leg and was ready to chew the rest of me until I stabbed his nose. My mama made a clean cut of my stump and my papa made a crutch to replace the part that
nanuk
had eaten."
    Old Arutaq laughed when he talked about outrunning bears, but everyone knew he had been paralyzed the one time
nanuk
had surprised him at a seal hole. He'd jammed his spear into the bear's black nose and taken off across the floe. Sulu had laughed long about that, imagining what bowlegged Arutaq had looked like running away.
    Then Appa told of being out in his kayak, trying to spear a beluga whale, when
nanuk
swam up from behind, more interested in him than the whale.
    There were many stories like these passed down by the brave men who hunted
nanuk
with spears and dogs on open ice.
    As Alika and Sulu lay together on their sleeping platform in the dark, Sulu said, "Tell me all the old stories again."
    Alika said, "Well, animals ruled the lands everywhere, thousands and thousands of winters ago, well before the first two-legged hunter was born. Caribou and musk oxen were ten feet tall back then. Other animals were even larger than icebergs, with tails twenty feet long."
    "Where are they now?" Sulu asked.
    "They've been dead a long, long, long time."
    "How long?" Sulu asked.
    "I don't know," Alika answered. "But as time went by,
nanuk
became smaller, as did the caribou and the musk oxen, the size we have today."
    Sulu said, "Why don't the caribou and musk oxen have souls like bears?"
    "I think they do," said Alika. "Maybe Inu knows for sure. But I do know about the souls of bears. Papa always made certain that the souls of the ones he killed were satisfied and went to
nanuk
heaven. He smeared caribou fat on their mouths and hung his lance over their heads for five days. He would not kill another bear for many months, and that satisfied their souls."
    Both Alika and Sulu knew about Papa's fight with one bear before they were born. He had been gone three days and came home with the
nanuk
carcass on his sledge and with frightful wounds on his back. They'd seen his scars. He'd shared the bear meat with the whole village.
    Sulu said, "Is it true what Inu has said, that bears can hear us talk?"
    "I think so," Alika answered. Inu would not say what wasn't true.
    "After they are dead, can they hear us talk?"
    "Their souls can. They never really die,"