River of Shadows Read online

  River of Shadows

  Underworld Gods #1

  Karina Halle

  Copyright © 2022 by Karina Halle

  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.

  Edited by: Laura Helseth

  Proofed by: Chanpreet Singh

  Cover design: Hang Le

  Contents

  Glossary & Pronunciation

  Playlist

  Introduction

  1. The Arrival

  2. The Funeral

  3. The Cottage

  4. The Waterfall

  5. The River of Shadows

  6. The Great Inland Sea

  7. The Hiisi Forest

  8. The Trade

  9. The Liekkiö Plains

  10. The Castle

  11. The Little Mermaid

  12. The Game

  13. The Daughter

  14. The Dinner

  15. The Library of the Veils

  16. The Night Visit

  17. The Sect of the Undead

  18. The Full Moon

  19. The Garden

  20. The Bride of Death

  Crown of Crimson (Underworld Gods #2)

  Black Sunshine

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Karina Halle

  For my father, Sven Halle – until we meet again.

  Glossary & Pronunciation

  * * *

  Tuonela (too-oh-nella)

  Realm or Land of the Dead. It is a large island that floats between worlds, with varied geography and terrain. The recently deceased travel via the River of Shadows to the City of Death where they are divided into factions (Amaranthus, the Golden Mean, and Inmost) and admitted into the afterlife. Outside the City of Death, Gods, Goddesses, spirits, shamans, and the dead who have escaped the city can be found.

  * * *

  Tuoni (too-oh-nee)

  The God of Death, otherwise called Death, and King of Tuonela who rules over the realm from his castle at Shadow’s End.

  * * *

  Louhi (low-hee)

  Ex-wife of Death’s, former Goddess, half-demon daughter of Rangaista.

  * * *

  Loviatar (low-vee-ah-tar)

  The Lesser Goddess of Death and Death’s Daughter. Her job is to ferry the dead down the River of Shadows to the City of Death, a role she shares with her brother Tuonen.

  * * *

  Tuonen (too-oh-nen)

  The Lesser God of Death and Death’s Son. He shares ferrying duties with his sister Loviatar. Tuonen is also a lord in the City of Death and helps oversee things in the afterlife.

  * * *

  Sarvi (sar-vih)

  Short for Yksisarvinen, Sarvi is a relic from the times of the Old Gods and originally from another world. Sarvi is a unicorn with bat-like wings that died a long time ago and is composed of skin and bone. Sentient, Sarvi is able to communicate telepathically. While he is a loyal and refined servant to Death, he is also vicious, violent and bloodthirsty by nature, as all unicorns are.

  * * *

  Ilmarinen (ill-mar-ee-nen)

  Louhi’s consort, the demigod shaman whom she left Death for. He lives with Louhi in their castle by the Star Swamps.

  * * *

  Eero (ay-ro)

  A powerful shaman from Northern Finland.

  * * *

  Väinämöinen (vah-ee-nah-moy-nen)

  Death’s past adversary and legendary shaman who became a Finnish folk-hero. Väinämöinen has supposedly been dead for centuries.

  * * *

  Ukko (oo-koh)

  A supreme God and the father of Tuoni, Ahto, Ilmatar, husband to Akka.

  * * *

  Akka (ah-ka)

  A supreme Goddess, wife to Ukko, and the mother of Tuoni, Ahto, Ilmatar.

  * * *

  Ilmatar (ill-mah-tar)

  Goddess of the Air, sister to Tuoni and Ahto.

  * * *

  Vellamo (vell-ah-mo)

  Goddess of the Deep, wife of Ahto. Protector of mermaids. Vellamo can be found in the Great Inland Sea.

  * * *

  Ahto (ah-to)

  God of the Oceans and Seas, husband of Vellamo, brother of Tuoni & Ilmatar.

  * * *

  Kuutar (koo-tar)

  Goddess of the Moon, Mother of Stars, protector of sea creatures.

  * * *

  Päivätär (pah-ee-vah-tar)

  Goddess of the Sun, protector of birds.

  * * *

  Kalma (kahl-ma)

  God of Graves and Tuoni’s right-hand man and advisor.

  * * *

  Surma (soor-mah)

  A relic from the days of the Old Gods and the personification of killing.

  * * *

  Raila (ray-lah)

  Hanna’s personal Deadmaiden.

  * * *

  Pyry (pee-ree)

  Deadmaiden. Head cook and gardener of Shadow’s End.

  * * *

  Harma (har-mah)

  Deadmaiden. Head of the Shadow’s End servants.

  * * *

  Tapio (tah-pee-oh)

  God of the Forest.

  * * *

  Tellervo (tell-air-voh)

  Lesser Goddess of the Forest and daughter of Tapio.

  * * *

  Hiisi (hee-si)

  Demons and goblins of Tuonela, spawns of Rangaista.

