Troll Fell

CHAPTER 1

The Coming of Uncle Baldur

Peer Ulfsson stood miserably at his father’s funeral pyre, watching the sparks whirl up like millions of shining spirits streaking away into the dark.

Dizzily he followed their bright career, unwilling to lower his eyes. The fire gobbled everything like a starving monster, crackling and crunching on bone-dry branches, hissing and spitting on green timber, licking up dribbles of resin from bleeding chunks of pinewood.

The heat struck his face and scorched his clothes. Tears baked on his cheeks. But his back was freezing, and a raw wind fingered the nape of his neck.

Father! thought Peer desperately. Where have you gone?

Suddenly he was sure the whole thing must be a bad dream. If he turned round, his father would be standing close, ready to give him a comforting squeeze. Behind me – just behind me! thought Peer. He turned slowly, stiffly, wanting to see his father’s thin, tanned face carved with deep lines of laughter and life. The black wind cut tears from his eyes. The sloping shingle beach ran steep and empty into the sea.

A small body bumped Peer’s legs. He reached down. His dog Loki leaned against him, a rough-haired, fleabitten brown mongrel – all the family Peer had left. Friends and neighbours crowded in a ring around the pyre, patiently watching and waiting. Their faces were curves of light and hollows of darkness: the flames lit up their steaming breath like dragon-smoke; they blew on their fingers and turned up their collars against the piercing wind.

The pyre flung violent shadows up and down the beach. Stones bigger than a man’s head blackened and cracked around it. Hidden in its white depths his father’s body lay, folded in flames.

Over the fire the night air wobbled and shook, magnifying the shapes of the people opposite. It was like looking through a magic glass into a world of ghosts and monsters, perhaps the world to which his father’s spirit was passing, beginning the long journey to the land of the dead. Peer gazed, awed, into the hot shimmer. What if he comes to me? What if I see him? Smoke unravelled in the air like half-finished gestures. Was that a pale face turning towards him? A dim arm waving? Peer’s breath stuck. A shadow lurched into life, beyond the fire. It can’t be! He glanced round in panic. Can anyone else see it? The shadow tramped forwards, man-shaped, looming up behind the people, who hadn’t noticed – who still hadn’t noticed—

Peer gave a strangled shout: “What’s that?”

A huge man lumbered into the circle of firelight, a sort of black haystack with thick groping arms. His scowling face shone red in the firelight as he elbowed rudely through the crowd. People turned, scattering. A mutter of alarm ran around the gathering.

Shoving forwards, the stranger tramped right up to the pyre and turned, his boots carelessly planted among the glowing ashes. Now he was a black giant against the flames. Everyone stared in uneasy silence. What did he want?

He spoke in a high, cracked voice, shrill as a whistle. “I’ve come for the boy. Which is Ulf’s son?”

Nobody answered. A shiver ran across the crowd. The men closest to Peer shuffled quietly nearer, drawing close around him. Catching the movement, the giant turned slowly, watching them. He lifted his head like a wolf smelling out its prey. Peer forgot to breathe. Their eyes met, and he winced. Sharp as little black glittering drills, those eyes seemed to bore through to the back of his head.

The stranger gave a satisfied grunt and bore down on him like a landslide. Enormous fingers crunched on his arm, hauling him out of the crowd. High over his head the reedy voice piped tonelessly, “I’m your uncle, Baldur Grimsson. From now on, you’ll be living with me!”

“But I haven’t got an uncle!” Peer gasped.

The huge stranger paid no attention. He dragged Peer’s arm up, twisting it. Peer yelped in pain, and Loki began to growl.

“I don’t like saying things twice!” said the man menacingly. “I’m your Uncle Baldur, the miller of Trollsvik. Come on!” He challenged the crowd. “You all know it’s true. Tell him so, before I twist his arm off!”

“Why—” Brand the shipbuilder stepped forwards uncertainly, rubbing his hands. Peer stared at him in disbelief. Brand spread his arms helplessly. “This – that is to say, Peer, your father did tell me once—”

His wife Ingrid pushed in front of him, glaring. “Let go of the boy, you brute! How dare you show your face here? We all know that poor Ulf never had anything to do with you!”

