The Ice Star (Konstabel Fenna Brongaard Book 1)

by Christoffer Petersen

  “You’re enjoying this?”

  “Better than picking up drunks on the weekend,” he said and gripped the handle of the door. He pushed it open only to duck back inside the station as the first of Burwardsley’s bullets thwacked into the door frame, the report of the Browning Hi Power ricocheting between the wooden buildings, echoing in the last clouds of fog. Maratse pulled his service pistol and loosed three rounds across the street at Burwardsley’s position, the big lieutenant dropped to the ground and sought cover.

  “Go.” Maratse said and pushed Fenna toward the Toyota, the engine rumbling in the gravel.

  Fenna pulled open the passenger door, hesitating at the sight of Petersen in the boot behind the rear passenger seat, his fingers curled around the square mesh of the dog guard.

  “Don’t worry about him,” Maratse said as he jumped into the driver’s seat.

  “What’s he doing there?”

  Maratse threw the Toyota into reverse, gravel spewing from the front wheels, spattering the front of the station with stone shot. He reversed onto the street and shifted into first gear.

  “He followed me,” Maratse said as floored the accelerator. Fenna rocked into the policeman’s shoulder. She gripped the carbine in her left hand, reached for the door and slammed it closed.

  “You have to stop him, Fenna. He’s breaking the law,” Petersen said, his fingers gripping the dog guard.

  “He’s not the only one.” Fenna shifted position to look out the rear window, flinching as the glass shattered and Petersen’s head slammed into the guard, the crack of Burwardsley’s Browning chasing the shot. She caught her breath at the sight of Petersen’s blood, brain matter and bone fragments spattered across the plastic grille.

  Maratse slewed the Toyota around the corner of the dirt street, sledge dog puppies and children scattering in front of the police car. He turned on the siren and the flashing blue light. A grin spread across the Greenlander’s face. Fenna turned away from Petersen as the man’s body slid into the rear and out of sight. She pulled on her seatbelt.

  “Do we have a plan?” Fenna said and pushed her palm against the roof of the vehicle as Maratse bumped over an old sledge runner, shifted into fourth gear. “We’re going to run out of road.”

  “No problem,” Maratse said and pointed at the sea ice covering the fjord. “Lots of road there.” He swung the Toyota into a right-hand turn, braked hard and wound down the window. Maratse pulled his service pistol and fired two rounds toward the red-striped yellow Hilux bearing down the dirt road. Fenna stared at the Nepali Sergeant behind the wheel.

  “Where did they get a vehicle?”

  “Stolen from the heliport,” Maratse said and shifted gear. He stomped on the accelerator and slung the police car down the incline to the harbour. Fenna pushed one hand against the dashboard as Maratse bumped the Toyota up and over the ice foot. Once on the sea ice, Maratse shifted through the gears, surface melt-water spraying from the wheels, funnelling to each side of the car as he wound up the window. He turned to Fenna. “It’s good? No?”

  Fenna leaned into Maratse, tilting her head for a better view of the wing mirror. The yellow and red Hilux bumped over the ice foot, the rear end swerving left and right as Bahadur settled into pursuit. Burwardsley stood in the bed of the pickup, gripping the roll bar behind the cabin as he jostled the Nepali’s SA80 onto the cab roof. Fenna watched as he leaned into the weapon and took aim.

  The first burst from Burwardsley’s SA80 raked the passenger side of the police Toyota. Maratse bounced up and down behind the steering wheel, cursing the ruts of the wheel tracks locking them in a straight line across the ice. He pushed the accelerator pedal flat to the floor, glancing at Fenna as the Toyota’s engine growled - a mere thirty centimetres of ice between them and the Greenland Sea.

  “We have to get out of this rut,” Fenna said and banged her head on the window. She flinched at a second burst of lead to her right.

  “Shoot back,” Maratse shouted. “Crawl into the back seat.”

  Fenna threw the M1 Carbine onto the back seat, unclipped her seatbelt and squirmed between the seats into the back. She ducked behind the seat back and loaded the carbine, leaning her back against the passenger seat. Fenna poked the barrel of the carbine through the dog guard, resting the stock on top of the seat. She took aim.

