Northwind

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022 (Now available for pre-order from Amazon)

December 24

A low rumble woke Luui, and she jerked her eyes open. But instead of Aassik’s gaping and bloody maw descending upon her she looked up into the elven face of Naaluk, hands clutched around her empty belly, as the Qamaarlutik peered down at her.

“She’s awake,” Kalaagi said as Luui lifted her head.

“I can see she’s awake, Brother.” Naaluk rolled her eyes at Luui. “I’m staring right at her.”

“Then you should move, Sister. And let me talk to her.”

“Naamik,” Naaluk said. She lowered her voice to a whisper as she wrapped her tiny hands around Luui’s finger. “I have to say something first.”

“What is it, Naaluk?” Luui blinked again, then pressed her free hand to her head, exploring the bandage wrapped around it. “What happened?”

“Kalaagi will tell you that in a second,” Naaluk said. “But first, I have to tell you what I did.”

“Naaluk?”

“I know,” she said, nodding. “I was bad. But you were…” Naaluk blew out her cheeks, tickling Luui’s nose with her breath. “You were…”

“I was sad, Naaluk,” Luui said. “I missed my Ataata. And my friend was stuck in the north. I was…” Luui sighed and said, “I was alone.”

“You had us,” Naaluk said, frowning.

“I know. But…”

“It doesn’t matter.” Naaluk squeezed Luui’s finger. “We will always stay with you. And so will the big woman.”

“Aunix? She’s here?”

“She’s coming soon,” Kalaagi said as she climbed onto Luui’s bed. “She took your boat to Uummannaq. She’s buying things.”

“Presents,” Naaluk said. “Imaqa.”

“Sister…” Kalaagi nudged Naaluk. “You were apologising.”

“I was?”

Kalaagi nodded.

“Well, Luui,” Naaluk said. “I’m sorry I tricked Northwind and made her challenge you.”

“You did this?”

“Go on,” Kalaagi said as Naaluk shivered.

“I may have,” she said. Then, at a prod from her brother, Naaluk nodded. “I did,” she said. “I told Northwind you would bring her pujoralak.”

“You told her that?”

“Aap,” Naaluk said. “But she doesn’t need it, of course. But maybe I told her she did, and the only one who could get it for her, was the shaman’s daughter.”

“You said that?”

Naaluk nodded.

“Why?”

“Because,” Kalaagi said, as Naaluk slumped onto her bottom. “She loves you, Luui. We both do. But you have been sad.”

“I have…”

“So very sad.”

“And you weren’t doing anything,” Naaluk said. “Tell her that, Brother.”

“You just did.”

“I know I did. But you should tell her… Because…”

Naaluk stopped speaking as Luui sat up. She held her breath, finger and thumb poised to snap her fingers as Luui reached for her. Kalaagi snuffed the magic from Naaluk’s fingers just as Luui wrapped her in a gentle but unyielding hug.

“Qujanaq,” Luui said, pulling Kalaagi into a hug too. “Both of you.”

She let them go, and Naaluk turned, fiddling with something she said was stuck in her eye before sliding off the bed to sit on the floor.

“What happened, Kalaagi?” Luui asked once she was sure Naaluk was all right.

Kalaagi took a tiny breath and then sat beside Luui.

“Everything happened,” he said. “Everything all at once.”

“Tell her about how I knocked the ice away from her head,” Naaluk said, looking up.

“The ice still hit her, Sister.”

“Aap,” Naaluk said. She picked herself up and climbed back onto the bed. “But only a little.”

“It’s true,” Kalaagi said. “Naaluk bumped the ice with her wing. It hit you…”

“Here,” Luui said, rubbing her fingers over a bump beneath her bandage.

“And another one on the back of your head,” Kalaagi said.

“I don’t remember that one.”

“You couldn’t,” Kalaagi said. “But when Sermilissuaq caught Aassik again…”

“When he ripped another worm in half,” Naaluk said, demonstrating with an aggressive wringing of her hands and a fierce look pasted onto her tiny face.

“And it became two more,” Kalaagi said.

Naaluk nodded. “Bothersome worms. We’re going to have to do something about them.”

“Later,” Kalaagi said, throwing his sister what he hoped was calming look.

“And Sermilissuaq?”

“He became a bear, shedding all his ice.” Kalaagi smiled as Luui nodded, as if he had known it had been her plan all along. “But even a great bear like Sermilissuaq is not match for three ice worms. He ran away.”

“He ran?”

“Very fast,” Naaluk said. “I tried to follow him, to see where he went. But even with help from your little wind…”

“Naalanngitsoq,” Luui said.

“Aap.” Naaluk nodded. “Even with her help, I didn’t see where he went.” Naaluk turned as Aunix thumped the snow from her boots against the side of the cabin before opening the door. “But she did.”

“I did what?” Aunix said. She hung her jacket on a hook on the wall and then she spotted Luui and grinned. “You’re up.”

“Aap.”

“And looking better already.” Aunix dumped the cardboard box she carried, and then pulled off her boots. “No peeking, Naaluk,” she said when the Qamaarlutik rushed past her as Aunix approached Luui’s bed. “Let me see that bandage.”

Luui tilted her head, and then reached for Aunix’ hand.

“You came back,” she said.

“I had some help.”

“I know,” Luui said. “Naaluk told me about Northwind.”

“Northwind?”

“She stopped blowing,” Luui said.

“Well, she did, but that’s not the help I mean.”

“Tell her about the bear,” Naaluk said.

“I will when you get your nose out of that box.”

Aunix made a shooing gesture with her fingers and Naaluk stepped to one side.

“What happened to Sermilissuaq?” Luui asked. “Did he reach the sea?”

“I don’t rightly know exactly what happened, and I don’t think anyone – present company excepted – would believe me if I told them. But the mountain shrank. I thought it was a quake, but the damned thing just slipped into the earth somehow. And this happened while that bear of yours was hightailing it down the mountain to the sea. It’s almost like the mountain wanted to make it easier for him, shrinking the distance, encouraging the bear into the sea. Now, it was a helluva splash that bear made when it got there. I tell you. It’s what I saw. Because, let’s be honest, it was a helluva bear you found in the mountains, Luui.”

“It was.”

“And those worm things…”

“Smaller than to begin with,” Luui said, only to frown when Kalaagi shook his head.

