Simon’s loose snowshoe slipped even more. As he turned to study the far shore he stomped his foot then pushed down, then stomped again and twisted his foot to jam his boot into the binding as far as he could; after this last stomp and twist a great dish of ice beneath them suddenly cracked and sagged and cracked some more, and just as the two began to move it broke away and they fell through the ice.
But they didn’t fall into the freezing lake they had expected, and understood would mean a fearful death, strapped to so much dead weight in the icy cold water; instead they fell, and fell freely; they fell through space, through the air, waving and kicking next to each other, the broken ice from above falling around them, the snow from above showering them. They fell and landed with a hard thud on a rock solid surface that knocked all the wind and awareness out of Simon and crumbled the left ankle and jammed the right knee of Joe Loon before he then hit his head.
They lay still, side by side, nearly touching, but not moving.
Snow fell down on them, the sun shone down on them, from the hole in the ice above them.
Kevin and his man were waiting for Maureen when she arrived at the café. Kevin told him to share his information.
“I saw him enter the police station an hour ago.”
“He’s still there?”
“I got here five minutes before you. Saw you drive by twice, yeah. He was still there when I came to meet you.”
“I’m goin’ to find him.”
“Wait a minute. Shouldn’t we make a—”
“I appreciate that you found him here. But after what you told me last night I realized we don’t know anything about his habits that would help me make a plan. So I’ll find him an’ watch for the opportunity.”
As she stood Kevin placed his hand on her arm to keep her there.
“I don’t like this.”
“I have to do this now, Kevin. Right now.”
“And when you’re successful. Then what?”
She settled back in her chair.
Kevin had been writing on a paper when Maureen arrived. He slipped it to her. “A safe house, just across the border. Here’s the directions. You head there and I will meet you.”
She remembered this house, one they’d used when they were planning the second series of London bombing raids. She nodded her approval, handed the paper back to Kevin with a last half smile, and headed out the door and down the street towards the police station. The pistol was tucked in the loop in her sleeve.
Joe Loon and Simon lay still, next to each other, on their backs. They were so deeply shocked by the fall that nothing worked as it should and so they each lay there, just barely moving now.
Neither understood what had happened, or what was happening, or even what they were looking at when they finally opened their eyes, or where they were, for they were doubly stunned, by the impact of the fall, and by the sense, an emerging understanding, that the swirling colored lights around were the Path of Souls and so they might be dead.
Simon found the question forming on his lips but that was when the deep spasm hit him hard, for his lungs were demanding their first breath since the last he gasped just as the ice gave way, and it was a battle, it was coming hard, it hurt. His lungs wouldn’t fill, couldn’t fill, and he fought for that first breathe, so focused on this simple task, the pain in his lungs so great, that he had no capacity to clear his mind’s confusion from the swirling dimensions of the world he’d fallen into.
Joe Loon lay still on his back, surprised he wasn’t fighting for his life in the middle of a lake of freezing water, wondering if he had already lost the fight and this was his first gift from the next world, to forget his death pain as he takes his first steps along the Path of Souls, as he had never seen a world like this one, one that swirled around him, always changing its colors, dancing and leaping colors. Then the sharp pain in his leg seemed the pain of the world he lived in, and he wondered if it was some evidence they might still be alive.
Joe Loon was able to slip off one snowshoe, and hoped it would relieve some of the pain in his ankle, but it didn’t. He pulled himself up on his side, towards Simon, but the pains running up and down his leg from his knee, and the way his vision wriggled and rolled when he lifted and turned his head as he looked past his immediate situation caused a deep sickness in him, and he quickly turned away from Simon as he gagged up what his stomach could no longer hold.
When he turned back again he realized that now they were on the hard thick ice that had covered the River and its lakes for well over a month, ice so thick it supported an ice tractor hauling sleds of logs. They were lying on the ice they thought they had walked out on.
Simon pulled his legs up and was finally gaining on the breath he’d been struggling to catch. As he did, he saw the blue sky above, framed by a hole in the great ceiling of ice, nearly twenty feet above them; the hole sent a bright shaft of white light that shined on them both. A few snowflakes drifted down.
They turned to each other. Joe Loon was moving his legs and rotating his feet to determine his injuries and found they were badly damaged.
Simon tried to sit up but it was still too soon, so he lay back down again.
“Grandfather.”
They listened while the word rolled out as a hollow sound, not echoing, but lingering.
“Yes, my son.”
“Are we dead?”
“I think we are alive, but I am not sure.”
“What is this place?”
“I do not know.”
Simon sat up next to him and understood for the first time that their island of white light was surrounded, all around, by a world of colored lights, of dancing swirls of colorful lights that were constantly twisting and folding and opening, shifting from blue to green, red crossing over yellow to blossom orange, so wondrous a dream world it scared and delighted him.
Joe Loon shook his head. “This is a place between worlds.”
“Ah gee, I have never seen any place like this. So many colors of light. Is this the home of Waawaate?”
