Offering to the Storm

by Dolores Redondo

‘This “other” of which Salazar y Frías spoke, was very real.’

  ‘Was or is?’ As she spoke, Amaia checked the messages on her phone; she saw no reply from Jonan, and reflected how he would regret missing out on this conversation when she told him about it.

  ‘Do you realise, my analytical, logical, pragmatic niece, that you’re talking about witchcraft in the twenty-first century?’

  ‘“When the new ways don’t work, people fall back on the old ones,”’ replied Amaia, quoting her aunt.

  ‘I’d like to meet your source,’ Engrasi said. ‘I find it intriguing that the Old Testament accepts the existence of lesser divinities, otherworldly forces that demanded constant sacrifices in order to survive. Take the story of the god Dagon. Three times his statue was found lying prostrate before the Ark of the Covenant, which had been placed in the temple dedicated to him, the third time with his head and hands severed. This was interpreted as the submission of the lesser divinities to the one God. In his book about the gods and heroes of ancient Greece, Robert Graves writes that when Jesus was born, the lesser divinities went to sleep until the end of time.’

  ‘Or until someone or something roused them …’

  ‘If you’re right, and someone has invoked Inguma, that would explain why the guardian keeps appearing. It must have taken an offering so astonishing, a crime so monstrous, that I wouldn’t be surprised if your Vatican priest were concerned,’ she said, fixing Amaia with her gaze, as though hoping to elicit the information that would confirm her suspicions.

  Amaia would have been amused by her aunt’s perspicacity had she not been assailed by images of the desecrations, her family’s violated itxusuria, its burial ground, the mound of stones on the table rock, her sister’s empty coffin, the Esparza girl’s dark, silky hair poking out of the rucksack in the rain, and the words of Amatxi Ballarena as she told her how Inguma had awoken in 1440 because someone had wanted to rouse him, and that the demon’s quest for lives hadn’t stopped until his thirst was quenched.

  32

  She soon regretted her decision to walk to the police station. Despite keeping up a brisk pace, the cold had rapidly seeped into her bones. The Puffa jacket she had worn up the mountain was still damp, and the overcoat she had put on instead was scarcely warm enough, with the pale sky threatening snow. As she entered the building, she bumped into Iriarte and Benigno Berrueta, who stopped in his tracks when he saw her.

  ‘Inspector …’

  She approached him cautiously; relatives could react unpredictably. Some were driven by grief and despair to search for scapegoats to assuage their own guilt, and the police were an easy target. She’d been on the receiving end a hundred times and had witnessed many more instances. But she relaxed when she saw the man’s hands outstretched, his eyes seeking out hers.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Berrueta, ‘thank you for trying. I heard about the problems you had, and if only they’d let you do your job, this would never have happened. I visited Yolanda in hospital this morning before coming here, and she told me that after the explosion she looked inside the tomb and they were there. My daughter’s hand was reduced to a pulp, her eye was hanging out of its socket, and yet she found the strength to shine a torch inside the grave to look for her children. You’ll probably think I’m crazy, but I’m glad this happened. It’s terrible, but it was the only way. My daughter knew that, and she did what had to be done. Today, for the first time in years, she started to grieve for her children, and I am hoping she has also started on the road to recovery.’

  Amaia looked at Iriarte, who was standing next to Berrueta. She extended her hand, which he clasped between his, slipping her his business card …

  ‘Thank you again,’ he said.

  The station was quiet upstairs; on Saturdays most of the officers were on traffic duty, and the crime team hadn’t much to do that morning. Amaia stood over her desk, checking her emails on the computer, while she listened to Iriarte.

  ‘It seems they’ll be able to save her eye, but she’ll be scarred for life. Apart from that, she’s out of danger and making a surprisingly speedy recovery. Like her father said, what happened appears to have accelerated the grieving process: acceptance is the hardest part – you can’t make any progress until you reach that stage.’

  She remained silent for a few seconds while she thought.

  ‘Judge Markina has assured me that De Gouvenain won’t be taking this any further.’

  Iriarte heaved a sigh of relief. ‘At last some good news – it’s been thin on the ground lately.’

  ‘Has Etxaide been in?’

  ‘Today’s Saturday,’ he replied, as if that explained everything.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, taking out her phone and checking her emails again. ‘But as I told you, we agreed he’d send me the photos he took yesterday at the cemetery in Ainhoa, and he hasn’t. It’s not like him.’

