Read Chapter 17: The Leap

The morning light was thin and cruel, filtering through the chalet's frosted windows like a promise it had no intention of keeping. Luc stood at the dining table, the shattered fragments of a hand mirror arranged before him in a rough reconstruction. Camille leaned over his shoulder, her breath fogging the cold air.

"Someone stepped on it," she said. "Or crushed it deliberately."

Luc picked up a shard, turning it between his fingers. The silver backing was intact, but the glass was spiderwebbed with cracks radiating from a single impact point. "This wasn't an accident. The rest of the kit is untouched. Whoever did this knew exactly which piece of our plan to kill."

Ali entered from the kitchen, a cloth bundle in his hands. "I found the matches. Still dry." He set them on the table and looked at the broken mirror. "The helicopter came at noon yesterday. We waited four hours in the snow for nothing."

Luc shook his head. "It wasn't for nothing. The signal was weak—the sun was behind the ridge. We needed more surface area." He tapped the table. "But the mirror was our only tool. Now we have an emergency reflective blanket, maybe some foil from the kitchen."

"Foil won't catch the sun like glass." Camille crossed her arms. "We need a different approach."

The chalet's main door groaned open. Viktor's voice carried through the foyer, thick with false cheer. "Moreau! Planning another expedition, are we? Or just tidying your little evidence collection?"

Luc swept the mirror shards into his palm and pocketed them before Viktor rounded the corner. The man's jacket hung open, the burn mark on its lapel catching the light—that matching pattern from the photograph still burned in Luc's mind.

"Survival strategy," Luc said evenly. "The helicopters are still running search patterns. We signal them, we get out."

"And we're all supposed to trust that you want us out? Given your record?" Viktor smiled, showing teeth. "Your father wanted the valley empty too, didn't he? Seems like a family tradition."

The room went silent. Luc felt the weight of the other guests' attention—Nadia hovering near the fireplace, Marcel standing awkwardly by the window, Pierre half-hidden behind a newspaper that shook slightly in his grip.

"I don't know what my father did or didn't do forty years ago," Luc said. "I know I'm the only one here with mountaineering training actively working on a way out."

"A way out that conveniently puts you alone on the ridge with whoever volunteers to help." Viktor spread his hands. "I'm just saying what the rest of us are thinking."

"Speak for yourself," Camille snapped. "Luc has been the only one doing anything while the rest of you sit here eating our supplies and making accusations."

Viktor's smile faltered. For a moment, Luc saw something else flicker behind those eyes—fear, maybe. Or calculation. Then it was gone, replaced by a theatrical shrug.

"Fine. Let him play hero. But when the avalanche comes again, don't say I didn't warn you about the Moreau curse." He turned and strode toward the staircase, his footsteps heavy on the wood.

Luc waited until Viktor was gone, then pulled the mirror shards from his pocket. "We still have a window. The weather report said clear skies until sunset. If we use the remaining glass pieces strategically, we might get enough reflection off a single window for a pilot to catch."

"One piece won't be enough." Ali examined the largest shard. "Maybe if we combine it with polished metal from the kitchen—the back of a ladle, a canteen."

Pierre lowered his newspaper. His face was pale, sweat beading on his forehead despite the cold. "The helicopter—it flew directly over us. I saw it. The noise woke me from a nap." His voice trembled. "But it veered away, like it was avoiding something."

Luc turned sharply. "Avoiding what? What did you see?"

"Nothing. I mean—" Pierre swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing. "The pilot might have thought the noise was an avalanche warning. Or the weather was worse than it looked. I can't be certain."

Camille frowned. "You've been staring at the ceiling all week, Pierre. You claimed you couldn't contribute anything. Now you're telling us you spotted the helicopter?"

"I'm telling you what I saw." Pierre's voice pitched higher. "Doesn't mean I have expertise. I'm a food critic, for God's sake. I review restaurants. I don't plan rescue operations."

Luc studied Pierre's face. The man was lying—or at least, hiding something. His eyes kept darting toward the window, and one hand was clenched white-knuckled around his newspaper.

"Pierre," Luc said quietly. "Is there something you need to tell us about what you saw?"

The room's attention shifted. Pierre's face went from pale to blotchy red. "I—no. I already told you. The helicopter just passed over. There's nothing more to say."

"You're shaking." Nadia spoke for the first time, her voice calm but pointed. "You know something about the mountain. About this valley. I can tell."

Pierre looked at her, something wild in his eyes. "I don't know what you're implying—"

"I'm implying you've been here before." Nadia stepped closer to the table. "Your hands know the freeze pattern of the valley ferns. I saw you touching them by the window yesterday, like an old friend. People who visit once don't do that."

The silence that followed was suffocating. Luc watched the food critic's facade crack further, his jaw working as if he were chewing words he couldn't swallow.

"I came here on assignment, two years ago," Pierre finally admitted. "To review a hotel down the valley, the Belle Épine." His voice was hoarse. "There was a man—a guest—who threatened me. Said I'd ruined his reputation with a bad review. Said he'd find me again and make me pay."

"Who was this man?" Ali asked.

Pierre shook his head violently. "I didn't see him again. He vanished after the avalanche cut us off. But I saw him in the chalet that first night. I saw him slip into the pantry when no one was looking. And then the food poisoning hit—everyone but me, because I hadn't touched the breakfast buffet."

Luc's heart rate quickened. "The body we found. Was that the man?"

Pierre's face went gray. "Body? What body? You said no one was—" He stopped, seeming to realize he'd been tricked.

Luc held his gaze. "The body near the treeline. Victim was male, conman by trade. Goes by many names." He watched Pierre's reaction carefully. "Mikhail Voss ring any bells?"

Pierre's mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. "I—Mikhail was hostile to me specifically. He was staying in this chalet three days before the rest of you arrived. I booked early to write, and he was here. He said he was a restaurateur. I didn't know he was a conman until I checked him against a list of industry fraud alerts."

"So you knew who he was all along." Luc kept his voice level.

"I knew he had threatened me." Pierre glanced at every face around the table. "I admit it. I tried to stay away from him. But when he disappeared after the avalanche, I assumed he'd fled the valley before the snow closed the pass."

"He didn't flee," Luc said. "He was killed. And someone staged his body to look like a lost skier."

Pierre's composure shattered entirely. He sagged back in his chair, burying his face in his hands. "God. I'm not the saboteur. I swear. I'm just a critic who made an enemy. I don't know who killed him. I don't know why anyone would come here and do such a thing."

Luc exchanged a glance with Camille. She gave him a small nod—Pierre's panic seemed genuine. But the man had still admitted to knowing the victim and hiding it.

A high, thin sound cut through the tension—metal scraping against metal. Luc turned to find Marcel standing at the window, his hand out of his pocket, tracing a line on the frosted glass. He was drawing a symbol Luc recognized with a jolt: the same spiraling mark that appeared in his father's photograph.

"Five, six, seven," Marcel murmured, not looking up. "There's always a seventh who doesn't belong."

"Who doesn't belong where?" Luc demanded.

Marcel blinked as if waking from a trance, his hand withdrawing quickly. "Pardon me. Just an old habit. Counting the chips in the snow." He turned away from the window, avoiding eye contact. "Nothing important."

But the mark remained on the glass—a perfect spiral, eight feet above the ground, visible to anyone who passed the window. And Luc had just seen his father draw the identical shape on a sepia photograph from forty years ago.

The plan to signal the helicopter would now have to wait. Something larger was writing itself into the valley's frozen surface—and Luc had a sinking feeling they were all trapped inside its turn.