Free Midnight Lamp by Gwyneth Jones

She fell asleep while they were still talking: woke and slept again. At last she woke and realised she was listening to the sound of heedless movement, somewhere in the trees—and that the tiger and the wolf were already sitting up, sharply alert.
    ‘What is it?’, she whispered. ‘D’you think it’s a bear?’
    ‘More like Harry’s back-up,’ said Ax. ‘Discreetly checking up on us.’
    ‘I think it’s a bear,’ said Fiorinda. ‘I’m afraid of bears. I’ve read about them, they come after food, but then they attack people.’
    ‘D’you get bears in Mexico?’ wondered Sage. ‘I thought they were extinct.’
    ‘There are bear-notices at the Oficina here, and the dumpsters have special bear-proof lids that you have to open a trick way.’
    ‘Everything’s locked in the Rat,’ said Ax, soothingly. ‘I read the notices. We’re okay, Fee, they’re not aggressive. It’s just walking around, being a bear.’
    They lay down again.
    ‘There’s more than one,’ remarked Ax. ‘I think there’s several.’
    ‘Well, then Fiorinda can relax,’ mumbled Sage, turning his back. ‘It’s probably range cattle, an’ we can go to sleep because bears do not hunt in packs—’
    There was a loud crack from much closer at hand, a rush of movement. The bears were in the clearing: a gestalt flip, from noises in the dark to shaggy limber bodies, right there, arm’s reach—
    ‘They do now!’ cried Fiorinda.
    The men shot to their feet, astonished, very glad they’d been sufficiently on guard not to crawl into their bags. Pale eyes shone with a light from God knows where, one of the beasts rose, tall as a man. It opened its mouth, the teeth and tongue glistening. It seemed to speak —
    ‘No!’ shouted Fiorinda.
    ‘My God!’ yelled Ax. ‘Fee, get to the car!’ He raced for the woodstack, grabbed a branch and threw another to Sage. But the bears were everywhere , eyes blazing lambent white, there seemed to be ten, twenty of them. Sage and Ax, back to back, flailed their branches. Fiorinda crouched in the tumbled bedding at their feet. The beasts backed off and rushed in, again and again, what the fuck is this, what’s got into them? Is this a nightmare? Ax used his arm to fend off a snarling maw and staggered, the shoulder seam of his leather jacket parting. A bear fell back but immediately there was another one, and what is that light in their eyes, why the fuck are they attacking us—?
    ‘FIORINDA!’ howled Sage, swinging his futile club, ‘DO something, babe!’
    ‘I’m trying to think! I’m trying to think!’ She scrabbled in her sleeping bag. She never slept without her saltbox, but where is it, what can I do? Here’s the saltbox… brain won’t work . What can I do? Oh, fuck, someone’s fighting me!
    Oh no you don’t, try a taste of this, wham .
    White crystals flew out, curling through the dark like ribbon. Where they landed they burst into flame, blue and orange flame like a wall, that split to make a corridor. The three of them ran, walls of flame twisting with them, across the clearing to the Rugrat: grabbed the door, and leapt inside-
    Fire stood around the car in a seething curtain: then it vanished.
    ‘Don’t touch me for a moment,’ whispered Fiorinda, huddled against the driver’s door. The bears seemed to have gone.
    ‘What d’you think?’ breathed Ax.
    ‘I think she saw them off.’
    They took flashlights, and went out to investigate. There were solid physical traces of the attack. Clawmarks, torn earth, one torn sleeping bag: splintered and toothmarked remnants of firewood. Sage found the sleeve from Ax’s jacket, sliced as if with knife blades.
    ‘Shit… Did that reach you?’
    ‘Dunno.’ Ax investigated, and discovered four parallel scratches on his upper arm. No serious damage, but a little blood. ‘Fuck, I hope I’m not going to be a werebear. What the hell was all that about?’
    ‘No idea.’
    Fiorinda had got out of the car. They joined her at the picnic