Fiction River: Unnatural Worlds

by Fiction River

  “What kind of equipment?” Retsler asked. “They couldn’t use dynamite and there wasn’t anything that would have made it up the mountain in a storm, no grader or anything.”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I never asked. My grandfather and his friends snowshoed down with the girl, got help, came back up with supplies. A handful of guys remained. They managed to make a small opening, found the frozen adults, but the children were still missing. So they did a search.”

  “The adults froze near the entrance then,” Retsler said. Of course. That made sense. Nothing supernatural at all. He felt a thread of relief.

  “No,” she said. “They were nearly a mile into the cave, in a room appropriately called ‘The Ice Palace.’ My grandfather said after this whole thing, there was talk of digging out that room to see if the stalagmites were actually people, frozen in place, but that idea got scrapped. It haunted my grandfather, though, I tell you.”

  It couldn’t be that easy. It never was. Not here, not in Oregon. Retsler sighed. “And the children?”

  “They left on their own, while the men were trying to get the bodies out of the Ice Palace. The kids said they were playing with their friends, and hadn’t even known there was a storm, had no idea they’d been there for days, weren’t even hungry, and certainly didn’t look like they’d been trapped in a cave.”

  “Denial,” Retsler said.

  She gave him an appraising look, then shrugged. “They didn’t use that word back then, but a lot thought it might be something like that.”

  “Your grandfather didn’t.”

  “He finished the winter here, and never came back. He kept moving south, away from snow or snow-capped mountain peaks. Died in Los Angeles, in a house where he couldn’t see any mountains at all.” She was clearly waiting for Retsler to ask a question, and this time, he knew what the question was.

  “Why was he afraid of snow?”

  “Said there were things in it. He could see them. Creatures. Said Hans Christian Andersen’s Snow Queen wasn’t a story after all.”

  “I never read it,” Retsler said.

  “Think of a winter queen. She had an army made of snowflakes, and commanded the ice. She could steal a man’s soul with a single kiss.”

  “Sounds like a fable to me,” Retsler said. “And there are no mountains in Denmark, so Andersen wouldn’t have been writing about the Shadow Side.”

  “He was writing about snow, and ice, and what some call ice fairies.”

  “Is that what you think this is?” Retsler added.

  “I think the word ‘fairy’ gets used for all kinds of magical beasts,” she said. “But the children lost time, like people do in fairy kingdoms. Washington Irving wrote about that in ‘Rip Van Winkle.’”

  “Which was a metaphor for the changes that occurred during the Revolutionary War,” Retsler said.

  Her expression cooled. “I didn’t expect a skeptic. They said you knew about these things.”

  He sighed. “Not snow creatures.”

  Although snow was water. Frozen water. Ice crystals.

  “You said the children were playing with their friends,” he said, hoping to get back on track.

  She nodded. “That’s why my grandfather never let me up here. The children had always talked about their imaginary friends in the Caves. After the incident, he decided those friends were real. He says he saw them.”

  “Children,” Retsler said.

  “Yes,” she said. “He said they loved coming into the camp kitchen to get warm.”

  ***

  Retsler didn’t know if he believed any of it. He didn’t know if he disbelieved any of it either. He poked a bit more, discovered that others had died in the Caves, but that the deaths were ruled exposure, which could happen to anyone in prolonged forty-one degree temperatures.

  Plus, he never trusted death analysis from the previous century—at least, not before 1950 or so, when the practice of forensic medicine, like the practice of medicine itself, became more science-based and less reliant on the skill of the practitioner.

  By the account that MariCate had given, these men had pulled bodies out of that cave that were “frozen to death,” but that phrase got used for everything from exposure to being too cold to actually freezing in a snow bank.

  Retsler could imagine what Denne would say. Retsler was using supposition just like everyone else was. Only Retsler’s reinforced his own bent to the practical, to the real world, not a willingness to believe in fairies and poltergeists and things that go bump in the night.

  Even though he had seen those things, more than once.

  He took the proffered hotel room, which was beautiful. It had clearly been redesigned in recent years, with a modern bathroom added, and the most comfortable mattress he’d ever encountered. The hotel had internet access and more television channels than he had in Montana. Even so, the place still felt rustic. Maybe it was the rough hewn walls, or the ancient bed frame. Maybe it was the photographs on the walls, black-and-whites of former guides and mountain men and the men who built this place.

  Or maybe it was the remoteness. Even with all the connectivity, he still felt far away from civilization. If he closed his eyes, he could imagine himself back an entire century, learning about the real-world magic of the Oregon mountains, the pines, the caves, the breath-taking views.

  To Retsler, that kind of beauty had fairy dust sprinkled all over it, and not the kind that made a man lose ten years, but the kind that made him realize there was no other place on Earth like this one.

  At a very good dinner in the fancy dining room, the town parents regaled him with stories about Marble Village, true-to-life stories about the town drunk and the occasional domestic and the one real murder the town had had in the past five years.

  He’d had a conversation just like this one in Montana before his hire there, and back then, it had sounded like heaven to him. Dealing with everyday problems, with families and bar fights and the occasional true crime.