  Iriarte shrugged, and started towards the exit.

  She followed, dialling Jonan’s number; it rang four times then went to voicemail.

  ‘Call me, Jonan,’ she said after the tone.

  The cold stung her face as she crossed the threshold, and she accepted gratefully Iriarte’s offer of a lift home. As they drove past Juanitaenea, he said:

  ‘The refurbishment doesn’t seem to be making much headway.’

  ‘No,’ she replied, a sudden wave of sorrow overwhelming her. Old Señor Yáñez’s words echoed in her head: A house isn’t a home.

  ‘Well, have a good trip,’ said Iriarte, pulling up outside Engrasi’s house. ‘When are you leaving?’

  ‘Tomorrow at noon,’ replied Amaia, climbing out of the car. ‘Tomorrow.’

  By afternoon, the sky had turned completely white, suggesting it would be snowing soon. At five o’clock, her phone rang, and on the screen she read the words: ‘Jonan home’. She wasn’t even aware that Jonan had a landline. She heard a woman’s voice on the other end of the phone.

  ‘Inspector Salazar? Deputy Inspector Etxaide’s mother speaking.’ Now she remembered: Jonan had given her their number once when he stayed with them for a few days while he had the decorators in.

  ‘Good afternoon, Señora, how are you?’

  ‘I’m fine, well …’ Her voice was tremulous. ‘Forgive me for calling you, but I can’t seem to get hold of Jonan, and … I don’t like to bother you, I thought perhaps you and he might be working on a case.’

  ‘No, we’re not working today. Have you tried his mobile?’ she said, instantly feeling foolish; of course she had, she was his mother.

  ‘Yes,’ the woman replied. ‘I was hoping you might know where he was. We were expecting him for lunch at one, and … well, this might sound foolish, but he always calls if he’s going to be late, and he’s not picking up.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s asleep,’ she said, not believing it herself. ‘These past few days have been exhausting, we’ve been working into the early hours, he might not have heard his phone.’

  After saying goodbye to Jonan’s mother, she dialled his mobile again, and once more the call went to voicemail.

  ‘Jonan, call me as soon as you get this message.’

  She rang Montes.

  ‘Fermín, are you in Pamplona?’

  ‘No, I’m in Elizondo. Why?’

  ‘Forget it …’

  ‘Boss, what’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing … Etxaide didn’t show up at the station this morning; we’d arranged for him to bring me some photos, and he hasn’t emailed them either. He isn’t picking up his phone, and his mother just called me. She’s worried because Jonan was supposed to have lunch with them, but he hasn’t turned up or called to let them know. She sounded worried. That’s the first time she’s called me in two years.’ After explaining it all, Amaia felt even more anxious.

  ‘Okay,’ said Montes. ‘I’ll call Zabalza. He lives near to Jonan’s place. He can easily pop over to check that he’s okay. I expect he’s fallen asleep with his phone on silent.’

  ‘Good,’ sh
e replied. ‘Do that.’

  James sat among the suitcases open on the bed, crossing things off the list they’d made of essential items, while Amaia rolled up her clothes so that they’d take up the minimum amount of space. She only needed enough for the first week, because everyone attending the Quantico seminars would be kitted out with a uniform when they arrived. This consisted of a track suit, shorts, trainers, four T-shirts, field fatigues, a bulletproof vest, belts, boots, socks and a badge they were obliged to wear at all times, which identified them as a participant in the course. They were also supplied with pens, a notebook, a folder with A4 paper and a cap bearing the letters FBI – the only thing they were permitted to take home with them.

  ‘Is something wrong?’ asked James, who had been watching her.

  ‘Why do you ask?’ she said, anxiously.

  ‘I’ve just watched you fold the same T-shirt three times.’

  She gazed at the piece of clothing in her hands as if she were seeing it for the first time.

  ‘Yes …’ she said, tossing it into the suitcase, distractedly.’ She was aware of having already experienced this sensation, and she knew what was coming. ‘I have to go, James,’ she said suddenly.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Where?’ she repeated, pulling off the cardigan she wore around the house, and taking her coat off the hook behind the door. ‘I’m not sure yet,’ she mused aloud, staring at him.

