She pulled her scarf tighter and started toward the entrance. Each step sank into snow that had begun to crust over, crunching under her boots with the sound of cracking bones. The brass handle of the front door burned her glove as she gripped it; it hadn’t been polished in years. A low hum carried through the wood—voices, rhythmic and in unison, the cadence too perfect to be innocent. When she stepped inside, warmth hit her with a faint odor of boiled cabbage.
The children stood in rows in the assembly room, their wool uniforms a dull brown, buttoned to the throat. The light bulbs above flickered with the weak pulse of a dying heart. A teacher at the front beat time with a small birch rod against her palm. The words came in fragments, then solidified into a chant: “The strength of the North is obedience. The strength of obedience is purity.”
Ingrid hesitated by the doorway, snow melting from her hair, a damp line trailing down her collar. “You can stop for now,” she said quietly. Her voice barely rose above the children’s chant, but the teacher heard. The rod paused mid-swing, then lowered.
Dozens of pale faces turned toward her—eyes too still, like glass marbles fixed in wax. “Good afternoon,” Ingrid tried again, forcing warmth into her tone. “I’m from the regional welfare office. I’m here to observe.”
A small boy in the front row flinched when the teacher’s hand brushed his shoulder. Ingrid noticed the faint tremor, the way he bit the inside of his lip until it bled. Her stomach tightened.
“Dr. Nilsen will speak with you,” the teacher said. Her voice was dry, polite, and hollow, as if rehearsed a hundred times. “The director values transparency.”
“Of course he does,” Ingrid murmured. She followed the corridor that had a faint smell of soap and smoke, her boots leaving wet imprints on the warped wooden floor. From behind closed doors came the muffled coughing of children, a sound that seemed to echo through the bones of the house.
At the end of the hall, a glass door bore the etched name Director Nilsen. Light spilled from beneath it in a steady, artificial band—the kind of light that denied dusk. She knocked once, then entered.
Dr. Nilsen looked up from his desk. His smile arrived before his words, slow and deliberate. “Ah, Ms. Solberg. You made it through the storm. I was afraid the pass would close again.”
“It nearly did,” Ingrid said. She removed her gloves, flexing her stiff fingers. The room was overheated, stiflingly so. “I’d like to discuss your program. I’ve received some concerning reports.”
“Reports,” he repeated, savoring the word. His voice was smooth, the kind that made everything sound reasonable. “Discipline therapy can seem harsh to outsiders. But it’s rooted in tradition—Nordic strength, self-reliance. These children come broken, frightened. They need structure.”
“Structure,” she echoed. Her gaze drifted past him, toward the far corner where the lamplight failed to reach. Something stirred there—a shifting darkness, almost like breath catching in a throat. She blinked. It was gone.
Dr. Nilsen leaned back, steepling his fingers. “You must understand, fear can be a teacher. These are lessons of the spirit. Our ancestors knew that.”
“Your ancestors didn’t use their fists.” The words slipped out before she could temper them.
His smile deepened, not offended, merely entertained. “You think we hurt them?”
“I’ve seen the bruises,” she said, her pulse quickening. “Knuckles, shoulders. Some haven’t slept in days.”
“Their souls are restless,” he murmured, almost tenderly. “Purification stirs unease.”
Outside the window, snow swirled in tight circles, white against the fading gray. The wind groaned through the seams of the house, and something within it answered—a low, almost human sigh. Ingrid glanced back toward the shadowed corner. The air there seemed thicker, colder, bending the lamplight as if it resisted illumination.
She swallowed hard. “I’ll need access to your records,” she said. “All disciplinary logs, sleep reports, any incident documentation.”
“Of course.” He rose, smoothing his vest. “We value accountability.”
When he turned to open a filing cabinet, his reflection in the window didn’t follow the movement. Ingrid’s breath hitched, but she forced her face still.
Later that night, in the cellar, she found the records. The air smelled of iron and damp paper. Each folder was labeled in neat block letters, the handwriting painfully precise. Her flashlight beam trembled over page after page of notes: Subject 12—nightmares of black snow. Subject 4—claims of a woman watching from the ceiling. The words "confession complete" repeated like a litany.
The final pages were signed not by staff, but by the children themselves—names scrawled in uneven strokes, each followed by a second signature, large and curling: Grýla.
Her gloved hand shook. The air around her seemed to shift, thick with unseen motion. Faintly, she heard footsteps above, slow and deliberate, though everyone should have been asleep. The building creaked, answering itself like an old throat clearing in the dark.
When she looked up, frost was forming on the ceiling beams, spidering outward in delicate white veins. Her breath puffed visibly, though she wore her coat zipped to the chin. Somewhere behind her, the metal door handle rattled once, then fell still.
Her disbelief—her years of studied rationality, of notes and assessments and tidy forms—wavered. Something primitive inside her recognized what logic could not. The children’s fear was not metaphor. It had weight, scent, and sound.
On Christmas Eve, the storm reached its full voice. The house trembled as if something vast pressed against its walls. In the chapel, the candles bent sideways in a wind that came from nowhere. Ingrid knelt among the pews, her palms slick against the wood, words rising unbidden from a place she thought long dead.
“God help them,” she whispered. The air shuddered, the timbers moaned. From the rafters came a cry that split the cold—a shriek both ancient and feminine, drawn out like fabric tearing. The sound dissolved into the hiss of snow, and when silence returned, it was deep enough to feel holy.
Ash drifted through the air like black snow. Frost gleamed on the altar rail. Ingrid stayed kneeling, breathing hard, her tears freezing before they could fall. She didn’t know if what answered her prayer was mercy or justice. The darkness had retreated, and it had cost her something she could never quite name.
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