“Is this my uncle?” Peer whispered. He twisted his head and looked up at Uncle Baldur. It was like looking up at a dark cliff. First came a powerful chest, then a thick neck, gleaming like naked rock. There was a black beard like a rook’s nest. Then a face of stony slabs with bristling black eyebrows for ledges. At the top came a tangled bush of black hair.

Loki’s body tensed against Peer’s legs, quivering with growls. In another moment he would bite. Uncle Baldur knew it too, and Peer read the death penalty in his face. “Loki!” he cried sharply, afraid. “Quiet!”

Loki subsided. Uncle Baldur let Peer go and bent his shaggy head to look at the dog.

“What d’you call that?” he taunted.

“He’s my dog, Loki,” said Peer defiantly, rubbing his bruised arm.

“That, a dog? Wait till my dog meets him. He’ll eat ’im!” Uncle Baldur tipped back his head and yelped with laughter. Peer glared at him. Brand put a protective arm round his shoulder.

“You can’t take the boy away,” he began. “We’re looking after him!”

“You? Who are you?” spat Uncle Baldur.

“He’s the master shipbuilder of Hammerhaven, that’s who he is!” declared Ingrid angrily, folding her arms. “Peer’s poor father was his best carpenter!”

“Best of a bad lot, eh?” sneered Uncle Baldur. “Could he make a barrel that didn’t leak?”

Brand glared at Baldur. “Ulf did a wonderful job on the new ship. Never made a mistake!”

“No? But he sliced himself with a chisel and died when it turned bad!” scoffed Uncle Baldur. “Some carpenter!”

Peer’s heart rapped like a hammer, hurting his chest. He leaped forwards. “Don’t talk about my father like that! You want to know what he could do? That’s what he could do! That’s what he made! See!” He pointed defiantly past Uncle Baldur.

High over the heads of the crowd reared the fierce dragon neck and head of the new longship. People stepped back, opening a path to where it lay chocked upright on the shelving beach. And the dragon head glared straight at Uncle Baldur, ogling him threateningly, as if it commanded the sea behind it, whose dark armies of marching waves rushed snarling up the shingle.

Uncle Baldur rocked back, off balance. He lowered his head and clenched his fists. Then he shrugged. “A dragonship! A pretty toy!” he jeered, turning his back on it. The crowd muttered angrily, but Uncle Baldur ignored them. He seized Peer’s arm again. “You’ll come now. I’m a busy man. I’ve a mill to run, and no time to waste!”

With a bang, a piece of wood exploded in the heart of the pyre. People dodged as the fire spat glowing fragments at their feet. The whole burning structure slipped and settled. Brand stepped in front of Uncle Baldur, barring his way.

“You won’t drag the boy away from his father’s funeral!” he exclaimed. “Why – it’s not even over!”

“A funeral? And I thought it was a pig-roast!” Uncle Baldur crowed with laughter. Sickened, Peer jerked his arm free, as the crowd surged angrily forwards, some crying, “Shame!” They surrounded Uncle Baldur, who shifted uneasily, looking around. “Can’t you take a joke?” he complained.

“Show some respect!” said Brand curtly.

Uncle Baldur grunted. Summing up the crowd with his sharp black eyes, he said at last, “Very well. I’ll stay a day or two. There’ll be stuff to sell off, I suppose?” Jerking his head towards Brand, he asked Peer shrilly, “Has he paid up your dad’s last wages – eh?”

“Yes! Of course he has,” Peer stammered angrily. “He’s been very kind to me – he’s arranged everything.”

“Nothing owing?” Uncle Baldur scowled, disappointed. “I’ll soon see. Your father may have been a halfwit, but nobody cheats me.”

Behind him, the funeral pyre collapsed into a pile of glowing ash and sighed out a last stream of sparks which sped away for ever.

With the eagerness of a pig digging for truffles, Uncle Baldur set about selling off Peer’s home. Stools, pots, blankets, Ulf’s cherished mallets and bright chisels – Uncle Baldur squeezed the last penny out of every deal. At first the neighbours paid generously for Peer’s goods. Then they realised where the money was going.

Brand dared to complain. Uncle Baldur stared at him coldly and jingled the silver and copper in his pocket. “It’s mine,” he said flatly. “Ulf owed me money.”

“That’s not true!” said Peer furiously.