  ‘Amaia, you’re scaring me, what’s going on?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said, aware that this was a lie. Of course you know, her own voice echoed in her head. She raced down the stairs, James following on her heels, alarmed.

  Engrasi, who was keeping an eye on Ibai in his new play area, rose when she saw her.

  ‘What’s the matter, Amaia?’

  She was about to reply when her phone rang. It was Fermín Montes.

  ‘Boss, Jonan was at home all the time. Zabalza went there and found the door open. Fuck, Amaia! He’s been shot.’

  Everything around her shattered into a thousand pieces that drifted away towards the ice-cold void of the universe. She had known for hours that something wasn’t right, she’d felt the weight in her neck, like something out of an Arab curse that crawls beneath your skin and forces you to carry it around with you for eternity. She found herself trying to remember when she’d first started to feel its menacing presence. She would think about that later, she told herself, she hadn’t time now. First she called Iriarte, then the police station in Pamplona, and finally she got in the car, clapping the siren on to the roof. She was fastening her seat belt when Montes leapt into the passenger seat beside her.

  ‘I told you to wait for me.’

  She accelerated by way of a reply.

  ‘Aren’t we waiting for Iriarte?’

  ‘He’s taking his car,’ she said, gesturing towards the rear-view mirror. Iriarte’s vehicle was right behind them. ‘What exactly did Zabalza say?’

  ‘He told me he rang the doorbell, and when Jonan didn’t answer, he knocked on the door, which it turned out was open. As soon as he walked in, he saw Jonan lying on the ground. It was obvious he’d been shot.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘In the chest.’

  ‘But he’s alive?’

  ‘Zabalza wasn’t sure. He said there was a lot of blood – he called the ambulance and then he called me.’

  ‘What do you mean, he wasn’t sure? He’s a police officer, for Christ’s sake!’

  ‘The pulse can be very weak when someone loses a lot of blood,’ explained Montes.

  ‘How many times?’ she asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘How many times was he shot?’ she shouted, struggling to make herself heard above the wail of the siren.

  ‘Twice, as far as he could tell.’

  ‘As far as he could tell,’ she echoed, speeding up as they reached a straight section of road, cursing every mile that separated them from Pamplona. ‘Call him again,’ she commanded.

  Montes obeyed.

  ‘He isn’t picking up.’

  ‘Well keep trying!’ she shouted. ‘Keep trying, damn it!’

  Montes dialled again.

  They had reached the first buildings on the outskirts of Pamplona when it began to snow. The flakes fell on to the car with a slowness that, when she thought about it later, seemed as unreal as everything that had happened after Montes’s call. And yet those snowflakes, as big as rose petals, would remain etched on her memory until the day she died.

  The sky was falling. The sky was dissolving with grief, blanketing the city, and nothing mattered any more.

  ‘Which hospital?’ she asked.

  Montes didn’t reply straight away.

  ‘He’s at the house.’

  She looked at him uneasily, taking her eyes off the road for too long as it became increasingly treacherous.

  ‘Why?’ she asked, her voice that of a desperate little girl demanding answers.

  ‘I don’t know,’ replied Montes. ‘I don’t know … Maybe they’re trying to stabilise him.’

  Patrol cars blocked both ends of the street. They flashed their badges, and rather than wait for the cars to move aside, Amaia drove up on to the pavement. Two ambulances were parked outside the entrance to the apartment block, and a dozen uniformed police officers were busy keeping curious neighbours and onlookers away. Leaping out of the car, she ran towards the entrance. Despite the heavy snowfall blinding her and covering every surface, she recognised Dr San Martín’s car double-parked outside, and the sight of it triggered in her mind an avalanche of doubt.

  ‘What’s he doing here?’ she asked Montes, who was right behind her, as they went through the door held open by a police officer. She repeated the question as they hurried past the lift, which was in use, and ran up the stairs:

  ‘What’s San Martín doing here?’

  She was relieved when Montes didn’t reply. The question wasn’t aimed at him, it was aimed at the universe; nor did she want him to reply, and yet she couldn’t help asking the question. She came to a landing, then continued up the next flight of stairs … Was it the fourth or fifth floor? She wasn’t sure. Inside her, a ball of fire was growing. She had kept it at bay on the way there, concentrating on the miles burning up beneath her tyres. But the instant she glimpsed San Martín’s vehicle, that monstrous portent of grief and misery, it had begun to climb up her throat, like a repulsive creature pushing its way through her mouth. She gulped air as she ran, forcing back the imminent birth of this thing inside her. She wished she could kill it, choke it to death, smother it, prevent it from ever seeing the light. They reached the apartment. She saw Zabalza, pale and distraught, leaning against the wall between Jonan’s front door and the lift; overwhelmed, he had slid down on to his haunches. Seeing her, he leapt to his feet – impossibly quickly, she thought, given the state he was in.

