West of the Moon

The troll on the roof skirmished around the smoke hole like a dog at a rabbit-burrow, trying to get an upside-down glimpse of the golden goblet, which Hilde lifted from the shelf and carried to her father.

“Lovely!” Ralf whispered, tilting it. The bowl was wide. Two handles like serpents looped from the rim to the foot. The gold shone in the firelight as if it might melt over his fingers like butter.

“It’s so pretty!” said Sigrid. “Why don’t we ever use it?”

“Use that?” cried Gudrun in horror. “Never! It’s real bad luck, you mark my words. Many a time I’ve asked your father to take it back up the hill and leave it. But he’s too stubborn.”

“Gudrun!” Ralf grumbled. “Always worrying! Who’d believe my story without this cup? My prize, won fair and square. Bad luck goes to people with bad hearts. We have nothing to fear.”

“Did the old miller like it?” asked Sigurd.

“Oh yes! ‘Troll treasure!’ said old Grim. ‘We could use a bit of that, couldn’t we, boys?’ The way he was looking at it made me uneasy. After all, no one knew where I was. I got up to go – and there were the boys in front of me, blocking the door, and old Grim behind me, picking up a log from the woodpile!” Ralf looked grim. “If it hadn’t been for Bjørn and Arne Egilsson coming to the door that moment with a sack of barley to grind, I might have been knocked on the head for this cup.”

“And that’s why the millers hate us?” said Hilde. “Because we’ve got the cup and they haven’t?”

“There’s more to it than that,” said Gudrun. “Old Grim was crazy to have that cup, or something like it. Next day he came round pestering your father to sell him the Stonemeadow. He thought if he owned it, he could dig it up for treasure.”

“I turned him down flat,” said Ralf. “‘If there’s any treasure up there,’ I told him, ‘it belongs to the trolls and they’ll be guarding it. Leave well alone!’”

“Now that was sense,” said Gudrun. “But what happened? Old Grim tells everyone that your father’s cheated him – taken his money and kept the land!”

“A dirty lie!” said Ralf, reddening.

“But old Grim’s dead now, isn’t he?” asked Hilde.

“Yes,” said Ralf, “he died last winter. But do you know why? Because he hung about on that hill in all weathers, hoping to find the way in, and he got caught in a snowstorm.”

“His sons found him,” added Gudrun, “lying under a crag, clawing at the rocks. Weeping that he’d found the gate, and could hear the gatekeeper laughing at him from inside the hill. They carried him back to the mill, but he was too far gone. They blamed your father, of course.”

“That’s not fair!” said Hilde.

“It’s not fair,” said Gudrun, “but it’s the way things are. Which makes it madness for your father to be thinking of taking off on a foolhardy voyage. Ralf,” she begged, “you know these trips are a gamble. Don’t go!”

Ralf scratched his head. “I want some adventure, Gudrun. All my life I’ve lived here, in this one little valley. I want new skies – new seas – new places.” He looked at her pleadingly. “Can’t you see?”

“All I can see,” Gudrun flashed, “is that you want to desert us, and throw away good money on a selfish pleasure trip.”

Ralf went scarlet. “If the money worries you, sell this!” he roared, brandishing the golden cup. “It’s gold, it will fetch a good price, and I know you’ve always hated it! But I’m sailing on that longship!”

“You’ll drown!” Gudrun sobbed. “And all the time I’m waiting and waiting for you, you’ll be riding over Hel’s bridge with the rest of the dead!”

There was an awful silence.

Ralf put the cup down and took Gudrun by the shoulders. He gave her a little shake and said gently, “You’re a wonderful woman, Gudrun. I married a grand woman, sure enough. But I’ve got to take this chance of going a-Viking.”

The gale buffeted the house. Draughts crept moaning under the door. Gudrun drew a long, shaky breath. “When do you go?”

Ralf looked at the floor. “Tomorrow morning,” he admitted in a low voice. “I’m sorry, Gudrun. The ship sails tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow!” Gudrun’s lips whitened. She turned her face against Ralf ’s shoulder and shuddered. “Ralf, Ralf! It’s no weather for sailors!”

“This will blow itself out by morning,” Ralf consoled her.

Up on the roof, the troll lost interest. It sat riding the ridge, waving its arms in the wind and calling loudly, “Hoooo! Hututututu!”

“How the wind shrieks!” said Gudrun. She took the poker and stirred up the fire. A stream of sparks shot through the smoke hole, and the startled troll threw itself backwards and rolled off the roof. Then it prowled inquisitively round the buildings, leaving odd little eight-toed footprints in the mud. The farmhouse door had a horseshoe nailed over it. The troll wouldn’t go near that. But it pried into every other corner of the farmyard, leaving smears of bad luck, like snail-tracks, on everything it touched.

