Bárdur spotted the hand and whacked Símin hard across the head. The next blow swiped Símin’s hand away.
‘Say your prayers,’ Bárdur sneered. ‘She’s unclean.’
‘Honour your father,’ Símin chanted, still hunched up. ‘He who curses his father shall suffer death…’
‘Where’s my friend?’ Arnaq managed to say. She got herself into a squatting position. Her voice was trembling from fear and exhaustion. ‘Where is she? Tell me now!’
‘It’s not appropriate for a woman to speak in the church,’ Símin said, still not daring to stand upright. He glanced sideways at Arnaq. Then he clutched his groin again. ‘It was Eve who was deceived and who disobeyed God’s command. It was Eve, wasn’t it, Dad?’
‘Eve is always a whore,’ Bárdur said, knocking Símin’s hand away again.
‘The two of you are fucking crazy,’ Arnaq said. The tears were flowing down her cheeks. ‘Sick bastards, the pair of you…Lunatics.’
‘She will not turn away from sin,’ Símin mumbled, squeezing his penis hard. ‘Those who lie with her, I will throw into great turmoil unless they turn away from her deeds, and I will kill her children.’
Arnaq collapsed onto the mattress from exhaustion.
Bárdur patted Símin on the head and pushed the plate of ribs closer to Arnaq with his foot. ‘You need to eat if you want to live.’
‘No.’ Arnaq shook her head. ‘I won’t touch your food until I see my friends.’ She didn’t look at them. She kept her eyes firmly on the rough concrete floor.
Símin reached down a hand to pick up a rib. ‘It’s tasty.’
‘Eat!’ Bárdur commanded her. He grabbed Símin and dragged him out of the door.
‘I want to see my friend,’ Arnaq screamed with her last strength. She heard the door glide shut and the bolt being slid across.
The light went out. Then it came back on. It went out. Came back on.
35
FÆRINGEHAVN, WEST GREENLAND, 23 OCTOBER 2014
Arnaq’s number sequence was disrupted when the door opened again. She hadn’t even noticed that the light had stayed on. Her eyes stung and hurt. She had dried-up sleep gunk in the corners of her eyes, and she could smell her own body. Her breath was dry and reeked of disease. The cell stank of urine. Her urine. She could no longer remember if she peed in the bucket or just let it trickle out where she lay. They brought her water every day and she drank it. Then she peed it out again. Many days must have passed. She had no idea how long it would take her to starve to death. She had expected to be dead by now, but the pains in her stomach came and went without really sapping the life out of her. Perhaps the light was keeping her alive. The by now endless sequence of numbers. The highest was fifteen. Except when something was being put into the room. Like now.
It usually happened quickly. A new bucket. More water. Meat she didn’t touch. And then they took it away. She didn’t have the energy to look at him. She had counted him. It took about eighty-five seconds from the door opening until it was shut again.
Arnaq frowned when she went past one hundred and twenty. At one hundred and forty she turned her head and looked towards to door.
She blinked. Símin was standing just inside the door. She couldn’t see the giant. She closed her eyes again and tried to organise her thoughts. The numbers kept going around her head. She could still feel the light coming and going, although it was now permanently on.
When she opened her eyes again, Símin had moved closer to her. She was exhausted right to the marrow in her bones, but she managed to straighten herself up so that she was sitting almost upright.
The pale young man handed her a piece of bread.
She snatched it and stuffed the whole chunk into her mouth at once. She chewed and swallowed it so quickly that it almost came up again. She started to sweat and fought her nausea. She closed her eyes and breathed in short, controlled breaths of four in and four out. Four in and four out. Her lips were slightly parted so the air cooled the nausea from her mouth and down to her stomach. Four. Four. Four. Four.
‘Everyone is allowed to eat God’s food,’ Símin mumbled. ‘But sinners mustn’t taint His altar.’
The words penetrated Arnaq’s numbers. ‘Water,’ she gasped.
Símin reached behind him, grabbed a bottle of water and gave it to her. ‘The Lord sanctifies it.’
Arnaq tried to shake her head, but she was too weak. ‘It’s just water.’
