The Lost Boy | ONC 2024

3 - Trolls

I woke up startled by Tom's gentle hand on my shoulder, and when I opened my eyes I saw him placing a finger to his lips and directing his eyes towards the door. I nodded and quietly got up from the bed. Something was clearly outside and I reached for my two shortswords on the floor as quietly as I could while Tom moved to peek through the wooden boards we'd placed over the windows the night before.

Frank was on high alert, sitting on a top shelf and peeking out between jars of flour and sugar, and I motioned him to stay put and hide if he had to. The tiny beast instantly crawled backwards until the only part showing was his tiny nose with those big nostrils moving as he was sniffing the air.

I looked at Tom with a raised eyebrow, but he shook his head stating he couldn't spot anything from that angle. With a frown on my face I pulled my loose linen shirt over my head and took a few steps towards the door. It would be impossible for most to hear my light elven footsteps, but we really had no idea who was out there.

I leaned closer to the door and found a crack to peer through, but it was pitch black outside, and even I had trouble seeing anything through that small gap. Instead I closed my eyes and focused on my hearing, trying to distinguish foreign sounds from the rustling leaves and the howling wind.

It took me a while, and I had to focus hard, but suddenly I could hear it - the distinct sound of someone breathing. I turned my head to locate where it came from, and to my surprise it sounded as if it was walking away from the building. I turned to motion Tom closer.

As soon as the dwarf was next to me I placed my lips close to his ear and whispered low, "I can hear something breathing out there, but it's moving towards the village centre."

He gave me a nod, he knew better than to open his mouth in these situations. My voice was soft and would be harder for them to notice, while his was raspy and strong and even if he whispered it would be easy to detect it.

It was funny how different we both were. I was tall and lean, he was short and stubby. His short cut hair was a thick brown, and so was his long beard and his eyes had almost an orange tint to them. I on the other hand looked like most elves, pale skin, blue eyes and white long hair. We were the complete opposites of one another, and people often joked about that.

There was no use trying to open the door, we were going to stay put and wait. Goblins were usually quite noisy so I had already scratched that option. It could be a bear or a wolf just taking a stroll through the village in search of food, but something about Frank's reaction told me otherwise. A dragon, no matter it's size, would never be scared of a wolf or a bear. If you have both wings and sharp teeth a four legged animal like that was no match for even a tiny baby like him. So what could it be then? The breathing told me it wasn't a ghoul or a ghost. It was clearly a humanoid.

I watched Tom relax slightly. We had waited for several minutes by now and whatever it was out there it seemed like it wasn't coming back. I let out a long breath and moved away from the door. We had a few more hours until daybreak and we should use that time to rest. Looking at Tom I knew that neither of us were going to relax enough to fall back to sleep now, but he had clearly been awake long before me.

"Get some rest," I whispered, "I'll keep watch." Surprisingly he agreed and walked over to his bed and pulled the blanket all the way up to his neck and within seconds he was fast asleep.

Before taking my position by the window closest to the front door, I decided to check on Frank. I moved one of the cans to find him shivering against the wall. My heart started to beat faster as I noticed the fear in his eyes. This was not normal behaviour and I was immediately concerned. I reached out to him and he immediately jumped into the palm of my hand. I scratched his head in an attempt to calm him, but he kept his eyes focused on the roof. My eyes travelled upwards, my ears searching to detect any sound, but I couldn't sense anything. I frowned and peered over at Tom, was this enough of a concern to wake him? I decided it wasn't and placed the small dragon on my shoulder and he instantly made himself comfortable, using my messy bed hair as a hiding place.

I found a good spot on the windowsill where there was a big enough space between the weathered planks to keep an eye on the outside activities. But for now everything was calm and peaceful. I rested my head against the wall, patted Frank's scaly back and let my heart slow down again. Whatever was out there, it had no idea that we were inside, or it didn't care. Eventually I struggled to stay awake, and when morning came I was brutally awakened by Tom's patronising chuckle.

"Remind me to never let ya keep watch again," he muttered and placed a pot of water in front of Frank's nose. "May we have a hot cuppa this morning o' mighty wee dragon?" he said with that sarcastic tone he had come to use when speaking to our tiny companion.

Frank looked as if he was going to refuse, but the thought of drinking something hot had me adding a pleading "please?" and the dragon reluctantly used his fiery breath to heat up the water for us.

"We should move out in a jiffy," Tom huffed. "This place is worse than tha' haunted house in Port Jev."

"I agree," I sighed and placed some tea leaves in the hot water before searching my bag for some bread. "But whatever was out there might still be watching, Frank kept peering at the roof," I added, "so we should be careful moving out."

Tom nodded, "guess he's not completely useless," he chuckled and winked at the dragon.

After breakfast we moved out, almost disappointed that there was nothing unusual outside. No traces of movement, no tracks. Nothing. And that made us feel even more uncomfortable, because all three of us had clearly felt the presence of something during the night.

"Breathing ghosts," I muttered as we had left the village far behind us. "That's a new one."

"Who knows wha' those villagers went through, maybe tha spirits of those poor sods lingers there to guard their homes."

I rubbed my arms, covered in goosebumps and peered behind me. "Let's focus on what's ahead and be happy nothing bad happened to us. From now on we won't stay in abandoned creepy villages."

"Aye to that, lad. We would be foolish not to learn from our mistakes," he chuckled.

Our moods rose with the sun, and when noon approached we were cracking jokes as usual, forgetting everything of the night's horrors. We had a boy to find, and we had moved quite far during the last couple of hours. Spurred with the notion of moving as far as we could from that village by nightfall.

The open fields turned into sparsely growing trees, lush landscapes untouched by man. The goblin-forest kept taunting us to our right, but those drooling monsters didn't feel as frightening anymore. You could hear them from a mile away and they never cared to sneak or hide when approaching a victim.

My thoughts were interrupted when Tom grabbed my arm, "eye laddie, that's a troll if I'm not mistaken."

I followed his gaze to a big boulder, the size of three houses spreading out in front of us. "Probably," I agreed. "Let's take a detour around it and be careful not to wake it." We moved forward in silence, and the closer we got we could feel the rumbling in the ground from its heavy snores. It was a good sign. "If the ground stops shaking, run the fastest you can," I whispered to my companion and I could see his eyes widen. His short legs would be no match for a big troll like that.

"Ya said they're peaceful and just want ta be left alone," he muttered and kept a close eye on the moss covered rock.

"Yes, so that's what we are doing," I snickered and grabbed his arm to pull him further away from the sleeping troll.

The rest of the day we were zigzagging between sleeping trolls, some small as a barrel, some big as a castle. We were clearly in troll territory, there was no doubt about it. I was delighted to see that my studying in school was put to good use for once. The history books were correct. If you left the trolls alone, they would keep sleeping and we were nothing more than a passing maggot to them, and I desperately needed things to stay that way.

"So, where are we going next?" Tom asked as we passed the final boulder and entered a grove filled with tall flowers, colourful butterflies and dancing pixies.

"Can't you tell?" I snickered. "The enchanted forest."