Page 4 of Echoes of Twilight (Dawn of Alaska #4)

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M ikhail stood at the mouth of the canyon, staring into the narrow passage that cut through the mountain. Walls of rock rose steep and sheer on either side, so tight that only one person could pass through at a time. But there was no question that the prospectors had gone through it. The loose gravel held clear imprints from two sets of boots.

Mikhail took a deep breath, adjusting his pack against his back, then stepped into the canyon.

It was the perfect place for an ambush from above. Not that he was on poor terms with the Tahltan tribe, who lived along the Stikine and Iskut Rivers, or the Tlingit, who sometimes roamed this far inland. But being at the bottom of such a narrow canyon put him in a position of intense vulnerability, and he hadn’t spent the past decade surviving as a wilderness guide by being vulnerable.

He also didn’t like what would happen to the canyon when the first snowfall came. It would be impassable. Fortunately he was still on track to reach the prospectors before nightfall, and if he was fast enough, he might be able to ask them about the botanists and then head back through the canyon before camping for the night. He didn’t like the idea of having to traverse it again in the morning, especially considering the snow flurries that had already drifted over the mountain.

Up ahead, the canyon widened slightly, and Mikhail stepped into the small opening and pulled his canteen from his pack, taking a long swig of the cold, metallic-tasting water before setting off again. He rounded two more bends before a faint sound drifted to him. It was almost imperceptible at first, but it grew louder with each step.

Water.

He reached the next bend in the canyon and stopped. Ahead, the walls had grown slick and dark, streaked with the shimmer of water running down from high up on the rock. The water ran into a crevice on the far side of the canyon, and he had a feeling it would eventually emerge on the outer side of the mountain as a waterfall.

At the moment, he was merely grateful the water hadn’t frozen. He sloshed through it and rounded another bend to find the canyon suddenly opening up, dumping him into a wooded valley.

He paused for a moment, quiet and careful as he took in his surroundings, not knowing who or what was in this new valley. The mountain he’d spent most of the day hiking up now towered behind him, and a series of other smaller peaks jutted up above the trees. He had no idea if the canyon behind him was the only way in and out of the valley, but the ground revealed a startlingly fresh set of tracks at his feet.

Good. That meant he’d be having a conversation with the prospectors within the hour, giving him plenty of time to trek back through the canyon before nightfall.

Mikhail readjusted his pack on his shoulders, then climbed over a fallen log and started forward. A distant sound floated on the wind, and he turned his head, trying to discern which direction it had come from. Was it a voice or merely the sound of the wind howling through the canyon?

The sound reached him again, and this time he was close enough to hear the deep undertones of a man’s voice.

He slowed his steps, moving his sealskin mukluks quietly over the forest floor. The last thing he needed was to be greeted at gunpoint by a prospector who didn’t take kindly to being followed. When meeting strangers in the woods, it was far better to size up the men and their camp before making his presence known.

The voices grew louder, snippets of conversation filtering through the trees; then a flicker of movement caught his eye. Blue, sticking out like a beacon against the greens and browns of the forest.

“I’m quite pleased with the progress I made while you were gone.”

“We should have returned a few days sooner. I didn’t realize how much the weather had changed up here.”

“No, no. Don’t apologize. This gave me more time to work. Are you sure we can’t waylay our journey even a day?”

“You can’t mean that. You’re out of food.”

They’d run out of food? Mikhail frowned. The prospectors? They shouldn’t have. He’d come across two places where fish had clearly been cooked over a campfire, and he’d assumed the men had been snaring rabbits as needed along the way.

The words cut out for a second, then continued. “...been worried this whole time and not journaling much.”

“There’s nothing to worry about now that we’ve returned. But we’re leaving first thing in the morning. Finish your work tonight.”

Mikhail found a thick patch of brush and crouched low, allowing him to finally glimpse the two men. One wore a blue coat and another a brown one, though they were moving away from him, back toward a pristine turquoise lake that sat nestled amid a circle of mountain peaks and thick forest.

Three tents had been pitched on the far side of the lake, and he watched as the two men headed around the lake toward the camp, where two others came to greet them.

Mikhail frowned. That should be impossible. He’d followed two sets of footprints through the mountains, not four. Perhaps the prospectors had left half of their party here in the valley and gone to search for more gold? But that seemed strange. If there wasn’t any gold in this valley, why would any prospectors have stayed here? And if there was gold, why would only two prospectors have left?

And why were they camped by the lake and not near one of the mountains or beside a stream, both of which were more likely to contain gold than a beach?

Unless they weren’t looking for gold.

Mikhail stood and moved along the edge of the trees, staying far enough from the clearing that the men wouldn’t be able to see him, but close enough that he could keep an eye on them. If he got closer to the tents, he just might be able to tell how long the men had been camping there.

Dare he hope that he’d found his team of missing scientists?