Símin got up. His expression was determined.
Arnaq looked up at the glowing light bulb. ‘Stay for a while…’
‘Me?’ Símin glanced towards the door, then he looked back at Arnaq.
She took a sip of the water. ‘Do you have something to do?’
He frowned. His eyebrows were just as white as his sparse hair. His eyes were so light blue that they almost disappeared in the white of his eyes.
‘Women must be silent in church.’
‘We’re not in a church…We’re in a fucking dungeon!’ Arnaq exclaimed. She glared at him and tried to straighten up fully. ‘Did you eat my friends? Tell me.’
‘There’s no other world than this one,’ Símin said.
‘I’m sorry…It’s okay. You’re right. It’s just me…’
Símin pointed upwards and shook his head. ‘The world up there has been abandoned by God and is full of demons.’ He shuddered.
‘Have you ever been there?’
‘No,’ he said, horrified. ‘My dad says—’
‘You have to help me,’ she cut him off.
Símin looked up at the ceiling.
‘Please let me go,’ Arnaq said. ‘Or I’ll die here…And I can help you too.’
He shook his head.
‘Where are we?’ Arnaq wanted to know.
‘I’ve never been anywhere other than here, under the City of the Dead Demons, and Dad’s old house on the other side of the fjord,’ Símin said.
Arnaq could hear from the hesitation in his voice that she had managed to sow a seed of doubt in his mind. ‘There are many people up there…Many nice people who won’t hit you.’
‘No,’ Símin said. ‘They’re sick and dangerous…All of them.’
‘Your dad is sick and dangerous,’ Arnaq said. She raised her voice. ‘Hitting children is against the law…As is killing.’
‘You’re sick,’ Símin shouted, and slapped Arnaq across the face with the palm of his hand. He tore at her blouse until it ripped, exposing her breasts.
‘You’re unclean,’ Símin yelled at her. ‘Unclean!’
‘I’m sorry,’ Arnaq sobbed, trying to cover herself up.
Símin clutched his groin. He stared at Arnaq’s breasts. He rubbed his groin. With his other hand he grabbed her breast.
She tried to push his hand away, but she had almost no strength left. He was too strong.
He squeezed her breast. Squeezed it hard with his fingertips. He rubbed his penis through his trousers. Strangled moans erupted from deep down in his throat.
‘Let me go,’ Arnaq sobbed. ‘Take your hands off me, you pervert!’
Símin jumped up with a yelp. A wet patch had appeared on the fabric covering his groin.
‘You’re a whore,’ he screamed. His hands were trembling. He stared at her breasts. Rubbed himself again. ‘You’re unclean… Unclean.’
He spun around and ran to the door, pulling it shut behind him.
The light disappeared. It came back. Disappeared. Came back. Went away. Came back.
Arnaq slumped sideways onto the thin foam mattress. She whimpered and tried to gather the ruined blouse around her. Inside her head the numbers were already running.
36
FÆRINGEHAVN, WEST GREENLAND, 25 OCTOBER 2014
The light had turned into darkness soon after Símin had disappeared. At first it had resuming flashing, as it usually did, before going out for good with no warning.
It had taken her several hours to let the light go. She had carried on counting although there was nothing to coun
t. There was no record to beat. You couldn’t count the darkness when it was there all the time.
After some time she had abandoned all hope that the light would ever come back. Everything was dark now.
She wondered if she had gone blind. If her brain had been so damaged by the light, starvation and lack of sleep that she had lost her sight. Perhaps the light was still flashing only she no longer sensed it.
Finally she had fallen asleep. She didn’t know how long she had slept. Nor how many times she had dozed off and woken up again. She didn’t even know whether it was day or night, or how long she had been a prisoner. When she checked her fingernails, it felt like a week. The eyebrows she would normally pluck had also grown long. They were so long that they no longer pricked her fingertips when she touched them.
While the light had been flashing she hadn’t registered anything other than smells. The stench of her own urine. Her unwashed skin. Her hair getting increasingly matted and greasy with each passing day. Now she also grew aware of touch. She had no senses left but touch and smell.
