An Unwanted Surprise
Welcome to another adventure from the Thousand Acre Woods deep within Trollheim of the NJ Pine Belt! Tales Chronicled by Jonathan Hulton... That's me! In today's tale, I meet the Jersey Devil. I have heard of him, my friends have told me of him, but I never had to wish I had never met him before.
I was walking past Trollheim through Fox Hollow above the Disappearing Pond heading toward Edge Rd. I was going to Ferrago Forge to have John Bowker forge me a Clontarf sword from local bog iron, meteor alloys, and a chunk from Mars I found around Ducks Pond. John is going to have a ball making it!
The Clontarf sword is the regional variant of a Viking sword just north of Dublin in Fingal. My grandmother is a Dowgin that can be claimed by the tribes in that region. Fingal was home to the light haired foreigners, Norwegians, and Dublin was home to the black hair Danes and Ivar's tricky sons of bitches…
Dowgin is a mixture of Dow in early to middle English meaning worthy and the hard g in gin was originally an f in Gaelic for foreigner. Since I was born in Princeton before the Civil War, not born in the Pines—I guess I'm a worthy foreigner.
On the way, my mind wandered on the various folklore Bjorn shared with me from Norway, detailing the various other forms of Trolls, besides the Nattrolls.
Trolls are everything magical in Scandinavia. Like Faeries are within the Celtic world. There are some crossovers, like the "King of the Cats", magical otters, mere-folk, and bloody knowledge.
Pookhas, seem to be only Celtic though—damn seven foot tall rabbits…
I was taking the left on Ferrago Lane when this dragon ran me over.
To be quite open; it was a pretty small dragon—though taller than me.
Not by much, granted, but taller.
I'm not sure if he was a dragon…
He had a protrusion, like a snout, but maybe more of a beak. Beak, snout? It was more like a horse's hoof…
Two short wings. They were bigger than a swallows, but then again, shorter than a turkey vulture's.
His neck was like a duck's. Though his body was tall and round like that newly found, then lost again Dodo.
Legs taller than Miss Gulch's. Definitely—not as pretty with this stubby little tail.
Brushing off my pants, as I stood up, I noticed it would be a stretch of the imagination to call him even a Wyven, though his wings were attached to his forearms.
"Will you look where you are going!" it yelled.
"Are you a Pookha," he didn't look really like a Wyvern dragon…
"A Pookha!" he yelled. "I do drink with the Pookha named Harvey though, at the Pine Ta—no, do I look like damn bunny to you?"
"No, I just, was told not to trust them, I have enough tricksters in my life already…"
"What do you have in your pic-a-nic basket?"
"Just a little iron."
"Spinach?"
"No—what are you?"
"A Gastornis,"
"A what?"
"Well that was what some bone hunters by the Delaware called us—it is a new name. We just called ourselves the…birds"
"Birds…that is as original as every tribe calling themselves 'the people'."
"What do you call us?"
"Picbicnic ho tone."
"What does that mean?"
"Small wagging fish."
"What?"
"Well you can't call you guys 'kickstand'…"
I gave him a queer look.
"I understand now why they call you SEPs," I said.
"Um, what," he said shaking his head.
"You're so aggravating, they leave you alone to become somebody else's problem."
"Hey," I yelled. "How many times have jumped out at some drunk walking back from the tavern, knowing no one would believe him?"
"Well, um…"
"Do you think it is nice sitting on someone's roof, and start scratching away at midnight?"
"Well I could date your daughter…"
"I don't have one."
"Well if you did…"
"Oh quit it," I begged. "You might be from Jersey, but you're no devil."
"Well, he is," Gast said pointing to Old Scratch. "You are at the crossroads."
"Yeah, but I don't play the fiddle."
Then I walked away.
Behind me those two stepped into clearing continued their game of whist with a Muhwe that brought the sandwiches and a Sasquatch.
We just released our first collection of Trollheim stories in print. It is available on this website at www.salemhousepress.com and Barnes & Noble. Pick up your copy today, pretty please with sugar on top...
Fiction/ Illustrated Fantasy/ Mythology / Scandinavian Myth/ Norse Sagas / Scandinavian Folk Lore / Coffee Table Book
Paperback: $45 | Hardcover: $65 | PDF eBook $5
Buy now link...
Following the Harry N. Abrams, Inc. tradition of the series that created Brian Froud's and Alan Lee's Faeries and Gnomes by Wil Huygen and Rien Poortvliet, we present you with what would have been the next book in the series: Trolls: A Compendium. Trolls—do you think you know what they are? Could you be wrong?
Trolls within Scandinavian lore, myth, saga, fantasy, and folktales are actually anything magical within our northern neighbor's culture. Richly illustrated in this volume are the tales of faeries, dwarves, nissen, huldras, gods, Jotuns, draugar, ghosts, and more. Also, this book introduces our readers to the world of Trollheim, populated by Nattrolls that escaped the 17th-century Swedish colony within the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Narrated by Christopher Jonathan Hulton, who lives in the Thousand Acre Woods just after the Civil War, their tales are filled with Native American lore and tales of their neighbor, the Jersey Devil.
Preview: Google Books
Hardcover: $65.00
PDF (non-flowable, best on tablet, desktop, or laptop) eBook: Download a copy onto your device today! Only $5.00
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