The sun’s light shone through the ceiling of ice, a ceiling with cracks and fissures and constantly shifting snow, and each crack and dancing variance affected the light refracting through the ice ceiling, then that refracted light reflected up off the ice floor, and was again remade, prism of light woven with prism of light, creating shimmering and swirling dances of light in columns and bolts and waves and currents. A silver gray had a brilliant blue streak running one way, then a green blue cut running the other, then white light glowed a moment with a rose wave rolling through it that became bright red; and when a wisp of wind in the world above caused new fallen snow to twirl and drifts to reform, the lights danced their harmony in blue.
This dance of lights was all around the white shaft that spot lit the pair.
“The ice has trapped Waawaate.”
“The Path of Souls passes through Waawaate.”
They watched the lights dance and flow. The red became rose again then wrapped itself around a shaft of blue silver before it vanished.
“Grandfather. It is beautiful.”
The sounds of their voices seemed to pause and hover, then join the dance of light all around.
There were other sounds. From just above, the crackling and tinkling, the crystalline snapping from the ice ceiling that sparkled overhead. And from far away, from some unknown distance, an echoed low rumble surrounded them.
“Is that low sound the voice of the dam Grandfather?”
“If that is the sound of the dam then I believe we are alive.”
It was the purity of their ice floor that was the piece of the puzzle that told Simon what must have happened. He remembered their trip to the dam during the summer, and the loud horn announcing the release of water.
“When the River began to freeze the water trapped behind the dam wall was there.” He pointed to their ice ceiling. “The ice began to form and became hard. But one day the dam let more water out. The water behind the
dam had dropped down to this level when the full winter ice formed.”
And it had formed perfectly protected from any distortion of the wind, no dimple or ruffles marked it, as absolutely smooth and slick a piece of ice that was ever created.
As Joe Loon studied the sleek surface he tried to look past the dancing lights; the thought came suddenly. He collected his legs under him to stand but the pain was so great he sat right back down again.
“My son, you must save us from this place. You must lead us out of this place between worlds. You must stand now and we must go.”
Simon tried to get to his feet but his balance was lost, from the effects of the blow and the distortion of living in the heart of the shimmering lights of Waawaate, and because the ice was so slippery smooth. He stayed on his knees until Joe Loon urged him again.
“My legs are broken. I cannot stand on them. You must save us.”
Joe Loon sat on the ice, the pain in his legs growing, and he collected his pack and the rifle and the last traps and his snowshoes all in a great pile in his lap. He had pulled a length of rope from under his coat and began to tie a loop in one end.
“We must find the way back to our world. We are not made for worlds between.”
As he finished with the rope, he looked and listened.
“I have lost the four directions…listen for the voice of the dam.”
After a moment listening, Simon pointed.
“It seems to be strongest in that direction Grandfather.”
“Yes, so then the shore is in this direction.”
Joe Loon put the loop of rope over his head, then under his armpits.
“I will be our sled; you will pull me.”
Simon grabbed the rope with both hands behind him, leaned forward, and began to pull in the direction Joe Loon had pointed, slipping on ice so very slick it was tricky catching enough traction for forward momentum, but any traction he did achieve was productive, for Joe Loon slid easily, sitting backwards behind Simon with his lap piled high. They slowly made their way, out of the spotlight into the world of swirling shafts and columns and waves of colored lights dancing and shimmering, glowing and glimmering. The dam’s deep rumbled purr and the icy bells above accompanied them as Joe Loon trailed his long length of scarf behind them to help them stay true to their course.
Watching the lights from the spotlight was fascinating. Now walking through them, bathed in them—the swirls and twirls enveloping one then the other, Simon bathed in blue and then bright red, Joe Loon yellow and then orange—this was fully befuddling, and Joe Loon was constantly calling course corrections as the scarf began to arc one way then the other.
Dutch, Mary Fobister, Grace O’Malley, and Little Stevie were finishing a late lunch when Brian stopped at their table. He gave his daughter a kiss then nodded for Dutch to step away with him for a moment.
“We’re into the third day now without hearing from her.”
“I don’t know what to say Bri.”
“God damn her. She promised to call every day; she knows there’s no way for me to call her… I need to get back to the booth.”
“As soon as we’re through here I’ll get them settled back in the room and come give you a hand.”
It looked like him.
He was more than a block away, but from the distance it looked like it could be him. Maureen’s heart was racing. An RUC officer was walking down the sidewalk, in her direction, and as soon as she saw him she thought it could be him. From this distance and with the brim of his hat covering so much of his face, she wasn’t yet sure.
He hadn’t been wearing a hat that day.
But it did look like him and with each step she was more confident.
She took a deep breath, for her heart was beating faster, and faster. She was accustomed to her state of deliberate calm as she prepared to act; now her adrenaline was winning and she was anxious for it.
