I overlooked the serene lake stoically. It had been 4 years since I was here last. Since I was the only witness to my brother Jake’s horrible drowning – an “accidental” drowning as it was reported – since I watched the lake pull him down and swallow him whole, lifejacket and all, on a calm, clear August day, not much different than this one.
The only thing left was the boat he’d taken us out on, and his inconsolable and utterly confused 12 year old brother. Now at 16 myself, standing taller and stronger, and more confident, made me question even more what I had seen that day. Could this lake just drag me down to the depths of hell too?
Returning to my family’s summer cabin was supposed to be healing, and it was proving harder than I thought. The only glimpses of joy I’d had so far were the jokes from my best friend Mitch, who I was allowed to bring to ‘keep my mind busy’, as my mother had said.
At night there were no jokes to fill my mind, there was only me and my whirring thoughts. My memories, that bled into nightmares. Jake’s face in slow motion, becoming wetter and wetter, deeper, and deeper, into the nothingness. Jake playing a stringless guitar from within the lake, a song from under the surface, that I strained to hear, but was unable to. And finally, peering into the water and Jake grabbing my head and holding it under. Where I could finally hear, but all at once, all too much. Jake tried to talk but was overpowered by the many other voices under the surface.
I awoke with a gasp and decided I could sleep no longer. I put on a hoodie and some slides and walked down to the dock to think. Who were all those voices Jake had wanted me to hear? Perhaps the voices of all the other mysterious drownings and disappearances surrounding the lake? There had been almost forty in the past 20 years….. I looked down over the dock into the lake’s reflection almost as if to ask …. “Is anybody there?” Just as I could’ve sworn had heard a low humming of voices I was interrupted by my mother calling out to me, to come up for breakfast.
After breakfast, Mitch and I headed to the corner store, a long walk away from the cabin, away from my parents, to clear my head. I confided in Mitch about the nightmares in hopes that he could reassure me that it was just a dream. That I was overreacting, overthinking, traumatized and doing my best to process. But Mitch only made things more real. He only asked about the other drownings, about what had really happened to those disappearances – did I really think it was connected? And what had I seen that day? Had I really seen playful lights under the surface that lured my brother to jump in? Or was it darker? A black scaly snake that pulled him under, like I had told police? Or were those just the inventions of a traumatized mind?
The corner store clerk heard our whisperings as we picked out some coke and two ice creams. Petra, she introduced herself as. A local high school senior working her way through summer. She had questions herself. Had we heard the stories?
The Slavic lore of Vodnik – a water spirit who hated the boldness of humans. Who used illusions beneath the surface to lure them into the water. Often with moving lights or using his long black scaly tail. Once in the water, you were his soul to keep. He would drag you to the depths of the lake and wait for your very last breath to escape you, which he would catch and keep in an overturned mug in the bottom of the lake as a trophy. As proof that humans were inferior. To mock the Vodnik in any way, call his name, or speak too boldly, would anger him to drown again. An anger that originated when the Vodnik fell in love with a human woman he had watched from the beach. When he presented himself to her in his human form, she laughed, and thus became his first victim.
I had to convince myself these sightings, these memories, were truth. I had to see for myself with fresh and wiser eyes. So the the 3 of us, Mitch, Petra and myself, agreed to paddle out in a canoe after dark.
The paddle was slow, and quiet, no one dared to talk or speak out loud what they were thinking for fear it either was true or was not. I honestly was unsure which outcome was worse for fear of embarrassment. Once out far enough we weren’t entirely sure what to do but wait. Impatiently, Mitch spoke up, insisting the Vodnik was not real and any drownings were purely accidental. Demons were not real, lore was made for campfire scares, and any lake this big probably just had a gross misidentified water snake.
Lights! Under the surface. At first deep, deep down. Then coming closer and closer still. We sat very still, silent, breathless, unable to move. The lights stopped, and we exchanged confused looks. A tail, a slippery, scaly tail. Slowly moving side to side. As if to invite us. As if luring us. Not violent, but hypnotic. But was it really black? Or was it the darkness that made it seem that way? Petra reached out, almost to touch it. But I slowly put my hand on hers and met her terrified eyes.
Safely ashore we huddled. What was that!? “Vodnik” Petra said quietly. “Well how do you kill it?” Asked Mitch, as if he hadn’t just doubted it’s existence a mere 20 minutes ago. “Sol,” she replied, “Salt. They are said to die in salt water.” Mitch was flustered, yelling something about hiring 100 dump trucks should about do it.
I ignored his rantings and thought hard. All the cabins were fed water from the lake. So maybe we didn’t have to go back into the lake, maybe we could get the Vodnik to come to the cabin and salt him there. The plan was set for the following night. Petra was tasked for supplies, salt, and a lot of it. Mitch was in charge of calling the Vodnik out through the bath water and the pipes. When he acted surprised by this, Petra laughed and assured him it was a job that would come easily enough to him.
I, however, would have to face my biggest fear. I would have to swim into the lake. The lake that looked so innocent and pure but rotted from deep down inside. I would have to free the trapped souls. But where even were the mugs? The Vodnik would keep them somewhere special to him. The beach where he presented himself as human, where he took his first soul.
“Ok, Jake,” I said out loud, “I’m coming for you”.