The Killing Forest (4 page)

S
une tried one more time. He'd found some dry twigs inside the hollow tree where he'd hung his hoodie up to dry, but couldn't get a fire started with his lighter.

He thought about his mother. She always backed him up, like the time he wanted to be a Boy Scout. His father had said it was a silly idea, that he'd started playing handball when he was seven, and he couldn't understand why his son wouldn't give it a shot.

Your son doesn't have the talent for it, she'd told him, after Sune did try. In the Boy Scouts, however, he earned every merit badge. Each time he brought one home, she proudly sewed it on his scout shirt.

Now his teeth chattered and his fingers were stiff from the cold, even though the rain had stopped. He'd waited over an hour before returning for the food he'd abandoned when the woman came running up and yelling at him. He knew he shouldn't eat it—he could get sick—but he was so incredibly hungry. His body, not his brain, steered him to the trees toward the clearing. To the food.

Another group of Asatro held their sacrifices at the old oak. It was their leftovers he'd been eating. He'd watched them from his hiding place as they gathered around the bonfire. He had never met them; they were the ones who had expelled the Asa group his father belonged to. That he also belonged to now. The thought slammed into his chest so hard he could barely breathe.

At first his father and the others in the group had been furious about the decision of the Asa and Vanir religious organization, Forn Sidr, to expel them. Now, however, they seemed to think of themselves as nobler, because they were more faithful to the original customs. Not like the hippie types who were more interested in getting high and drinking their homemade mead, as his father put it.

He had spent many nights in the forest since his initiation. Twice he had found food at the sacrificial oak. What he'd gathered up after the ceremony had lasted a week. The second time, he'd packed the food in big leaves, hoping that would help keep it fresh.

Several hours had passed after the horrific events of his initiation before he dared sneak out into the clearing. The cars were gone, and he'd held his breath; the silence and the sharp light from the clear, starlit sky seemed threatening. A few embers from the bonfire still glowed, but he didn't dare approach it to warm himself. He had no way of knowing if anyone had stayed behind to wait for him. At last he snuck around in the shadows of the trees over to the oak, where he knew they must have left a lot of the food his father had brought along.

He had tried to forget what had happened, to banish the image of the young woman smiling at him before she was killed. After the men had returned to the clearing without her, and the gothi had closed the circle and passed the oath ring around, they sat beside the bonfire, eating and drinking as if nothing had happened.

But so much had happened, and everything had gone wrong for Sune. Very wrong. He missed his mother. Every single night, he suffered from nightmares about her death. He saw white coffins and graveyards. He woke up bathed in sweat. He knew his mother grew weaker every day that he was away. But he also knew, full well, that he couldn't return home without reconciling with his father and the others. And he wasn't going to do that. Not after what he'd gone through that evening. He would never be a part of that; would never be like them.

He jerked around when he heard a car approaching on the narrow forest road, kicking over the small twigs and branches he'd arranged for the small fire before hiding in the tree.

They came looking for him every night. When they got too close, he picked up his things and ran. Like a hunted animal driven from its den, he hurried off to find another hiding place. He didn't know who it was on any given night. They might be taking turns searching, he thought. He hugged his knees.

The fear of being found made his skin tingle. He had to get out of this area, go somewhere they wouldn't be looking for him. He just didn't know where. If only he'd gotten the stupid fire started earlier. His clothes would've been dry by now, and he wouldn't be freezing.

He opened one of the leaves and gnawed on a cold pork chop, thinking about his mother again. Hopefully, his father was taking care of her. Sune used to go into her bedroom and sit and read to her when he'd come home from school. She wasn't strong enough now to hold a book. Once in a while she fell asleep and snored lightly with her mouth half open, but he'd just kept on reading. When she woke up, she'd smile and say, “I guess I dozed off for a moment.”

His father didn't like books. They were a waste of time, he always said. But he wanted his son to do well in school, so he didn't complain when Sune read.

School
, Sune thought, as he watched the red taillights of the car after it passed by. This was the final week of exams. How had his parents explained his absence to the school?

He swallowed the last of the pork chop, too quickly—and felt a sharp pain in his esophagus. He didn't have anything to wash the food down with. Normally he drank from the stream, but he couldn't go there now.

The car approached again, so he kept perfectly still. It drove by slowly, stopping several times while the driver peered out into the trees. Finally it left.

Sune had asked himself a thousand times if he shouldn't just go home, but he realized that was no longer an option. He had defied the men, the brotherhood, by not receiving the ring and swearing an oath of silence together with the others.

C
amilla closed the heavy front door, kicked off her running shoes, and barged into her husband's office in her wet clothes.

“When you gut a buck or whatever the hell it's called, you could clean up, you know. There's practically a lake of blood out in the forest.”

Frederik looked up. “What is this, what's happened to you?”

“I fell flat on my face in a big puddle of blood.”

Camilla didn't know much about hunting or forest management, though she did know that Frederik had been out several times lately hunting bucks. But she had no idea what happened after the animal was killed, except that it had to be split open on the spot and gutted to make sure the meat wasn't spoiled.

