Stories by Lauren

You are strongly advised not to feed the ducks in this pond.

My grandmother once told me a story of the kelpie, of how it would appear and entice children to ride on its back and then take them away to its lake and drown them. But, the story went, it did not do this because it was evil, because it hated humans, nor because it ate them.

No, she took these children because hers had died. She did not understand that human children drowned, that they couldn't live underwater with her. She just wanted a child, but hers was gone, so now she has to steal one.

The kelpie, or nøkken, is often as not a tragic figure in Scandinavian folklore.