The Shaman's Daughter Read online

  Contents

  The Shaman's Daughter

  Author's Note

  Map: Greenland

  Glossary

  The Shaman's Daughter

  Part 1

  Part 2

  Part 3

  Part 4

  Part 5

  Part 6

  Part 7

  Part 8

  Part 9

  Part 10

  Part 11

  Part 12

  Part 13

  Part 14

  Part 15

  Part 16

  Part 17

  Part 18

  Part 19

  BONUS SHORT STORY

  RAM

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  About the Author

  By the same Author

  Copyright Information

  The Shaman’s Daughter

  Greenland Missing Persons #6

  featuring Constable Petra “Piitalaat” Jensen

  Don’t miss the next title in the

  Greenland Missing Persons series

  The Ice Whispers

  Author’s Note

  You are amazing. Yes, you!

  You’ve followed Petra this far. You’ve suspended your disbelief at the mention of Magic! And you’ve put up with my indulgences and crazy fixation on all things to do with snow, ice, and sledge dogs.

  Your reward?

  Well, it’s more of the same, I’m afraid.

  I have always said that this series is cosier than the gritty novels featuring Petra and Maratse. And it’s true. No one even pulls a gun in this one. But what I hope you find here is a deeper dive into the backgrounds of popular characters, more familiar faces, and a few new characters to make things interesting. I’m building this fictional Greenland one story at a time, and thanks to your support, it’s just getting bigger!

  Which brings me to the next thing – the real reward for your patience and support.

  Petra will return and the Greenland Missing Persons series will continue, but the next in the series is a novel – a feature-length investigation packed with familiar faces, new threats, a tiny bit of magic, and a slightly harder tone.

  In other words:

  More grit. More action. More pages. More Petra.

  But until then, we have to find the shaman’s daughter.

  Chris

  February 2021

  Denmark

  Glossary of Greenlandic Words

  used in the Greenland Missing Persons series

  mattak – whale skin and blubber delicacy

  aap – yes

  (Maratse says iiji because he is from the east coast)

  naamik – no

  (Maratse says eeqqi because he is from the east coast)

  kaffemik – celebration/party

  ukaleq – Arctic hare

  anaana – grandmother

  ana – mother

  ata – grandfather

  ataata – father

  qajaq – kayak

  angakkoq – shaman

  imaqa – maybe

  kamikker/kamiks – sealskin boots

  qujanaq – thank you

  The Shaman’s Daughter

  Greenland Missing Persons #6

  Part 1

  Everything hurt. The doctor said my fingers would heal quickly – within four to six weeks, provided I followed her instructions, kept them strapped, and didn’t exert myself. She said not to touch my nose, that my eyes and cheeks would be sore for a while, that the bruising would fade, and that I should avoid make-up. Make-up was Atii’s department, and I wondered if the doctor had a prescription drug, I could take each time Atii dropped by for a visit. Atii insisted on making me laugh, claiming it was the best kind of therapy. If only she knew how much it hurt.

  The wine helped.

  The second time Atii came around – the first weekend after Narsarsuaq – she made sure we had plenty of the cheap stuff we drank while studying at the academy. She poured, I laughed, we both drank, and after a few glasses I would forget all about Venus Manumina and the sheep farming country of southern Greenland. I remembered to ask about Constable Innaaq Paniula before we started our third glass of wine, but Atii said the case was ongoing, which was another way of saying there was nothing new to report and that I should be patient.

  It was the last part that was difficult.

  I wasn’t good at being patient or being a patient.

  But the wine helped.

  Atii typically passed out after the third glass, just as she did when we were cadets. I found her a blanket and tucked her into my couch as best I could with broken fingers, before savouring my third glass alone in the armchair by the window. I turned out the lights as she snored, followed the headlights of cars and taxis, and the occasional flash of blue emergency lights on the road from Qinngorput to Nuuk, before closing my eyes and drifting off in the chair.

  The wine dulled my pain but had the opposite effect on my mind – as if the memories could be any more surrealistic. I saw Pannapa twisting at the end of the rope, grinning down at me, apologising for not being able to stop and chat. I helped Eqilana bake mountains of bread in her kitchen, using them to brick up the door as Innaaq paced back and forth outside the window. It was all too much. And when I decided it couldn’t be any weirder…

  I opened my eyes.

  Atii was gone. A note on the kitchen table, with kisses and a hurried get well soon, P.

  “I’m trying, Atii.”

  Truthfully, I wasn’t trying at all. Being on sick leave gave me something I hadn’t had in such a long time: weekends!

  At home in my apartment, about as far from the station as I could get while still living in Nuuk, I was beyond Sergeant Duneq’s reach. Training was over, but the best thing about being sick was that life could begin.

  I spent my first free Saturday morning in my pyjamas, enjoying one coffee after another, chocolate because I needed the sugar – really, I did – news on the radio, and a hopeless glut of Candy Crush, one level after another, on my phone.

