Snowblind truth Snow- blind truth Thanos Kalamidas The Lapland’s shield Death, lies and a heritage buried in ice. Thanos Kalamidas Ovi ebooks are available in Ovi/Ovi eBookshelves pages and they are for free. If somebody tries to sell you an Ovi book please contact us immediately. For details, contact: ovimagazine@yahoo.com No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the writer or the above publisher of this book An Ovi eBooks Publication 2025 Ovi eBookPublications - All material is copyright of the Ovi eBooks Publications & the writer C Snowblind truth Snowblind truth Thanos Kalamidas The Lapland’s shield Thanos Kalamidas An Ovi eBooks Publication 2025 Ovi eBookPublications - All material is copyright of the Ovi eBooks Publications & the writer C All the names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents in this book are either the product of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Snowblind truth T he wind tore across the high plains of Lapland like it was looking for something to kill. Killian Frank tugged his scarf higher over his nose as he stepped onto his porch, breath turning instantly to frost. Lotta padded behind him, her thick white coat nearly vanishing in the blowing snow. She paused, ears forward, sensing what he already knew. Something was wrong. It was supposed to be a quiet Thursday. No drama. Just cold stew, a shot of cloudberry brandy, and a crackling fire to lull him to sleep. But peace didn’t last out here. Not when you had a reputation. Not when you were Killian Frank, the Berlin bloodhound who came north to forget and somehow turned into Lapland’s unofficial crime detector. Thanos Kalamidas The knock on his door had been no casual thing. Three short. Two long. Finnish border police code. Now, as he watched the lone snowmobile tear through the blizzard and crawl to a stop outside his cabin, he felt the world tilt. Reijo Haapala stumbled off the machine, wrapped in three layers of wool and military pragmatism. His face was red, his beard clotted with ice, his eyes sharp behind fogged goggles. He didn’t waste time. “Frank. We’ve got a situation.” “Do I look like I want a situation?” Killian asked, deadpan. Reijo didn’t smile. “Cabin west of Pite River. Family birthday gathering gone sideways. Whole chest of Sami artefacts gone. We’re talking ancestral knives, drums, carved bone jewellery. One-of-a-kind pieces. Storm hit right after the theft. No one in. No one out. That leaves... family.” Killian glanced back at Lotta, who had already sat beside the pack by the door, ears tilted in silent agreement. Her version of volunteering. Snowblind truth He sighed. “You bring enough fuel to get us back?” “You’re not coming back until the storm clears.” Killian threw on his coat. “Of course I’m not.” * * * * * * They carved through the wilderness like a silver bullet through bone. Killian leaned into the ride, Lotta crouched behind him, her muscles rippling with instinct. Pine trees passed like shadows, and the storm swirled in howling waves. It was a place where nature could kill you six different ways before breakfast. By the time they reached the cabin, the wind had fallen just enough to reveal its silhouette, a low, two- story log fortress, half-buried in snow. Smoke curled from a single chimney. The drifts along the windows were high enough to make a man feel claustrophobic before he even stepped inside. Killian opened the door and walked into a wall of warmth, woodsmoke, and cold stares. Inside were four people and a silence so thick you could hang meat in it. Thanos Kalamidas Matti, the eldest, built like an avalanche, pockmarked with frostbite scars, his eyes hard from years spent hauling timber or wrestling drunks in Kiruna bars. Elsa, mid-forties, reed-thin with twitchy hands, sweater cuffs chewed to hell. Her eyes flitted like a sparrow’s, and Killian pegged her as the nervous one. Sami, the youngest, soft palms, expensive boots, hair too styled for a cabin in the mountains. Killian sniffed: academia. Olavi Lehtinen, the patriarch, sat in a wooden chair beside the fire, draped in thick wool, his face sunken but his eyes still bright. Once a famed cultural anthropologist. Now, just bones and secrets wrapped in a blanket. “You’re the Berlin man,” Matti said, arms crossed. Not a question. Killian nodded. “You’re the suspects.” Sami stood up. “We called the police, not a retired cop with a pet wolf.” Lotta growled softly. Killian didn’t blink. “She’s a husky. Smarter than half the cops I’ve worked with, Snowblind truth and she doesn’t talk crap. Where’s the collection?” Elsa pointed toward a corner. An empty platform sat where a cedar display case had once been. Scratches in the floor where it had been dragged. A few splinters left behind like