(part XXXXXII)
As Willow lay on the ground motionless
Both Moon Cow and I put two more arrows
Into the belly of the mama bear as she stood up
Which shook her enough
To make her turn around and start walking off
With her baby now
In front of her and moving away
Moon Cow motioned to me to tend to Willow
And he slowly followed the bear
Putting two more arrows into her
Before she finally collapsed some distance beyond
The edge of the clearing.
When he came back to us
He had the bear cub by ruff of its baby neck
I was minding to Willow
Who didn’t have any cuts or bruises
That I could see immediately
But she was whiter then a ghost
And not responding to me
Knocked out I could only guess
By this time, Lily was up and out of her bed
Very worried about her mother
To keep her busy
I asked her to clean up what the bear had knocked down
And if she could, a cup of tea for her mother
I took some of the sweet mint leaves
And rubbed them together under her nose
Which slowly brought some colour back to her face
Her breathing became more dominant
And her eyes opened
And the first thing she said was
Is Lily ok?
I smiled at her and said Lily was right here
Who came over and lay down next to her mom
With a blanket in her hand
That she wrapped around the two of them
Clearly shaken and trying to be brave
I asked Willow if anything hurt
She said she couldn’t really tell
So I started with getting her to wiggle her toes
Which she was able to
Then I asked her to rock her feet slowly
From side to side
Which she was able to
I then pinched her toes
Which she said she could feel
So I declared she was going to live
And everybody laughed a little bit,
Including Willow
Which immediately made her wince in pain
Pointing to her stomach.
Through a process of poking and prodding
I eventually concluded that she had broken a rib or two
I was relieved (and so was she)
That when she next peed
There was no blood in it
We both knew what that would mean.
We decided to take the day
To decide which direction we should go
To Frank and Amy’s, where they had a warm house
And all the care we could ask for
This was still about a two days walk
If Willow wasn’t going to be able to ride a horse,
The other option was to head back to the village
Which would be about a days walk from here
Maybe two, if it was really hard for her to walk
Moon Cow proposed we make a sleigh
For her to ride in
But I knew that that would be no more comfortable
Then her riding the horse
And Willow agreed with this
So we decided that walking
Would be the smartest route for her.
By the end of the day
Willow was able to walk around
In moderate comfort
And we could definitely see the bruising starting to form
On her left rib area
Where the bear had collided nearly full charge.
(part XXXXXIV)