  Until, of course, the Greenlandic news ended, and the Danish version began. Something in the newscaster’s voice made me look up. The description of a five-year-old girl, missing for more than twenty-four hours, was like a punch to the gut. I dropped my phone into my lap, worked on my breathing. The following description of the girl’s father – a seventy-one-year-old who often wore his thick grey hair pulled into a bun at the top of his head – compounded my difficulty to breathe with a bout of shivers. The newscaster began the next article, and a second later my phone rang.

  “Atii,” I said, as I answered her call. “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know. They called me in. I’m still hungover, P, but they want everyone in. This is big.”

  “It’s Luui…”

  “We don’t know that.”

  “I know,” I said, and then, “I’m coming in.”

  “You can’t, you’re on…”

  “Sick leave?” I headed for the door, stopping with my fingers curled around the handle, taking a breath. “I need to change. Then I’ll catch the bus. I’m coming in.”

  I ended the call with a swipe of my thumb – the one digit on my right hand that was neither broken nor in a splint – and turned back for the bedroom, to change clothes, to go back to work.

  “To find Luui.”

  Part 2

  I avoided the stares and ignored the comments in the bus, as I scrolled through what news I could find on my phone, oblivious to passengers’ concerns about my appearance, my panda eyes, yellow and purple cheeks, and the splints bunching my fingers inside invisible mittens. The driver coughed when we reached my stop, gi
ving me a concerned look in the mirror as I exited the bus through the middle doors. I barely noticed the puddles on the side of the road as I splashed through them on the way to the police station, absorbed and frustrated as I was by the lack of news in the news articles. All the media outlets and social media feeds covered the missing girl and her suspect father, but none of them mentioned either of them by name.

  But I knew who they were.

  I pocketed my phone as I reached the main entrance of the station, nodded my thanks to the constable who held the door, and marched towards the briefing room.

  “Stop right there, Jensen.”

  I was a metre from the door, hand outstretched, only to pause at the sound of Sergeant Duneq’s voice.

  “Don’t even think about going in there.”

  “But, Sergeant,” I said, as I turned to face him.

  “You’re on sick leave, Constable.” Duneq waddled to a stop in front of me, finger raised, wobbling in the air between us, as if he was ready to prod me in the chest, to push me away from the door, but was unsure if he should or not. “And even if you weren’t,” he said. “You’re too close to this case. You can’t be objective.”

  I didn’t hear his last sentence. I focused instead on the one before it – the one that felt like he had sucker punched me in the stomach.

  “Go home, Jensen. This isn’t your case.”

  He opened the door, scowling as I blurted out…

  “But she’s missing.”

  Duneq shook his head. “Not your case.” He closed the door behind him.

  I stared at the door, willing it to open, willing myself to open it. But all my strength had left me. There was nothing left but the pain in my eyes, my cheeks, my fingers, and the empty pain in my stomach that spread into my chest.

  “Constable.”

  I pressed my splinted fingers over my heart, searching for a beat, something to prove that I was still living, that this wasn’t some terrible dream, that there was something I could do about it, if only I had the strength to do it.

  “Petra?”

  I looked up, searching for whoever said my name – louder the second time. Commissioner Lars Andersen waved to me from the second door to the briefing room, the one just beyond and beneath the main staircase. He beckoned me forward, placed his finger over his lips, and opened the door. I nodded once as I walked past him, then found a quiet place to stand at the back of the room. The commissioner closed the door behind him and stood to one side, reminding me to keep quiet with another brush of his finger across his lips.

  “That’s all we’ve got at the moment.” Sergeant Gaba Alatak snapped his fingers for the next slide. I caught my breath as a grainy picture of Tuukula flashed onto the screen. “But I’ve asked Ms. Blixt to give us some background on the father. Ms. Blixt?”

  A portly woman left her seat in the front row and huffed up the steps onto the stage. She wore her hair in a tight bun at the back of her head, shuffled her notes onto the podium and settled her wire-rimmed glasses with a quick jerk of the arms.

  “Tuukula Angakkuarneq…”

  I caught my breath as I heard Tuukula’s last name for the very first time.

  “… is seventy-one years old. He lives in Qaanaaq with his five-year-old daughter…”

  “Luui,” I breathed. The commissioner shot me a warning glance, and I nodded I would behave.

  “Thank you,” Blixt said, as she waved for the next slide. “As you can see, the house is far from suitable for a small child, but that’s only the first on a long list on concerns that I have regarding the child’s wellbeing.” Blixt stopped to look up at the police officers assembled before her. “Prior to her disappearance, of course.”

  I turned to the police officer next to me, and whispered, “Who is she?”

  “Social worker, from Denmark,” he said. “Been here a month, as far as I know.”

  “She’s working out of Ilulissat?”

  “To start with.” The police officer made a discreet gesture at the room. “With ambitions, I guess. Apparently, she was in Nuuk when the girl…”

  “Luui,” I said.

  “When she was officially declared missing.”

