Giants of the Frost
know if I tried to tell you on the phone you wouldn't listen. I went to see my new psychic, Bathsheba, this morning. She told me something very disturbing. Right in the middle of the reading, she closed her eyes and gasped, then she said, "Whose name starts with V?" Of course, I said, "That's my daughter, Victoria." Then she said, "There are dark psychic forces gathering around Victoria."
    Vicky, I know what you're thinking, and I know you want to throw this letter in the rubbish, but consider it, darling. How did she know about somebody whose name starts with V? There are twenty-six letters, and V is not that common. I asked her a lot more questions that she couldn't answer, but she did say I should tell you to come home. I trust Bathsheba, she's very good at what she does. Please come home. I'm so worried about you.
    Love, Mum
    I didn't know whether I was more amused or annoyed that my mother trusted somebody named Bathsheba. What Mum had failed to clarify was whether or not she was wearing the little enamel "V" around her neck that Aunty Clementine had bought her when I was born. I put the letter aside, wondering if Bathsheba had given her another useless batch of lottery numbers or advised her that she would meet the love of her life in June. I'm sure that at least two of my mother's failed marriages were encouraged by psychics.
    I loved my mum, of course, but she had made such a mess of her life. She was bom into disadvantage and stayed there. I had watched her ramble unsuspectingly from failure to failure—men, jobs, diets—always complaining about a lack of money, brains or luck, but never realizing that what she really lacked was the ability to manage her own life. I was different. I wanted to escape where I came from, from the welfare rolls, from the overcrowded schools, from having the phone cut off every second month. When I took the job at Kirkja, I was running from it so hard that the momentum kept me awake at night. I didn't want to be swallowed alive by circumstance. I didn't want to be like Mum, spending so much time predicting what fate had in store for her that it hadn't occurred to her that her future was for herself to make.
    There are dark psychic forces gathering around Victoria.
    Mum wanted me home, and she would say anything to get me there. I didn't know if it was because she missed me or because she felt that my successes proved her choices in life wrong, but she had elected to use precisely the worst method of persuasion. As I had told Gunnar, I didn't scare easy. Not back then, anyway. That was all still ahead of me.
    I showed up at the control room for my first solo shift that evening. The late shift was eight until four, hours that I was already intimately acquainted with from my sleepless nights. Alex handed over to me, and I spent the first few hours going through my list of tasks, launching the balloon, filling the blanks in the database. After 1:00 a.m., I had less to occupy me. I turned off the bright fluorescent lights so that the space was only lit by the glow of three computer screens. The room was punctuated all around with floor-to-ceiling windows. Outside the sky was cloudy, stained by the inky black of treetops. I had a training manual to read, but I put it aside to sit on the long couch near the staircase, lying back and enjoying the solitude. I lay there a long time, letting my mind drift. Every ten seconds, the transmitter sounded a gentle beep. The heating whirred softly. The printer hummed. Dark and still. I didn't notice that my eyelids had fallen closed.
    The sound of my breathing. The door from the observation deck opening wide. A cool breeze on my skin. Struggling to sit up, to look around. Paralyzed in my own body. A hot rush of fear. There was someone in the room.
    Brrring.
    I sat up with a start. The phone. I reached for it, glancing around. No, the door was closed. I was still alone.
    "Hello?"
    "Vicky? It's Gunnar."
    I checked the clock above me. "Gunnar, it's two in the
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