The silence groaned over Nunapisu as Paarsisoq watched errant flakes of snow drift over the edge. It stretched on too long.
He doesn’t want to help. His job is just to watch for people who are going to go over the edge, not worry about those already gone.
He turned his gaze to the girl in the snow. The seconds ticked by, then something in his visage cracked. “Child—”
“I am Orluvoq.”
“Orluvoq. I can tell you with the highest surety right now that no amount of searching you can do will ever lead to you finding them. There are numberless droves of bodies in this cliff. You could climb straight down for weeks and still be seeing new faces.”
Her heart fell. That was the exact news she had been fearing on her journey out; the reason she wouldn’t mind a nice death on the ice. She would never see her parents or her clan again.
“But,” he continued, “I will help you.”
Her heart jumped. That was the exact news she had been hoping for on her journey out; the entire reason she came.
She scrabbled to her feet and wrapped her arms around her new friend. “Oh, thank you, thank you. I always knew Mama was righter than Daddy.”
A slow, sturdy smile spread across Paarsisoq’s face. The Watcher dropped to his knees and returned the embrace. “Your mother sounds like a wise woman. I hope that we find her.”
There, before the unfathomable nullity of the universe, two negligible silhouettes hugged a particle of healing into one another’s heart as the first wisps of the aurora played to life overhead.
5
Paarsisoq
25 Years Prior
Paarsisoq fumbled the bone needle, cursing himself for not having practiced with it more. That seemed to be one of his main activities these days, upbraiding the laxity of his past self. He’d never properly learned how to skin or gut a caribou or narwhal, much less hunt one. Never learned how to distil oil or render tallow. Never learned how to use candles. Never learned how to make tools. Never fully learned how to hunt. Never truly learned how to live.
He couldn’t describe what had kept him land-bound that day he had showed up at the end of the earth. His intentions to jump were wings, his guilt updrafts. But as he had stared into the consuming murk, something inside had told him to wait. Perhaps it was cowardice. Nevertheless, another pilgrim of nihility had shown up the next day.
“You here just for the view or did you come to meet the void personally?” the man asked, removing his gloves and digging into his sizable pack.
Paarsisoq stared slack-jawed through squinted eyes. When his mind registered that it was another human, he tried to dredge up the proper protocols for interacting with something other than ice. “Uh, I’m going to, well, I’m here for my own business.”
“A man after my own heart. I don’t mean to disrupt your important business, but perhaps I could interest you in some narwhal meat.” He pulled a bundle of waxy leather from the pack.
Paarsisoq grunted and accepted a hunk of red flesh.
“You been here long?” the newcomer asked. “I didn’t notice you ahead of me on the ice.”
The prospective suicidal shook his head. “A day.” He finished masticating his mouthful. “What about you? Have you come to, um, jump?”
The traveler chuckled. “Not in the sense you’re thinking. No, the spirits know I won’t see the end of the earth after I die, so I thought I needed to see it in person.” He slipped the pack from his shoulders and pulled at his coat where the straps had rested, peeling away the sweaty leather. “You wouldn’t mind looking after my belongings for a moment, would you? I promise to pay you.”
Paarsisoq slowly ran his eyes over the environs, ending with a raised eyebrow on the strange man. “Where…”
“Where indeed,” the fellow remarked, removing a tuuaaq candle from inside his parka. “I suggest you don’t follow. Actually, that would depend on the nature of your business here.”
His eyes slid shut and breath seeped in through his nostrils. When the man seemed he might pop, his eyes shot open, and a sharp breath smote the tuuaaq wick. Fire flickered to life.
Paarsisoq radiated disbelief. The man merely nodded, then ran over the edge.
What the? Paarsisoq rushed to follow him with his eyes. Looking down the unending cliff, he watched the stranger sprinting faster than should have been possible. Admittedly, the sprinting should also not have been possible.
