Authors: Katherine Langrish
Troll Mill
Katherine Langrish
TROLL
MILL
For
Dave, Alice, and Isobel
,
with love
“K
ersten!”
Cold fright shook Peer’s voice.
“What’s wrong?”
The baby?
Peer blinked in horror. But she was thrusting it at him; he had to take it: Little light arms and legs waved in the rain. He looked desperately to cover its head, and Kersten pushed a blanket into his arms. She was speaking, words he didn’t understand.
“Take her—to Gudrun—Gudrun can feed her—”
“Kersten,” Peer croaked. “What’s happened? Where are you going?”
She looked at him with eyes like dark holes. “Home.”
Then she was past him, the cloak dragging after her. He snatched for it. Sleek wet fur tugged through his fingers. “Kersten! Stop!”
She ran on down the path, and he began to run too, but the baby jolting in his arms slowed him to long desperate strides.
“Kersten!” Rain slashed into his eyes. His feet skated on wet grass, sank into pockets of soft sand. She was on the beach now, running straight down the shingle to the water. Peer skidded to a crazy halt. He couldn’t catch her.
An airthly nourrice sits and sings
And aye she sings, “Ba lily-wean
Little ken I my bairn’s father
Far less the land that he stops in.”
Then one arose at her bed’s foot
,
And a grumly guest I’m sure was he
,
“Here am I, thy bairn’s father
,
Although that I be not comely.
I am a man upon the land
,
And I am a silkie in the sea
And when I’m far and far frae land
,
My dwelling is on Sule Skerrie.”
From “The Great Silkie of Sule Skerrie,” Anonymous
CHAPTER 1
WHAT HAPPENED ON THE SHORE
CHAPTER 2
A BRUSH WITH THE TROLLS
CHAPTER 3
A WARNING FROM THE NIS
CHAPTER 8
VOICES AT THE MILLPOND
CHAPTER 9
THE NIS BEHAVES BADLY
CHAPTER 15
THE LUBBERS AT LARGE
CHAPTER 18
THE TROLL BABY AT THE FARM
CHAPTER 19
GRANNY GREEN-TEETH’S LAIR
CHAPTER 20
THE MILLER OF TROLL FELL
WHAT HAPPENED ON THE SHORET
HE BOAT DANCED
clumsily in from the fishing grounds, dipping and rolling over lively waves at the mouth of the fjord. Her crew, a man and a boy, reached steadily forward and back, tugging their two pairs of oars through the choppy water.
The boy, rowing in the bows, looked up over his companion’s bent back. Out west beyond the islands, the wind tore a long yellow rift in the clouds, and the setting sun blinked through in stormy brilliance, splashing the water with fiery oils.
Dazzled, the boy missed his next stroke, slicing the oars through air instead of water. Braced to pull, he flew backward off his seat into a tangle of nets and creels and a slither of fat, bright fish. He lay breathless as the boat
heaved under his spine, hurling him skyward, then sinking away underneath as though falling through space.
“Resting?” teased his friend Bjorn. “Had enough rowing for one day?”
Peer laughed back from the bottom of the boat, his long arms and legs sprawling. “Yes, I’m tired. I think I’ll just stay here. Ouch!” Salt water slapped his face as the prow cut through a wave, and he scrambled up hastily with dripping hair, snatching at the loose oars.
“I’ll take us in,” said Bjorn over his shoulder. He leaned on his own pair of oars, and Peer knelt, clutching the slender bows, looking forward at the land. The water under the boat lit up a cloudy green; over on the shore the pebbles glittered, and the sea-grass on the dunes glowed gold. The late sunlight turned the slanting pastures above the village into slopes of emerald. High above all, the rugged peak of Troll Fell shone as if gilded against a sky dark as a bruise.
“Bad weather coming,” said Bjorn, squinting at the sunset. The breeze stiffened, carrying cold points of rain. “But we’ll get home before it catches us.”
“Maybe you will,” Peer said. “I’ll get soaked on my way up the hill.”
“Stay with us,” offered Bjorn. “Kersten would love to see you. You can earn your supper by admiring the baby.” He glanced around, smiling at Peer’s sudden silence. “Come on. Surely you’ve got used to babies with little Eirik to practice on up at the farm? How old is he now?”
Peer calculated. “He was born last seedtime, just after Grandfather Eirik died, so … about a year. He certainly keeps Gudrun and Hilde busy. He’s into everything.”
“He’s a fine little fellow, isn’t he? It’s sad his grandpa never saw him.”
“Yes … although actually,” said Peer, “I think he might have lost patience with the noise. Dear old Eirik, he was always grumbling, ‘A poet needs peace and quiet!’ Little Eirik screams such a lot. Babies! I never knew they were so much trouble.”
“Ours is a good little soul,” Bjorn said proudly. “Never cries.”
“And how is Kersten?” Peer asked, his eye on the shore as they ran in past lines of black rocks. He crouched, tensing. Bjorn pulled a
couple of hard strokes on one oar to straighten up.
“She’s fine, thanks,” he grunted, twisting around as the boat shot in on the back of a breaking wave. The keel knocked on the shingle, and Peer sprang out into a welter of froth and seaweed. Bjorn followed and together they ran the boat higher up the stony beach.
“That was a good day’s work!” said Bjorn. “Glad Ralf could spare you.”
“I’ve been helping him plough,” Peer explained, “but we’ve got the seed in now and lambing’s nearly over. So he said I deserved a holiday.”
“It’s been nice to have your company.” Reaching into the boat, Bjorn hooked his fingers into the gills of a heavy, shining cod and hefted it. “There’s plenty of eating on that one. Take it back with you.” He handed it over. “Or will you stay?”
Cradling the fish awkwardly, Peer glanced around. The brief sunset flare was over. The rising wind whipped strands of sea-stiffened fair hair across his face. Loose swirls of cloud were descending over Troll Fell. The fjord
disappeared under a gray sea fret, and restless waves slapped jerkily against the rocks.