The new batch of jam takes up a whole shelf. I think it’ll stay there. I can’t eat jam anymore. I’ll still keep it here though, just in case.
I suppose it was bound to happen. I woke up from an afternoon nap to find the cottage empty. I looked behind and inside the shed, in the copse of mountain birch huddling next to the house. You were nowhere to be found. Finally, I started calling for you. There was no answer. I thought perhaps you had fallen into a hole on the bog. New ones open every spring. I put my rubber boots on and went to look. I walked from the cottage and west towards Sylarna. I walked until the cottage disappeared from view, and then I turned north. I walked back and forth, calling you, until the sun dipped below the horizon. Then I turned back to the house.
You must have been digging all day. I found the hole by accident, kicking the kneading-trough in frustration where it lay on the ground by the front steps. As it moved, I saw the hole. I called your name.
“Please come out,” I said.
“I don’t want to,” you said, muffled.
“What are you doing down there?”
“Digging.”
“Won’t you please come out? I’ll make us supper.”
“I don’t want to.”
I went and got the shovel, setting it to the edge of the hole. But as soon as the shovel broke the ground, you screamed. I looked down. The soil was riddled with white root tendrils.
“You’re hurting me!” you wailed.
I understood then.
“I’m so sorry, love,” I said. “I am so sorry. I won’t hurt you anymore, I promise.”
I went back into the house and sat down at the kitchen table. I cried a little. Then I got the watering can from the garden and filled it with fresh water. I poured it over the ground by the hole. I could hear a giggle down there. That was the first time I’d heard you make that sound.
August is here. The cloudberries are still red; in a little while they will ripen to gold. I will pick as many as I can, for jam and compote. You haven’t spoken since that day you burrowed into the ground. But there’s a clutch of green leaves growing by the hole. When I water them, I can still hear faint laughter.
Pyret
Description, Behavior, and History
When not applied to small and defenceless creatures, the word “pyre” describes a mysterious life form: Pyret, Swedish for “the little tyke.” The word has all the characteristics of a euphemism, but nothing resembling an older name has turned up—possibly because it was taboo and in time forgotten, as is often the case. A name that evokes an image of something benevolent and harmless indicates both a form of worship and an underlying fear of its powers: an expression of love and an appeal for benevolence.[1] During the years I have spent researching Pyret, it seems more and more likely that this mix of adoration and fear stems from its extremely alien nature.
A mimic and an infiltrator, Pyret mingles with and assumes the form of pack— or herd animals, changing color and shape to match the others. From a distance it will look like an ordinary animal. It does not grow actual fur, eyes, or other extremities—the features are completely superficial, making it likely that its skin is covered by chromatophores, much like octopi and chameleons.
Although its feeding habits remain unknown, one thing is certain: Pyret does not behave like a predator. There are no records of it causing physical harm, although it insists on physical contact, which has traumatized a number of witnesses. Accounts of Pyret invariably describe a creature that tries to get close, cuddle, and sometimes even mate with the animal or person in question. The adult size of Pyret seems to be anything between a human and a cow. As for lifespan, no Pyre has been observed to die of old age; it has either wandered off or been slain by humans.
Pyret seems to have sought out and coexisted with the farmers of the Nordic countries for centuries. Swedish, Norwegian and Finnish folklore is rife with stories about farmers discovering a fledgling Pyre in a litter of domesticated animals (Tilli, Pia: Nordic Cryptids, Basilisk Förlag, Helsinki 1989, p. 68), indicating that the parent places its spawn with other litters, cuckoo-style. However, Pyret is just as likely to appear in its adult form: there are numerous mentions of strange cows, goats, or sheep appearing in a flock overnight, rubbing up against the other animals. Their presence is often described as having a calming effect. Cows and goats will start producing prodigious amounts of milk, sheep will grow silky soft wool, and pigs fatten up even if food is scarce.
A Gift from the Gods
The earliest mention of Pyret occurs in the Icelandic saga Alfdís saga, in which Alfdís Sigurdardóttir divorces her husband Gunnlaug because he accidentally sets fire to their barn while drunk, “killing six cows and also Freyr’s pyril[2], thereby ruining their family.” (Jónsson, Guðni: Íslendinga sögur, Reykjavík, 1946, book 25, p. 15) Alfdís complains bitterly about the loss of the pyril that she had reared from infancy, and which had kept her cattle happy and fat (Jónsson, p. 16). Because of the death of the pyril, Alfdís is exempt from the normal divorce penalty and retains the family’s remaining possessions, while Gunnlaug is cast out of the community and left destitute (Jónsson, p. 18). Gunnlaug’s punishment and the attribution of the pyril to Freyr, a god of fertility, indicate that it was considered a sacred creature.
This is the first and last mention in Icelandic literature. Afterward and up to modern times, stories and accounts of Pyret are confined to the northern and middle Scandinavian Peninsula, as far south as the pyril of Stavanger(Tilli,p. 69)and as far east as Carelia under the name of pienokainen.[3] (Tilli, p. 72) The majority of accounts, however, come from the sparsely populated countryside of northern Sweden.
“The Devil’s Cattle”
The Christianization of Scandinavia dethroned the Norse gods but did little to wipe out belief in supernatural creatures, due in part to all the attention they were given by the Church. The pyril of Norse faith moved into folklore where it becamethe cattle of the vittra, powerful beings that live underground and in hills, similar to the daoine sidhe of Ireland. The Church, seeing it as a very real threat, called Pyret “the Devil’s cattle” and warned the populace not to have dealings with it. Doing so was considered witchcraft. This had the opposite effect, as folklorist Ebbe Schön conjectures: “if the Church made so much noise about them, these creatures must indeed be powerful and therefore worthy of worship.” (Schön, Ebbe: Älvor, vättar och andra väsen, Rabén Prisma, Stockholm, 1996, p.16)
Between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries, roughly four hundred people were tried and executed for witchcraft and witchcraft-related crimes.[4] Twelve instances mention involvement with Pyret. (Leijd, Carclass="underline" Rättsprocessens avarter, Meli Förlag, Göteborg 1964, p. 223) Extensive notes from a court case in 1702 concern one Anders of Kräkånger, who was sentenced to death for harboring Pyret. To my knowledge it is also the only trial where Pyret was present. Usually, Pyret would be killed on sight, but Anders of Kräkånger had reared his to such a monstrous size that no one dared touch it. Shaped like a bull, it strode into the courtroom together with Anders and refused to leave his side. The trial was very short, as during the proceedings, “the unholy creature constantly rubbed up against its owner, emitting warbling noises and upsetting those attending, causing many to weep with fear.” (Leijd, p. 257) The court decreed that Anders’s death sentence be carried out immediately but was not quite sure how to deal with Pyret. Anders himself solved this conundrum, offering to go willingly if the court in turn promised to set Pyret free after his death. Considering what he might otherwise command his beast to do, the court accepted this. Whether it intended to keep this promise, we will never know.
1
Like gods and spirits, predators were often called by euphemisms to avoid bad luck or visits from said creatures. In some cases the euphemisms have replaced the taboo name in common usage. The Swedish word for wolf,
4
The most common witchcraft-related crime was “illegal mingling”: young men consorting with female trolls and vittra.