Anders Knutas 03 - The Inner Circle aka Unknown

by Mari Jungstedt

  He sank to the floor.

  Jacobsson and Kihlgård hurried toward the farm and caught sight of Knutas, who was pressed up against the side of the house.

  "What's going on?" whispered Jacobsson as she inquisitively peeked through the window.

  "They're performing some kind of ritual. Both Eskil Rondahl and Aron Bjarke are inside, and Bjarke seems to be the leader, as you can see. I don't know what it means, but it looks as if they're drinking blood."

  "Are you serious?"

  Kihlgård made himself as small as possible, considering the bulk of his body.

  Knutas was starting to get very worried. The reinforcements that he'd called for hadn't arrived, and he wondered where Johan and Pia had gone.

  "Where's Rondahl?" asked Jacobsson.

  Knutas crouched down and let his eyes survey the mysterious figures inside the hall. He couldn't see Rondahl anywhere. Apparently he had left the room without Knutas noticing.

  "Both Johan and Pia have disappeared, too," said Knutas tensely. "And that was quite a while ago."

  Pia was lying in the most uncomfortable position imaginable. She had found a stairway at one end of the house, on the outside. She'd gone up to the attic and discovered a hatch that she was able to lift up so she had a full view of the living room below.

  Up there she could stretch out and film what was happening undisturbed, as long as none of the participants decided to look up and peer through the crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling.

  She would not have dreamed that what was playing out in the room below would ever occur in reality.

  Several of the participants were holding figures, which they dipped into the bowls containing something that actually did look like blood. She tried to zoom in on the sculptures to make out what they were supposed to symbolize. One woman was kissing her sculpture, and to Pia's horror, she then carefully began licking off the blood.

  Pia recognized Aron Bjarke, although he was behaving in a totally unexpected manner. His face was contorted and his eyes rigid as he stretched his arms overhead and intoned incantations that she couldn't understand.

  She let the camera roll, hoping that the images would be clear enough.

  Suddenly something happened. The door opened, and the man who had left the room a while ago came back. He looked agitated. Now Pia recognized him. It was the man from the film, Eskil Rondahl. She noticed that he had blood on his clothes and his hands, although she didn't recall seeing any on him when he left the room. But it could have come from one of the bowls that were being passed around.

  He went over to Aron and whispered in his ear. Aron's expression instantly changed. He turned toward Eskil to talk to him, but what they said was inaudible. Pia silently cursed. Now she could see only his back.

  Suddenly she saw through the camera's viewfinder that Aron was saying something to the man with the drum, and the rhythmic pounding abruptly stopped. One by one the participants noticed that the drumming had ceased, and they, too, stopped moving as they looked around the room in confusion. Aron raised his hand and started speaking. Pia heard him order those present to go home now, but to return on the following night to complete the ritual when the moon was full. If they came back, they would all experience something extraordinary.

  Some tried to ask Aron what he meant, but he merely raised his hand and gave them a faint smile.

  At the very moment when they discovered that Eskil Rondahl was gone, he came back. They watched him go over to his brother, they watched Aron speak to all the people gathered in the room, and they watched as a certain amount of confusion arose when the ritual was interrupted. One by one the participants left the house. The moonlight forced the three police officers to back so far away from the house that they had a hard time hearing what was said or seeing who came out. Neither Knutas nor Jacobsson recognized any of the individuals in the mysterious sect, except for Aron and Eskild. Since everyone's face was painted, it was hard to make out their features.

  Knutas was getting more and more worried about Johan and Pia. Where had they gone? He was afraid that something had happened to them.

  Where the hell were the police cars?

  They decided to wait to launch an assault until the guests had driven off. As soon as the last car disappeared beyond the hill, the door to the house opened and the two brothers came out. They walked briskly across the yard toward the dark barn. With tense and serious expressions, they went in, carefully closing the door behind them. A light went on inside.

  Knutas had an ice-cold feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he urged his colleagues to hurry. The three of them raced across the barnyard. When Knutas peered through the window, his fears were confirmed. Both brothers were bending over someone lying on the ground, and Aron was holding a knife.

  The man on the ground was Johan. It took only a few seconds before Knutas, followed by his colleagues, stormed through the door with their pistols drawn.

  "Police!" shouted Knutas. "Drop your weapon and put your hands up!"

  Aron and Eskil were leaning down, with their backs to the door. For a second they froze.

  "Drop the knife!" Knutas shouted again.

  He tried to see whether Johan was still alive, but the reporter's body was hidden from view. Slowly the two men straightened up and turned around. Even though Knutas had met Aron several times before, he hardly recognized him. His face had changed, but Knutas couldn't figure out what was different about it. His expression was not the same; his mask had fallen away. Knutas was struck by how similar the brothers looked.

  So far Aron had made no sign of letting go of the knife. He stared at Knutas with a remote look in his eye, as if he weren't really present in the room.

  "Drop the weapon!" Knutas shouted for the third time.

  He sensed Jacobsson and Kihlgård on either side of him, standing a couple of paces back. They had their guns aimed at the brothers.