  But this time, he couldn’t make himself focus. He had already told Bronly that he wasn’t interested in the job, and no matter what kind of stories the town parents told him, he wasn’t going to change his mind.

  He didn’t even change his mind when they offered him nearly double his current salary, plus a house at the edge of town. He had never been in this business for the money. He wasn’t about to start now.

  No one mentioned the supernatural at all. No one talked about the event in the kitchen or the strange things he’d seen just since he got here, and he didn’t blame them.

  After talking with MariCate, some of the interest had left him. The others had been right: this wasn’t something that a police chief would deal with, even if he did work up here. The vandalism wasn’t really vandalism, the intruder was known to everyone.

  It was one of those things that people put up with. Had the intruder been an actual person and not something magical, everyone would make excuses, telling Retsler about the kid’s bad home life or his poor upbringing or his limited intelligence. No one would ask the chief to intervene, especially since it seemed that no one got hurt.

  That was what had cooled him, if “cool” was the right word. So far as he could tell, these creatures hadn’t ever killed anyone. In fact, if the story MariCate had told could be believed, the creatures had saved the life of the children during that snowstorm, and got them out untraumatized.

  All of the stories were relatively benevolent. There was no evidence that the creatures were what killed the adults, they might have simply died in a colder part of the cave, thinking they were safe. The creature that invaded the kitchen had never harmed a soul, not even when that cook years ago had let the creature choose ingredients for meals. In fact, the meals had to be good because the recipes were still in use.

  So, aside from the occasional angry outburst, the kind he’d seen from a variety of humans in a variety of circumstances, the creature seemed somewhat normal.

  If such things cou
ld be called normal.

  After a few bottles of Blackberry Porter from Wild River Brewing (something he couldn’t get in Montana and missed, the summertime microbrews from his home state), Retsler planned his drive back to Montana. He decided he wouldn’t even go to Whale Rock. He still didn’t want to see anyone there, still didn’t want to revisit the place.

  He was still, despite his momentary lapse, running away from all things unworldly.

  And, he told himself, he always would.

  ***

  Sunlight woke him, which he found ironic since everyone talked about living on the shadow side. Apparently, his east-facing hotel room avoided that shadow altogether.

  He supposed he could close the curtains, but they were gauzy and white and wouldn’t make a lot of difference. He checked his watch, saw that it wasn’t even six yet, which was when the diner opened. He had checked the night before, knowing he would be leaving as early as he could. He could make it back to Montana in one long day, but he preferred to drive sensibly. No reason the chief of police of any town should get caught weaving all over an empty highway due to exhaustion.

  Even with a leisurely shower, he got downstairs ten minutes before the diner opened. He found himself wandering outside, to the path. It was dark here, shadowy, the pond itself looking a bit grim and more algae-covered than he remembered.

  It was also cold, the kind of cold he loved about the West. Yeah, it would heat up to maybe ninety-five later in the day, but right now, it was fifty and he wasn’t wearing a coat.

  He looked at the mountain, rising up before him. He couldn’t see the peak here because he was too close. The mountain didn’t look formidable when you were on it, only as you drove up to it from sea level. Then it seemed impossible to cross.

  A chill breeze touched him, the kind he hadn’t yet gotten used to in the Montana winters. Some of the locals there called it a prairie breeze because it came from the East, bringing Midwestern or Canadian cold onto the part of Montana that passed for flatland. The weather guys called it an arctic wind, but that suggested gales filled with snow particles. This felt only like the precursor.

  And he shouldn’t feel it, not in summer. He looked over his shoulder, realized that he was standing near the kitchen door.

  He should have been warmer standing here, but he wasn’t.

  He turned slowly, holding his hands up like a man with a gun trained on him.

  The creature stood behind him, just like he had expected from that chill. All of the descriptions were right: childlike, young, maybe male, maybe female. The eyes looked older than a child’s ever could, but the slender build reminded Retsler of some paintings he had seen of androgynous figures looming out of the mists.

  He didn’t know how to talk to it. If he asked it questions, it would probably leave.

  So he said, “Beautiful morning, isn’t it?”

  Its mouth opened, as if it were going to answer him, revealing a slightly pink interior. As he watched, the creature gained a bit of pinkness all over, as if it were trying to mimic his flesh color.

  “They think you come down here to get warm,” he said. “I don’t. I think you come down here for company.”

  It tilted its head. Its eyes were now blue, the blue of the Montana sky. Its face had no more definition than before, but it seemed to relax a little.

  “You like cooking, you like listening to conversation, and you miss your friends. When the Park Service blocked off the interiors of the Caves, did you lose your own people or access to ours?”

  It nodded toward him, just once, and his heart leapt. It was answering him.

  “I thought so,” he said. “Your people, they’re not fond of us. The rest of them hide, don’t they?”

  It raised its shoulders slightly, then let them drop. A small shrug. It had been around humans long enough to learn gestures. He wondered if it could talk. He suspected that it couldn’t or it would have spoken before now—not to him, but to the others.