  Fenna’s first bullet splintered the windshield, startling Bahadur into the same tracks they were caught in. With her target trapped in a static line of pursuit, Fenna took her time with each shot, anticipating the bumps and jolts in the ice road with well-placed rounds and the occasional near-miss. The Nepali slowed, the Hilux bumping further and further behind them.

  “I made them cautious,” Fenna called out as she peered along the sight.

  “Maybe,” Maratse said and adjusted the rear-view mirror. “Maybe not.”

  Fenna watched as Bahadur rolled the Hilux back and forth until the front wheel on the passenger side crept over the lip of the tyre tracks. The Hilux inched forward, bumped onto the surface of the ice and accelerated.

  “They’re coming back,” Fenna said and pulled the M1 out of the grill. She slid over to the other side of the seat and took aim.

  “Not long,” Maratse called out.

  “Until what?”

  “Thin ice,” he said and grinned at her in the rear view mirror.

  Maratse shifted down through the gears and slowed the Toyota, rolling backwards and forwards until the police car bumped out of the tracks. With a volley of shots, Fenna pushed the Hilux to her left, further out to sea and wide of the Toyota. Burwardsley walked a long burst of 5.56mm into the ice and rear passenger window showering Fenna in a storm of glass.

  “Maratse,” Fenna yelled as she ducked.

  “All okay,” he said and accelerated, aquaplaning through a large puddle of surface meltwater. Maratse gripped the steering wheel as the Toyota spun one hundred and eighty degrees. When the Toyota stopped spinning the engine stalled.

  The Ship

  EAST GREENLAND

  Chapter 17

  “I’m getting out,” Fenna said and slid across the seat. She opened the passenger door on the driver’s side and dropped onto the ice. Fenna crouched by the rear wheel and took aim, firing single shots at the rapidly approaching Hilux.

  The Toyota engine coughed and shuddered as Fenna ran back to the passenger door. The engine caught on Maratse’s third attempt, exhaust fumes spattered the ice. Fenna climbed in behind Maratse as he shifted into first and spun the Toyota out of the puddle and in front of the Hilux just as Bahadur rammed the passenger side, crumpling the bonnet. Fenna fired blindly, emptying the carbine’s magazine into the rear of the Hilux.

  “Take this,” Maratse ripped his pistol out of the holster and flung it onto the back seat. Fenna grabbed the Heckler and Koch 9mm USP Compact pistol, leaned into the back of the passenger seat and fired. Maratse flicked the finger at the Nepali as the police car and the Hilux roared alongside one another, alternating between jarring bumps and the crack and thump of incoming rounds.

  “Shit,” Maratse said and slammed on the brakes, spinning out to the left and away from the Hilux. He turned the Toyota toward the brown rocky coastline and accelerated away from a wide lead of black water splitting the ice in a long line before them. Fenna held her breath as Bahadur accelerated, throwing the Hilux over the lead and crashing into the sea ice on the other side, the rear wheels spinning, half on, and half off the ice. Burwardsley threw himself over the cab, sliding down the bonnet, spreading his weight over the front end of the vehicle. The Nepali turned the steering wheel back toward the ice, swerving toward the open water and back again, slinging the Hilux onto the safety of thicker ice. He accelerated in a course parallel to the police car. Burwardsley clambered back into the bed of the pick-up.

  “We’re going to run out of ice,” Fenna said and crawled into the passenger seat beside Maratse. “It will be even thinner near the shore. The current around that point,” she said and jabbed her fin
gers toward the granite coastline, where black lichen and bare rock peppered the snow above the ice foot. “It’s bad there, isn’t it?”

  “Iiji,” Maratse said and shifted to a higher gear.

  “Then what?”

  “Wait,” he said. He jerked the Toyota into fifth and fished a crumpled packet of Prince cigarettes from his pocket. He tossed the packet into Fenna’s lap.

  “I don’t smoke.”

  “I do,” he said and pointed at his mouth.

  Fenna pulled a cigarette from the packet and poked it between Maratse’s lips. He rolled it into the gap between his teeth with his tongue and leaned forwards as Fenna lit the cigarette with the lighter tucked inside the packet.

  “Qujanaq,” he said. Maratse gripped the wheel with both hands and puffed at the cigarette.

  Fenna turned to stare at the Hilux churning along the ice on the other side of the lead. Bahadur gripped the wheel. Burwardsley leaned against the roll bar, the stock of the bullpup rifle resting on his hip.

