Svala has been perched on a vantage point high above the camp. Now, as the skin is revealed, she creeps down crabwise, wariness in her every move. It is as if she cannot quite believe what she sees. I believe it. I grew up on tales of sailors and mermaids, selkies and the misguided men who loved them. This tale, Svala’s tale, is full of pain, sorrow and beauty. When it is finished I will make a new song.

“Felix!” Sibeal calls softly. “It’s time.”

I move to stand beside her. The skin lies before us, an oddly shaped mat of earth shades, slate and shingle, sand and pebble, stone and shadow. The firelight touches it gently.

Svala reaches the flat ground and walks toward us, slowly, so slowly. I think even now she doubts the evidence of her own eyes. She comes to the far edge of the skin. A trembling courses through her body, but she stands as tall and proud as a queen. Her eyes are on the two of us, Sibeal and me.

“Felix,” Sibeal murmurs, “you say what must be said. I think she will understand.”

In my heart I hear the tolling of a great, solemn bell. I remember the sound of the creature singing, joining me in celebration of wrong put right. I think of Paul. “What was cruelly stolen from you, we now return to you,” I tell Svala, making sure I meet her eyes and trying to form the right images in my mind, as I know Sibeal does. “It is yours; take it. We are sorry. We are more sorry than we can say. We will never trouble your shore again.” I do not ask her to let us go safely out of the bay. Now is the time for this one thing only.

“Take it, Svala,” says Sibeal in a voice lovely as the nightingale’s song. “Be yourself again, in all your strength and dignity. Take it.”

Then, without a word or a glance at each other, we step back from the skin. Around us the men of the crew are still and silent, caught in the moment. They have forgotten, for now, how many lives were lost here.

Svala nods. It is an acknowledgment of what we have done. She bends to take the edge of the great skin in her hands. I stare, not knowing what I will see, not understanding how this can possibly work, but aware that we are about to witness something truly remarkable.

Svala lifts the skin one-handed, flipping it up and through the air as if it weighs no more than a lady’s silk kerchief. As it rises above her, Knut screams. “No! No! In Thor’s name, no!” He is on his feet, wrenching at the rope that binds him, desperate to get away. Nobody helps him. All eyes are on her.