DALAÅI CREEK:

Gunnhild held the reins with one hand and brushed at her eyes with the other, sparkling her mitten with freezing tears. She had just tried to bid farewell to her father at Jusureid, a short way up the dale, but he had only growled and stomped back inside the cottage. A poor excuse of a parting.

A small group had huddled there by the creek in a last goodbye: her stepmother, Merry Margit; her teenage half-sister Åshild; and her younger brother Mundi, still single and working at Huvestad. Burly Knut and Bjørgulv lay in their graves; Hæge and Aslaug had written farewells from their husbands' farms; Tarjei and Red Knut without a word of excuse had moved away and fallen out of contact.

Merry Margit pressed a small packet into Gunnhild's hand. "Seeds from the mountains, friendly blossoms to bring you comfort in a faraway land."

Gunnhild turned the packet over to see the word written neatly on the front. "Stemorsblom," it said. She laughed through her pain. "Stepmother's flower! Pansies! That is so thoughtful, so thoughtful." She hugged her stepmother tight. "Thank you," she whispered, then stumbled back to the sleigh.

And now she waited, two miles and three bends of the creek downstream from Jusureid, waited for her husband's cousin to come down Bjørnflatin creek from Homme farm.

Stepmother's flower. What a good stepmother Merry Margit had been for her those many years ago. What a good stepmother Gunnhild had tried to be for Åsne, Toli, and Bibbi. In the end, her stepchildren had decided to remain at Åkre with their cousins. Did that mean she had failed in her efforts?

Nei, the three were adults now, and had made their own choices. Tall Såmund had written to each of them, and they had chosen not to follow his lead. So it was just Gunnhild and her own five children. Little Såmund (not so little any more at fourteen years old), Asla, Halvor, Asi, and two-year-old Bjørgo.

Gunnhild rummaged through her winter garb to place the packet of seeds in an inside pocket, and drew out the list Tall Såmund had sent. Follow Dalaåi to Sundkilen, take the ice-road out onto Lake Kvitseidvatn, follow it to the narrow, fjord-like sound at the far end. Just keep going downstream, he had written. Downstream to Langesund, then contact the innkeeper who had promised to buy the horses and sleigh.

"Your new home is waiting," he had scrawled at the bottom, "and my heart yearns to see you again."

A skidding, slithering sound came from uphill to the left. Folding the letter and returning it to its place near her heart, Gunnhild glanced up to see a lone skier sailing down the path from Homme farm. Birgit's brother again, she saw as he deliberately swung off the trail and over a hump edging the creek.

He landed with a thump and a swish, spun around to face her, and bowed. "On their way down now, my lady."

Gunnhild had to smile. The man's spirits were contagious.

"Amazing!" eight-year-old Halvor said. "Wish I could do that."

"Not where you're going, more's the pity," said Sveinung. "The drab, flat prairies of Amerika, rumpled by a rise or two -- sad excuses for hills. But now, as the French say, bon voyage!"

"Thank you, good sir," Gunnhild replied, like a queen greeting her knight. "Look, children, here come your cousins."

"Second cousins," Halvor explained to Sveinung Saddlemaker.

Two sleighs came slowly down the incline along Bjørnflatin creek, braking against the steep slope. Jon and Birgit rode in one with their four children and Uncle Halvor Lamefoot. Birgit's nephew Bjørn drove the other with the two Annes, Ingebjørg, and Old Guro and her housegirl Signe. Seven-year-old Tone* waved and called, "Guess what, Halvor?* I get to start my schooling, after all! Teacher Anne is coming with us all the way to Amerika!"

"Ready?" Jon asked Gunnhild when his sleigh reached the frozen creek.

"Ja. We've said farewell to Åe and Åkre and Dalen and Jusureid. It's time to be on our way."

Jon turned in his seat to gaze a last time on the looming knoll of home. "Farewell, Homme! Keep watch, Homme's Crest! We won't forget."

A low ray of sun gilded the highest point of the fjell, catching in its blink a white owl disturbed from its perch. The silent bird sailed down, down, down from Homme's Crest until it vanished in the woods like a ghost, like the spirit of an ancient ancestor bidding farewell.

Gunnhild drew a long breath and shook the reins. "Off we go, then. Shall we make a new tale on the way? About the father of five children—"

"Stolen away by trolls," Asla said.

"And the children go seeking him over hill and dale," said Halvor.

Asi piped up. "And over the sea!"

"There was one time," Gunnhild said as the horses clopped along the frozen creek bed and the sleigh runners hissed and the cold north wind blew down from Homme's Crest. "There was one time a handsome, hard-working woodcutter who was carried off by trolls to a far, far land, but missing him dearly, his five clever children set out on a quest..."

BEHIND THE SCENES

Tall Såmund's grown kids Åsne, Talleiv, and Birgit did not appear on the same passenger list as Gunnhild. Where'd they go? Did they stay in the Kviteseid area? Move to another parish? Emigrate later?

With snow on the ground until March or April, the best road to the coast was on the ice-road: the frozen waterways.

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This ends the dramatized saga that traces my roots through the fjells of Telemark.

* Still to come:  one final part, relating a few details about the emigration and beyond. Watch for news about Tone Jonsdotter Homme and Halvor Såmundsson Åe.