Vigor sank into one of the chairs. “I think I’m fine right here.”
“Bed” was all Kowalski said, tramping up the stairs, rubbing his eyes like a kid who had been up well past his bedtime.
Gray didn’t disagree with Kowalski’s plan, proving it by yawning loudly. “Sorry. I think we all should get as much shut-eye as we can. We’ll need to be up an hour or two before sunrise if we’re to meet the shaman for his cleansing ritual.”
“At least you guys will,” Seichan said sourly.
That was another concession that had to be made to accommodate the shaman’s rules. No girls allowed. It was clearly a boys’ club when it came to the Buryats’ sacred sites.
“Seichan and I will have to make a spa day of it then,” Rachel said, “while you all go traipsing out into the cold.”
Still, she didn’t truly look any happier, staring at the back of her uncle’s head. She didn’t want Vigor out of her sight. She even sank into a chair next to him by the fire.
With a final few words, they all settled in for the night.
As Gray climbed the stairs, the wood creaking underfoot, he could not escape the feeling of foreboding. A window at the landing above shone with the light of the comet. But he felt the danger was much closer, like someone stepping on his grave.
Or someone else’s grave.
Seichan followed him up, never even creaking a stair.
3:03 A.M.
Rachel woke in a panic, hearing a gunshot.
She found herself slouched in a chair by a fire. Another loud pop of wood from the hearth calmed her initial fear. She quickly remembered where she was. She checked her watch, discerning when.
Shocked, she shifted in her seat.
“Uncle Vigor, what are you still doing up? It’s past three in the morning, and you have to be awake in another few hours.”
Across the hearth from her, he had a local travel book open on his lap, his reading glasses perched on his nose, reflecting the flames.
“I slept on the plane ride here, took a nap on the drive over.” He shooed her concerns away with a flutter of fingers. “A couple hours of sleep and I’ll be fine.”
She knew every one of those statements was a lie. She had watched him the entire trip. He had never closed his eyes once. Even now, she noted the sheen of sweat on his brow that had nothing to do with the fire. His pallid expression confirmed it.
His insomnia wasn’t from old age. It wasn’t even from his interest in the research book on his lap. It was pain.
She pushed from her chair and slid next to him, kneeling at his feet, hugging close to his legs.
“Just tell me,” she said, knowing she needed no more words to clarify what she meant.
He sighed heavily, his eyes wincing slightly at the corners. He placed his book aside and stared into the flame. “It’s pancreatic cancer,” he whispered, as if ashamed—not at being sick but keeping this secret.
“How long?”
“I was diagnosed three months ago.”
She stared up at him, showing him that wasn’t the question she was asking. “How long?” she repeated.
“I have another two, maybe three months.”
Hearing the truth was both a relief and a terror. After so long of not knowing, she wanted the truth, needed the truth, to be able to put a name to her fear. But now that it was in the open, she could not shield herself with false hope.
Tears rose to her eyes.
He reached and wiped them away. “No tears. That’s why I didn’t want anyone to know. I’ve had a good run.”
“You could have told me.”
“I needed . . .” He sighed again. “I needed this to be my own for a while.”
He shook his head, plainly disappointed he couldn’t explain it better.
But Rachel understood, squeezing his knee. He had to come to terms with his own mortality, its inevitability, before sharing that truth with others.
He then went and gave her more details. Like most pancreatic cancers, his disease was silent, asymptomatic. By the time he felt ill, initially dismissing it as indigestion, it was too late. The cancer had metastasized throughout his abdomen and into his lungs. He opted for palliative treatment only, drugs to stave off the worst of the pain.
“The small blessing,” he said, finding a silver lining amid the darkness, “is that I can still be vital until near the very end.”
Rachel swallowed the lump in her throat, suddenly so very glad she had not restricted him from this trip, one that was likely to be his last.
“I’ll be there for you,” she promised.
“And that’s fine, but don’t forget to live yourself.” He waved a hand along his body. “This is only temporary, a small gift that hopefully leads to a greater glory. But do not waste that gift, do not set it on a shelf for some future use; grab it with both hands and live it now, live it every day.”
She rested her cheek on his lap, shoulders shaking, losing her struggle against her grief.
He allowed it now. He placed a hand atop her head and spoke softly.
“I love you, Rachel. You are my daughter. You’ve always been that to me. I cherish that I got to share my life with you.”
She hugged his legs—not wanting to ever let go, but knowing she must soon.
I love you, too.
3:19 A.M.
Seichan had an arm over her eyes as she lay in bed, holding her own tears in check. She had heard everything below. Her room was directly above the communal space. Every whisper rose to her, amplified by the acoustics of the wooden echo chamber that was this inn.
She had not meant to eavesdrop, but their voices had woken her.
She heard the love in those few words of the priest.
You are my daughter.
The truth cut her to the core—that although Vigor certainly was not Rachel’s father, the two had forged a family despite it.
As she had listened, she had pictured her mother’s face, now that of a stranger, the two of them separated by a gulf of time and tragedy. Rather than trying to renew their roles as mother and daughter, could they forge something new, to begin again as two strangers who shared a lost dream of another time? Could they take those faded embers and stoke something anew?
Seichan felt a flicker of hope, of possibility.
She rolled to her feet, knowing she would not be able to sleep.
Vigor’s advice also stayed with her.
. . . do not waste that gift, do not set it on a shelf for some future use; grab it with both hands and live it now . . .
She climbed to her feet and slipped a loose shirt over her naked body. On bare feet, she moved silently from her room and down the chilly hall. She found his door unlocked and slipped into the warmer darkness inside.