Margit Sandemo - The Ice People 11 - Blood Feud

“But now it’s all over!” she said in agitated triumph. “Now it’s over. I’m free. My eyes are open and I’m seeing clearly once more. I believed him, you see, because I wanted to believe him. I stubbornly defied all warnings and ignored all the gossip, as I called it then. Oh, God!”

She hid her face in her hands and fell on her knees in front of the cross in deep and fervent compassion with her sister.

“Oh, Martha, Martha,” she exclaimed with big sobs. “How could you and I have been so blind? And yet I got away from it all while you ... But now he’s gone and can no longer cause us any pain.”

The grief rushed over her. The sorrow over Martha, her own sorrow over Eldar and the shock of her near-death experience culminated all at once.

Martha’s parents understood perfectly well why Miss Villemo had finally broken down. They touched her clumsily to show their sympathy, but other than that they left her alone.

Finally, she managed to regain her composure. She wiped away her tears as she sniffled and got up, forcing a smile. Then the other smallholder came with the horse.

She was helped up onto it and they all set off. Martha’s Dad walked beside the horse through the forest and said:

“Do you know what, miss? Somehow, I feel lighter at heart this evening. We’ll never be able to recover from losing our daughter in such a cruel way. However, for us it’s a blessing that we’ve been able to save another girl’s life. It heals the soul if you know what I mean.”

“Yes, I know what you mean,” Villemo replied warm-heartedly. “But there’s one thing I don’t understand ...”

”Yes?”

“I just don’t understand who pushed me. Not knowing is a heavy burden to bear.”

“I’ve thought about it, too,” the mother added. “I don’t believe in ghosts. Certainly not. But people have been speaking about an evil moose in the neighbouring parish. Could it be that?”

Villemo didn’t believe that. She had felt someone shove her and she had heard rustling in the forest a bit earlier. A moose? Highly unlikely.

“Maybe,” she said softly.

They met the young men who had been sent to Linden Avenue returning on the trail. They were walking with some shocked servants.

“The landlord and his family weren’t at home,” one of the men said. “They were all visiting the vicar.”

“Oh, yes,” Villemo said. “I was also supposed to be over there. I’d forgotten. Then there will be nobody at home at Graastensholm and Elistrand either. If it’s possible for me to borrow the horse just so I can get home, that would be fine.”

The father of the brothers offered to lead the horse the whole way, which she accepted with gratitude. After a touching goodbye with her rescuers, she rode home to Elistrand.

Actually, she was quite relieved that her parents weren’t at home because she wasn’t sure that she should tell them all that had happened, especially now, when there was so much danger around. Evil and sudden death plagued the forests of Graastensholm. Wherever a man from the Black Forest went, he knew that his life was at risk. The Wollers were after them as they had been for half a century. And the Wollers themselves didn’t go out on their own, certainly not without being properly armed. They were prepared to kill and be killed.

One man from the Woller family had ridden into Akershus all by himself, having full confidence in his sharp eyes and his agile horse. The horse returned home with its saddle covered in blood.

A man from the Black Forest was fishing alone in a small lake in the forest, which he should never have done. His corpse floated up to the water’s edge nine days later; there was a knife wound in his back.

Villemo had become involved in this blood feud because of her senseless teenage crush. But Villemo never did anything half-heartedly. If she loved somebody, she loved them with all her heart, preferring to suffer the bitter regret of her decision afterwards. Just as now. Oh, how she regretted that she had fallen in love with Eldar Black Forest. And even more that she had allowed him to see it! It would have been wonderful to show that womaniser that there was someone in the world who could withstand his charm. And she had fallen for him like a fool. How embarrassing! At least he hadn’t persuaded her into bed, to Villemo’s great relief.

She hated him for what he had done to Martha and undoubtedly to many more. She didn’t think she was capable of hating another person so fervently. She thought of Martha, who had met the only love of her life and had trusted him. How must she have felt in that final moment by the river?

Villemo preferred not to think about it. After all, she had experienced the same thing, the difference being that whoever had pushed her over the edge hadn’t been her lover.

‘God help us poor women,’ she thought. ‘Those of us who fall in love with the wrong man and who sacrifice everything, often giving more than we have, only to be treated like old rags.’

Compassion for other women hadn’t been Villemo’s strong point until recently. Her thoughts had been preoccupied with other, more impractical things. But poor Kristine from Tobrønn whose parents had held her captive had opened her eyes and Martha’s fate had ignited her. Angrily she wiped away a tear and plodded into Elistrand.

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