Fire (54 page)

Adriana phoned yesterday to remind them how important it is that they present themselves in the courtroom looking ‘proper’. Vanessa has a long, hot shower, washes her hair and combs out the tangles. She finds a pair of scissors on the top shelf in the cabinet and trims the split ends.

Back in her bedroom, she puts on the only one of Anna-Karin’s bras that seems to fit more or less okay. The fact is that she’s using the wrong size altogether and Vanessa promises herself she’ll tell Anna-Karin that. Later, if they get to live long enough.

When she starts a serious search in Anna-Karin’s wardrobe she almost loses all hope. She keeps rummaging helplessly among old tracksuits and saggy trousers.

She should have guessed. Cursing herself, she walks back to the kitchen.

‘There you are. Up already?’ Mia Nieminen says without looking at her daughter.

‘Mum,’ Vanessa says, despite the word feeling so utterly wrong, ‘do you mind if I look around in your wardrobe?’

Baffled, Mia turns to look at her.

‘What for?’

‘I’m doing some stuff at school.’

Mia gets up and slowly leads the way into her own bedroom.

On the wall above the bed hangs a small embroidery sampler with the motto:

‘
There’s no place like home
.’

‘But isn’t it Saturday today?’ she says as she opens the wardrobe doors.

‘Yeah, but it’s some special stuff.’

The contents of Mia’s wardrobe are practically identical
with Anna-Karin’s. But she finds a black skirt suit. Utterly dull and unfashionable, which is surely what’s meant by ‘proper’.

‘May I borrow that suit?’ Vanessa asks.

‘What? Is it a funeral?’

I hope not, Vanessa thinks.

‘It looks kind of grown-up, that’s all,’ she says.

Vanessa returns to the bathroom and puts Anna-Karin’s hair up in a bun. After rooting around in the bathroom cabinet for a while, she locates a tube with nearly dried-out mascara and sharpens up the look of her lashes. She never realised before how green Anna-Karin’s eyes are. Perfect, or would be if only she had a little lipgloss.

‘Now we’ll bloody show them,’ Vanessa tells herself in the mirror.

When she walks into the kitchen, Mia stares at her.

‘Goodness, you’ve tarted yourself up,’ she says and sounds almost disapproving.

‘Oh, thanks,’ Vanessa says and edges past Mia to pour cornflakes and milk into a bowl.

Mia reaches for her packet of cigarettes and, at the same time, starts coughing chestily.

Christ, she smokes so much that her lungs must be full of tar, Vanessa thinks. She’s a worse case than Mona Moonbeam.

Anna-Karin’s mother has gone back to staring out through the window and Vanessa wonders what might actually be going on inside her head. On the surface, everything about her seems so empty and dead. Resigned. Inside her, what’s it like? Just the same? All the time? Vanessa is sorry for her. But she is even sorrier for Anna-Karin.

Now she understands why Anna-Karin used her magic to change her mother. And if Vanessa had been given the same power, if she could have made her mother leave Nicke much
sooner, would she have been able to resist the temptation?

She rinses her plate under the tap. Checks the time. Suddenly, she’s in a hurry. Another couple of minutes and Adriana is due to collect her.

‘I’m off now,’ Vanessa says.

Mia doesn’t even look her way. Vanessa suddenly asks herself what life would be like for Mia if something were to happen to Anna-Karin. This could be the last time she sees her daughter.

She goes to Mia and puts her arm around her. Anna-Karin’s mother starts at the touch, but Vanessa doesn’t back away.

‘I hope you’ll have a good day today, Mum,’ she says. ‘I care very much for you.’

She cannot make herself say that she loves her. But this is better than nothing. Mia looks down and makes a mumbling noise.

‘Have a nice time,’ she says, places her hand on top of Vanessa’s and pats it a little awkwardly.

When Vanessa steps out into the street, the dark blue car is already there, waiting for her.

Adriana drives off the moment she shuts the car door.

‘How do you feel?’ Adriana asks.

‘Not too bad,’ Vanessa replies.

The car is warm and she pulls off Anna-Karin’s duffel coat.

‘You’ve dressed up,’ Adriana says. ‘Good for you.’

‘If I get a death sentence I’ll at least want to go out in style.’

