In Irina's Cards (The Variant Conspiracy #1)

IN IRINA’S CARDS

The Variant Conspiracy

CHRISTINE HART

SOUL MATE PUBLISHING

New York

IN IRINA’S CARDS

Copyright©2016

CHRISTINE HART

Cover Design by Ramona Lockwood

This book is a work of fiction.  The names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.  Any resemblance to actual events, business establishments, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher.  The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

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Published in the United States of America by

Soul Mate Publishing

P.O. Box 24

Macedon, New York, 14502

ISBN: 978-1-68291-105-1

www.SoulMatePublishing.com

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

To Johnathan and Elizabeth,

for opening my eyes and my heart.

Acknowledgements

This book, and the series as a whole, has truly been a labor of love over the last few years. Many friends, family and professionals have helped me along the way.

Big thanks to my husband, Jeff; my parents, Rick and Mary; my sister Sarah; my friends Jessica, Jamie, and everyone who has offered encouragement and support through the whole process.

Huge thanks to Soul Mate Publishing and Samantha McMahon for sharing my vision and helping it shine.

Chapter 1

I stepped off the bus behind Victoria’s palatial Empress Hotel. A crisp cocktail of salt, diesel, and fresh flowers hit me in a gust of air. I caught my breath and looked around, every bit a tourist like half the other passengers on the bus. Even in March, British Columbia’s capital already drew me in, but I’d made the trip for something more than scenery.

After eighteen grueling hours coming down from Prince George–affectionately called ‘BC’s northern capital’ in spite of it being smack in the middle of the province–finally I’d see the city from my dreams in person. For clarity, I wasn’t chasing daydreams, or letting my imagination elaborate on Photo-shopped landscapes I’d viewed on a website.

No, I mean visions. Unnerving and realistic scenes sparked by some dingy old Tarot cards I’d bought at a farmer’s market. Ridiculous, but even though I knew better, those cards told me a story, and I felt hunger to see it all in person.

I picked up my backpack, stuffed full with what I’d need for a few days in Victoria and hefted it up onto my back. In the distance, I heard the popping beats of hand-drums, so I instinctively started walking towards the sound. My route took me through the flower gardens next to The Empress Hotel while the refined figure of the Provincial Legislature building loomed on my left. I emerged from the tree line and looked across the Inner Harbour. Twilight turned an unseasonably clear sky into a sapphire ceiling over old world brick buildings and twinkling streetlights.

I crossed the waterfront street and followed the flow of pedestrians down a flight of stairs to a marina side market. The Harbour hopped with activity around performers and artists’ booths. I joined in watching a man plunge a flame-tipped rod down his throat while pedaling precariously on a unicycle. Next to the fire-swallower, a juggler flipped a handful of bowling pins up and around and up and around, while my gaze followed the loop. The juggler moved with the fluid grace of a ribbon in a light breeze. In the dim light, it almost looked like something behind him caught every other pin. In a blink, I thought I saw the swish of a tail.

I rubbed my tired eyes and surveyed the rest of the Harbour’s lower level. The booths included a watercolor print display, a leather goods table, another lady with rough hand-hewn silver jewelry and a man doing live caricature drawings. A saxophone player opened his case and piped a soft jazz tune in front of the waterfront restaurant ahead. His horn wove into the tribal beats of the bongo-player creating a unique soundtrack for the waterfront.

Light drained quickly from the sky and the crowd thinned accordingly. Chilly ocean air put an end to the party. I kept walking past the row of tables and wares, to reach the northern staircase at the edge of the waterfront. I had to find a place to spend the night.

I’d noticed a series of motels along the Greyhound’s route into the downtown core. I needed to backtrack one block east and keep heading north to find a room. A sense of urgency gripped me as I walked along the trendy boutique-lined Government Street. The light tourist traffic that had been milling about disappeared quickly as though the darkness cast an unspoken curfew. I cursed myself for not printing off a Google map or booking a room before I left home. I pushed forward, practically marching into the wind that cut right through my fleece jacket.

I turned onto a street lined with gift boutiques and headed back toward the main drag, Douglas Street. I finally reached the cluster of cheap-looking motels I’d marked in my mind on the way to the bus depot. I veered into the parking lot of the odd copper-topped building that jumped out at me when I first passed. The Capital City Motel could be considered retro-kitsch or blatantly tacky. But I liked that sort of thing, so I wanted to try it first. I pushed open the glass door at the entrance. Relief washed over me as the wind finally stopped. A sixty-something silver-haired man at the counter looked up at me with an exhausted expression. I didn’t feel particularly welcome, but I had come in the door, so the decision was made. I rummaged in my backpack until I found my wallet and extracted it from the dense brick of clothing.

