Hopelessness consumed Laelia. She thought of herself as a fragile, dry leaf that would crumble any moment. How could Odin conquer Zote without weapons? She watched Zote racing angrily around the lake, his rage absorbing the very air they breathed. Yet her brother calmly stood his ground, seemingly undisturbed in spite of the impending crisis. But Laelia was unaware of her brother’s shaking hands as he played the screeching pitch of a hunting owl.
Putting his flute aside, Odin thought of the clever fox. When in a tight predicament, the fox used his intelligence to conquer the moment. He untied the pouch that hung from his neck and reached in for his other weapon. When Manti saw Odin reach for the pouch, she moved next to him and whispered into his ear. He nodded his head and smiled. The witch placed her glasses on the tip of her nose and gathered dry wood and hay from a nearby haystack. As she disturbed the haystack, Manti detected the distinct odor of methane emitted from its rotting core. She used the hay and wood to kindle a fire.
Odin again raised the flute to his lips. He moved his fingers along its length, stopping, starting, creating a rapid succession of hypnotic notes. The scrambled tones further maddened Zote as his powerful legs thrashed through the grassy edge of the lake. The fire had no more sputtered into a blaze than Zote’s massive body cast a shadow over it. There stood Zote, directly in front of them, separated from Laelia and her rescuers by the fire.
Zote turned toward Laelia, his black eyes blazing as he glared into hers. She could not help but see, not just rage, but also the hurt in Zote’s eyes. She had outsmarted him. His heart heavy with pain, Zote also believed that the little troll had betrayed him. His temper now had complete control. He began frothing at the mouth like a rabid dog, stomping his feet and pounding on his chest. His quick movements created sparks from his flint earrings. These sparks further intensified the grisliness of Zote’s bearded face. His fixation on Mt. Grieg again consumed him as he snarled that he must have the note that made the mountain his or he would recapture Laelia.
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Odin appeared calm as he continued to play his flute. Music is said to calm the savage breast or, in this case, the savage beast, but the beast in Zote was not soothed; each discordant note intensified his fury. The red-bearded troll’s fearlessness puzzled the simple-minded Zote. When Odin suddenly stopped playing, the silence further confused the bog troll.
Facing the angry troll with the confidence of a warrior, Odin tossed into the flames of the fire the fox dung he had taken from his pouch. The dung smoldered in the hot fire, and smoke riddled with the potent dung floated in the air. Puffs of wind came off the lake and blew the fumes from the fox dung toward Zote. Now the particles of dung commingled with the smoke circled over his head.
As the smoke began to befuddle Zote, his temper betrayed the worst of him; he yipped and leaped in front of the fire. Odin struggled to conceal his own fear.
Meanwhile, stunned by her brother’s lack of weapons and passive behavior, Laelia could not comprehend his actions. What could her unarmed brother do against this furious creature ready to pounce upon all of them? As she and Amal clung together, they could see the vapors were confusing Zote as his eyes glazed over with tears. Laelia felt pity mixed with horror and moved as far away as possible from her fearsome captor.
Zote cursed at the troll who played taunting tunes with a ridiculous stone flute. The fox dung’s fumes and the harsh notes induced hallucination of a turbulent storm and frightful deep water. This image and Odin’s serene behavior drove Zote senseless. But roaring and swinging his tail back and forth made absolutely no impression on the mountain troll.
Punga, who worried that Zote’s temper had reached a dangerous level, crawled out of Odin’s beard to get a better look. He was relieved to see that the thick smoke circling and befuddling the lunatic troll was working as planned.
Laelia now understood that the smoke’s magic came from the fox dung. Her brother knew the power of his weapons. How could she ever have doubted him? A light wind blew overhead, capturing and tossing her hair. When she caught the delicate scent of jasmine, her fear of Zote vanished. However, mixed with the fragrant scent was an unmistakable whiff of methane gas. Laelia thought this odor strange.
She watched a green vapor drift over and conceal Manti. The ancient witch lowered her body to the ground and disappeared.