She touched her nose. Felt her ears and eyes. Her lips. They were cracked. Her skin tasted salty. She nibbled the skin on her hand with her lips. Tasting the salty skin. She wondered how many days you could survive if you ate your own arm and nothing but that, or a leg. How many days’ worth of calories were in a leg like hers?
The tears started rolling down her cheeks. The mutilated bodies kept dominating her thoughts. Lasse’s blood spurting over her. Brain matter being forced out by the blow. Alma’s empty gaze fading away.
She turned over onto her stomach and pushed herself up on all fours so that she could crawl towards the door.
The first thing she bumped into was the bucket. She grabbed it and pulled it with her towards the heavy iron door.
There was a hollow echo through the room when she started banging the bucket against the door.
‘Hello?’ she shouted without really shouting. There wasn’t much fight left in her and her throat was sore. ‘Hello? Help me…I’m going to…die in here.’
She swung the bucket against the door once more, but only the echo answered. Her body gave in and she collapsed on the floor. The concrete felt cold against her skin. She lost herself in the darkness. She lay still on the floor. She could smell urine.
A knocking sound brought her attention back to the door. No one had knocked on it before. Or had they? She couldn’t remember.
The knocking resumed and she pushed herself into a sitting position.
She tried to speak, but her throat was raw and she coughed to clear it. ‘Yes?’
She heard grating sounds from the bolt and the door as it was opened. A thin sliver of light penetrated, and she was forced to narrow her eyes.
She held up a hand and peered out between her fingers. It was Símin. She instinctively gathered the torn blouse in front of her.
He set down a tray of bread and water and handed her another blouse.
Arnaq snatched a slice of bread and stuffed it quickly into her mouth. It had been a long time since the last slice. Several days perhaps. While she chewed it, she considered spitting it out. Her hunger pains had almost gone away. Whenever she ate some bread, they would resume a few hours later. But there were two slices this time. She reached for the second slice and stuffed that into her mouth as well. She wasn’t able to close her mouth properly, but she didn’t care.
Símin waved the hand holding the blouse. ‘Sorry.’ He had squatted down on his haunches next to the tray.
She took the blouse carefully and hesitated for a few seconds while she looked into his ice-blue eyes. There was something familiar about them.
‘Is this you playing the Good Samaritan now?’ Arnaq mumbled, snatching the blouse. She quickly pulled it over her head and covered herself up.
Símin frowned.
She shook her head. ‘Thank you.’ Then she looked down at the empty plate. ‘Thank you for all of it…I’m going to die in here.’ Her stomach was already fighting the bread. First there would be several hours of pain and spasms in her stomach and intestines followed by a few good hours before her hunger would slowly begin to trouble her again and wouldn’t disappear until many hours later.
‘Símin?’
‘Yes?’
‘I had a backpack up in the house. A pink one. I think you took it.’
Símin nodded slowly.
‘There was something inside it that I need.’ She placed her hand on his thigh. ‘Please would you fetch it?’
He looked down at her hand. The Adam’s apple moved under the skin of his neck.
‘I’m not allowed to touch it,’ he said hoarsely. The words came from the back of his throat.
‘I just want to show you something,’ she said, trying to make her voice light. ‘You’ll like it.’
He glanced at the door. Then he nodded and got up from the floor.
Símin opened the door fully when he came back, letting more light into the cell.
Arnaq unzipped her backpack and checked it. It was clear that somebody had rifled through it, but nothing was missing. She took her back-up mobile from a closed side pocket at the bottom of her backpack and connected it to a small powerbank. In one of the backpack’s external side pockets there was a freezer bag tied with a knot. It contained a SIM card from an Icelandic mobile company. It was wrapped in a yellow sticky note with the activation code.
Lars had given it to her, saying that on a good day the Icelandic reception was just a tad better than Greenland’s TelePost.
She slotted the SIM card in place and entered the code. As with her other mobile, which had a Greenlandic SIM card, there was no 3G network. But there was a single telephone coverage bar. One out of four.
