From the Ashes

by Sandra Saidak

  “Wait a minute,” said Adolf. “That can’t be right. I heard him speak just a few minutes ago.”

  “I’m getting there,” said Karl. “The poor fool pulled Seppi’s mouth open—and Seppi bit off three of his fingers! Glove leather and all! Next, he head butted him into the forge—they hadn’t put out the fire since they needed it for the hot irons—and brained two soldiers with an iron bar.

  “These recruits, or whatever they were, panicked, and Seppi finished off most of them with his bare hands. Rolf and one of his guards made it out alive, but that was all.”

  “How did Seppi get out?”

  “No one knows. He had at least a dozen bullets in him, and Rolf’s rather the old fashioned type when it comes to interrogation: whips and hot irons. Seppi shouldn’t have been able to walk, let alone run. But he did. And now he’s a legend. I know people who’d follow him to the gates of Hell.

  “But you want to know what’s really funny about all this? Seppi wasn’t even in the resistance back then! He didn’t tell them anything, because he honestly didn’t know! But now, he’s the undisputed chief enemy of the Reich and everything it stands for. He says he won’t rest until every last Nazi is dead.”

  “I’m so glad he didn’t say ‘German,’” said Adolf. “A lot of them do, you know.” He shook his head. “And so once again, our Illustrious Leaders create their own downfall.”

  “How do you mean?” asked Karl.

  “You said it yourself: Seppi wasn’t the least bit dangerous to the Party, until they gave him a reason to be. And he’s not the only one. Look at the two of us, for example.”

  Karl was thoughtful for a moment. “Do you really think so?” he asked. “I mean, do you think, if they hadn’t targeted the museum crowds, if they had just left us alone, we’d never have become a threat?”

  “I guess I always assumed that,” Adolf said feeling surprised. “But maybe not. The principles of Judaism could never have co existed with something like the Reich. Maybe a clash was inevitable.”

  “Maybe they should have burned the books along with the Jews,” said Karl.

  “I’m sure right now, there are many powerful men expressing that very sentiment. But I think it wouldn’t have mattered. I think Judaism would have resurfaced anyway, even without the props.”

  “You always were the mystic, Adolf. Do you really think it’s going to happen? That a dead religion will somehow topple the Thousand Year Reich?”

  “If it doesn’t, something else will. It’s inevitable now.”

  “Yes but when? Will we live to see it? And how do we know it’ll be any better than what he have now?”

  “Good questions, Karl. Maybe if we live long enough, we’ll find out.”

  The cave dwelling partisans, who by now were acting if this sort of thing happened every day, called Adolf and Karl to supper as soon as they finished talking.

  “Will you bless the meal, Rabbi?” asked Rika.

  “That should be the job of the youngest child,” he said.

  The younger people exchanged embarrassed glances. “We don’t know any of the blessings,” said Thoresten.

  “Then I’ll teach you,” said Adolf. “Who wants to help me?”

  Several boys and girls came forward. He recited each blessing, and had the children repeat them.

  As always, he was moved by just how many people bowed their heads as he prayed, revering the act, the speaker, and possibly even the God he prayed to.

  It wouldn’t be easy, he reflected, but just maybe, in this place, they could all accomplish something.

  CHAPTER 22

  “It could just be misinformation,” Thoresten said hopefully.

  Ilsa exchanged a glance with the Eikki, the grizzled old radio operator, and shook her head. “It’s from a reliable source. And really, it’s not that surprising. We should have been prepared for it.”

  Adolf rubbed his pounding temples. Ilsa was right, but sometimes he wished she could be a little more tactful. Both agreed that they had seen and accomplished more in these past two months in Finland than in the previous three years. But neither had ever been part of so large an operation before—let alone, tried to lead one.

  “Prepared for the Party to learn Hebrew?” said Rika.

  “It was supposed to be unbreakable!” wailed one of the younger men.

  “No code is unbreakable,” said Eikki.

  “But it wasn’t just a code,” said Thoresten. “It’s a language. One that no living Party member should even know of.”