“Prove it!” jeered his uncle. “And what’s that ring you’ve got? Silver, eh? Boys don’t wear rings. Give it here!”

“No! It was my father’s!” Peer backed away, hands behind his back. Uncle Baldur grabbed him, forcing his fingers open. He wrenched the ring off and tried pushing it over his own hairy knuckles, but it was too tight. He bit it. “Silver,” he nodded, and stuffed it in his pocket.

Fat, comfortable Ingrid took Peer in and tried to mother him. “Cheer up, my pet,” she crooned sympathetically, pushing a honey cake into his hand. Peer let his hand fall. The honey cake disappeared into the eager jaws of Loki, who was lurking under the table.

“Ingrid,” Peer said in desperation, “how can that fat beast be my uncle?”

Ingrid’s plump face cramped into worried folds. She sat down heavily and reached across the table to pat his hand. “It’s a sad story, Peer. Your father never wanted to tell you. He was just a boy when his own father died, and his mother married the miller at Trollsvik, the other side of Troll Fell. Poor soul, she lived to regret it. The old miller was a cruel hard man.”

Peer flushed and his fists clenched. “He beat my father?”

“Well,” said Ingrid cautiously, “what your father could not stand, was to see his mother knocked about. So he ran away, you see, and never saw her again. And in the meantime she had two more boys, and this Baldur is one of them. They’re your father’s own half-brothers, but as far as I know, he never laid eyes on them.”

She got up and bustled about, lifting her wooden bread bowl from the hearth and pouring a yeasty froth into the warm flour.

“Still, the old miller’s dead now, and his wife too. Perhaps things will all come right at last! Maybe it’s meant to happen. If your uncles don’t marry, the mill could come to you one day! I know your uncle Baldur is very rough-spoken, and not a bit like your father, but blood is thicker than water. After all, he did come to find you! Surely he’ll look after you, you poor, poor boy.”

“I don’t want to live with him!” Peer shivered. “Or at his mill. What will I do there, way up over Troll Fell? I won’t have any friends.”

“Perhaps you’ll like it,” said Ingrid hopefully. “Though Troll Fell itself is a bleak, unchancy place,” she added, frowning. “I’ve heard many an odd tale— But there! Your uncles are the millers, so I’m sure you’ll live in style. Millers are always well-to-do.”

Peer was silent.

“Ingrid?” He cleared his throat. “Couldn’t I – couldn’t I stay here with you?”

“Oh, my dearie!” cried Ingrid. “Don’t think we haven’t thought about it. But we can’t. He’s your uncle, you see. He’s got a right to you, and we haven’t.”

“No,” said Peer bitterly. “Of course not. I understand.”

Ingrid flushed deeply. “We only want the best for you,” she pleaded. She tried to put an arm round him, but Peer hunched his shoulder at her. “And don’t forget,” she went on, turning back to her bread-making, “he’s not your only uncle. There’s another brother up at the mill, isn’t there? Don’t you think your father would have wanted you to try?”

“Maybe. Yes,” said Peer. He shut his eyes on a sudden glimpse of his father, turning over a piece of oak and saying as he often did, “You’ve got to make the best of the wood you’re given, Peer. And that’s true in life, too!” He could almost smell the sweet sawdust clinging to his father’s clothes.

“I’m worried. About Loki,” he muttered presently, twiddling a piece of dough between his fingers. He pulled little bits off, rolled them into balls and flicked them away. “Uncle Baldur said his dog would eat him. I don’t even know if I’m going to be allowed to keep him!” His voice shook.

“Now that’s silly!” said Ingrid briskly. “Loki will make friends with your uncle’s dog, you’ll see! You’ll be all right, won’t you, boy?” she said to Loki, who thumped his tail.

An ox-cart drove up outside. Loki sprang to his feet barking. The door thudded open and the room darkened as Uncle Baldur bent his head and shoulders to come through.

“Boy!” Uncle Baldur squealed. “Are those chickens in the yard yours? I thought so. I’m taking them. Catch them and put them in the cart. We’re leaving. Run!”

Peer fled outside, Loki at his heels. A fine row blew up indoors as his uncle accused Ingrid of trying to steal the chickens. Peer began stalking a fat speckled hen, but she squawked in fright and ran. Peer chased her. Loki joined in. He dashed at the hens, barking excitedly. Feathers flew as the hens scattered, cackling wildly. “Bad dog! Stop it, Loki!” Peer cried, but Loki had lost his head and was hurtling around the yard with a mouthful of brown tailfeathers.