“As far as I know, there haven't been any bucks gutted out there,” he said. “We haven't hunted in over a week now. Where was it?”

“I don't know exactly. But there's a big tree, partly hollow, close to a clearing with a bonfire site. It looks like someone has been there.”

Frederik stood up. He didn't work at home very often. Most of his waking hours were spent in the management offices at Termo-Lux, a window manufacturer. But the board of directors had just accepted his ultimatum: If he was to stay on as managing director of the family business, he had to have one day off a week to work on his film manuscripts—and also to see something of his wife, he'd added, when telling Camilla that they had accepted his demands.

She had met Frederik Sachs-Smith in California, where over the years he had established himself as a film scriptwriter. He'd already had a hand in several big Hollywood productions; she had considered him a mixture of upper-class bohemian and cool businessman. The scriptwriting was something he did simply because he enjoyed it. While doing research for an interview with him, she had discovered that he was a more-than-competent investor; he'd turned his inheritance from his grandparents into a sizable fortune. He didn't need to work.

When they fell in love, the plan had been that she and her son, Markus, would move in with him in Santa Barbara. But after the death of Frederik's brother and the announcement that his sister had chosen for personal reasons to step down as managing director, their plans changed. He returned to Denmark.

At first, Camilla didn't understand; Frederik had never hidden the fact that he had left Denmark to avoid becoming part of the family dynasty. He'd said numerous times that there had to be many others well qualified to head up the business. Gradually she came to realize that he had accepted the job for the sake of his father, not for the business. Walther Sachs-Smith had been forced off the board of directors of his own company the year before, as he had begun to prepare for his successor. Greed and a lust for power had driven Frederik's two younger siblings to betray their father, who all too late discovered what they were up to.

Which was why Frederik put on a suit and tie four days a week now, to lead the business his grandfather had established many years ago.

“It sounds like you've been out at the sacrificial oak,” he said. “Which means it's probably pig's blood you slipped in. They buy it from the butcher.”

“They? Who in the hell are ‘they'?” Camilla bellowed. She began ripping off her jogging pants.

“The people who make sacrifices to the gods. They believe in Odin and Thor, and once in a while they meet out in the forest and perform rituals.”

“Are they some of the people from over at the Viking Ship Museum?”

“No.” He laughed and shook his head at her. “These people are believers. They're Asatro.”

“Actually I think I saw one of them.”

She tossed her blouse on top of the wet pile of clothes and grabbed a blanket off the Chesterfield sofa. The office looked exactly the same as it did when Frederik's father moved out and left the house to them. Immediately they'd changed the property's name to Ingersminde, in honor of Walther's deceased wife.

“This old lady appeared out of nowhere and looked me straight in the eye. I almost had a heart attack—I hadn't at all heard her walk up behind me. It seems to me she could be one of those people. She had this long braid hanging down over her shoulder.”

Frederik laughed harder this time. “That's Elinor. She lives in the gatekeeper's house; she has most of her life. She's completely harmless, and definitely not one of the Asatro or wights.”

“Why do you let them run around and pour blood all over our forest?” Camilla asked. She nestled into the couch to get warm.

“The old Asatro has deep roots in this region, though no one in our family ever believed in it,” Frederik said. “It attracts people interested in the Nordic gods and sagas. A lot of our country's history comes from this area.”

Camilla struggled to remember some of what she had learned in history class.

“This is where Skjold drifted to shore in an unmanned ship the gods sent,” Frederik continued. “He grew up and became king in Lejre. His was the strongest and bravest army. Did you know that?”

She nodded. Everyone who had gone to high school in Roskilde knew that story. They had heard a lot about King Skjold and his descendants, including the tale of his departure. When he died at a very old age, his body was carried aboard the ship he had arrived on as a baby and laid on his shield, together with piles of gold, jewelry, and valuable weapons. The ship was launched from shore; only the gods know where it ended up.

“I met a boy out there, too,” she said. “I think he's about Markus's age. He was eating some food on the ground by the tree. But he could have been one of them, of course.”

Frederik frowned. “I don't think the kids come by themselves. Usually they all meet down by the gate where they park their cars, and then they all walk in together. But I've seen their food lying around on the ground, several times. They share it with the gods or something, and that's fine. The animals out there can have at it, as long as there's no plastic or other garbage.”

Camilla smiled at him and gathered up her clothes. “We certainly didn't have heathen worshipers like that when I was a little girl in Frederiksberg.”

She kissed him. “At least not in my part of Frederiksberg.”

S
omeone knocked on the office door and immediately Charlie was on his feet, growling. Louise jumped; she'd forgotten about the big German shepherd on the folded-up gray dog blanket beside Eik's chair. She waved and shook her head, warning Rønholt not to come in.

“Can I have a few minutes?” he asked, stepping behind the door.

The dog was still growling, even though Eik grabbed his collar and tried to force him back on his blanket. “Settle down. Down now; it's okay for them to be here, too,” he said. Louise rolled her eyes and walked out into the hall.

Rønholt put his arm around her shoulder. “It's nice having you back,” he said. “We've missed you. So how are you doing?”