  “What do we do about them?”

  “Wait,” Maratse said and swerved around a patch of thin ice. The Toyota buoyed as the pack ice bowed under the vibration of the wave building beneath the surface. Maratse slowed, driving in ever-widening curves around patches of ice too weak to hold the weight of the vehicle. “There,” he said and pointed towards the shore.

  “Where?” Fenna said and placed her hands on the dashboard. She leaned forward and scanned the coastline.

  “Left of the point.”

  “A sledge,” Fenna said and pointed. “I see it.”

  “Kula,” Maratse said and grinned, smoke billowing out of the corners of his mouth.

  “That’s a big team.” Fenna squinted, shading her eyes as the sun cut through the fog. A team of dogs running in fan formation pulled a long, broad sledge smartly across the ice. With an extra two metres of line, a small bitch led the team.

  “Seventeen dogs,” Maratse said and stabbed his chest with his thumb. “Seven of mine.” He leaned over the wheel, staring at the ice as he accelerated.

  Fenna twisted in her seat and looked across the lead of open water at the yellow and red-striped Hilux. She watched as Burwardsley banged his fist on the cab roof as he bent down to shout through the driver’s window. The lieutenant pointed at the approaching sledge.

  “Bad ice,” Maratse said and pointed to the right as the Hilux slowed. “They won’t make it.”

  “What’s the plan?” Fenna said and rested the 9mm pistol on her thigh.

  “You get on the sledge and go find Dina.”

  “With Kula?”

  “Iiji.”

  “What will you do?”

  “Stop them,” Maratse said and pointed at the Hilux crawling along the ice behind them. Fenna watched as Burwardsley jumped down from the vehicle and then walked ahead of the vehicle, directing Bahadur around the thin ice.

  “You’ll need this,” Fenna said and slipped Maratse’s pistol back into the policeman’s holster.

  Kula slowed his dog team to a stop. He leaped lightly from the sledge, curling the sealskin whip back and forth along the surface of the ice until the team dropped to their bellies. Maratse lifted his foot from the accelerator pedal, down-shifting and drifting to a stop by the side of the team.

  “Out,” Maratse said and nodded towards the sledge.

  “Thank you,” Fenna said and gripped the policeman’s hand.

  “Find Dina,” he said and gave Fenna’s hand a final squeeze.

  “Be careful, Maratse.”

  “Iiji.”

  Fenna stepped out of the Toyota as the policeman waved at Kula. Maratse stuck a new cigarette between his lips, lit it and crunched the Toyota into gear. He turned the vehicle through a slow circle on the ice as Fenna watched him leave.

  “Fenna?” Kula said and pressed a firm hand upon her shoulder.

  “Yes,” she said and turned. The hunter cracked a smile in his weather-beaten almond-skinned face. His cheeks creased beneath bushy, black eyebrows.

  “We must go,” he said and hurried Fenna to the sledge and dogs.

  The dogs stirred as she sat sideways towards the front of the sledge. Fenna zipped Maratse’s jacket and pulled up the collar as Kula pressed the patrol’s satellite telephone into Fenna’s hand.

  “The battery is dead,” he said.

  “Where did you get it?”

  “From your sledge.” Kula pointed to the mouth of the fjord to the east. “Around the point.”

  “Dina sledged all that way?”

  “Maybe,” he said. “I haven’t found Dina, only your sledge and team. I’ll take you to them.” He glanced over his shoulder at the Toyota, cracked the whip on the ice and leaped onto the sledge, his thin legs hidden within the thick fur of polar bear skin trousers. Kula curled the whip along the ice, distracting the dogs from the alternating crack of 9mm and 5.56mm rounds as Maratse harassed Burwardsley and his Nepalese Sergeant. Fenna started at the noise of another round close by. Kula grinned, and snapped the whip a second time. The team tugged at the traces, blurring into a mass of fur and bushy tails pulling the sledge across the ice towards the open lead of black water.

  “That’s a big lead,” Fenna said and clenched her fists.

  “Iiji,” Kula said and shrugged. “They’re good dogs.” He reached into a sledge bag hanging between the uprights and handed Fenna a pair of sealskin mittens. He nodded for her to put them on. The sealskin blocked the wind and Fenna’s fingers prickled as they warmed.

