Towards White Read online

  Zena Shapter writes from a castle in a flying city hidden by a thunder-cloud. She’s the winner of a dozen national writing competitions including a Ditmar Award, the Glen Miles Short Story Prize and the Australian Horror Writers’ Association Award for Short Fiction. Her stories have appeared in collections such as the Hugo-nominated ‘Sci Phi Journal’, ‘Midnight Echo’ (as well as their ‘best of’ anthology), ‘Award-Winning Australian Writing’ (twice), and ‘Antipodean SF’. Reviewer for Tangent Online Lillian Csernica has referred to her as a writer who “deserves your attention”. In 2016 her co-authored science fiction novel ‘Into Tordon’ for 8-14 year olds was published by MidnightSun Publishing and distributed into school libraries by Scholastic under the pseudonym Z.F. Kingbolt. She’s also the founder and leader of Sydney’s award-winning Northern Beaches Writers’ Group, with whom she’s written several speculative adventure books for young readers to raise money for The Kids’ Cancer Project.

  When not writing, Zena is a writing mentor, editor, tutor, competition judge, book creator, and workshop presenter. She enjoys travelling, wine, movies, chocolate, frogs and connecting with fellow story nerds online. Find her via @zenashapter or zenashapter.com

  Praise for Towards White

  ‘Zena Shapter’s debut novel will hold you tight from start to finish. With characters as convoluted as the faultless plot, ‘Towards White’ expands the mind, and the mind’s eye, as you track the journey of life, death, love and deception. Suspense that takes you to the brink, then pushes you over. The world building was perfection. Highly recommended!’

  -Kim Falconer, author of ‘The Blood in the Beginning’, an Ava Sykes Novel.

  ‘Zena Shapter’s debut novel ‘Towards White’ is that rarest of books—an easy read that tackles hard subjects. Combining ominous vibes with science driven action, this slick technothriller will keep you turning the pages long past when you should have gone to bed. ‘Towards White’ shows the conflict and chaos of a meeting between the unstoppable force of scientific progress and the immovable object that is human nature—and what happens to those caught in the middle.’

  - David McDonald, author of ‘Guardians of the Galaxy: Castaways’ and ‘Captain America: Sub Rosa’

  ‘Towards White’ is a smart supernatural thriller, with a central mystery that is both heartbreaking and intriguing. Shapter blurs the line between technology and spirituality, all the while exploring a fascinating Icelandic setting through the eyes of a complex and driven female lead. It’s a novel that delves deep into the nature of justice, religion and death, but at it’s heart it’s a story about family and the bonds that connect us all.’

  - Joanne Anderton, award-winning author of ‘Debris’ and ‘The Bone Chime Song and Other Stories’.

  ‘Eerie and engrossing, ‘Towards White’ is an interrogation of the mystery of life wrapped in a Nordic sci-fi noir story about unravelling the mystery of a death. Set against a starkly beautiful landscape, the story is steeped in a deep sense of unease, alternating between white-knuckle action and a deliberate unfolding of the layers of truth.’

  - Leife Shallcross, author of ‘The Beast’s Heart’

  Towards

  White

  BY ZENA SHAPTER

  This is a work of fiction. The events and characters portrayed herein are imaginary and are not intended to refer to specific places, events or living persons. The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the publisher.

  Towards White

  All Rights Reserved

  ISBN-13: 978-1-925496-40-6

  Copyright ©2017 Zena Shapter

  V1.1

  This book may not be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in whole or in part by any means, including graphic, electronic, or mechanical without the express written consent of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Font types: Palatino Linotype, Gill Sans and Gill Sans MT.

  IFWG Publishing Australia

  Melbourne

  www.ifwgaustralia.com

  Acknowledgement

  First and foremost, thank you to my readers—life is short and you’ve spent some of your time with me. That’s both an honour and an encouragement. Thank you!

  Big thanks of course go to everyone at IFWG Australia for publishing ‘Towards White’: Gerry Huntman, Rebecca Fraser, Steve McCracken and Elizabeth Lang—what an amazing team!

