West of the Moon

West
of the
Moon

KATHERINE LANGRISH

This book is for
my mother and father

Contents

 

 

 

 

 

Part One

P
EER
U
LFSSON STOOD
at his father's funeral pyre, watching the sparks whirl up like millions of shining spirits streaking away into the dark. The flames scorched his face, but his back was freezing. The wind slid cold fingers down his neck.

Surely this was all a bad dream? He turned, almost expecting to see his father standing behind him, his thin, tanned face carved with deep lines of laughter and life. But 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, flea-bitten brown mongrel – all the family Peer had left.

The pyre flung violent shadows up and down the beach. Friends and neighbours crowded around it in a ring. Their faces were curves of light and hollows of darkness: the flames lit up their steaming breath like dragon-smoke. Above the fire, the air shimmered and shook. It was like looking through a magic glass into a world of ghosts and monsters – the world into which his father's spirit was passing, beginning the long journey to the land of the dead. Was that a pale face turning towards him? A dim arm waving?

What if I see him?

Beyond the fire a shadow lurched into life. It tramped forwards, man-shaped, looming up behind the people, a sort of black haystack with thick groping arms…

Peer gave a strangled shout.

A huge man shoved his way into the circle of firelight. Elbowing the neighbours aside, he tramped right up to the pyre and turned, his boots carelessly planted in the glowing ashes. He waited, dark against the flames, until an uneasy silence fell. Then he spoke, in a high cracked voice as shrill as a whistle.

“I've come for the boy. Which is Ulf 's son?”

Nobody answered. The men close to Peer edged nearer, closing ranks around him. Catching the movement, the giant turned. He lifted his head like a wolf smelling out its prey. Peer stopped breathing. Their eyes met.

The stranger bore down on him like a landslide. Enormous fingers crunched on his arm. High over his head the toneless, reedy voice piped, “I'm your uncle, Baldur Grimsson. From now on, you'll be living with me.”

“But I haven't got an uncle,” Peer gasped.

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

Brand the shipbuilder stepped forward, shaking his head in distress. “Dear me! This – that is to say, Peer, your father did mention to me once —”

His wife Ingrid pushed in, glaring. “Let go of the boy, you brute. We all know that poor Ulf never had anything to do with you!”

“
Is
this my uncle?” Peer whispered. He 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, and a face of stony slabs with bristling black eyebrows for ledges. At the top came tangled bushes of dark hair.

Against Peer's legs Loki pulsed, growling. Any moment now, he would bite. Uncle Baldur knew it too. He looked down, and Peer read the death penalty in his face.

“Loki, quiet!” he cried in sharp fear. The little dog subsided. Uncle Baldur released Peer's arm and inspected him. “What's
that
?”

“He's my dog, Loki.” Peer rubbed his bruised arm.

“Call that a dog?” Uncle Baldur grinned. “My dog could have 'im for breakfast!”

Brand put a protective arm around Peer's shoulder. “You don't need to take the boy away. We're looking after him.”

“You are, are you? And who are you?”

“He's the master shipbuilder of Hammerhaven, that's who!” Ingrid snapped. “Peer's father was his best carpenter!”

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

Brand glared. “Ulf did a wonderful job on the new ship. Never put a finger wrong.”

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

With a bang, a piece of wood exploded in the heart of the pyre. Peer leaped forwards. “Don't talk about my father like that! You want to know what he could do? Look there!
That's
what he could do!” He pointed seawards. Uncle Baldur rocked back, off balance. High over the crowd, the fierce head and snaky neck of a dragon emerged from the darkness. The firelight glinted on its red scales and open jaws, and its goggle eyes glared threateningly at Uncle Baldur. The neck curved down swanlike and became the swooping lines of a ship, chocked upright on the beach. Behind it, ranks of dark waves rushed up the shingle.

Uncle Baldur recovered, though sweat glistened on his face. He forced a laugh. “A dragonship! A pretty toy,” he jeered, and a mutter of anger ran through the crowd. He seized Peer's arm again. “Come along. I'm a busy man. I've a mill to run and no time to waste.”

“You'll not drag the boy away from his father's funeral?” Brand exclaimed. “Why, it's not even over!”

And the villagers surged around, crying, “Shame!”

“Show some respect!” said Brand hotly.

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's stuff to sell, I suppose.” Jerking his head at Brand he demanded, “Has he paid your dad's last wages – eh?”

“Of c-course he has,” Peer stammered in fury. “He's been very k-kind – he's arranged everything.”

“Nothing owing?” Uncle Baldur scowled. “I'll look into that. Nobody cheats
me
.”

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

Eager as a pig digging for truffles, Uncle Baldur set about selling off Peer's home. Benches, pots, blankets, Ulf 's cherished mallets and bright chisels – he squeezed the last penny out of each deal.

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

“That's not true!” cried Peer.

“How would you know?” jeered his uncle. “And what's that ring on your finger? Silver, eh? Boys don't wear rings. Give it here.”

“No! It was my father's!” Peer backed away, fists clenched. Uncle Baldur grabbed him, prised his fingers open and wrenched the ring off.

“Silver,” he nodded. It was too tight to fit over his own hairy knuckles, so he stuffed it in his pocket.

Fat comfortable Ingrid took Peer in and tried to mother him. “Cheer up, my pet!” She pushed a honey cake into his hand. Peer dropped it, and it disappeared into the eager jaws of Loki, lurking under the table.

