Black Christmas - 1. Black Christmas

21st December, 1896

In most of the northern hemisphere, today is the darkest, longest night of the year; the Winter Solstice. Not where I am, however. Today is just as dark as yesterday, and the day before that, and it will be just as dark tomorrow. It has been weeks since there was even the chance of blue dusk at midday, since it was possible to glimpse the red rays of a dying sun on the southern horizon for just a few moments.

I asked the shaman, through my young interpreter Hector, how his people could tell the difference between day and night this time of year prior to modern time keeping devices. I have found my pocket watch invaluable since I have been here. The old man laughed with sparkling, dark eyes and told me that the movements of the stars were enough. Then he took my hands and said, ‘Come, my son. Let me joik you.’ Upon my surprised expression, my interpreter hurriedly explained that the joik is a song, specific to both the singer and the subject of the song. Unique, in other words. The old Laplander (or ‘Sami’, as is their own preferred term) sang to me in a voice like ice and gravel—such a contrast to the softness of his native tongue—and then Hector and I left his tent.

My fingers are stiff with cold and I am quite certain that were it not for the fire my ink would freeze solid. As it is, I am wrapped up in several layers of wool and reindeer skins, and the thick mittens I was given by an old woman of the tribe are enough to shield my hands against the bitter cold even when outside, but they are not especially practical for writing.

I may have to give this up as a futile exercise, since the fire, though bright, is not the best light to write by as it flickers in the pit. It casts a warm, orange glow over the interior of the tent. The light burns hot on my cheeks, and the scent of burning wood and smoke is making me oddly sleepy.

I have long since passed the point of no return on my journey. It is now hardly possible to leave this frozen waste, not until the sun returns. At present, we get around by skis or by sled pulled by reindeer. I never thought I would say that I missed London, where winter means rain and wind and fog, and a light powdering of snows from time to time if one is lucky, which quickly turns to slush in the busy streets, but there you have it. I left civilisation behind when I left Trondheim and its Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters. Now I have darkness, tents (the natives call them ‘lavvu’) and what appears to be an infinite supply of snow.

Hector enters the tent, shaking the snow off his mittens. His cheeks are red with the cold and his blue eyes are shining. ‘Good afternoon,’ he greets me. ‘How fare you today?’ His English is quite excellent, with hardly a trace of an accent.

‘I am very well thank you,’ I tell him automatically. ‘Yourself?’

‘Cold, but quite well.’ He smiles and sits down next to me by the fire, rather closer than one might usually find appropriate, but the best way to stay warm is to stay close to others. I do not mind in the least. His shoulder brushes my own, through several layers of clothing.

Hector is an attractive young man of twenty-seven. His features are soft and graceful, his dark hair wavy and silky. Currently it is hidden inside his hood, however. The necessary attire has a tendency of making everyone look bulky, but the first time I met Hector he was in a fashionable suit, and I know him to be a lean, willowy sort of chap underneath those layers.

He takes off his mittens, holding his hands over the fire and sighing happily as the warmth enters his bones once more.

‘I asked about Christmas Eve,’ he tells me. ‘A whole group of them will be travelling to Karasjok to go to church, and we are welcome to join them.’

‘How many of them are Christians?’ I ask.

‘Oh, nearly all,’ says Hector. ‘They have been forcefully converted for several hundred years, by at least four different denominations. The Papists got here first, of course.’ He grins. ‘Most of them follow Læstadius now. This tribe is one of the few remaining where anyone follows the old religion at all. Most of their shamanic instruments have been burned, their sacred sites destroyed by well meaning missionaries.’

I feel like I should already know these things. It is embarrassing, being schooled by this boy who is nearly ten years my junior, in a field that I have studied for most of my adult life. Still, that is why I am here. To learn. It cannot hurt to learn a bit about Hector while I am at it.

‘How many languages do you speak?’ I ask him casually.

‘Fluently or functionally?’

I shrug.

‘Well, let’s see . . .’ He begins to count them off on his fingers. ‘Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, English, French, German, Italian . . . Latin and Greek. Russian, Finnish. Five Sami languages; Southern, Northern, Lule, Inari and Skolt. Oh, and I suppose I get by in Icelandic, Faroese, Gaelic, Welsh and Spanish as well, if I must.’

‘That is remarkable,’ I tell him, truly astonished.