There might be more to this world than I thought. The incredible feat twisted his mind into knots. A few minutes later, the man grew on the vertical horizon below until he popped back up over the edge with a flourish. Seemingly unwinded, he snuffed out the candle and dug into his pack.
“What do you need? Food, clothes, tools? Ooh, candles? I bet it’s candles.”
“Um.”
The angakkuq selected two tuuaaq candles from his overcoat and handed them to Paarsisoq. “There. You have a knife?”
The boy touched his hip and nodded.
“Well, maybe we’ll meet again. Perhaps at the start of the world next time.” The man grunted as he reshouldered his pack. “What was your name?”
“My name is Paarsisoq. What did you just do? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“I wish I had time to explain all. Suffice it to say there was an object that needed retrieving and I was the one to do it.” He smiled, the first Paarsisoq had seen in weeks. “Farewell.”
“Wait, what was your name?”
“Hm,” he tutted, “call me Nalor. Unless you’re overly concerned with formalities, then call me Nalorsitsaarut.” Another smile and he turned to the great white expanse.
Nalor’s nonchalance in helping a stranger and performing great angakkuq feats had pacified Paarsisoq’s fatal urges. In the year since, he had wished plenty often that Nalor would never have shown up—that he would have just jumped upon arrival—but the fluky encounter had firmly planted one foot in the present, though the other often toed the grave.
He had used the tuuaaq candles to summon caribou for meat. His knife had faced trial by ice when constructing his igloo. He received incidental supplies from people come to jump. Some inquiries turned into genuine conversations that fogged over the reason they came. Seven different people had boarded with him for seven different stretches of days until finally they turned their backs on the void and returned to the ice. Three of them had invited him to join them on boats. He had almost accepted the first until he realized that he felt something he hadn’t felt in a while. He felt good.
“Paarsisoq.”
His hands jerked, and the needle pricked his thumb. Who on earth’s white face would be calling him by name? He turned to the doorway of his igloo and his jaw fell.
“Mom?”
Her round, worried face bloomed with relief. She dropped her hood, her other hand flying to her mouth as tears flowed. “It’s true.” Pack slumping to the ground, she ran to him and threw her arms around his neck. “My baby.” She trembled above him, then collapsed into his lap.
Paarsisoq couldn’t find words to match his feelings, so he just hugged her back as she heaved unfettered into his chest. The last person he had expected to see had traveled weeks to find him, and she was happy.
“How did you find me?” he ventured at last.
She sniffled. “Word whistles over the ice farther and faster than you might think. It was maybe six months ago we first heard of the one who lodged on Nunapisu, chatting with the forlorn and bringing them back from the darkness. I tried to quell any hope that this watcher might have saved you. Fools hope, sages wait.
“But then a ship came by the clan and one of them told us the story of how he was saved by this strange, young watcher. ‘So few years for so much wisdom,’ he said. The other line I’ll never forget that he said was, ‘I tried to convince Paarsisoq to join me as a sailor, but he insisted Nunapisu was his home.’ You can’t imagine my shock.
“‘Who?’ I begged him to tell me.
“‘Paarsisoq, my dearest
friend,’ he replied. I almost couldn’t contain myself. I blasted him with endless questions about you and knew that I had to come.” She took his face in both her hands. “And here you are.”
And here I am. It still shocked him that his mother didn’t hate him. In fact, it seemed like she still loved him. “But why? How could you come after what I did? Why couldn’t I just be dead to you?”
Her smile tarnished over with a melancholic matte. “My dearest one, my asasaq. I know your spirit, and I know your heart. Killing is not the way of Paarsisoq. The first hunt is always a time of trial and accident; yours just more so than most. Your father didn’t fare so well his first time around either.” Her smile dropped entirely, her voice a feeble diminuendo. “Or his last.”
The words jabbed a bone into his heart. “Mother, I apologize, but I’ll never be like dad. I tried so hard in the months after he died, but I can’t.” The doubts and inadequacies of a year ago came creeping back in, and suddenly the Watcher became the watched.
“You needn’t be your father. The only thing that must happen is that I must be your mother, and you will always be my son.”
