Astrid's Wings: Varangian Descendants Book II

by K. Panikian

  A small front porch branched off the cabin, so we sat out there and discussed our plan.

  The lake was huge. It would take years to explore all of its nooks and crannies, searching for a portal. Plus, we wouldn’t see the portal unless it was active. There had to be a trigger or a key to open the gate.

  In Russia, the key came from the meteorite fragments that exploded from this world into Terra Novum in the initial impact blast. When one of the fragments neared the portal in the center of the meteor crater, it glowed blue and the gate appeared. Cato found one, which was how my family ended up coming through.

  Abaddon’s scouts found one, too, which was how Abaddon learned about this world. Its lack of magical defenses was irresistible to him and he was determined to find a way here.

  “We need to ask some of the locals if they recall any large explosions, or stories of large explosions, in the past fifty or sixty years. That’s how long there have been reports of the lake monster, I think,” Julian said.

  I nodded. “And ask, too, if there have been any strange disappearances and where. We need to narrow down the search area significantly.”

  I added, “The fishermen at the lodge probably won’t be any help. They’re only here temporarily and then they fly back out. Probably the staff, too, the young guys, are just seasonal workers. We need a gossipy old person.”

  “Let’s take a boat out tomorrow morning and pretend we’re going fishing. We can tie up in town and walk to the general store and the post office, see if we can find a local person,” Julian said.

  I agreed. “Yeah, and let’s see if we can get any of the guides at dinner to talk about the monster. I bet they like to tell ghost stores to the tourists.”

  That settled, we sat silently, watching the ripples on the lake’s surface and listening to the wheezes and clicks of the forest around us. Traces of pine and watery freshness from the lake scented the air. I could hear Julian breathing beside me. Listening for a moment, I matched my breaths to his, and then caught myself. I stood, sending my chair scooting back on the wooden planks of the deck with a squeak.

  “I’m going to grab a drink before dinner. Coming?” I stepped down off the porch, heading toward the lodge without waiting for Julian’s answer.

  LATER that night, as I tried to sleep in our shared cabin, I cursed myself for my awkward retreat earlier. I needed to be smoother about avoiding spending time alone with Julian. If all went well with our hunt, it would be soon enough before I couldn’t avoid him. But that didn’t mean I had to be always at his side right now.

  It hurt too much to be near him but not have the right to touch him. I’d been fooling myself, thinking what I felt was only an infatuation that would fade. Every moment in Julian’s company right now felt like a knife in my heart.

  He doesn’t want to be with me, I reminded myself again, waiting for the impact to sink in and stop my heartache. It didn’t work.

  We’d heard some good monster stories at dinner from the guides. It sounded like there were two nearby spots along the lakefront where lots of people reported strange occurrences. Maybe tomorrow, we could split up.

  I comforted myself with that idea and finally fell asleep.

  Chapter 6

  In the morning, I woke to the sound of Julian in the shower. Listening briefly to the cascading water, I let my imagination conjure the image of his large hands soaping the planes of his tanned and muscled body. Then I hopped out of bed and ran out the door.

  I stood on the deck in my sleep shirt and socks, breathing deeply, my arms tight across my chest. I saw the mist on the surface of the lake and sent out my power, bringing the cool air up the slope to the cabin. I inhaled the fresh scent, calming.

  Sitting in a deck chair, I checked my phone. I had no cellular signal but the Wi-Fi from the lodge reached the cabin and so I looked through my emails. Brief updates from the others revealed that no one had solid information yet.

  The cabin door opened and Julian stepped onto the deck in a swirl of steam. His long hair was wet and trailing down his back, looking darker than its normal blond. He wore shorts and a t-shirt and the skin along his freshly shaved jaw looked pink in the morning light.

  “Listen—” I started to say at the same moment that he said, “Hey—”

  After we smiled at each other awkwardly, Julian tried again. “Hey, I think we should split up today. We heard the stories about the two spooky lake spots last night. I want to take out a boat and check them out. I can drop you in town and you can ask around about any explosions.”