scattered breadcrumbs. “Gone this morning,” she said. “We woke up and it was just... gone.” “No broken windows. No opened doors. No fresh tracks in the snow,” Reijo added. “Which leaves one of you,” Killian said, scanning their faces. Matti stepped forward. “You think I stole from my own father?” “I think people steal for worse reasons,” Killian replied. “And with storms like this, a secret doesn’t go far. It just sweats.” * * * * * * That night, the wind screamed around the cabin like it wanted in. Lotta lay near the fire while Killian interviewed them one by one in the back room. Thanos Kalamidas Matti claimed he’d gone to the outhouse around midnight, couldn’t see past his own piss, and nearly got lost. “Couldn’t steal a fart, let alone a chest,” he grunted. Elsa said she’d heard footsteps during the storm but thought it was the wind. She bit her nails the whole time and smelled faintly of pine pitch and anxiety. Sami launched into a polished rant about colonial appropriation, repatriation, and how the artefacts belonged in Helsinki’s Sami Museum. “I’d never steal them,” he said. “I’ve written papers about this kind of thing.” Killian held his gaze. “I’ve arrested people who wrote papers about ethics too. Usually after they ran out of grant money.” Sami blushed. Elsa flinched. Matti muttered something about cowards. Killian returned to the main room. Olavi hadn’t moved. “You notice anything strange last night?” he asked the old man. Snowblind truth Olavi stared at the fire. “I’m old, Mr. Frank. Strange is the only thing left.” Cryptic. But Killian had known enough dying men to know when one of them was watching his family like a raven circles a corpse. * * * * * * By morning, the storm had thickened to the point where the windows glowed blue with snowlight. Coffee boiled black on the stove. Tension simmered hotter. Then came the scream. Elsa, from behind the cabin. Killian was the first outside, revolver drawn. He found her kneeling beside a mound of half- packed snow. Wood splinters poked through. Reijo followed, digging with his gloved hands. There it was. The chest. Frozen solid, half-buried behind the firewood stack. No tracks around it. No drag marks. No time to get it that far in that weather without someone noticing. Thanos Kalamidas “Someone tried to hide it,” Reijo said. “No,” Killian murmured, brushing away snow from the lid. “Someone tried to keep it.” He opened it. Inside: most of the artefacts. But one piece missing. The drum. A sacred item, passed down in Olavi’s bloodline. Killian turned. And Matti charged. The big man roared, barrelling through the snow like a moose gone mad. Killian sidestepped, let Matti stumble past and then swung his boot into the back of Matti’s knee. The man went down hard, face smashing into the snow. Killian knelt on his back, revolver pressed against his neck. “You stole the drum.” Matti thrashed, bleeding from the mouth. “I didn’t! I wanted to sell the case, not burn it!” “Burn it?” Elsa’s voice cracked. “You burned it?!” “No!” Matti spat blood. “That crazy bastard, Sami, he said it was cursed! Said we had to destroy it before someone used it!” Snowblind truth Killian’s heart froze colder than the storm. Inside, Olavi’s chair was empty. * * * * * * By the time Killian made it back inside the cabin, the wind had shifted. It wasn’t just snow anymore—it was the kind of gale that made trees scream and roofs groan. Lotta slipped through the door beside him, hackles raised. Her breath steamed in the cold air inside the cabin. That’s what stopped Killian short. It was colder inside than it should’ve been. “Olavi!” Elsa’s voice cracked as she stepped past him, panic now overriding years of submissive silence. “Where is he? Where the hell is he?!” The chair was empty. A trail of water, melted snow from old boots, led from the hearth to the hallway. “Reijo,” Killian barked. “Sami. With me. Elsa, grab Matti and stay put. If either of you leaves this house, I’ll assume you’re the thief, the killer, or the fool, and I’ve got no time to figure out which.” Thanos Kalamidas Elsa nodded, wide-eyed. Lotta growled low in her throat. Sami hesitated, some internal debate between fear and academic curiosity but Reijo grabbed his coat and the rifle from the wall and shoved him out the door. They followed the wet bootprints through the corridor and down a narrow flight of stairs Killian hadn’t noticed before, half-hidden behind a warped cedar panel. A cellar. A lantern swung below, casting grotesque shadows. Olavi’s breath echoed before they could see him. “Why the hell does every murder mystery end in a goddamn cellar?” Reijo muttered. Killian didn’t answer. He was already halfway down the stairs. * * * * * * The smell hit them first. Musk, earth, and something older. It