… only to hear an ominous booming noise coming from somewhere higher up the stone stairwell.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
The guard-trolls swapped confused glances. What was this?
The great booms became louder and faster before suddenly seven large wooden barrels came tumbling out of the upper reaches of the stairwell at speed, rampaging down the steps, careening off the spiraling walls.
The first barrel slammed into the first troll with frightening force and swept him clean off his feet, hurling the big troll backward before bouncing further down the stairs, past the other shocked guards.
The guards managed to dodge and duck the rain of heavy barrels that followed, but not without injury. The tumbling rush of barrels crashed and careered past them, bouncing down the stairs into the darkness below.
The guards pressed on upward and entered the watchtower with their hammers raised …
… only to find it empty.
No thief. No wise old troll either.
The guards rushed down to the battlement to ask the six guards there if the fugitives had come down that way, only to be told that they had not.
The guard-trolls looked at each other, bamboozled.
*
In the meantime, some of the other trolls had headed for the door leading back down to the Great Hall, only to find it closed and barricaded from the other side.
The Troll King, on his winter throne, looked about in confusion and rage.
*
At the base of the stairwell hidden inside the north-western column of the Winter Throne Hall, the last of the seven barrels thrown from the watchtower bounced to a halt.
Its lid was kicked open from within, and out of it, wrapped in a padding of cloth and hay, popped Raf.
The barrel beside him wobbled and Raf heard a muffled shout from inside it. He ripped off its lid and pulled out Vilnar.
“This way,” Raf said grimly, pulling Vilnar by the hand.
As they dashed for the door, Raf pulled one of Ko’s bulbous flint-tipped arrows from a clip on the side of the crossbow and struck it against the stone wall, igniting it in a flash of flame.
*
Raf and Vilnar emerged from the north-western column at a run. The trolls near the king’s throne saw them immediately and took off in pursuit.
But, just before he raced out into the rainstorm, Raf dashed past the small green barrel set up beside the great column—and as he did so, without missing a step, he touched his flaming arrowhead to the barrel’s candlewick.
The wick ignited like a fuse …
Raf saw the trolls massing over by the stopped-up exit to the Winter Throne Hall—and figured that Düm had been there, too—and in that same moment, he also realized that Ko had even suggested his escape route.
“We can’t get down!” Vilnar yelled.
“Yes we can!”
Chased by the horde of trolls, Raf bolted for the western side of the Winter Throne Hall. No rail protected its edge. Mountains loomed beyond it, veiled in rain. Empty air fell away before him and Vilnar.
“Grab hold of me!” Raf yelled as they came to the edge.
Vilnar gripped his waist while Raf pulled out his crossbow and, at the very moment that the sizzling fuse on the firepowder barrel beside the north-western column burned down to its base and the little barrel exploded violently—obliterating the column, transforming it in a single shattering instant into a cloud of stone dust—Raf launched the two of them off the edge of the mountaintop!
*
As Raf and Vilnar leaped off the western edge of the Winter Throne Hall, a shocking scene occurred behind them.
The blast of the firepowder barrel had completely destroyed the north-western column, thus causing the entire roof of the Winter Throne Hall and the whole summit of the mountain above it to come crashing down on the rear half of the open-air space.
With a momentous boom, the mountain’s summit slammed down onto the Winter Throne Hall and toppled clear off its rear northern edge, where it fell for two thousand feet before splashing into the dam-lake that curled around the rear of Troll Mountain, sending a stupendous gout of white water spraying into the air.
The rearward angle of the summit’s fall meant that none of the two hundred trolls trying to flee the open-air hall were killed or even hurt, but those few guards who were still inside the summit screamed all the way down.
Chapter 25
While this was happening, Raf slid down the rain-slicked surface of the upper western flank of Troll Mountain, bouncing on his backside with Vilnar still clinging to him.
After about a hundred feet of sliding, they sailed off a second brink and, for a moment, found themselves two thousand dizzying feet above the stakes at the bottom of the mountain’s vertical western face—the same stakes that lay beneath the triangular prison cells cut into that flank.
As he and Vilnar flew out into thin air, Raf reached out with his crossbow and hooked it around the roof of the small shack that housed the elevator mechanism servicing the cells.
The crossbow snagged the edge of the roof …
… and Raf and Vilnar suddenly swung inward and landed in an ungainly heap on the wooden platform directly underneath the shack—the platform with the hole in its floor through which the elevator was raised and lowered.
Dazed, Raf shook his head and looked up to see the huge shadow of a troll standing right in front of him!
Before Raf could move, the troll had lifted him bodily into the air, gripping him firmly in its massive hands, drawing him up to its huge gray face.
A face that Raf recognized.
It was Düm.
*
“Master Raf, you are crazy human, but you smart, you figure out Master Ko’s plan. Düm hope you pleased with Düm’s efforts. It very hard for Düm to remember all of Master Ko’s instructions.”
“You’ve been great, Düm,” Raf said. “Thank you.”
It was then that Raf noticed Graia standing behind the troll. “You must be Graia.”
“I am. And I am coming with you.”
