Lakebridge: Winter: The Lakebridge Cycle - Book 4

By Natasha Troop

Long after the autumn leaves have turned, the final curtain of winter descends upon the last residents of Stansbury, Vermont. Lakebridge: Winter is the fourth and final book of The Lakebridge Cycle.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Red Frog
• Release date: Feb 21, 2019
• ISBN: 9781949877014

Natasha Troop

Natasha grew up in Southern California and received her Bachelor's degree from UCLA in Comparative Literature. She also holds a Master's Degrees in both Secondary Education and Creative Writing. She is currently earning an Ed.D in Organizational Leadership because she would like to lead an organization. It seems a thing to do as she approaches the end of her first half century on this planet, which has included surviving and thriving as a trans woman. Natasha currently lives in the Los Angeles area with her spouse, son, daughter and menagerie of pets including too many cats, a rambunctious mutt and an overprotective Rough Collie. Aside from writing novels, she spends her days teaching high school students to love theatre and film, supporting and encouraging them to discover their voices as artists and activists, and admit to liking at least one book (not her books specifically, but it is always nice when that happens) before they graduate.

Book preview

Prologue

Gil was no longer surprised. It was a side effect of the gift Francis Stansbury had given him. He could see everything coming now. Not that he could see deep into the future. He just knew what was going to happen right before it happened, and in that moment, he could change things if he liked. More to the point, he could change things to be as he wanted.

He had first discovered this ability when he was at the airport with Ivy, his rough collie. He thought it would be simple enough to have her fly in a crate to New Zealand. That’s how he thought things were supposed to be. But he hadn’t really given moving to the other side of the planet much more thought other than wanting to do it. He never bothered to discover the logistics. Perhaps he never thought he would actually do it, so never did anything more than daydream about it. As a result, he didn’t know there was a process involved in bringing a pet along to another country. New Zealand, apparently, had quarantine laws. Really strict ones that required letters from vets and a battery of tests.

Gil didn’t know anything about it before he got to the airport. All he knew was that he wanted to get to New Zealand with his dog. He had a memory of the ticketing agent patiently explaining the process to him before denying him the ability to travel with Ivy. It was a complete memory and he still had it even though it never happened. He had hundreds of memories of moments which never happened cluttering up his mind – annoying redundancies that warned him not to abuse this particular trick.

Gil didn’t want to wait in Boston for six weeks and put Ivy through the trauma. He wanted to get on the plane that day and he wanted to do it with his dog. He didn’t even want her to have to sit in a crate-like luggage. He wanted her to have a seat up in first class with him. It started with the ticket agent whose nametag read, Sebastian.

He remembered Sebastian saying, Sir, your dog will have to ride in a crate.

Gil also remembered he wanted Sebastian to say something else. He watched the agent struggle against his will for a moment and then lose.

Sebastian smiled. Your dog is quite beautiful. I love collies.

Gil smiled in return. He almost felt badly about abusing his power. Almost. After suffering for nearly his entire life because of it, he was certain he deserved some benefit now he could control it.

Thank you. I’ll take two first class tickets to Christchurch, New Zealand.

And who will be traveling with you, sir?

Gil smiled. It will be just me and Ivy here. He gave her a scratch on the head and she smiled back at him.

He remembered Sebastian frowning, I’m sorry, sir. That is against our rules.

He imagined Ivy enjoying her time riding next to him and wanted nothing more for her. He the agent giving him what he wanted.

Sebastian smiled. Of course! All Rough Collies should fly first class as far as I’m concerned. They are first class dogs.

He remembered every airport and airline official denying Ivy access. He remembered wanting them all to change their minds and they did. So he also remembered how much they all loved Ivy. Airport security took pictures with her as did the nice Malaysian woman at the gate. The flight attendants were downright delighted to have his Collie dog to enjoy on each of the three legs to Christchurch. He had never spent that much time traveling by air and had never been in first class, which he never imagined could be so delightful. There was really nothing wrong with being pampered, even if it cost him around twelve thousand dollars. Money was not an issue for him. He probably could have flown free if he really wanted, but it didn’t seem right. There was no need to steal.

The sad truth was Gil didn’t know much about New Zealand. He supposed if he spent time using the Internet, he might have a better sense of where he had emigrated. All he knew about the place was from an article he read in a travel magazine about Dunedin and the area around it. Mostly what he remembered were pictures of rolling green hillsides and a sense he would belong there as he belonged in Stansbury. Everything else was just details he would pick up when he settled down.

When he and Ivy arrived in Christchurch, they wandered around the city until they found a used car lot with an almost new Land Rover. It seemed like the right kind of vehicle for the place. He told that to Murray, the genial salesman, who quite agreed it was the very best kind of vehicle for traversing the South Island in search of adventure. Gil didn’t disagree with him even though he had no interest in adventuring the way most people who visited here did. He just wanted to find a quiet place with rolling green hills.

He remembered being turned away because he didn’t have the proper paperwork to purchase a vehicle.

He didn’t want to deal with all of the paperwork and remembered Murray laughing about all of the silly rules the government really didn’t care about anyway. He laughed with Murray because he agreed governments had far too many unnecessary rules.