  Thanks also to those who have read ‘Towards White’ and supported its development, specifically: Alex Adsett, Jo Butler, Roberta Ivers, Abigail Nathan and Cameron McClure—you rock! Thank you Bob Benton, Sara Galletly and Catherine Meek for answering my questions about entropy, diving and lawyers, respectively. Thank you also for helping at various stages of this novel’s journey: Kim Falconer, Ian Irvine, Pip Harry, Fiona Howland-Rose, Susan Steggall, Tony McFadden, Mijmark, Anne Swan, Chris Lake, Malcolm Goff, Arthur Siannos, Tracey Jackson, Zoya Nojin, Madi Duncan, Kirsten Taylor, Andrew Mills, Rondel Freeman, Mike Blandamer, and Justine Joffe.

  Finally, thank you to my children for their never-ending patience, and to my husband for his support. Bill, you’ve been there every step of the way since this story’s inception back in Iceland in 2001, and I’ve appreciated every second you’ve ventured into this world with me. Thank you!

  For those we’ve lost.

  In 1917, Rudolf Otto, an eminent theologian, philosopher and scholar of comparative religion, identified a single element that all faiths share: the numinous experience. He said it was “like a hidden force of nature, like stored-up electricity, discharging itself upon any one who comes too near…in it we come upon something inherently wholly other, whose kind and character are incommensurable with our own, and before which we therefore recoil in a wonder that strikes us chill and numb.”

  Rudolf Otto, Oxford University Press, 1923, pp.10–28, ‘Das Heilige’ (1917),

  trans. John W Harvey

  Prologue

  I am suspended in warm water, ten metres beneath the brilliant turquoise surface of the Caribbean Sea, and I’m so glad I haven’t eaten yet today. Lifting my arms above my head, I feel the stretch in my abdomen and watch the school of curious horse-eye jackfish circling me. They close in, their shimmering mass as solid as a revolving silver cylinder. Around them, lemon sunbeams rotate hypnotically through the quiet blue. This is how I want to always be. Amazed by life, not rushing through it.

  Closing my eyes, I weave my fingers through silky ocean and let the strain of the last nine days melt away. Whoever thought lawyers living on Grand Cayman would be so uptight?

  I listen to my breath escaping from my regulator and count my blessings. I am no longer one of them. I am something different now. That is at least a start.

  Beyond the whooshing of my bubbles is the reassuring crackle of distant shrimp claws and fish crunching on coral. My body rocks in a gentle sway as I glide my fins to and fro under my body. Looking down, I peer into the impenetrable abyss beneath my fins.

  “Plummets four miles into the heart of the Caribbean Sea,” my dive guide said of the Cayman Trench. “Really these islands are the tips of underwater mountains, taller than any land mountain in the United States.”

  I survey the darkness. There is nothing but blue merging into navy; beyond that, black. The vast emptiness makes me feel like I’m falling. Of course I’m not. My instincts are just playing a trick on me. They don’t know they’re obsolete impulses. Inferior compulsions no rational person needs. But I do. I look up to see I’m still surrounded by glinting silver scales. The fish here are so beautiful. I glide clo
ser, and closer, reaching out…until a piercing blast of white noise shoots through my earpiece.

  What the hell?

  “Becky?” My dive guide’s voice detonates in my ear.

  I flinch at the pain, scare the jackfish with my movement. They dart into an underwater canyon, their mustard yellow tails disappearing inside the North Wall in seconds.

  “Becky, you need to ascend immediately.”

  I check my Seiko. There’s fifteen minutes before the end of my dive, and so much of the North Wall still to see. Hulking lime and ochre corals cling to the craggy sides of the canyon where the jackfish darted. Blue tangs and butterfly fish weave through colourful submerged gardens. Where did those jackfish go? I glide closer to the Wall.

  “Sorry, Becky. I know you said no interruptions for a whole hour, but there’s an urgent phone call for you. They insist on talking to you, and only you, straight away.”

