THE RINGSTETTEN SAGA XVII: A HARD TEST

Previously on The Ringstetten Saga:
On a warm springtime's night, Katia, dressed as a Cossack, finally makes it past the fence and wakes Gustav Adolf up, while whispering about their freedom plans. The Russians did not confiscate the Swedish officers' weapons after Poltava: the young lieutenant in blue is still armed on parole and able to defend his beloved.
Both leap over the fort palisade, in the most iconic scene in the story arc, on twin mares stolen from the officers' stables: Gustav Adolf on white Foudre (Lightning) and Katinka on black Poudre (Gunpowder). When the garrison's officers give chase, the fugitives seek shelter in the woods, where they transform into flying squirrels and their steeds into flycatchers (black and white passerines). When the detachment returns empty-handed to the guardhouse, the commandant suffers from a heart attack, clenching his chest and falling unconscious.
In the meantime, the two shapeshifters are still bound for Sweden, always heading towards the setting sun. Until, in late summer, they (as squirrels once more) reach a vast and elegant baroque palace, that Katia mistakes for Versailles. They fall off a fir tree becoming human again.
But they are wearing court dresses instead of their military uniforms, and approached in that state by finely dressed and French-speaking lords and ladies, who mistake them for newcomers of their rank from the provinces. Turns out that their "Versailles" was the Czar's French-style court, on the outskirts of Saint Petersburg, and our hero and heroine receive some aid from His Imperial Majesty to board a clipper, across the Baltic, bound for Kalmar, Sweden. Once they have landed and resume their ride on land towards the Ringstetten estate, summer turns into autumn.
In the Swedish woods, Gustav Adolf and his fiancée transform back into their usual selves, Katia discarding her Cossack's uniform and putting on the frock she had packed in advance. The two young riders, galloping through copses of emerald firs and golden birches, are completely unaware of what will occur once they have reached Värmland. Something that will shatter their hopes and put them on trial.
For a white hare crosses the riders' path before they reach the Ringstetten estate. Just like before the Poltava debacle, the omen repeats itself...
During the cross-country ride, Gustav Adolf decides to tell Katia his favourite story, a tale of the old gods told by his nanny a thousand times, which reminds him of the path he's chosen to take now:
"In Elfland (Alvhem), it was always a cool northern summer, and elves and nature lived in harmony. Their ruler Frey was responsible for the friendly climate and the growth of vegetation.
One day, the smith of Elfland, called Völund, made a sword that could even threaten the gods themselves in order to protect the magical land. He gave this sword to his liege lord Frey, for him to guard Elfland from the trolls and the frost-folk who might arrive as invaders and bring a perpetual winter. This sword was a rapier with runes inlaid on its blade, and Völund had called it Lävatein.
Frey, the ruler of all the elves, was fair-haired and tall, young and dashing forever like all of his subjects. He had a younger foster brother called Skirner, who was more than a friend to him. One day, Skirner persuaded Frey to move his throne to the tallest peak in Elfland. From there, the fair lord could see into the enemy country of Giantland (Jotunheim), and there, in a hall in a rocky glacier valley, he saw a bonnie maiden as young and fair-haired as he was himself. From that day on, he neglected his duties as ruler and guardian of Elfland, and as responsible for the plants' growth and welfare.
In the end, Frey confided in his good friend Skirner that he had fallen in love with a young frost giantess, which might lead to tragedy (being members of enemy species). He couldn't leave his kingdom, or else it would be invaded by his beloved Gerd's own kin... and thus, Skirner volunteered to visit the maiden at her birthplace, the great hall outside which she had been seen.
Thus, the young lad took Frey's reflection from the pond where the secret had been told, and he put this reflection in his drinking-horn canteen. He also asked for Lävatein, for he intended to bring the sword to the in-laws in exchange for their daughter, as a gift of peace. Though Frey knew the price he had to pay, he gladly sacrificed his rapier, the only weapon in Elfland, to attain a romance with his intellectual equal.