“I’m pleased to hear it,” Raf said. He could hear the loud banging of the trolls trying to break down the upper door that Düm had barricaded.
“We’re not out of this yet. We have an old man to rescue and then we have to run as fast as we can. Düm, the wheel, please.”
*
Within minutes, with Düm turning the great cogwheel that raised and lowered the elevator and Raf standing on the elevator itself, they found Ko in his cliff-side cell.
The old man was very pleased to see Raf. He stepped onto the elevator.
“You listen well, my young friend,” Ko said as Düm raised them up. “And I am most glad you came back for me on your way out.”
“You did ask me to,” Raf said. “Although did you really expect me to beat the trolls’ champion in single combat?”
Ko shrugged. “I told you before: a quest would not be a quest if it were easy. Either you beat their champion or you failed in your mission—”
Pained cries interrupted him.
The other prisoners—most of them starving Southmen and Southwomen—had seen them on the elevator and were desperately begging to be rescued, too.
Raf was momentarily taken aback.
Apart from his spontaneous decision to free Vilnar, he hadn’t thought of rescuing anyone else. He had come to Troll Mountain for the Elixir and he had only stopped here to grab Ko on the way out.
Then another voice called, “Raf! Raf!”
Raf turned.
It was Bader. He was standing with his legs astride his inverted triangular hole, peering up and out at Raf.
“Take me with you,” Bader croaked. “Please.”
Raf stared at him, at this pale imitation of the formerly haughty prince.
“I have the Elixir, Bader.” He indicated the pouch hanging from his hip. “I can save our tribe.”
“Please take me with you, Raf
.”
And in Bader’s desperation, Raf saw something. Bader was just as desperate to live as the Southmen prisoners were.
In that moment, Raf knew that whether they be Northmen or Southmen, they were all the same, they were all people, and if he saved one of these captives now, he had to save them all.
“People, listen to me! If you want to flee this place, get on this contraption now! This is your one and only chance of escape!”
And so, hauled up by the mighty exertions of Düm, the great escape from the cliff-side cells of the trolls began.
It took four trips to release all fifteen prisoners—first Ko and Bader plus one other man; then all of the others in groups of four.
Raf would greet each load of prisoners at the elevator platform and send them on their way with the words, “Go! Don’t look back!”
Bader had not needed a second invitation. He stole away immediately, dashing inside the mountain while Raf stayed at the elevator platform to release the other captives.
The bangs of the trolls on the upper stone door continued and just as Raf helped the last prisoner—a young woman from the Southmen tribe—from the elevator, he heard a great rending crack and then troll voices shouting angrily.
“They’ve broken through Düm’s barricade,” he said to Ko. “We have to go!”
Chapter 26
Running at the rear of the group of fleeing captives, Raf, Ko, Vilnar, Düm, and Graia dashed back down to the Great Hall of the Mountain King.
The noise of the trolls rampaging down the stairways and tunnels behind them rang in their ears.
It was now a race to get out.
Hurrying last of all, Raf came to the top of the spiral stairs circling the outer flank of one of the pillars of the Great Hall. Looking behind him, he saw the shadows of the pursuing trolls coming around the corner of the tunnel, heard the thunder of their footsteps.
As he started down the stairs, emerging near the ceiling of the Great Hall, he touched his waist to check that he still had the pouch containing the Elixir—
He felt no pouch.
Raf looked at his waist.
The pouch was gone.
“What in the name of—” Had he dropped it? Had—
“Raf! Hurry!” Ko called back.
“I’ve lost the Elix—”
And then Raf saw him.
He looked out across the hall just in time to see Bader dash out through the huge main doorway.
Gripped tightly in Bader’s hand was Raf’s pouch.
*
Raf’s eyes almost popped out of his head.
Bader! He must have lifted it from my belt when I was busy freeing the other captives.
His anger was short-lived, for just then, with a terrifying bellow, the first furious troll appeared at the top of the spiral stairs only ten steps away from Raf.
Raf flew down the stone stairs—leaping down them three at a time as the upper reaches of the spiraling stairway filled with more and more trolls.
Having broken through the barricaded door up top, now the full horde of two hundred angry trolls flooded down all four of the stair-ringed pillars of the Great Hall!
It was a fearsome and spectacular sight: the mass of trolls looked like a swarm of ants streaming down the four spiraling staircases, trying to head off the fleeing captives, especially the one they thought was stealing their Elixir.
The Southmen captives raced out the main door after Bader but well behind him. They burst out into the stormy night and hurried down the steep royal staircase, heading for the Main Gate at its base. The door and staircase which had once been reserved for troll royalty were now being used as the main route of escape by the fleeing captives.
Raf hit the floor of the hall at a run and saw that all four pillars were now teeming with trolls. He joined Ko at the main door as Düm, Graia, and Vilnar ran out into the rainstorm, heading down the royal stairway.
“Raf!” Ko called. “The barrels! Shoot the barrels!”
Raf turned and saw them: Ko’s three other firepowder barrels arrayed around the Great Hall, at the bases of three of the four pillars, the same barrels he had seen Düm placing earlier.
