I took a step forward and then another, the torch beam shimmering ahead.
The darkness gathered in the room behind me, a thick wall, silent save for a small noise, coming in mechanical intervals. The short, sharp intake of breath; a deep expulsion of panic from the lungs.
I swallowed, trying to calm myself and make a decision. I looked back at the darkness that held the Partorg’s daughter. Hilja would kill her. I could leave her here; she would find her way to somewhere, eventually. This safe point would no longer be safe, but at least my conscience would be assuaged.
Beyond the open door, the trees shifted and swayed. I heard the low hum of voices.
My cousin’s face swam before my eyes; her eyes hollow, leaden. Aunt Juudit was dead. My parents, too. Oskar’s family. The women from the knitting circle would be gone too. Even if they had survived the purge, we would probably never see them again. To try would be to put their lives in danger. Jakob was somewhere in the woods, perhaps wounded or dying. Etti was the only one I could protect; and in her grief she had attached herself to someone who could turn on us at any moment. What had she said? Like us. The girl was like us.
Another thought rose up. Something my mind had missed in the shock of seeing Etti again and the overwhelming anger the Partorg’s daughter had stirred in me.
A lace shawl. The torch beam had picked it out, wound around the girl’s shoulders. And she’d spoken Estonian, although the words were strangely curt, heavily accented.
I turned back, swinging the light across the floor. She was standing against the wall, her hands grasped beneath her chin. Her blue eyes stared straight ahead and although she could not possibly see me, standing behind the glare of the torch, I had the strangest feeling of connection.
It was as if I were seeing my wolf, made human. Alone, hunted. Something in me recognised that ache, the hunger that would never cease. She shrank back. A corner of her shawl slipped, and she tugged it up over her shoulder. The white lace enswathed the cream blouse she was wearing. The torch beam trembled as I moved towards her until we were inches apart. She smelled of faded perfume.
It couldn’t be, and yet it was.
Lightning pattern, long rows of it. And at the very bottom a wolf’s paw, half-hidden in the lace like a footprint buried in the snow.
‘Where did you get that shawl?’ I demanded.
The woman flinched as I reached out and fingered the lace. I rubbed my thumb over the wolf’s paw and felt a surge of response, a current travelling through a wire. Up close I could see the stitches were not my grandmother’s; they were not fine enough. But the wolf’s paw… It could not be a coincidence.
‘It was my mother’s.’ Up close, I could see dust smeared on the woman’s face. A branch had torn the skin of her cheek. ‘Ta oli eestlane. She was Estonian, as Etti said.’ She lifted her hand and wiped it across her forehead. ‘Leave me here,’ she said. ‘Go. I would not blame you.’
An owl screeched again outside. A warning? I licked my lip, tasting salt.
I should leave her. Why risk taking someone who would be searched for, hunted? I had no doubt the Partorg would come looking. I let the lace shawl fall from my fingers and the woman shrank back, nodding, as if she’d already decided her fate for me.
I began to turn away.
My grandmother’s voice came back to me, loud and clear as if she was standing behind me, hidden in the shadows. Why do we make shawls? Not only for ourselves but to send our Estonian traditions out into the world.
Here was a shawl which had come back.
Before I could change my mind, before I could quieten the voice of warning screaming in my head, I seized her shoulder and dragged her outside with me, into the night.
‘Over there.’
Hilja’s voice rasped. I rubbed at my bleary eyes, trying hard to focus where she was pointing. The others shuffled around me. I gazed down at the twisted nest of fallen birch logs. The grey light of dawn turned their trunks the colour of faded bruises.
‘Climb up.’ Hilja grunted as she hoisted herself onto the nearest trunk, then straightened. She held her arms out for balance. ‘Walk to the end. Then make sure you jump across to the other side. We can’t leave track marks for the Soviets to find.’ She jerked her head at the copse of trees ahead. ‘Camp is there, beyond those spruces.’
A buzz of excitement thickened the air.
‘Etti, we are close.’ I turned to look at her. ‘We are here.’ My cousin’s face did not change. She still wore the same weary expression. Dark shadows were gathered beneath her eyes. Her dress was stained with mud. Spider webs clung to her hair. When I brushed them off, she closed her eyes and drew a long breath in through her nose. I kissed her cheek. It was cold. The faint scent of vomit lingered on her breath.
For hours, we had stumbled along, slapping at bugs, fighting the branches that scratched at our faces. We hadn’t spoken, too busy concentrating on following the flash of Hilja’s torch.
Only once had we heard a volley of shots break the silence. Hilja had pulled us into the undergrowth, where we had lain for what seemed like hours on our stomachs, unable to move as the insects crawled across our skin, waiting for Hilja to tell us it was safe to keep moving.
Etti had been the last to emerge. She had shaken off my grasp on her shoulder, wanting to stay curled beneath the bracken and the coiled fronds.
‘I can’t move,’ she said, her voice edged with panic. Her arms were wrapped about her waist. ‘Something is squeezing me! It won’t let go!’ Her breathing came in short gasps. I watched helplessly as she shuddered, arching her back against my hand, her sobbing muffled by leaves.
‘Please try, Etti.’ I could feel sweat soaking into my hand. I looked in desperation at the line of refugees moving away from us, through the trees. What if we were left behind?
‘You must get up!’ I said. ‘Come, I’ll help you!’
Etti twisted and writhed. When I put my hand under her arm, she ripped it fiercely away. I was on the verge of calling out for Hilja when Lydia appeared, her white shawl gleaming in the darkness.
‘Etti is ill!’ I said, although the words seemed so insufficient. ‘I can’t get her to move…’
‘Let me see.’ Moving the ferns apart, the Partorg’s daughter kneeled beside Etti’s prostrate form. I heard them whispering and moments later, Lydia stood up and helped my trembling cousin to her feet.
‘It’s gone, now,’ Etti said. She sounded weary and exhausted. ‘The feeling.’
‘You are sure?’ Our breath mingled in the darkness.
‘Yes.’ She took a wobbly step forward, clutching Lydia’s arm. ‘Come on, Lida.’
The line of refugees was already disappearing through the trees. Hilja’s torch beam bounced off the trunks of white aspens. We hurried to join them. When we stopped for food, Etti took one bite of her cake before thrusting it at me and stumbling away to be sick. She returned, wiping her mouth with her hand, her legs trembling and shaking like a child who is learning how to skate on ice for the first time. Hilja had not noticed, too busy handing out the cakes. Sometimes we had lagged behind, waiting for Etti’s pain to pass before we moved again. The long night stretched out taut as a length of yarn, broken only by moments of panic where I prayed we would not be left and times when I almost wished we would, so that Etti could rest.
At long last, the sky had begun to lighten, the birds warbling their dawn songs. It was both a relief and a source of sorrow. So many would not wake this morning. So many were gone.
I pushed down my grief. People began to help each other climb up onto the fallen trees as Hilja had instructed, edging their way towards the spruce trees. Some people crawled on hands and knees, afraid of slipping.