The Killing Forest

by Sara Blaedel

  A post had been stuck into the ground. On top of it was a large, black horse’s head.

  Louise froze. Eik bumped into her from behind, and she stepped on his foot. He grabbed her shoulders to steady her. The horse’s head had been cut off far down the neck; its mane lay draped over the post like a veil. Black, dead eyes stared at them. A few big blowflies buzzed around the corners of the eyes and the bloody bottom of the neck.

  “What in hell is this?” She pushed at Eik to get away from it.

  “Frederik calls it a nithing pole,” Camilla said. She sounded feeble. She led Louise back into the kitchen while Eik walked over the lawn to join Frederik and Tønnesen. “It’s part of the old Nordic religion. It means that someone has cast a spell on us.”

  “I’ve never heard of anything like this,” Louise said. Her legs were still shaky.

  “He says it’s like when the Viking ships sailed in with a dragon head carved into the stem. It was considered an act of aggression.”

  Camilla sat down and pulled a chair over for her bad leg. “God knows where they got the head. Everyone around here has horses. I hope it’s not one from close by. The whole area will be screaming!”

  Louise walked over to the Nespresso machine and asked what Camilla wanted.

  “Strong, big, with milk.” Camilla leaned over. “I started crying, I was so scared.” She breathed deeply for a moment before straightening up. Louise handed her the coffee.

  “First thing in the morning,” Camilla said, “I open the door and step outside. We eat breakfast on the terrace when the weather’s good.” She looked up at Louise. “I didn’t see it until I was standing right in front of it.”

  Louise watched through the window as Eik let Charlie out of the car. He ran across the lawn, his snout to the grass. “How long have you been hiding the boy, and why didn’t you tell us? You knew we were looking for him!”

  “We weren’t hiding him.” Camilla held the coffee mug with both hands and stared down into the foam.

  “You do realize, don’t you, that a young woman has in all probability been murdered in your forest. Sune might be an important witness, but instead of calling the police and saying you found the boy, you do nothing. Until you let our witness disappear again.” Louise’s hands were shaking with fury, but she knew she had to get hold of herself, to focus. “How long have you been hiding him from the police?”

  Now it was Camilla’s turn to explode. She slammed the mug down, splashing coffee onto the table. “I haven’t been hiding him, goddamn it. Not from the police. Something terrible happened yesterday evening, and we took care of him. The only person we hid him from was the idiot dragging him over to a car.”

  She shook her head and closed her eyes for a moment. Then she explained that she and Frederik had been taking some supplies out to him.

  “We heard screams, and we saw a man dragging him on the ground. We did what anyone would have done; we brought him back to safety.”

  “What anyone would have done is to call the police,” Louise said.

  “Damn it, Louise! We wanted to, but he wouldn’t have come with us if we did. Besides, he needed somewhere safe, a meal, and a shower.”

  “Did he speak with his father out in the forest?”

  Camilla’s explanation had eased her somewhat. And she had to admit that she probably would have done the same thing. The well-being of the boy came first, of course it did.

  Camilla nodded. “I don’t know how long they spoke; we didn’t get there until Sune started screaming, and Frederik ran over to him. Then I followed him to his camp, but his father had disappeared.”

  Before Louise could ask about the man who had abducted Sune, Camilla shoved a scrap of paper across the table. “This is the man’s license plate number. You can check it out. It was a black four-wheel-drive, Frederik said.”

  She paused for a moment. “Sune was shaking like a leaf when he ran over to me. He was so scared. This may be just another case for you, but that boy screamed like it was life or death. And he was in shock.”

  Louise nodded. She read the license plate and was immediately stunned; she recognized the ST in front of the numbers. That those two letters and her friend’s description pointed to Thomsen’s four-wheel-drive didn’t surprise her. But knowing that he was a step in front of them made her skin crawl.

  “How much did Sune tell you?” The three men and the dog were walking across the lawn now, back to the house.

