Kelsey spied a set of vending machines in the far corner of the lounge and strolled over. She reached into her leather jacket for her wallet. A metal rack filled with tour excursion brochures displayed next to it caught her attention and she paused. There was no end to what adventures someone could experience in Alaska. The brochures ran the gamut from zip-lining and dogsledding to whale watching. For those with a lot of money to burn, there were tours to take you by helicopter right up to a glacier where you could literally walk on it.
Kelsey flipped through one pamphlet thick with pages of challenging winter camping trips, each one with a glaring disclaimer that it was only for the physically fit. She scoffed. Challenging. That was nothing compared to the training excursion she and Ari had done in their teens. She creased her brows. Ari. What the hell was she going to do about him? How long was she going to stay mad at him? Until he fixed things? If she couldn’t fix things, how did she possibly expect him to? He couldn’t and she knew it. Staying mad at him was just an excuse to punish him further. Except, didn’t he deserve it? How could she possibly forgive him for what he’d done? She flipped through a few three and four day backpacking adventure hikes along the Chilkoot Trail and finally tossed them aside.
She was about to turn away when something on the wall caught her eye. The bulletin board was rife with tacked fliers filled with items for sale, car services and tour job opportunities, but it was a flier for a missing person’s report that caught her attention. She winced inwardly as she stared at the young toddler featured in the color photograph. She was adorable with rosy, fat cheeks and a happy, carefree smile. Someone had put her hair up in pigtails and adorned them with pink hair bows. Kelsey cringed thinking that something, or someone, had wiped that expression off her precious face. The awful things people do to each other. That men do…to children…
She read from the flier:
Missing from Juneau, Alaska, since August, three year-old Evie Thornton was last seen playing in the backyard of her grandmother’s mobile home around five o’clock pm. 37 inches tall and 31 lbs., with brown hair and brown eyes, she was last seen wearing a pink T-Shirt with strawberry designs on it, matching shorts, a purple sweat jacket and a pair of light-up pink and yellow sneakers. The Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska has also offered a ten thousand dollar reward for any information leading to her whereabouts.
The little girl had been missing since August and the sign was still up? That was four months ago. Kelsey stared back at the snow covered mountains outside and somehow knew that this poor girl was not going to be found anytime soon.
An announcement sounded over the loudspeaker and Kelsey heard them call her for boarding. She’d be jumping on a forty-five minute prop-plane for her trip to Skagway. She grabbed a bottled water from the vending machine, sifted her change to also purchase a chocolate bar, tossed on her backpack, and ran to catch her flight.
Chapter 8
“Here you go, Miss. Enjoy Skagway. Gateway to the Klondike Gold Rush.”
“How much do I owe you, Mister…?” Kelsey asked.
The man laughed and his wrinkles made his eyes disappear for a moment within the folds. “You can call me Charlie. Charlie Marks. Although if I told you my Tlingit clan name, I’d have to kill you,” he teased and winked. “You owe me nothing. I only drove you a few blocks for the company. It’s been a quiet day. In fact, you’re the only tourist to come here in a week. The fact is, you could have walked from the airport yourself. It was all of two blocks, you know. I just took you the long way through town just to get a chance to pretend I’m young and could make a play for the prettiest girl to come to Skagway this season.”
Kelsey grinned. “You are a charmer, sir. And let it be known I knew it was only a two block walk but you enchanted me into using your services.”
The old man beamed.
She handed him a ten dollar bill anyway. “Please just take this. Consider it your fee for flirting with me. Every girl loves a good flirt. So, are you busy or can you chat with me a bit more? I’d love to learn a few things about the area if you have the time.”
Charlie tilted his head and then accepted the cash. It disappeared into his front pocket. “So, young lady, what can I help you with?”
“Have you lived here a long time?”
