“Please watch over him,” she asks. “Please bless him with strength and wisdom to lead our people to freedom.”
Ulrike had seen me hung by my neck. She witnessed the branch breaking, and was among one of the first to say that I’d been blessed by the spirits. Ulrike believes that I was sent by our ancestors to save our people. She isn’t the only one who thinks so on this island.
“Thank you,” I say to her, but she only kisses my palms before she returns to her work. I can feel the women’s stares as I walk from the groves to the line of slaves’ quarters. Everyone has heard about my kraft. It scares me that so many people know, when it was something I’d desperately hidden for so many years. The women whisper to themselves. He was blessed by the spirits with kraft. He has the power to take the kraft of the kongelig—take their power, and use it as his own. They see this as a sign that I am meant to destroy the Fjern and lead our people to freedom.
The quarters are ten shacks along a dirt path, some of which were claimed by the guards as barracks, though no one else will sleep in them. Next to the barracks is the valley’s field, where the guards train. Malthe oversees the guards of the island, as well as anyone who had not been a guard but is able to carry a blade. He works his guards harder than when we had been under the rule of the kongelig. I work alongside him to teach formations and techniques for hours beneath the burning sun, to the point where some have fallen unconscious. Malthe risks them dying of heatstroke, but it’s a risk he thinks must be taken. The Fjern have already attacked Hans Lollik Helle twice since we took the island, but we have the advantage of the mangroves as a natural fort, and the manor on the hill allows us to see the ships coming. We work hard to keep our lives and our freedom.
The exercises are over for the day. Only a few men linger at the edges of the field, sharpening machetes and crafting arrows. When I check on them, a guard named Steef tells me they’re worried they won’t have enough materials.
“We’re running low especially on flint stones,” he says.
“Check with everyone who is clearing the groves,” I tell him. “They might be able to find more resources under the remains.”
The others nod their agreement, and Steef thanks me. There are plenty of guards who follow Malthe with unwavering loyalty, but it makes me uneasy that I can also sense a particular level of respect for me in some guards, Steef included. I can feel that he wishes I was in command of the guard. I’ve shown more mercy than Malthe. I’ve been more patient in teaching and running the drills. I can only hope that these are thoughts Steef and the others will keep to themselves.
In the field, some children play with sticks they pretend are machete blades, chasing each other with high-pitched screams. One girl named Anke runs at me with a stick clutched in both hands, ready to strike. I step around her and pick her up so that she squeals. Anke has a kraft that she hides. She’s able to heal wounds, by putting a hand to an injury and watching the cut heal and disappear. It’s still a young ability, but there’s potential for it to become strong. Had the kongelig learned of this power, the girl would’ve been hung from her neck. She’s still afraid to tell anyone. I don’t see any need to expose her secret.
Helga, the woman who watches over Anke and all the children, frowns from the firepit, where she and others chop cassava and ready a pot of stew. There aren’t many children on the island—only seven, all orphans who were brought to the royal island for safety when their parents were killed in the fighting. I carry Anke back to Helga. She scolds the girl, telling her she needs to learn to sit still.
This field is where I’d want to have a village built. We would have our own homes, not quarters where there’d only be enough space for all of us to sleep, cramped on the ground. We would have our own gardens. The groves, once replanted, would be for everyone’s use. The Fjern came here and put a price on fruit and fish and water, but these would be provided without any cost once we’re free from the kongelig’s reign. We don’t stop anyone from eating food if they’re hungry.
Marieke argues that the food still has to be more carefully rationed. Yes, we’re no longer slaves, but this doesn’t mean we can eat like our former masters. There are about seventy islanders on Hans Lollik Helle. Nearly fifty are guards under Malthe. The islanders who don’t fight came to us in the aftermath of the uprising, and with the Fjern patrolling the seas, very few have been able to leave. There were only enough goats to last the kongelig the storm season, and they’ve all been slaughtered. We’ve overfished the bays, which had never been plentiful, and half of the groves were burned down in the battles. The trees that remain aren’t growing fruit quickly enough. If we continue this way, we won’t last another month.
The prayer songs slow until the only sounds are the birds and crickets. The sun is setting quickly, the sky turning pink and then a deep red. I can hear laughter throughout the groves. I walk without purpose, accepting prayers and blessings and giving what little advice I can offer to those who need it. Maybe Malthe is right. What have I done since the night of the first revolt? I’ve attended the meetings and given my opinions. I’ve walked the island, observing those who pick fruit from the trees. I’ve helped to teach the newer guards how to hold their machetes and fix the position of their feet and their arms for a swifter kill. But is it enough?
Marieke has followed me from the manor, through the groves and to the field. She approaches me without speaking. She wonders if what the others say is true—if I really have taken Sigourney’s kraft. If I have, she worries that this would be used as an excuse to execute the former Elskerinde. Sigourney Rose’s power contributes to the debate of whether she should be alive or dead, and she wouldn’t be needed anymore if I have her kraft as well.
“It isn’t as strong,” I tell her. She isn’t surprised that I’ve noticed her. Marieke has witnessed too many things in this lifetime to startle easily. “It’s a shadow in comparison to hers. She could look at a person and see all of their past, their wants, become that person entirely. I feel and hear only snippets. I can’t control their bodies.”
“It’s still astounding,” she says as she walks to join me. “Your kraft inspires people, Løren. I hear them whisper about your power.”
I understand what she implies. Whereas Malthe doesn’t want me to lead this insurrection, Marieke does.
We walk as the sky darkens, toward the mangroves and the bay. She seems to realize what I’m thinking, even without a kraft of her own.
“The others look to you for guidance,” she tells me. “They feel comfortable with you and trust in your judgment.” When I don’t speak, she continues. “I see the way everyone looks at you. They have hope. You have the spirit of a leader, Løren.”
But being a leader is not a position I want. It’s strange to have anyone’s confidence when I’d once been the boy on the floor of the slaves’ quarters, listening to the others whisper that I couldn’t be trusted because I was the slave master’s son. I’d been hated. The other islanders saw me and only saw the blood of the Fjern that was in my veins.
It didn’t matter that they knew how I’d been treated. I’d learned to try to avoid my brother and my father and especially the Elskerinde Jannik whenever I could, but when any of them were in the mood for torture, I was their entertainment. My father would beat me, sometimes because he was angry and other times because he was bored. He would find ways to use me against Aksel. To humiliate my brother and make him feel lesser than me, a slave. Aksel would then find his ways to punish me for it, chasing me through the groves with a rope so that he could attempt to hang me from my neck. He’d wanted me dead, though he was too afraid to take my life himself.