  Knutas had to summon all his forces to make himself stand still. Precious time was being wasted while the life was possibly running out of Johan as he lay motionless on the floor. We have to call for an ambulance, thought Knutas. He could be dying.

  Slowly Aron released his grip on the knife, and with a hollow clang it fell to the floor. The officers immediately rushed forward and seized the men.

  Johan lay on the floor, his face white and his eyes closed. His shirt was dark red with blood that had soaked through and run out onto the floor.

  "He has a pulse, but it's faint," said Jacobsson.

  The door opened, and Pia came in, holding the camera in her hand. When she caught sight of Johan, she screamed and ran over to him.

  "He's alive," said Jacobsson, "but just barely."

  SUNDAY, AUGUST 8

  The walls were painted with soothing colors, and all the sounds were muted. She sat with the baby in her arms, as the chair she was sitting in rocked back and forth. It might have been a day like any other. She was nursing Elin. The baby greedily sucked in life, letting it flow through her little body. Emma had no tears. She wished that she could cry, but her anguish and despair were dry. Something became petrified inside her when she received word that Johan had been seriously wounded and was hovering between life and death. Inside she felt frozen solid, and she didn't know whether she would ever thaw out again.

  She looked down at Elin. It was quiet in the waiting room. By now it was undoubtedly all over the news: the story about the local reporter from Swedish TV who had been stabbed by one of the arrested perpetrators and who was now undergoing surgery at Visby Hospital.

  She thought that this was her punishment for not accepting Johan and his love. She had shut him out. She now regretted doing that, but it was too late. The doctors had told her that he had internal bleeding as a result of multiple stab wounds to the abdomen. A team of doctors was working to save his life.

  When the door to the intensive care unit opened, she gave such a start that Elin let go of her nipple.

  A doctor came out. She recognized him.
He was one of the doctors who had spoken to her earlier. He was a tall man, with a sympathetic air, maybe ten years older than she was. It was a long way to the door, which gave her time to study him. She realized that he was coming to talk to her. He had a loping gait; he was wearing white wooden clogs, and some of the polish had scuffed off the toes. She noticed that he was wearing a wedding ring. A ballpoint pen was sticking out of his breast pocket. Did doctors always have pens in their breast pockets? She couldn't remember ever seeing a doctor without one. He was suntanned, and he had those white rings around his eyes that people got from going sailing.

  He looked at her. He came closer. He was only a few yards away. Should she fall over now? She ventured a glance up at his face. He was very close.

  The sun was shining, Elin was sleeping, it was summer outside the window.

  The doctor looked kind, but she couldn't read anything at all from his expression.

  She felt him take her hand.

  FRIDAY, AUGUST 13

  Not that Knutas was superstitious, but the day's date hadn't gone unnoticed. Feeling rather despondent, he noted that his vacation was starting on Friday, the thirteenth of August. Rain was pouring down outside the windows of police headquarters. He had four weeks' vacation ahead of him. All that remained was for him to clear off his desk and compile his last report before he could put the shocking investigation behind him.

  The court proceedings for charging Aron Bjarke and Eskil Rondahl had been held on Thursday and resulted in both of them being arrested for the murders of Martina Flochten, Staffan Mellgren, and Gunnar Ambjörnsson. The charges also included attempted murder, theft, breach of the laws regarding national cultural treasures, illegal threats, fencing of stolen goods, and animal abuse.

  It was Aron who was thought to have carried out the actual murders. He was the stronger of the two brothers and the one more inclined to violence. Eskil handled the stolen goods operation, but he had also helped his brother with the homicides.

  Both of them denied any crime, which made no real difference. There was strong evidence against them—both the testimony of witnesses and the technical evidence, including the plastic packages containing blood that were in Eskil Rondahl's freezer. Aron Bjarke's fingerprints had been found on both the packages and the freezer itself. The stolen gold armlet that had disappeared from the Antiquities Room was discovered among Eskil Rondahl's possessions at the farm in Hall, along with a large quantity of other artifacts that had gone missing from various excavation sites on Gotland. His computer, which contained information about the sale of relics, had been confiscated. In addition, there was the film that Pia Lilja had given to the police. At the farm in Hall the body of a standardbred stallion was found buried under a mound of dirt. The horse had been sent out to graze in the summer pastures at Sudret along with sixty other horses, and that was why it hadn't been missed. It had been transported alive to the farm and decapitated there. The clothing of the victims was found in a locked chest in the burned-out bedroom belonging to the brothers' parents.

  After the arrest of the brothers at the farm in Hall, a whole new series of facts had emerged. It turned out that Staffan Mellgren belonged to a small group led by Aron Bjarke that practiced an extreme form of Æsir worship and shamanism. During the past week the police had succeeded in locating every single one of the twelve members. The little Æsir group existed solely in the minds of its members—there were no Web sites, no documents, and no group roster. Maybe that was how they had managed to keep it so secret. They had devoted themselves to an occult form of idol worship in which the blood sacrifice of various animals was a common practice. On the other hand, none of the other participants was aware that it had included human blood. Many were horribly shocked when they realized that they had drunk the blood of a former member, Staffan Mellgren.