“They started small,” he said. “But they grew bigger once they stopped fighting Sermilissuaq.”

“I told you,” Naaluk said. “We’re going to have to do something about those worms.”

“But not before coffee, and soup, and…” Aunix pushed off the bed and padded across the floor to the box. “I’ve got chocolate. I’ve got some kind of meat –foul, I think.” She caught Naaluk’s eye as the tiny Qamaarlutik gulped. “Not ptarmigan. Just not duck, or whatever you’re supposed to eat in Christmas Eve in Greenland.”

“It’s Christmas Eve?” Luui said.

“Yep,” Aunix said with a grin. “I flew home for Christmas. Just like the song says.”

“But those worms….”

“Later, Naaluk,” Luui said as she slipped free of the covers and slid out of bed. “Food first.”

Kalaagi clicked his fingers softly to send a spark of magic at his sister. She caught it, and, at a nod from Kalaagi, she followed him out of the trapdoor in the cabin floor to give the big folk, as they called them, some space.

“What did you mean when you said you had help in the north?” Luui asked once Aunix had finished heating the soup. She wrapped her fingers around the enamel mug as they sat at the table by the window.

“It was the strangest thing,” Aunix said. “There was this creature.”

“What kind?”

“Ugly.” Aunix shook her head at the memory. “It had the rankest breath. A skeleton head. Thin, saggy breasts, and…”

“A penis?” Luui asked.

“That’s right, but…” Aunix frowned at Luui as the shaman’s daughter fidgeted on her chair. “What’s gotten into you?”

“This is wonderful,” Luui said.

“I’m not sure wonderful is how I would describe it. But this thing topped up the tanks when the wind stopped blowing. She got me home for Christmas.”

“More than that.” Luui reached for Aunix’ hand. “She gave you a lot more than that.”

“Like what?”

Luui took a breath, pausing at the rattle of the windowpanes, and then turned to look at Aunix. “The creature’s name is Uersat Inuat. She, and he, is a helper spirit.”

“She helped me,” Aunix said.

“But that’s not all, is it?”

“No.” Aunix leaned back in her chair. “There was a moment…” She shivered at the memory of it. “Honestly, Luui, I thought that thing was going to rape me.”

“And it might have,” Luui said. “If you didn’t listen to it.”

“If I didn’t what?”

“It showed you something, didn’t it?”

Aunix nodded. “I saw something in the Northern Lights. Strange mountains – lots of contrasts.”

“She showed you the spirit world.”

“She did?”

“Aap,” Luui said. “Uersat Inuat only comes when they find someone suppressing their powers.” Luui grinned, and then slapped the table. “I didn’t see it. But she did.”

“See what?”

“You’re a shaman, Aunix. You have powers.”

“Powers?” Aunix shook her head. “I don’t see that I do…”

“Exactly. You don’t see it. And if you don’t…” Luui paused as the glass in the window rattled again, louder the second time. “Well… It’s dangerous if you don’t. Uersat Inuat has shown you. Now it’s up to you…” Luui sighed as the glass rattled for a third time. “I’ll help you,” she said as she pushed her chair back from the table.

“Luui?”

“I need to go outside for a moment,” Luui said.

“You can’t leave me with a cliffhanger like that.”

“But I’m going to.” Luui grinned. She stuffed her feet into her boots and grabbed Aunix’ thick winter jacket. “I’ll be right back.”

Luui climbed the slope to the ridge above the cabin. She zipped the jacket as an insistent breeze curled over the top of the ridge, teasing at the flaps, snapping at the sleeves. Luui smiled as she recognised the wind – stronger now, as if Naalanngitsoq had grown since they parted.

“It’s good to see you, too,” she said as the cheeky, but not so little wind, gave Luui a gentle push the last few steps to the top. Luui squared her feet in the snow and stared into the black sky. “I’m here,” she said.

Luui leaned forward as an icy gust of wind rushed into her body.

“Shaman’s daughter,” Northwind said, shushing and fizzing the ‘s’s. “Friend of Qamaarlutik.”

“Aap,” Luui said.

“Trickster…”

“Me?” Luui shrugged. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“You had help.”

“Only a little.”

“You called Aassik…”

“Now, wait a second,” Luui said, raising her finger. Northwind flurried a great scoop of snow into the image of Aassik and Luui on the mountain, seconds before the ice worm devoured the shaman’s daughter. “I can explain that,” Luui said.

“And this?”

Northwind changed the image to create something that resembled Assagissat, the helper spirit with the pincers.

“She wasn’t as much help as I had hoped.”

“And yet, they helped you up the mountain.”

“Aap,” Luui said, unable to deny it.

“And him?”

Luui’s breath caught in her throat as Northwind drew the image of her father in the sky before her.

“He helped you?”

“Aap,” Luui said. “He always has. Even when he couldn’t.”

“But you let him go.”

“I had to.” Luui swallowed. “I didn’t want to.”

“Sometimes we must.”

The image of Tuukula Angakkuarneq dissolved in front of Luui and Northwind settled. And Luui frowned again as she latched onto Northwind’s last words.

“We?”

“I cannot always be the north wind,” Northwind said. “In the summer, when the warm fronts disrupt me, I am sad. Just as Naaluk said you were sad.”

“I was,” Luui said.

“And now?”

“Better.”

“As am I.” Northwind sketched another snowy image in the black sky, and Luui smiled at the crude image of Aunix’ little plane, and the way it bustled before her. “I am happiest in winter, but I can be cruel.” The plane settled into a less tempestuous flight. “I have learned.”

“Aap,” Luui said. “And so have I.”

“I do not need to blow through everything. I no longer care about pujoralak.”

“I think Naaluk might have fooled you on that one.” Luui smiled at the thought of the tiny Qamaarlutik and the great reach she had. Enough to influence the wind and force me into action. Luui made a mental note to take more interest in the Qamaarlutik. When they’re not looking, of course.

But Northwind wasn’t finished, and a gentle nudge from Naalanngitsoq bumped Luui back into the moment.

“I will teach other winds to blow far and free,” Northwind said. “It will be my purpose.”

“Aap,” Luui said. “I’m happy for you. Happy for you both.”

Naalanngitsoq brushed Luui’s fringe and then whisked away, her cold touch lingering a moment on Luui’s cheek.

“You will also teach,” Northwind said. “That will be your purpose.”

“I will?”