She wanted to walk faster, she wanted to run, but her will won out and she maintained her steady stride as she wove her way through the pedestrians. She couldn’t take her eyes off him, and she bumped into a woman, who frowned at the lady who wasn’t watching where she was going and at the last moment a man stepped out of her way and smiled at her intense and otherworldly beauty.
But she didn’t notice them, for the RUC officer was coming closer.
It was him; he stopped to talk with an old man and pushed his hat back and Maureen’s knees nearly buckled. Faint, she leaned against a shop window, and took another deep breath.
She saw this man, pistol in his hand, standing over her da. She heard the crack of his pistol and saw her da’s eyes empty and his body crumble to the ground.
Her anxiety was gone.
They were five yards from each other and Maureen collected herself when she felt the weight of the pistol against her arm; she was in control again, and she slipped the pistol gracefully, and quickly, from the loop into her hand, still hidden in the folds of her coat. Just as she began to imagine this moment as an opportunity and pictured shooting him right there, in the name of Donovan O’Toole, for all to witness, he turned away from the old man and walked back in the direction he came from, and then he turned at the first corner and disappeared down a side street. Maureen had driven down that street twice and she smiled at her recollection of it and what she found at the end of it.
She walked to the corner; the side street was as it had been when she drove it—quiet. There was a shop on either side right at the corner, but no action on the street or sidewalk except her target walking away past the abandoned buildings that dominated both sides of the street.
She studied the sidewalk traffic towards the police station, to see if any other RUC were around. Finding none, she followed him, for she had her plan for this opportunity. If he continued on as he was, and if no one appeared, she would pick up her pace—she did—and when he got to the end of the street she would catch up to him, and call out to him, and ask him a question about a location just around the next corner to the alley she remembered was fully deserted and offered her a hidden escape route. There, she would raise her pistol and shoot him in the head.
So she followed him, ready with the story that would explain where she was heading if he turned and engaged her, and constantly looking back over her shoulder.
Half way down the street her target stopped to check a locked door and she ducked in an entryway. When she peaked around the corner he was continuing on and she hadn’t caught up with him by the time he turned the corner, so she came after him, silent and swift, her pistol ready in her hand, hidden in her coat pocket.
She turned the corner; he was gone, the back alley appeared empty.
“You lost, miss?”
She felt him behind her before he spoke, so she controlled her surprise and turned naturally, with a smile.
“Yes sir, can you help me.” She pulled her pistol from her pocket. “I was looking for a—” And now the pistol was free and she raised it quickly with a practiced touch.
But he had been suspicious; he hadn’t had time to wonder why this woman would be following him but instinct told him she was. So he was ready and he grabbed her arm in his firm grip and the pistol was pointed to the sky.
“Drop the—”
He was brought short by Maureen’s hard knee to his groin; his face grew dumb and she wrenched her pistol hand away to take aim at his head. He reached for the gun and just before she pulled the trigger she closed her eyes, and the shot fired out, and she felt him drop at her feet. When she opened her eyes again, there he was, lying on his back, with a bullet hole right through his left eye, and a pool of blood forming a halo around his head. He kicked out once, and she prepared to shoot again, but when he kicked again it was his last.
The alley led to an empty lot, then another street that would lead her to her car. Without looking back again, she headed that way.
On her way to the safe house she would look for a phone box to get a message to her Mum, that she was sorry
to miss her birthday but she wouldn’t be home soon.
And she would try to call Brian.
Simon stopped. He had grown accustomed to the lights; he thought he had learned to overcome their distraction. But now his confusion was back, for the strongest sound from the dam seemed to be ahead of them now.
“Grandfather, do you hear?”
Joe Loon heard, and had already called to the spirits who reside in the worlds between for help, and help was coming in a dark column of light spinning their way. As it approached, a darker shadow in the deep blue gray took shape and just as the column passed them, Joe Loon saw it quickly take the shape of a human’s face that vanished the instant it formed. It was Hunter and his blue grey column of light passed them and rolled on, marking a new course for them to follow.
Joe Loon pointed Simon in that direction.
“You will lead us that way.”
Simon had removed his snowshoes and was learning how to press against the inside edges of his boots to most effectively catch some friction to push off and pull his grandfather across the ice, but still the progress was slow, and often a step slipped by with no gain.
After a few minutes Simon stopped again. He thought he saw something move in the lights, ahead and off to the side. He stepped back to help his grandfather turn around to see.
“There is something coming towards us.”
“Yes.”
The shadow moved through the shifting lights, and as is it did a second and much larger shadow took shape behind it. Their course was not easy to ascertain with the lights all around always swirling and twirling and floating back and opening wide, and always changing colors. The two shadows moved slowly through veils of light that obscured, until the next step of the first shadow showed itself to be a wolf and Simon took a peek at his grandfather to gauge his reaction. The wolf trotted a path through the lights, a blue wolf one moment, then green, and then his natural silver seemed to glow with fire as a shimmer of rose washed over him.
Worlds Between Page 10