  Inside Amaia the question clamoured: What’s he doing here?

  Zabalza intercepted her at the door.

  ‘Don’t go in,’ he whispered. It was a plea.

  ‘Get out of my way!’

  ‘Don’t go in,’ he repeated, holding her firmly by the arms.

  ‘Let go of me!’ She wriggled free, but Zabalza was determined. The force with which he held her, clasping her to his chest, belied the despair on his face, his thin voice.

  ‘Don’t go in, please, don’t go in,’ he implored, looking searchingly at Montes, who had reached the fourth floor and was shaking his head.

  Amaia was aware of Zabalza’s cheek against hers, the scent of laundry softener on his jumper, the more acrid smell of sweat underneath. She stopped struggling for a few seconds, and when she felt Zabalza’s body slacken, grabbed her gun from its holster, and pressed it into his side. He stiffened as he felt the hard muzzle, raising his arms and gazing at her with infinite sorrow. Amaia entered the apartment. Seeing San Martín crouched over Jonan, she obtained the reply to the question she hadn’t wanted to ask, the reply she didn’t wish
to hear. Jonan Etxaide, Jonan, her closest friend, possibly the finest person she had ever known, lay sprawled on his back, in the middle of a large pool of blood.

  He had been shot twice. Once, as Montes had told her, in the chest, just below the sternum. The bullethole was dark and relatively clean, as most of the blood came from the exit wound. The other shot, to the forehead, had left a tiny circular mark, raising the chestnut hair on his crown into a congealed mass. She approached, still clutching her weapon, to the consternation of the other officers inside the sitting room. And at that moment, having tried so carefully not to breathe, she could hold on no longer. She inhaled, giving life to that creature, which rose up her gullet, choking her as she opened her mouth, resigned to letting the horror inside her escape. She felt as if she was suffocating. The pain was so intense her eyes stung as the last breath of air left her lungs, searing her throat. Her head was spinning, and she fell to her knees beside Jonan Etxaide’s lifeless body.

  Then, the grief that had been gestating inside her was born. And as the tears flowed from her eyes, as her heart imploded with grief, she felt that she loved it, as she did all the fruits of her womb, she embraced it, became one with her sorrow, aware that no other would ever equal it, and yet she would have died rather than feel it. She leaned forward, opened her eyes and amid the tears she saw his pale hands resting in the dark pool of blood, his handsome face wearing the mask of death, his pale mouth open, all colour drained from his lips. A stabbing pain made her clasp her hands to her chest. Only then did she realise she was still holding her gun. She looked down at it, wondering where to put it. Kneeling beside her, Montes carefully prised the gun from her hand, as he looked at San Martín. The Professor, the man who loved to give a running commentary while he worked, was struck dumb; his ashen face wore an expression of despair, his eyes shone with what to Montes seemed like disbelief. His hands were sheathed in gloves as he examined the wounds slowly, with infinite care, running his fingers over Jonan’s hair caked with blood, a subtle, unusual gesture, which gave the impression that he was trying to staunch the wound with his fingers, push the shards of bone back into Jonan’s skull, the viscous grey matter, the pooled blood staining the floor. A ritual that Montes assumed was new to San Martín, and which he interrupted only to look at Amaia. Free of her gun, she had folded her arms firmly across her chest, in what might have seemed like an attempt to console herself, but which San Martín recognised as a supreme effort to control her urge to touch the body, thereby contaminating the scene. Their eyes met, and he gazed at her, devastated, his lips set in a fold. He didn’t speak, he couldn’t as he kept running his fingers mechanically through Jonan’s hair. Montes and San Martín had never really liked each other; Montes found the doctor’s clinical techno-babble irritating, while San Martín considered Montes’s policing methods antiquated. But in that instant, as he observed the pathologist’s gloved hand resting on Jonan’s head, Montes knew that he would be incapable of carrying out the autopsy.