Moira
Foss … Foss, Moira called silently. What’s happening? The house had suddenly become quiet. Too quiet. She tried to sit up, to peek over the side of the box, but fear, like an old habit, clamped her limbs and she couldn’t move.
“Get up, child of man.”
Child of man and woman, Moira answered automatically, wondering if she could sit up now.
“Get up, child of man and woman.” The fox’s voice had the same tone as her harp teacher when Moira had made the same mistake three times in a row: slightly sharp and slightly tired.
Get up and go where?
“To the larder.”
The larder was the last place she wanted to go. She’d never actually seen a dead body. A dead, chopped-up body. She and her parents were vegetarians, for gosh sakes.
“He is not dead, human child. Listen.”
Listening was something she was good at. So she lay in the box and listened to the soft, almost imperceptible breaths of the girls in the box with her. To the snap of the fire in the hearth. To a soft pain-filled groan coming from … the larder.
“The larder!” Sitting up, Moira whispered, “Foss, he’s not dead.”
“I told you, human child. You must get up quickly and go into the larder and save him.”
She got up, stepping over the four girls, who didn’t even flutter a lash at her.
“My limbs still work!” She felt as if she hadn’t moved in a week. “But…” She hesitated. “What about them?” She pointed to the girls who lay as still as dolls. Four here, seven more elsewhere.
“Leave them. I told you, this is only Thor’s Day. We have till tomorrow.”
“Today would be better than tomorrow.” She stretched out her arms, worked her stiff fingers, wondered if she’d ever be able to play the harp again.
“The princesses are under an enchantment. You could not move them by yourself. Help is here.”
She gazed speculatively around the room. “Help is where?”
“In the larder.”
Oh!
She ran into the larder. In it stood a troll-sized oak table and three troll chairs, two at the ends and a smaller one snugged in on the side closest to the larder door.
A boy about her age with sandy-colored hair hung upside down from the ceiling, a heavy beige rope knotted around his ankles. The far end was tied to an iron hook on the wall. Another rope was wrapped tightly around the boy’s body, keeping his arms against his side. He was moaning.
“Stop moaning. The trolls will hear you,” she warned.
He stopped moaning and turned his head toward the sound of her voice. The left side of his face was already purpling where the troll must have hit him earlier to shut him up. The right eye was a startling blue. Even in the dim candlelight of the larder she could see that.
“Trolls?” he whispered. “They were trolls? Like in fairy tales—trolls?”
“What did you think they were?”
“Huge. But then lots of folk in Minnesota are huge. Viking stock. I thought they were … kidnappers. Wanting ransom.”
“Ransom?”
He sighed. “You know. For giving me back.”
“They don’t give back people. They eat people.” She said it matter-of-factly.
“Cannibals?” He moaned again. “I thought you said they were trolls. Can you get me out of here?” His voice rose. “Now?”
“Shhh.” She came closer, stared up at him. He was hanging about a foot and a half above her.
He stared back. “Are you a troll, too?”
She laughed, a short sharp bark, like the fox. “Do I look like a troll?”
He gulped. “You look like a…”
“I’m a musician. And…”
“Let me guess,” he said. “A Dairy Princess.”
She gawked at him as, all unaccountably, he broke into song. His voice was a pleasant tenor, and he was on key, the more surprising since he was upside down.
And he was singing:
What’s better than a butter girl?
Badder than my better girl.
Best when I’m not buttered up as well …
He began coughing so strongly, he bounced up and down on the rope.
“I’m going to try to get you down,” she told him, keeping her voice low and sensible.
He stopped coughing. Closed his good eye and opened it again. “Ready when you are. Just do it.”
She spotted six wooden-handled knives hanging from pegs on the whitewashed wall. Each knife looked as large as a sword. Two had serrated edges and one had a hammer-like thing on the bottom of the handle. But they were far too high up for her to reach.
Then she noticed a honing strap and a seventh knife on a three-legged chopping block by the side of the dining table. The chopping block was also above her head, but she thought she might be able to push it over if she could get a good run at it. Three legs were not as steady as four.
“Hold on,” she told the boy.
“Is that a joke?”
She ignored him and, backing up till she felt the far wall behind her, she pushed off. Hands straight ahead of her, she ran full tilt at the nearest leg of the chopping block. Striking it hard, she got it teetering. Quickly, she gave a half turn and shoved her shoulder into the front legs and the stocky chopping block fell over, clattering onto the floor.
“So much for being quiet,” he called down to her.
Her shoulder hurt. “Best I could do,” she muttered, and picked up the knife that was as big as a broadsword. All the while she was thinking, Stupid, ungrateful boy, quickly followed by, Shut up, Moira. Because of course he was scared and saying the first thing that came to mind. At least he’d stopped moaning.
Foss’ voice came sharply into her head. “What was that unholy racket?”
“Hero at work,” she shot back at him. “Why aren’t you in here helping?”
“Who are you talking to?” the boy asked.
“Foss.” As if that told him anything.
“Who is he? Another troll?”
“He’s … he’s another musician,” she said.
“That makes three of us,” the boy said.
But if he’s a musician, too, Moira wondered, why doesn’t he hear Foss?
The fox didn’t answer, nor did she expect him to. He was very good at giving orders and being tricky. But when it came to the actual hard work, he was never around.
Lugging the heavy knife back to the hanging boy, Moira swung it with all her might at the rope attached to the iron hook.
The knife bounced off, making no impression on the rope. None at all.
“Well,” Moira said, huffing with effort, “that was fun.” Her arms ached from the blow.
“Saw…” the boy said to her, his voice a raspy whisper. “Use it like a saw.”
He was right, and she immediately began sawing at the rope, the heavy knife held high over her head. It was a very uncomfortable position but, she supposed, comfort was hardly something heroes ever worried about. “This is a very tough rope,” she told him, “so I’ll have to do it strand by strand.”
She sawed until she thought her arms would fall off her shoulder. Back and forth, back and forth. Suddenly the strand parted with a loud pop!
“There … that’s the first one. Now for the second.” The rope was braided, which made it extra strong. Good for hanging up dinner. Bad for cutting through. It took some time.
“A third…”
“Just let me know when it’s all gone through,” he interrupted, “so I’ll be expecting the fall.”
“Okay.”
“I need to be prepared. I was a Boy Scout, you know. Not for very long. Hated the uniform.”
He was babbling now. Just as well, Moira thought. It will keep his mind off the trolls. She sawed through a fourth strand, without answering him back. Then a fifth.
“Child of man, the trolls…” came Foss’s voice.
“And woman,” Moira whispered, as the last strand began to part.
“Last one,” she said, to alert the boy, before placing the knife on the floor so as to be ready to help him.
But this strand didn’t burst apart as the others had. Rather it unraveled, slow enough that she had time to catch him as he fell. They both went over backward, though she managed to cradle him against her body. It turned out he couldn’t stand up on his own.
She scrambled out from under him and pulled him to his feet.
“Cut them. Cut the ropes.…”
“How about saying thanks?” she asked huffily.
“Hurry, child of…” Foss began.
“Oh shut up,” Moira cut him off. “We’re almost out of here!”
“I don’t want to shut up,” the boy said.
“Not you—Foss.” But explaining would take too much time. “Trolls coming,” she said. “Not going to cut the rest of the ropes here.” She grabbed up the heavy knife and pushed the boy out the back door ahead of her.
He didn’t argue, just stumbled out soundlessly.