Murder on the Lake, page 21
And I had promised Tlalli and Jesús to stay in touch. I was going to break that promise almost at once. I felt like garbage.
"Hey," Loke said again, a bit less boisterously this time. It was like he could tell his efforts to cheer me just weren't going to cut it. Not today. "Come here." He put an arm around my shoulders and guided me over to the windows. "Drat, it's gotten dark. But still, look down there."
I followed the direction of his finger, down into the valley at the south end of the village, past the public gardens.
"I don't see anything," I said. With the sun behind the hills to the west, the valley was just a pit of darkness that stretched to a bare glimpse of the lake far on the horizon.
"Look carefully," he said. "Follow the road past the garden. It's strewn with white pebbles that reflect the starlight. Do you see it?"
"I think so," I said, squinting.
"Follow that road with your eyes. It breaks in a few places - that's where the hills start to roll - but you can pick up the next stretch if you look carefully."
"Okay," I said. "Cow pastures?"
"And goats and a few pigs," he said. "All the animals safely indoors by now, I'm sure. But do you see that house there? It's apart from the others, not close to the road at all. It's just there, in that stand of trees."
At first I didn't think I could find it. Then I saw a single window glowing with light from a lamp, and once I had that I could discern the outline of the building around it. "Yes, I see it."
"That's my family's house," he said. "That's where I live with my sister, Esja. I know I promised to introduce you two. But she has good and bad days, and lately they've all been bad."
"I'm sorry," I said. "I hope I didn't pressure you. Not when you had so much to deal with it."
"Not at all," he said. "But I'm still waiting for that first good day."
"I'll be there when she's ready," I promised. Then I realized that was as much as promising I was going to be in Villmark and capable of reaching that house when that day came.
So I had already made up my mind. I was going to agree to the council's demands. I had to.
"I hate that house," Loke said. "And yet I can't leave it. Because that house and Esja are like one. If not for Esja I would go far, far away from here, from all this. Further than Duluth or Canada, further than Adam was planning to go in a million years. I don't think I'd ever stop that going away. I know I'd never return."
I didn't know what to say, so I just hugged him as tightly as I could, for as long as he would allow.
Which wasn't long. He really did remind me of Mjolner in a lot of ways.
"But I can't do that, and so here I am!" he said, stepping away from me and swinging his arms as if defining his personal space. "But at least now I have a crucial new job to keep my occupied."
"You've got a job?" I asked. "Doing what?"
"Keeping you connected with your friends, of course," he said. "The council forbids you from seeing them and them from seeing you, but they never said a thing about me doing both."
"I think it was implied," I said.
He waved his hand dismissively. "As much as I hate following rules, I really hate following the rules that are implied."
Normally I disapproved of Loke's anarchist worldview, but I had to admit he had me with that one.
"Come on," he said, leading the way back to the front door. "Time to head back to Runde."
"I guess I do have to pack," I said as I trailed along behind him.
He stopped just outside the door to spin on one heel and give me a mock severe look. "Pack? That's what you're thinking of?"
"What are you thinking of?" I asked.
"I'm thinking you have three days to spend in Runde with your Runde friends. That's one long party to be whipped up on short notice, but I think I can manage it."
"I'm exhausted already just thinking about it," I said.
"You can sleep when you're dead," he said with another dismissive wave. "In the mean time, I'm going to be sure you fill every waking minute of the next three days with maximum friends and fun. Hey!" he said, clapping his hands together and tipping his head to give me a conspiratorial wink. "You can call that packing too."
"I guess I can," I said, and found myself smiling, really smiling.
I had a path in front of me, and I couldn't tell how long that path was. But at the end of it, I would be back among my friends again. It shone like an enchanted city on the horizon, my final, most magical destination.
Of course, between me and that final step into the enchanted city was an encounter with Halldis, but I didn't have to think about that now. So I deliberately didn't.
"It's not forever," he said, perhaps misreading the look on my face.