  I pause mid-stroke, rehearing words like ‘urgent’ and ‘immediately’.

  Mark.

  My brother Mark phones me every Saturday, or I phone him, irrespective of where we are in the world, but it’s Tuesday already and he hasn’t called me yet. This is the first time I haven’t heard from him on a Saturday in over eighteen months. His phone’s switched off and he’s sent me no message. The phone call has to be him.

  I turn towards the boat. My pulse quickens as I swim as fast as I can. Mark’s been in Iceland these last few months, researching the country’s new social philosophy, the Heimspeki, based on where the electrical energy in our brains goes when we die. His research is giving him the final bit of insight he needs to publish his thesis paper on world energy theories.

  If it’s not him calling, on the other hand, I’m going to be mad. I accept that one of the downsides to being in demand is the constant phone calls. And I accept that my Jersey report last year went viral. I even enjoy the industry fame that’s come with it. What I don’t appreciate is the fact that all I asked for was a single hour of peace. I don’t get paid like a lawyer anymore, so needn’t be as accessible, and the sooner my boss understands that the better.

  The underside of the dive boat shadows the sea ahead, and I have a feeling I’m about to lose my temper. If my brother were the one calling, my guide would have said so. Instead he referred to ‘they’.

  I surface, stabilise my fins on the swim platform’s ladder, then rip my mouthpiece from my lips. Taking a breath, I try to stay calm.

  “Is it Mark, my brother?” I ask, struggling to keep irritation from my tone.

  “They didn’t give a name,” he says, squinting hard against the water glare.

  “It’s not anyone from Dictum, or the British Law Commission, is it? Because they could have waited.” I thrust my fins at him, ignore his out-stretched hand and use a rope to hoist myself free of the ocean. As I stand to face him, a heavy Cayman heat smothers saltwater from my skin. It doesn’t help keep me cool. “Is it one of them?”

  “No. But they said it was about your brother.”

  “About him?” I hurry out of my rebreather. About is another one of those words people use in emergencies.

  “I think,” my guide mutters, giving me a concerned expression, “it’s someone from Iceland.”

  “You think?” My legs shake as I clamber into the cool grey shadows under the console’s canopy.

  Someone from Iceland is calling about my brother, and they need to speak with me immediately. It’s urgent. Straight away. About…

  Chapter 1

  I sink down into my seat on the midnight Flybus and wish the Icelandic passengers would stop staring at me. I’m sure they don’t mean to make me feel uncomfortable, that would be a negative thing to do. But the subtlety they’re attempting simply isn’t working. I’ve seen their multiple side-glances, gazes roaming the carpeted aisle only to pass over me. Too many people have pretended to look out my window—though at what I don’t know. It’s the early hours of the morning and there’s nothing but black outside. Probably, they’re just curious. They want to know if I’m one of them, and, if I’m not, to assure me that I should be. Still, I wish they’d stop. They’re not the reason I’m here.

  Please Mark, be okay.

  I rest my forehead against the window’s cold glass and clear a circle in the condensation as a shadowy white cabin flashes past. Mark travelled along this dark road recently; all visitors arriving in Iceland do. So for miles I watch for something more. Occasionally I cup a hand between my face and the glass. But it’s no use. There’s nothing more to see. The night is so dark it’s like a black hole sucking at my body’s warmth.

  So with a shiver, I turn instead to re-check my seat pocket is clear of belongings. We’re getting closer to Reykjavík. There’s an artificial brightness that wasn’t outside before and, as soon as the Flybus stops, I need to hit the ground running. My connection to Höfkállur leaves soon after this one arrives in Reykjavík, and I have to get up North tonight. Mark hasn’t been in contact for days now. I’m sure he has his reasons, but I need to know them, otherwise the one Director Úlfar offered me yesterday morning on the dive boat will be all that’s left. And it mustn’t be. This mustn’t be anything other than one big misunderstanding—a misunderstanding that’s resulted in my flying hundreds of miles to see my brother, whom of course will be okay. He has to be okay. He’s been urging me for months to visit him in Iceland, to experience the effects of the Heimspeki firsthand, as he’s been doing. But I’ve been too busy.