Northwind drew another quick sketch of Aunix’ plane.

“Ah…” Luui nodded. She glanced over her shoulder and smiled at a steady wisp of smoke rising out of the cabin’s chimney. “Of course.”

“Then we can part, on good terms?”

“We can,” Luui said. She lifted her chin and stared into the wind. “Juullimi Pilluarit,” she said.

“And to you, daughter of the shaman.”

“Actually,” Luui said, as she straightened her shoulders. “I think it’s just shaman now.”

“As you wish.”

“I do,” Luui said, nodding as Northwind retreated. She turned, ready to take her first step back to the cabin, only to pause as she looked to her right. A plume of snow on a far ridge deep in the Svartenhuk Mountains caught her eye, and she sighed. “Right,” she said, as another plume joined the first. “About those worms…”

 

The End

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022 (Now available for pre-order from Amazon)

December 23

It had felt like a good idea at the time, and with memories of her five-year-old self driving her forwards, Luui had imagined simply grabbing the attention of the bear and leading it away from the mountain as it tried to eat her.

Simple, she had thought. And no magic involved.

But as she studied the bear, was she watched the great chunks of ice slide of its flanks and crash onto the ground with the power and thunder of a glacier calving, Luui thought of an alternative plan, one that would require help, “And a little magic, after all.”

She spent the rest of the night and the next day observing Sermilissuaq and, on retreating to a shallow snow cave she and Naalanngitsoq hollowed out of a snow drift, she entered a trance state to call for backup.

Backup.

It made her smile before she cleared her mind, searching for the entrance to the spirit world. But either Luui’s luck had run out, or the thought of tangling with Sermilissuaq was too much – even for Âmo, which worried her –as all the spirits were busy.

Busy wasn’t good.

But as Luui returned from her brief visit to the spirit world, and Qaqqaq rumbled – just checking in – she thought of someone else, some thing, that might help.

“He’s helped me once, already,” Luui whispered, although the thought of what it had cost her sent shivers through her body. Naalanngitsoq flicked at Luui’s fringe, querying the furrow on Luui’s brow as the shaman’s daughter nodded, decision made.

Of course, finding the worm was another matter.

Luui slid out of the tunnel she had bored into the snow cave and then waited for Naalanngitsoq to flurry after her. The cheeky little wind had stuck around longer than Luui had imagined she would, to the point where the shaman’s daughter was beginning to worry about attachment issues.

Winds need to be free, to grow strong. Luui sighed. Like Northwind. She held out her finger and spun it, encouraging the little wind to wrap herself around it.

“It’s time for you to go, now, Naalanngitsoq.”

Luui winced at the sudden pinch of cold air Naalanngitsoq wrapped around her finger. But just as she released her father to rest, it was time for the wind to blow free and far.

“You can’t stay with me forever,” she said, wincing again at another bite. “But you can visit, whenever you want. Only, I think it’s best if you don’t see what happens next.” Luui took a breath, not entirely sure she wanted to see it either. “But if you can do one last thing,” she said, nodding as Naalanngitsoq whipped up a fresh tornado of surface snow, spinning to the left and right in front of Luui. “Then, perhaps, you could find Northwind?”

Naalanngitsoq slowed, the snow cascaded to the ground, and Luui nodded.

“If you would?” she said.

And then, with a plume of white powder as Naalanngitsoq streaked through the snow, the little wind was gone and Luui was alone on the mountain.

“Okay,” she said, tightening the strap of her slingpack. “It’s time.”

Qaqqaq rumbled again, and Luui nodded. But when the rumbling continued, she paused. She turned her head, scanning the ridges for the familiar burst of snow as she realised the rumble didn’t come from inside the mountain, but across it.

Luui took a second to determine the worm’s direction, and then picked her way back up the slope to the lip of Sermilissuaq’s hollow. She caught her breath at the top and stared down at the great bear covered in ice.

“It’s the ice that’s the problem,” she said, as her breath clouded in front of her face. She shivered in the chill air as she studied the bear. Since choosing its new residence, it had hardly moved and the ice had built up, grown heavy, weighing the bear down until great sheaths of ice slid off it to make room for more layers. “But if we can get rid of more layers,” Luui said. “Then Sermilissuaq can run and hunt again.” She grinned, took a breath, and said, “Good plan, Luui Angakkuarneq. Now, let’s make this work.”

Luui gripped the ice axe in both hands and leaped over the top of the slope to begin her mad descent down the other side as she steered for the nose of Sermilissuaq.

Glissading – that’s what they called it. Although Luui wondered if falling wasn’t a better word for sliding down a steep snowfield without skis, and with little or no control. She used the tip of the ice axe like a rudder as she crouched, snow pluming from her heels. Luui steered towards the bear’s nose, sparing a glance ever other second at the snow and grit pluming in the wake of the worm as Aassik burrowed through the surface snow, curved to rise over stubborn crests of granite, before crashing over the lip of the hollow on an intercept course headed straight for the shaman’s daughter.

But Luui was light, unencumbered by the bands of cartilage covering the Arctic Annelida in crusty segments. She cruised towards Sermilissuaq’s nose, not entirely sure what she would do when she reached it, but confident she would get there before Aassik got her.

“Which is when the fun begins,” she said, breath wisping away over her shoulder as the great bear opened its eyes.

Luui tried kicked off the snow to sprawl on the ice, star-shaped, as she tried to slow her descent only to enter an uncontrolled, and, frankly, inelegant, spin towards the bear’s nose. She slammed into Sermilissuaq with such force she knocked a chunk of ice from its nose, before flying through the air to crash into the side of the bear’s face. Luui swung the ice axe and the pick caught in the ice covering Sermilissuaq’s ear, arresting Luui’s flight, until she hung there like a shaman-sized earring dangling from Sermilissuaq’s icy lobes.

“Hi there,” Luui said, as Sermilissuaq caught her eye.

Ice didn’t just weight the bear down, Luui realised as it stared at her with one great black eye, it slowed it down, too, including its otherwise renowned intelligence. Polar bears were smart. They used tools, had been observed pushing blocks of ice like a screen in front of it as it wriggled towards a seal basking on the surface of the sea ice. They plunged their great paws through the roofs of seals snow holes, after waiting interminable lengths of time for the slightest whisper of a seal inside it. But Sermilissuaq was slow and encumbered, far more so than the ice worm as it adjusted course, sensing Luui dangling beneath Sermilissuaq’s ear.

