River of Shadows (Underworld Gods #1)

“Soup is ready, if you want to join me,” Rasmus says, gesturing to the tiny circular table by the door.

I nod and go sit down. Rasmus brings me a bowl of steaming hot burgundy soup, some sour cream in the middle, and a cup of coffee. I eat two huge bowls, the sour cabbage strangely addictive, and drink three cups of coffee, while Rasmus stays mostly silent, his focus on his food and thankfully not me, slurping away. I used to eat like a bird, but part of my recovery was to embrace the messiness of food.

As soon as the meal is done, I wash the dishes, feeling bizarrely domestic, and Rasmus starts gathering things from all around the cottage, throwing them in a leather backpack that has seen better days, then brings out clothes from a closet and starts laying them on the couch.

“What’s all this?” I ask, wiping my hands on an embroidered dish towel.

“Can’t go anywhere if you’re just wearing that,” he says, pointing at me. He then shoves a long black coat in my hands. It’s leather but there’s shearling inside and along the wide collar and when I bury my nose into it, it smells like my dad.

I close my eyes for a moment as my heart aches for him.

“There’s no way this will fit,” I tell Rasmus, but I put it on and somehow it fits perfectly, cozy without being bulky.

“I think he’s had that since the 70’s,” Rasmus says with a smile. “He was a lot slimmer then.” Then he hands me a black scarf and a pair of black-and-white mittens and a matching knit cap with flaps over the ears, similar to the Sami traditional dress.

At first I think it’s overkill, but when we step outside to fetch the reindeer, I immediately know how life-saving these clothes are. I pull up the scarf over my mouth and nose, the air biting at my exposed skin, and watch as Rasmus gets the reindeer attached to the sleigh.

“Ladies first,” he says when he’s done, having made quick work of it.

I sit down on the animal pelts he just laid out on the sleigh, then he gets down beside me and says an encouraging word or two to the reindeer. It starts to trot, pulling us through the snow with a jerk.

“You don’t even have any reins,” I point out as the sleigh glides along under the snow-frosted trees. “How are you steering him?”

“Sulo is a she,” he says, “hence why she still has antlers at this time of year. And we have a connection.”

“Is this a shaman thing?” I ask.

He gives me a wry smile. “You have a lot to learn.”

He says it in a jovial way but his words strike deep. My father was a shaman. All this time and he had this whole other life, one he never let me be a part of. Why didn’t he trust me? He knew I wouldn’t think it odd, or any less of him. Hell, he knew I was a bit woo-woo myself with all my crystals and tarot decks and whatnot (I mean, I mostly have the tarot decks because I like the artwork, I don’t actually know how to use them well).

And yet, it was all kept from me. Why?

What hurts even more is the fact that I may never get an answer to that question. For all that Rasmus has been talking about my father being alive somewhere fantastical, I can’t help but cling to the idea. I don’t believe in a Land of the Dead, no matter how powerful a shaman my father was, but part of me hopes that Rasmus is at least partially right. That my father is still alive and out in the world somewhere, and it’s just a matter of time before he pops up.

But that’s what people think when their loved ones die, isn’t it? They keep thinking it’s only temporary. That they’re gone, in the other room, maybe at work, or on vacation. That they’re just away and they’ll be back at some point. Maybe that’s how you get through death, by telling yourself your father will pick up the phone, and that if he doesn’t that he’ll call you back soon, and so in the back of your mind, at the back of your heart, you’re just waiting. Waiting for them to return and for life to go back to normal again. The idea that they’re never coming back is…it’s more than unbearable. It goes against everything you’ve ever known.

My father was a true constant in my life, even when he was far away. He was always there. That’s all that I’ve known. That’s all I can accept. I’ve never had someone just vanish off the face of the planet—everyone always comes back in some way.

But maybe not this time, I think to myself. I shut my eyes to the tears.

I don’t know if it was the food, all the stress, or the fresh air and rocking motion of the sleigh, but I seem to doze off for a bit. When I come to, the sleigh has stopped and I expect to find myself in a strip mall parking lot or something like that.

Instead, we’re still in the forest.

I look around to see Rasmus getting off the sleigh and patting the reindeer who is snorting, stamping its hooves, and looking restless.

“What’s happening?” I ask.

“We have to walk the rest,” Rasmus says to me. He reaches into the sleigh and grabs his backpack, shrugging it on over his coat, then reaches for my hand.

“What? Why? Where are we?”

“A place where Sula won’t go any further.”

“How far from the police station are we?” I ask.

“We only have to walk a bit,” he says, gesturing impatiently with his hand again.

I sigh and let him help me out of the sleigh.

Once on my feet, I gasp at the sight ahead of us.

I’m standing in my father’s painting. While I don’t see a sign, I see an ice-blue river that’s frosted over, coming from a frozen waterfall in the distance. It’s at least fifty feet high, caught in mid-cascade over a cliff dotted with dead trees.

“My father painted this,” I whisper in awe.

“Yes, I know.”

“He called this…Tyt?r, ?l? tule luokseni.”

A tight look comes across his face and he nods, then turns his attention back to the reindeer. He says something in a quick, hushed tone while stroking its nose and the reindeer snorts again, before backing up with the sleigh. Like on a dime, it turns and runs away, snow flying in the sleigh’s wake.

“What the hell!” I yell. “Where is he going?!”

“She,” he corrects me again, adjusting the backpack on his shoulder. “And she is going home.”

“She’s not going to wait for us?”

He stares at me for a moment as light snowflakes begin to fall. “You’re not coming back this way, you said so yourself.”

“Okay, so how are you going to get back home?”

He shrugs. “It doesn’t really matter now. Come on.”

He starts to walk off, skirting along the edge of the frozen river. The snow is falling faster and sticking to his shoulders.

I look behind me, but the reindeer is long gone and the tracks it left in the snow have already disappeared. I truly am in the middle of fucking nowhere and I have no choice but to follow Rasmus.

I grumble and then start after him. “I’m starting to believe this isn’t the way to town,” I tell him. “I mean, we’re heading toward a frozen waterfall and a cliff. I’m starting to think this isn’t the way to anywhere.”

Rasmus doesn’t say anything.

“So, what did the painting say?” I ask, trudging through the snow behind him. “What did my father write at the bottom? When was he here?”

“All the questions again.”

I run a few feet and grab his arm, pulling him to a stop. It’s harder than it looks. He may be tall and skinny, but he’s built solidly, like a tree with roots.

“What did it say?” I repeat.

He rubs his lips together and then looks off to the waterfall. “It says…Daughter, don’t come for me.”

Then he pulls out of my grasp and keeps walking.

Daughter, don’t come for me?

“What does that mean?” I ask, jogging after him again. “That was directed to me. How did he know I’d be reading his journal, his diaries? How did he know?”

“I’m sure he wrote it in a lot of places, knowing someday you’d find out he was gone, knowing someday you would be right here, in this very place, about to go after him.”