by P. W. Child
“Splendid,” Lita announced in her deep voice, now purely impressed with her prisoner.
Nina was famished, wishing there was at least some bread put out so long. Then she remembered where she was and in which capacity she dwelled: at the mercy of Lita Røderic, psycho bitch extraordinaire. The latter sentiment was the irony of the evening, as the tall captor had swung to the exact opposite persona as 20 minutes before when she salivated at the prospect of cannibalizing Nina.
The dishes were served. Roast duck with cranberry preserve, asparagus, baby potatoes, and salad. Lita, like a harmless high school pal, pointed at the salad and remarked, “I wasn’t quite sure what you eat, really, so I opted for greens. I hope that’s okay?”
Nina smiled and nodded, completely perplexed by Lita’s sudden amicable nature and her instincts urging her to play along as nicely as she could. She was desperately curious about Lita’s plans for her and equally much to know what Sam’s status was. However, between the succulent meat that painfully stilled her hunger with every bite and Lita’s tendency to shed her skin like a shape shifter, she elected to remain cordial and docile. Nina felt like an Omega wolf, cowering lower than the head of the Alpha to appease it, but she had no reservations about the peril of this woman’s company.
Lita did not eat. Instead she lit another cigarette and poured some whisky for them both. Again, Nina did not ask. Lita’s dress was stained with a few rusty blots that made her nervous. Outside, the mockery of the wind had not relented and it stirred the embroidered fabric banners on the wall of the room. Depicting ravenous wolves tearing at an elk, it swayed in the draft that haunted the bare window that sat about a story higher in the curvature of the stone wall. Like a blind eye, it shimmered from the light overcast sky that brightened the darkness.
“What is the time now? I have completely lost track,” Nina asked. Her watch broke when she was forced into the car at Warriston Graveyard.
“I don’t know,” Lita said indifferently. Nina’s eyes found the kind henchman standing on ceremony and he lifted his three fingers to indicate it was 3am. It was clear that Lita had no routine or concept of time. Perhaps it was part of her idiosyncrasies or maybe she just never slept. That was a disturbing thought, as if she was not psychotic enough. At once, Lita turned her ice blue eyes on Nina, pinning her with a stare that carried absolutely no indication of intention or mood, implying that she had heard Nina’s mental accusation somehow.
“You are going to try and stop me, aren’t you, Nina?” Lita said evenly while her face remained static in its position, moving only her lips. Her words fell from her grotesquely cavernous mouth in slow motion, leaving Nina’s food bitter on her tongue. To add to the horror of the moment, when Lita rose from her chair, Nina noticed for the first time the Black Sun insignia extending across the surface span of the convex ceiling above them.
Of course she knew very well that Lita was involved with them, but the sight of the odious emblem just affirmed the tenacity of the all-consuming, power drunk cult and its array of variously unhinged members.
“What do you mean?” Nina asked submissively.
Lita dealt her a hefty wallop across the face, propelling Nina off her chair and onto the moist stone floor. Her knees burned from the impact and within her peripheral vision she could see the subordinate man flinch, but he knew better than to come to her aid.
“What do you mean?” Lita mocked Nina in her most contemptuous little girl voice and planted a devastating kick in the small woman’s abdomen as she tried to get up from all fours. Nina’s breath left her momentarily and her swollen cheek throbbed as her mouth filled with blood.
“Get Slokin and Dr. Krantz!” she roared. Nina vomited on the floor and felt her skin grow cold as the fainting spell possessed her frail muscles. The floor she was crawling on slanted and buckled under her, the hideous Black Sun symbol enveloping her like a giant black spider, sinking from above to catch her. Many footsteps clapped in the hollow hallway and entered the chamber, but Nina could only see feet surrounding her. She felt her body being seized, lifted onto the dining table where she had a decent dinner not 10 minutes before.
Slokin’s repulsive sneer twisted and floated way too close to her face and Nina could hear her own voice, moaning in discontent and hopelessness. It sounded like someone else’s, as if another Nina stood somewhere in the room and watched, just watched and made horrible sounds to suit the pain of the victim on the table.