Bears are smart.

Worms… Not so much.

While Luui saw a bear covered in ice, Aassik simply saw or sensed ice. Nothing more. The worm’s cartilage rings rippled as it picked up speed and crashed into Sermilissuaq’s head, breaking a huge chunk of ice from the bear’s frozen beard.

Luui pushed off Sermilissuaq’s ear with swift kick, tugging her axe free as she fell clear of the worm’s claws protruding from its petal mouth. She landed hard on the icy ground, gasping for breath but too stunned to move. She stared up at the worm as Aassik adjusted course once more, turning its great maw towards Luui. She swallowed, eyes glued to the worm’s descent, just as Sermilissuaq turned its head and snapped its jaws around the worm’s body.

Ice cascaded from the bear as it moved, cracking layer after layer from its flanks. It was still an oversized bear, but as it grew lighter, shedding tonnes and tonnes of ice, it grew faster, snapping at the worm, shedding chunks of ice in all directions.

Aassik escaped Sermilissuaq’s first bite with little more than a gash from a torn ring. It twisted toward its new opponent, forgetting all about the shaman’s daughter to focus on an even bigger prize. But even without eyes, Aassik’s appetite was still greater than its belly. As it slammed into Sermilissuaq’s flanks, the great bear, no longer covered in ice, caught the worm between its front paws.

Luui saw the gush of grey blood as Sermilissuaq ripped the worm in two. She felt the tremor in the ground as Sermilissuaq hurled both halves of the ice worm – one to each side of the hollow. But, as Sermilissuaq turned its eye on Luui, she saw what the bear didn’t, as both halves of the worm rippled with new life. Two independent bodies controlled by one brain – albeit a very small and limited one.

Aassik resumed its attack on Sermilissuaq, distracting the bear with the bloody end of its bottom half, as it bit at the bear’s tail with the other.

Sermilissuaq shed another layer of ice as it moved and Luui glimpsed the first hollow hairs of the great bear poking out from the thinnest layer of ice on its flanks. She tried to move as another twist of the bear’s torso sent a new barrage of ice in her direction. A smaller chunk, the size of a human head, arced through the winter sky towards Luui and she braced for what she guessed would be a stunning, if not life ending, impact.

But even as she followed the trajectory of the ice, she glimpsed other things in the sky and frowned at what looked like two crazy ptarmigans jinking through the storm of ice shards towards her. But beyond that, higher in the sky, a split second before the ice glanced the side of her head, Luui saw something yellow buzzing in a tight turn above the hollow and she smiled.

 

To be continued on December 24

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022

Don’t miss tomorrow’s episode!

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022 (Now available for pre-order from Amazon)

December 22

Aunix slept as the creature charged her batteries. When she woke, she made tea, a meagre breakfast, wondering if the creature needed to eat, what it might eat, and what it wanted in return for powering the battery banks of Aunix’ little canary.

“So many questions,” Aunix said as she blew upon her tea to cool it.

Cooling things in the Arctic always made her smile, and, under a new swathe of Northern Lights draped in the black sky above, full batteries with green lights blinking, Aunix felt there was plenty to smile about.

And then, the hideous, albeit generous and helpful creature, turned upon her.

Aunix dropped her tea on the ice. The enamel mug tinkled to a stop. The spilt tea steamed as it started to freeze in the chill air, and the creature, the beast, turned its watery eyes upon Aunix and lunged towards her.

Aunix reached once more for the imaginary guns she just wished she wore at her hip, but coming up empty, falling onto the ice, she spun onto all fours instead, pushed herself to her feet, and ran.

The beast was fast, huffing great clouds of rancid breath at Aunix. The beast’s saggy breasts flapped as its lungs worked like bellows, drawing air into cavernous lungs, only to expel it again in a rush of noxious gas that sent Aunix reeling, knocking her to her knees, until she sprawled on the ice and the beast was upon her.

Aunix stared at the massive member thrusting towards her, convinced she was about to suffer and likely die in some wild, carnal frenzy, desperately alone on the ice, in the far north of Greenland. But as the beast pinned Aunix’ arms to the ice, clasping her with bony fingers, digging dirty cracked nails into Aunix’ clothes, so deep Aunix imagined them piercing her skin, the beast looked Aunix in the eye, took another great bellow of breath and then smothered Aunix in what she guessed was to be her last breath in a final rotten cloud expelled from the creature’s gangrenous skin.

But Aunix did not die.

Instead, she dreamed.

It was a living dream, so vivid she struggled to think she was conscious. But the weight of the creature was still upon her – she felt it. The ice beneath her was freezing cold, cooling her body as the cold seeped through her clothes. And the Northern Lights were…

The lights… So many lights.

Aunix thought they might be stars, but she knew stars, knew the position and twinkle of the them as she navigated clear night skies, or glimpsed them through breaks in the cloud. But these were foreign stars with a different weight.

Yes. They are heavier.

In the grip of the creature, intoxicated by its awful, heady breath, Aunix’ celestial observations made sense. She understood, as she stared into the Northern Lights, that she was looking into another world, and the deeper, further, harder she looked, the more she concentrated, the more she saw. There were mountain peaks. Some curled over like rocky fronds of grey immobile plants. Others intertwined, woven like branches of trees. She saw gaps between them, caught the flicker of something flying through them.

Me. And my little canary.

Below the peaks was the sea – white with thick ice here, black and tumultuous there. The land was at once fertile and barren. It didn’t make sense. Aunix’ brow furrowed as she saw an abundance of green in patches between the black and white bite of winter. The creature breathed again, and again Aunix was subjected to a rush of clarity amid the choking and body-wracking gagging as her lungs demanded clean air.

But the creature was not done.

There was more to sea.

And there, several rancid breaths later, Aunix saw a figure on a floe of ice. It was a woman, clad in furs, standing tall, and… Aunix blinked. The woman was waving.

Luui?

But it wasn’t Luui.

Whoever it was, they were familiar – achingly so, as if there was a deeper connection between the woman on the floe and Aunix pinned beneath a monster on the ice.

The woman waved again, revealed a tantalising glimpse of her hair, her strong chin, and then she was gone, and the air thinned, the creature retreated, and Aunix, after a long pause, sat up.