No. It couldn’t be them. He’d clearly followed prospectors here. There was no question that the men he’d tracked had been searching for gold. They’d panned for gold in every stream they’d crossed and stopped to examine several geological formations on the mountain. Besides, there were only four people at the campsite, the two men whose conversation he’d just overheard, and the two other men who were now talking to the first two near the fire. He was looking for a party of six.

Or at least he thought he was, since six people had left Sitka on the botany expedition last spring. But what if there were only four left now?

Something tightened in his gut, and Mikhail cast his gaze toward the heavens. Please let everyone be safe, Father.

But God didn’t give him any kind of clue as to whether he’d answered the prayer, so Mikhail moved closer to the camp, creeping through the trees and brush as he neared the tents with a small fire in the center. There were several unusual things in the camp, like the series of glass jars that held various types of foliage. They sat atop a boulder near the edge of the forest with a journal lying beside them. Finding a journal itself in a camp wouldn’t be terribly unusual. But this wasn’t some small, cheaply bound book that a prospector might use to make notes about where he’d been and what he’d found. It looked heavy and thick and ornate.

Then there were the two small trowels sitting at the base of the boulder, their tips blackened with dirt.

Finally he spotted a botanical press sitting on the opposite side of the boulder. It wasn’t overly large, but he recognized it as the device used to press samples of plants until they were paper thin. He suspected there were herbarium sheets somewhere in the camp, too, to help preserve whatever specimens had been collected.

It appeared he’d found his team of botanists after?—

“Stay right where you are, sir.”

He turned at the sound of the voice to find a woman staring at him from beside a nearby tree. She was dressed in a green woolen coat and matching cap, with fiery, untamed waves of hair falling about her face.

A woman. Memories flashed of his first expedition long ago, of another woman with long blond hair rather than red.

Please, God. Not a woman. Not here. Not when we barely have a chance of getting out of this wilderness before winter.

How could he have missed the fact that a woman was on the botany expedition?

Before he could ask who she was, she opened her mouth and screamed. “Heath! Richard! We have an intruder!”

Footsteps sounded from the direction of the camp, and Mikhail didn’t need to turn around to know that all four men were headed his way.

He was tempted to ask who she was, but he could put it together easily enough. She was married to one of the scientists and was out on a lark, thinking herself special for leaving her fancy life in the city and trekking through the wilds of Alaska for half a year. And the wilderness certainly hadn’t suited her. She was pale and gaunt, with circles under her eyes and tight lines around her mouth and a coat that looked far too big for her bony, narrow shoulders.

The men he’d glimpsed in the camp near the lake hadn’t looked half starved, though. Maybe she’d gotten dysentery or contracted some other disease that had left her weak and emaciated.

Please keep her alive, Father. Please don’t let her be too far gone already.

He expected her to look nervously about and wait for her husband—Heath, he assumed, since she’d called for him first. But instead, she straightened her spine and met his gaze.

“I don’t know why you’re spying on our camp, but we have nothing of interest to you. Certainly not any gold. Just plant specimens, so you best move along.” She made a shooing motion with her hand, as though he were a rabbit or bird or something she could easily scare off.

She might be frail, but she wasn’t spineless. That was a good thing, wasn’t it?

“Bryony? What’s wrong?” The man in the brown coat strode through the trees to the woman. He was tall and lithe, and his shirt looked more white than brown. He had red hair, much the same as the woman’s, with a red beard to match.

The man came to a stop beside her, drawing himself up to his full height and glaring at him with hard green eyes. “Is this man bothering you?”

“Yes, yes, why were you shouting?” A man in a blue coat with snowy white hair and thick spectacles traipsed toward them, followed by a balding, middle-aged man whose hair held only a few hints of gray.

The final man of the group was the only one sensible enough to appear holding a revolver which was something Mikhail would certainly have done if the situation were reversed.

But the sight of the silvery barrel pointed his direction wasn’t what made his muscles coil. That had to do with the familiar face of the man holding the gun. Richard Caldwell.

He’d changed little over the past decade. His dark hair was still meticulously combed back, every strand in place despite the rugged terrain. His high cheekbones and straight nose made him appear as though he belonged in a portrait hung in some grand parlor rather than in the wilds of Alaska. And those calculating, cold eyes of his hadn’t softened with age. If anything, they’d grown harder.

Richard’s presence on the botany team was the reason Mikhail had chosen to guide a team of scientists sent to study the Kuskokwim River rather than the botanists headed up the Stikine. The interactions he’d had with the man over a decade ago were enough for him to know that everyone in Alaska would be happiest if he and Richard were thousands of miles apart.

When tasked with finding the lost expedition team, he’d known he would run into Richard, but that still didn’t stop every muscle of his body from coiling tight now that they were staring at each other.