  Camilla shook her head. “Nothing. Only that now they were after his father, too, because he tried to protect Sune. He looked terrible, and he had no place to go. That’s why Frederik told him he could stay with us. But he wasn’t in any shape to answer questions; he needed to sleep before we tried to find out anything more. He was sleeping like a rock in the guest room beside yours when I went to bed.”

  “Would you have heard if the boy got up and tiptoed out during the night?”

  “No, I doubt we would have. But the kitchen door was broken into from the outside. And he could have just unlocked the door and walked out.”

  Louise thought for a second. “You’re sure his father was protecting him against the other man?”

  “I didn’t see it, but that’s what he said. I only saw the man who hit Frederik before he drove off. Actually, I only saw him from behind. But like I say, the boy was totally shaken up and very afraid for his father. He said that his father had tried to stop the man who’d taken him.”

  “And you saw the man?”

  “I told you, only his back. It wasn’t light enough to see a whole lot. Mostly, I saw a shadow walking away.” Camilla rubbed her forehead with her fingers. “I don’t know what shocked the boy most, seeing his father get hit or the argument between the two men.”

  “He might’ve been surprised that his father was defending him,” Louise suggested. “He might have felt he didn’t need to hide anymore, knowing that his father would fight for him.”

  Camilla frowned. “Why in the world would anyone put their child in a situation like this?” she mumbled.

  The men walked in. “No doubt about it,” Frederik said, “they used the old trail to get up here.” He set coffee mugs on the table. “The grass has been trampled, and it looks like there’s been a struggle.”

  Louise glanced at Eik. “Let’s go. We need to find the butcher, and I have a feeling we need to find him fast.”

  34

  The butcher’s white van was parked in the middle of the lot, as if it had been abandoned in haste. Otherwise the farmhouse looked dark and deserted.

  Louise was apprehensive, less about the quiet than about her uncertainty—about not knowing what awaited her. She had the unmistakable sense that something was slipping away.

  Eik slammed the car door behind her. As she walked up to the door, she flashed on an image of Jane’s pleading expression. She hoped with all her heart that the family was finally together. Hoped that Sune had been taken to his parents, and right now he was sitting beside his mother’s bed. But she couldn’t forget the horse’s head. The threat and the skirmish out in the forest pointed in a different direction, toward some sort of a showdown.

  Louise knocked, and after a moment she tried the door. It was open. She listened for sounds from the house, then stepped inside. The kitchen was empty, as was the living room, but the door to Jane’s bedroom stood open a crack. Louise looked around. A phone and a wallet lay on the dining room table. A pair of slippers had been kicked off over by the sofa; a wrinkled blanket hung over its arm and down to the floor.

  “Hello,” she cried out. She walked to the door. “Anybody here?”

  She stopped. She thought she heard a sound, cloth or some material being rubbed, but no one answered. Then she heard someone breathing in heavily and sniffling.

  Louise pushed the door open. The butcher sat hunched over in a chair beside the empty bed. His forearms rested on his thighs, and his hands hung down. His face was pale and streaked with tears, his eyes red and shiny. Here is a man falli
ng to pieces, Louise thought. The bed was made, the comforter’s cover smooth, the pillows fluffed up.

  Suddenly she had difficulty breathing, as if air wasn’t reaching her lungs. Fragments of sentences, images from school, long-forgotten memories swarmed inside her head. She and Jane exploring Hammershus during a camping trip to Bornholm. Summers with swimming lessons in Uggerløse’s outdoor pool, where she reached her hundred- and thousand-meter levels. The school bus had picked them up beside Skolesøen every morning, and when school was out they went to the grill and ate French fries.

  She laid a hand on the butcher’s shoulder. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes followed her movements. Now he sat up and looked over at the doorway where Eik was standing. His mouth trembled, but he pressed his lips together and formed what ended up as a grimace.

  Louise pointed to the bed and raised her eyebrows.

  The butcher shook his head. “Jane is at her parents. She’s left me.”