She saw the creature lope across the ice with its strange knock-kneed gait. It disappeared behind an ice-locked berg, but Aunix still felt the pincer grip of its fingers, could still see its saggy breasts bellowing with rotten breaths, and the evil member thrusting and quivering between its breasts. But Aunix was not violated. She felt no pain beyond the pseudo grip of the creature’s grip, only a teasing clarity, with a dull ache of something yet to be resolved.

Aunix picked herself up.

She brushed snow from her cargo trousers.

She took a moment to search for the creature between the bergs but saw nothing more than the memory of a shadow.

But there, ahead of her on the ice, sat the little canary, resting on voluminous tundra tyres, green lamps glowing on the batteries, and her nose pointing south.

“Yes,” Aunix said, as she walked towards her plane. “It’s time.”

The conditions were unnaturally good – perfect, in fact, with clear black skies, a tiny lick of wind, and the drift of great curtains of Aurora Borealis to light her way.

And yet, as she packed up the remainder of her equipment, prised the enamel cup from the tacky clutches of the ice, her mind buzzed with what she had seen in the lights. She looked up, but the crazy peaks were gone. So too was the woman on the floe, but if Aunix concentrated, if she really looked, then the strangely familiar woman clad in furs shed some of her mystery, and Aunix thought she might understand, at least a little, of what the creature wanted to tell her.

She ran through the pre-flight checks, removed the ice from the flaps and the rudder. Aunix climbed into the cockpit and primed the engine heater, smiling at the familiar mosquito whine as the electrical coils warmed the little canary’s heart.

“Here goes something,” Aunix said once the engine was ready for cranking.

She climbed out of the cockpit and dropped down onto the ice. Aunix gripped the propeller and yanked it down, expecting to do it one more time at least, but the canary was just as eager to fly as she was and the propeller caught at once, and Aunix climbed back into the cockpit. She tilted her head a little to accommodate what she joked was an irregular sized smile, and then settled into her seat.

She throttled up, felt the gratifying and simply gorgeous tremble of power through the light fuselage, and then rocked the tyres free of the fjord’s icy grip with a gentle bump of power. The tyres rolled off the stubborn ice with a rubber squeal and a long, drawn-out kiss until Aunix’ little canary was loose.

“Free to fly,” she said, as she throttled up, worked the pedals to move the rudder and kick the tail into position as she rattled across the ice.

Aunix lowered the flaps to push air under the wings, and then, once the tail wheel lifted off the ice, she increased power, and whooped as the tiny aircraft lifted into the black winter sky. She glimpsed what might have been the creature on the ice when she looked out of the port side of the aircraft, but it was but a glimpse and a shadow, perhaps even a memory.

“Or a really bad dream.”

Except it wasn’t a dream, and it wasn’t bad.

“Just confusing,” she said, as she settled into the flight, studying her instruments, tapping the altimeter as it always was a little ornery. And there, reflected in the glass covering the dials, she saw the woman on the floe, waving, and Aunix waved back.

 

To be continued on December 23

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022

Don’t miss tomorrow’s episode!

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022 (Now available for pre-order from Amazon)

December 21

Qaqqaq, at its roots, Luui assumed, was a mountain like any other. All mountains grew. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world, had not stopped growing. Why should Qaqqaq be any different?

Luui said the last bit out loud, pausing in a cloud of her own breath as she took a break. Around her, stretching as far as she could see, were the ridges and peaks of the Svartenhuk Mountains. If she squinted, added a teaspoon of imagination, and a liberal dose of longing, she could see her cabin, picture herself sweeping the dust and snow from the floor, hanging homemade decorations, wrestling with pots and pans as she tried to cook – not her greatest skill – only to curse herself for not living just a little closer to Uummannaq, where she could sail to and see what they might have in the store. December in Uummannaq could be plagued by shortages as families bought what they thought they needed, then bought some more to barter and sell what they didn’t. Eggs and yeast could be a real earner in the month of May when families prepared cakes to celebrate the confirmation of sons and daughters, just before the arrival of the first supply ship of spring. Christmas was close enough to November, when the last ship might sneak through the ice…

Luui shook her head.

“That was then,” she said. “When I was small. Back when we had ice each winter.”

It might have bothered her that she was suddenly all mixed up, but a tickle of wind across her cheek reminded her to dig out another handful of whale meat – the last few strips – from her slingpack, to quench her thirst with another handful of snow, and to take five minutes longer than planned before cracking on and climbing the next stretch of the ever-growing mountain.

“All mountains grow,” she said, once her break was over, and Naalanngitsoq helped her up the mountain with a persistent press of air against her back. Luui tested her once, and leaned back to see if she could sit, only to fall on her rump and receive a gusty giggle of snow flurried into her face. “Right,” Luui said. “Focus.”

She focused.

She concentrated on the climb, cutting steps where necessary, whispering her thanks to Naalanngitsoq when the wind steadied her along a particularly sharp ridge of exposed granite, and then onwards and upwards, ever upwards.

“All mountains…”

Luui took a breather.

“They grow,” she said, moving on. “But they grow over millions of years.”

She paused again, aware that she almost had it and that a gentle nod of encouragement from her father would be exactly what she needed to get it. But Tuukula was gone, and despite the hollow feeling in her stomach, she knew it was right, that he was finally at peace. “Resting on a sledge behind a big team as he took the longest sledge journey…”

Luui smiled at the thought.

But it wasn’t the thought she was supposed to be thinking.

“Mountains take their time…” Luui looked up. If she jammed her ice axe into the snow, she could lean to her left, tilt her head, and just see the crooked peak. “So, Qaqqaq,” she said. “What’s your hurry?”

And there, again, she felt the tingle of something that made sense, that could even help her if she shaped the thought further, to give it a more definitive form and purpose.

That word again.

What was Qaqqaq’s purpose?

And then she had it.

And, with an unexpected wave of empathy, the hollow in her stomach swelled. It grew heavy, dense like the granite upon which she stood, as she realised Qaqqaq grew fast because it had no purpose. It grew because there was nothing else to do.

And yet…

“That’s not it,” Luui said.

She turned, looking for Naalanngitsoq, and then waved the wind over, whispering to her to clean a patch of snow from the granite so that she – Luui – might talk to the mountain.

Naalanngitsoq did as she asked, but kept the snow in a small tornado, ready to dump it again when Luui came to her senses and realised she could not talk to the mountain.

But Luui rarely thought about what she could or could not do. And, if she dug deep, just as she imagined a time of sea ice, back when she was a small girl, she would know that nothing was impossible, not even after one tried and failed.

“You just have to keep trying.”

Which, when she pressed her palm to the smooth patch of granite Naalanngitsoq had cleared, made sense as Qaqqaq had clearly not stopped trying something, even if Luui had no clue what that something might be.

She knelt in the snow with her palm flat on the granite and thought about the young girl she was, smiling as she glimpsed the five-year-old Luui, hands on hips, or fingers curled into the fur of a particularly sturdy and contrary sledge dog.

“Cargo,” Luui said, as she remembered the dog’s name.

Little Luui never backed down.

Big Luui wasn’t about to either.

Which is when Qaqqaq understood the young Greenlandic woman struggling up its slopes wanted to talk, wanted to see, and understand, and it responded.

The first rumble might have sent Luui running for cover to escape the path of a sudden rock fall, but the warmth that flooded through her palm, mixing into her blood like…. “Lava,” she said… encouraged her to stay where she was. Never mind Naalanngitsoq’s excited flurries, Luui stayed where she was as the mountain rumbled and shifted beneath her. The rumbling became a great cracking and splintering, as the ground upon which she knelt lifted to flow up the mountain upon a track of granite pebbles, rolling uphill, speeding up the mountain. Luui opened her eyes, felt the tickle of water streaming from them, freezing on her cheeks as the patch of granite flew like the flying carpets she had seen in books, up the mountain. It was never more than a few centimetres above the slope, never breaking contact, but it moved, and Luui moved with it.

Naalanngitsoq whistled around Luui as she drew energy from the mountain, rushing up to keep pace with Luui, in the same way as a katabatic wind might rush down a mountain valley. Together they flew up the slopes – Luui with one hand pressed to the granite, and the other gripping the shaft of her ice axe, ready to plunge it into the ice if Qaqqaq heaved her off the granite escalator, and Naalanngitsoq, the cheeky little wind, gusting in the gritty wake of the shaman’s daughter.

The summit loomed before them.

Luui saw the crooked peak, the unfathomable ball of something that she guessed was pujoralak, and then, lying in a great cirque of rock, filling the mountainous bowl, was the bear covered in ice.

“Sermilissuaq,” Luui said, nodding as she understood.

Qaqqaq slowed Luui’s ascent, bringing her close enough to Sermilissuaq to taste the bear’s cool, musty breath on her tongue as it gusted great icy snores at her face, but far enough to remain out of reach.

But only just.

Luui waited for the ground to settle, and then she stepped to one side, crouching in the snow to observer the bear as Naalanngitsoq settled beside her.

The wind flicked at Luui’s fringe, blowing it gently, rhythmically, as if breathing, but really just letting know Luui she was there, she was close, if the shaman’s daughter needed her.

Luui sniffed the bear’s breath, nodding once again as she understood.

“It’s clean,” she said. “Empty.”

Qaqqaq rumbled, and Luui, remembering her youth, pieced the puzzle together.

“Bears live on the ice.”

Qaqqaq rumbled once more.

“But the ice is gone. Sermilissuaq climbed into the mountains, looking for ice. But Svartenhuk is no place for a bear, and no bear the size of Sermilissuaq can settle on a tiny mountain.” Luui smiled at the spot she thought Naalanngitsoq had settled as she made the final assumption. “Sermilissuaq settled on the only mountain big enough to accommodate him. He called Qaqqaq, and the mountain came to him.”

Luui dug the pick of her axe into the ice as the mountain rumbled.

“But there’s nothing to eat here,” Luui said, as she took another look at Sermilissuaq. “And if it doesn’t eat, the great bear covered in ice will become just that…” Luui paused at the thought of it. “Ice. Just ice.”

Luui blew out her cheeks in a long sigh, and then slumped onto the ground. Naalanngitsoq brushed snow from Luui’s trousers, and then flurried gently around her, waiting, as Luui thought.

“I have to get the bear off the mountain,” Luui said. She glanced over her shoulder, then shook her head. “That’s a big bear.”

Qaqqaq agreed with a rumble.

“And Sermilissuaq called the mountain, and once called, it cannot rest.”

Another rumble.

“So….” Luui took another long breath, followed by another equally long sigh. “The bear needs a reason to leave the mountain. It needs to eat. And…” Another sigh, followed by another glance at the bear. “The only thing to eat around here…” Luui laughed at the thought of it. “Is me.”

Qaqqaq rumbled.

Naalanngitsoq shivered.

And Luui, the shaman’s daughter, stood up.

She looked up at the crooked peak and the pujoralak hanging like a Christmas bauble beneath it.

“Northwind will just have to wait,” she said, as she tightened the loop of cord connecting her to the ice axe. “First, I have to wake a sleeping bear, and see if it’s hungry.”

Naalanngitsoq shushed snow across Luui’s boots.

“Right,” Luui said. “What am I saying? Bears are always hungry.”

She took a step towards Sermilissuaq, wondering if her steps were numbered, and if this was the first, how many did she have left?

Luui gripped the ice axe in one hand and took another step.

 

To be continued on December 22

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022

Don’t miss tomorrow’s episode!

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022 (Now available for pre-order from Amazon)

December 20

Luui fell for more than a day. Naalanngitsoq saved her from the worst blows, cushioning her under a pillow of chill air, gusting her over a ridge, between a crevice, but still the descent of Qaqqaq took its toll, and Luui struggled to breathe, struggled to think, struggled to believe she would survive.

I want to live, she thought, when sliding down a long snowfield. I will live.

But as she bumped and tumbled down the steeper sections of the ever-growing mountain, she wondered if even if she lived, she would be doomed to spend eternity falling, ever falling, just as the mountain continued to grow.

It was the stuff of legends.

She, Luui Angakkuarneq, the shaman’s daughter, now shaman in her own right, would write herself into the myths and legends of Greenland in the tale of The Shaman who Never Stopped Falling.

It was a good title. A worthy story to be told around summer campfires, or in winter, on the couch, to small children wrapped in blankets as they leaned in close to the mothers, fathers, uncles, and grandmothers to hear the story of when Luui fell down the mountain. And what happened when she finally slid to a stop.

Luui.

How did she stop, Anaana? The children would ask.

