Margrét eased herself up off the chair to find her daughter, and almost immediately fell into a fit of coughing that pushed her to her knees. She hacked at the floorboards until a thick clot of blood was expelled from her lungs. It left her feeble, and she waited there on all fours, breathing hard, until she felt strong enough to rise.
It took Margrét several minutes to find Lauga. She was not by the warmth of the hearth in the kitchen, nor in the dairy. Margrét shuffled into the darkness of the pantry, holding a candle aloft.
‘Lauga?’
There was a faint noise from the corner where the barrels stood together.
‘Lauga, is that you?’
The candlelight threw shadows over the walls, before lighting on someone behind a half-filled sack of meal.
‘Mamma?’
‘What are you doing in here, Lauga?’ Margrét stepped forward and brought the candle closer to her daughter’s face.
Lauga squinted in the light and hurriedly stood up. Her eyes were red. ‘Nothing at all.’
‘Are you upset?’
Lauga blinked and quickly rubbed her eyes. ‘No, Mamma.’
Margrét studied her daughter. ‘I’ve been trying to find you,’ she said.
‘I only wanted a minute to myself.’
They regarded each other for a moment in the ragged light of the guttering candle.
‘To bed, then,’ Margrét finally suggested. She handed Lauga the candle and silently followed her out of the room.
THERE WAS NO PURSE. FRIDRIK never found the money he wanted. Agnes, Agnes, where did he bury it, is it in the trunk? But it was too late, my fingers were slippery-thick with the whale fat all rubbed into the wood and mingled with the blood on the floor and the lamp was already dashed on the boards and Sigga had already screamed at the sound of glass breaking.
They try to make me eat, but, Tóti, I cannot do it. Don’t feed me or I will bite you, I will bite the hand that feeds me, that refuses to love me, that leaves me. Where is my stone? You don’t understand! I have nothing to say to you, where are the ravens? Jóas has sent them all away, they never speak to me, it’s not fair. See what I do for them? I eat stones, I shatter my teeth, and still they will not speak to me. Only the wind. Only the wind speaks and it will not talk sense, it screams like the widow of the world and will not wait for a reply.
You will be lost. There is no final home, there is no burial, there is only a constant scattering, a thwarted journey that takes you everywhere without offering you a way home, for there is no home, there is only this cold island and your dark self spread thinly upon it until you take up the wind’s howl and mimic its loneliness you are not going home you are gone silence will claim you, suck your life down into its black waters and churn out stars that might remember you, but if they do they will not say, they will not say, and if no one will say your name you are forgotten I am forgotten.
THE NIGHT BEFORE THE EXECUTION, the family of Kornsá sat together in the badstofa. Steina, tear-streaked, had gathered as many lamps as she could find, lighting them and placing them about the room to dispel the shadows that lingered in the corners. The servants sat on their beds with their backs against the wall, dumbly watching Tóti and Agnes as they huddled together on her bed. They were holding hands, the Reverend whispering quietly to her. She gazed at the floor, shivering.
Jón came in from feeding the stock, and eased himself down on the bed next to Margrét, bending down slowly to untie his boots. Margrét took the knitting out of her lap and stood to help him out of his jacket, and then hovered there, holding the frayed coat out from her.
‘Mamma?’ Steina got up from her place beside Lauga, who was staring impassively at the dancing wick of the lamp at her side. ‘Mamma, let me take that.’
Margrét pressed her lips together and silently handed Steina the wet coat. Then she slowly got down on her knees and, stifling a cough, shuffled closer to her bed. Her daughter watched as she reached beneath the bunk. ‘Steina?’