Adriana glances at her, clearly confused. And Vanessa realises that she sounded far too much like herself.

Driving through the centre of town, Vanessa notes that yellow flags and bunting are flapping in the wind in front of
the supermarket and that its window displays seem to consist mainly of posters advertising either ‘POSITIVE PRICES’ or ‘THE SPRING REVEL’.

They drive over Canal Bridge and Vanessa stares down at the water.

She is filled with hatred for Erik and Robin. When all this is over we’ll make them pay, she thinks.

And, in that instant, she realises that she is no longer afraid. She is far too angry for that. Furious with the Council and everyone else who is against them.

Vanessa intends to win against these forces. Regardless of cost.

Anna-Karin is on her way to the manor house. She pedals Ida’s bicycle as fast as she can.

She couldn’t get out of the Holmström household fast enough. Carina and Anders tried to keep her at the breakfast table, intent on ‘having a serious talk’. They were certainly not going to ‘just stay on the sidelines’ while she went about ‘ruining’ her ‘future’ and her ‘whole social life’. Anna-Karin had a distinct feeling that, above all, it was their own social life they had in mind.

Cars have been parked all over the gravelled area in front of the manor house but the only human beings within sight are Minoo, Linnéa and Ida. They look up when she comes.

‘Where is …?’ she begins as she brakes and stops near them.

‘Vanessa has already gone inside. Adriana is with her,’ Minoo says quickly. ‘Are you ready to come along?’

Anna-Karin just nods.

She has dreaded this day for so long it’s almost impossible to grasp that it has arrived.

When they walk into the grand entrance hall, the smell
of fresh paint is almost overwhelming. The window shutters are still closed, but this time lamps spread a warm light over newly painted white walls.

Viktor is waiting for them, standing at the old reception desk. His hair is combed straight back and he looks even more uptight than usual.

He greets them gravely.

‘Why so gloomy?’ Linnéa says. ‘Surely you’ve been looking forward to this.’

‘Not at all, Vanessa,’ he replies. ‘No, I haven’t. Would you all please come with me.’

They walk along the corridor to the library and Anna-Karin can’t stop herself from thinking of cows lining up for the slaughterhouse.

The double doors of the library are wide open and, standing guard on either side, two stony-faced men in suits. Their eyes follow Anna-Karin, Linnéa, Ida and Minoo as they walk across the black-and-white tiled floor. Anna-Karin thinks she sees a kind of gun-holster shape bulging under their jackets, but it could be that her imagination is accelerating at the same pace as her feelings of panic.

By now, there is no way back. They are caught. They have to participate in this, until the bitter end.

And it is all her fault.

Someone takes her hand. Minoo. Together, they walk through the double doors.

When Anna-Karin has tried to visualise the trial, she has imagined something like the courtrooms in crime dramas on TV, all dark wood panelling and judges in white wigs. This court sits in an ordinary conference hall, where everything is styled in white and birchwood veneer. The people who have come to watch look like any bunch of conference members. Men and women wearing businesslike outfits fill the rows of chairs.

Anna-Karin wonders if any of these people will side with her; perhaps every one of them would like nothing more than to hear her being found guilty.

Viktor ushers them to chairs at a table where Adriana is already seated. She turns and nods at them. A large antique silver brooch gleams on her sober jacket. She looks serious, but calm. It is impossible to see her now as the same woman who talked to them in the fairground just a few days ago. Her facade is intact once more. Anna-Karin would like to learn the trick.

She looks at the empty seat next to Adriana.

I ought to be sitting there, she thinks and feels her guilty fear grow stronger still.

Viktor sits down at the same table as Alexander, who’s concentrating as he leafs through some documentation. Preparing for his big show. This is to be his opportunity to excel, to become even more approved of and even more loved by the Council. No wonder he seemed to revel in the interrogations, since he knew he was leading them straight into a trap.

There is a door at the very front of the courtroom, and next to it is a table with five chairs behind it. To the right of the table stands a solitary chair, unlike any of the others in the room. It is high-backed and made of some kind of metal that is blackened with age. Anna-Karin understands immediately. That chair is for the witnesses as they are being heard.

Anna-Karin squeezes Minoo’s hand harder.

The door in front of them all opens and, as if on a given signal, everyone stands. Anna-Karin follows the movement and, next to her, Minoo, Ida and Linnéa do too.

