The Sea of Trolls

Jack and Thorgil’s magical cloaks camouflage them, and the spider gathers the children up with her eggs. She flees from the dragon into the forest and places the egg sack high in a tree over an enormous web. Thorgil frees herself and Jack from the sack and urges him to attack the spider, but he refuses because they aren’t in immediate danger, and he understands that he will lose his power as a bard if he takes life needlessly.

Bold Heart advises Jack to lull the spider to sleep, which he achieves by playing the strands of the spiderweb like harp strings in “the most important music recital of his life” (393). The crow finds the owls whose lives Jack saved, and the birds carry the children to safety. The next morning, Jack and Thorgil reach the fjord and rejoin Olaf’s crew.

Jack and Thorgil describe how Olaf died battling a troll-bear, and his crew members honor the fallen warrior. That night, Jack tells Rune that they found Mimir’s Well and gives him the bottle of water. The water strengthens Rune’s health and voice, although he is not the gifted singer he was in his youth.

The next morning, the ship sails from Jotunheim to Middle Earth. After they cross the border between worlds, Thorgil finds it more difficult to understand birds, and the life force feels more distant to Jack. They return to Ivar’s land and have a mournful reunion with Olaf’s family. That evening, Thorgil spontaneously creates a poem honoring her adoptive father, and everyone is stunned by her new skill with language. Some of Olaf’s friends and relatives murmur that the girl is a witch, and Jack challenges them, “[Olaf] accepted her. Why can’t you?” (404). Chastened, Olaf’s heir, Skakki, recognizes her as his sister and welcomes her into the family. Overwhelmed by this unfamiliar display of acceptance, Thorgil rushes off to the king’s dogs.

A week after Jack’s return, Ivar and Frith summon him. On the night of the harvest moon, Jack, Thorgil, Rune, Bold Heart, and Heide go to the royals’ hall. Along the way, Rune explains to the young bard that Jack’s magic depends upon his self-knowledge, and the boy hesitantly acknowledges that he is “kind of heroic” and not “just a farm brat” (409).

When Jack stands before Queen Frith, the Norns speak through him. They declare that the half-troll can regain her beauty by taking some of her cats’ hair and lying upon it under the full moon in Freya’s Meadow. Frith threatens to sacrifice Lucy if the ritual fails. She is meant to use only a third of the cats’ hair, but she takes all of it and is transformed into “something large and shaggy that had never been seen before” (417). While Jack frees Lucy, Thorgil releases the queen’s cats, and the animals chase Frith into the perilous fen.

King Ivar’s people rejoice at the news that Queen Frith has disappeared into the marsh. Lucy is thin and unresponsive, and Jack spends hours talking to her about their family in an attempt to “reach the place where Lucy had hidden herself” (420). He finds the toys that Olaf made for her, and Bold Heart teases her by stealing some like he did long ago. Suddenly, Lucy sits up and cries, “Come back, you thief!” (421). The girl regains her memory and her appetite.

Skakki and Thorgil are among the Northmen who sail Jack and his sister home to England. During the voyage, Lucy reveals that she survived her time in Frith’s hall by imagining herself inside her father’s stories about her royal origins.

When Skakki’s ship reaches England, Jack rejoices. However, his excitement turns to outrage when he overhears some of the crew say that they will return to raid the towns they pass. Jack feels betrayed by the Northmen he has come to consider friends, especially Rune, who tells him that they must plunder to survive, and more groups of Northmen are already preparing to attack England. However, out of gratitude to Jack, King Ivar’s people pledge never to attack the boy’s village.

On Jack’s last night with the Northmen, he realizes that Thorgil had always been “truly beautiful,” but this had been hidden by her “blighted spirit” (432). Rune recounts the story of Loki and Fenris, and Jack tells the tale of the trolls’ flight from Utgard. Thorgil recites a poem she composed about her and Jack climbing a hill to “fetch a pail of water” (434), and she’s distraught when her fellow Northmen dismiss the piece. Jack comforts her by saying that her poem will be remembered for ages to come. In the morning, Jack and Lucy bid the Northmen goodbye, and Rune gives Jack the few remaining drops of water from Mimir’s Well.

When Jack and Lucy return home, the villagers initially mistake Jack for a raider because of his confident poise and grand attire. Giles weeps when he sees that his son is alive, and he tells anyone who will listen about Jack’s supernatural adventures. While Lucy basks in the villagers’ attention, Jack reunites with their mother, who always believed her children would survive.

Jack’s mother brings him to the Bard, who is in the same infant-like state he was in when Jack was abducted months ago. Bold Heart collides with the elderly man, and they both collapse. Jack revives the Bard with the last drops from Mimir’s Well, and the Bard explains that he traded places with the crow when Queen Frith attacked him and that he was the one accompanying Jack on his journey all along. The Bard tends to the frightened crow until he regains the confidence to fly and care for himself again.

Jack asks the Bard if he was right to give Thorgil the rune of protection, and he answers, “No kindness is ever wasted, nor can we ever tell how much good may come of it” (449). The shield maiden is now a servant of the life force, like Jack and the Bard, although she doesn’t realize it yet. Jack basks in the beauty of his home in summertime, certain that he is exactly where he wants to be.