  “They call this the Shadow Side,” Retsler said. “You can’t travel outside of it, can you? You can’t look for your friends anywhere else.”

  Water dripped off its chin. He didn’t know if it was melting in the relative heat or if those were tears.

  He didn’t know if this thing could cry.

  Denne would want him to photograph it. Denne would want him to ask all kinds of procedural questions.

  But Retsler wasn’t interested in procedure. This creature had done nothing wrong. It was just lonely.

  He understood that.

  He nodded, glanced at the kitchen door, then back at the creature. “They need to talk to you,” he said. “They want to make some changes.”

  Its head snapped back, its hand came out, and for a moment, Retsler thought it might hit him. He could actually feel the anger coming off the creature.

  His heart pounded. He kept his hands up. “They don’t want to get rid of the kitchen,” he said, keeping his voice calm. “But out here, outside the Caves, our equipment decays. Falls apart.”

  More water dripped off its chin.

  “We repair that damage,” he said. “But sometimes we have to replace things. Like the dishes. Remember how we replaced the dishes?”

  It watched him. He had no idea how old this thing was, but he would wager it was decades older than he was. And he would wager that it was one of the younger members of its species.

  He had no idea if it understood. He hoped it did. Because he finally figured out its anger.

  The interior of the Caves had remained the same for hundreds of years. The early deaths might have been caused when humans wandered in, interfered with something important. He would wager that the Ice Palace meant something to this creature’s people.

  But he didn’t know, and obviously, it couldn’t tell him. Not easily, anyway.

  “Let us make the changes,” he said. “Then we’ll stay. The kitchen will stay. The path will stay. You can still observe, and maybe even help again.”

  It wiped a hand along its chin, a very human gesture. Then it closed its fingers around the water it had collected.

  When it opened its hand again, it was holding what looked like tiny diamonds. It extended that hand to Retsler.

  His heart pounded. He’d learned not to accept magical items from any creature. He’d once lost a friend to centuries-old wine. All of the fairytales cautioned against eating anything offered by the supernatural.

  But the creature didn’t want him to eat the diamonds, at least so far as Retsler could tell.

  He brought his right hand down and extended it, palm up. The creature touched the tips of its fingers to the tips of his, its skin sending an icy shock through him.

  Then the creature closed its hand again, and smiled.

  The smile was a surprise. The face warmed, and the creature looked almost human.

  Retsler smiled back.

  The creature nodded, then walked around Retsler, heading down the path toward the Caves.

  Retsler watched it until it disappeared around a small corner. The chill slowly left the air. He could feel the warmth of the day wrap itself around him.

  No wonder the creature left so early. It would melt faster in the heat of a mountain summer.

  His stomach growled. He ate too much up here, and he still wasn’t getting full. He glanced at his watch to see how long the interaction took and was startled to see that three hours had gone by.

  He had lost time. A few minutes conversation, to him, and he had lost time.

  No wonder those children had lost days. He wondered what they had done in the Caves as the snow fell, as their parents died in the Ice Palace.

  Then he shook his head slightly. He was intrigued. Dammit. He hadn’t been intrigued in years. Frightened, yes. Overwhelmed, most definitely. And then he had run away to a place that hadn’t challenged him at all.

  He had never been intrigued in his Montana job, although learning the job had occupied him for a while. It had brought him a feeling close to i
ntrigue. But he had never quite achieved it.

  He stared at the path down the center of the shadow side, leading to a blocked off part of the Caves. Home, but not home. Water creatures, but no great body of water. A history, but not the history he had grown up with.

  A new start, again.

  “Dammit,” he repeated.

  And then he turned, and walked into the kitchen. He didn’t run, and he certainly wasn’t running away.

  In fact, he had some information to give to the chef and the entire staff, maybe to the town parents, and certainly to Stanley and MariCate. He knew how they should treat their visitor, and how to keep that visitor calm.

  He also knew he was signing on for a ride. They were, as Bronly had told him, under some kind of assault. But so was Whale Rock. He didn’t want to go back there.

  But he didn’t want to return to Montana either, where he faced domestic quarrels fueled by too much alcohol and an easy access to firearms.

  Retsler suspected he would find enough of those up here. It was a rural village after all, despite the obvious wealth backing the hotel. Wealth didn’t prevent people from getting angry or drinking too much or losing sight of the things they loved.

  Hell, nothing did.

  Humans reserved the right to be stupid.

  And they deserved the right to change their mind.

  Introduction to “Sisters”

  Leah Cutter loves diverse settings. Her first three novels, Paper Mage, Caves of Buda, and The Jaguar and the Wolf, take place in Tang Dynasty China, World War II Budapest, and the Viking Era. Lately, she has focused on contemporary fantasy in such novels as Zydeco Queen and the Creole Fairy Courts. She also writes a lot of short fiction, with stories upcoming in anthologies and Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine.

  Her work has received starred reviews and a lot of deserved acclaim. She should receive even more acclaim after people read “Sisters.”