The older man nodded. “I have. My great great-grandfathers were of the Tlingit tribe who settled the Alaskan territory thousands of years ago. They were an amazing, strong people skilled as hunters and fishermen. Our people’s weaving abilities cannot be compared to, even today, though the other clans may claim otherwise. Unfortunately, it is hard to make a living here and over the years the clans have dispersed. Most of my extended family moved down to Juneau for better work opportunities.”
“You didn’t go with them? How come?” Kelsey was enthralled with stories about the Native Americans and had the utmost respect for how they honored the land.
Charlie shook his head. “Oh, I left with my parents when I was a child, but returned to Skagway on my own when I was in my twenties and haven’t left since. Now it’s been so long I wouldn’t know where to go if I tried. But it’s good for me here. I’m the oldest tour guide in the area and Tlingit to boot. Tourists love taking pictures with me. They think I’m a novelty. Here, take my card and call me if you need any photos, or for me to drive you anywhere during your stay.”
She took the card and pocketed it. She turned and peered down the main thoroughfare. Kelsey found Skagway beautiful and quaint. She’d had Charlie drop her off on Broadway, near where the cruise ships came to port during the summer months, but he had come from the other side of town and driven her down some of the side streets first. “I’m curious. Why is it called Skagway?”
“It’s a Tlingit word, referring to the rough seas in the Taiya Inlet which is caused by a series of strong wind currents.” He gave her a conspiratorial look. “But Skagway is actually the nickname of Kanagu. Legend says Kanagu is a woman who once transformed herself into stone at Skagway Bay and is the reason for all the strong winds and bad weather we have.”
Kelsey leaned in. She loved legends. “And why did she transform herself?”
He raised his brows and clicked his tongue. “Well, young lady, apparently she was not too pleased with all the whites coming to the area and blew strong winds in her wrath to punish them. That’s not me saying this, but what the legends say, of course. No offense taken by present company, please.”
“Of course not. None taken.” Kelsey eyed the vacant cruise docks at the end of the street that she knew were packed with vacationers over the summer. “I guess she doesn’t like the cruise industry these days, does she?”
Charlie chuckled. “Probably not. But we do. Tourism is what keeps this town alive in this day and age. I’ll tell you this. I think Kanagu took a long vacation and is now hiding out in Dyea. If you get a chance, you should check the place out. It’s an abandoned mining town that’s now part of the Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Park. Nothing’s really there anymore but the most beautiful scenery and a few ghosts. It’s a great place to take a girl if you want to scare her into your arms. Walk her through any of the old graveyards still standing, tell her the story about the Palm Sunday Avalanche that killed a slew of miners, and she’ll be putty in your hands. I won’t lie. I’ve tried that very line myself over the years. With much success, I might add. It’s how I got my first wife, Marian, to marry me. Scared her right into my waiting arms.” He winked and Kelsey laughed.
She stepped out of the car and was about to move away when Charlie called her back. Suddenly his jovial demeanor had vanished and he was deadly serious. “Miss, just a word of caution if you’d be so kind to humor an old man? Do me a favor. Please keep your windows closed and don’t go walking out about at night. People have a way of going missing in Alaska. We lost two fisherman last summer, three cruise ship tourists this past season, and over the years more than a few local children in the neighboring towns who went out t
o play at night and who never returned. Some even disappeared from their very beds. Alaska can be a dangerous place sometimes.”
“How awful,” Kelsey said. “What do you think happened to all those people?”
He shrugged. “The police have thought it all circumstantial and regular crimes. We have a lot of foreigners, hikers and transients who come through Skagway on a regular basis, so maybe one of them had something to do with these missing folks. Maybe it was the elements that got them. The Alaskan winters and the woods can be treacherous for those not prepared. Heck, maybe they got lost in the woods, a bear ate them, or they just wanted to disappear. It could be anything, of course. Things just happen sometimes.” He clicked his tongue.
Kelsey squinted. “I get the distinct feeling you don’t believe any of that is what really happened, do you?”
Charlie pursed his lips. “Well, what I believe and what my people believe is quite different than what the local police and visitors believe. The last thing we want to do is hurt the livelihood of the town with stories that will scare away the tourists. This is supposed to be a safe place.”