“I caught this man here spying on us,” the woman said, gesturing to Mikhail.

Mikhail moved his gaze away from Richard, who was holstering his gun, and surveyed the group. “Where’s Jack? Is he hunting?”

Everyone froze, their gazes slowly finding each other in a way that made Mikhail’s muscles tighten even more.

“How do you know Jack?” The redheaded man stepped closer.

“They’re fellow guides.” Richard finally spoke, his lips twisting into a subtle sneer. “This is none other than Mikhail Amos, and I assume he’s here to rescue us.”

“The explorer?” the redheaded man’s eyes widened, and he swept his gaze down Mikhail.

Mikhail tried to hold back a wince. Did the men he’d been sent to rescue have to recognize him? He’d rather people not have the first clue who he was.

A grin broke out on the redheaded man’s face, and he extended his hand. “Heath Wetherby with the Department of the Interior. I’ve read your articles. It’s an honor to meet you.”

“I’m Heath’s father, Professor Atticus Wetherby, head botanist for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC.” The man with snowy white hair stepped closer and held out his hand for Mikhail to shake. “This is my daughter, Bryony, who’s assisting her brother and me on our expedition.” The scientist gestured toward both the woman and the redheaded man—evidently not her husband. Now that he knew they were related, Mikhail could see their similarities, and they were both named after English plants. White bryony was a vine that produced berries, if he recalled correctly, and heath was a shrub that grew in the moorlands and produced purple flowers in late summer.

Perhaps Dr. Wetherby had worked in England before taking a position with the Smithsonian Institution. Or maybe he had an English heritage.

“I’m Dr. Ottingford, Dr. Wetherby’s associate.” The middle-aged man with the balding head reached out to shake his hand. “I must say, I’ve read all of your articles too, and it’s an honor to meet you.”

“Thank you,” Mikhail mumbled, then shifted his gaze to Richard, but the other man didn’t offer his hand. It was just as well. Mikhail had no interest in pretending to play nice.

“Did the Department of the Interior send you to find us?” Miss Wetherby stepped forward and extended her own slender hand.

Rather than shake it as he’d done with the men, Mikhail twisted it until her hand rested atop the side of his and tilted his head toward it. It felt small and dainty beneath her gloves, far too breakable. “Technically, it was the governor’s office. Governor Caldwell grew worried when you didn’t return to Sitka by the first of September as planned.” He dropped her hand, then scanned the group again. “Now who wants to tell me what happened to Jack?”

“Oh, ah... about Mr. Ledman...” Dr. Wetherby scratched the back of his head.

“It’s quite unfortunate, that.” Dr. Ottingford’s brows knit together above his bony nose.

Heath slanted a glance at Richard, but Richard shifted, refusing to look in Heath’s direction.

Miss Wetherby was the only one who met his eyes directly. They were hazel, like the warm tones of honey swirling in tea. “There was a bear attack, and we couldn’t do anything to stop it. It happened over ten weeks ago.”

“A bear that attacked only one person and left the rest of you unharmed?” Mikhail rubbed the back of his neck.

“Mr. Ledman wasn’t with us.” Again, Miss Wetherby was the one to answer. “He was out hunting. Richard heard his screams and ran to help, but it was too late.”

“I came as soon as I heard his screams.” Richard swallowed, his sharp eyes clouding for a moment. “I don’t know if there was anything we could have done differently.”

“There likely wasn’t, not with a bear, and especially not if it was a sow with a cub nearby.” Mikhail’s voice came out sharper than he intended. He wasn’t angry at Richard but at the whole mess. He’d grown up with Jack. They’d chased each other through the mountains of Sitka more times than he could count. Jack was a good man and an excellent guide—and now he was gone.

But that was the way of things in Alaska. Life here was harder than life in other places. There was always something waiting to snuff it out. A bear, a storm, a falling tree. It only served as a warning for what might come their way if they weren’t careful.

A gust of wind chose that moment to sweep into the valley, and he raised his eyes to the sky, where thick, dark clouds gathered.

He didn’t like the look of them, but it was too close to nightfall to pull up camp now, not with all the scientific specimens they’d need to pack before transporting them.

Dear God, please hold back the snow for a few more days. That was all he needed, just long enough to get the team over the trio of mountains separating them from the Iskut River, where it was more likely to rain than snow.

“Pack up your specimens tonight. We leave first thing in the morning,” he said to the group.

Dr. Wetherby held up a finger. “Are you sure we can’t stay another day or two? I’m not quite finished with my research.”

Mikhail was tempted to ask if the man understood snow, or that the canyon that led to this peaceful little valley would be impassable with the smallest bit of it. Did he understand how precarious a position they were in by staying in the wilderness even a day longer than necessary?

But he’d learned long ago that fewer words often had more impact than more words. So all he said was, “Dawn.”

Then he stalked off toward the camp.