The Face in the Ice

It was the January of 2011, and I had taken a job as a night watchman at a decommissioned fish processing plant on the outskirts of a small Norwegian town called Kirkenes. The plant, a sprawling maze of rusted machinery and freezing corridors, sat on the edge of a fjord that had frozen solid for the first time in decades. My shift was from midnight to eight in the morning, and I was alone, save for the occasional howl of the wind and the groan of the old building settling.

That night, the cold was oppressive, biting through my heavy coat as I made my rounds. The plant had been closed for years, and the power was barely enough to keep the few dim lights flickering in the main office. I carried a flashlight, its beam cutting through the darkness as I walked the familiar path: through the sorting hall, past the conveyor belts, and into the cold storage room where the temperature was always a few degrees below freezing.

It was in that storage room that I first noticed it. The floor was coated with a thin layer of ice, and as my light swept across it, I saw something lying in the far corner, glinting in the beam. Curiosity got the better of me, and I walked over. It was a small, tarnished locket, its chain broken. I picked it up, and inside was a faded photograph of a young woman, her face frozen in a smile that seemed too wide, her eyes staring straight ahead with an unsettling intensity.

I pocketed the locket, thinking it might be some lost memento from a worker long ago, and continued my rounds. But as I moved on, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched. Every few minutes, I would turn, sure that something was just behind me, but there was nothing. The silence was absolute, save for the occasional drip of water from a leaky pipe.

Around three in the morning, I decided to take a break in the small break room, which still had a working coffee machine. I poured myself a cup, the bitter liquid warming my hands, and sat down at the table. The room was lit by a single fluorescent tube that buzzed overhead, casting everything in a sickly green light. I pulled out the locket again, turning it over in my hands. The face in the photograph seemed to change as I stared at it, the smile becoming more pronounced, the eyes seeming to follow me no matter where I moved.

A sudden clang from the direction of the cold storage room made me drop the locket. I stood, heart pounding, and grabbed my flashlight. I crept back along the corridor, the beam of light trembling as I held it out. The door to the cold storage room was ajar, and through the gap I could see a faint glow from inside. I pushed the door open, and the light grew brighter, illuminating the room in a pale, blue-white luminescence. And there, standing in the middle of the room, was the woman from the photograph.

She was wearing a thin, white dress that shimmered like frost, and her long, dark hair hung wetly around her face. But it was her face that held me captive. It was the same face as the photograph, but it was wrong. Her skin was pale, almost translucent, and her features were too sharp, too angular. And her smile, that terrible smile, was too wide, showing teeth that were needle-thin and pointed. Her eyes were black, bottomless, and as she looked at me, I felt an icy dread seep into my bones.

I tried to scream, but no sound came out. The cold seemed to wrap around me, squeezing the breath from my lungs. She took a step forward, her bare feet making no sound on the ice-covered floor. ‘You found me,’ she said, her voice like the wind over a frozen lake. ‘I was waiting.’

I wanted to run, but my legs were frozen, locked in place. She reached out a hand, her fingers long and white, and touched my cheek. The touch was like a burn of ice, and I felt something inside me begin to wither, as if she were drawing the warmth from my body. ‘Let me rest,’ she whispered, and her smile widened impossibly, splitting her face from ear to ear.

Then the lights went out. The entire building plunged into darkness, and I was left alone in the black, the cold pressing against me. I collapsed to my knees, gasping for air, and when I finally managed to stagger to my feet, the room was empty. The locket was lying on the floor where I had dropped it, but the photograph was gone. In its place was a piece of paper, folded into a tiny square. I unfolded it with trembling fingers. Written in a shaky, old-fashioned handwriting, it read: ‘She never left this place. She waits for the one who carries her home.’

The rest of my shift passed in a blur. When the morning finally came and the sun rose over the fjord, I walked out of that plant and never looked back. I still have the locket, though I cannot bear to open it. And every night, just before I fall asleep, I swear I can hear a faint whisper in my ear, soft as falling snow: ‘You found me.’