“Ingrid,” he asked in desperation, “how can that fat beast be my uncle?”

Ingrid's plump face creased into worried folds. “Oh Peer, it's a sad story. Your father was just a boy when his own father died. 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. He used his fists on both of them.”

Peer flinched. “He never told me. What happened?”

“Your father ran away and never saw his mother again. But she had two more boys, and this Baldur is one of them. He's your father's own half-brother, though as far as I know, they never met.” Ingrid lifted her wooden bread bowl from the hearth and poured a yeasty froth into the warm flour. “But that was all long ago. I know your Uncle Baldur is very rough-spoken, and not a bit like your father, but blood is thicker than water. Surely he'll look after you, you poor boy!”

Peer was silent. He cleared his throat. “Couldn't I stay here with you?”

“Oh my dearie!” Ingrid cried. “We've thought of it. But we can't. He's your uncle. He's got a right to you, and we haven't.”

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

Ingrid tried to put an arm around his shoulders. “Give your uncles a chance,” she pleaded. “Don't you think your father would want you to try?”

“Maybe…” Peer 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 of life, too!” He could almost smell the sweet sawdust clinging to his father's clothes.

Loki sprang to his feet barking. The door opened and Uncle Baldur thrust his head and shoulders in. “Boy!” he squealed. “Are those chickens in the yard yours? Catch them and put them in the cart. We're leaving.
Run!
”

A fine row blew up indoors as his uncle accused Ingrid of trying to steal the chickens. Peer fled outside and began stalking a fat speckled hen. Loki joined in. He dashed at the hens, which scattered, cackling. “Bad dog!” cried Peer, but Loki had lost his head and was hurtling around the yard with a mouthful of brown tail feathers.

Uncle Baldur burst out of the house. He bent down, heaved up the heavy stone 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. Now catch them and tie them up with this.” He threw Peer a hank of twine. “Be quick!”

As Peer captured the last of the hens, Uncle Baldur tied a string around Loki's neck. “Fasten 'im to the tail of the cart. He can run behind.”

“Can't he ride?” Peer asked. “He's limping...” But his voice died under Uncle Baldur's unwinking stare, and miserably he did as he was told. Then he clambered into the cart himself.

Ingrid came out to see him off, mopping first her hands and then her eyes on her apron. “Poor lamb,” she wailed. “And Brand's down at the shipyard and can't even say goodbye. Whatever will he say when he hears?”

The cart creaked as Uncle Baldur climbed aboard. He took a new piece of twine from his pocket and tied one end around the rail of the cart. Then he tied the other end around Peer's right wrist. Peer's mouth fell open. He tried to pull away and got his ears slapped.

“What are you doing to the boy?” Ingrid shrieked.

Uncle Baldur looked round in surprise. “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. Peer looked at her.
See?
he told her silently.

“Gee! Hoick!” Uncle Baldur cracked his whip over the oxen. The cart lurched. Peer stared resolutely ahead. He did not wave goodbye.

The steep road twisted up into low woods of birch and spruce, then into high meadows, and then stony and boggy moorland. “Garn! Grr! Hoick, hoick!” The oxen snorted, straining. The cart tilted like the deck of a ship and the chickens slid about, flapping.

“Shall I get out and walk?” Peer suggested.

His uncle ignored him. Peer muttered a bad word. He sat on a pile of sacks, his arm awkwardly tethered above his head. Over the end of the cart he could see Loki trotting along with his head and tail low. He looked miserable, but the limp had gone – he'd been faking it, Peer decided.

They came to a bend in the road. Peer looked, then pulled himself up, staring. In front, dwarfing Uncle Baldur's bulky shoulders, the land swooped upwards. Crag above crag, upland beyond upland, in murky shouldering ridges, clotted with trees and tumbling with rockfalls, the flanks of Troll Fell rose before him. At the summit he glimpsed a savage crown of rocks, but even as he gazed, the clouds came lower. The top of Troll Fell wrapped itself in mist.

A fine cold rain began to fall, soaking through Peer's clothes. He dragged out a sack and draped it across his shoulders. Uncle Baldur pulled up the hood of his thick cloak.

Shadowy boulders loomed out of the drizzle on both sides of the track. They seemed to stare at Peer as he huddled in the bottom of the cart. One looked like a giant's head with shallow, scooped-out eyes. Something bolted out from underneath it as the cart passed, kicking itself up the hillside with powerful leaps. Peer sat up. What was that? Too big for a hare – and he thought he'd seen
elbows
…

A wind sprang up. Mud sprayed from the great wooden cartwheels. Peer clutched the sodden sack under his chin and sat jolting and shivering.

At last he realised that they were over the saddle of the hill and beginning to descend. Leaning out, he looked down into a great shadowy basin. A few faint lights freckled the valley. That must be the village of Trollsvik. He thought longingly of dry clothes, hot food and a fire. 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 pointed. “Down among the trees yonder. A matter of half a mile. Beside the brook.” He sounded quite civil for once, and Peer was encouraged.

“Home!” his uncle added, in his shrill toad's croak. “Lived there all me life, and me father before him, and
his
father before
him
. Millers all.”

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

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

You've got my money now
, Peer thought bitterly.

“– I'd be the most important man in the place,” his uncle went on. “I'm the miller. I deserve to be rich. I
will be
rich. Hark!”

He hauled on the reins. The track plunged between steep banks, and the cart slewed, blocking the road. Uncle Baldur twisted around, straining his thick neck and raising one hand.