When you hear how a sailor from Scotland, and a Norwegian girl ended up together, it is hard not to believe in the miracle of fate.

The Renton couple's amazing story is the focus of a documentary called "Through Hell and High Water."

In 1944, 21-year-old Nancy was living in Nazi occupied Norway.

The film takes us back to 1944, when Archie is a 21-year-old sailor in the British navy, protecting convoys at sea, and 21-year-old Nancy is living in Nazi occupied Norway.

Nancy and other Norwegians lived under the harsh rule of the Nazis for several years. As the Germans retreated in 1944, they burned Nancy's town of Hammerfest to the ground.

"To see our own home go up in flames, we just watched and couldn't do a thing about it. It was heartbreaking and horrifying," she said.

Yearning for freedom, and afraid of where the Nazis would send her, Nancy has no plans on obeying German orders to move south.

"And I wasn't going to let the Germans tell me. So, we just decided absolutely not. We were not going to do that," she said.

Instead, she and hundreds of other Norwegians escaped and hide in remote sea caves on Soroya island along the Norwegian coast.

"We were refugees from a very, very bad situation," said Nancy.

Nancy hid with six others in a cave.

Archie was a sailor in the British navy.

"That was our home for a little over four months, in the coldest part of the winter. Like a bunch of animals hibernating for the winter," she said.

More than a half-century later, she traveled from Renton to visit that Norwegian cave, and return to her past one more time.

"You know sometimes you really have to go back to see if it's true what you went through. It's like putting a ghost to rest," she said.

It was the first time in more than 50 years she had seen her good friend, Gunvar, a fellow cave survivor.

Her friend Gunvar was one of the six other people who hid with Nancy in the cave.

"In the winter, we don't have any daylight for 3 or 4 months. So it was a pretty dark way of living," said Nancy. "It was a miserable time really, cause we didn't know what was ahead of us. We may have had our own thoughts but kept them strictly to ourselves."

More than a half-century later, Nancy traveled from Renton to visit that Norwegian cave, and return to her past one more time.

It wasn't easy to live in a cave as small as it was, and not have any way of gettin' supplies," she said.

One morning, a Nazi patrol boat nearly found them.

"Pretty damn scary. We were terrified and thought the end must be near," said Nancy. "We wouldn't give in, we simply would not give in."

In February of 1945, Nancy heard news the British navy was sending ships through u-boat infested waters to the other side of the island to rescue hundreds of Norwegians hiding in coastal caves.

"We skied across that mountain about six hours, most of that time was climbing," she said.

Some 500 Norwegians eagerly climbed aboard the ships that will carry them to freedom.

Nancy was torn whether to stay with relatives, stay in her homeland, or leave with.

"I didn't have much time. I was the last one to make up my mind. Everyone else was ... and I thought, oh well, I'll try it," she said. "We had no idea where we were goin'. We felt at least we were rid of the Germans, we hoped. But we felt free."

Nancy and hundreds of other Norwegians escaped and hid in remote sea caves on Soroya island along the Norwegian coast.

It was not be an uneventful voyage to freedom. Something happened at sea that changed Nancy and Archie's lives forever.

"We didn't have breakfast before we were hit with a torpedo. There was absolutely no warning. It was a horrible feeling we just had to scramble on deck and get in a life raft. I don't know how we made it. We couldn't see anyone else in sight. We felt lost, and I thought we were not going to be picked up at all," said Nancy.

As fate would have it, her future husband, Archie, was serving on the HMS Onslaught, the British ship that came to save her.

"The captain told us that we were going to rescue these Norwegian survivors. There was a lot of havoc and screaming, 'get this people outta the water,'" said Archie.

Evading German submarines and fighters, Archie and his shipmates took Nancy and the others aboard.

Archie was in charge of looking after the Norwegian refugees.

"The first time I saw Archie was when one of the officers brought him down to the officer's mess, where we were all gathered. He looked friendly and kind of cuddly type. So I did notice him much. He was really worthwhile lookin' at twice," said Nancy.

Said Archie, "Just one of those things where you see somebody and say, hey there's something different there, you know."

Love at first sight?

"I think so, yes, yes, and that's the absolute truth," said Archie.

Archie and Nancy married in September of 1945.

They sailed through horrific seas, on their way to Scotland. Through that harrowing journey, their love for each other grew.

After a couple of long weeks in those stormy seas, the ships carrying the Norwegian cave refugees finally arrived in Scotland.

"Goin' into new country, it was nice to know there was somebody I knew I could turn to and would care. When we were leavin' the ship, Archie came along and gave me a note with his address on, and I thought that was kinda cute. And he told me to go see his mother," said Nancy.

"I had felt happy we had arrived and got them safely ashore. The ship was supposed to go join a convoy and I wondered if I would see her again," said Archie.

But fate would intervene again. Archie's ship struck another on the way back to convoy duty. He and the crew are sent ashore, where he tracked Nancy down in a refugee camp. They married in September of 1945.

Archie and Nancy now live in Renton, Wash.

"That was the happiest day of my life. Really a great, great day," said Nancy.

They knew then and now how lucky they were to have survived a war in which so many others perished.

"When you saw one of your ships go down, it was kinda saddenin'. Watchin' sailors sittin' there and crying … I was one of them too," said Archie.

Nancy and Archie moved to Washington in 1955 and have been blessed with a daughter, grandchildren, and great grandchildren.

"We value peace and quiet, after so many years of war and tragedies. "You kind of look back and think things could have been so much worse," said Nancy.

"God is what directed my ship, the HMS onslaught on to pick these survivors up from the water, and it was fate that brought us together. It was a sad, sad thing for people to be torpedoed and it was a tragedy, but out of that tragedy, I found my happiness," said Archie.