into an uneasy doze. A cobwebby shadow scampered from a dark corner to sit hunched on the hearthstones. Peer woke. He heard a faint sound, a steady lapping like a cat’s. A satisfied sigh. The click of a wooden bowl set stealthily down.
Peer watched between his lashes as the Nis set the room to rights, a little rushing shadow, swift as a bat. He hadn’t seen the Nis in a long time. Sometimes he glimpsed a wispy grey beard or a little red cap glowing in the firelight, but when he looked closer it was always just a bit of sheep’s wool escaped from Gudrun’s spindle, or a bright rag wrapped around Sigrid’s doll. He’d been hurt that the Nis wanted so little to do with him, when they’d shared so much. The Nis had rescued him from the lubbers, the disgusting creatures who lived in his uncles’ freezing privy. It had helped to save Loki from his uncles’ savage dog, Grendel. But now, living in a happy household with plenty to eat, it kept out of his way.
“Perhaps you don’t need one another any more,” Hilde had suggested when he talked to her about it. “Down at the mill you were both outcasts. Your uncles treated you both so badly, you had something in common.” Peer saw what she meant, but still he missed the Nis.
Now here it was again, as if to comfort him for this terrible day. It frisked round the hearth, sweeping up stray ashes, dampening the cloth over the dough that Gudrun had left by the fire, and turning the bowl so that it should rise evenly. Finished, it skipped lightly up on to the edge of the creaking cradle and perched there. With a furtive glance over one shoulder, it extended a knobbly forefinger into the cradle to prod one of the sleeping babies, then snatched it back, as if it had touched red-hot iron. It chirruped disapprovingly and hopped down.
Peer raised himself on one elbow. “Nis!” he called softly, half expecting the Nis to vanish like a mouse whisking into its hole.
The Nis stiffened. Two beady, glinting eyes fixed on his. Behind him, Loki broke into a grumbling growl; Loki had never liked the Nis.
“Quiet, Loki,”whispered Peer. “Nis, I’m so glad to see you. It’s been ages! Why don’t you talk to me any more?”
The Nis glared at him.
“What has you done, Peer Ulfsson?” it demanded, bristling.
“Me?” asked Peer, surprised. “What do you mean? I brought Kersten’s baby home, that’s all.”
“Yes, it is all your fault!” the Nis squeaked. Its hair and beard frilled out into a mad ruff of feathery tendrils. “Foolish, foolish boy! What was you thinking of to bring such a baby here?”
“Wait a minute!” Peer sat bolt upright. “That little baby has lost her mother. What did you want me to do–leave her?”
“Yes!” hissed the Nis. “She doesn’t belong here, Peer Ulfsson. Who is her mother? One of the savage sea people, all wild and wet and webbed. Brrr!” It shook its head in disgust, rapid as a cat, a whirr and a blurr of bright eyes and whiskers. “The likes of them doesn’t belong in housen, Peer Ulfsson.”
“You’re a fine one to talk!” said Peer angrily.
The Nis’s eyes nearly popped out of its head with agitation. “Think! If the sea people come to claim her, what then? What then, Peer Ulfsson? Besides, how can the mistress feed two childs, eh? Poor little Eirik. He will starve!”
“No he won’t,” said Peer. “Eirik’s nearly weaned. He eats all sorts of things.”
The Nis ignored him, covering its face with two spidery hands. “Poor, poor Eirik!” it mourned, peeping through its fingers. “No milk for him! No food! The little stranger eats it all, steals his mother away. Like a cuckoo chick!”
“Oh, come on!” Peer rallied. “I thought you liked babies. What’s wrong with her?”
“Everything!” fizzed the Nis. “This is not a proper baby, but a seal baby. Not one thing, not the other.”With its head on one side, it added more cheerfully, “Maybe she will pine, maybe she will die!”
Peer almost choked. “‘A seal baby.’ You’ve been listening to Gudrun, but she doesn’t know. Bjørn wouldn’t…Kersten wasn’t! Ralf doesn’t believe it, and neither do I. And even if it was true, what are you saying? Just because her mother might be a seal woman, you want the baby to go–yet it’s quite all right for you to live here?”
“For me?” The Nis nodded vigorously. “The Nis is very useful in a house,” it said virtuously. “Often, often, the mistress says she can’t manage without me!”
“How nice for you,” said Peer.
The Nis simpered, plaiting its long fingers. “So the baby will go!” it chirped.
“No–actually, the baby will stay.”
The Nis’s lower lip stuck out and its eyes glittered. “Peer Ulfsson is so clever,” it hissed. “Of course he is right. He knows so much more than the poor Nis!” It turned its back on Peer.
Peer tried to calm his own feelings. The Nis had always been prickly, but he was shocked by this unexpected selfishness. Still, he owed the Nis a lot.
“Don’t be angry,” he said.
“Huh!” snapped the Nis without turning.
“Oh, really, Nis–let’s not quarrel.”
“If the baby stays–I goes.” The Nis delivered this ultimatum over its shoulder, its face still half-averted.
“I think you’re—” Peer halted. He’d been going to say, “I think you’re being silly,” but he thought better of it. “—I think you’re overreacting.”
“I means it, Peer Ulfsson,” the Nis insisted.
“I’m sure you won’t go,” said Peer soothingly. “Now, come on. Tell me what else is happening.”
“What does the Nis know? The Nis knows nothing,” the little creature sulked.
“No news?” Peer asked. “When it’s so long since we talked? And I thought you heard everything. Are you losing your touch?” He faked a yawn. “Very well, then; I’m tired. I’ll go back to sleep.”
This worked almost too well. The Nis turned round, stiff with fury. “What sort of news does Peer Ulfsson want?”
“I was only joking!” But Peer saw he had gone too far. While the Nis loved to tease others, it hated to be teased itself.
“News of the trolls–the merrows–the nixies?” it demanded with an unforgiving glare.
Peer sighed. “Tell me about the trolls.”
“Great tidings from Troll Fell,” announced the Nis in a cold, huffy voice. “Remember the Gaffer? And his daughter the troll princess, who married and went to live with the trolls of the Dovrefell? She has borne a son.”
“Really?” The Gaffer was the cunning old king of Troll Fell. Years ago, when Peer and Hilde had ventured deep into the mountain to rescue the twins, they’d met the Gaffer–and his sly daughter.
“So the Gaffer has a grandson,” Peer said without enthusiasm.
