On the Cold Coasts

condition, although not until the end of summer when the weight had begun to show, and too late for any measures to be taken in secret. The girl, just fourteen winters old, had shown little understanding of what had happened, being completely ignorant of the natural and, indeed, deliberate consequences of the sensual acts performed by a man and a woman. This despite the fact that a year earlier she had been promised to a man in marriage, and the wedding was to take place as soon she turned fifteen and was fit to be wed. For that reason alone, Sigridur might already have informed her daughter of such consequences, remarked Ragna’s foster-father Thorsteinn sternly, yet he made no allowance for this rather glaring omission when he decided Ragna’s punishment. He gave her a good lashing with brushwood and made her fast on bread and water for seven days straight. Possibly he was hoping that the treatment might result in a miscarriage, and that was certainly her own fervent wish when she finally understood what it meant to be a fallen woman and a harlot.
    Yet her sin was not only that of lying under that pathetic English dog outside of wedlock. Even more appalling was the fact that they had done the deed during Easter week, when intercourse between a man and a woman was strictly forbidden, as it was on all other holy days and most particularly when celebrating the resurrection of the Savior, when transgression meant heavy penance. She had defiled herself at a time when true, honest Christians did their utmost to cleanse the body and the soul through fasting and abstinence, and had thus put her own soul in peril.
    Moreover, for this very reason it was considered highly likely that the child would be born deformed as an eternal reminder to its parent. Such could be the punishment of God Almighty if His Word was violated, Father Pall, the priest of Akrar, told her, his face flushed red with disapproval and indignation on behalf of the Lord, poking a long-nailed index finger into the girl’s belly and causing her to retreat backward in alarm.
    Even more painful was the humiliation when the two men from Muli in Adaldalur Valley came to Akrar to be given the news: Gudbjartur Floki and his son Thorkell, who a summer earlier had grinned at her with sincere anticipation as they shook hands to seal their engagement, and then kissed her once on each cheek, proud yet shy.
    She was bathed and dressed in her best apparel prior to their arrival, a wide dress with short sleeves made of blue flax, gathered with a white belt beneath the breasts, though not tightly enough to make a bad situation seem worse. She wore a silver chain decorated with a small Holyrood around her neck and rings on her fingers. Her black, waist-length hair had been repeatedly washed and then combed so thoroughly that her scalp burned, bringing tears to her eyes. It was then braided and decorated with combs adorned with precious stones. Finally a line was drawn with charcoal across her arched brows and above her eyelashes to enhance her eyes, and her cheeks were pinched to make them rosy. After a sun-filled summer, her skin was already darker than usual, even though she had tortured herself daily by drinking dandelion tonic to make her complexion seem brighter. To no avail.
    Thus primped and attired, she sat on the women’s bench with her mother and younger sister, humble, with downcast eyes and glowing cheeks, when the men from Adaldalur Valley entered the parlor. She was rewarded with their admiring looks and warm greetings. The son was tall, already exceeding his father in height, with blond hair and dark, bushy eyebrows that gave him a particularly strong expression around the eyes, and long lashes like that of a woman. The childish look that had characterized his narrow face a year earlier had now vanished, and instead there was an ambiguous look about him, scrutinizing, yet so warm and penetrating that Ragna grew shy and disconcerted and utterly timid.
    But all fondness disappeared from their faces when Lawman Thorsteinn gave a long-winded explanation filled with digressions about the current and particular situation of the subject. No sympathy was spared for her even though he took it upon himself to include in the story that the miscreant, who had abandoned the scene on a sailing vessel before the discovery was made, had forced the girl’s will through violence. Thorkell gave Ragna a distraught and disbelieving look, and she wanted nothing more than to