Fire by Sara B. Elfgren & Mats Strandberg Page B

once. It sneaks in behind the gravestone. Anna-Karin wishes that she could hide, too.
    Nicolaus is walking across the cemetery. Linnéa is jogging along after him.
    No one speaks. There is nothing to say. They have gone behind Nicolaus’s back. Lied to him. Nicolaus, who has never betrayed them.
    He stops at the edge of the gaping hole. Stares at it, standing still, as if frozen to the ground.
    ‘Forgive us,’ Anna-Karin says.
    ‘Honestly, we had no choice,’ Linnéa says breathlessly.
    Nicolaus looks up and meets Anna-Karin’s eyes. He doesn’t seem angry, only resigned.
    ‘I cannot criticise you for this,’ he says. ‘And I realise I ought not to have attempted to hinder you. My courage failed me. But not without reason. I do not know what is in that coffin, but whatever it is terrifies me to the depths of my soul.’ He sighs heavily. ‘But, whatever it is, I must have wanted to find it. I cannot escape.’
    Cat interrupts by drawn-out meowing. It emerges from behind the gravestone and pads towards Nicolaus, sits down just in front of the grave and looks up at him. Its tail twitches from side to side. Nicolaus kneels down.
    Around them, the silence seems to grow thicker. Nicolaus reaches out and Cat rubs its head against his hand. Anna-Karin can almost see the magic bond between them.
    ‘No,’ Nicolaus mumbles and lifts his hand to his throat, asif he suddenly finds breathing difficult. ‘No, no, I cannot …’
    Cat meows again. Tears are streaming from Nicolaus’s eyes.
    ‘No,’ he whispers. ‘I cannot …’
    ‘What’s going on?’ Ida asks impatiently.
    Nicolaus looks up, but seems evasive, even ashamed.
    ‘You must all leave this place. Please. I beg you.’
    Anna-Karin feels as cold as ice. She doesn’t want to walk away. She wants to run away from here. Something is very wrong.
    ‘We’re going nowhere,’ Linnéa says.
    Cat rubs itself against Nicolaus’s knees and begins to purr softly.
    Nicolaus closes his eyes and bends his neck. He lifts Cat and holds it in his arms as if it were a baby. Its purring gets louder.
    ‘Forgive me, forgive, forgive …’ Nicolaus whispers over and over again, his lips pressed close to Cat’s ear.
    He places his hand over Cat’s eyes.
    Cat’s meowing sounds pained. The paws shudder a few times. Then its body goes limp and its head slumps. The bond between Cat and Nicolaus is broken for ever.
    Anna-Karin’s eyes fill with tears as Nicolaus lowers the lifeless body to the ground in front of the grave. Cat’s single eye is still wide open.
    ‘ Memento mori ,’ Nicolaus whispers.
    A crackling noise comes from inside the hole. Then one more. And another. It sounds like hailstones pattering against a roof.
    Anna-Karin takes a few steps closer to the open grave. The others follow her.
    The lid of the coffin is cracking and falling apart. Torn chunks of wood become sticks which become flakes thatdissolve into nothingness. Anna-Karin is aware of the magic flowing out of the grave. She senses something in the air, something shimmering. It whirls towards Nicolaus and wraps him in a swarm of sparks that gradually fade.
    Anna-Karin leans forward over the hole again.
    Left inside the coffin are only shards of bone, blackened and porous. As she watches, they, too, fall apart into a fine dust. Instinctively, Anna-Karin covers her nose and mouth with her hands to keep herself from breathing in dust and death.
    She casts a sidelong glance at Nicolaus, who is sitting curled up near the grave and staring into it.
    ‘Nicolaus? What’s happened?’
    Nicolaus takes his time to answer.
    ‘I remember,’ he says in the end.
    ‘What do you remember?’
    Nicolaus slowly straightens up and looks at her.
    It is Nicolaus and yet it is not. The uncertain look has gone. It has been replaced by infinite suffering.
    ‘Everything,’ he replies.

13
    Minoo observes Nicolaus. He gets up, drags his hand through his hair. That gesture is so characteristic of him. And yet, he is not