“You're going to have to explain to him that he can't bring that dog in here. It's totally crazy,” she said, niftily avoiding the question, as they walked down to Rønholt's office. “I've tried to tell him, but it goes in one ear and out the other.”

“That's not going to be so easy,” Rønholt mumbled, staring down at the gray linoleum.

“What do you mean? You're not going to allow this!”

Rønholt still didn't look at her. “You have to admit he's being very decent.”

“The dog?” Louise was incredulous. “You couldn't even walk into our office! If that dog's staying, Eik's going to have to move back to his old office.”

“Not the dog. I'm talking about Eik offering to take care of it while his friend is dealing with his very unfortunate situation.”

Ragner Rønholt closed his office door and gestured to her to drag the chair over to his desk. Louise could see he was finished talking about the dog.

“I'm having second thoughts,” he began, looking a bit apologetic now. “I sent a case from Hvalsø over to you.”

She broke in. “I've already talked to Mik.”

“You're too close to it,” he continued, ignoring her remark. “I was just thinking that coming back to a case would be good for you. You know, right back up on the horse, that sort of thing.”

He was wringing his hands, so hard that Louise thought it must hurt.

“But not in Hvalsø. Of course you shouldn't be going back down there. Especially if the father of the missing boy is one of the…”

He seemed to search, in vain, for the right words. “You're too close,” he finally repeated. “I've told Olle to take over.”

Louise studied her clenched hands. “You can't do this,” she said. “I have no problem with working in Hvalsø.”

And she meant that. She hadn't seen Lars Frandsen in twenty years, and she could hardly imagine what he looked like now. Back then, he had been rangy with thick, light hair, round cheeks, and a broad nose that wiggled when he laughed. A happy boy with a certain status, he was the butcher's son and lived in a large residential home on Præstegårdsvej, with an indoor pool and access to his parents' bar in the basement, where there were pinball machines and a billiard table.

Louise knew all of this because he was the guy Klaus hung out with the most back then. They had finished their apprenticeships at the same time, Lars with his father in Hvalsø, Klaus with the butcher over in Tølløse. When they attended butcher school in Roskilde, they took the morning train together, which was how Klaus had become part of Big Thomsen's gang.

“I just thought it might not be good for you to meet one of them after what happened,” Rønholt added in a nearly fatherly tone. “It's better that I send one of the others to poke around.”

Louise shook her head. “If anyone's going to poke around over in Hvalsø, it should be me. It doesn't bother me one bit to meet the butcher or anyone else there.”

She gave him her stubborn look. “If I was that way, I couldn't walk around Copenhagen for fear of running into someone from the Eastern European mafia, not to mention the gang members I've put behind bars. If I'm scared or have problems confronting people, I should go into private security instead of holding on to this lousy-paying job.”

She paused for a moment, then leaned forward. “I'll find that boy. Tell Olle the case is mine.”

She met Olle in the hallway as he walked down from their office, carrying the few case files that Mik had mailed them. “Welcome back!” he said, and spread his arms.

He was about to keep chattering, so she broke in to tell him that Rønholt had changed his mind: She would continue with the case. “But it could very well be that we'll need your help,” she added, smiling at her tall, balding colleague before walking past him.

Louise was about to open the door to the Rathole when she remembered the dog. “Can I come in?” she called out. She felt like an idiot, standing there waiting for the green light to enter her own office.

A moment later Eik said, “Come on in.”

She hurried inside and sat down at her desk while Eik held the German shepherd's collar with one hand and pushed three dog biscuits across her desk with the other.

“Try giving him one,” he suggested.

“Come on, Eik! You're the one who has to deal with this dog. He shouldn't be here. It's not right that I can't work without worrying about a German shepherd biting my ass.”

“Charlie's not aggressive. He just has to get to know you. Give him a chance.”

Eik went on to say that the photographer who had set up the camera blind in Boserup Forest had called while she was talking to Rønholt. “He'll call back.”

Reluctantly, Louise grabbed one of the square dog biscuits and held it out. The dog growled from deep in his throat.

“Come on, give it to him!” Eik said. “Or else he'll think you're stringing him along!”

“This is bullshit!”

Eik broke out laughing. It flustered her that he looked so great when he laughed; she ignored Charlie's growling and held out the biscuit, which disappeared in a second. The dog began licking her hand.

“What did I tell you?” Eik said, gesturing for her to give Charlie another one.

The dog rested his big head on her lap. “Here!” She pushed him gently and dropped the biscuit on the floor to get him away, but as soon as he ate it, he was back.

“Oh, look. He loves you,” Eik said. He folded his arms and looked on with obvious contentment as she gave Charlie the last of the goodies. Louise shook her head.

The phone rang. She wiped her dog-slobbered hand on her pants. “That's perfect,” she answered when the photographer offered to meet them in the forest and show them the camera that had captured the boy. “We can be there in an hour.”

Eik caught her attention. “Is the boy in any of the photos we haven't seen?”

Louise repeated the question to the photographer, and thanked him when he offered to look through the pictures before meeting them.