“I have learnt to like the Norwegians,” she said, “and I shall never marry unless I can go to Norway!”
But the smallest of the sisters whispered to the Trold, “that is only because she once heard a song which said that when the world came to an end, the rocks of Norway would still stand, and that is why she wants to go there, she is so afraid of being exterminated.”
“Ho, ho!” said the Trold, “so that slipped out. But what can the seventh do?”
“The sixth comes before the seventh,” said the Elf-king, for he could reckon, but she would not come forward.
“I can only tell people the truth,” she said. “Nobody cares for me, and I have enough to do in making my winding sheet.”
Now came the seventh and last, what could she do? Well she could tell stories as many as ever she liked.
“Here are my five fingers,” said the old Trold, “tell me a story for each one.”
The elf-maiden took hold of his wrist, and he chuckled and laughed, till he nearly choked. When she came to the fourth finger, which had a gold ring on it, as if it knew there was to be a betrothal, the Trold said, “Hold fast what you have got, the hand is yours, I will have you for a wife myself!” The elf-maiden said that the stories about Guldbrand, the fourth finger, and little Peter Playman, the fifth, had not yet been told.
“Never mind, keep those till winter. Then you shall tell us about the fir, and the birch, and the fairy gifts, and the tingling frost. You shall have every opportunity of telling us stories; nobody up there does it yet. We will sit in the Stone Hall, where the pine logs blaze, and drink mead out of the golden horns of the old Norwegian kings. The river god gave me a couple. When we sit there the mountain sprite comes to pay us a visit, and he will sing you the songs of the Sæter girls. The salmon will leap in the waterfalls, and beat against the stone wall, but it won’t get in. Ah, you may believe me when I say that we lead a merry life there in good old Norway. But where are the lads?”