  I should have come earlier. I should have come when he first invited me. Now I have to face all these strange people alone. Why didn’t Mark tell me how ridiculously serious the Icelanders have become about their new ideals?

  I shift upright. A few heads bob up as I move, looking to see if they can offer me any assurances. I just want to check my smartphone. I log into every application and scan to see if Mark’s sent me a text, a tweet, a post, a chat or an email and I haven’t heard the ping alert for some reason.

  There’s nothing.

  When I dial his number again, it goes straight to voicemail. Taking a deep breath, I grip onto the phone and will some message, any message, to appear on the phone’s display. Of course none does. The screen fades with inactivity. Still I stare at it, until the Flybus takes a sharp right turn and swings through a well-lit set of tall iron gates.

  We glide past a sign welcoming visitors to Reykjavík’s Central Travel Depot then jerk to a stop beside a glass-walled tourist information centre. Stiff-limbed from travel, I ease myself down the Flybus’s steps, glad to be moving again, albeit into a pre-dawn breeze so icy it bites at my face and shoulders. If this is Iceland’s summer, maybe I’m glad I didn’t join Mark earlier after all.

  The driver points me towards the raised tarmac oval where I can wait for the Austurleid SBS to Höfkállur, then she passes me my suitcase and climbs back inside. By the time I reach the oval, the Flybus has disappeared down some distant street, taking all its rumbling resonance with it. Even so, it isn’t until I sit on the oval’s sheltered bench that I realise how deserted it is here. I know it’s the middle of the night, still, shouldn’t Reykjavík’s Central Travel Depot have some travellers passing through other than me?

  I look around. Five wooden shelters are spread throughout the depot offering passengers refuge, but no one is using them. Pools of pale yellow lamplight burn circles directly into the damp tarmac, yet no travellers huddle under them and no one hurries between them. Where is everyone? I scan the fluorescent brightness of the information centre and notice the top of someone’s head bowed behind a reception desk. Given how cold it is out here, perhaps everyone’s inside? I reach for my suitcase’s handle to walk over.

  “Rebecca Dales?” someone yells from the depot’s gated entrance, their tone as crisp as the air.

  I seek out a person or movement to accompany the voice but there’s none. Maybe I misheard?


  After waiting a moment I head along the oval towards the information centre, until a car door slams and a man in a long grey coat emerges through the shadows and strides in my direction. I search for a face but he’s hunched into his collar against the night air. He also carries no luggage with him. Perhaps he’s an official with a message about Mark? Perhaps Director Úlfar’s realised he’s made a mistake after all and really Mark is okay? I stop and wait.

  As the man nears, I think of all the people who know I’m transiting through Reykjavík tonight. Mum and Dad. My boss. Director Úlfar. The guesthouse in Höfkállur where I’m staying tonight. They all have my phone number though, so why would any of them send someone to find me? Unless…maybe my phone isn’t working?

  I pull it out and activate its screen. There’s nothing wrong with it, and now the man is stepping onto the oval, raising his face to greet me. It takes me a second, but when I recognise him I’m not sure how to react.

  Director Úlfar Finnsson looks larger in person than he did over our video conferencing connection yesterday, when he called with the news about Mark. He’s taller too, more sturdy. A roundness presses against his coat where his stomach sits. I don’t know how he can bear it—doesn’t he realise people can see?

  “Velkominn, Miss Dales,” he says, offering me a nervous half-smile before dropping his chin into the warmth of his upturned collar.

  “Director Úlfar.” I nod him a greeting.

  “How are you? Do you need anything?” He glances around the depot, nods to himself as if in approval of something. “It can be a challenge, já, travelling alone?” He pulls a gloved hand from his coat pocket and smooths flat his bouncy brown hair while assessing my expression.

  “Not at all, Director Úlfar.” I smile. Travelling alone honestly doesn’t bother me. “It’s nice to have some peace and quiet. Why are you here?”