‘The first ten were the hardest,’ he says with a sheepish grin. ‘I feel like I have spent the last decade just going from one university to the next. It is nice to get to use my knowledge for something, well, useful. For once.’

‘I am deeply impressed. Which universities did you attend?’

‘Well, I started at The Royal Frederick’s in Christiania, with general linguistics. Then I studied Nordic languages at Uppsala, in Sweden. I have been to Heidelberg, I was in Oxford for a year, then Toulouse . . . Then I returned to Sweden and went to Lund, where I have been since.’

I shake my head. ‘All my time at Oxford feels so very short now, in comparison.’

‘Oh, but my dear fellow, you are a proper scholar!’ Hector insists. ‘Your work within your field is quite excellent, and you have been out there, doing practical research—I adored your articles on your time with the Maori—while I have been sitting in libraries and lecture halls, trying to understand old Greek texts. I am really very excited to be involved in this,’ he confesses, leaning in conspiratorially, though we are alone in the tent. ‘Working with you is an honour and a privilege.’

I can feel myself blushing. ‘Why, thank you. That is very kind.’

‘It is not kind. It is true,’ says he.

I clear my throat. ‘And how do you come to know so much about the Sami people?’

It is his turn to blush now, and he looks away, smiling still. ‘Ah. Well, you see, my grandmother was Sami. From a bit further south, though.’

Aha. I thought I had detected a trace of the epicanthic fold in the corners of my young interpreter’s eyes.

‘What about you?’ he asks, turning his gaze back on me. ‘What led you to the path of anthropology?’

I consider for a moment. ‘I have always found people fascinating,’ I confess. ‘As a boy, I never really fit in with my classmates, so I spent most of my time watching them and the interactions between them instead. How their behaviour changed in smaller and larger groups, the social norms within their cliques, it was all very interesting to me. I suppose that is what caused me to consider anthropology when it was time to go to university.’

My companion nods. Then he shuffles over to the tent entrance, leaving the space beside me oddly cold again, and pokes his head out. ‘Hello! The snow has stopped. And the sky seems to be clearing.’ He pulls the tent flap shut and sits back down, looking at me, his head cocked gently to one side.

I clear my throat. ‘Have you ever done this before?’ I ask.

He elevates his left eyebrow. ‘This . . . what?’

‘Been north of the arctic circle this time of year.’

‘Oh! Yes. Not this far north, however.’ He smiles. ‘You miss your home.’

I shrug. ‘It feels strange,’ I tell him. ‘Being here, in the dark, for Christmas. Nothing but vast blackness as far as the eye can see outside . . .’

‘Oh, it is not so black,’ says Hector. ‘Come.’ He stands. ‘Come outside with me.’

I put on my hat and mittens, and pull my hood up around my head. The prospect of going outside again today, away from the warmth of the fire and into the chill of the evening air, is not a particularly tantalising one, but Hector is smiling at me, and I think I cannot resist that smile. Were such things at all prudent I would likely take him in my arms as one might a beautiful woman. Instead, I take his offered hand as I reach the tent mouth, and he pulls me to my feet.

There is at least a foot of snow, and it glistens white and cold in the light of . . . what?

‘Now, look up,’ Hector tells me, and I do as he asks, my hand still in his, and what I see causes me to grasp his hand tighter.

The light above me is dancing, flickering in shades of greens and blues and reds, great curtains of it moving across the heavens, and beyond it is a sky thick with stars. Nearly all of the clouds are gone, and the eerie light above us shines nearly as brightly as the dawn.

‘The aurora borealis,’ says Hector, softly. ‘The Northern Lights. Guovssahasat, in the local tongue. It means "the audible light". The Sami believe it to be something supernatural. Some scientists have said that it is due to electric currents in the atmosphere, but Kristian Birkeland believes it comes from the sun. So even when we think the sun is gone, we can see evidence of her existence.’

‘It is . . .’ I swallow. ‘It is not the first time I have seen it, but it was nowhere near this spectacular the last time. It was in Trondheim, when I first arrived there, one night in October. I have not seen it since I have been up here.’

‘No, it is more common in autumn and spring,’ Hector agrees. ‘But you see now, don’t you? It is not so black.’

‘No. It is not.’

Hector smiles at me. He has made no move to let go of my hand.

END