  During the interrogation, it emerged that the murder of Martina Flochten was apparently provoked by the controversy surrounding the plans for a hotel at Högklint, which was the group's most sacred site. When the plans became known, a conflict arose between the leader, Aron Bjarke, and Staffan Mellgren, who was regarded as the second in command of the group.

  Bjarke wanted to take drastic measures to stop the construction, but Mellgren was opposed to the idea, and he persuaded the rest of the members to support his view. This schism then became a determining factor. Apparently Bjarke couldn't let go of his own ideas, which got stronger and stronger. When Patrick Flochten's daughter, Martina, started having a love affair with Mellgren, Bjarke saw an opportunity to administer a double blow.

  Knutas had spoken with Agneta Larsvik, who was convinced that the impending forensic psychiatric examination would show that both brothers were seriously unbalanced. According to her, Aron had manipulated Eskil into taking part in the murders. Eskil wouldn't have been capable of carrying them out alone. In terms of guilt, however, both had to be considered perpetrators of the crimes.

  During the interrogation, which went on all week, an image of the brothers' childhood had emerged. Both had endured a difficult upbringing. They'd had trouble fitting in and were frequently bullied. Their parents had been devout Christians who had strict rules for everything in their home. If either of the boys broke a rule or did anything wrong, he was harshly punished. Physical violence was just as common as psychological abuse.

  They had both managed to make it through school. It had gone better for Aron than for Eskil, because things came easier to him, and he was also more outgoing. The fact that he was a handsome boy helped him more than he realized. Aron had gone on to continue his education. He studied in Stockholm, and it was then that he came into contact with Æsir worshippers. His interest in ancient Nordic mythology went hand in hand with his interest in archaeology. His belief grew stronger over the years, and while in Stockholm he changed his last name to one that had more of an Æsir sound to it. When he returned to Gotland, he found some like-minded people through the college, and eventually they started the small extremist organization that shunned any other Æsir groups.

  Aron awakened an interest in Æsir worship in his elder brother, who was still living with their parents, even though he was over fifty. The brothers were strongly influenced by their parents and remained utterly devoted to them when Aron moved back home. By taking part in the group meetings, Eskil began the process of liberating himself. All his life he had taken refuge in the artifacts that he worked with, and through them he had made contact with spiritual beings. He started having trouble distinguishing between what was real and what wasn't. He began regarding the artifacts as his own. He spent a lot of his free time sitting in front of the computer when he wasn't helping his parents on the farm, and after a while he discovered a market for ancient relics. He gradually started selling objects, and it went extremely well. Now and then he would go to Stockholm to meet a contact person. He made a lot of money on the thefts, and he used most of it for the farm.

  Each of them had his own way of filling in the holes from his childhood—the lack of care and parental support and solace. Yet something more was needed to fill in the painful void. That was how the whole thing got started. Presumably the fire in which their parents had perished was the deciding factor. That was Knutas's theory, at any rate.

  Prosecutor Birger Smittenberg thought there was sufficient cause to reopen the investigation. In light of the summer's violent crimes, there was reason to suspect that the brothers had also set the fire that brought about the death of their parents.

  Knutas put aside the last report.

  He left police headquarters and walked out into the rain. He now had a week ahead of him out in the country with his family before the fall semester started for his children. Then he would be alone in the summer house and could spend his time doing woodwork and going fishing, which was his favorite pastime. When he was halfway home, the sky darkened and he heard thunder rumbling in the distance, over the sea.

  Somehow that seemed just as it should be.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
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br />   Occasionally I have taken artistic liberties to change things for the benefit of the narrative. This includes Swedish TV's coverage of Gotland, which in the book has been moved to Stockholm. I have nothing but respect for Swedish TV's regional news program Östnytt, which covers Gotland with a permanent team stationed in Visby.

  The settings in the book are almost all described as they actually appear in reality, although there are a few exceptions.

  Any errors that may have slipped in are entirely my own.

  First and foremost, I wish to thank my husband, journalist Cenneth Niklasson, for his loving support, tough criticism, and good ideas.

  Thanks also to:

  Gösta Svensson, former detective superintendent with the Visby police, for his invaluable help with all the police work.

  Olle Hoffman, archaeologist, for his willingness to share his expertise and information about his fascinating work.

  Mikaela Säfvenberg, archaeologist and authorized guide.

  Martin Cstalos, the Forensic Medicine Laboratory in Solna

  Johan Gardelius and Bo Ekedahl, crime technicians, Visby police.

  Håkan Onsjö, veterinarian

  Ulf Åsgård, psychiatrist Marie and Göthe Modin, managers of the Warfsholm hotel

  My first readers for their valuable opinions:

  Lena Allerstam, journalist, Swedish TV

  Bosse Jungstedt, my brother, and Kerstin Jungstedt, my sister-in-law

  Lilian Andersson, editor at Bonnier Educational Books

  Anna-Maja Persson, journalist, Swedish TV