Now it was his turn for a pair of wet eyes. How could she still love him? He was a killer and a disgrace. Not worthy of a spare thought, and especially not worthy of a trek to the end of the earth.
“Come home, Paarsisoq.”
He looked at this woman who wouldn’t give up and turned away. “Mom, I can’t. I’m so sorry, but I can’t. I have no place there.”
“Of course, you do. You are one of us, and you always will be.” She squeezed his arm, then looked away herself. “I need you.”
The three words broke his heart into a million pieces and threw them all off the cliff. “You don’t understand. I have finally found my place. Here, at the end of the earth. I… I can talk to people and make them alright when all is wrong—usually. I can’t explain it, it just happens when the conversation starts. This is my lot.”
The strongest woman he knew surveyed him, her dark eyes peeling back the layers of his soul. “My asasaq. You realize that no matter how much you do, no matter how hard you try, how much of your heart you give them, many of them will still perish?”
He nodded. “Of course, Mama. But if I do nothing, then they all shall perish. If I watched and waited all my days and turned back but one soul, not a day of my life would be wasted.”
She looked as if she might cry again. “There. I told you I knew your heart. That is the way of Paarsisoq.” She leaned against him.
“You don’t know what it’s like to stare into that void and realize that your only hope is hopelessness.” His mind jumped to his dead father. Or maybe you do…
“If you are certain that this is where you belong, asasaq, I won’t force you away.”
Paarsisoq sighed a bittersweet sigh. “Thank you, mother.”
“But I will be staying two weeks.”
A smile took over Paarsisoq’s face.
“Hand me that needle and let me show you how to sew so that you won’t have to do it again in a month.”
6
Orluvoq
Orluvoq’s lips were a battleground devastated by the wind’s unremitting forces. As soon as she healed them up, they tore into a thousand craggy pieces again. Her eyes felt like a bone pole left out to dry for too long. The spots on her thighs where the harness gripped had needed a break for the past three days. All that could quickly be forgotten by providing herself with a little mental healing.
“Ah,” Paarsisoq barked. “Keep that in your pocket.”
Orluvoq whimpered, tuuaaq trembling in her hand. “But I need it.”
“As far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing about hanging above an endless void that calls for dulling your senses by getting stewed up on the crooked horn.” The Watcher hammered in another piton above somebody’s frozen face. “If I would have realized how much of an addict you are, I would have made you leave all your substances up in my igloo.”
She tried to figure out a way to take a bite without him noticing. That had proven pretty hard with the only life for miles being their dangling bodies bopping into each other.
“No, I said put it back.”
“But just a little nibble,” she pleaded. “That’s all.”
“You don’t need those ‘maintenance morsels’ as much as you think you do.” He motioned to the nearest set of corpses in the cliff wall. “Any of these look like your parents?”
The girl shook her head and curled the tusk toward her mouth.
“Hey,” Paarsisoq called. “Cut that out. You can just hand over the tuuaaq to me and we don’t ever have to have this conversation again.”
She stared at the beautiful sprig of bone before finally pocketing it again. The movement was like watching the sail unfurl first thing in the morning, slowly pulling it apart from its frosted self. “Can’t do that. You’ll just throw it down there.” She pointed at nothing.
“I already promised I wouldn’t.” The Watcher sighed. “You remember a couple days ago when you took a bite? Then suddenly we found your mom, I spent spirits know how long digging down to her, only to have you point at the next one over—who was a man—and say, no that one’s my mom? And the next one and the next one was your mom, too. I said I’d help, but how can I help if you’re polluted on tuuaaq?” Another sigh brushed by his lips. “If you’d rather, we can return topside, and I can turn you to wander strung-out on your favorite snack.”
“No! I need to find a token.” She wiped at her raw nose. “If I don’t have that, I don’t have anything.” The face of a person long dead, this one with its eyes open, sat a foot from hers. Paarsisoq had said it was only unsettling for the first few hours. That had been six days prior, and she was still waiting for the ‘first few hours’ to pass. Oh, I know how I can make it better. Her hand drifted to her pocket.
