River of Shadows (Underworld Gods #1)

“We have no use for delicate people up here,” she says stiffly. “They don’t survive very long. Sorry, I’ll have the heat on in a moment.” The car backs up and then rolls across the parking lot, the tires on snow making a pleasing crunching sound. “Your father told me you used to be a dancer.”

“Yes,” I say, the bitterness in the air now settling on my tongue. “Unfortunately, you have to be a delicate flower in dance and there was a point where I couldn’t do that anymore.” In other words, dance was everything to me, and especially to my mother. But the extremes I went to so I could remain lithe and airy and light eventually took their toll on my body and mind. “But then I discovered martial arts. Capoeira. It’s from Brazil. Combines dancing and fighting.”

Noora takes her eyes off the road to look at me. “He never mentioned that.”

I shrug. I’m not competitive. My heart can’t take anything competitive anymore, not after what I went through. It’s just a hobby. After high school I realized if I couldn’t be accepted in dance anymore, then I wanted to do something else to keep my body moving. I started building muscle, lifting weights, and it just came naturally to me. I used to do a little tae kwon do for a while, even arnis, but capoeira is what stuck.

Noora’s vibe shifts a little. Like this information concerns her. Perhaps she’s old-fashioned and doesn’t believe girls should fight. She’d get along with my mother with that view.

I flash her a placating smile. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to go beating up anyone at Papa’s funeral.” She gives me a stiff smile and I immediately feel awkward. I look around the car. “So what’s the smell?”

“Do you like it?” she asks.

Not really. “Smells like sage.” And like rotting corpses, I add in my head and the accurate thought makes me shiver. I pull my coat closer around me, my cold hands shoved in my pockets. I’ve always been morbid, but I don’t need these thoughts before my father’s funeral.

“Sage, palo santo, lavender, myrrh and sieni. Mushrooms.”

“Didn’t know dried mushrooms smell like that.”

“These ones are special.”

Aren’t all mushrooms special? I think. If I actually had a social life in high school maybe I’d know what dried mushrooms smell like.

I turn my attention to the scenery passing by the window. Like the view from the airplane, the land is made up of pine trees and snow, with a few low rolling hills thrown into the mix. I have a feeling we’re driving past lakes and rivers, but the thick snow covers them and makes everything look the same.

It’s such the opposite of Los Angeles that I’m suddenly hit with a pang of fear, like I’m on the edge of the earth, close to falling off into infinity, and I feel precariously placed. In my mind I’m looking at the globe and I can see the little dot where I am and there’s just nothing above me at all except ice and snow forever.

Not only that, but I’ve barely seen any cars on this highway and I realize I don’t know Noora at all. I’m about to pull out my phone and check for reception, maybe send Jenny a text even though I have no idea what time it is back home, when the skin on my spine starts to crawl. I have the most awful, unsettling feeling that if I look at Noora right now, that I won’t see Noora at all. That I’ll see some smiling demonic creature. In fact, out of the corner of my eye, I swear I see a pair of horns, no, antlers, growing from the top of her head.

I immediately close my eyes and take in a deep breath. Jet lag, I tell myself. Grief and jet lag. Hell of a combo.

“Are you alright?” Noora asks.

I nod, pressing my lips together, keeping my eyes closed. “Just really tired all of a sudden.”

“Why don’t you sleep? The resort is another forty-five minutes away.”

Hell no, I’m not sleeping now, I think, resting my head against the frozen window.

But then the car engine suddenly turns off and I hear Noora say, “We’re here.”

My eyes snap open and I sit upright in my seat. We’re parked in front of a low rustic building, the roof piled high with snow, a forest surrounding it, the branches glittering in the waning sun like icing sugar.

What the hell?

I blink and shake my head. “What happened? I literally just closed my eyes.”

“You fell asleep,” she says. “Come on, let’s get you to your room so you can go to bed.”

My brain feels like a train that’s slowly pulling out of the station as I try to make sense of how time has passed so quickly. “You’re not supposed to sleep the first day you arrive, not until night. Otherwise you’ll never get over your jet lag,” I tell her, my tongue feeling thick.

“It’ll be night in an hour,” she says in a no-nonsense voice. She gets out of the car and opens up the trunk, pulling out my suitcase. I stare at the log-building, at the intricately carved sign that says “Wilderness Hotel” over it, smoke rising from the chimney. I guess this is it. This is what my dad worked so hard for.

Like clockwork, I feel hot tears behind my eyes and I take in a sharp, shaking breath trying to ward them off. I don’t want to cry in front of Noora. I feel like I can’t let myself be vulnerable in front of her.

I get out of the car, the air even colder here, but bracingly fresh, peppered with the smell of pine and woodsmoke. There are only four other cars in the parking lot.

“I guess it’s not very busy right now,” I observe, walking somewhat unsteadily over to Noora, holding my hand out for my suitcase.

“Shoulder season,” she says, keeping the suitcase away. “We only have one guest at the moment. You relax, Eero will take care of your bag.”

I’m about to ask who Eero is when the door to the hotel opens and a tall, robust man with a long gray beard appears in the frame. For a moment I swear I’m staring at my dad, except this man looks older, and somehow crueler. I know that’s an odd thing to glean from someone’s looks, but it’s all in his eyes. Once again, my vibe radar is going off the rails.

He walks over to us and gives me a wide smile, taking the suitcase from Noora. He’s wearing a reindeer fur vest over a snowsuit, and a white and red knitted cap that stands tall on his head, ear flaps hanging by his cheeks. At least he seems more appropriately dressed.

“Nice to meet you, Hanna,” he says in a deep voice. “I’m Eero. I was a good friend of your father’s. We are so glad you are here.”

I can only muster a half-smile. I know I might seem rude and stand-offish, but I just can’t shake the weird feeling.

He exchanges a look with Noora that I can’t read, and they head toward the hotel.

“As you know, the premise of the hotel is that guests can stay in little wilderness cabins in the woods and by the lake, all perfectly placed for watching the northern lights,” Noora says as we walk down the path to the hotel entrance. “But we figured it would be better if you stayed in one of the rooms in the main lodge here. That way you won’t feel so alone. I imagine with your jet lag and your grief, all of this must feel quite confusing by now.” She glances at me over her shoulder. “Tomorrow morning I’ll give you a tour. For now, you rest.”

Suddenly I’m too tired to protest. Eero opens the door and leads us into the hotel, the air smelling of butter, cinnamon, and cardamom, my stomach rumbling in response. The lobby is wonderfully rustic with the log cabin walls, woven tapestries and paintings, numerous chandeliers made of reindeer and moose antlers hanging from the ceiling with flickering candles in them. I know that was one hundred percent the aesthetic choice of my father.

I look around and catch a glance of a dining room, lounge and kitchen before they lead me upstairs to my room, located down a narrow hallway.

Eero opens the door and places my bag beside the bed. I step inside, quickly taking it in. The room is simple, with birch walls and fur curtains, though it smells just like Noora’s car.

“We’ll see you in the morning,” Noora says to me as they start to leave.

“Wait,” I spin around, and she pauses in the doorway. “It’s only three in the afternoon. Where are you going?”

“You need your sleep,” Eero says, not answering my question at all.

Then he closes the door.