The house door slammed open, bouncing off the wall. Uncle Baldur burst through, bent down, heaved up the heavy doorstop and hurled it at Loki. There were two shrieks, one from Peer and the other from Loki, who lay down suddenly and licked his flank, whimpering.

“You could have killed him!” Peer yelled. His uncle turned on him.

“If he ever chases my chickens again, I will,” he wheezed savagely. “Now catch them, and tie them up with this.” He threw Peer a hank of twine. “Be quick!”

The exhausted hens crowded together in a frilly huddle. Peer captured them and tied their feet together. “Sorry!” he mumbled to them as he carried them in pairs to the ox-cart. There they lay on the splintery boards, gargling faintly. As Peer finished, Uncle Baldur came up dragging a reluctant Loki along by a string round his neck.

“Fasten ’im to the tail of the cart,” his uncle ordered. “He can run along behind.” He grinned, sneering. “It’s a long way. Think he’ll make it?”

Loki limped pathetically. “Can’t he ride?” Peer faltered. “Look, he’s lame…”

His voice died under Uncle Baldur’s unwinking stare, and miserably he did as he was told. Then he clambered up into the cart himself. It was time to go.

Ingrid came out to see him off, wiping first her hands and then her eyes on her apron.

“You poor lamb!” she wailed. “Dragged off at a moment’s notice! And Brand’s down at the shipyard, and can’t even say goodbye. What he’ll say when he hears, I don’t dare to think! Come back soon, Peer, and see us!”

“I will if I can,” he promised glumly. The cart tipped, creaking, as Uncle Baldur hauled himself up. He took a new piece of twine from his pocket, and tied one end round the rail of the cart. Then he tied the other end, in a businesslike manner, around Peer’s right wrist. Peer’s mouth fell open. He tried to jerk away, and got his ears slapped.

“Whatever are you doing?” shrieked Ingrid, bustling forwards. “Untie the boy, you brute!” Uncle Baldur looked round at her, mildly surprised. “Got to fasten up the livestock,” he explained. “Chickens or boys – can’t have ’em escaping, running around loose.” Ingrid opened her mouth – and shut it. She looked at Peer. Peer looked back. See? he told her silently.

“Gee! Hoick!” screamed Uncle Baldur, climbing on to the driving seat and cracking his whip over the oxen. The cart lurched. Peer stared resolutely forwards. He didn’t wave goodbye to Ingrid.

Soon the town of Hammerhaven was out of sight. The steep, rough road twisted up into stony and boggy moorland, looping round white rocks and black pools of peatwater. Low woods of birch and spruce grew on both sides of the road, and rough clumps of heather and bilberry. If the oxen tried to snatch a mouthful as they passed, Uncle Baldur’s whip snapped out.

“Garn! Grr! Hoick, hoick!” The cart tilted like the deck of a ship as one wheel rose over a huge boulder, then dropped with a crash that nearly drove Peer’s spine right through his skull. The oxen snorted, straining to drag not only the cart, but big fat Uncle Baldur up the steep slope.

“Uncle,” Peer hinted. “Shall I get out and walk?”

But his uncle ignored him. Peer muttered a bad word under his breath and sat down uncomfortably on a pile of sacks. His arm was stretched awkwardly up, still tied with twine to the rail of the cart. The pile of chickens slid about, flapping as the cart jolted. He counted them. They were all there: the little black one with the red comb, the three speckled sisters, the five big brown ones. They rolled red-rimmed eyes at him and squawked.

“It’s not my fault,” he told them sadly.

Over the end of the cart he could see Loki, trotting along with his head and tail low. Peer called. Loki glanced up briefly. He looked miserable, but the limp had gone – he’d been faking it, Peer decided.

They came round a bend in the road. Peer turned his head, then pulled himself up on to his knees and gazed.

In front, dwarfing Uncle Baldur’s bulky shoulders, the land swooped upwards. In heaves and hollows and scallops, crag above crag, upland beyond upland: in murky shouldering ridges, clotted with trees, tumbling with rockfalls, the flanks of Troll Fell rose before him. The narrow, rutted track scrambled breathlessly towards the skyline and vanished.