The five judges enter. Two women and three men, all more or less ancient. One by one, they sit down at the judges’ table.

‘Please be seated,’ the woman in the middle commands.

She is wearing a suit in a dark red colour that makes Anna-Karin think of blood.

‘Escort the defendant into the court,’ the woman says.

Anna-Karin turns to look. Like everyone else.

Two guards enter from the library with Vanessa between them.

Anna-Karin has never seen herself like this. She wears Mum’s funeral suit. Walks easily, with her head high. Her hair is pulled back in a bun at the base of her neck. She looks almost beautiful.

As she is led towards the judges’ table, Vanessa’s gaze stays steady. But Anna-Karin can see that she is nervous.

What have I done? Anna-Karin thinks. How could I land the others in this mess?

The guards leave Vanessa at Adriana’s table. Alexander rises.

‘Your Honours,’ he says. ‘You see before you the defendant, Anna-Karin Nieminen. She is accused of having violated the laws of the Council. I propose that she is heard first, may it please Your Honours.’

‘As you wish, Prosecutor,’ the woman in the blood-red suit says, then stands up with an ease that belies her advanced age. ‘I hereby declare the trial of Anna-Karin Nieminen begun.’

Vanessa sits down on the ice-cold, hard chair. The metal armrests have been worn shiny and she imagines the many hands gripping them, the bodies that must have been writhing in agony while occupying this seat. But she doesn’t sense any magic.

Instead she feels all the eyes focused on her. She forces herself to meet them.

The judges. The people in the audience. Viktor, who watches her with absolute concentration. Alexander, who manages somehow to look cool and under control at the same time as being full of expectation. Adriana, who nods encouragingly.

Vanessa looks at Ida, Linnéa and Minoo, before letting her eyes rest on Anna-Karin.

I’ll fix this, Vanessa tells herself.

She takes a deep breath and straightens up, as much as Anna-Karin’s body will let her.

‘Are you Anna-Karin Nieminen?’

Alexander is walking slowly towards her. He moves with self-assurance, as if his victory is already won and all that remains is a minor formality, soon to be dealt with. Vanessa presses her fingertips against the cold metal.

‘Are you Anna-Karin Nieminen?’ he says again.

Is ‘yes’ a lie? Vanessa doesn’t know. Sure, Anna-Karin’s
body is sitting on the chair. But does this make the whole into Anna-Karin?

‘Yes,’ she replies.

She waits. Her tense hands clutch the armrests. Nothing happens.

‘Your defence counsel has informed you of the consequences of lying to the court. Are you prepared to swear that you will tell the truth throughout this trial?’

Now, it is definitely time for a lie. She steels herself against the pain. She can almost feel it already. She glances at Linnéa, trying to find strength in her.

‘Yes.’

But still nothing happens. Her hands relax a little.

‘You are charged with practising magic without the permission of the Council,’ Alexander continues. ‘You are further charged with having employed your magic power with a degree of openness which put you at risk of being exposed to the non-magic community as a witch. In addition, we cannot exclude the possibility that you may have used magic to break non-magic laws. Do you understand the charges made against you?’

‘I do,’ Vanessa says.

‘Last autumn, you grossly abused your powers,’ Alexander states. ‘You used your earth magic in order to influence the image many people had of you. Is that correct?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

Vanessa can’t help thinking about Anna-Karin at Jonte’s party and how they had to stop her from practically raping Jari. And then she thinks about all the times they tried to stop her doing magic in school, tried to make her understand that she risked giving them all away to the demons. But Anna-Karin wouldn’t even admit that she used her power.

Is it so impossible to imagine that I could become popular without it?

She had detested Anna-Karin for what she did then. But now it is up to Vanessa to understand her, so she can save her.

‘I know I behaved egotistically,’ Vanessa says. ‘I was aware all along that it was wrong of me. But all I wanted was for people to like me.’

Someone in the courtroom tut-tuts.

‘I’ve been bullied for as long as I can remember,’ Vanessa says and steals a quick glance at Anna-Karin. ‘Even in day nursery. And it carried on, right through school. That’s how it goes in a town like Engelsfors. Once something like that has begun, you never get free of it. Every day was like hell for me, over and over again …’