Dead of Winter

Chapter 12

An officer bagged my sample, but because the department had to send it out of town for processing, told me we wouldn't have the results for a week or more. Although I was willing to share this information with Ferrilyn, the stranger event of the morning—thinking I'd heard Taryn outside—I kept to myself. No sense in upsetting Ferrilyn any more than she already was.

After he left, the two of us retreated to the living room for coffee that went cold in our mugs during the protracted stretch of silence that followed. An awkward and weighty silence, during which I attempted to make sense of the jumble of unpleasant thoughts that kept rearing in my head. If I had heard Taryn's voice, it made sense that the perpetrator would've had to record it at some point, which suggested some form of involvement on her part.

But why? I'd done nothing to her. Nothing terrible enough to provoke harm, at any rate. Was she related to Nisha's killer, or perhaps a friend or acquaintance? Had her attack been an attempt to conceal her complicity, or did it reflect a last-minute change of heart, a refusal to carry through that put her instead of me in harm's way?

No matter how many times I mulled it over, the most logical conclusion always rose to the forefront of my consciousness. Chilling in its implications, it was like the reply on the pallid face of a die in a Magic Eight Ball's watery indigo window...

As I see it, yes.

"Penny for your thoughts," Ferrilyn said, her clear voice piercing the cloud of suffocating silence that hung between us.

No time like the present. "I was just thinking about Taryn." I shifted position in the armchair, uncurling now-stiff legs, which I'd tucked beneath me to warm my wet feet.

"You and me both," Ferrilyn said, as a shudder rippled through her. "God, Amara, I've never seen her in such an awful state."

"Rory said she kept repeating someone's name," I ventured.

"Between calling out for her father, which scared the crap out of me—he was one of the COs at Clinton who died in the prison revolt—there was something else." She shook her head. "Took me a while, but I figured out what she was saying. Manitou." When I flashed her a quizzical look, she repeated the word. "It's some kind of Algonquian spirit. Her dad was part Indian, you know."

"I didn't." Another fact to add to the growing list of things I'd never known about Taryn.

"They were close, all each other had. Taryn said he used to tell her all kinds of stories about Native Indian mythology. She loved them as much as he did, although for her, I think they were more than just stories."

"So, is a manitou like a spirit guardian?"

"That's the weird part. From what she said, it's about as far from a benevolent spirit as it gets. Another word for it is wendigo. It's a winter creature, like a yeti, but hairless, and it eats human flesh."

"Delightful." Although I didn't believe in cryptids, her yeti description troubled me.

It comes at night, with the cold…

"Oh, but I haven't even told you the best part! A wendigo doesn't just kill a person; it can incorporate parts of its prey into itself. Things like their personality, consciousness, even the sound of their voice. And they retain those aspects, even after the person's… Well, enough about that. I'm sure I must sound like a crazy woman right now." Ferrilyn's hands flew to her face to stay the flush of crimson that was now spreading over her cheeks.

"Go on; it's okay."

"Anyway, after her attack, I think that's where Taryn went in her head. To the past, her dad. Anything to make sense of what happened. Except, not being in her right mind, instead of grasping a lifeline, she fell down a rabbit hole."

"Makes sense, I guess." As much as any of this did. 

"Unless you believe an abominable snowman tried to slice her to ribbons, it's as good an explanation as any."

"A bald one, let's not forget." I slid out of the chair, grabbed a poker, and started jabbing at the fireplace embers. Logs, rendered to hunks of charcoal, collapsed at my touch. All dead. That gave me an idea. "Think she'd be up for a couple of visitors?"

Ferrilyn bounded off the couch and tackled me in a fierce hug. "Oh, God, Amara, I was hoping you'd say that! I wanted to check in on her but didn't want to leave you here all alone."

To be honest, I hadn't been fancying solo isolating much, either. "Let me change. I'll meet you back here in ten."