But then, in a fleeting instant, another thought struck Raf: something bigger than his own escape or that of the other prisoners.
To Ko’s surprise, Raf took off, running back into the Great Hall of the Mountain King, but off to the right, to the eastern side, heading for the nearest pillar on that side.
“What are you doing!” Ko called. “Use the flaming arrows to ignite the barrels!”
“Go!” Raf yelled back. “Get out of here!”
“But Raf—”
“Remember your own lesson: to bring down a four-legged creature, I only need to disable two of its legs. Now go!”
Ko just shook his head and raced out the main door, leaving Raf to his madness.
*
As he ran, Raf extracted a flaming arrowhead, struck it against the floor, igniting it, and notched it in his crossbow.
Then with the ranks of trolls streaming down toward him, he fired the flaming arrow diagonally across the width of the hall.
The arrow streaked across the wide interior space and slammed into the green barrel at the base of the north-western pillar, penetrating it with its flaming head.
The barrel exploded.
A moment later, the immense pillar, cracked at its base, toppled. All the trolls on it fell every which way, flung clear.
The mountain trembled.
But the hall was still intact.
Raf reached the pillar he had been running toward—the south-eastern one—and scooped up the small firepowder barrel at its base.
The trolls on this pillar, led by the king and Prince Turv, were almost down its stairs, practically right on top of Raf.
Ignoring their pounding footfalls and their furious roars, Raf calmly armed his crossbow with another flaming arrowhead, leveled the crossbow at the opposite pillar—the south-western one—and fired.
Again, the arrow streaked across the hall and lodged in the barrel just as the first troll leaped off that pillar’s stairway and started running across the hall toward Raf.
The barrel exploded.
With a great rending crash, that pillar crumbled, too, sending trolls sailing off it, tumbling to the floor.
And now the ceiling of the Great Hall began to crack. Enormous chunks of stone began to drop down from it. With two of its supporting pillars now crippled, the weight of the ceiling could no longer be upheld.
And as Raf raced out the door in the eastern wall with the barrel under his arm and dashed down the dragging ramp there, the magnificent ceiling of the Great Hall of the Mountain King came crashing down on the mass of trolls, crushing them in a thunderous and devastating avalanche of stone.
The Hall of the Mountain King was no more.
*
But it wasn’t over yet.
Troll Mountain itself was collapsing.
With the hall at its heart imploding, the entire mountain now began to fall.
For Raf’s arrow shots had not been random: since he had destroyed the pillars on the western side of the hall, the mountain now toppled in that direction.
Backlit by lightning and veiled by rain, with a great crashing noise, the top half of Troll Mountain—having already lost its summit—tilted westward, breaking away from its base, folding at the waist like a slow-falling tree. As the mountain crumbled, it turned boulders to dust and sent a great cloud of that dust billowing outward.
The whole great mountain then disappeared inside its own dust cloud as it smashed down against the nearest mountain to the west.
Ko, Vilnar, Düm, and Graia only barely managed to outrun the toppling peak. As it fell westward, it took the top half of the royal staircase with it, but fortunately for them, they had just hurried past the point where the staircase was violently ripped away.
It was likewise for Raf.
Safe on the eastern flank of the mounta
in, with the last little green barrel held under his arm, he just watched the great mountain peak break off from its base and fall away from him.
He found himself at the top of the dragging ramp, near a couple of stone sleds.
It was raining so hard that a small stream of water now flowed down the path as if it were a broad gutter.
Raf thought about using one of the sleds to slide down the sloping ramp, but figured he’d never be able to move one into position, so he just started running down the slick wet path.
He hadn’t taken twenty steps when a furious shout from behind made him spin.
The Troll King stood above him, covered head to toe in stone dust, his tusked face twisted with rage, his eyes red with fury.
“You!” he cried.
The pouring rain quickly mixed with the layer of dust on his huge body, turning it into streaking rivulets of mud that looked like grim war paint.
The king also spied the sleds and, one-handed, hurled one onto the dragging ramp. He leaped onto it, then pushed it hard so that it began to slide toward Raf down the rain-slicked stone path.
Raf saw two choices: be crushed under the weight of the heavy stone sled or dive off the outer edge of the path to avoid the sled and die that way.
The sled came rushing toward him, picking up speed. Through years of daily use, the dragging path was worn smooth. In this storm, with the added lubricant of the stream flowing down it, the path became a slick trench that could convey a sled at great speed.
The sled rushed toward Raf, aided by the water, but instead of going under it or diving clear of it, Raf did something else: he leaped up and onto the speeding sled—still gripping his green barrel—crashing into the Troll King and, thanks to the extra weight of the barrel, knocking the big troll onto his backside.
Now they were both on the sled and the sled was still speeding down the path.
Raf hauled himself off the Troll King, just in time to avoid a lashing blow from the angry troll.
Raf regathered his footing as the sled swept around the curve of the dragging path, rushing toward the Main Gate.
As it came round the base of the mountain—with the upper half of the mountain still collapsing and boulders bouncing down the mountainside and rain pouring and lightning flashing—Raf saw the end of the path come into view.
Troll Mountain Page 9
