C2 Chapter 2

Someone gently shook him awake.

“Venerable boy with the ability to draw symbols,” said Inu in a respectful voice. “Morning is approaching and it will soon be time to leave.”

Gabriel was immediately wide awake. Tova and Nataniel were still asleep and he got up very quietly so as not to wake them. He felt extremely privileged.

A cold morning light covered the slope. He shuddered and knew that his face looked frozen, with an early morning pallor. He was unable to display more enthusiasm. A little hot food and drink would have helped, but they didn’t have any.

No, this simply wouldn’t do! He couldn’t have such spineless thoughts if he was a chosen one!

Marco stood close by him, with an impenetrable look on his face. Rune and Halkatla were busy dragging a couple of dark-clad men over to a grave nearby.

“Then what I dreamt was true!” Gabriel whispered. “Who were they?”

“A couple of Tengel the Evil’s living criminals who were dumb enough to take part in a battle between spiritual beings. They were actually the only ones who suffered. Apart from them, it was so evenly fought that our enemies soon retreated. It was just an attempt on their part to frighten us. We weren’t too impressed,” said Marco, smiling crookedly.

He went up to the boy and placed his beautiful hands on Gabriel’s shoulders.

“You have an unpleasant task before you,” he said with warmth in his voice. “But Ulvhedin is watching over you, and all of Taran-gai’s shamans have promised to keep an eye on you, so nothing will happen to you that might upset your mother Karine or your father. Write down as much as you can, but just in a few words that you can rework later on. It’s important that you include everything, especially for the sake of the losing party.”

Gabriel had been so absorbed with the men being dragged away that he hadn’t noticed what was behind him. He turned around and caught sight of a big group of short, black-clad shamans who were ready to be off. Alongside them stood Sarmik the Wolf, their leader. And with him his two sons, Orin and Vassar.

And Mar was there too with his mighty bow. The sight of him reassured Gabriel.

From what he had gathered, one of the shamans was Tun-sij, but he couldn’t figure out which one she was because, just as they had been at the Demon’s Mountain, they were all dressed alike. Their faces were concealed behind a grid of thick black cords that hung down from their wide, hat-like headdresses.

He was so moved he felt his throat constricting. There was something so exceptionally magnificent and heartrending about this chance to observe a tribe of people who had become extinct long ago and whom no one knew anything about now. And that he was allowed to hand down his knowledge about them to future generations.

They all bowed to Gabriel and he returned their greeting in the same way.

He didn’t find their politeness silly: in fact, he liked it. Western civilizations could actually learn something from it. It created respect and thoughtfulness among people. It was a good custom, Gabriel thought.

It was still nighttime when the big group started making its way up the mountain. The foggy veil of daybreak had clothed the slopes and they could no longer see their horrible ancestors waiting up there. But the Taran-gai carried on with renewed energy. They seemed to know where they were going.

Soon, Gabriel’s companions on his journey to Norway had disappeared in the fog below them. He wished he had at least had Nataniel and Marco with him, but Ulvhedin’s presence gave him some sense of safety. The great giant was like a tower compared to the little Taran-gai, many of whom were smaller than Gabriel.

They walked in silence. The climb was so strenuous that Gabriel didn’t have the energy to talk.

Shocked, he realized all at once that he was the only living person among them. It was a walk among spirits!

But that wasn’t what it felt like. They were all friends. It was a good feeling.

One of the shamans sidled up to him. “Are you afraid, Gabriel?”

He recognized Tun-sij’s voice. “No, not very.”

“You’re going to record all this, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” Gabriel answered. “I’ve already written a lot down in my notebook. And I have more notebooks with me.”

“That’s good. You know that we are an extinct people. I want people to know about us, so that we don’t disappear into thin air and lose our place in history. Let this, our last battle, be remembered by the people of the future world!”

Gabriel was moved by her words. “I will,” he said with a grainy voice. “But no more harm can come to you, can it? Since you’re all dead, I mean?”

“My little friend,” said Tun-sij sadly. “As noble people of the Ice People we have been very privileged, we shamans of Taran-gai. We have escaped having to go to Shama’s black gardens. But the fear that we may be sent there after all has been rekindled, and you should know that we are fighting against Shama’s allies now. And then there is our common, malicious ancestor. He has the power to send us wherever he chooses should we fall into his claws. He could send us to Shama or to ... the Great Abyss.”