  She looked up as a long, low blast of a car horn cut across the ice. Maratse waved from beside the Toyota. The Hilux crawled along the ice towards them, Burwardsley leading on foot from the front.

  Kula leaped from the sledge as the team slowed in front of the lead. Larger floes of ice bobbed in the water, and it dawned on Fenna that the hunter intended to use them. She waited for instruction as he encouraged the dogs with whip curls on the ice and soft words. Kula guided the lead dog over a smaller crack in the ice and towards the edge where a large floe bobbed two metres away in the dark seawater. The hunter ran to the sledge and picked up a length of rope.

  “Hold this,” he said and threw one end to Fenna. “Stand here.” Kula pointed at the edge of the ice before the floe, in front of the dogs. He walked the length of the team to the rear of the sledge.

  Fenna stuffed the mittens in her jacket pockets, gripped the rope and planted her feet squarely on the ice. She took a moment to study the hunter, the sealskin kamiks on his feet, the polar bear-skin trousers and the blue fishing smock pulled snugly over a thick wool sweater. He is shorter than me, she realised, and three times my age. At least. She held her breath as Kula, the whip in one hand and the end of the rope in the other, ran to the edge of the ice and leaped onto the floe.

  Fenna gripped the rope as Kula scrabbled to his feet, the floe seesawing as the skin soles of his kamiks gripped the surface. He dropped the whip onto the ice and pulled the rope, hand over hand, tugging the floe to the ice. Fenna held on and laughed as the hunter grinned at her. He had fewer teeth than Maratse.

  At Kula’s command, the dogs pulled the sledge onto the floe. He picked up his whip and gestured for Fenna to get on the sledge. The next floe was smaller, but wedged against the opposite side of the lead. There was a metre of black water between the floes, and Kula tossed his lead dog by the harness over the water and onto the floe. The bitch skittered for balance, claws rasping on the ice. Kula leaped onto the floe and slipped. Fenna gasped as he gripped his lead dog by the leg and pulled himself into the centre of the floe. Kula kneeled on the ice, and, with a firm grip of the gangline, he pulled the floes together. The dogs shuffled on the ice, their paws spread and claws splayed for purchase on the slippery surface.

  “I’m impressed,” Fenna said and walked to the rear of the sledge. She gripped the uprights and prepared to push the sledge as Kula directed. As the floes crunched together in the water, he turned to leap onto the ice on the other side of the lead. His lead dog fol
lowed and the fan-shape of the team narrowed into a cornet as the dogs scrambled from one floe to the other and then onto the ice. Kula curled the whip behind them and nodded for Fenna to get back on the sledge. He ran for a few metres more before leaping on to the sledge and settling on the reindeer skins beside Fenna. Kula tucked the whip beneath the cord criss-crossed over the sledge, and let the end of the whip trail along the ice. He clasped his bare, nut-brown hands in his lap and watched as Fenna coiled the rope. The ice thickened and the runners shushed across the surface layer of snow and Fenna relaxed to the familiar sounds and rhythm of the sledge. She placed the rope on the thwarts beside her and slipped her hands inside the mittens.

  “We made it,” she said and smiled at the hunter. Kula nodded and turned to look over the rear of the sledge.

  “They didn’t,” Kula said and laughed. He pointed at the Hilux sinking through the ice on the other side of the lead. The two British soldiers scrabbled to get clear. Fenna looked beyond the sinking vehicle and saw the familiar shape of the police Toyota as Maratse drove back towards the settlement. Kula nodded at the sky. “The fog is clearing. It will be a good day.”

  “Yes,” Fenna said and looked up. “Good flying weather.”

  The dogs leaned into their traces, the lines taut, pulling the sledge across the sea ice to follow the coastline east towards the mouth of the fjord.

  Chapter 18

  The snow reflected the late morning sun and forced Fenna's eyes closed. She felt the warmth on her eyelids, lulling her into a sense of security at once familiar and dangerous. She blinked in the sunlight, but the weight of her eyelids feeling heavy after the previous day's interrogation and escape. She slipped into the rhythm of the sledge, her chin tucked inside the collar of Maratse's jacket and her mittened hands clasped between her thighs. Fenna dozed as the dogs shushed the sledge along the ice, encouraged with a soft double clap of Kula's gnarled hands and an accompanying whistle.