wasn’t rot—it was something ceremonial. Something buried. The cellar was bigger than expected. Stone-walled, half-carved into the mountain itself. At the center stood Olavi, shirtless now, trembling as he clutched a drum unlike any Killian had seen. Snowblind truth The missing artefact. Taut hide stretched over a round birch frame. Intricate carvings along the edges. Iron nails. Symbols in blood, fresh blood painted across the face. “Oh no,” Sami breathed. “That’s not just any drum. That’s a noaidi’s drum. A shaman’s drum. And those markings, he’s activated it.” Olavi’s eyes had gone dark. Not rolled back. Not white. Just hollow. Like something else was looking out of them. “You don’t know what you’re touching, old man,” Killian said, stepping closer, revolver raised. “Put it down.” “You think I let my bloodline rot in museums?” Olavi rasped. “Those bastards stole our gods, boxed them up behind glass. You think they didn’t feel it? You think they didn’t scream to be taken back?” The wind above moaned. Then came the drumbeat. Boom. Boom. Boom. Olavi struck it with a bone-handled beater. Once. Thanos Kalamidas Twice. The third beat shook dust from the ceiling. Sami staggered back. “Stop him! That’s a real ritual. He’s trying to invoke something!” Reijo raised the rifle. “No!” Killian shouted. Too late. The gun cracked. A clean shot, through Olavi’s shoulder but it only made him howl, animal and triumphant, as blood spattered the floor. Killian lunged. The old man swung the drum into his side with surprising force. The frame splintered, but not before Killian caught a glimpse of something carved on its underside— A spiral. Double-ended. Like a snare. Or a trap. Then Olavi screamed. Not from pain. From ecstasy. “Let them come,” he said, smiling through bloodied teeth. “Let them take you all.” And he slammed the beater against the hide one final time. Snowblind truth The cellar shook. * * * * * * Upstairs, Matti roared again, Elsa’s scream following. A window shattered somewhere above. “Reijo, go!” Killian barked. The Finn bolted up the stairs. Sami didn’t move. He was shaking, eyes fixed on Olavi’s slumped body. Blood soaked his wool trousers. The drum dropped from his hands. Killian bent down and felt for a pulse. Gone. Dead by his own madness or something darker. “Killian...” Sami whispered. “We need to burn it. Now.” Killian grabbed the drum. Its hide was warm, vibrating faintly. Something in the wood thrummed like a heartbeat. “Burn it where?” “Anywhere. Just not in here.” Outside, the wind was rising into a scream. Thanos Kalamidas * * * * * * When they stumbled out the front door, the world had gone feral. The wind was slicing like razors. Pine trees bent like they were genuflecting to some ancient wrath. Reijo stood over Matti, who was gasping on the floor, his face a mass of bruises, blood on his hands, Elsa weeping beside him. “What happened?” Killian shouted. “He snapped,” Reijo said. “He thought the drum was killing Olavi. Tried to torch the kitchen stove. Got Elsa by the throat. I stopped him.” Killian turned toward the clearing. Snow churned in strange patterns. Lotta howled, not in fear, but in warning. “Back up,” Killian growled. He stepped into the storm with the drum. Each step felt heavier. Like something pressed down on him from the trees, from the clouds, from underneath the snow. Snowblind truth He dropped the drum in the fire pit, poured a full flask of Reijo’s fuel over it, struck a match. Nothing. The flame sputtered. Died. Sami swore. “It doesn’t want to burn.” Killian stared down, heart pounding. “That’s too bad for it.” He pulled his revolver. Took two steps back. Raised the muzzle. Bang. The drum exploded in splinters and smoke. And then... just like that the wind stopped. Silence. Not peace. Just... absence. As if something had turned its face away. Denied this place its attention. Killian didn’t lower his weapon for a long time. * * * * * * Later, with the survivors wrapped in blankets and the storm retreating over the horizon like a sulking Thanos Kalamidas god, Killian stood outside the cabin, watching Lotta sniff the last of the broken wood. Sami joined him, face pale. “I’ll document this,” he said. “Write about what happened. What it meant.” Killian didn’t look at him. “Write what you want. Just don’t lie about it.” “And if no one believes it?” “Then we got lucky.” * * * * * * They left Olavi’s body in the cabin. The police would take days to reach it. Killian didn’t mind. The mountain could keep its ghosts. As he climbed onto his snowmobile, Lotta leaping beside him, Sami called after him. “Was it real? The... power in that drum?” Killian didn’t answer right away. He looked out over the snow-swept valley. Something moved down below in the mist, maybe a fox. Maybe not.