  * * *

  Rangaista (ran-gais-tah)

  A powerful demon and Old God, father of Louhi.

  * * *

  Liekkiö (lehk-kio)

  The spirits of murdered children who haunt the Leikkio Plains. They are made of bones and burn eternally.

  * * *

  Vipunen (vee-pooh-nen)

  An unseen giant who lives in the Caves of Vipunen near Shadow’s End. The most ancient and wise being in Tuonela from before the time of the Old Gods.

  Playlist

  Link to Spotify—click here

  (or search for River of Shadows)

  * * *

  “Immigrant Song” – Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, Karen O

  “Dead Skin Mask” – Slayer

  “Sin” – Nine Inch Nails

  “The Beginning of the End” - (+++) Crosses

  “Gatekeeper” - Torii Wolf

  “Castle” - Halsey

  “You’ve Seen the Butcher” - Deftones

  “Meet Your Master” – Nine Inch Nails

  “Welcome to My World” – Depeche Mode

  “Doing it to Death” - The Kills

  “Blk Stallion” – (+++) Crosses

  “Goddess” – Banks

  “I am not a woman, I’m a god” – Halsey

  “Various Methods of Escape” – Nine Inch Nails

  “Last Cup of Sorrow” – Faith No More

  “Death’s Head Tattoo” - Mark Lanegan Band

  “This Link is Dead” – Deftones

  “Master of Puppets” – Metallica

  “Bone House” – The Dead Weather

  “Should Be Higher” – Depeche Mode

  “Welcome Oblivion” - How to Destroy Angels

  “Die by the Drop” – The Dead Weather

  “Born to Die” – Lana Del Rey

  “Death Bell” - (+++) Crosses

  “King for a Day” – Faith No More

  “Nocturne” - Mark Lanegan Band

  “Gods & Monsters” – Lana Del Rey

  “Phantom Bride” - Deftones

  “Surprise, You’re Dead!” - Faith No More

  “Lantern Room” - To
rii Wolf

  “The Epilogue” - (+++) Crosses

  “This Place is Death” - Deftones

  Introduction

  River of Shadows is the first book in the Underworld Gods series and is based on Finnish Mythology. I have dual citizenship with Canada and Finland and have always been fascinated with the lesser-known mythology of my mother’s side (my father was Norwegian, and while I love Norse mythology, it’s certainly not obscure). Finnish mythology is dark, gruesome, and disturbing, all things that call to my deviant little soul, but there’s also an undercurrent of heart built into the myths and folklore, especially when it comes to Tuoni (Death) and his family. Usually underworld rulers in mythology do their job alone, but Tuoni does it alongside his family members, with each of them having their own role. I liked the fact that ruling the dead is a family affair.

  All that said, I have taken various liberties with the mythology and the Kalevala, the famous epic of Finland, so for some more astute Finns you may find that some names have been changed to avoid confusion, or characters have been added. Any mistakes in the Finnish language are mine (I ran them past my mother, but I won’t throw her under the bus if they aren’t correct because I am sure she was tired of me).

  CONTENT WARNING: this is a dark fantasy adult romance that ends on a cliffhanger. It contains mature themes such as graphic sex, language, captive situations, violence, and dub con. While this book belongs in the dark fantasy sub-genre—and sensitive readers should heed the warnings—it is not dark enough to be considered a dark romance.

  Chapter 1

  The Arrival

  “We come from the land of the ice and snow, where the midnight sun and the hot springs flow,” Robert Plant sings through my noise-canceling headphones as the plane begins its descent. My music choice was certainly apt since there’s nothing but ice and snow for miles. I don’t even see the town of Ivalo, let alone the airport where we’re supposed to be landing shortly. There’re just low rolling hills of white until they blend in with the monotone sky, like we’re flying into nothingness.

  A flutter of panic forms in my chest and I immediately grip my armrest, my eyes pinching shut. I’m lucky no one’s seated next to me on this Finnair flight from Helsinki up to Lapland because I’ve been riding the Hot Mess Express the whole time. One minute, tears are streaming down my face, lost in grief and regret over my father, the next I’m having a full-on panic attack, wondering what the hell I’m doing, flying to not only Finland, but the remote north of the country, all by myself. I’m no stranger to taking flights alone—it’s a part of my job—but this time it’s different. My mother refused to come to my father’s funeral, and I’m an only child, which means I have to carry the burden without any support. I’ve never even been to a funeral before.

  At least I’ve been to Finland, though this is my first time in Lapland. I was actually born in the town of Savonlinna, but my mother left my father when I was only six years old, ushering me off to California. I don’t remember much of my childhood in Finland, and my only other visits were every other summer when growing up. My father fought long and hard to see me when he could, and I later learned that it was only when he threatened my mother with a custody battle that she relented and let me visit.

