Sorry about the delay...life intervenes.
Old Nilas is still searching for his son, and has enlisted the help of 3 mysterious sisters.
Chapter 4
Niklas had never seen a dogsled move so fast. They ran all the way to where the wood meets the sea. As evening fell, they entered the dooryard of another hut, and here too was an old woman drawing water from the well with her nose.
“Good evening, Mother!” said Niklas. The woman looked up with suspicion, “Who is calling me Mother after so very many years?” Then she recognized the dogsled, and asked, “You have come from my sister? Why does she send you here?” Niklas explained his plight as the two fed and watered the dogs and got them settled down for the night.
“I don’t get visitors here as I live so near the edge of the world, but I am ruler over all the fish in the sea. Perhaps one of them knows him.” And with that she drew out a small pipe and played such a delightful tune that very soon the sea was a-boil with all the swimming creatures. But none of them had heard of Father Weatherbye.
“Ah, well,” said the old woman, “there is one sister of us left. Tomorrow after a good rest you must go to her. But her home is six hundred miles from here! Not even my sister’s dogs can travel that far in one day. You must take my horse.