  Even though I’d been about to say the same thing, it still stung that he was equally as anxious to be away from me. I swallowed and said breezily, “Sure. Believe it or not, that’s exactly what I was going to say.”

  He smiled, relieved. I waved him on to the lodge and said I’d be there in a minute, after I showered.

  I took my time and when I finally made it up to the building, it was crowded with fishermen and guides. Filling a plate with some scrambled eggs and fruit, I grabbed an empty seat next to Caleb. I saw Julian by the windows with a couple of older men and waved at him briefly. He looked confused to see me across the room and I turned away to smile at Caleb.

  “Morning!”

  “Hey, Astrid,” he said, grinning at me cheerfully. “Ready to catch some fish?”

  “Ah, no, not me.” I shook my head regretfully. “I told Julian I’d come with him to hang out, but I’m not that interested in fishing. I was thinking about walking around the town, maybe doing some sketching or something.”

  “Oh, that’s interesting. You’re an artist?”

  “I just like to draw for fun.”

  “Cool,” Caleb said. “Yeah, there are lots of scenic spots around the lakefront. If you talk to Josephine at the general store, she can tell you where to go to maybe see some seals.”

  I smiled brightly at him, pleased. “Josephine, got it. Have fun with the fish today!”

  He winked at me and got up to bring his plate to the bin by the wall. Sprinkling some black pepper on my eggs, I looked around. There were a couple of women guides scattered among the men. I wondered if they lived in town or were seasonal workers only.

  After I finished eating, I found Julian and raised my eyebrows, waving to the door. He nodded at me, stepping away from the man he’d been talking to by the window. As we walked back to the cabin, he said the man, Ken, was the owner of the lodge. Ken had told Julian we could take out any of the small skiffs tied up at the dock, as long as we returned by dark. The boats all had life jackets on board and GPS beacons if we got lost.

  I ran inside our cabin and found my sketchbook.

  We headed down to the dock right when lots of guides and guests exited the lodge. I poked Julian and we hurried for the first empty boat we saw. It was small and gray, with a large motor hanging off the back. I had no idea how to operate it, so I put on my life jacket and sat on a bench, out of the way.

  Julian put on his own life jacket and then dropped the motor into the water. Sitting beside it, he pulled on a couple of knobs and valves, then turned the key. The motor started. Julian pointed to the rope beside me and I untied us from the dock. Then shifting out of neutral, he grabbed the steering handle and away we went.

  The wind ruffled my hair as we sped along and I smiled up at the warm sun. The sky bounced off the smooth surface of the lake in front of us, blue without a cloud in sight, and the gray crags that dropped down to the lake’s edge mirrored perfectly in the watery reflection. On my side of the boat, the green shoreline winked in and out with dark, rocky beaches. The air smelled crisp and clean.

  After only a few minutes, I saw the town docks ahead. There were skiffs like ours, some floatplanes tied up, and a few buildings just beyond them. Julian pulled up to the dock and pointed at the buildings. “That’s the general store, according to Ken, and the post office is right up the road. There’s a lodge there, too, if you’re done early and want to sit and relax.”

  He pointed farth
er west down the lake. “I’m heading in that direction. Ken said the monster cruises in between Iliamna and Newhalen, so I’m going to motor back and forth a few times, then probably drop anchor and sit. I have my knives if something weird happens.

  “I’ll pick you up in a couple of hours. If you’re not on the docks, I’ll come up and look for you. I grabbed two of the bag lunches, so we can eat in the boat later, if you want.”

  I agreed, stepping out of the boat and walking up the aluminum dock without looking back. I heard the motor start up behind me again and then disappear into the distance.

  Taking a deep breath, I exhaled shakily. Then I walked across the gravel road and headed for the store.

  There were a couple of old pickup trucks in the lot, but no people. When I walked in the door, a bell jangled. I started to wander the aisles. It looked like the store sold a little bit of everything—fishing equipment, groceries, hardware supplies—there was even a counter advertising espresso drinks.