  Suddenly a memory floods my mind, making my heart feel waterlogged. I had been staying with my father at his lakeside cottage where he lived, having just come in from a refreshing near midnight swim. Despite the hour, the sun was still shining, as it does in the summer months, and the air was thick with dragonflies that buzzed about on kaleidoscope wings, nipping at the mosquitos.

  I walked along the dock, a towel draped around me, wet footprints in my wake, wondering where my father had gone, when suddenly he appeared in the doorway to the cottage.

  Only he was pretending to be someone else. Santa Claus.

  My father is…was one of those people, like Leslie Neilson or Christopher Lloyd, who always looked old with his prematurely white hair and beard, so he suited the role perfectly. He stood there in the waning golden light of the summer sun, dressed in the red velvet Santa suit, a sack full of toys beside him.

  I was about eight or nine years old, old enough to not believe in Santa Claus anymore. And even if I had, it would have given me a major pause to have Santa come visit during the summer. But I know from the letters my father would write me (my mother didn’t let us talk on the phone very often), that he missed having me around at Christmas, especially since Finland is Santa’s home, and so I played along happily, reveling in his attention, and the toys and treats of course.

  My chest grows warm at the memory, and yet there’s a sharp pinch between my ribs. That’s how it’s been ever since I got the phone call that my father had died. Every moment I feel like I’m torn between two worlds: the world where my father is still alive and my life can carry on as usual, and the world where my father is dead and my life has changed irrevocably, never to be the same.

  It was my father’s colleague, Noora, who had made the call a week ago. She told me that my father had gone for a walk in the woods and somehow became disoriented. A search party found him the next day, coated in ice and snow. Dead.

  The news didn’t seem real at the time. To be honest, it still doesn’t. It feels like those two worlds are still intermingling with each other, and I keep being bounced around and I never know where I’ll land. Sometimes I just wish that the grief would set like cement, because the moments where the reality crashes upon me can be too difficult to bear. I’d rather be stuck in the thick of it, all the time, as real and raw as possible, as if I could get the pain over with.

  People assumed that because I rarely saw or spoke to my father that we didn’t have a close relationship, but the strange thing is that, despite the distance, I felt closer to him than my mother. It’s like we had our own silent language, or some kind of magnetic tie between us that kept us connected throughout my life. I always felt him with me, felt his love, even when we were technically estranged.

  That’s the part that hurts the most, though. After high school, when my mother moved to Seattle with her now-husband George, and I was still in LA, I thought about going to Finland. I thought about asking if my father would come to LA. I thought these things, but along with the thoughts of I should stop eating so many donuts and I don’t need to watch Howl’s Moving Castle again, and I certainly don’t need another succulent for the patio, they never came to fruition. I just thought them and moved on, making the mistake of thinking there was plenty of time. I decided that a year from now, when I turned twenty-five, that’s when I’d finally take a vacation from work and go and see my father. I thought that’s when I’d start making him—my family—a priority.

  I never thought he’d die. Not now, frankly not ever. He didn’t seem the type, and if you’d met him you’d know. My father was like an unstoppable force. He was the life of the party, popular to the bone, full of life and zest. People loved him and he loved people. My father had this way of making you believe in magic, in that anything in the world was possible, and that you could be anything you wanted to be.

  And now he’s…gone.

  There has to be a mistake, I think to myself as the plane slams down onto the runway. I grip the armrests tighter, warily glancing out the window at the snow that’s blowing across the slice of bare pavement on the runway.

  We bump along for a while and finally come to a stop.

  I let out the breath I was holding as the flight attendant starts speaking in Finnish, so fast that I can’t understand a word of it. I have a very rudimentary grasp of the language from what my father taught me as a child, and I’ll admit it was only because Finnish inspired Tolkien’s Elvish language that made me stay interested in it.

  It doesn’t take long for me to exit the plane, considering how small it is and it was only half-full to begin with, February being Lapland’s off-season. I still have to wait for my carry-on bag though, since they made me check it because of the diminutive overhead bins, and i
t’s while I’m waiting at baggage claim in what must be the world’s tiniest airport that I feel a burst of cold at my back.

  For a moment I’m disoriented, dizzy, and the skin on my scalp prickles.

  I turn around to see a middle-aged woman staring at me, short, with a graying blonde bob and round, weathered cheeks that shine like apples. She’s smiling, though her dark eyes aren’t.

  “Welcome to Sampi,” the woman says to me in a thick accent, and though I’ve never met her before, I immediately know it’s Noora. In fact, I can hear her name being sung in my head, as if from a robin on a branch, and I have to blink a few times to right myself. Jet lag is no joke.

  “Sampi?” I repeat. Dear god, don’t tell me I got on the wrong flight.

  “It’s what we Sami people call Lapland,” she says. Then she extends her hand, like an afterthought. “I’m Noora. But you already knew that. I’m sorry we couldn’t have met under better circumstances. You meant the world to your father. There wasn’t a day where he didn’t talk about his dear Hanna.”