  A dying woman doesn’t leave her husband, Louise thought. Her anxiety returned.

  “Did you tell her that you ran away yesterday instead of staying and helping your son?” Eik asked.

  The butcher lowered his head. “I didn’t run away,” he said softly. Not as an excuse. More to inform them. “I followed the people, who rescued Sune, up to their manor. I watched them take him inside. I don’t expect you to understand, but believe me, my son is safer there than with me.”

  He buried his face in his hands, his thick fingers seeming to hold his desperation. “They can’t do this to me.” His voice was hoarse. “To him. He’s just a boy. I don’t know where to take him so they can’t find him. I don’t know how to protect him.”

  He whispered the last words. Then he sat up. “I have to go get him; we have to get away from here. There’s just so much. What’ll I do with the shop? And what about Jane? I’m not sure she’s strong enough to be moved again. She didn’t have the strength to even speak to me last night when I called.”

  Eik walked over to the bed and sat beside Louise. She would have given the butcher a few more minutes, but Eik took over. “Unfortunately it’s too late.”

  His voice was neutral, no hint of accusation or blame. At first it seemed as if the butcher hadn’t understood what he said, but then he looked angrily at Eik.

  “What do you mean, too late?” he sneered. “If you’re going to sic social services on us, go right ahead. But I’ll be damned if you’re going to stop me from trying to protect my boy!”

  “Sune’s not at the manor anymore,” Eik said. He explained that someone had broken into the house during the night. “This morning he was gone.”

  The butcher’s arms fell; he stared silently at Eik, as if trying to understand what had been said.

  “They stuck a post in the ground with a horse’s head on top, just outside their door,” Louise said. “What should we make of that?”

  The butcher’s face twisted and strained. Desperation, Louise thought. That’s what it looked like. Genuine desperation and fear.

  “They’ll kill him,” he whispered. “The nithing pole means that they’re turning against the people who were hiding Sune. And they’ll sacrifice Sune to the gods as punishment for breaking out of the brotherhood.”

  “You don’t kill somebody for leaving a group of friends,” Louise said. Then Klaus came to mind.

  “This is no group of friends,” he said. “I thought you of all people had that figured out. This is hell. No one gets out.”

  35

  He could be anywhere. The possibilities seemed endless to Louise as she sat in Eik’s car, watching the fields around Skov Hastrup slip by. There were so many places you could easily hide a fifteen-year-old boy. Empty Boy Scout cabins. All the barns in the area. Haylofts, sheds out in the forest. A search would be immensely difficult if Thomsen had decided to stow the boy away.

  After they had handed the butcher over to a few of Nymand’s men so he could help find Sune, Louise thought the gnawing in her stomach came from knowing there was little time. It had started when she heard of Sune’s disappearance from Camilla and Frederik’s house. But now, as Eik turned onto Kvandrupvej and headed for Big Thomsen’s farm, she realized the source of her dread was the thought of what these men might put the boy through. The butcher was absolutely right. If anyone knew how far they would go to stop whoever was in their way, she did.

  “Come on, come on, damn it,” she barked as Eik took a curve and Thomsen’s farm came into sight. Instead he slowed down.

  “Have they called in?” he asked.

  Louise clenched her teeth and shook her head. Nymand had sent his men out to the mason in Såby and Pussy’s farm in Særløse, which was less than a kilometer from her and Eik. The plan was that when they were close to their destinations they would text Nymand, who then would ensure that the searches took place simultaneously.

  Louise had just texted him that they were ready. She stared at her phone’s display, waiting for Go.

  She gave Eik points for not saying anything about her pushing him, when all they could do was sit and wait. She glanced at him. His longish dark hair was combed back. He had thrown his leather jacket in the backseat of the car, and now she noticed he was wearing a white T-shirt, not black. He always wore black T-shirts.

  When they had first met, he admitted to her that he dressed in black solely because he hated shopping. He bought clothes in stacks. Ten black T-shirts, five pairs of black Levi’s, same model. Black socks. He didn’t wear underwear, he told her. He picked up that habit during a long journey in India.

