In the Company of Stones

Chapter 2: The Upturned Ship, part 2.3

Halfdan shifted the basket he carried on his bent back, adjusting the tumpline that pressed painfully against his forehead. Not for the first time, he wished for the use of his horse. But, no. Huldufolk, those shy, elusive forest wights, believed that all land creatures were brothers not to be used for human benefit.

And so it came to this. A long morning’s hike through mist and marsh across the Slienfjord and up into the beechwoods, carrying a basket of stinking fish guts.

Halfdan hoped the effort would pay off. That the Huldu-folk knew where Rannulf had gone.

Huldu-folk been here since before the first men had come to settle. Long, long ago, so long ago that no-one knew when, women and Huldu had developed a trade pact of sorts. Huldu had no use for human gold, or sharp metals, or cloth, or grain. What they wanted was fish guts. In return, if the season was right, if the current males were old enough, they offered healing – for those fish guts.  The secrets of beer and bread – for fish guts.  And sometimes knowledge – for fish guts.  

Here, the beech-wood canopy opened to admit the sun, dappled ferns and underbrush growing sparse until they tapered out, leaving a roughly circular patch of sandy soil. Halfdan strode into the center of the grove, and knelt to hoist the tumpline off his forehead. He rolled the heavy basket off his back, onto the sandy ground. Fishheads and slimy ropes of entrails spilled out. A fresh wave of stink rolled with it.

Halfdan rubbed the ridges in his forehead, and nudged a bony, gaping maw with the toe of a boot.  He imagined Thora by his side, with her calm manner, her easy familiarity with the creatures that lived in this glade. They were part and parcel of her woman’s magics.

Many years ago, in the time of Halfdan’s grandfather’s grandfather, a man had thought to capture a Huldra Queen, and take her for his wife. A strange, pale, cold, red-haired beauty, the Huldra Queen had roused other men to a possessive fury. The end of that saga was still sung, quietly -- a cautionary tale women sang on late, late nights when men did not come home when expected.

Now, the Huldre Queen would only deal with women like his wife, women who were not roused by their scent. The Queens avoided human men as if diseased, sending only Huldu males to deal with them. But the Huldu males made Halfdan uneasy with their rough, bark-like skin, their iridescent eyes that shone like butterfly wings in the sun. He rolled his shoulders as if to shake off the memory.

No, Huldu males were not like men at all.

Halfdan retreated to the edge of the glade and squatted, his back against the lumpy, roughened bole of an enormous old beech.  He stretched and tipped his head from side to side, cracking his neck.  Nothing moved in the glade except for a flock of ravens, Odin’s messengers. They watched his antics from high above, squawking to one another as if daring themselves to raid his precious fish-heads.

Amused, he called up to them. “They’re not for you.”

The ravens stilled, a last cry cut off in mid-croak.  Even the rustle of leaves faded into stillness, the air itself ceasing all movement, as if Jörð herself held her breath.

He couldn’t blame the earth goddess if she had.  The stink would do that to anyone.

Anyone except for Huldu. The smell was like the calling of a horn to them. It brought them – well, if not exactly running, it brought them.

The dirt by the basket began to churn, rippling like the surface of the Slie when fish streamed beneath. Eddies formed, tiny vortices circling. A pale tendril emerged, faintly glowing, like fungus in the depth of a cave. Soon more followed, slender writhing filaments that reached for the basket like a hand with too many fingers.