He remembered he didn’t want to deal with government rules ever again.

After taking a picture with Murray and Ivy, he drove his almost new car off the lot. He stopped to pick up some essentials from a few local stores where everyone was quite agreeable – the way he wanted everyone to be. He wasn’t sure if it was because he wanted them to be agreeable or because they were naturally so. He had no memory of anyone being disagreeable, but he wondered if he could affect people before they had a chance to make him want them to be different. His power confused him because he was constantly unsure if people were the way they were or the way he wanted them to be. It was difficult for him to want people to be themselves and also want them to be nice. There was something subtly evil about it because it was all too appealing to not be troubled by his ability and just go with it.

It was seductive.

As he drove south towards Dunedin, he had long conversations with Ivy about the morality of remaking the world to his vision of how things should be. He toyed with giving her the ability to speak so she could actively participate in the conversation beyond queer looks and the joyous face she made when she watched the world go by. It was tempting, but he decided then and there to limit himself. He didn’t even know how he to do it except practice not wanting things, which led him to worry the world was the way he wanted it to be without his interference and if he actively did not want something to be the way he wanted then maybe he was still responsible for it all.

As he pulled into the village of Seacliff, Gil announced to Ivy he would stop thinking about it and just appreciate he could be here, in this lovely little town with a view of the ocean he could never have in Vermont and be grateful he had survived long enough to be here. Seacliff felt right – the way Stansbury did. Like he was meant to be there. He was a little worried because it felt so natural to him, but as he was a little worried about everything, he resolved to settle down and not think too hard until there was a good reason to do so.

It wasn’t difficult to find a little house for sale just outside of the town. It came with a with rolling green hills and trees as far as he could see. He loved it, as he knew he would. Ivy loved it as well. He even secured a little sheep and called him Moose. Ivy seemed content keeping watch over Moose, and the little sheep didn’t seem to mind the dog lazily watching him.

At every step of his journey, there was a moment he saw coming, an obstacle to be circumvented. All he needed to do was want things to be as he liked, and they were. The memories piled up and crowded his mind to the point if anyone were to ask him how he got from Stansbury to Seacliff, he wasn’t sure if he could separate what had happened from what might have happened. It was a good thing his neighbors were respectful of his space – as he wanted them to be – and didn’t pry into his affairs. He learned to be friendly, but aloof. No one sought him out nor did they mind when he would wander into town to share a drink or a meal or pick up some supplies. He almost never had to change things from how they were going to be.

One thing he had not grown used to down under was the weather. It was summer in January and not winter. Sitting in front of his little house on a perfectly beautiful and mild summer’s day, he found himself missing Vermont’s deep winter chill. He looked over at Ivy, who was flopped out on her side doing her best impression of a speed bump.

It should be cold in January, dog. It should be snowing.

She didn’t dignify his remark with a chuff. He didn’t blame her. Only a fool would want to trade a day like this one for a brutal winter storm.

Gil couldn’t help his foolish smile as the wind picked up, blowing unseasonably cold and bringing dark clouds with it. As he stood to go inside and rescue a coat, he laughed as the first heavy snowflake drifted down and landed on Ivy’s nose.

Chapter One

Francis could feel his body again, feel it feeding on itself when there was nothing else and, as his form had lost the need for fat storage, his hunger never abated. It subsided for a time, but the need to eat was always there, insistent and distracting. As a result, he almost never left Charlie’s Grill. The pantry was well stocked with a winter’s worth of food. There had been something canned called, 'Corned Beef Hash,' which was at once indescribably grotesque and horribly addictive. There had been a great number of cans of the stuff which, in a desperate attempt to be sated, he continuously consumed. For days on end, he ate nothing but this hash substance which was both meat and potato and neither really. Then it was gone, just a mess of empty cans the awful little beast which lurked around this place would knock about in the vain hope a morsel of meat had been left behind.

After his initial exercise in futility, he learned to space out his meals. While there were many cans of food on Charlie’s shelves, most of them required additional preparation.

He thought about moving into the B and B, kill the one who knew enough about the universe to be dangerous, and let the other tend to him. It would be simple to turn the remaining residents of Stansbury into his unwilling servants. As it was, they were all connected to him through the energy lines he placed the day Gil Hamilton left Stansbury for good. He never even tugged on them. He never sent his mind out to see through theirs.

He just made sure they couldn’t leave.

If any were unlucky enough to penetrate the wards he constructed around the town, he set a line in them as well. In the pair of months since the autumn morning he took control, only two new people had found their way into town.

Kaylee and Logan were teenagers, students at some local university. The pair had been on something they called a ‘walkabout,’ which required a mind-altering substance to allow them access to a ‘higher plane.’ It also allowed them access to Stansbury. When they ‘came down’ from their ‘trip’ and discovered they could not leave, it became clear to Francis he could not abide their presence. They started by whining about their devices not functioning, followed immediately by prolonged exclamations about their collective boredom. Francis could not tolerate their continued presence when they went on ‘strike’ and demanded rights. When they made a show of calling a town meeting, Francis took advantage of the gathering. He forced the others to watch as he drained the pair to nothing more than a pale memory – a warning to the others they would suffer a similar fate if they interfered in his affairs. This benefitted him both in the influx of energy, and relief from their incessant awfulness.