  Now she noticed that the T-shirt wasn’t the only thing different. The two thin yellow and green strings he usually wore around his wrist were gone, as was his shark’s tooth necklace. She’d never asked him about these things; she had the impression that he’d been wearing them since his girlfriend disappeared.

  She wanted to lay her hand on his arm, to feel his sinewy muscles, the warmth of his body.

  “Do you really think they might kill the boy?”

  Louise straightened up. Was it possible? She thought about it for a while, then nodded. “I’m afraid so. To save their own asses. I’m afraid they’ll do almost anything to avoid a murder charge. If they have any brains at all, they’ll know that’s exactly what they’re facing if Sune talks. And if things start falling apart for them, who knows what else will come to light.”

  “But killing a boy?”

  “That’s not how they see it. He’s not a boy to them. In their world, he’s an adult who broke a vow of silence.”

  “In their world?”

  “Maybe that’s not how things work in the city,” she said, annoyed at him now. “But out here, people stick together. I think that’s how it is in most small communities. You stick together, and from what I’ve seen, it’s plain that Thomsen and his gang have taken this type of solidarity to extremes. The butcher said it. It’s not a question of friendship now, it’s like a street gang or sect no one can get out of. That’s why I think it’s all the same to them if someone’s fifteen or thirty.”

  That feeling in her stomach, that anxiety, was anger now. “Back when we had parties in school, friends took care of each other. If someone was getting beat up, friends stepped in. Those were the rules, and I think everyone was okay with that, with what friends were expected to do.”

  Eik grunted, but he didn’t comment. She wasn’t sure what he thought about all this.

  “It’s not very politically correct,” she said, “but I can’t say I wouldn’t do the same. If I were out with Camilla, and somebody jumped her, I’d get involved.”

  “That’d be something to see,” he mumbled.

  Louise ignored him. Instead she leaned over, and she was about to comment on his T-shirt when her phone rang. “Let’s go,” Nymand said.

  * * *

  Eik floored it. Fields and corrals flew by, but all Louise saw was the image of Big Thomsen, Sune’s tormentor, who had resorted to violence to nab him. She was more than ready to
get in his face about that.

  The farmhouse’s white gable came into view. Thomsen’s Toyota Land Cruiser was parked at the end of one wing, its tailgate open.

  “Showtime,” Eik said, and he drove in.

  Their plan was that if Thomsen didn’t come out, Louise would take the back door, Eik would stay out front. If he wasn’t home, they would have to contact a neighbor to witness the search. But none of this was necessary; Big Thomsen walked out the minute Eik drove up.

  He didn’t seem thrilled to see them, but neither did he act as if he’d been expecting them. He looked like his normal self, laid-back, his hands in the pockets of his blue work pants. He clearly meant to appear standoffish, but for whatever reason it didn’t work on Louise, who walked up to him and said they would like his permission to search his property.

  Eik spoke up from behind her. “We have a warrant, of c—”

  “Stop!” Louise shouted, as Thomsen lifted his phone to his ear. “No calls. You’re going back inside with my colleague, and you two can have a chat while I look around.”

  “This is not all right, you going around harassing citizens this way all the time. What is it you think I’ve done?”

  She wanted to tell him there were plenty of reasons why they’d returned. She wanted to yell it in his face. She couldn’t stop thinking of Sune, and of the three-year-old boy without a mother to care for him. But she contented herself with giving him a dirty look.

  “We’re not saying you’ve done anything,” Eik said as he herded him toward the house. “But we know you were out in Boserup Forest last night, dragging a fifteen-year-old boy to your car. We also know you had a scrap with the boy’s father, but Sune managed to get away. We want to know where the boy is.”

  “I wasn’t out in any forest last night. And how the hell should I know where the boy is?” Thomsen sounded amused. “And I haven’t ‘had a scrap’ with anyone. Either you fight or you don’t fight.”