Another pounding on the door. “What? Come along!”
Varzha understood who she was, a Kalderaš Romani. The long flower-print skirts, loose tunic tops, multiple scarves in colored patterns that contrasted with the pattern of the skirt—these were the uniform of her people. Breasts were not emphasized because they were considered unimportant, mere tools for feeding children. But below the waist, between the legs—there both men and women had to observe cleanliness and modesty at all times.
A quick minute passed before Mattias again pounded on the door. “Women,” Varzha heard him comment. “I never understand why they need so bloody long to get ready.”
Varzha separated the top layer of the skirt of the wedding dress. She pulled on the longer satin underskirt, tying it at the waist with a piece of torn lace. The leather of the boots they gave her was soft. They fit well. Varzha emerged from the bathroom ready to face Mattias’ anger that she had refused the skirt he had given her.
“Va fan,” Liam exclaimed when she emerged. What the hell?
He moved automatically to embrace her. Varzha reacted quickly. Forming her right hand into a flat blade, she gave a quick chop at the man’s windpipe. Gagging, Liam staggered backward. He recovered and charged at Varzha. Mattias grabbed him by the jacket collar and wrenched him backward.
“Liam!” Mattias snapped.
“What the hell is going on?” said another voice.
Coming in with Nils, a fourth man stood at the head of the hallway, a tall, modern-looking guy in a black leather jacket, his short-cropped hair gelled up. Young, in his twenties.
Mattias and Liam instantly became deferential. “She hit me!” Liam cried.
“She hit me,” the newcomer mimicked. “What are you, a child? Get the fuck away from her.”
He summoned them back into the main room. Varzha knew who the man was, or at least had been expecting to meet him at some point in her journey as a captive. She recognized him from a photo she had studied. One of the big bosses. She was a little surprised that he had shown himself so early. The others yielded to him, addressing the man as “JV.”
“This is the one?” he said, assessing Varzha. JV addressed her directly, talking loudly the way stupid people do to someone who might not know their language. “Are you okay? Have they treated you well?”
“She don’t talk,” Mattias said briskly. “Let’s go.”
JV stood Nils and Liam up in front of him, side by side like a pair of soldiers. “Stay here,” he commanded, using a crisp, no-nonsense tone. “No communication whatsoever, do you hear? You don’t call us, we call you.”
“Yes, JV,” Nils said.
“Shut up!” JV screamed. “Don’t say my name!”
The flunkies stared at the floor. “Stay here,” JV ordered. “You don’t speak to anyone, you don’t go outside, no phone, no calls, stay put until we contact you, capiche?”
“Right, Ja—I mean, right, Boss.”
Such was the first rule of the stolen-girl pipeline. JV always insisted that the principle was unchallengeable and fundamental. Each step along the trail had to be severed as soon as it was taken. The path for smuggling young women to service the North Sea oil towns of Norway changed often. With this protective strategy it always became instantly untraceable.
“They going to be all right?” JV questioned Mattias, referring to Liam and Nils.
“They’ll do what they’re told,” Mattias said. “Come on, we’ve got a long drive ahead of us.”
He handed Varzha a pair of mittens and a down coat with a hood, which she dutifully put on. She was grateful for the warmth. She tried not to let the words “a long drive ahead” bother her. The idea of spending time with JV filled her with distaste. He resembled the ads she had seen for bodybuilding, an idiot fad so popular with Swedes. These were the type of men who collected guns and kept big-jawed dogs. For hunting, they always said. But the thought of dogs threw her sideways. Perhaps they could be used against humans.
Mattias led Varzha out of the room behind the big boss. A great sadness rose in her when she thought of Vago, abandoned and alone. She wondered if the guardian angel Luri was protecting him. She asked herself how long it would be before she saw her brother again. Or if she would ever see him again.
6.
Brand woke to a silent house. She felt a queasy sense of dislocation. The washed-out quality of the light made her unsure of the time. She had a headache. Her mouth tasted vile. In the night some unknown person had covered her with a goose-down quilt. They had removed her footwear. The knitted slippers presented to her now sat on the floor next to the narrow bed.
She sat up. The deadness of the Dalgren residence puzzled her. The evening before it had been lively and crammed with people. Not for the first time, Brand cursed the evils of amphetamine. The drug was a godsend, until it wasn’t. She paid for the energy its alkaloids gave her. The crash of the aftermath left her feeling ugly and hopeless.
Speed sleep was rarely restful. The dreaming mind drew a blank, but half-remembered waking dreams surfaced in her mind like breaching sea creatures. Had she really stirred in her sleep to hear voices, thuds and commotion in the night? Had she gotten up, gone to the stairwell and witnessed a shadowy form at the bottom of the stairs, something that appeared to be half human, half animal?
Brand also felt certain—almost certain—that at some point during the night she had stood at the door to the balcony. Through its small glass windowpane she witnessed a ghost-like figure cross the snowy yard toward one of the barns. Krister Hammar. He startled her by turning to look back at the house. His gaze seemed to bore directly into Brand. He disappeared through a door into