Luui!

Well, their mother would say. Stopping is just the beginning of the story. Luui had to stop before she could start.

The children would frown. Boys would fidget. Girls might fart. Mother’s might make a cup of cocoa. Father’s might offer grandma a glass of wine. Or, perhaps, when sitting around the campfire, as the wind blew sand through the camp, a craggy-faced hunter might pause to light a cigarette – a hand-rolled one he had tucked behind his ear, for just such an occasion.

Luui Angakkuarneq!

How strange that the tip of the cigarette glowed blue.

Daughter. Stop!

And Luui blinked.

She shook snow from her face with a little gust of the cheeky, now tired, wind Naalanngitsoq. She blinked again, reached for the shaft of the ice axe tumbling alongside her at the end of the sealskin cord looped around Luui’s wrist. She grabbed it, pulled it to her chest, slid one cold, stiff hand over the fat adze, her other around the shaft, and then kicked off the snow to roll onto her chest. Luui dug the pick into the snow and held on. She gritted her teeth until the pick finally, miraculously, caught hold, snagging something under the snow, jolting Luui to as stop. She breathed, blinked, and then turned her head to see what was wrong with her feet. Why did they feel like they were floating?

“Oh,” Luui said, as she saw her legs – from her knees to her toes – dangling over an icy precipice. “That’s why.”

Luui squirmed a little higher up the slope and then dug the fingers of her left hand through the crusty surface of the snow and pulled herself another inch further up the slope. She did it again. And again, tentatively pulling the pick out of the snow to dig it in higher, and further from the drop of the mountain.

Well done, Luui.

“Ataata?”

And suddenly it made sense.

“You came back.”

“Aap,” he said, as Tuukula’s form shimmered into view, the tip of his cigarette lending a blue glow to his body as he settled, cross-legged, by the side of Luui. “I came back. And,” he said, with a nod to the precipice, “just at the right time.”

“I was ready to fall,” Luui said. She sat up. “I was ready for it to end.”

“Qaqqaq does not end, Luui,” Tuukula said. “It is ever-growing.”

“But it must start somewhere.”

Tuukula shrugged and said, “It starts wherever it chooses.”

“That’s hardly fair.”

“It’s not. But it is interesting.”

“If you’re not falling,” Luui said. She smiled a Naalanngitsoq brushed snow out of her lap with a gentle gust.

“She is a good friend,” Tuukula said. “Not like Assagissat.”

“Assagissat was hungry.” Luui shook snow from her slingpack and then reached inside to see if she had any whale meat left. She found a piece, bent it into a roll and popped it in her mouth. “I’m hungry,” she said. “And tired.”

“You can return to the cabin.”

“Naamik.” Luui shook her head, and then looked up the mountain, squinting into the black sky as she searched for the summit. “I must finish what I started.”

“Aap,” Tuukula said.

“I need to bring Aunix home.”

“She will come…”

“But only if I get what Northwind wants from the mountain.”

“Northwind doesn’t know what she wants.” Tuukula’s cigarette glowed brightly as he took another spectral drag. “And neither do you, daughter.”

Luui frowned, and said, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You are confused.”

“Not confused. I know what I have to do to get Aunix home.”

“I’m talking about you, Luui. You are confused.”

“Well, now I am.” Luui sighed. “What are you talking about, Ataata? And don’t say me. Don’t make me any more confused than you already think I am.”

“Sad is another word.”

“Instead of confused?” Luui’s breath pearled on her sweater as it froze. “I suppose this is what I get when riddle-swapping with shamans on the side of an ever-growing mountain. This is what they will tell the kids when the tell the story of The Shaman Who…”

“…Never Stopped Falling.” Tuukula smiled. “A favourite of mine, I must admit.”

“And do you know how it ends?”

“Aap.”

Luui waited.

Tuukula smoked.

“Are you going to tell me?”

“I can tell you one version of it, and you can decide if that’s the ending you want to hear, or if you would prefer another.”

“I have a choice?”

“Always,” Tuukula said. “Although it’s not always good to choose. Better to accept.”

“Accept what?”

Tuukula finished his cigarette. His body faded for a moment, almost invisible before the lit a second cigarette.

“You must accept that I am dead.”

“But I…”

“Must accept it. Must say it. And then, daughter, you can continue up the mountain to complete your quest and bring your friend home safely for Christmas.”

“I have to say you are gone?”

“Not just gone,” Tuukula said. “When you say gone, you think I am coming back.”

“You’re here now,” Luui said. “You were gone. You came back.” She raised her hands, spreading her palms to suggest her father’s theory was flawed. “Tell me why I should think any different.”

“Because you’re not thinking, Luui. You are feeling.” Tuukula reached out to press his hand upon Luui’s heart. “This is what they say in the story. This is the moment when ana tells her grandchildren to press their hands upon their hearts. The hunter does the same around the campfire, and the children watching him copy him, pressing tiny hands to tiny hearts. They feel the act of feeling. Just like you.”

Tuukula let his hand fall. Luui reached for it, but it disintegrated into atoms, drifting out of her grasp.

“Let me go, Daughter,” he said. “And climb the mountain with a lighter heart, and a clear head.” Tuukula flattened his lips into a grim smile, adding, “You will need both if you are to outsmart Sermilissuaq.”

“The bear covered in ice.”

“It’s the next part of the story,” Tuukula said. “The Tale of the Shaman and the Bear Covered in Ice.”

“Do I defeat it?”

Tuukula shrugged. “Only you can choose the ending, Luui. It is your story after all.”

“I never wanted you to die,” she said.

“You were a child. I was an old man.”

“An old shaman.”

“Aap,” he said. “Which made things easier… And worse.”

“I kept you around, didn’t I?”

Tuukula nodded.

“It was me who stopped you moving on.”

“You and your magic, Luui,” Tuukula said. Tuukula’s eyes twinkled with a smile as he took a last drag on his cigarette. “You have always been strong. Stronger than me. I used to joke that when you were too much, I would ask the spirits for help. Only to find…”

“I had made them a better offer.” Luui laughed. “I remember you saying that.”

“Many times,” Tuukula said.

Luui looked at Tuukula’s cigarette – a tiny stub pinched between the tips of his finger and thumb, almost finished.

“This is it, isn’t it?” she said.

Tuukula nodded. “Aap.”

“And I won’t see you again?”