Chapter 3

Talking to the Nis

AFTER THE FIRST stunned moment, Peer began to laugh – tight, hiccupping laughter that hurt his chest.

Uncle Grim and Uncle Baldur were identical twins. Same barrel chests and muscular, knotted arms. Same mean little eyes peering from masses of black tangled beard and hair. Uncle Baldur was still wrapped in his wet cloak, however, while his brother seemed to have been eating supper, for he was holding a knife with a piece of meat skewered to the point.

“Shut up,” he said to Peer. “And get down.” Only the voice was different – deep and rough.

With a stitch in his side from laughing – or sobbing – Peer held up his wrist, still tethered to the side of the cart. Uncle Grim snapped the twine with a contemptuous jerk. He sucked the meat off his knife, licked the blade, and severed the string holding Loki. “Now get down,” he ordered through his food. He turned to his brother as Peer jumped stiffly into the mud. “Not much, is he?”

“But he’ll do,” grunted Uncle Baldur. “Here!” He thrust the lantern at Peer. “Take this. Put the oxen in the stalls. Put the hens in the barn. Feed them. Move!” He threw an arm over Grim’s shoulder and as the two of them slouched away, Peer heard Baldur saying, “What’s in the pot? Stew? I’ll have some of that!” The door shut.

Peer stood in the rain with the lantern. All desire to laugh left him. Loki whined, his head on one side. “Come on, boy,” said Peer wearily. “Let’s get on with it.”

He unloaded the hens and set them loose on the barn floor, where an arrogant black cockerel came strutting to inspect them. Then he unhitched the oxen and gave them some hay. Loki curled up in the straw and fell asleep. Peer decided to leave him there. There had been a big dog barking inside the mill, and he hadn’t forgotten what Uncle Baldur had said about his dog eating Loki. Taking the lantern, he set off across the yard. It had stopped raining, and tatters of cloud blew wildly overhead.

Not a glimmer of light escaped from the mill. Peer hoped his uncles hadn’t locked him out. Cold, damp and hungry, he hesitated on the step, afraid to go in. Voices mumbled inside. What were they saying? Was it about him? He put his ear to the door and listened.

“There wasn’t much,” Baldur was saying.

“Count it anyway,” said Grim’s deep voice, and Peer realised they were counting the money Baldur had made from the sale.

“Twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-one, in copper and silver,” Baldur finished. “Lock it up! We don’t want the boy finding it.”

“It’s my money, you thieves,” Peer whispered furiously. A lid creaked open and crashed shut. They had hidden the money in some chest. If he walked in now, he might see where it was.

“About the boy,” said Baldur, and Peer glued his ear to the wet wood. Unfortunately Baldur was walking about, for he could hear feet clumping to and fro, and the words came in snatches.

“…time to take him to the Gaffer?” Peer heard, and, “…no point taking him yet. Plenty of time before the wedding.”

What wedding? And who’s the Gaffer? Peer applied his ear to the door again. A succession of thuds sounded like both of his uncles taking their boots off and kicking them across the room. He heard Grim say loudly, “At least we’ll get some work out of him first,” and this seemed to end the discussion.

Peer straightened up and scratched his head. But it was too cold to stand around wondering. The wind bit his ears and a fresh rain shower rattled out of the sky. Inside the mill Baldur was saying, “Hasn’t that pesky lad finished yet?” Hastily Peer knocked and lifted the latch.

With a blood-curdling bellow, the most enormous dog Peer had ever seen launched itself from the fireside directly at his throat. Uncle Grim stuck out a casual hand and yanked the monster backwards, roaring, “Down, Grendel! Come in and shut the door,” he added roughly to Peer. “Let him smell you. Then he’ll know you.”

Grendel was taller than a wolf. His brindled coat stood up in a thick ruff of fur over his shoulders and down his spine. He smelled Peer’s outstretched fingers, grumbling distrustfully. “Best dog in the valley,” boasted Uncle Grim, giving him an affectionate slap. “Wins every fight: a real killer!”

Thank goodness I didn’t bring Loki in, Peer thought with a shudder as he looked about. The narrow smoke-stained room was a jumble of rickety furniture, bins, barrels and old tools. A sullen fire smouldered in the middle of the floor, and Uncle Baldur sat beside it on a stool, guzzling stew from a bowl in his lap and toasting his vast hairy toes over the embers. Two bunk beds, set into alcoves, trailed tangles of dirty blankets on to the floor.