The Coal Burner and the Troll

Once, on a point of land jutting into the northwest corner of Lake Råsvalen, in the region of Linde, there lived a coal burner named Nils. He had a small garden patch that he left in the care of a servant boy, while he himself spent all his time in the forest—chopping wood for charcoal in the summer and burning it in the winter. But no matter how hard he worked, luck never seemed to favor him, and he became the talk of the village, for everyone knew that poor Nils could not catch a break.

One day, as he was building a stack of wood for burning on the other side of the lake, near the dark Harg Mountain, a strange woman appeared before him and asked if he needed help with his work.

“Yes, indeed! I could certainly use a hand,” Nils replied. Without another word, the woman began to haul logs and wood with such speed that she outpaced Nils’s horse, and by noon all the material for a new stack lay ready on the ground. When evening came, she asked Nils what he thought of her day’s work and whether she might return the next day.

The coal burner could hardly say no, so she came back the following day, and then every day after that. When the stack was burned, she helped him with the hauling, and never before had Nils produced so much coal, or coal of such fine quality.

Thus the woman stayed with him in the forest for three years, during which time she bore him three children. This did not trouble Nils, for she took care of them so well that he had no bother from them at all.

But when the fourth year began, she grew more bold. She demanded that he take her home and make her his wife. Nils did not like this idea, but since she was so useful in the coal forest, he was careful not to reveal his thoughts and simply said he would think it over.

One day, Nils went to church—a thing he had not done for many years—and what he heard there set his mind churning as it had not since he was an innocent child. He began to wonder if he had made a grave mistake, and whether the woman who had so willingly helped him might not be a troll in disguise.

Lost in these thoughts as he made his way back to his forest home, he forgot the agreement he had made with the woman when she first entered his service: that upon his arrival, before approaching the stack, he must strike three times with his ax against an old pine tree that stood a little way from the coal kiln. So he walked straight on, and suddenly a sight burst upon him that nearly drove him out of his wits. As he neared the stack, he saw it in bright flames, and around it stood the woman and her three children, drawing the coal. They pulled and raked with such fury that fire, smoke, and sparks flew high into the heavens. But instead of using pine branches, as was customary for damping the fire, they used their bushy tails, which they dipped in the snow and then beat the flames with.

Nils watched for a while, then crept stealthily back to the pine tree and struck it three times with his ax, making the blows echo far off to Harg Mountain. Only then did he walk forward to the stack, acting as though he had seen nothing. When he arrived, everything was just as he was used to: the stack burned steadily and well, and the woman went about her tasks as usual.

When the woman saw Nils again, she renewed her pleas to be allowed to go to his home and become his wife.

“Yes, the matter shall be settled now,” said Nils, trying to sound comforting, and he set off for home, ostensibly to fetch his horse. But instead, he went to Kallernäs, on the eastern shore of the lake, where a wise old man lived. Nils asked him what he should do to free himself from this dilemma.

The old man advised him to go home, hitch his horse to the coal cart, but make sure that the reins and harness had no loops in them. Then he should ride over the ice on the back of his horse, turn at the coal kiln without stopping, shout to the troll woman and her children to jump into the cart, and then drive briskly back onto the ice.

The coal burner followed the instructions exactly. He harnessed his horse, carefully checking that there were no loops in the reins or harness, then rode over the ice, up into the woods to the kiln, and called to the woman and her children to jump in. At the same moment, he turned the horse and made for the ice at top speed.

When he reached the middle of the lake, he saw a great pack of wolves racing toward him from the wilderness. Quickly, he let the harness slip from the shafts, leaving the cart and its contents standing on the slippery ice, and rode as fast as his horse could carry him toward the far shore.

When the troll woman saw the wolves, she began to shriek and plead. “Come back! Come back!” she cried. “If you will not do it for my sake, do it for your youngest daughter, Vipa!” But Nils kept riding for the shore.

Then he heard the trolls calling to one another: “Brother in Harsberg, sister in Stripa, and cousin in Ringshällen, catch hold of the loops and pull!”

“He has no loop,” came a reply from the depths of Harsberg.

“Catch him at Härkällarn, then.”

“He does not ride in that direction,” came from Ringshällen.

And indeed, Nils did not ride that way, but over fields, stones, and roads straight to his home. He had barely arrived when his horse fell dead, and a troll-shot tore away the corner of the stable.

Nils himself fell ill soon after and was confined to his bed for many weeks. When he recovered, he sold his cabin in the forest and spent the rest of his days cultivating the few acres around his cottage. And so the trolls were once caught napping.