Margit Sandemo: The Ice People 22 - The Demon and the Virgin

Now everything was gone. Grandfather Ulf. She had managed to get to know him and Aunt Ingrid at Gråstensholm before they died. She remembered Aunt Ingrid’s magnificent funeral, at which the whole parish had been present. The last member of the Ice People at Gråstensholm. It was the only time Mrs Ingrid had been inside the church, the nasty farmers’ wives said.

Her thoughts went back to her first harsh year in her smallholding. As the daughter of the manor, she hadn’t the first idea how to manage the place on her own. She had been very confused. Fortunately, she had arrived there in the summer, but there was such an awful lot she had to learn and so much she needed. And then the unbearable sorrow. The sense of being lost, the helplessness and the powerlessness,

Not to mention the loneliness! The horror of the darkness before she became familiar with all the sounds of the forest. She would crouch in the farthest corner by the bed, staring at the door, hour after hour. She remembered all the old ghost tales. The goat didn’t get much sleep on those nights because Vinga had taken it to bed with her, holding it very close.

The horror of going to Mrs Fleden’s house was the only thing that had made her endure it all. She became afraid of everybody, which she needn’t have been, but how was she to know? Suddenly, everyone had seemed to turn against her. The servants had left, one after the other, after her parents died. By the end, only one farmhand was left, and he had also let her down when she needed him the most. That was when Mr Snivel had arrived and made everything horrible.

Her thoughts wandered, without objective or meaning. She seemed to have used up all her resources now that she had lost the only place she could call home.

The bitter truth dawned on her, and she was too afraid to go back to her smallholding. Not even now, in the middle of the night. Vinga sat down and hid her face in her hands. Tomorrow they would come and they would take all her possessions from her. All the good food she had stored away. Everything she had made from what she found in the forest to help her keep going. Although her soul was desperate, her thoughts went back to the time when she had struggled to survive. Then she had told herself that now she had had enough of powerlessness and tears and her intense fear of the darkness. She had become strong and hard. That was when she learned how to be a forest creature just like the animals. Perhaps she had gone a little crazy, but the paradox was that it was her only option if she wanted to keep her soul and intellect intact. If she had to go on being frightened by the unknown, all the wild animals around her, if she tried to keep hold of her lost life, yearning in vain to have it back ... Well, then she would never have gained the courage and strength to go on living. That was why she had slipped out of the world of human beings and became “odd”.

But now, at this moment, everything had fallen to pieces – the whole shield that she had built around her vulnerable soul. Now she had to face the truth: she was nothing but a frightened, defenceless little creature in a big, hostile world.

Vinga sat still for a long time. The goat was lying down, chewing with its eyes half closed. It would stop chewing now and then, and then its chin would move again, moving from one side to the other.

Finally, Vinga realized that she had to do something. She would need to be far away by the time the sun rose.

She woke up from her deep thoughts. Then she smelled smoke from burning juniper twigs. She got to her feet in a swift movement.

Was the forest on fire?

Had those scoundrels set her forest on fire? The column of smoke that wound its way up the mountainside was very small. If it was a forest fire, she could probably manage to stop it.

“Come on!” she whispered.

The goat stretched its legs and stood up. They jumped through the undergrowth as if they were two goats, not one. Vinga was still wary: the people were on their way down the mountain but you never knew ...

Now she could see a yellow-red glow ahead of her. She would have to stop. She had been wearing her shoes all through the winter, and her feet were not quite accustomed to the forest floor: she would have to remove all the juniper spines that were stuck in them. She didn’t mind going barefoot in summer because then her skin became as thick as leather. Now, however, it was woefully sensitive.

It was nice not having to wear those shoes because they were now too small for her and they had hardly any soles left. Next winter would be worse.

Next winter ...?

She began to walk again; she didn’t want to think about it.

When Vinga and the goat got closer to where the smoke was coming from, she slowed down and moved more carefully. The vertical mountain wall was right in front of her. She knew there was a clearing in the shelter of this wall, an open area between the mountain and the dense forest. It was from there that the smoke was rising in an almost vertical column. The juniper twigs crackled in the fire. She stopped and stood motionless, as if she was a part of the forest.

Her heart was beating like a woodpecker. She pressed her hand against the goat’s forehead so that it wouldn’t go any farther. She moved her hand up to one of its horns, holding it tightly.

The smoke came from a fire, and between it and the rock face sat a horribly big creature, so large that his flickering shadow stood out enormous and grotesque on the stone. His shoulders were so broad that she had to stare at them for a long time in order to believe what she saw.

He sat on a low stump so that the fire hid his face, and she could only see a glimpse of it now and then. She wasn’t sure that she wanted to see more ...

Slowly, very slowly, she squatted down so that he wouldn’t see her.

The sight fascinated and completely captivated her. What was it? She called the creature “it” because it didn’t seem to belong to the human race nor to the animal world.

Vinga just stared, forgetting time and place and her own fear. She was in a world of her own gazing at this incredible sight. If you forget yourself, you also lose a lot of the weight that human beings drag around in the form of fear, arrogance, bitterness and all the other less desirable emotions. Vinga now found herself in an extremely receptive mode, and suddenly she realized that this was what the creature wanted. Once again, she understood that he had the ability to send signals to her.

Silent as a mouse, she sat there gazing. She had forgotten where she was now that she was faced with this new experience.

She started as he rose so that the glow from the fire fell on his face. As she tried to decide whether to stay still or run away for dear life, she heard his voice:

“Welcome Vinga. Won’t you come over here and sit by my fire?”

His voice was deep and hoarse, as if it came from the underworld.

The mountain king, she thought as she gazed at his incredible face. Or the chief troll himself?

He had helped her. Many, many times. He had carried the goat in his arms effortlessly, had rescued it from the ravine. He had done nothing but good for her.

She didn’t have a sense of horror, even if he did come from the underworld. Perhaps he was going to lure her inside the mountain, but how much worse could it be compared to the world of human beings anyway?

She got to her feet carefully. Somehow, it was irritating that he had discovered her: nobody had done that before, but then he was no ordinary human being!

He gave her a smile. How could such yellow eyes, such a terrible face, be changed so much by a smile?

She stood still! She didn’t run away! For the first time for years, she just stood there, didn’t flee from the presence of another person. Could it be because this creature was not human?