He had grown fond of Charlie’s. There was a comfortable bed in the room upstairs, plus all the cans of food. There was also Charlie himself. Or at least, Charlie’s head. It hadn’t taken much to keep it from rotting. Francis knew a charm or two to stave off flesh’s decay. He didn’t know why he kept the head there on the counter, smiling the wry smile he fashioned for it, but over time it had grown on him. He even went so far as to fashion a wooden body for it with working parts – an automaton with a human head. He could move it around – make it fetch him things he required. He toyed with giving it a voice, but there was no point. It would only speak the words he gave it to say. He could not restore Charlie’s life-energy to the head. He had tried. It would have been lovely to have a more independent servant who knew how to cook and occasionally say something which piqued his interest. Alas, he did not possess the ability to raise the dead.

It was, however, within his ability to talk to the ghosts of the dead. He had consumed most of the spirits he encountered over the years with little prejudice. They were generally boring and good for little other than an energy boost when he needed it. But the few ghosts who remained in Stansbury had proven useful – providing him with information he needed in exchange for not losing what was left of themselves. They learned it was best to avoid him unless they were summoned. Most, except for Charlie, of course, who was deeply offended by what had become of his head and would probably be relieved to have what was left of his life in this plane ended.

Even now, as his smiling golem brought him a bowl of what the can advertised to be 'Chunky Clam Chowder' which had been warmed in the microwave device, Charlie’s ghost looked on with a frown.

What are you doing that you can’t heat up the chowder yourself?

There is nothing about it which could meet even the very low bar of what has historically been defined as chowder. But if you must know, I’m placing energy markers on the four intersecting battlefields of the Lesser Variances. It takes a great deal of concentration. I find movement requires the intake of additional food. I already waste too much time eating.

I won’t even pretend to know what you are talking about.

Why would you either pretend or know?

The ghost harrumphed, which was how most of their conversations ended. Francis had the feeling Charlie wasn’t much for conversation when he was alive, which was all well and good for Francis. He had no use for loquacious spirits.

Francis was hungry. He hated his need for food. Food became shit. What was food when there was so much power he could have any time- No! He couldn’t go back to it. There was a reason his father warned him to never tap directly into a local well of power. But his father never told him why. It wasn’t a naturally occurring fountain – like some mystical spring which gave everlasting life to any lucky enough to drink from it. The power well was a lure set by a carnivorous deity so ancient those who might have known its name had long since vanished from the known planes. Any with power enough to take the bait were likely to be swallowed whole. This god existed in the Ailm, a dimension about which he had been unable to discover any information except its name. In the darkest corners of the Labyrinthine City, he found nothing more than rumors surrounding the Ailm, the being who resided within, and suppositions of its purpose.

He was not alone in his desire to discover more about the Ailm. There were more than a few times when his questions drew the kinds of notice Quiades warned him to avoid. There were dire consequences for risky behavior in the City, especially when it related to the acquisition of energy and power. Many Others had thrown caution to the wind in their pursuit of the Ailm, only to find another of their kind, or a Traveler such as Quiades, willing to trade in doubtful secret knowledge. The exchange was always what remained of their energy or power, and a trip down some path which lost its beginning and never came to an end.

Francis spied on these ill-favored demigods. They agreed the Ailm existed but nothing more. The one thing Francis believed to be true was that at the heart of the Ailm lived a being that madly, mindlessly plunged its lures across time and space. It searched for the minds of others to thoughtlessly devour. Its hunger was infinite, and it did not need patience, as it had no concept of time. Eventually everything that ever was would be absorbed into the chaotic insanity which endlessly writhed at the center of the Ailm .

Francis was almost frightened by the thought he would be lost. But if it was an eventuality, there was no reason to fear it. It was something that would happen. There was no reason to live in fear of something which would happen – either in some far-off future or ten minutes from now. He couldn’t know. Divination had never proven to be anything but a way to separate money from the pockets of the insecure. While he accepted the finality of everything, it didn’t affect his plans one way or another. He would return to the Labyrinthine City and rule from there, until it was no longer his place to do so.

Even before he knew of the god who dwelled within the Ailm, he had been using an approximation of its tactics to lure an Other to his construct. There was nothing unique about the subterfuge. It was simply a trail of breadcrumbs made of power-infused energy, meant to simulate a wounded Traveler who had escaped the field of some unending conflict, such as the Devastation of the Lesser Variances. Quiades taught him how to mimic the distinct signature of a Traveler. Others loved nothing more than to feed on their remains, and some energy-depleted being in need of sustenance would eventually come looking for it, believing it to be an easy meal.

For the last twenty-three days on Earth, he had been patiently leading an Other towards his new bridge. The previous forty-two days had been spent ensuring the construct was properly fitted for its purpose. He would have kept at it if the Dreaming Queen had not spotted this potential resident. Even now, he continued to add complexities and charms to the bridge – when he was not setting lures, eating, shitting or sleeping. Francis was uncertain if it could capture this Other. He credited chance as much as skill to his success in trapping the last Other in