  “When was that?”

  The police officer checked his watch. “This is day three.”

  “There are other concerns,” Blixt said, raising her voice. “Alarming signs that suggest wanton neglect by the father, and a lack of care on the part of the mother.” She settled her glasses, then turned to the next page of her notes. “Frankly, we are very concerned.”

  Part 3

  “These drawings, photographed in the girl’s bedroom,” Blixt said, nodding each time she was ready to move onto the next slide, “suggest trauma.” Blixt pointed at the screen behind her. “The disembodied head – a lack of connection with peers and daily life.” She nodded for the next image. “This one in particular concerns me. See the abnormally long arms coming from the monster? Clearly, the girl is concerned about being caught. She is fleeing something. Perhaps the alcoholic environment in which she is living. But, more than likely, the untoward attentions of her father.”

  I caught the cry in my voice, muffling it with my mitten fingers. I sank back against the wall as Blixt scanned the faces in front of her.

  “As I was saying,” she said. “These drawings reveal a tortured soul. A child in need. There is no love to be found from her alcoholic mother. Alma Tuloriak, fifty-three, has a history of abuse and can hardly be described as a caring or suitable mother. Prior to her disappearance, the child lived mostly with her father, in the hovel I showed you from Qaanaaq. Again, poor living conditions.” Blixt waved her hand, as if dismissing further thoughts in favour of returning to the more pertinent details. “The child was staying with her mother in her apartment in Ilulissat. She was reported missing twenty-four hours ago, but further investigation reveals it is closer to two days, and today is the third day.” Blixt settled her glasses for the third time, and said, “I think it is safe to say we can fear the worst.”

  “Any questions?” Gaba said, taking a small step forward.

  “Yes?” Blixt said, pointing to an officer in the second row.

  “The drawings…”

  “Found in her room.” Blixt nodded.

  “And you’re sure they are monsters? Only, I heard…” The man turned in his seat, and I shrank even further against the wall. He paused before looking at Blixt. “I thought he was a shaman. And these drawings could be…”

  “Tuukula Angakkuarneq calls himself a shaman,” Blixt said, raising her voice. “The reality couldn’t be further from the truth. He is a hunter. Nothing more.” She pointed at the drawing of the being with long arms behind her. “Suppose he has filled the girl’s head with monsters. It only makes him more culpable. Add the unreliable mother and we have a recipe for disaster…”

  The empty pain in my stomach twisted into bile and I felt sick, suddenly hot, worried that I couldn’t get out without being seen, but if I threw up, I would only draw attention to myself.

  I reached out for the officer beside me, steadying myself with a clumsy grip on his arm, before sliding to the door. I heard Gaba’s voice, as he took over the briefing, together with words such as organised search and priority, ending with manhunt. I opened the door, slipped out of the briefing room, and staggered to the main entrance.

  The fresh air helped, and I gulped it into my lungs. Each breath gave me strength, and I stood straighter, pacing as my renewed energy gave me the vigour to attack the woman’s words, to counter Blixt’s diagnosis of a broken home and uncaring parents.

  She said he was just a hunter, but failed to see that Tuukula was a provider, that Luui wanted for nothing, and while the things she had were not the finest or most expensive, the love and attention Tuukula gave her made up for any deficit. They lived a simple life, a life Blixt dissected after a month in Greenland, based on little more than hospital notes documenting Alma’s substance abuse, and a handful of drawings she interpreted
as monsters.

  “Spirits,” I said, after another lungful of Greenland air – pure, with a hint of brine.

  Duneq said I was too close to the case to be objective. I turned to glare at the station, picturing Blixt on the stage as I wondered if she could be any more subjective in her so-called professional analysis of Luui’s parents.

  The last bout of nausea twisted into something like rage, as I realised she had provided nothing insightful regarding where Luui might be, only why she might have run away.

  “She has no idea,” I said, exhaling – purging Blixt’s bile from my body.

  I paced around the patrol cars in the parking lot, then slowed as my phone rang. I stared at the unfamiliar number, then swiped my single working digit across the screen to answer it.

  “Petra?”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s Tuukula. I need your help.”

  Part 4

  “Tuukula, the police are looking for you.”

  “Aap, and I am looking for Luui.”

  I paced in the middle of the parking lot, up and down the lines of patrol cars.

  “Go to the police. Turn yourself in.”

  “I’ve done nothing wrong, Petra.”

  “I know but…”

  “And if I turn myself in, who will look for Luui?”

  “They will,” I said.

  “Naamik. They only think they will. They will ask me the wrong questions, and my answers will frustrate them, and then no one will find Luui.”

  “Tuukula…” I took a breath, bit my lip, and then said, “You’re not making any sense.”

  “I’m not?”

  “No. None.”

  “Then listen, Petra. Forget everything you think you know and really listen.”

  “I’m listening,” I said, sighing as I pressed the phone to my ear with my clumsy hand. “What are the wrong questions…”