“Orluvoq.”
She pulled the hand back and lowered herself down the cliff to reach the Watcher’s level.
“I think it’s about time to head back up, anyway.” He sucked some snot into his throat and spat it into the nullity below. “We need to restock on food, and these harnesses aren’t doing much for my legs either.”
“But we haven’t found my parents.” Even with the Watcher, even with the tuuaaq, even after her trek across the ice and encounter with the demon, she had gotten nowhere. Maybe if she couldn’t make the right decisions, she should have just let the captain decide.
“Quite true, my child. If only Nunapisu was a little more sequential in how it deposited bodies. We’ll take a respite, then make another expedition.” He offered a conciliatory smile and pulled himself upward. “If we start now, then we won’t have to sleep on the cliff again.”
The young angakkuq noticed he said nothing about ‘before dark’, just about sleeping. As much as she wanted to see her parents again, taking a little break to see the sun wouldn’t offend anyone. Being on the cliff, she decided, was like voluntarily entering winter, just with fewer storms.
After a few hours of climbing, she heard Paarsisoq stop below her. The stopping itself wasn’t unusual. Both of them initiated their fair share of breaks. The hand on her heel was.
“Orluvoq.”
Was he about to congratulate her on not taking any tuuaaq in the past while? Because she had definitely taken some about an hour ago when he wasn’t looking. She wasn’t even sure why he was so upset about—
“Look!”
She cast her eyes up to the left and leaned back on her leg straps. “Did someone jump?” A dark form dropped rapidly down the cliff.
“Not if my intuitions are attuned,” Paarsisoq answered. “I believe we’re looking at an old friend of mine whom I haven’t seen in a couple years. Can you light up a candle and tug him to come this way?”
Could she? Maybe? Trying wouldn’t hurt anything. Candle in hand, she sparked some heatmoss. In the deftness of inebriation, she tried to light the tuuaaq wick and ended up hitting Paarsisoq in the face.
>
“Ah! Did you just drop the candle?” It was the first time genuine anger had tinctured in his voice.
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to.”
“Wait, are you on tuuaaq right now? Tiaavuluk, we don’t have time for this. You need to call him over. Nalor!” he shouted.
She tried to redouble her concentration and pulled the last candle of the expedition out of her pocket. With the utmost care, the candle flared to life and she tapped into it, sending a summoning out across the cliff.
Paarsisoq cried out in triumph when the man who was somehow running down the cliff changed his course toward them. “Perfect, I knew you could do it, Orluvoq. Just try to burn the tuuaaq next time instead of eating it. Resources do have their limits.”
The girl watched the figure approach. As he neared, her fear ballooned. She needed to be anywhere except for there. Claw her way up the cliff, cut the cords, anything. This was something more than windwalking, and it was almost upon her. When his face came into focus, her fears crystallized. She had seen him before.
In a cave.
He ran up alongside them and stabbed a pick into the ice. He made hanging there look like the most natural thing a person could do. “Paarsisoq, a pleasure. I was wondering why I didn’t see you at your typical post. And… oh my. I do believe we’ve met, but I can’t admit to being properly acquainted. The name’s Nalor, or Nalorsitsaarut for the stuffy, formal types. You know, when they talk about hanging yourself, I don’t think this is what they usually mean. What has provoked you to throw the old trope on its head this fine day?”
“You’re not a demon?” blurted out Orluvoq.
“That seems like a very contextual question,” said Nalor.
“A deep pleasure, as always, Nalor,” Paarsisoq said from below. “This is my new friend, Orluvoq, who would do well to show a little more respect. We’re on a quest to find her dead parents.”
“Oh, I do love a good quest, Paarsi. You’ll have to try and swim up Qilaknakka next. Maybe the king will even go with you.” Nalor gave a wink. “Any luck so far?”
Orluvoq Page 6