“You won’t,” he said. “But I will rest these very old bones. And I will be at peace, Daughter. Remember that.”

“I wish I was at peace.”

Tuukula smiled and then, with one last look at his daughter, and a brief dip of Luui’s head, he flicked the butt into the snow, and was gone.

 

To be continued on December 21

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022

Don’t miss tomorrow’s episode!

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022 (Now available for pre-order from Amazon)

December 19

The wind traps were useless. Aunix kicked the closest one at the same time as she wondered if breathing heavy into the traps might turn the fans just enough to remind the traps about what they were supposed to do, or if even a breath would prove too much for what Aunix believed were now thoroughly useless contraptions. Although the actual words she preferred to use were a little stronger.

“Just a tad,” she said, drawing a tiny bit of amusement from her new favourite word.

If she had just a tad of wind, she might get off the ground. Getting off the ground – just a tad – would at least give her some lift, and she could dip the wings, drop the nose, pick up speed and then force air through the thoroughly useless contraptions, and then power into the air again to do the same thing, caterpillaring through the air with steep, perilous dives to fill the tanks, before spending a good portion of that same fuel to lift the little canary into the air again. It truly was a case of one step forward and two steps back, and Aunix didn’t like it.

It was number one on a very short list of things the pilot didn’t like.

The second thing was the bony hermaphrodite creature with the skeletal face and what Aunix could only describe has stark and drastic sexual organs. The creature prowled between the bergs locked in the ice – close enough to reveal itself as if it wanted to be seen, and yet not so close that Aunix became unnecessarily worried. Although she had started sleeping inside the plane, contorting her limps into a semi-reclined position as she preferred what little protection the glass and fibreglass frame afforded her when compared to the wind beaten, battered, and tattered remains of her tent.

The creature observed Aunix, and when Aunix wasn’t fussing with and grumbling about the wind traps, she observed it right back.

Apart from the initial repulsiveness of the creature’s form, there was something urgently haunting and insistent about it. Aunix found herself watching it as she drank her twice daily cup of tea – rationed as with everything else. Once she had chipped ice to be boiled in a sturdy pan above a block of hexamine, Aunix spent the next ten minutes observing the creature. It had a curious gait – body bent forwards, knees protruding at right angles, while it waved its arms like paddles as if propelling itself forward through the air, across the ice, and between the bergs. But no matter how or where it walked, its head was always turned towards Aunix.

They observed each other for several days, until, that morning, when Aunix threatened to breathe fire and fury through the traps, she turned and the creature was right there, right behind her, arms outstretched, and the tip of its manly parts throbbing.

Aunix stumbled back against the plane. She reached for something – anything – she might use to defend herself but found little more than a spare wind strut. She brandished it like a bat, as if she was stepping up to the invisible plate in a baseball stadium, ready to swing and remove the creature’s head if necessary.

But the creature didn’t move. Nor did it shy away. It simply stared at Aunix, and, at such close quarters, revealed a set of watery eyes rolling within great orbs of bone cut into its skull. The creature had a tongue, and Aunix shivered as she saw it dart out, and then further, tasting the air, licking at this and that as if searching for something.

The repulsiveness of the creature was accentuated with thin grey-green skin hanging from a bony body, the massive member between its legs that Aunix tried not to look at but resolved to strike at first if the thing came any closer to her, and the lank hair that twisted in the air behind the creature’s head as it turned to look at the plane, at Aunix, and, finally, the wind traps.

They were on the list of things that bothered Aunix most – together with the creature – but when it reached for the closest trap, Aunix took a step forward, winding back the strut with the intent to do some serious damage if the creature even thought about breaking the only thing that might, might, get her home for Christmas.

“Hey!” Aunix took another step forward as the creature clasped the wind trap between long bony fingers. “That’s mine.”

A small part of Aunix’ mind took a moment’s pause to reflect on the fact that the creature seemed interested in the trap. Not Aunix. And that no matter how repulsive it might be, or how intimidating and, frankly, disgusting the manly member might be, it was the trap that the creature wanted. Not Aunix.

Thoughts such as thanking God for small mercies passed through Aunix’ mind, until the creature huffed breath of rancid air through the wind trap, forcing Aunix to double up and gag. She dropped the strut, thumped her hands on her knees to stop herself toppling over, and then, as she fought for breath, managing a unnecessary but equally unavoidable, “Damn, that’s bad,” she noticed the trap was spinning.

Not just spinning.

The lamp was glowing amber and then brighter and brighter like a flame, burning yellow, then white hot, and, finally, the most glorious and lushest green Aunix had ever seen.

“But that’s…”

Aunix might have said more, but as the creature filled her lungs ready for the next exhale, Aunix clapped her hands over her nose and mouth and said nothing. She just watched. Aunix watched and smiled, eyes shining, as the creature kept the trap spinning with another blast of simply the worst, the absolute worst thing she had ever smelled.

Worse than the week-old moose carcass that summer, she thought.

Worse than…

She didn’t want to say it, but the smell that leaked through her fingers to assault her nose, smelled worse than her grandmother, that fateful day Aunix bounded into her grandparent’s kitchen to find grandma slumped at the table.

She’d been there four days while grandpa was recovering from surgery in the hospital.

That’s what the adults said when they thought Aunix wasn’t listening.

And this smells like that.

Aunix took a small step to one side.

“Only worse,” she said as the creature blew another rancid lungful of air through the trap.

Aunix heard the trap’s overpower alarm start to beep, and took a step forward with the intention of… What exactly, she intended to do escaped Aunix, but she knew the trap was in danger of breaking, and as much as she might have wanted to break it earlier in the day, the previous night, and the day before that, it was one of the only means of generating any power for her little canary.

The creature turned its head as the beeping continued, and then placed the trap in the ground before stalking around the plane, arms paddling the air, penis lunging, and knees at right angles, until it picked up the second trap and blew another gust of death through the trap.

Aunix followed, keeping her distance, but not so far away she couldn’t see the glow of amber, then green as the trap spun and the charge flooded into the battery.

“I have no idea what you are,” Aunix said as she observed the creature. “But you have my thanks.”

Of course, she hoped her thanks would be enough, as the creature turned to stare at her with those watery eyes and sickly tongue.

 

To be continued on December 20

Northwind © Christoffer Petersen 2022

Don’t miss tomorrow’s episode!