“Have you got a room available?” I asked hopefully, and then added with a nervous laugh. “I hope you take debit cards.”

“Yes for both, my dear,” he said quietly.

He reached down with a wilted hand to pick up the debit machine. He lifted his other equally drained hand up to select my room key. I looked away out of awkward guilt and I noticed something odd on the counter. The polished wood surface had a blemish, no a bump. And it moved! A quarter-sized oval lump dislodged itself from the pattern and skittered across the desk. It paused on its way past me and looked up with a twitch of curiosity.

The creature’s antennae flickered and it sped off along the rest of the countertop until it stopped and disappeared back into the wood grain. I felt my jaw hanging open as the clerk finally turned back around with my room key. I stared at him, then over to where the chameleon-esque beetle vanished, and back at the clerk.

He smiled weakly. “That’s 64 dollars plus tax.” He took my bankcard. “Sign here please.”

I punched in my code, signed the paper, and collected my key.

“Hey, you know you’ve got a disappearing beetle on your counter here,” I said, partly in shock, partly disgusted. I realized what I sounded like when he gave me the same weak smile. “Never mind. I’ve been on the bus too long.”

“Have a nice day, Miss Irina Proffer and enjoy your stay in Victoria.” His voice droned a joyless monotone. I hoisted my backpack back over my shoulder and headed through the lobby towards the stairs.

Inside the stairwell, a damp chill amplified the musty smell. On the second floor, the scent changed to a combination of stale lard and carpet shampoo. I found room number 237 and jiggled my key in the doorknob until I convinced the door to open. I flung my backpack and jacket onto the bargain shop floral bedspread and started the bath running. I had nowhere to be, so I figured the best way to spend my night was a relaxing soak. I was already lonely and bored–a lame traveler for sure.

I paused in front of the full-length mirror on the wall and cringed at my reflection. The funky punk haircut and bold electric blue color I treated myself to after I lost my job faded too quickly. I pulled small elastics off each of my two stringy braids and fluffed up the dull brown layers and not-so-blue streaks. I leaned forward and looked into my eyes. My green irises were brighter than usual against the bloodshot whites. I sized up the state of my charcoal hoodie and Union Jack shirt. No stains, but I looked like I’d been camping for a week covered in stray animal hair and lint. I’d been clean when I left my house.
Thanks Greyhound
, I thought. I peeled off it all and stepped into the bath.

Twenty minutes later, I finished detangling my hair from the cheap motel shampoo and conditioner. I flopped down on the bed, wrapped in one of the small, thin towels from the bathroom. I picked up my backpack and emptied it onto my bed. Getting organized always makes me feel better, so I donned my pajama T-shirt and sweats before proceeding to sort the contents of my bag. My now notorious Tarot deck earned a prime spot at the center of the room’s tiny dining table.

As I refolded my clothes and arranged my belongings around the room, I thought about the week leading up to my horribly long bus ride to Victoria. I had recently lost a shitty job that, for ten bucks an hour, involved wearing cheap rayon and itchy polyester business clothes, endlessly greeting jerks and answering the phone all while herding salesman at a greasy used car dealership. Greasy isn’t a good enough word for Nechako Motors. A sleazy place run by a slimy man that ran afoul of the law. I hadn’t been expecting much better since I’d skipped out on going to university even though I knew a high school diploma wasn’t going to get me very far.

After a week of watching me mope around the house, my mom, Tabitha, and my stepfather, Darryl began each morning by circling jobs in the newspaper classifieds and printing off postings from job search web sites. Prince George unemployment hovered notoriously low, but I couldn’t work up even the slightest interest in any of the jobs they found. My newly acquired free time highlighted the reality that my friends had all moved away for college and careers.

My best friend Bridget was backpacking through Europe with her boyfriend. And my younger half-sister, Gemma didn’t help matters with her disgusting overachieving. The apple of Darryl’s eye with a preternatural aptitude in math and science, Gemma was already at the University of British Columbia on an academic scholarship, having passed on the year-off-plus-extension strategy I had chosen. Everybody had something important going on but me.

On a boring and lonely Monday afternoon home alone, I picked up the tattered deck of Tarot cards I’d just bought. It was a strange purchase and totally out of character for me. Normally, I would have passed right by the weird old man selling random junk at a local farmer’s market. When I caught sight of the cards, I couldn’t resist buying them.

I didn’t know how to use Tarot cards. I needed some sort of companion literature to understand what each picture symbolized. But, I could enjoy the artwork, even if I couldn’t interpret the messages. I’d carefully shuffled the large soft cards, looking around and over my shoulder. The last thing I needed that day was for Darryl to walk in and catch me wasting time.