  “You were supposed to burn everything you didn’t take out of the museum with you,” Karl said with an accusing glare at Ilsa.

  “No, I was supposed to doctor the records so no one would realize how much was missing,” Ilsa said calmly. “Then they were supposed to burn everything.”

  “So what happened?” asked Thoresten.

  “Nazi efficiency, most likely,” said Ilsa. “They save copies of everything.”

  “But how did they realize it was Hebrew in the first place?” asked Rika. “How did they even make the connection?”

  “Just as no code is unbreakable,” said Thoresten, “No side of any war is safe from treachery. It was only a matter of time before the Party captured someone who knew the language, and got it from them.”

  “I’d hardly call breaking under torture treachery,” said Rika.

  “Whatever we call it,” said Adolf, trying to move the discussion toward a solution. “We have to decide what to do—“

  “—And soon,” Eikki finished for him. “Our communications network has gotten too big to go back to using old-fashioned military codes.”

  Adolf pondered for a moment. “You know, it’s never been just the language,” he said. “The Party knows the language, yes. But the stories; the people from Torah—that’s what they don’t know.”

  “But they will,” said Rika.

  Thoresten shook his head, eagerly taking up the thread of Adolf’s thinking. “They’re only just learning the language. But the code depends on knowing Judaism. To break it fully, they’ll have to think like Jews.”

  For a moment, there was silence. Slowly, almost against their will, smiles slid across the faces of the gathered partisans.

  “It would almost be worth it, wouldn’t it?” said Rika. “To lose the war—but know the whole Nazi Party had to halfway become Jews to beat us?”

  “Almost,” said Adolf. “However, I don’t intend to lose the war. We have, at the outside, six months, before they can decode any message we send. I’d say that gives us three months to come up with something new, or…” He let the sentence trail off, unfinished.

  “Or what?” Thoresten asked impatiently.

  “Or be ready to take on the Party and win—in three months.”

  The silence that reigned was almost palpable. Adolf was enough of a leader to recognize an advantage when he saw one. Before anyone could speak, he divided his team into groups and assigned each one a task, ranging from new code ideas to obtaining the specs for the Party’s worldwide broadcast system. They departed in silence.

  “Ludwig was right,” said a voice behind Adolf. He turned to find Seppi leaning against the rough stone wall of the cave.

  “About what?” asked Adolf.

  “You are the One.”

  “I wish people would stop talking about me like that!”

  “Like what?”

  “Like…there was a capital ‘O’ when you said the word ‘one.’”

  Seppi chuckled. “Most young men would eat up the praise and adulation! But then, I guess that’s part of the deal. The ones who want the job, and all the worship that goes with it, are the ones you’re better off not having. I guess the only good leader is one who doesn’t want to be one.”

  “And don’t forget the rest of the equation,” said Adolf. “Those who make the best leaders in winning the revolution are not the people you want running the government afterwards.”

  “That’s not usually a problem,” Sepp
i. “They generally manage to get shot by the time the war’s over. Though I have to admit, sometimes it’s by their own side.”

  “Well, like you said, at least it solves the problem.”

  Seppi didn’t smile. “I hope that doesn’t happen this time, Adolf. Because, I believe you to be one of the rare exceptions. And it’s going to take someone very special indeed, to clean up this mess when it’s all over.”

  I’ll add that to my list of things to do, thought Adolf, taking a foot path out of the cave.

  It was summer now in the land of the midnight sun, although Adolf rarely left the caves often enough to know it. Ilsa, who divided her time between hunting reindeer and keeping up with the news from all known forces of their ragged revolution, saw more of it.

  Adolf had learned that this base did not, in fact, hold the population of a small town. It was more like a city. Since he was still not certain of every path in this place, he stopped frequently to ask directions, and at the same time, checked on the progress of each group in the vast network of caves.

  There was an entire team of scientists who lived in one of the inner caves, and probably saw the sun less often than Adolf. Currently, they were poring over the medical notes Adolf had brought from the polio colony in the hopes of further breakthroughs. So far, none of them had found anything to support Alina’s theories of new Party super weapons.

