In a dimly lit kitchen, Ingeri (Gunnel Lindblom) — a wild creature sometimes referred to as a servant girl and sometimes as half-sister to Karin
(Birgitta Pettersson) — crouches in front of a fireplace. She puffs her cheeks and blows. Her expulsion of breath fans the sparks into a flame, which slowly begins to dispel the darkness around. Ingeri prods open the skylight.
Looking up at the morning spilling through the roof, Ingeri prays, “God Odin, come!”
She repeats the entreaty and then hisses,
“I seek your service.” What is it that she seek? Perhaps she just wants proof, simple proof, that the faith of her pagan fathers is still viable and valid in the face of the new religion that’s begun to sway people like Karin’s parents, Töre (Max von Sydow) and Märeta (Birgitta Valberg).
Even the director of the film appears swayed. Where he barely allowed any light into the kitchen that is Ingeri’s domain,
Töre and Märeta — who stand outside, clasping their hands in front of an icon of Christ — are lit beatifically, as if to emphasise their enlightenment, their breaking free of
the barbaric religions of the past. And where Ingeri is a dirty scullery maid, Karin, the Christian, is presented to us as an angel. Even the colour of their hair suggests a
bias — Karin is a blonde goddess, Ingeri a raven-haired wildcat.
When Karin sets out to deliver the Virgin’s candles to Mass, at a church across the forest, Ingeri accompanies her. They approach
a stream, and a gnarled bridge-keeper (Axel Slangus) rises to shepherd their horses across. Even here, Karin is given precedence. Ingeri watches hatefully, awaiting her
turn. But the moment Karin reaches the other bank, something suddenly changes
in Ingeri — as if what had been crossed weren’t a stream so much as an invisible line, a point of no return.
She scrambles across the shallow waters and pleads with Karin, “Let’s turn back... The forest is so black; I can’t go on.” Taken aback by this hysterical display, Karin arranges for Ingeri to stay with the bridge-keeper until her return. “Come, I can help,” the bridge-keeper says, and leads the way to his hut. Ingeri observes, “This is a forlorn place. Have you no neighbours?”
He comes closer, but he’s no longer the kindly old man from outside. Inside, he looks like a leering ghoul. By way of an answer, he explains, “I hear what I will and I see what I will. I hear what mankind whispers in secret and I see what it believes no one can see.”
Ingeri becomes uneasy. Is she beginning to wonder if the old man knows something? After all, if he can “hear what mankind whispers in secret,” perhaps he’s overheard her entreaties to Odin in the dimly lit kitchen. Perhaps he knows that she prayed for evil to befall Karin and later regretted her actions, which is why she turned so hysterical, beseeching Karin to flee from the forest.
The bridge-keeper — who, it is evident by now, is no ordinary bridge-keeper — reaches for a box and begins to pull out shamanistic objects. “Here is a cure for your suffering. Here is a cure for your woe.” One of the objects is a severed finger.
Ingeri trembles, “You have made a human sacrifice — a sacrifice to Odin.” At the mention of the pagan God’s name, he snarls,
“I recognised you at once. I recognised you by your eyes, your mouth, your hands.”
He knows her kind. He is her kind — a benighted believer in curses and sacrifices, and he now pledges his support, as if they were both part of a shadowy cabal resisting the onslaught of Christianity. “But you are afraid; you must not be,” he rasps. “I shall give you strength.”