Jason turned to Byron. “Did we sail out of range of whatever was causing the aberration?”
The navigator shifted and checked a glowing chart. “That magnetic compass is mostly decorative, a nod to our sailing past. We now rely on gyrocompasses, which fix our position by the rotation of the Earth.” He tapped at his colored screen. “This ECDIS system calibrates the gyro, along with speed logs, NAVTEX, GPS, and other nav-equipment, to plot our nautical position.”
“What does all that show?” Gray asked.
“While the storm is wreaking havoc with some systems, we’re still getting decent data. Enough to display both the geographical North Pole and the last charting of the Earth’s magnetic pole.”
Gray stared back at the old compass. “Let me guess. That’s not where the needle is pointing.”
“Not even close.” Byron looked at him. “Commander Pierce, I owe you an apology.”
“What for?”
“For not believing you. Something bloody strange is out here.”
“Do not be deceived by its false pull,” Anna whispered, quoting from Nicolas of Lynn’sInventio Fortunata.
“Can we follow that needle’s course?” Gray asked Byron, glancing over to Captain Kelly, who still manned the helm, consulting with a pair of crewmen.
“We’re roughly doing that already,” the navigator answered. “It lies in the same direction as the coordinates I determined from the borealis’s spinning.”
Kelly broke away and crossed toward them, his lips thin and drawn with worry. He had clearly heard enough of the conversation to offerhis own opinion. “The crew reported on the depth soundings and ice thickness ahead. The waters grow very shallow, less than twenty meters deep, and theKingdrafts eleven of those. We’ll be scraping our keel before long. Even worse, the ice is steadily thickening.”
“How much farther can we go?” Gray asked.
“Maybe another two miles. But I’d prefer to err on the side of caution and go no more than half that.” The captain responded to the dismay on Gray’s face. “You can always take the helicopter and search ahead. That’s if there’s anything to see through the fog. Or go overland, using our snowmobiles.”
A firm voice called from across the bridge. “That won’t be necessary.”
They all turned and watched Omryn Akkay back away from the bank of windows. His manner looked dismayed, almost fearful. Past the Chukchi native, the view outside had partially cleared, the fog shredding in front of the bow.
Through the haze, the midday sun reflected brightly off open ice. Scraps of dense mists still hung in places, mostly near spires of black rock rising out of the ice, as if snagged by those sharp points. The bluffs rose four or five stories high, climbing in sheer faces. The outcroppings formed a rough circle, like a jagged crown poking out of the ice.
In the center, though, a lone peak climbed higher, easily ten to fifteen stories high. Fog draped its rocky heights, which fell away in steep cliffs. Lower down, a massive sheet of ice rode up its eastern flank, as if a wave had struck long ago and frozen in place.
Gray noted that the compass needle pointed straight toward that spire.
“We found it,” he said, his voice hushed with awe.
Anna spoke its name, one lost in time and myth. “Hyperborea.”
1:08P.M.
As the exploratory team set off over the ice, Jason glanced back at the mountainous crimson bulwark of thePolar King. The icebreaker had come to a stop a mile from the peaks. The ship had dared come no closer. The waters were too shallow, and likely frozen solid nearer the buried shoreline.
Jason rode at the back of a four-person Arctic Snowcat. It trundled on double tracks across the ice. Another Cat followed, exiting a hold near theKing’s stern and driving across a ramp that extended to the frozen sea.
It carried Omryn, whom Gray had convinced to join them, as the Chukchi crewman might have some insight concerning this home of his peoples’ sea gods. The burly red-haired driver, Ryan Marr, was from Boston, a former Coast Guard officer who had served on cutters in the Arctic. He was accompanied by his Aussie wife, Harper, theKing’s medical doctor, a blonde spitfire with a no-nonsense attitude.
Jason hoped no one would need her services today.
He turned his attention forward. Anna sat up front with the icebreaker’s captain, who aimed them toward the black peaks. It seemed Kelly hadn’t wanted to miss out on this opportunity. Jason couldn’t blame the guy. After traveling thousands of miles across featureless ice, to make landfall and explore such a strange site had to be irresistible.
Ahead of them, the final two members of the team sped across the ice on Polaris snowmobiles. Gray and Seichan switched back and forth across each other’s path, clearly enjoying the freedom after the cramped days of travel. Still, they kept their speed tame enough for the others to follow.
Not that anyone could be easily lost.
All the vehicles were painted in red and black, to match thePolar King, and for another important reason. The bright colors made them easy to spot on the ice in case of emergency.