Kelsey stood her ground. “I want to hear what you think it is. Trust me, I can take it.”
He cocked his head. "Maybe you can and maybe you can’t. My people believe something much more sinister happened to all of them. Something straight from Tlingit lore. We think all those unfortunate people may have met up with Kushtaka.”
“Kushtaka? What is that?” Kelsey asked.
“It’s not a what, but a who. He is a legendary, hair-covered giant. A shape-shifting being who steals humans to take their souls so they can never reincarnate or have everlasting life.”
Kelsey felt the hairs on her arms prickle and rise up. Reincarnation? Again? I just can’t seem to escape it. “A big hair-covered giant? Do you mean like Bigfoot or a Yeti?” This is all just too coincidental for comfort.
He nodded. “Some of the native tribes believe he is half-human, half-otter. Others believe he is a Sasquatch that lives in caves deep in the woods. Others believe they are shapeshifters. Our Tlingit mothers used to put the fear of Kushtaka into our bedtime stories so that we wouldn’t venture out in the night. I have a bit of fascination with him and sometimes spend nights searching for this creature. I have for years. I’ve yet to find him, though I have seen and heard many odd things in the darkest parts of the night.
“I say this to you in all sincerity, Miss. If you hear a baby’s cry where there should be no baby, or a high pitched whistle in three parts, please, I beg of you. Run as fast as you can.”
And with that, he turned back around and drove his car slowly down the main thoroughfare, leaving Kelsey standing there, open-mouthed.
After her discussion with Charlie, she decided to explore the town before she made her way to the retreat, which was just an easy mile walk through the woods. It wasn’t too cold, just shy of forty degrees, but she wrapped her cream angora scarf tightly around her neck and put on her fur-lined leather gloves, because she’d heard the temperature could drop fast. Her knapsack rested lightly on her back. She hadn’t packed a lot. Just enough to get her through the next few days. She planned on wearing the same pair of gray skinny jeans and her gray Asolo Stynger GTX hiking boots the entire time. A few shirts and a sweater and she was good to go.
Skagway proved to be as quaint and lovely as the pictures she had seen online, but it also had an intimate feel that small towns had and big cities simply didn’t. The main downtown was all of seven blocks, and filled with stores that evoked an era long ago. She passed a plethora of restaurants, surprised to discover they ranged through a host of different ethnic groups. She thought they’d all be fish-themed with a thousand different types of salmon recipes, but she saw everything from Indian, to Barbecue, to Thai. Her stomach rumbled.
She window-shopped, bought some fudge, and perused the front display cases of stores filled with trinkets and gems, most likely fueled with the dollars from the thousands of cruise ship visitors who arrived daily over the summer months.
An artisan shop selling local weavings intrigued her greatly and she went inside. A little bell tinkled to alert the owners that she was there. The shopkeeper came around the counter to chat with her.
Chilkat blankets were displayed in grand fashion and Kelsey was awed when the owner explained how much time it took to create one. She’d always thought it had taken just a few months, but apparently some took upwards of a year to create. Not to mention the amazing materials in the blankets. The shop owner told her most were comprised of goat wool, dog hair and red and yellow cedar bark. They had to use whatever they had handy, right? She’d learned many tribes besides the Tlingit weaved. So did the Tsimshian, the Haida and a host of other Northwest coast clans, and there were examples of all their work on display. She reminded herself to purchase one before she came home because something about them appealed to her greatly. She spied one behind a glass display case and went over to examine it. A chill she couldn’t explain went through her, and she placed her hands gently on the glass and leaned down to get a closer look.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” The shopkeeper came to Kelsey’s side. “When you look at this, you can almost see the tragic story behind it.”
Kelsey could only nod. She could tell it was ancient. Dark stains covered it, bleeding through the now-faded designs. “Where did this come from?” she whispered.
