Short Fiction - Poul Anderson (books to read for self improvement .TXT) 📗

a small silver amulet. The wizard had told him that no supernatural being could harm anyone who carried a piece of silver.

The northmen said that a troll was powerless against a man who was not afraid; but, of course, only to see one was to feel the heart turn to ice. They did not know the value of silver, it seemed⁠—odd that they shouldn’t, but they did not. Because Cappen Varra did, he had no reason to be afraid; therefore he was doubly safe, and it was but a matter of talking the troll into giving him some fire. If indeed there was a troll here, and not some harmless fisherman.

He whistled gaily, wrung some of the water from his cloak and ruddy hair, and started along the beach. In the sleety gloom, he could just see a hewn-out path winding up one of the cliffs and he set his feet on it.

At the top of the path, the wind ripped his whistling from his lips. He hunched his back against it and walked faster, swearing as he stumbled on hidden rocks. The ice-sheathed ground was slippery underfoot, and the cold bit like a knife.

Rounding a crag, he saw redness glow in the face of a steep bluff. A cave mouth, a fire within⁠—he hastened his steps, hungering for warmth, until he stood in the entrance.

“Who comes?”

It was a hoarse bass cry that rang and boomed between walls of rock; there was ice and horror in it, for a moment Cappen’s heart stumbled. Then he remembered the amulet and strode boldly inside.

“Good evening, mother,” he said cheerily.

The cave widened out into a stony hugeness that gaped with tunnels leading further underground. The rough, soot-blackened walls were hung with plundered silks and cloth-of-gold, gone ragged with age and damp; the floor was strewn with stinking rushes, and gnawed bones were heaped in disorder. Cappen saw the skulls of men among them. In the center of the room, a great fire leaped and blazed, throwing billows of heat against him; some of its smoke went up a hole in the roof, the rest stung his eyes to watering and he sneezed.

The troll-wife crouched on the floor, snarling at him. She was quite the most hideous thing Cappen had ever seen: nearly as tall as he, she was twice as broad and thick, and the knotted arms hung down past bowed knees till their clawed fingers brushed the ground. Her head was beast-like, almost split in half by the tusked mouth, the eyes wells of darkness, the nose an ell long; her hairless skin was green and cold, moving on her bones. A tattered shift covered some of her monstrousness, but she was still a nightmare.

“Ho-ho, ho-ho!” Her laughter roared out, hungry and hollow as the surf around the island. Slowly, she shuffled closer. “So my dinner comes walking in to greet me, ho, ho, ho! Welcome, sweet flesh, welcome, good marrow-filled bones, come in and be warmed.”

“Why, thank you, good mother.” Cappen shucked his cloak and grinning at her through the smoke. He felt his clothes steaming already. “I love you too.”

Over her shoulder, he suddenly saw the girl. She was huddled in a corner, wrapped in fear, but the eyes that watched him were as blue as the skies over Caronne. The ragged dress did not hide the gentle curves of her body, nor did the tear-streaked grime spoil the lilt of her face. “Why, ’tis springtime in here,” cried Cappen, “and Primavera herself is strewing flowers of love.”

“What are you talking about, crazy man?” rumbled the troll-wife. She turned to the girl. “Heap the fire, Hildigund, and set up the roasting spit. Tonight I feast!”

“Truly I see heaven in female form before me,” said Cappen.

The troll scratched her misshapen head.

“You must surely be from far away, moonstruck man,” she said.

“Aye, from golden Croy am I wandered, drawn over dolorous seas and empty wild lands by the fame of loveliness waiting here; and now that I have seen you, my life is full.” Cappen was looking at the girl as he spoke, but he hoped the troll might take it as aimed her way.

“It will be fuller,” grinned the monster. “Stuffed with hot coals while yet you live.” She glanced back at the girl. “What, are you not working yet, you lazy tub of lard? Set up the spit, I said!”

The girl shuddered back against a heap of wood. “No,” she whispered. “I cannot⁠—not⁠ ⁠… not for a man.”

“Can and will, my girl,” said the troll, picking up a bone to throw at her. The girl shrieked a little.

“No, no, sweet mother. I would not be so ungallant as to have beauty toil for me.” Cappen plucked at the troll’s filthy dress. “It is not meet⁠—in two senses. I only came to beg a little fire; yet will I bear away a greater fire within my heart.”

“Fire in your guts, you mean! No man ever left me save as picked bones.”

Cappen thought he heard a worried note in the animal growl. “Shall we have music for the feast?” he asked mildly. He unslung the case of his harp and took it out.

The troll-wife waved her fists in the air and danced with rage. “Are you mad? I tell you, you are going to be eaten!”

The minstrel plucked a string on his harp. “This wet air has played the devil with her tone,” he murmured sadly.

The troll-wife roared wordlessly and lunged at him. Hildigund covered her eyes. Cappen tuned his harp. A foot from his throat, the claws stopped.

“Pray do not excite yourself, mother,” said the bard. “I carry silver, you know.”

“What is that to me? If you think you have a charm which will turn me, know that there is none. I’ve no fear of your metal!”

Cappen threw back his head and sang:

“A lovely lady full oft lies.
The light that lies within her eyes
And lies and lies, in no surprise.
All her unkindness can devise
To trouble hearts that seek the prize
Which is