After a warm leave-taking, Skirner went through many pitfalls and perils to reach fair Gerd's residence. There, he asked the servants to let him have a tête-à-tête with the young heiress... and then, he told her of Elfland and the fair folk, of vast gardens and calm lakes, of Frey's pocket-sized ship that could grow at his will and also fly through the skies, of the golden pig Gyllenborste, that Frey kept as a pet... and, not least, of Frey himself: young and handsome, cheerful and clever, the only match for a maiden like Gerd. Yet she didn't believe the Elven messenger... until Skirner, the sharp lad, put Frey's reflection in her drink (which made her nearly swoon with infatuation), made the engagement known to her caregivers, and handed over the rune-inlaid Lävatein to the household. 
Once the bonnie Gerd had reached the Great Hall of Elfland, a wedding without an equal was celebrated among the Fair Folk. The bride and groom received countless gifts, and the revels lasted from that full moon till the next one. No one regretted having given up the sword..." Gustav Adolf ostensibly concludes the story. The Sidhe has watched her ward return as a young and dashing officer, in spite of the many privations he has suffered. He may be wearing a steel rapier, but it remains in his scabbard, as his pistols do in their holsters. She has fallen in love with the young lieutenant, and is thus determined to take his freedom and make him hers. 
Thus, she casts ferns and strange mushrooms into the spring from which Charles XI had drunk at the start of the season, enchanting it for a second time. This spell, though, is to make any young warrior who drinks from the spring lose all his feelings, his heart freezing to ice.
Katia and Gustav Adolf soon arrive, both unaware of the impending threat to their relationship. As the thirsty lieutenant drinks his fill, he feels a sharp, stabbing pain in his chest, like a stab with a blade of ice, while the enchanted draught lands in his stomach (like if he were "warmed" with brandy, but "cooled" instead). Katia springs to his aid, but he rejects her with an ice-cold glare and continues solo, on Foudre, towards the Ringstetten estate, leaving Katia and Poudre on their own by the spring.
Then, right before the rectory, the Sidhe pulls the dragonfly trick on Birgitta, one of the Reverend's young daughters. The little redhead follows the dragonfly to a clearing where there are rune stones: the Sidhe turns her into a rune stone and takes her form to supplant her.
The Count and Countess are overjoyed with their prodigal son's homecoming, deciding to celebrate it, but he reacts coldly and without one word. His highborn parents attribute this change of character to the war and the subsequent captivity.
When Etienne and Christina pay the estate a visit, the Walloon (next in line for the title and lands of Count of Ringstetten after Gustav Adolf) is surprised by the appearance of the missing rightful heir... and by his change of personality. He tries to reconcile with the young lieutenant, but in vain. In fact, Gustav Adolf looks coldly at Etienne, insinuates that he has tried to claim the lands in his absence, and calls him a usurper. The Wallonian industrialist, feeling offended, challenges his brother-in-law to a duel on Midsummer Green, the day after the harvest fête at sunrise.
Katia makes it to the soldier's croft, where she finds his widow Kerstin and her seven children. The Northlander was called up and killed at Poltava. The young foreigner decides to help them work for their lords: the Count and Countess of Ringstetten, whose only son has just come home from the wars.
Now it's her turn to experience toil and trouble!
During the harvest celebrations, Gustav Adolf announces his intention to leave the Swedish Army and his parents having betrothed him to Birgitta. Katia, who hoped to get to dance with him but was violently shoved aside, feels completely deserted: did she leave everything she knew in vain?
So she takes the knife she had brought from the outpost and slashes her own wrists at dusk, on the edge of the woods, veiled by the evening fog... as Gustav Adolf, returning home from the dance on Midsummer Green with his parents, sees her bleeding and asks her why. A weeping and bleeding Katia calls him a traitor in response. The maiden's blood and tears on the lieutenant's skin break the spell. He asks her for forgiveness, being forgiven, and she is taken back to the estate, where her beau tends to her wounds. The Count and Countess accept Katinka for a daughter-in-law. 

The young officer spends the whole night awake thinking also of Etienne and the fact that either of them may die the next day. He tells Katia of the argument he had with the Walloon while frozenhearted. The maiden can’t be more worried either.

As the sun rises, Gustav Adolf runs off with Erik, one of the household servants, and a loaded pistol to Midsummer Green. There, he finds Etienne and a younger Walloon, who appears to be a servant of his or someone important at the steelworks.