Too weak to fight, Nina saw an older man in his mid-60s with a white coat and military haircut lean over her. He gently took her left arm and turned her palm upward. She could not see what he was doing, but Lita walked away, pacing impatiently while Slokin’s child rapist smile sickened her.
Nina felt so alone. She felt locked out of the world with not one ally to unlock the door and let her back in. She was locked out with the wolves, naked in a snow frozen night. It started as a faint itch and gradually it grew worse, burning like acid into the tissue of her arm the skin of her arm was peeled back, flayed awake and feeling.
“S-s…” was all Nina’s numb tongue could form against her teeth. Inside her head she was screaming for him, but here at the mercy of these Nazi monsters, his name died in her lips.
But they could not reach inside her mind.
‘Sam.’
Chapter 25
At 6.45am, on the flat clearing between the Port Edgar Yacht Club and the great waters of the North Sea, Sam switched off the engine of the 1300cc Honda he borrowed from one of The Brotherhood’s ladies. He was exhausted, unable to get a wink of sleep since Erika and her sisters brought him back from the mystical world he was walking through after he drank the poison of the vial.
Sam could recall every sound, every scent, and every sensation he felt there, had there been words in this waking world to describe it. But there were none. Not even poets could conjure the imagery of Hel. He knew that was what it was called; he was told by the swans he saw on the black river. Hel, the Other Side of Life. Hel, the Realm of the Dead.
Before this encounter, Sam did not believe in such things, really. From his strange experiences on expeditions and vision quests, he was forced to re-evaluate the lengths his morals, how far his mind and spirit would go to accommodate the things he was challenged to fathom. What happened to him he could not explain, and for the first time, he felt no need to.
It did not matter what he believed now, what he had seen or if it was real. All that mattered was that he took that journey and found his purpose. Sam, for once, did not feel the innate need to report on what he found. Never before had he allowed anything stupendous to go untold. It was his calling to expose the hidden and give individuals the opportunity to judge for themselves what he objectively conveyed.
But not this time.
Sam had seen Hel, the afterlife. It was not the hell of the Christians or the burning circles of brimstone and fire where demons danced to the pen of literature and poetry. Nor was it a place of damnation or tribulation. It was merely the next life; the transcendence from one state to another. Now he understood why spirits of those who had passed over were said to know the future, why they understood the universe and knew the names of babies even before conception. The place through which he wandered was a specific place he was supposed to see, just as Nina had shown him in the book. Gunnar explained that what Sam had seen, the so-called ‘Vision of Kvasir’, was pivotal to locating Valhalla before Lita Røderic would – before she unleashed the corruption of the earth that would have brother destroying brother and have mankind drive itself to extinction.
It was not as if we weren’t close enough already. The night before, Erika and Gunnar told Sam to recount as much as he could remember of the place, so that they could figure out where it was before the Order of the Black Sun could. If they did, they would certainly free the evil that would bring about Ragnarök in a misguided attempt at world domination.
Another problem was that the vial was depleted.
All night long, they
all sat around the table, consulting all their scrolls and books, even Googled voodoo recipes for the correct combination of herbs and chemicals that could mimic the consistency and smell of the potion. If Slokin discovered that he was being deceived, Nina would surely be killed, there was no doubt about that. And they could not abandon Val and Sam’s friend.
From government records, they had discovered that Slokin technically did not exist. Sam found it all intriguing. He finally confronted Gunnar about his and Val’s records that did not exist either. The leader of Sleipnir explained that what they did, how they lived, could not be uncovered. Therefore, to avoid their fingerprints and identities being revealed after a battle and landing them in prison, they had Tomi erase their records entirely.
Tomi was Sleipnir’s master hacker and general professional miscreant, a disgraced accountant who was once arrested for forgery and accused of several internet based crimes perpetrated against government officials and corrupt politicians. Tomi was simply opposed to anything and anyone who condoned the power of corporations and perpetuated the control of natural resources to extort tribal councils and indigenous peoples for the value of their land. In short, Tomi hated money. Well, he did not hate money, he hated what the pursuit of it drove people to resort to.
The odd thing though, was that Lita Røderic was on record. One would think that she would do the same thing, to sink her identity under the radar. But she was registered as Gaelita Brunnhilde Røderic, born July 27th, 1935 in the village of Toftir on the coast of the Faroe Islands. And yes, the discrepancy in her year of birth was noticed, but she had access to a whole group of Tomi’s of her own and they took care of her records every 20 years, adjusting it to match the constant of her perceived age. This was one of the reasons why The Brotherhood had to stop her once and for all and dispatch as many of her misbegotten associates with her. First, they had to recover Nina from the claws of the Black Sun’s disciples and for that they needed to effectively fool Slokin into believing the contents of the vial was genuine.
The sun was up, but its full splendor was obscured by the dark clouds that gathered over Queensferry, hovering above the Forth Road Bridge and deterring the morning rays from casting a silvery sheen on the water. Erika had warned Sam, after his awakening, that any form of pain would induce visions of Valhalla, therefore he would have to steer clear of any violence whilst alone. After the accidental consumption of the vial, Sam swore off alcohol binges. Dugal thought it was an excellent idea and he wished Sam well on whatever he was supposed to embark on with the bikers, because they refused to share any information with him or Terry.
He was very nervous, even after all the sting operations he had conducted before, gathering intelligence for one exposé after another, and dealing with serious crimes and espionage. Nina was his biggest concern. God knows what they have been doing to her while she was held captive.
Sam looked forward to seeing her, but he feared how she would react to him. After all, he was fucking about on a drinking binge when he should have collected the damn flask and bringing it to her. Had he done that promptly, none of this may have happened, because they would have been together, and safe. It was, indirectly, his fault that she was abducted and he was sure she would let him have it. But that was alright with him, as long as Nina was alive.
At precisely 7am, a blue and grey catamaran appeared on the waves from under the Forth Road Bridge, coming in from the east. The vessel sat wide and low atop the breakers, bobbing with a foamy white trail in its wakes. Two hulls pounded the water as it sped toward Port Edgar, but Sam could see no identifying markings or insignias. Still seated on the Honda, he watched the vessel slow down into the port area and it moored shortly after. A whole crew appeared on the deck. Sam sharpened his gaze to see if he recognized anyone among them, but the shadowy morning made it difficult to discern between the moving figures at a distance. In his leather jacket pocket, his hand fondled the evil vial that had caused them so much trouble. Sam had a silent conversation with the item several times between his departure from Denton House and his destination.
Now that he had succumbed to its thrall, it yielded no more eerie sensations or irresistible manipulation of his will. On his way to the Yacht Club, Sam had accused the flask, ‘You know, you are nothing but a plain slut – only beguiling my senses long enough for the fruition of your seduction. Oh, you were all over my body, pushing and luring me with such eagerness…and now? Now that I have partaken of you, now you ignore me. Seriously?’ Sam had spoken to the object in his silly mind as he pushed the Honda on the A90. ‘You think behaving absolutely normal is going to make me believe that I imagined it all? Well, guess what, I know what’s going on here. And when I give you to Slokin and he finds out there is nothing magical about you anymore, you are going to end up with all the other discarded canteens. A has-been. So you can kiss my ass!’
When he realized that he was smack-talking an inanimate object, Sam shook his head.
“You are certifiable,” he told himself under his breath while the incoming sea air ruffled his hair. He could not help but have a vendetta against the silver vial, though, no matter how ludicrous it may appear. From the beginning, it felt to him as if the vial was after him, hunting him, and deciding so intelligently.
Now he could see two people disembark. Sam perked up. A scrawny man stepped onto the jetty. He was dressed in white shoes and a black suit, covered by a long black coat that was obviously too large for his frame and it made him look like a baby bird, throwing its skimpy neck forward to receive a worm from its mother. Behind him, a small female appeared, dressed only in jeans and a sweater. Her hair was slightly matted and her skin pale, paler than usual.
