Margit Sandemo: The Ice People 41 - Demon's Mountain

The Demon's Mountain

The Legend of the Ice People 41 - The Demon's Mountain

© Margit Sandemo 1986

© eBook in English: Jentas A/S, 2019

Series: The Legend of The Ice People

Title: The Demon's Mountain

Title number: 41

Original title: Demonernas fjäll

Translator: Anna Halager

© Translation: Jentas A/S

ISBN: 978-87-7107-705-6

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchase.

All contracts and agreements regarding the work, translation, editing, and layout are owned by Jentas A/S.

Acknowledgement

The legend of the Ice People is dedicated with love and gratitude to the memory of my dear late husband Asbjorn Sandemo, who made my life a fairy tale.

Margit Sandemo

The Ice People - Reviews

‘Margit Sandemo is, simply, quite wonderful.’

- The Guardian

‘Full of convincing characters, well estabished in time and place, and enlightening ... will get your eyes popping, and quite possibly groins twitching ... these are graphic novels without pictures ... I want to know what happens next.’

- The Times

‘A mixure of myth and legend interwoven with historical events, this is imaginative creation that involves the reader from the first page to the last.’

- Historical Novels Review

‘Loved by the masses, the prolific Margit Sandemo has written over 172 novels to date and is Scandinavia s most widely read author...’

- Scanorama magazine

The Legend of the Ice People

The legend of the Ice People begins many centuries ago with Tengel the Evil. He was ruthless and greedy, and there was only one way to get everything that he wanted: he had to make a pact with the devil. He travelled far into the wilderness and summoned the devil with a magic potion that he had brewed in a pot. Tengel the Evil gained unlimited wealth and power but in exchange, he cursed his own family. One of his descendants in every generation would serve the Devil with evil deeds. When it was done, Tengel buried the pot. If anyone found it, the curse would be broken.

So the curse was passed down through Tengel’s descendants, the Ice People. One person in every generation was born with yellow cat’s eyes, a sign of the curse, and magical powers which they used to serve the Devil. One day the most powerful of all the cursed Ice People would be born.

This is what the legend says. Nobody knows whether it is true, but in the 16th century, a cursed child of the Ice People was born. He tried to turn evil into good, which is why they called him Tengel the Good. This legend is about his family. Actually, it is mostly about the women in his family – the women who held the fate of the Ice People in their hands.

Chapter 1

The light was really extraordinary on that spring evening, 30 April 1960.

Walpurgis Night, the night of the witches!

In Norway, that event is now a thing of the past. But in Sweden and Germany and several other Northern European countries, the old rituals are still kept. This is the evening on which the Swedes light bonfires, in the same way that the Norwegians do on Midsummer’s Eve. Not many modern Swedes recall that these fires were traditionally lit to keep witches away. Because Walpurgis Night was a dangerous night.

On that night in 1960, the area around Linden Avenue was unbelievably serene. The sky was a soft blue, though in the west it flamed from blood-red to pale yellow.

So calm, so very calm ...

A signal could be heard far away in the distance.

A crisp sound, as from a brass pipe. Only two tones, the second one a whole tone higher than the first, dying out slowly. The signal was repeated three times.

Benedikte of the Ice People was just about to go to bed for the night. She was getting on for ninety, though she could have passed for seventy.

She was sitting on the edge of her bed, and had just placed her toe against her other heel to push off her shoe, when she vaguely noticed the signals. She was curious and walked over to the window.

She couldn’t see very far because of the new houses that had been built on the plain in the old parish of Gråstensholm, but she saw the red sky of sunset, and she quivered with a sense of doom.

All of a sudden, she knew that she wasn’t alone in the room.

She turned around.

There stood Heike, her guardian spirit among her ancestors. “Dress up warmly, Benedikte! We’ll be travelling far tonight!”

She was startled. Was it now that ...?

The tall Heike smiled. “No, your time isn’t up yet. Gand has summoned all of us.”

She merely nodded with the dignity that was typical of her. “I’ll be ready. Will everyone in the house be coming?”

“All those who were born members of the Ice People will be coming. All the living and many, many others. As Dida put it: ‘Tonight, the line between the living and the dead will be erased.’”

“And Sander?” Benedikte asked quietly.

Heike gave her a regretful look. “No, not Sander. He wasn’t of our blood.”

“I understand. Perhaps it’s just as well. After all, I’m so old. I suppose I’m slightly vain,” she said with a smile.

“Yes. Come out when you’re ready.”

When he had left the room, Benedikte searched feverishly in her wardrobe. She wanted to be nicely and warmly dressed this evening. Could she wear this pearl-grey dress? Yes, she certainly could.

When she was ready, dressed in her best cloak and with her straight hair carefully and neatly brushed, she went into the hall.

André and Mali had been sitting in the living room. It was that time of the evening when they couldn’t bring themselves to get up and go to bed but just sat there, encouraging each other: “Well, we’d better be off to bed, don’t you think?” without moving from the spot. Not a bad state of mind to be in.

Then, all of a sudden, somebody was standing on their Persian carpet.

They started. André regarded the dark, handsome man, who came from a century when men really dressed like men, to their very best advantage.

“Dominic?” he asked in wonder.

The stranger bowed with a jolly smile. “You’re quite right. I’m to be Mali’s helper in the time to come, and I’ve come to fetch both of you to a meeting of all the sons and daughters of the Ice People.”

“We’re ready. But don’t I have a special protector?” André asked.

“Because you’ll be an important figure, you’ll have a strong protector. That’s what Gand told me. But he didn’t say who it is. My task was just to fetch the two of you.”

André hesitated. “Perhaps it would be best for my old mother to stay at home.”

Said he, who was getting on for seventy.

Dominic smiled. “I think Benedikte would be very hurt if she were left behind. Besides, we need her. Her forte is that she’s able to read the history of an object merely by holding it in her hand.”

Mali broke in: “She certainly hasn’t made very much use of that trait.”

Dominic turned his beautiful eyes on her. There was a yellow glint in them. “Benedikte decided to live an ordinary life. But different, more difficult times, are drawing near.”

“So we gather,” replied Mali. “Our hour of destiny has come, hasn’t it?”

“Yes, we have to take up the battle now.”

André and Mali looked at one another.

“We’re joining you,” was their calm answer.

Benedikte was waiting in the hall with Heike, whom everybody greeted graciously.