Margit Sandemo - The Ice People 15 - The East Wind

Corfitz Beck wasn’t the only one who observed the boy in wonderment. There were others, both Swedes and Russians, who also noticed him as the journey progressed.

Vendel Grip did not resemble a typical descendant of the Ice People. Thanks to the many light-blond antecedents who had married into the lineage, his shining hair was flaxen blond, its tresses tumbling over his shoulders. His eyes were clear blue, friendly, curious and filled with a great sense of humour, and his skin was so fair that at first it had suffered a great deal due to the sudden harshness of outdoor life, but he had now attained a deep, golden tan that emphasized his cornflower blue eyes and the whiteness of his teeth. His face was more open and friendly than was normally the case with members of his mother’s family and, of course, much more so than his father’s. He had probably inherited his good sense of humour from his great-grandfather, Tancred. Despite that it was clear from his awkward, gauche manner that he was a mere boy of fifteen. And he was not yet fully grown: there was a good chance that he would grow up to be a tall, broad-shouldered man.

Vendel had just finished making things as comfortable as he possibly could for an officer who had been abandoned at the edge of the woods; he had succumbed to an attack of the plague that had infected the army. The boy wiped away a tear from his eye and ran to catch up with Corfitz Beck, who stood waiting for him.

“Just what exactly are you made of, Vendel?”

“Please forgive my moment of weakness, but I ... ”

“I’m not referring to your tears,” Corfitz Beck interrupted him, “I mean, here we are, men are dying by the dozen, and meanwhile you take care of them and clean them up without getting the least bit sick. You seem to have more lives than a cat!”

Vendel smiled. “From what I’ve heard, my mother comes from hardy Norwegian stock.”

“I thought her parents were Danish?”

“We’ve been spreading like weeds all over Scandinavia,” Vendel answered.

“And now all the way to Russia,” the captain mumbled in a low voice. “But I wouldn’t exactly call you weeds. My mother and grandmother, and my grandmother’s father, Christian IV of Denmark, have always spoken well of your lineage. Your ancestors have been known to do some great favours for our family through the ages. Tell me, is it true what they say, that your family is well-versed in witchcraft?”

Vendel laughed. “I don’t believe that! It’s just superstition. It would be wonderful if, by merely wishing it, I could send us all back home with a snap of my fingers, but I can’t.”

“Well, they’re signalling for us to stop farther on. We’ll probably spend the night at that little village over there. It’ll be good to get some food.”

Vendel didn’t answer. He always got so dejected when they raided the small villages for food. He wondered about the miserable state they were left in, with the inhabitants having nothing but starvation to look forward to. He had felt even worse when the Swedes, as conquerors, had gone in and plundered villages. Now at least they were just prisoners of war, so the responsibility lay with the Russians.

Vendel and Captain Beck were assigned lodgings for the night in a miserable little house together with a small group of officers and private soldiers. The conditions were just as grim as they were on all other nights: the quarters were cramped and cold, the sleeping conditions were bad and there was vermin. But as he always said, “Fifty lice more or less on a body that’s already crawling with them won’t make much difference. It just proves that your blood is nutritious and in demand.”

They looked resignedly at the crammed front room.

Corfitz Beck sighed. “It’s my turn to keep watch tonight.”

“I’ll keep you company, Captain.”

“No, Vendel! You’re the youngest and strongest of us here so you always end up being selected to keep watch. You kept watch the night before last and I didn’t keep you company then! Now that just isn’t fair! What you can do is sit in the corner on that bench and I’ll wake you if I need you.”

Vendel agreed to that. They had to sit up in the hall of the small farmhouse because Captain Beck had to keep watch and Vendel wasn’t allowed to sleep in the sitting room. Since it was well into autumn and they were approaching Moscow the weather had turned even colder than it had been up to now. So it was a matter of taking good care of the few rags they were lucky enough still to have. The guards stole as much as they could from them whenever they got the chance.

“Would you like a piece of bread?” Vendel whispered in a low voice after everyone had found a spot to sleep in, no matter how miserable it was. As usual, the officers had been assigned to the living room while the privates had to make do with the hall and the courtyard.

“Where did you get that from?” Corfitz Beck asked as he accepted the bread with gratitude.

“A farmer’s wife gave it to me in the last place we stopped at. She called me ‘little son’ and had tears in her eyes. I was touched and didn’t have anything to thank her with apart from a kiss on the cheek.”

They quietly ate the small piece of bread. If the others had seen it, a big fight would have started and every one of them would have ended up getting such a tiny amount it wouldn’t have satisfied anyone anyway.

“You’ve managed to learn a good deal of Russian,” Corfitz Beck whispered.

Vendel shrugged his shoulders and gave a friendly smile. “I pick up the most useful phrases: ‘food’, ‘sleep’, ‘trade’, ‘You’re a pretty girl’ ... that sort of thing.”

“You sly fox,” Captain Beck smiled.

Then his voice became serious. “It doesn’t look good for Corporal Wärja.”

Vendel looked down at the older man who was lying on the floor, whimpering quietly. “No, it doesn’t, he can’t keep any food down. He’s getting completely dehydrated.”

“Do you think maybe you could get a little water for him?”

“I’ll try.”

Vendel tiptoed out into the starlit night. There hadn’t been any snow yet, but the ground was frozen solid and the soldiers who lay against the walls of the house could be heard shivering loudly.

He stood there for a moment. Above the characteristically pointed rooftops of the village houses and the onion dome of the church, the stars shone so brightly that it practically hurt his eyes to look at them. But perhaps the stinging sensation in his eyes was just as much due to the lack of fat in his diet.

Orion. The Big Dipper. Cassiopeia. The same constellations lit up the night sky of his own home far, far away. He swallowed the lump in his throat and suppressed his feeling of longing for his beautiful little home in Scania. Mum ...

Strangely, he didn’t long so much for his father. They had never understood one another; they were very different. Søren Grip thought that his son was soft and irresponsible and lacked any ambition to gain worldly goods and riches. And his son couldn’t tolerate his father’s lack of morals, as he called it.

But they did have one thing in common, Vendel thought with a sardonic smile. Neither of them could eat if they weren’t sitting at their regular spot at the dinner table. In the evenings his father always sat in his favourite chair, which unfortunately happened to be Vendel’s favourite too. Vendel always ended up being the one who had to give in, in order to avoid a fight. They also preferred the same horse for their morning expeditions. They didn’t ride together, but always at the same time. Then too, his father was the one who got the favoured horse. And I’ve also inherited his temperament, Vendel thought. It’s not that I don’t like him, I do. It’s just that Mum and I have something in our blood that makes us understand one another without having to use words. Dad always wants to demonstrate his power ...