“Nina,” Sam whispered, his heart racing at the thought of her condition. He did not even care about the imp who could very well out him for the fake dream juice and send both him and Nina to the next world. He pulled out the half-filled vial and walked over to meet them where the road became a pallid concrete slab which led to the platform.
Nina’s face was blank. All she did was stare dead ahead, emotionless and numb, it appeared. Sam did not like it one bit. He had heard of this Slokin prick and he did not trust him one bit. If he had done anything to harm her, Sam was ready to kill him, regardless of the repercussions.
With his departure this morning, The Brotherhood and Sleipnir had also trekked from Denton House, to assure that Lita’s goons could not attack them there. This was war – once and for all the stalemate between Lita Røderic and The Brotherhood would be ended and the casualties would be inconsequential to the survival of the relatively free world as they knew it. Since becoming a member of the Nazi fold, Lita had been a festering boil on the ass of The Brotherhood, constantly disturbing the resting places of the Vikings throughout Northern Europe and Scandinavia.
“Nina?” Sam shouted, but she did not respond at all to his voice. Thinking that she may not have heard him, he called again, but her face remained stark as she limped along with Slokin.
“Mr. Cleave!” Slokin squealed with a ratty smile. “I like a man who is on time for his appointments.”
“What’s wrong with Nina?”
“Nothing. Just an adverse reaction to incarceration, I suppose. Or it could have been the asparagus last night, “Jasper Slokin shrugged, and then had the audacity to trace Nina’s cheek with the back of his index finger. When Sam saw that she did not even flinch or blink, aberrant behavior of the feisty, defensive Nina he adored, he could feel his blood boil. Something very traumatic had to have befallen her.
“Maybe she is allergic to inferior races,” Sam remarked snidely, deliberately playing on Slokin’s heritage to get under his sarcastic skin and skewer his balls. “Here is your aphrodisiac. Doubt anything would drug away those handsome features of yours. Now give me Nina.”
Slokin fumed. He had never been outdone, at least not in his opinion. Sam did not wait for him to deliver Nina, but stepped forward and claimed her. Slokin shook the vial to ascertain that it was n
ot empty. Then he opened it and sniffed at it like a dog. His beady eyes darted in space as he took it in and established its authenticity. Sam pulled Nina against him while they waited for his verdict. He could feel the subdued tremor in her tiny physique and it only infuriated him more.
Finally, the reprehensible insect snickered, “It’s the stuff. Off you go, then.”
It was the green light Sam had been waiting for. Behind Slokin he noticed Gunnar emerge from one of the boat lock-ups, his vengeful eyes fixed on Lita’s lackey. Slokin killed his wife and he vowed to treat him to a slow departure from this earth. Sam knew that if Gunnar killed Slokin right here in public, he would be arrested and locked up for life. That would profit him and Sleipnir nothing and would probably force the motorcycle club and The Brotherhood to disband.
“Hey, Slokin, a message for your queen bitch…” Sam feigned a spiteful laugh and planted his right fist hard across Slokin’s left side jawbone so hard that he fell on his knees with a crack. Instantly, the pain of the impact of knuckle against bone threw Sam into a vision of Valhalla again. For a moment, he was stunned by the shift into the other state, but he quickly recovered. A short distance away, Gunnar stopped in his tracks, seeing Sam’s dip into the other side.
Unfortunately for Sam, Slokin saw this. With a mild hint of suspicion, he looked at the journalist who had a right hook from hell and held his jaw in place with his right hand while grasping the vial in the other. Some of his nautical entourage rushed to his side to help, asking if they should summon the local law officers, but Slokin rejected their offer and watched Sam intently as he walked away with Nina in his embrace.
Gunnar would have to exact his revenge some other time and Sam would have to watch his reckless behavior. Nina’s arm was bandaged and she was aware of the wound, but she had no idea what the medical staff of the Black Sun did to her. She had no memory of it, courtesy of the benzodiazepine related designer substance they had fed her at dinner. All she knew was that Lita would never let her walk away after acknowledging her as nemesis. Something foul was afoot and she had a bad feeling that it was under her bandage.
