Fire by Sara B. Elfgren & Mats Strandberg Read Free Book Online

impossible as to forgive her.
    ‘Now what? Are we supposed to stand around here all night?’ Ida asks.
    Nicolaus looks stern.
    ‘You’re right, Miss Holmström. Let’s get this over and done with.’
    They enter the cemetery. Their shoes make crunchingnoises on the gravel. Vanessa is staring straight ahead when Linnéa comes alongside her.
    ‘Hi. How are you?’ Linnéa says.
    ‘Fine.’ Vanessa makes the short word sound dismissive.
    If only Linnéa would stop looking at her like that. Vanessa repeats Melvin’s favourite tune as a mantra to prevent herself from accidental thoughts that Linnéa might listen in to.
    Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are! Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky!
    After a sidelong glance at Vanessa, Linnéa moves on to the front of the group. She waves to the others, a signal that they are to follow her into the old part of the cemetery.
    A narrow path runs between crumbling blocks of stone and heavy cast-iron crosses. For several hundred years now, no one has known what the people buried here looked like while they were alive, or what kind of people they were. It is a strangely fascinating, dizzying thought.
    ‘Here it is,’ Linnéa says.
    She stops at a gravestone that looks unimpressive compared with the grander memorials. She lights a torch and directs the beam at Nicolaus’s name.
    Minoo observes Nicolaus. He stands absolutely still, like one of those ghastly mime characters at festivals who pretend to be statues. She wonders what he’s feeling.
    Ida breaks the silence.
    ‘So, Nicolaus had an ancestor with the same name. What I don’t get is, why do we check out a graveyard in the middle of the night? Does Cat want us to take up genealogy? Or what?’
    Ida’s tone of voice makes Minoo cringe.
    ‘ Memento mori ,’ she says, fighting to control her voice. ‘ Remember you must die . It said so in the letter Nicolauswrote to himself. We have been wondering about it all this time. Now, maybe, we’ll find out.’
    Ida raises her eyebrows and looks at Nicolaus, who still hasn’t said a word.
    ‘Fine. You’d better tell us then,’ she says. ‘What is so special about this grave?’
    He simply shakes his head.
    Minoo realises that she’s being unfair but, at this moment, he is so frustrating. She had no idea what she’d expected from him when he confronted the grave. But something , at least.
    ‘What do you think, maybe we ought to carry out a ritual?’ Anna-Karin asks.
    Everyone looks at Minoo and she can’t help wondering why it has come to this. Why is she supposed to have the answers, she who can’t read the Book of Patterns and doesn’t even have her own element?
    ‘I don’t know. We could seek guidance from the book …’ ‘I’ve tried already and didn’t find anything useful,’ Linnéa says. ‘Besides, what we must do is perfectly obvious.’
    She pauses, looks at the others.
    ‘We must start digging.’
    It has occurred to Minoo, too, but she has dismissed the idea. They have done quite a few bizarre things together. Conducted magic rituals, fought demons – but to dig up a grave …
    Still, she can’t come up with an alternative.
    ‘That’s simply disgusting,’ Ida says. ‘Do you want us to start clawing at the ground here and now?’
    ‘You will absolutely not break the peace of the grave,’ Nicolaus says suddenly.
    Minoo glances at him. His face has taken on a determined, authoritarian look. A look that won’t allow you to argue. This is a side of Nicolaus that she hasn’t seen before.
    ‘What do you suggest we do?’ Minoo asks feebly.
    ‘Nothing. You do nothing. It is a mystery, I concede that. So it should remain. This is consecrated ground.’
    ‘But …’
    ‘No ifs, no buts!’
    ‘What is your problem?’ Linnéa asks. ‘It was your familiar that led us to this grave. It was you who wrote that letter to yourself , complete with the clue memento mori . Therefore, you made us come here. Back when