Katia looks from behind a linden, as both duelists take their steps apart, and soon they are aiming at each other with their loaded guns. She still looks on as two gunshots are heard, scaring the crows off their nests and the rabbits away, and, a second later, she sees Etienne unscathed and Gustav Adolf reeling, bleeding and clutching his left thigh where it joins the hip. The Walloon reaches out to his brother-in-law and offers him to lean against him. Carrying a half-conscious lieutenant leaning by his side, Etienne meets Katia and tells them that he never intended to kill Gustav Adolf, whom he knows and loves since the Ringstetten heir was a child. Moreover, the soldier stationed in next shire is an old surgeon with battlefield experience from the Polish Wars, and Etienne takes his brother-in-law there for this surgeon to tend to his wounds. A draught of brandy and a bullet removal later, everyone is reconciled.
The Sidhe disenchants Birgitta and returns to her usual form, promising that she'll get revenge on the Ringstettens for losing her beau.
Pretty soon, in a modest church by Lake Vänern, merry bells are pealing over treetops and rooftops. Gustav Adolf and Katia are now husband and wife, and soon they will be count and countess!
During the wedding celebrations, the Veiled Singer reveals herself as Ilse and reconciles herself with her family. The old Count and Countess give her the right to roam free with her new loved ones, but she is welcomed, with her spouse and their three children, to the Ringstetten shire whenever she pleases.
And Gustav Adolf concludes, after the wedding fête, the ostensibly finished story of Frey:
"Years went by, elves always young and good-looking, Elfland always friendly and inviting. Then, suddenly, came the great battle of Ragnarök, the confrontation that would put an end to many worlds, including Elfland itself. And Lord Frey was merely armed with a stag's antler, helpless, against a powerful enemy.
The leader of the invading host was Surt, made of fire, the primeval ancestor of all the giants and trolls of Jotunheim. Surt, chaos incarnate, a blade of flaming steel in his right hand, 
It didn't take long for Frey to recognize his own sword, the sacred rapier Lävatein. Though that was the last instant of his existance: no sooner had a flash of regret crossed his mind that the fair lord fell, a blade of fire run through his chest into his throbbing heart.
Thus, Frey was slain with his own sword, the one he had given up for love's sake.
At the same time, the enemy fell as well, Surt's left eye pierced by the antler that Frey had thrust into it as he had lunged forward... to get run through with flaming steel.
The good lord and the devastator had, thus, slain each other at unison.
Subsequently, the land of the elves was completely devastated with fire and sword risen from the vengeful ranks of Surt, and a widowed Gerd and her little son Fjölner were slain, along with most of the fair folk of Elfland: those who didn't make it to the Middle-land (or Earth)."
Like Frey, the former Carolean sees himself as one not afraid of death or dishonour after having left the military profession to contrive to marry his intellectual equal.
Peace seems to have returned to the nation, and to the Northern world at large. The Walloons have, once more, made up with the Ringstettens. King Charles XII dies young and childless, during the siege of Fredrikshald, "a petty fortress", shot in the nape of the neck at night by "an unknown hand", still unclear if of friend or foe, on the 30th of November 1718. General Rehnskiöld, released from captivity, rejoined the Swedish Army and witnessed the death of his liege lord. Aurora von Königsmarck, in her ancestral seat, has died peacefully in her sleep, having accidentally pricked herself with a brooch, which may have been poisoned. And Parliament has been reinstated in Sweden.
Gustav Adolf, now done with his military career and resting on his laurels, is made aware of it all and reflects on the effects of all of these changes. What are great people but mortals, and aren’t empires condemned to decadence? How will the world, or at least the province, remember his legacy?
Three decades after that, two more rune stones stand next to each other, beside Liselotte's, on the road to church, and Katia and her spouse are rulers of the peaceful shire. Etienne, now widowed and elderly, having handed over the steel mill to his eldest son, lives in the hall with them, and he is the children's tutor. The foreign countess has given birth to seven children, of which only the youngest three have survived their first year as punishment from the Sidhe: twin boys, both blond and amber-eyed, and a slightly younger platinum blond and blue-eyed little girl. But... has the Sidhe really forgotten her oath of revenge and decided to put daring Krister, curious Kristian, and self-indulgent Ulrika to the test?