Have you heard the story of the last bear? If yes, then you may not be interested in what follows. But if you haven’t, then listen…
There was once a hunter who lived at the edge of a mighty ancient forest. His life seemed modest enough: a small house, with a vast lawn to the right and the deep forest stretching endlessly to the left. He lived alone. His children had long since grown up and left the family nest. No one knew his true origins. He had once been a red-haired man — bright and fiery in the years of his youth and strength — but now his hair had faded, touched with silver, thinning with age. Outwardly, he appeared calm, even harmless. But this man kept the entire forest in fear. He was a skilled hunter — not one who killed for food or survival, but for sport. His hunger was not of the body but of the spirit, driven by a need to dominate. The walls of his home were lined with the heads of his trophies — mute reminders of all he had conquered.
Every morning, he watched the sun rise behind the forest, listening to nature awaken, while strategizing his next venture into the wild. He felt the excitement of the chase and the thrill of victory. Something predatory stirred within him — an unrelenting hunger for dominance over the helpless creatures of the forest, watching them die at his feet. He killed simply because he could.
Then there was a bear seasoned by scars. One of the last of his kind in the forest tyrannized by the hunter. His children had been taken. His beloved mate, too. His brothers were gone. His mother had died alone, weighed down by sorrow, mourning the family she had lost — killed by the same hunter who roamed freely, terrorizing the forest.
One morning, the hunter felt the old, familiar urge. He dressed, took up his rifle, and entered the forest. His loyal dog followed. There, among the shadows, he sensed the presence of the bear. Slowly, methodically, he moved into position. He slowed his breath, steadied his hand. He became one with the rifle — a machine of death.
Then came the shot. It shattered the stillness of the morning forest. Smoke curled skyward. And the bear was gone.
The hunter searched and searched. There was blood — yes. But no bear. Even his faithful dog lost the scent. After hours of tracking, the hunter returned home, disappointed and irritable, even stung by a sense of humiliation and embarrassment caused by the bear. The forest had not yielded. Not this time.
The day passed slowly, in half-laziness, for the hunter. There was no usual routine of skinning the poor forest creatures — his trophies. By evening, the irritation had faded, replaced by a thrill and a certainty about the next morning. He assured himself that then he would find the bear and finish him once and for all. After all, no one could leave him in such a humiliating, embarrassing position as he had been that morning.
The next morning never came for the hunter. The bear, who had not died, entered the house that night. Wounded and bleeding, he walked slowly into the hunter’s bedroom and tore the man limb from limb. He ripped off his head and flung it aside. He opened the hunter’s stomach, peeling back the skin, savoring each piece of his body. Splashes of blood covered the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. The sound of cracking bones filled the silence.
After a while, the bear grew tired. He sat on the floor in a pool of blood, his own body still bleeding, and looked around at the scattered pieces of flesh and bone. Then his eyes lifted. Above the fireplace, above the torn remains, hung the heads of his children. He gazed at those dear faces he had loved so deeply — faces now frozen in death — and wept, mourning them.
He lingered there, broken but unbowed, until the first light of dawn reminded him that life still waited beyond the walls of death. The dawn was approaching. Rays of sunlight spilled into the room. It was time to go. The bear left the house and returned to the wilderness of his forest. He climbed to the highest ridge and sat, watching the sun rise. Golden light pierced the morning mist, brushing his skin with warmth and tenderness.
His eyes, full of tears, reflected the colors of the sunrise. They were unusual eyes for a bear — not the ordinary brown, but fjord-blue. A color not fixed, but shifting with the weather of his emotions, like the fjord changing its shades of blue under passing skies. Those tear-filled eyes caught the warmth of the sun and radiated the hope of a new beginning — the beginning of freedom for his home. His eyes were not merely blue, but fjord-blue, shimmering with the gold of freedom. And around him, the fairies swirled, joyful in the cheer of his victory.
And that was the story of the last bear: the hunter’s final hunt, and the prey who did not die.
Disclaimer
This text was written by the author with assistance from ChatGPT-5.0, which was used for checking English grammar and refining language flow.
The accompanying figure was generated by ChatGPT-5.0 with the assistance of the author.
Svetlana Saarela 