  An older Native Alaskan woman walked out of the back room and smiled at me. “Hello. Are you Astrid?”

  I laughed and said yes, surprised.

  She nodded confidently. “Caleb called over and said you might come by. I’m Josephine.” She had salt and pepper hair and a beautiful, lilting accent. Her kind eyes were wide and enfolded with laugh lines. She was petite but sturdy, and she held out her slim, tan hand to me.

  “You want to find the seals?” she asked. “Or do you only want a place to relax that’s not surrounded by fishermen?”

  I laughed again. “A little bit of both.”

  She smiled at me. “My daughter-in-law will watch the store. You, come with me.”

  She led the way back outside and pointed to a four-wheeler. She handed me a helmet, pulled one on herself, and climbed onto the front seat nimbly. I slipped on behind, holding her tightly around her waist.

  We turned around in the parking lot and headed west down the gravel road that ran alongside the lake. The four-wheeler vibrated my body down to my bones and kicked up a trail of dust behind us. After a little bit, we turned off onto a small trail and headed up into the trees, following a narrow path. We climbed for another few minutes and then Josephine stopped the four-wheeler and we clambered off.

  Leaving our helmets on the machine, we turned toward the lake again. We stood high enough now to see the huge expanse of blue water all the way across to the green shore on the other side of the lake.

  Josephine led me over to a large, gray boulder and we climbed to the top. Pulling out a pair of binoculars, she focused on the rocky beaches far below us. After a moment, she handed the glasses to me and pointed to one area in particular. I looked and saw the silvery, pale bodies of a family of seals, basking on the rocks. I grinned, delighted.

  Josephine nodded at me and said now that we knew where they were today, we could drive down there in a minute and get a closer look. I agreed and then sat on the warm face of the boulder, looking down at the lake.

  Josephine sat beside me in the sunny spot, stretching out her jean-clad legs, and started talking. She explained she owned the general store and was also the village public safety officer. The closest real law enforcement agency was the State Troopers, an hour away in Anchorage, so she responded to emergency calls by herself.

  She said the village has about 200 residents in the summer, with all of the fishing lodge personnel, and that’s a slower time for her. The tourists stay in their lodges in the evening and the locals are busy with construction projects, fishing jobs, and other work.

  In the winter though, there are more problems. She has to deal with things like domestic violence situations, which are incredibly dangerous for her, as she isn’t allowed to carry a weapon as part of her job.

  The State Troopers come through every once in a while, when a situation is too big for her to handle alone. For example, a number of people had dissappeared in the area over the past couple of years. The Troopers came down every time someone vanished and asked a lot of questions, but no one knew what was going on or why, so it just kept happening.

  I must have looked enthralled because she continued on.

  “The first person who disappeared was a woman at one of the fishing lodges, a guide. Two years ago, she and her sister were here for the summer and in August, only a few weeks before they were supposed to head back home to Anchorage, she disappeared.” Josephine frowned. “It was a very strange case. The Troopers came out right away and started investigating, but she vanished completely.

  “Her name was Grace. Her sister still comes out every summer to guide. I asked her once how she could stand it and she said that Grace would have wanted her here.”

  I grimaced, thinking if something happened to Bard or Cato, what would I do. It gave me the shivers to contemplate. I thought probably, yes, I’d want to visit a place where they’d been happy.

  “So sad…” Josephine trailed off, lost in thought.

  “How did she disappear?” I asked. “Was she fishing and didn’t come home?”

  “No. She slept in the women’s bunk at one of the big lodges and one morning when everyone woke up, she wasn’t there.”

  “That’s so horrible,” I said softly. “Her poor family.” I shivered again. “What about the other disappearances?”

  Josephine continued. “All men. That first winter after Grace disappeared, another guide vanished. He was a local man and was supposed to meet some buddies for ice fishing, but he never showed. No one found a body or anything and there were no signs of a struggle. He was just gone.

  “The next one was in the spring, right before the summer lodges opened up. Another local man, poof. It’s been like clockwork since then. Every six months or so, another man disappears.”

