Around 1740–1770, a certain bond named Sigurd son of Bjorn lived in Hleidrargard on the Island Fjord. He was known as a wise and outstanding man.
They say that one day in early spring, when he was still young, he went to buy fish west to the foot of the Glacier. It so happened that he and the man with whom he traded were not in agreement; Because of this, a quarrel and a fight arose between them. Sigurd was a strong and decisive man; he threw the enemy over himself and dealt him several blows. This man immediately rose to his feet, threatened Sigurd, saying that he would repay him no later than a year, and walked away, and Sigurd and his comrades returned home and stayed there.
At this time, in the Crown Court, the nearest farmstead to Hleidrargard, there lived a man named Hadl, nicknamed the Strong. He was clairvoyant and often saw ghosts and communicated with them. They say that in the autumn, after the summer when Sigurd went to buy fish, this Hadl stood in the evening at his barn. Then he saw a ghost in the guise of a girl walking down the street. She was small, wearing a red shirt, a light brown knee-length skirt, a hat with a tassel and no jacket.
As soon as the girl saw Hadl, she wanted to turn off the road, but he blocked her path and asked who she was. She said her name was Sigga. He asked where she came from and where she was going.
She replied:
- To Hleidrargard.
– What are you going to do there? he asked.
“Kill Sigurd son of Bjorn,” she said. Then the girl ran on her way, so that sparks sparkled from under her heels.
That evening Sigurd slept in his bed. There was a window directly above it. The people in the bedroom were awake.
Suddenly Sigurd jumped to his feet and asked:
-Who called me?
He was told that no one had called him. He went back to bed, but as soon as he fell asleep, he jumped up and said that now it was as if someone had called him. He was told no. He lay down again, but did not fall asleep.
After some time, people noticed that he was looking out the window and saying:
- Ah! Is this true?
People saw that his face had changed a lot. Then he went out through the bedroom door, and people heard him say loudly:
- If there is anyone here who is looking for Sigurd son of Bjorn, then here he is! - and pointed with his hand at a poor boy named Hjaulmar, who was sitting on a bench near the bedroom door and scratching his wool.
Immediately the boy was thrown from the bench onto the floor; he rolled around as if someone terrible and invisible was strangling him. Then Sigurd brought a rod and began to whip around the boy. Then the boy felt better, and Sigurd went to bed again. The boy's body became swollen and broken. Such a disaster occurred three or four times that night and occasionally from that time until the beginning of winter. The boy died in one of these attacks, and his body was very swollen and bloated with obvious black fingerprints of the ghost.
After this, the ghost haunted Sigurd and his children, as well as all the people from Hleidrargard. Clairvoyants often saw this girl, who was nicknamed Scotta of Hleidrgard and who was recognized by her cap with a tassel. Usually she was seen on some kind of beam, most often in the front. They say that there she somehow skinned a cat.
Sigurd defended himself all the time, but little by little she killed his cattle and the cattle on the neighboring farm. The carcasses were torn to pieces, blackened and completely inedible. The death of one man was attributed to her, Sigurd of the Cape, a good bond; he began to have convulsions and died from them.
When her insolence increased and people's fear grew, the situation became disastrous, but luck struck. People said that a certain beggar from under the Glacier came to the parish, whom everyone called Glacier Petur. He was very knowledgeable in witchcraft, and was always careful in this art.
Sigurd of Hleidrargard was friendly and helpful, received Petur well and told him that he should not remain in his parish, since a ghost had been sent here, which had caused much harm to both Sigurd and others, and would probably eventually bring him to death.
Petur said that he would help him get rid of this evil spirit, and one night he went away, taking the ghost with him, and chained him under a large and strong stone in that place between the Angry River and Wallny in the area of the Dirty Farm, which is called the Warm Pasture. For a long time the ghost could not cause harm, but at night its howl was often heard, and none of the people walked nearby there, because their mood deteriorated, they became dizzy, and even on a clear day they could lose their way.
In 1806–1810, a priest from Gryaznoe Khutor, whose name was Reverend Sigurd and who is still alive, built a shepherd's hut not far from this place, because there was good pasture here. On the very first night they settled in this house, one sheep was killed, and later the rest. People recognized the same marks on the carcasses of sheep that the ghost had previously left, and came to the conclusion that his bonds began to weaken. Gradually, sheep began to get sick and die throughout the Island Fjord, it was a pestilence, but for a long time people mistakenly believed that a ghost was the cause.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru