How the Stalos were Tricked
How the Stalos were Tricked is a Lapp fairy tale collected by J. C. Poestion in Lapplandische Märchen. Andrew Lang included it in The Orange Fairy Book.
Synopsis
A boy saw a giant man in the woods, and his mother identified it as a Stalo, a man-eater.
Soon after, Patto's children began to vanish. One day, a boy told him how he had seen his youngest daughter caught in the Stalo's trap and drowned. Patto went to the trap and made it catch him without drowning him. The Stalo carried him off. Patto stole his ax, and when the Stalo sent his three sons to find it, they could not; the Stalo came himself, Patto cut his head off, and the three sons ran off, being frightened that their father's head had just come off for no reason.
They went to their mother, and stayed with her. Nearby lived two brothers Sodno and their sister Lyma. One day the Stalos carried off Lyma and their reindeer. Her brothers followed, and had Lyma stir ashes into the food so that the Stalos would tell her to throw it out, and she could bring it to them; they had not eaten for three days. After they had eaten, they told her that once the oldest Stalo fell asleep, she must pull off his iron mantle and heat it on the fire.
That night, they frightened the reindeer so that the Stalos thought they were fighting. The oldest one sent his two younger brothers to stop them, but the brothers Sodno killed them both. The oldest followed, and because his mantle was hot, he went out without it, and they killed him as well. The brothers dressed themselves as the younger ones, and told the mother they had forgotten where they had hid their treasure; she told them.
Lyma put her iron cane in the fire and told her that she had been talking to a Sodno. She jumped out of the bed and seized her cane to beat them to death, but it was so hot that she caught on fire.
The brothers took their sister, their reindeer, and the treasure, and went home.