  Josephine’s voice dropped to a whisper. “The Troopers think it’s a serial killer—”

  I gasped.

  “—but I think it’s something else,” she continued. “I think it’s the lake monster.”

  I stared at Josephine, my mind whirling. “What makes you think that?”

  “Everyone who has vanished had a connection to the lake, either a guide or a local who fished for a living.”

  “But the lake monster’s been around for decades,” I pointed out. “Why would it start hunting people now?”

  “Yes,” Josephine conceded, “that is the flaw in my idea. Also, you would be hard-pressed to find a person around here who doesn’t have connection to the lake.”

  She stood up on the rock. “Come on, enough sad talk. Let’s go see the seals.”

  A little while later, we crouched on the gravel beach and watched the seals. The pod basked on the rocks only a few yards away, their white bellies pointed toward the sun and their flippers in the air. I took some photos with my phone and then pulled out my sketchbook. Josephine sat quietly beside me, watching the mammals, while I sketched.

  Scraping sounds and snuffles whispered in the air as the pod rolled on the gravel. A few of the pups let out muted barks.

  I drew their little, smiling faces and their dark, liquid eyes and then Josephine softly started to explain about them. They were rare, freshwater seals and they only lived in Lake Iliamna. They were incredibly endangered, at risk both by climate change and the proposed mining developments near the lake.

  I watched the babies nuzzle their mothers, their black noses camouflaging with the spots on their skin and asked Josephine, speaking of climate change, if she’d heard of any methane gas explosions around the area, reciting what I could remember from Caleb’s lecture the day before.

  “Oh yes,” she answered. “Would you like to see one?”

  She took me on the four-wheeler back up to the main gravel road and we went another mile closer to Newhalen before she turned off.

  “There’s the trail.” She pointed to a narrow path through the spruce trees. It was marked by a red blaze on a fallen log. We walked a little bit up the trail before a large, stagnant pond appeared in front of us. It was perfectly round and
had a layer of green scum on its surface. The air smelled sour and the trees surrounding the pond sagged sickly.

  “It exploded about 60 years ago, I think,” Josephine said. “I was only a little girl, but I remember my father saying he heard it at the store and then drove down here to see. He said the air had such a stench and no one could approach for the longest time because it was impossible to breathe. Eventually, he saw the crater and the mud. There were bones from fish and small animals everywhere. The hole slowly filled back up with water. Nothing grows there though, no fish or anything. The mud is still too poisonous.”

  Peering into the pond’s murky depths, I stretched my senses, searching for any sign of a portal, but didn’t feel anything unusual.

  I thanked her for showing me and we headed into town again. It was time to meet Julian. We pulled up to the docks just as I saw him motoring toward us from the west. His blond hair streamed behind him in the wind and his blue eyes blazed like sapphires in the sunlight. I felt a quiver go through me.

  “Oh my,” I heard Josephine mutter. “Is that one yours?”

  “Not mine,” I answered, blushing.

  “He will be,” she stated emphatically. “A girl as kind and beautiful as you? He’d have to be a fool.”

  “He’s a fool then,” I said sadly, “because he’s definitely not interested.”

  Josephine stared hard at Julian’s face as he steered the boat toward where we waited on the dock. “No, not a fool,” she said slowly. “Scared.” She paused, looking from him to me again, and then said emphatically again, “You scare him.”

  I laughed and she patted my arm. “Don’t worry. He’ll figure it out.”

  Then she turned and walked back up the dock, waving her arm at my goodbye and thank you call.

  “See you tomorrow!” she shouted on the wind.

  Chapter 7

  Julian steered the skiff away from the dock after dropping Astrid in Iliamna. Pointing the boat toward open water, he turned to watch her walk away. Her coppery hair flared brightly in the sun and her long legs, slim and bare in a little pair of shorts, walked confidently across the rocking planks. He felt his heart squeeze. She was pulling away from him. She made a show of being cheerful in his presence, but he saw her wary eyes and knew she’d been dying to separate from him that morning. It was why he suggested splitting up.