She said the last words in a low voice, as though she was scared someone might overhear her.

“Do you know what that is?” Gabriel asked in a low voice. “Or where it is?”

“No one knows,” said Tun-sij. Then she placed her finger on her lips to indicate that they didn’t normally talk about such things.

Gabriel stopped and looked despondently up at the mountaintops. He was tired and out of breath and the last part looked unpleasantly steep. And he was also freezing. His feet felt like lumps of ice after the night frost and his whole body felt numb.

He couldn’t see anything. A walk in the mountains is always deceptive. The peaks that you assume are the highest conceal even higher peaks behind them once you reach them. So they no longer had those two horrifying peaks in front of them, at least not within their range of vision.

Nighttime wouldn’t let go of its hold. He wondered what the time was. He made a wild guess: around four, four-thirty.

Tun-sij was saying something to him, and he shook his head to try to concentrate better on it.

“You and I are actually relatives. Yes, through Tan-ghil, of course, but that is so long ago. But my grandchild, Shira, had a half-brother Örjan, and that’s who you are descended from.”

“Yes, that’s right,” said Gabriel, smiling at her. His eyes always glowed when he smiled, making everyone’s heart melt.

“We’ll be sure to take good care of you,” said Tun-sij, moved. “So that nothing happens to you, because it’s going to be intense up there, I promise you. Stay in the background! Ulvhedin will be with you the whole time!”

Gabriel promised her that he would. He didn’t have any particular urge to take part in the battle against the spirits of Taran-gai and their spirits’ spirits.

But he would carry out his duty! His father and mother and the entire family would be sure to be proud of him and his diaries!

Suddenly they had reached their destination.

It happened so unexpectedly that Gabriel couldn’t believe it.

They were suddenly standing right in front of one of the mountaintops. The fog drifted past a deserted slope which they sensed more than they saw. But right near them, up on the peak, sat a frightening creature all hunched over. It didn’t so much as glance at them.

“Kat,” Inu murmured.

Dense smoke covered the area and ...

Gabriel started.

“I can smell the smoke,” he whispered. “Does that mean it’s real?”

“Just illusions,” said Tun-sij.

Mar and Sarmik and his two sons were leading the Taran-gai group. The four of them had stopped at the foot of the slope.

Gabriel had taken out his notebook and was eagerly writing.

“Our leaders are discussing what they ought to do. They aren’t sure of the position of the other one, Kat-ghil, because you can’t see very far in this fog. We seem to be on a kind of island – Kat’s hill is an island. He looks horrible ... (crossed out). He looks horribly foul. Tiny and stocky with evil eyes staring out across the valley that we can no longer see. And in a semi-circle behind him is some kind of grille or fence from which dried human bodies are hanging. Just like mummies. That makes sense because he probably takes after his father, Winter Sorrow, who used to abduct women and sacrifice them afterwards. These mummies look like women. But not all of them. The others are probably his enemies. He may regard every human as his enemy. But I don’t see the spirits that ought to be surrounding him. And didn’t Kat live in a hole in the ground from which spirits used to fly in and out? Perhaps this is Kat-ghil?”

At that very moment Gabriel heard warning shouts from the vanguard and instinctively ducked. Something came whirling towards him through the air. Gabriel shut his eyes and covered his ears with his hands because it made an unpleasant, shrill sound.

When he opened his eyes again he could see grey creatures who looked as though they consisted of the fog itself rushing over the group and up to the peak as though to gather energy, then coming back again.

They were formless, without substance, like grey comets, densest at the front only to thin out at the back in a long tail. They swept down past the Taran-gai, who had thrown themselves to the ground. But Mar and Sarmik stood up.

“Aren’t we shamans ourselves?” Sarmik shouted. “We’re going to retaliate together!”

They all got back on their feet. Only Gabriel remained lying down on the ground on Ulvhedin’s orders. His guardian was squatting next to him, protecting him against the attacks. Gabriel had tucked his notebook underneath him. He pulled it out and wrote, perhaps mostly to chase away his thoughts and quell the terror he was experiencing.

“Kat has stood up and turned to face us. He really does look horrifying! His teeth are jagged and pointed, and I can’t help thinking that it’s so he can chew his victims properly! But that can’t be true, I mustn’t become macabre! He is extending his arms towards his descendants and shouting to them. Yes, he really is shouting, though never before have I heard such a shrill voice – it pierces every bone in your body. It’s probably some sort of conjuration.

