“But how could you have done this!” he cried, and was quite unhappy. “Had you only waited three days longer, I should have been free!” said he. “But now I must return to the evil giantess and marry her, and all is over between us.” “Can I not follow you there?” asked the princess. “No, that is something you could not do in all your days, for if you rest or even so much as bend your knees to sit down, you will go back during the night as far as you came forward during the day,” said he; leaped to the door, and disappeared.
Then the princess wept and wailed, and waited for him to return; but she heard and saw nothing more of him. After a few days she grew so restless and wretched that she could no longer remain at home, and implored her maid to go along with her to search for the golden forest. The girl finally allowed herself to be moved; but she would not agree to set out until she had gotten together a yard of drilling, a yard of ticking, and a yard of fine linen; and she got them at once, as you may imagine, for there was no shortage of such things in the castle.
So they set out and wandered far, and ever farther, until their feet ached, and their spirits fell. Toward evening they came into the middle of a thick, dark forest; and climbed up into a high tree. The princess was so tired that the maid had to hold her in her arms while she slept a little. But during the night the ground about the tree grew alive with wolves, in the most sinister fashion, and they howled and cried, so that the princess did not venture to close her eyes another moment. But when daylight appeared in the skies, it seemed as though the wolves had suddenly all been blown away.
The following day they wandered far and ever farther, until their feet ached more, and their spirits sank lower. Toward evening they again came to the middle of a thick, dark forest. And they once more climbed into a high, high tree; but the princess was so tired that the maid had to hold her in her arms while she slept a little. When it grew darker, a most alarming number of bears flocked together under the tree, and began to dance and turn in a circle, with alarming speed, and all at once they tried to climb the tree. So the princess and her maid had to stand up in the tree-top the whole night through, and could not close an eye; but when day came, it seemed as though the bears sank into the earth in a single moment.
The third day they wandered far and ever farther, and then a bit more. Toward evening they again came to a thick, dark forest. There they again climbed into a high, high tree; but no sooner were they up in the tree than the ground beneath the tree and the whole forest were alive with lions, and they all roared and howled together in such a gruesome way that the echoes came back from rock and woodland. Suddenly they began to dance and whirl around in such a terrible fashion that the earth trembled, and in between they would clutch the tree again, and try to shake and loosen it, as though they would pull it out root and branch. The princess and her maid had to stand up in the very tree-top, and though they were so tired they could have fallen down from time to time, neither of them dared think of sleeping. But the moment day dawned, the lions all suddenly disappeared from the face of the earth, where they were, walking and standing.
Then they stumbled along, this way and that, the whole day long, until their feet ached harder than hard, and their spirits sank lower than low. They lost path and direction, and though they hunted north and south and east and west, they could not find the way out of the great, dark forest.
At last the princess grew tired and sad beyond all measure, and wanted to sit down every moment, in order to rest a little; but the maid held her and dragged her forward, and never let her bend her knees for a moment to sit down, because then they would have gone back just as far as they had come that day; for you must know that the giantess in the golden forest had so arranged matters.
In the evening they came to an enormous, horrible rock. “I will knock here,” said the maid, and tapped and knocked. “O no,” said the princess, “please don’t knock here, you can see how ugly everything is here!” “Who is knocking there at my door?” cried the giantess in the rock, in a loud, harsh manner, opened the door, and stuck her nose—it was all of a yard long—out through the crack.
“The youngest princess and her maid, they want to get to a prince in the golden forest, whose name is Trouble and Care,” was the maid’s reply.
“O, faugh!” cried the giantess, “that is so far to the north that one can neither sail nor row there. But what do you want of Trouble and Care? Is this, perhaps, the princess who wanted to marry him?” asked the giantess. Yes, this was the princess. “Well, she will never get him as long as she lives,” said the giantess, “for now he must marry the great giantess in the golden forest. You might just as well go back home now as later,” said she. No, they would not turn back for anything, and the maid asked whether it would not be possible for her to take them in for the darkest part of the night. “I can take you in easily enough,” said the giantess, “but when my husband comes home he will tear off your heads, and eat you up!” But there was no help for it, they could not go on in the middle of the night. Then the maid pulled out the yard of ticking, and gave it to the giantess for linen. “It can’t be true! It can’t be true!” cried she. “Here I have been married all of a hundred years, and have never yet had any ticking!” And she was so pleased that she invited the wanderers in, received them kindly, and took the best care of them. After a while, when they had strengthened themselves with food and drink, the giantess said to them: “Yes, he is a ferocious fellow, is my husband, and I will have to hide you in the anteroom. Perhaps he will not find you then.” And she prepared a bed for them, as soft and comfortable as a bed can be; but they did not care to lie down in it, nor sit in it; no, they could not even close their eyes, for they had to watch to see that their knees did not bend. So they stood the whole night through, and took turns holding each other up, for by now the maid was so weary and wretched that she was ready to give in.