  Soldiers were being trained in various outer caves. Medical teams came and went from the base infirmary, responding to calls for help far and wide, but usually arriving too late due to limited transportation. There was only so much you could do with sled dogs and skis.

  When he finally reached open air, Adolf stood for a moment dazzled by the sun. Then he nerved himself for a look down the mountain. Despite the beauty of it all, the dizzying drop from where he stood always caused his stomach to tighten. The ledge he stood on was nearly at the tree line. Above him was only gray rock and snow. Below was the brilliant splash of green fir trees, snowy fjords and deep valleys, crossed with streams that looked like tiny blue threads from up here.

  Children picked berries, clambering up and down the slopes like the mountain goats these people raised. Then he saw a truly amazing sight. A group of women were sunbathing on a small ledge—and one of them was Ilsa.

  Granted, she was more modest than the others, with a small towel over her crotch. The other women seemed intent on capturing the warmth of Finland’s short summer—with everything they had. Still, the sight of her there, relaxed, at peace—and natural—delighted him. Almost as much as the fact that she was actually taking time off from the war.

  “Hello, Adolf,” Ilsa said lazily, after he had stared for several minutes. “Care to join us?” The other three women smiled invitingly. No one seemed disconcerted by his fully clothed presence.

  “I’m afraid the sun would be wasted on my poor, pale flesh,” he teased. “Did we win the war and someone forget to tell me?”

  “No,” said Ilsa, sitting up, and stretching. “But with you setting that deadline of three months, I thought we’d better take a break while we still could. This might be the last one for quite some time.”

  “Actually,” said one of the other women, “the real break for everyone will be next week at Litha. We’re working on Ilsa now, since she’s such a tough case.”

  “Litha is the Midsummer Festival these northerners have celebrated for thousands of years,” explained Ilsa.

  Adolf smiled. Any annual celebration that could survive unchecked through these times was bound to be good for morale. “So what will we be doing?”

  The oldest of the three locals smiled. “Singing. Dancing. Making love under the midnight sun. Listening to the skalds recite the old tales. And—if the reindeer are cooperative—feasting.”

  “With Ilsa here to hunt with us, we’ll have reindeer whether they want to cooperate or not!” said the youngest, one of Ilsa’s many devoted followers.

  “Normally there’s a lot of drinking, too,” said the third woman. “But now, with nothing but Garnet’s homemade brew, you take your life in your hands if you do!”

  “We’ve always been a people of risk takers,” said the first. “And notoriously hard to kill—even with Garnet’s home brew.”

  Midsummer Eve, when it arrived was everything the locals had promised. For a moment, it seemed, they were suspended in time. There was no war. No hunger. No terror. Only the impossible beauty of a summer night that seemed never to end. And the rituals of a people as old as the Jews.

  Adolf took part in the festivities with relish. He could hardly help doing so. They were outdoors, feasting in a mountain meadow so green it was nearly blinding. There was roasted reindeer meat, goat’s milk cheese, nuts, berries and, for anyone brave enough, Garnet’s mead. He danced with Ilsa, and most of the other women of the base, to the tunes of drums, fiddles and flutes. When he was finally too tired to dance, Adolf lay back in the grass, and listened to an old man tell the great deeds of Thor and Odin.

  Yet, for all the beauty and pleasure, and the women who invitingly explained that for this one night, marriage vows were null, Adolf could not shake off pangs of envy.

  These people were partaking in a ritual as old as any Jewish festival Adolf and his friends had imitated—but here, it truly belonged to the revelers. It was theirs by birth and by blood. Perhaps, in the great scheme of things, the difference was not really important, but for the first time, Adolf became painfully aware of the fact that there was a difference.

  “Is this my husband, looking so grave and serious at a festival?” Ilsa stood over Adolf, a drinking horn in each hand.

  “What’s wrong with that?” asked Adolf. “Afraid I’ll muscle into your territory?

