The Ritual

youngest lad has a
few problems. And Phil’s wife is a permanent state of ball-ache for the guy. There’s some trouble at both mills, if you follow. So go easy, is all I’m saying.’
    ‘Sure. No worries.’
    ‘On the bright side,’ Hutch said, trying to change the conversation, ‘we cut this crap in half today, then we get more time in Stockholm before we head back. You love that
town.’
    ‘I guess,’ Luke said.
    ‘But?’
    Luke shrugged. Blew smoke out through his nose. ‘At least here, we are on a trail we can see on the map. The forest is new ground. It’s off piste, mate. There are no trails
marked.’
    ‘It’ll be a treat. Trust me. Wait until you get inside. It’s National Park. Completely untampered with. Virgin forest.’
    Luke’s index finger tapped the map. ‘Maybe . . . but you don’t know what the ground is like in there. At least this rock is flat. There’s marshes in there, H. Look. Here.
And here.’
    ‘We won’t go near them. We’ll just weave through the thinnest band of the trees, here, for a couple of hours, and voilà . . . pop out the other side.’
    Luke raised his eyebrows. ‘You sure? No one will know we’re down there.’
    ‘Makes no difference. The Environment office was closed when we left, and I never called ahead to the Porjus branch. It’ll be fine though. That’s only a precaution for winter.
It’s hardly even autumn. There won’t be any snow or ice. We might even see some wildlife in there. And the fat men couldn’t walk on sponge for another two days, let alone rock.
This short cut will halve the distance. We’re still looking down the barrel at walking through the second half of today. And we’d need another whole day and evening to reach Porjus
tomorrow. Look at them. They’re done, mate.’
    Luke nodded, exhaled long twin plumes of smoke down his nostrils. ‘You’re the boss.’

TWO
    FOUR HOURS, TWENTY MINUTES LATER
    Dead wood snapped under their soles and broken pieces were kicked away. Branches forced aside snapped back into those walking behind. Phil fell and crashed into the
nettles, but stood up without a murmur and jogged to catch up with the others who were almost running by this time. Their heads were down and their shoulders were stooped. Twigs whipped faces and
laces were pulled undone, but they kept going. Forward, until Hutch stopped and sighed and put his hands on his knees in a tiny clearing. A brown place where the dead wood and leaf mould was
shallow and the thorny vines no longer ripped into socks or left burrs, impossibly, inside shirts and trousers.
    Luke spoke for the first time since they’d stumbled across the dead animal. He was breathless but still managed to get a cigarette into his mouth. Only he couldn’t light it. Four
attempts he made with his Zippo until he was blowing smoke out of his nose. ‘Hunter I reckon.’
    ‘You can’t hunt here,’ Hutch said.
    ‘Farmer then.’
    ‘But why put it up there?’ Dom asked again.
    Hutch took his pack off. ‘Who knows. There’s nothing cultivated in the whole park. It’s wilderness. That’s the whole point of it. I could use a smoke.’
    Luke wiped at his eyes. Tears streamed down his cheeks. Bits of powdery bark kept getting under his eyelids. ‘A wolf killed it. It was an elk, or deer. And . . . something put it in the
tree.’ He threw the packet of Camel cigarettes at Hutch.
    Hutch picked the cigarette packet from the ground.
    Phil frowned, stared at his feet. ‘A forest has wardens. Rangers. Would they . . .’
    Hutch shrugged, lit up. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if we were the first people to walk through this bit. Seriously. Think of the size of the county. Twenty-seven thousand square
kilometres. Most of it untouched. We’re at least five kilometres from the last trail, and that’s hardly ever used.’
    Luke exhaled. He tried again. ‘A bear. Maybe a bear put it up there. To stop things eating it. You know, on the ground.’
    Hutch looked at the end of his cigarette, frowned. ‘Maybe. Are they that big in Sweden?’
    Dom and Phil sat down. Phil rolled a sleeve up a chubby white forearm to his elbow. ‘I’m scratched to buggery.’
    Dom’s face was white. Even his lips. ‘Hutch! I’ll ram that map up your useless Yorkshire arse.’ He often spoke to Hutch like this. Luke was always surprised at the
outbursts, at the violence of the language. But there was no genuine hate in these exchanges, just familiarity. It meant Dom and Hutch