Katherine Langrish - West of the Moon

“To the Stonemeadow. Ssh!” The Nis laid a long finger to its lips and tiptoed closer to Loki.

“Oh, leave him alone! The Stonemeadow? Where’s that?”

The Nis gave up. “High up on Troll Fell!” it snapped.

“I thought they’d gone drinking. What are they doing there?”

The Nis looked at him out of the corner of one eye.

“Talking to trolls? Please tell me,” Peer begged. “I heard them say something about trolls, and taking me to the – to the Gaffer, the King of the Trolls. Is that right? And something about a wedding? Do you know anything? Can you help me?”

The Nis ran into the corner where the big scales hung, and jumped into one of the pans, which hardly moved. It sat there bouncing gently and would not look round.

Peer saw he had gone about things the wrong way.

“Nis,” he called quietly, “I think you’re very clever.”

The Nis sniffed.

“I know a girl who lives on a farm near here. She has lots of butter. Shall I ask her to give me a big lump all for you?”

The Nis twitched and the scales swayed.

“Please be my friend, Nis, and I’ll be yours.” Peer stopped as his voice shook. He so badly wanted a friend.

The Nis relented. It sat cross-legged in the pan and leaned on the chains to make the scales swing. “What does you want to know, Peer Ulfsson?”

Peer didn’t know where to start. “Well – what’s this wedding?”

“Oh!” The Nis got very excited. “A very big wedding indeed! At midwinter, the Gaffer, the old King of Troll Fell, will marry his son to – guess who?”

“I can’t guess,” said Peer.

“Guess! Guess!” the Nis insisted.

“I can’t,” Peer laughed. “Tell me!”

The Nis paused, and said in a hushed voice, “To the King of the Dovrefell’s daughter!” It sat back.

It meant something to Peer after all. Even he had heard of the trolls of the Dovrefell, the wild mountain range to the north. “That’s an important match?” he suggested.

The Nis nodded. “Everyone is going, Peer Ulfsson. They say the bride is very beautiful. There will be such a feast!” It wriggled with delight and cracked its knuckles.

“Are you going?”

The Nis’s face fell. “I doesn’t know,” it admitted. “Food and drink, as much as you can hold, music and dancing, and the hill raised up on red pillars – but they hasn’t invited poor Nithing yet.”

“Oh, there’s plenty of time, if it’s not till midwinter. But what has the troll wedding got to do with Uncle Baldur and Uncle Grim? What are they up to on Troll Fell in the middle of the night?”

“Middle of the night is daytime for trolls,” the Nis pointed out scornfully. “If Grimssons go knocking on the troll gate at noon, what will they hear? Snores.”

“I see that. But what do they want with the trolls at all?”

The Nis was getting bored and fidgety. “Treasure,” it yawned, showing a pink tongue and sharp little teeth like a kitten’s.

“Troll gold? Yes, but why,” said Peer, struggling to make sense of it, “why would the trolls give them any? I don’t understand.”

With a loud squeak, the scales tipped as the Nis leaped into the rafters like a squirrel. Heavy feet sounded at the door. In tramped Uncle Baldur and Uncle Grim, stamping mud from their boots, cold night air pouring from them like water. They looked sour and displeased. Grendel loped behind them, and Loki nipped quickly outside.

Peer scrambled up. Uncle Baldur took him by the ear, led him to the door and booted him out. “Make yourself useful, you idle young layabout. I want the wheel stopped now.”

“But I don’t know how,” Peer called at the closing door.

Uncle Baldur paused with the door a couple of inches open. “Go and lower the sluicegate, of course. And then get off to the barn. Don’t come knocking and disturbing us – it’s late!”

And the door slammed shut.

Chapter 7

Granny Greenteeth

IT WAS PAST midnight. A star fell over the barn roof. Peer shivered, wrapping his arms across his chest.

“They didn’t look too happy, did they?” he muttered to Loki. “Perhaps their interview with the King of Troll Fell didn’t go too well. No need to take it out on us, though. Lower the sluicegate? At this hour?”

Loki whined softly. Peer didn’t know which was scarier, to disobey Uncle Baldur or go up near that dark millpond by himself.

“Into the barn with you,” he told Loki, dragging him there by the collar. “Sit. Stay! I’m not risking you.” Loki’s eyes gleamed in the dark and again he whined gently.

Peer crossed the yard and turned on to the wooden bridge. The mill clacked steadily. The wheel churned, chopping the water with dripping blades that glinted in the starlight. Peer leaned on the rail, trying to gather courage to go on.

A black shadow moved at the corner of his eye. He whipped around, heart beating wildly. But it was only a woman plodding up the road, dressed in dark clothes with a scarf over her head. She was using a stick to help herself along.

She saw him and stopped. Realising that she too might be nervous, Peer called out softly. “It’s all right. I’m the – the millers’ boy. Only the millers’ boy.”

“The millers’ boy!” repeated the woman. “And what is the millers’ boy doing out here so late?”

“I have to close the sluicegate,” said Peer.

“Ah!” The woman looked at him. It was too dark to see her face properly, but her eyes glittered in the starlight. “So late at night, that’s a job for the miller himself. He shouldn’t be sending a boy out. They say Granny Greenteeth lives in the millpond. Aren’t you afraid of her?”

“A bit,” Peer confessed, “but if I don’t go my uncles will be angry.”

“And you’re more afraid of them.” The woman nodded angrily. “Ah, Baldur Grimsson, Grim Grimsson, I’d make you sorry if I had my way!” She shook her finger at the lightless mill before turning to Peer again. “I’ll come along with you, my son, if you like.”

Peer hesitated. Something about the old woman made him shiver, but his father had taught him to honour old people, and he didn’t know how to refuse. And it was true he would feel braver with company, though the path to the sluice seemed no place for an old lady to be hobbling along at night. He made her a stiff little bow and offered her his arm. She took it with a chuckle and a cough.

“Quite the young lord! You didn’t learn your manners from the Grimssons. What’s your name, boy?”

“Peer Ulfsson – ma’am.” Peer winced as her cold claw dug into his arm. She was surprisingly smelly too, now he was close to her. Her clothes must be damp, mouldy, or something.

But he was glad she was there. As they passed the millrace, he knew he would have been terrified by himself. The threshing wheel and racing water made him dizzy; there was a cold draught fanned by the wheel, and a smell of wet stone and black slime. He tripped, and the old woman steadied him, hugging his arm to her side. She felt strong, and cold.

At the edge of the millpond she released his arm so he could step on to the narrow walkway above the sluice. The pond was so black he could not see where the surface lay. If only there was a guardrail! He shuffled out and grabbed the handle of the sluicegate, remembering it acted like a simple shutter. He leaned his weight on it, driving the gate down against the pressure of the water. The wheel slowed, its great vanes dripping. The rattle and grumble of the mill faltered and ceased. Only the sound of the water was left, tumbling over the weir.

“Well done,” said the old woman. She stretched out a hand to help Peer off the bridge. He took it and then let go with a cry. It was clammy – and wet – and webbed.