  “Maybe.” Ilsa sat beside Adolf, and handed him a horn.

  “I’m just feeling envious,” said Adolf.

  “Of who?”

  “Of anyone born with actual blood ties to the heroes who founded their religious tradition. Anyone who has a birthright to ritual, rather than stealing it.”

  “Is that what you think we’ve done with Judaism?”

  “What else do you call it? We only found it at all because our grandparents kept the books as curiosities of a dead race. We celebrated some of their most sacred rituals as a game. Just because we’ve started taking it seriously—does that give us the right to claim the traditions? The covenant with God?” He took a sip of the mead, and then gagged as liquid fire shot down his throat.

  Ilsa patted his back helpfully. “Take it slow. It grows on you.”

  “If it doesn’t kill you first!” gasped Adolf.

  “If you think about it, most things in life are like that. Anyway, back to your mood swings. Blood isn’t the only thing that gives a person the right to claim a tradition. Take this festival—Litha. Nearly half the people in this compound come from outside Scandinavia, but they’re celebrating it just the same.”

  “As guests,” sighed Adolf. “Which is a fine, time honored tradition in its own right. But…I’m tired of being a guest! I want something that belongs to me—while at the same time, I belong to it! The only traditions my parents gave me were some neo pagan bullshit manufactured by the First Führer’s Minister of Propaganda!”

  “Not much of an inheritance,” agreed Ilsa. “But then, how are you any different from Abraham? He wasn’t born to Judaism any more than you were. Torah says the Lord called him. Isn’t that what He’s done with you?”

  “Has He? According to Torah, God literally called Abraham! He introduced Himself, and spoke to Abraham in a language he could understand. Established a covenant with him. Hardly the stumbling around in the dark I’ve been doing these last seven years.”

  “You sure you want the same covenant Abraham had? I didn’t think that circumcision thing sounded all that appealing.”

  At that, Adolf laughed. “Good point.” He took another swig from the horn. “I just wish for something equally clear and personal. You know? Like an engraved invitation?” />
  Ilsa shook her head. “Be careful what you wish for on a night like this. They say the walls between worlds are thin.”

  Adolf laughed again and drained the horn.

  Shortly before dawn, Ilsa helped Adolf find his bed. He was eloquently continuing an explanation for the universe and his plans for its future. The frightening thing about a drunken Adolf, the community agreed, was that he didn’t slur his speech, and sounded just as convincing as when he was sober.

  After several protests that he could find his own bed, Adolf allowed Ilsa to tuck him in.

  He dreamed that night, that he was walking with Ilsa through a meadow dotted with pomegranate trees. They continued past a flock of sheep, tended by a shepherd who was playing a harp. In the distance, an old man and a young boy were descending a mountain. On another mountain, in the opposite direction, was beached a ponderous wooden ship.

  They paused by a gurgling stream of milk and honey. Adolf stopped and turned to kiss Ilsa, then saw, over her shoulder, a strange flash, as if the sun was rising in the west. He stared for a moment in a puzzling silence as birds began to fall from the surrounding trees. Then, the trees began to bend, as if in a ferocious wind. All at once, the trees and everything else in the field burst into silent flames, crumbled into ash, and blew away. Horrified, Adolf grabbed hold of Ilsa, as if by his own strength he could save her. For a moment, he thought he had.

  Then, very slowly, Ilsa turned to ashes in his arms, and began to crumble through his fingers. Just as her face began to blacken, she looked at Adolf and asked, “Why didn’t you stop it when you had the chance?”

  Then she was gone.

  Adolf came awake, choking on non-existent smoke and gagging on a bitter metallic taste in his mouth. He cried out Ilsa’s name, but heard only her sleepy response as she lay safe and whole beside him.

  CHAPTER 23

  A few days later, Adolf sat alone at a long wooden table. Spread before him were carefully organized sheets of paper. There were maps, lists of names, messages that defied decoding and, in the margins, a few scrawls in Adolf’s own handwriting.