"I know," I said, pushing my fear of Halldis aside. "If I work hard, it will be a lot less than forever, right?"
"Right," he agreed. "And in the meantime, did I mention I am the most discrete carrier of love letters? I rarely steam them open and almost never make copies for my own use."
"What? Ew!" I said, slugging him hard on the arm.
"Oh, you're going to appreciate me before all this is through," he said. "I can guarantee it."
And I knew I would. Not that I would tell him, but I already did.
Check Out Book Four!
The Viking Witch will return in Killing in the Village Commons, coming February 9, 2021 and available for preorder now!
* * *
Winter has come to the lost Norse village of Villmark, the wind and snow separating cozy house from cozy house like a knife breaks apart shortbread.
And for the first time in her life, Ingrid Torfa lives alone. No mother, no grandmother, no roommate. Just a big, empty house and a cat who loves to disappear. Magical studies fill her every waking hour, and yet those hours stretch out in unbroken silence.
Until a scream rents the night, drawing every neighbor out into the cold streets. A woman lies dead at the bottom of the well. It looks like an accident to the villagers, but to Ingrid it feels like a murder.
Luckily, Ingrid knows just the friends to help her solve the mystery. Not even the bite of winter can stop them from uncovering the truth.
Killing in the Village Commons, Book 4 in the Viking Witch Mystery Series!
The Witches Three Cozy Mysteries
In case you missed it, check out Charm School, the first book in the complete Witches Three Cozy Mystery Series!
Amanda Clarke thinks of herself as perfectly ordinary in every way. Just a small-town girl who serves breakfast all day in a little diner nestled next to the highway, nothing but dairy farms for miles around. She fits in there.
But then an old woman she never met dies, and Amanda was named in her will. Now Amanda packs a bag and heads to the big city, to Miss Zenobia Weekes' Charm School for Exceptional Young Ladies. And it's not in just any neighborhood. No, she finds herself on Summit Avenue in St. Paul, a street lined with gorgeous old houses, the former homes of lumber barons, railroad millionaires, even the writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. Why, Amanda can practically hear the jazz music still playing across the decades.
Scratch that. The music really, literally, still plays in the backyard of the charm school. Because the house stretches across time itself. Without a witch to protect this tear in the fabric of the world, anything can spill over. Like music.
Or like murder.
* * *
Charm School, the first book in the complete Witches Three Cozy Mystery Series!
Also from Ratatoskr Press
The Ritchie and Fitz Sci-Fi Murder Mysteries starts with Murder on the Intergalactic Railway.
* * *
For Murdina Ritchie, acceptance at the Oymyakon Foreign Service Academy means one last chance at her dream of becoming a diplomat for the Union of Free Worlds. For Shackleton Fitz IV, it represents his last chance not to fail out of military service entirely.
Strange that fate should throw them together now, among the last group of students admitted after the start of the semester. They had once shared the strongest of friendships. But that all ended a long time ago.
But when an insufferable but politically important woman turns up murdered, the two agree to put their differences aside and work together to solve the case.
Because the murderer might strike again. But more importantly, solving a murder would just have to impress the dour colonel who clearly thinks neither of them belong at his academy.
* * *
Murder on the Intergalactic Railway, the first book in the Ritchie and Fitz Sci-Fi Murder Mysteries.
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About the Author
Cate Martin is a mystery writer who lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Also by Cate Martin
The Witches Three Cozy Mystery Series
Charm School
Work Like a Charm
Third Time is a Charm
Old World Charm
Charm his Pants Off
Charm Offensive
* * *
The Viking Witch Cozy Mystery Series
Body at the Crossroads
Death Under the Bridge
Murder on the Lake
Killing in the Village Commons (coming February 9, 2021)
Copyright © 2020 by Cate Martin
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cover design by Shezaad Sudar.
Ratatoskr Press logo by Aidan Vincent.
ISBN 978-1-951439-50-7
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Cate Martin, Murder on the Lake