‘Is that you?’ Símin studied the small mobile with interest. It was an old Samsung. The background picture on glowing screen showed Arnaq and Alma outside their school in Denmark.
Arnaq looked briefly into his pale blue eyes. ‘Símin, do you know where the other girl is?’
He shook his head and looked at the mobile. Carefully he touched the screen. It changed under his fingertip and he let out a gasp of surprise and looked at Arnaq.
‘It’s just like television,’ she said, pressing her playlist. ‘Listen.’
‘We don’t listen to music,’ Símin said with a glance at the door.
‘I’m sorry,’ Arnaq said, switching the music off. ‘Only it’s so quiet here.’ Her voice had grown thick. ‘Let me try something else.’
She pressed her mother’s number, but nothing happened. She tried it again and on her third attempt it rang. The connection was poor, but it did ring.
Her mother’s voice could be heard softly.
‘Help,’ Arnaq whispered. Her throat contracted. ‘I don’t know where I am, but we haven’t sailed anywhere.’ The tears streamed down her cheeks and her upper body convulsed. ‘I love you, Mum.’ Else’s voice was drowned out by white noise. Arnaq sobbed.
‘What is it?’ Símin said, taking the mobile from her.
‘No…Símin.’ She reached out her arm. Her gaze was desperate. Dissolving. ‘It’s mine.’
He knocked her hand aside and raised the mobile to his face. Else’s voice spoke from the small mobile. She was shouting. She sounded agitated. Símin looked at the glowing screen. He could make out the picture of Arnaq and Alma. ‘Demons,’ he yelled, hurling the mobile onto the floor, where it shattered.
Arnaq collapsed in floods of tears. Her whole body was trembling. She felt Símin’s fingers touch her cheek. Very carefully. He nudged her tears with the tips of his fingers.
The light disappeared for a second, but then returned along with a roar.
Both of them jumped in fear.
‘The devil’s spawn,’ Bárdur thundered as his hand shot towards Símin, and he picked the young man up from the floor by the scruff of his neck as though he was nothing but a ragdoll. ‘She’s unclean.’
Símin winced under the blows raining down on his neck
and back.
‘Now get out of here,’ Bárdur ordered him. He kicked Símin’s side with his wooden clog boot.
‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’ Símin limped to the door.
Bárdur slapped Arnaq repeatedly across the face with the palm of his hand. She tried to crawl out of reach, but she wasn’t strong enough to escape.
‘You’re a filthy whore,’ Bárdur sneered at her. He raised his hand in preparation for yet another blow, then let it sink down slowly. ‘Why did you give her one of Mona’s blouses?’ he called out towards the door.
‘The other one got damaged.’ Símin’s voice was low and it was coming from the corridor.
‘You idiot. Go to your room and say your prayers,’ Bárdur shouted. ‘I’ll clear up here.’
FÆRINGEHAVN
37
NUUK, WEST GREENLAND, 25 OCTOBER 2014
‘We’ve patrolled Færingehavn every day—twice—but there’s absolutely nothing inside any of the buildings.’ Rakel looked at Matthew. ‘We’ve turned the place upside down and inside out. I don’t get it. It’s as if they’ve dropped off the face of the earth.’
Ottesen gestured towards some papers stapled together on the desk. ‘You’re welcome to read the report.’
Matthew nodded. ‘So now what?’
‘We carry on,’ Rakel said. ‘It’s our number one priority. They must be found. We’ve also taken samples from several buildings for analysis; perhaps they’ll give us something to go on.’ She turned to Ottesen. ‘We will find them.’
Ottesen looked out of his office window.
Matthew followed his gaze. There were scattered piles of snow outside, but it was mainly sleet that was raining down on them.
‘I’m going to Ittoqqortoormiit,’ Ottesen said. ‘And I’ll stop by the hospital in Reykjavik to have a chat with Nukannguaq.’
‘So you’ll be flying today, is that what you’re saying?’
‘Yes, in a couple of hours.’ He trained his gaze on Matthew again. ‘Rakel will lead the investigation while I’m gone.’
Rakel nodded and smiled at Matthew. ‘Did you manage to read what I sent you earlier today?’
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