“My great-grandmother was given this by her grandmother and it was passed down generation to generation. There’s a tale about its owner, one of my ancestors, who went through a great battle with this blanket. I keep it safe to remember her.” She cocked her head and pointed. “As you can see, the weave is quite exquisite and you can feel the loving care that went into making this. This particular one was made of caribou sinew and besides the white, was just black, yellow and bluish-green. Back then, they didn’t even use dyes.”
Kelsey had an irresistible urge to wrap the blanket around her shoulders. Instead, she stepped away from the glass. “Is it for sale?”
The shop owner smiled sadly. “I’m sorry. It’s only for display.”
Kelsey nodded and left the shop with an odd feeling in her gut, but it passed as she continued her stroll through town. She glanced down side streets and spied the local supermarket, located the post office, and chatted with a man walking a Siberian Husky pup. He apparently loved to talk and shared with her that there’d been so few high school seniors one year they’d had to ferry the kids to the neighboring town of Haines to have a proper high school prom.
Kelsey finally hit the end of the town proper and veered north. She took out her iPhone, checked her map, and within a few blocks spotted the road leading up into the mountain towards the retreat. It was early afternoon and the sun was still bright in the sky, but Charlie’s ominous words echoed in her head. She wasn’t frightened, though. Did he really think Bigfoot was an actual creature? Still, she kept alert. She knew that most legends were based on some sort of actual fact, but she thought maybe it was a big bear or some other sort of animal at the root of everything.
After a mile, the asphalt turned to dirt, and she then followed a -well-worn one lane road until she hit the retreat. No one passed her on her way there, but she wasn’t surprised. It was November and not the regular tourist season. She was surprised there wasn’t snow on the ground yet. She glanced up and gasped in amazement at the bald eagle sitting majestically at the top branch of the nearest tree. He turned his intelligent, beady glare on her and she stared back. The bird radiated a power and intensity that gave her a bit of a chill as she continued up the path. She glanced back once and she was sure it still stared at her.
What is going on here? I’m getting chills staring at blankets and looking at a bird? Get a grip, Kelsey.
The retreat turned out to resemble a lovely wooden lodge and had a large sign declaring “Noble Path House” on the top of the arched entranceway. Surrounding the main cabin, and hidden partially in the surrounding wood,
were smaller cabins, presumably for the guests. She could see each of them, one by one, disappearing further into the woods. In front of her was a cobbled walkway leading to the three wooden steps into the entrance. She skipped up them until she stood on the covered porch. A few wooden rocking chairs swayed lightly in the breeze. Two brightly painted donation boxes, one for clothing and one for books and toys, sat at the left side of the porch. She turned to the front door and saw a visitor’s sign nailed on a post next to it.
Noble Path House is a place for healing the heart, healing the mind and healing the body. We practice the art of compassion and reflection in everything we do. We ask that you speak in hushed tones, so as not to disturb the meditations of our guests. In the evenings, we practice the art of Noble Silence until morning prayers commence.
Kelsey gently pushed open the door and tiptoed inside the temple. It was a large, open and airy space that immediately appealed to her senses. Hardwood floors glowed as if they’d just been polished, and floor mats, the shade of burnt-rust and decorated with yellow pillows, were placed in neat rows. On a mat next to the front door lay a pair of dusty brown, closed-toe shoes in canvas. She removed her own hiking boots and placed them on the mat.
So much went into the making of a temple. It could be simple or it could be ornate. She remembered the decadence of the Bodhidharma Monastery in Tibet. It was so expansive and beautiful, with rooms filled with Thangka scrolls, prayer wheels and all sorts of historical Tibetan artifacts.
While Noble Path House was decorated simply, it was tastefully done. On the wall in front of her and to her left was a shrine with hanging multicolored curtains surrounding a three foot high golden Buddha. In front of the statue was a low table filled with candles. Fruit and flowers were strewn about as offerings. Incense smoked gently and wafted in spiral curls upwards towards the cathedral ceiling. She could smell the scent of jasmine mixed with another woodsy scent she couldn’t identify.
The Call of Mount Sumeru Page 6