“But Mar and the others who can conjure are responding! Help, the curses are really flying through the air now! And step by step our people are making their way up the mountain.

“Ugh! Kat has suddenly changed his attack. His spirits ... are taking shape. Oh goodness, they must be eastern demons, or whatever you call them. They are making their way down towards us, each more terrifying than the last. Yet still ... somehow they look a bit ridiculous. Like a child’s idea of horror figures. Dragon-like dogs on two legs, sticking out their tongues and puffing and snorting just like dogs. They are making wild faces but ...”

Gabriel couldn’t help it, he burst into uncontrollable laughter. They really did look comical!

His sarcastic laughter had an intense and completely surprising effect around him. All the spirits stopped. Kat stared at the blasphemous one. The spirits clearly couldn’t stand being laughed at and it seemed that they all took themselves very seriously. In other words, they possessed no self-irony.

That sort of thing is dangerous. Creatures of that kind are the most dangerous of them all.

But Kat and his spirits had no chance to recover from the shock of being laughed at because the Taran-gai stormed the hill and toppled the frightening grille with the mummified victims. And the next moment Kat was surrounded by the palms of hands thrust at him and a resounding, strong, common conjuration aimed directly at him.

He screamed. They heard him screaming for help but it was too late. Right before Gabriel’s eyes he shrank and turned into a dried-up mummy, just like his victims. But he was still alive. He lived long enough to experience his powerlessness and humiliation. Long enough to see Vassar and Orin re-erect the grille, remove all the poor mummies from it and hang him on it instead. Then the shamans turned to the grille and chanted, sounding like a big, gloomy and monotonous choir. Kat was helpless. His dried-up face grimaced wildly but no matter how much he resisted he had to accept the fact that the entire grille and its macabre decoration – himself – was dissolving into nothing.

When Kat was gone they heard the pitiful moaning of the oriental demons as with a final little “peep” they vanished into the fog.

The Taran-gai shamans stood completely still.

Then they turned to Gabriel.

“Thank you,” said Sarmik, their leader. “Thank you, little friend: you gave us the small breather we needed to overpower them!”

He issued an order and together they gathered Kat’s unfortunate victims on the hill and buried them under rocks. All the while they sang strange hymns honouring those who had suffered such a grisly fate while Kat had been in this world. Gabriel thought it was so beautiful. He would have like to place a flower on each grave, but there were no flowers. The ground was covered in snow. Instead he said a small Christian prayer as his grandfather Abel had taught him. It certainly couldn’t do any harm.

When the chanting had ended they remained standing there. But then they looked at one another in bewilderment, because the singing was continuing! It was not coming from them and it did not sound nearly as beautiful.

What they could hear were wild, frightening troll runes coming from a peak concealed in the fog.

“Kat-ghil,” whispered Tun-sij, “Kat-ghil with the troll songs.”

“That always meant war for anyone in Taran-gai,” said Inu.

“We’re not in Taran-gai now,” countered Star.

“We could try to sneak past him,” Hiir suggested. “Across the moors.”

“And what will we do there?” asked Tun-sij sharply. “We are here to clear the way for the chosen ones of the Ice People and nothing more.”

“Yes, of course,” said Hiir. “How stupid of me.”

The little Taran-gai were clearly ill-at-ease. Their pride at having defeated Kat had now been replaced by another fear.

Somewhat unenthusiastically, they trudged down the mountain and went in the direction of the sound.

“Kat-ghil is even more dangerous,” Mar muttered to Gabriel. “His troll songs are deadly.”

But most of the individuals here are already dead, Gabriel thought. Then he remembered what Tun-sij had said about the Taran-gai fearing for their souls. They feared ending up with Shama or in the Deep Abyss.

The closer they got the more clearly they could hear the song. It had a distinctly evil sound to it. Guttural and aggressive. The steps of the Taran-gai became even more sluggish and hesitant.

A new peak could be seen in the distance, and a new sacrificial fire. Next to it sat Kat-ghil with his legs crossed and his hands resting on his knees. His head was tilted back as his song ascended, shrill and grating, towards the sky.

Then he suddenly fell silent. His horrendous face turned towards them. Kat-ghil was severely stricken: that was clear for anybody to see. But it didn’t seem to bother him – on the contrary, he seemed rather proud of it. His mouth curled with loathing at the sight of the group approaching him.