I divided them into three piles and flipped one off the top from left to right. I inspected them and sort of gapped out.

As I stared at the images on the cards, their drawings overtook my field of vision as though I’d leaned forward and plunged my face into the pictures. Faded colors became vivid imagery, which in turn melted away into real life scenery. I recognized downtown Victoria and the Inner Harbour in front of the Parliament buildings. The oxidized green copper domes of the legislature gleamed in the cheerful sunlight.

I looked over at the vine-covered Empress Hotel with its valet attendants and well-dressed guests coming and going. The Harbour shone full of bright white sailboats with spindly masts. The daytime lapsed quickly as the sky darkened. The legislature disappeared beneath a cage of twinkling yellow-white lights. Street lamps bordering the waterfront and lights in the surrounding towers spilled into the water and reflected a shimmering second city.

The bustle of nightlife dwindled and my mind’s eye left the Harbour. Daytime came again and I wandered through Chinatown. Steam rose from a grate in the gutter. I smelled barbecued meat and fried noodles. As I floated down the street, weaving through pedestrians at eye level, I looked into tightly packed shop windows and browsed carts on the street. Everywhere paper lanterns, trinkets and bells surrounded pottery, produce and woven baskets. I passed a narrow alley crowded with pedestrians just as the scene faded.

In a flash, I stood on a cedar-lined beach under the dull glow of an overcast sky. The ocean opened up and reached into the distance, merging into the muddled grey of the horizon as far as the eye could see. Still the West Coast from the distinctive shape of the windswept evergreens. Suddenly, I leapt forward along the beach.

My gaze zoomed in to rest on the face of a young man, vacant and lethargic, sitting cross-legged on a wood stump surrounded by driftwood. He wasn’t bound or cuffed, but I felt certain he was trapped. And his features . . . he looked familiar. I’d never seen him before, let alone known him at any point in my life. I’d also never seen a picture of my father who died before I was born. The boy could be a distant cousin. He had fine cinnamon hair like mine, but cut short, although long enough on top for a few curls. His narrow face framed a long nose. His skin had a warm ruddy hue, weathered as though he’d been in the sun. His bright amber eyes looked exactly like mine too.

I couldn’t explain it, but after I saw that man, I couldn’t think about anything else. I felt compelled to talk to him. He had answers for me. The fact that I didn’t even know the questions burrowed into my brain, driving me to distraction in the days that followed.

A few days later, I came up with a cover story for my parents. I would find work in Victoria. The quest for a job was easy to sell so I stuffed my backpack and got on a bus. I felt ridiculous at having spent a ton of time and money for nothing more than an image in my screwed-up head.

Having finally made it to Victoria, the question of ‘What now?’ occupied my mind in the dark motel room. Curled up under the bedcovers, I stared at the bathroom door across from me. The electronic hum of a beer fridge and the faint sounds of a too-quiet city buzzed in my ears as I shifted and turned on the too-firm motel mattress. It took me almost an hour to finally fall asleep in spite of my utter exhaustion after the trip.

I woke the next morning to the glow of an overcast sky outside. I’d forgotten to close the blinds and my room happened to have an east-facing window. I wasn’t feeling perky, but too alert to go back to bed, so I dressed and went downstairs.

The motel diner had started serving breakfast. The aroma of fresh coffee, roasted potatoes, and buttery batter filled the air. I smiled to find the restaurant almost empty. I looked around the large bright room. Windows on the east side poured light into the space, highlighting the dated decor. Either the room hadn’t been re-decorated since the sixties, or the owner aimed to create a mid-century look. Mustard yellow vinyl padding popped off the smooth chocolate brown plastic booths that surrounded the enclosed kitchen at the center of the room. Cream and sage checker-patterned carpet stretched from the lobby into the diner, faded in spots from foot traffic and sun. Family-sized tables, each with four vinyl-cushioned chrome chairs lined the windows bordering Douglas Street on the east.

A chrome-trimmed pedestal sign instructed guests to seat themselves, so I selected a booth and slid onto the cushioned bench. I picked up a laminated menu and flipped through the pages looking for the section on pancakes and waffles to make sure they also made crepes–which they did. A friendly would-be grandmother type waitress took my order and I focused on watching the many passersby. Anonymity felt thrilling and suffocating.

After breakfast, I decided to go for a general wander around downtown. I needed a computer, a map, a bus schedule, or any single resource that could help me find the sites I promised myself I’d locate. Chinatown would stick out. I’d already caught a glimpse of it on my way to and from the Inner Harbour. My mystery beach proved the real problem, although my memory of it remained surprisingly vivid. I didn’t know for sure that it was near Victoria, so I needed access to tourist literature, or preferably a computer with Internet access. I cursed myself for not doing more research in advance.