Page 9 of North Is the Night
“My child, I need you to tell us what happened,” he says, gently cupping my face. He winces, inspecting the blood at my brow. The forest stops spinning. The torchlight doesn’t feel quite so painfully bright.
“The woman...” I swallow, still tasting her stench in the back of my throat. “The creature... she was behind us on the beach. We ran for the trees. I tried to protect Aina. I tried—” My words break on a sob.
Onni’s arm is back around my shoulders. “No one blames you, Siiri.”
“I had my knife,” I go on. “I cut her, but she didn’t even flinch. I threw the knife, and it struck her in the heart. She just smiled.... Then she took Aina from me. They’re gone.”
“Oh gods,” her father cries, digging his hands through his hair. “Oh, my Aina.”
Another man puts an arm around his shoulders, keeping him on his feet.
I can’t look at him. I can’t see his tears. I look to the other men instead. They’re all watching me with expressions of shock and horror. Some are stepping back. Others exchange worried glances with each other.
Father draws himself up to his full height, glancing around the clearing. “You did the best you could,” he declares. “No man here could have done any better.”
A few nod their heads.
“But whatwasit?” one of them asks.
“A witch!”
“A monster!”
“I’m telling you, it was Ajatar,” shouts another. “The forest witch of Pohjola. It’s why she wore a serpent’s face.”
Old farmer Aatos shakes his head. “No, no, it was a Lempo, a demon spirit.”
“Was it a kalman väki?”
“Or Kalma herself,” another man offers.
A shudder of worried exclamations passes through the assembled men.
“All-Mother, protect us,” Aina’s father cries, touching a hand to his forehead, then his chest. A few other men repeat the gesture. More than one man makes the sign of the Christian cross.
“I’m taking my daughter home,” Father calls to the group. “Go tell your womenfolk what happened here. Until we know more, lock your doors and stay by your fires. We’ll speak again tomorrow.”
The men reluctantly part in twos and threes.
“Come,” Onni says gently. “Let’s get you home.”
I let myself be steered through the darkness back to our homestead. It rests on the edge of the lakeshore—a small, pinewood house situated a stone’s throw from the water, and a looming barn behind. A few outbuildings and njalle are scattered around the yard, along with our family sauna.
Father leads me right up to the house. The high windows are all shut tight. Golden light glows around their frames, and smoke billows from the chimney. He pounds on the door with his large fist. “It’s us,” he calls.
There’s a scraping sound as my mummi lifts the bar and swings the door inward. “Oh, praise the All-Mother,” she weeps, reaching out with greedy hands to pull me inside. I fall against her breast, her hands in my hair as I cling weakly to her apron-covered hips.
Father bolts the door. “Check the shutters,” he directs Aksel.
My brothers skirt the perimeter of our one-room house, reaching up high to check the fastenings on the shuttered windows.
Meanwhile, Mummi steers me to the fire. Our great stone hearth takes up one whole wall of the house. Pegs pounded into the stone hold all manner of cookware. The wooden table is laden with an evening meal—creamy salmon soup with potatoes and carrots, seasoned with dill. A basket of cloudberries waits next to a pile of barley loaves. There’s a pitcher of reindeer milk too, and a blackberry tart.
“Sit yourself down,” Mummi murmurs, her strong hands guiding me onto a stool.
I sink down. Everything is spinning again. My head aches.
“She’s bleeding,” my little sister Liisa whispers from her spot at the end of the table. Her grey cat sits curled in her lap. “Why is she bleeding?”