Tipping his head back, Peer stared upwards at the summit, where he thought he could discern a savage crown of rocks. But as he watched, the clouds came lower. The top of Troll Fell wrapped itself in mist.

The light was fading. Fine cold rain began to soak into Peer’s clothes. He dragged out a sack and draped it over his shoulders. Uncle Baldur pulled up the hood of his thick cloak.

Great shadowy boulders loomed up out of the drizzle on both sides of the track. They seemed to stare at Peer as he huddled uneasily in the bottom of the cart. One looked like a giant’s head with shallow scooped-out eyes and sneering mouth. One had a blind muzzle poking at the sky. Something bolted out from under it as the cart passed, kicking itself up the hillside with powerful leaps. Peer sat up, startled, as it swerved out of sight. What was that? Too big for a hare – and he thought he’d seen elbows…

From the hidden crest of Troll Fell rolled a sinister chuckle of thunder. A wind sprang up, hissing through the rocks. Mud sprayed from the great wooden cartwheels. Peer clutched the sodden sack under his chin and sat jolting and shivering.

At last he realised from the angle of the cart that they were over the saddle of the hill, beginning to descend towards Trollsvik. Leaning forwards, he looked down into a great shadowy basin. A few faint lights freckled the dim valley. That must be the village. Frozen and soaked, he thought longingly of dry clothes, a fire, hot drinks and food. He had hardly spoken to his uncle all the way, but now he called out as politely as he could, “Uncle? How far is the mill?”

Uncle Baldur jerked his head to the left and pointed. “Down there, among the trees yonder. A matter of half a mile. Beside the brook.” He sounded quite civil for once, and Peer was encouraged. Perhaps his uncle could be normal, after all.

To his surprise, Uncle Baldur spoke over his shoulder again. “Home!” he cried in his shrill toad’s croak. “Lived there all me life, and me father before me, and his father before him! Millers all.”

“That’s nice,” Peer agreed, between chattering teeth.

“Needs new machinery,” complained his uncle. “And a new wheel, and the dam repaired,” he added. “If I had the money – if I had my rights—”

Well you’ve got my money now, thought Peer bitterly.

“A pity your father was dirt-poor,” his uncle went on. “I’m proud of that place. I’d do a lot for that place. I’m the miller. The miller is an important man. I deserve to be rich. I will be rich. Hark!”

He leaned back hard, forcing the oxen to stop. The track here plunged between steep banks, and the cart slewed, blocking the road. Loki yelped as the string yanked him off his feet. Peer cried out in distress, but Uncle Baldur twisted round, straining his thick neck and raising one hand.

“Quiet!” he muttered. “Hear that? Someone coming. Catching us up.”

Peer stared uneasily into the night, listening. It was too dark to see properly. What had Uncle Baldur heard? Why would he stop on this wild, lonely road? He held his breath. Was that a bird shrieking – that long, burbling cry drifting on the wind?

“Who is it? Who is it?” Uncle Baldur hissed eagerly. “Could be friends of mine, boy – I’ve got some funny friends. People you’d be surprised to meet!” He giggled, and Peer’s skin crawled. The darkness, the whole wild hillside – suddenly anywhere seemed safer than staying with Uncle Baldur in this cart. He tugged the twine that held his wrist, testing it. It felt tight and strong. He couldn’t jump out and run.

Stones clattered on the track close behind. Loki scuttled under the tail of the cart, and Peer heard him growling. He braced himself. What was coming?

There was a loud, disapproving snort. Out of the rain emerged the dim shape of a small, wet pony picking its way downhill, carrying a rider and a packsaddle. On seeing the cart, it flung up its head and shied. There was no room to pass. The rider shouted, “Hello there! Can you move that cart? I can’t get through.”

Uncle Baldur sat motionless for a second, taking deep breaths of fury. To Peer’s amazement, he then flung down the reins and surged to his feet, teetering on the cart’s narrow step. His shock of black hair and tangled beard mingled with the thunderclouds: he looked like a mighty headless pillar.

“Ralf Eiriksson!” he screamed. “I know you, you cheating piece of stinking offal! How dare you creep around up here, you – you crawling worm!”