He straightened up abruptly, making it look as though he had grown, and his malicious gaze rested on Vassar. The song began again, strong, powerful and intense.

Vassar stopped instantly, clutched his chest and curled up. The next moment Tun-sij screamed out loud.

Behind Kat-ghil another figure emerged: an unpleasant-looking individual, diffuse, as though he derived from prehistoric times. His hair, black and streaky, reached his thighs and practically covered his face. Gabriel had seen pictures of humanity’s oldest ancestors and the word “humanoid” came to mind – something between a human and an ape. But this man was like a parody of his own people. His face was wider than it was long, his cranium was flat and the slits of his eyes so narrow that they were practically invisible.

The characteristic features of the stricken were very distinct in him, and his attitude was anything but friendly.

“Winter Sorrow,” Inu whispered. “I never got the chance to see him, but he was described to me.”

Tengel the Evil’s own son ... The half-brother of Targenor? The thought was absurd!

“Is he also a shaman?” Ulvhedin asked.

“Most certainly! And with greater capabilities than us!”

“Heaven help us,” said Star, who was one of the few female shamans.

Barely had she finished uttering the words when a little grey figure came creeping towards them. With unerring certainty, he made for Gabriel.

“The Terror!” shouted He-who-was-born-in-the-door. “The Terror who sacrificed children to the gods!”

“Stop!” Ulvhedin commanded the little grey figure. “This boy is protected by the four spirits of Taran-gai: Earth, Wind, Air and Fire.”

The Terror stopped, giggling, and sniffed the air as though working out Gabriel’s identity. The boy got a slightly nauseous feeling from looking into his malicious yellow eyes.

With a grunting sound, the Terror spun on his heels and focused his concentration on Sarmik’s two sons. Although they were older, it was possible to refer to them as children.

“Don’t touch them!” shouted Sarmik. “Or I’ll invoke the curse on you!”

The Terror spat something reddish-brown at Sarmik’s feet. It appeared to be the kind of stimulant the elder Taran-gai used to chew on.

The brave little shamans had already raised their hands to conjure something against the three stricken ancestors, Kat-ghil, Winter Sorrow and the Terror, when there was a shout from Tun-sij: “Look up! For heaven’s sake, look up!”

Behind them a fourth figure had emerged. Vendel Grip would have recognized the abominable creature that crawled across the ground and grabbed hold of Vassar’s legs, toppling him over.

But Tun-sij knew him as well. They had been contemporaries.

“The Evil Eye!” she shouted to the group of shamans. “Run! Retreat!”

But everyone, including Tun-sij, stayed where they were.

Kat-ghil had stood up. He was standing on the hill and chanting a frightening spell aimed at Vassar. Winter Sorrow advanced and he, too, was focused on Vassar, while the Terror, the kidnapper of children, extended his arms towards the younger of the boys.

But the worst of them was the Evil Eye, who had toppled Vassar and now hurled himself on Orin, who was attempting to help his little brother. There was uproar at the foot of the slope. The boys’ wails, the invocations of the shamans and Sarmik’s shouts for help echoed all across the area.

Then Winter Sorrow triumphantly got to his feet.

“We have them, gentlemen!” he shouted.

Suddenly another figure emerged in the background. One whom Gabriel knew all too well. An ordinary man, or rather, not all that ordinary.

“Number One,” Gabriel whispered. “Or Lynx, as he is also known. He is mortally dangerous.”

Sarmik and Mar had grabbed hold of Vassar and Orin in order to pull them away and shield them, but their evil ancestors wouldn’t let go. Ulvhedin held his hand over Gabriel and pulled him to him as he chanted spells in a low voice.

But none of it stopped Lynx. He merely made a movement with his hand and something reptilian rushed through the air in the direction of Sarmik and his sons. It resembled a sling or lasso that was as slippery as an eel, Gabriel thought. But everything went so fast that he didn’t get a chance to register any details. Vassar was torn from the arms of the others and flung high up in the air. With a fearful scream the young Taran-gai disappeared into the banks of fog.

The evil glances of Kat-ghil and the others had now captured Orin. Despite his father’s desperate attempt to save his other son from the depths of the Great Abyss, Orin suffered the same fate as his brother.

Their screams could be heard for a long time afterwards, growing increasingly faint the further they fell.

Finally, all that could be heard was the mournful sighing of the wind across the moor.