Dictatious squinted six beady eyes at Draal and said, “Is he supposed to look this odd?”
Ballustra moved to strike Dictatious. But Kanjigar held her back and said, “Dictatious, Blinky, you honor us as our son’s first visitors. Yet what makes this day so ‘accursed’? What brings those drums of war to our very threshold?”
Calming himself, Blinky said, “The Gumm-Gumms have invaded Trollmarket. Our Trollhunter, Gogun the Gentle, does his best to keep them at bay, but their numbers are legion!”
“And you’ve come here to hide?” asked Ballustra, her contempt apparent.
“No, not to hide. Only to inform Kanjigar that the Gumm-Gumms are sacking the scholars’ library as we speak,” Blinky said.
“But also to hide,” Dictatious added hastily.
“Then it seems we’ve been blessed with two more babies on this day,” said Ballustra.
She crossed to her worktable and picked up an iron crossbow loaded with crystalline arrows. As Ballustra adjusted its bowstring, Kanjigar placed a hand on her spiked shoulder.
“Wife, do not do this,” said Kanjigar. “Do not go out there.”
But Ballustra said, “It is my skill to make arms and my duty to take them up in battle. I am a Monger.”
“You are also a mother,” Kanjigar replied. “Right now, our son needs you more than our Trollmarket. To leave our cave is to welcome death.”
“Ah, but death needs no welcome,” growled a darker voice. “It goes wherever it pleases.”
Kanjigar felt Draal squirm in his arms, frightened by this new presence. Ballustra whirled around and aimed her weapon at the entrance to their home. Through the crossbow’s sights, she saw an enormous Gumm-Gumm filling the entirety of the doorway, his hulking body threaded with veins of pale blue energy, his single eye burning bright.
“Gunmar the Black!” Blinky exclaimed.
“Begone, Gumm-Gumm,” Kanjigar said bitterly. “We hold no quarrel with you.”
“Yet you hold something else of interest,” Gunmar snarled, black bile dripping from his jowls. “For I seek to add to our mighty ranks . . . with a recruitment drive.”
Kanjigar realized with horror that Gunmar now looked directly at young Draal, as if sizing him for a miniature set of Gumm-Gumm armor. The monstrous Troll stepped deeper into the cave and said, “Enlist your whelp in my army. Or he dies on the same day he was born.”
Ballustra tightened her finger around the crossbow’s trigger while Kanjigar tightened his grip around their son. Gunmar moved closer, only for Blinky to defiantly block his path and say, “Now hear this, foul one! None of us will ever serve you! Isn’t that right, brother?”
“Well . . .” Dictatious demurred from his hiding place behind Ballustra.
“You speak as though you have a choice,” Gunmar said, knocking aside Blinky.
The towering Gumm-Gumm’s right claw flexed, summoning pale strands of energy from his veins and molding them into the Decimaar Blade. Gunmar pointed his sword in Draal’s direction and growled, “Give me your offspring—NOW. With luck, he may survive the rigors of my training and become as fine a killer as my own heir.”
Kanjigar looked beyond Gunmar to see a second Gumm-Gumm darken his doorstep. This one was smaller, but his red eyes bore the same merciless glare. Still recovering on the floor, Blinky looked up and gasped, “Bular!”
Gunmar and Bular filled the cave with matching howls, making baby Draal cry. In response, Ballustra fired her arrow directly into Gunmar’s chest. The Gumm-Gumm general grunted in pain, then grunted again as he yanked the crystal bolt from his hide. Bular pulled twin swords from the scabbards across his back and stalked toward Kanjigar and Draal.
Kanjigar’s first thought was to shield his son from the oncoming beast. But the young Troll slipped out of his hands before he could even react. Bewildered, Kanjigar watched his son’s plump face screw into an angry pout and rocky spikes pop out of his back, just like Ballustra’s. Young Draal then grabbed his toes, tucked his little, naked body into a ball, and rolled headlong at Bular with incredible speed.
Caught off guard by the bizarre sight, Bular could only watch as the Troll tyke gave a tiny roar and crashed into him like a living boulder. The impact toppled Bular, sending his swords spinning in opposite directions. Kanjigar and the Galadrigals stood in stunned silence, until Blinky said, “I believe this means Draal’s first word was ‘RRRAAH!’ ”
Kanjigar reclaimed his son and looked over to Ballustra, who now fought off Gunmar’s Decimaar Blade with a matching pair of battle staves. Their weapons smashed and sparked against each other, until a grating, out-of-tune horn blew in the distance.
“It’s the Gumm-Gumms—they’re sounding their retreat!” Dictatious said.
“Gogun must have turned the tides!” cheered Blinky.
Bular retrieved his swords, while Gunmar readied the Decimaar Blade for a final slash. But the horn blared again, far more urgently this time, followed by a stampede of hundreds of Gumm-Gumms away from Glastonbury Tor Trollmarket. Gunmar kept his one eye fixed on the family of three, even as he vanished his Decimaar Blade in a cloud of brimstone.
“You will serve me,” Gunmar said to the infant Draal. “One day . . .”
Ballustra and Kanjigar tensed their bodies, ready for another violent attack. But Gunmar gave a low, decisive snort to Bular. The two Gumm-Gumms backed out of the cave just as quickly as they had trespassed into it.
Once the last blast of the horn faded in the distance, signaling a full withdrawal, Ballustra tossed aside the staves and took Draal back into her arms. She cradled him so close to her own body, she could feel his small heart beat against her own. Kanjigar looked at what was left of their meager belongings. He saw the broken crib and toys he’d built in anticipation of Draal’s arrival, now crushed from when Bular had been bowled into them.
“You have our thanks, Kanjigar, for offering us safe haven,” said Blinky. “And you, Ballustra, for defending us so vigorously.”
“It’s Draal who deserves your thanks, not I,” said Ballustra, hoisting her boy in the air like a hero. “Not an hour out of his Birthstone and already felling grown Gumm-Gumms!”
“Hear, hear!” Dictatious called. “To Draal!”
“To Draal!” echoed Blinky.
Kanjigar was the only one to not repeat the words. For the sublime happiness he’d enjoyed upon his son’s birth was now replaced by the sharp pang of a new paternal feeling—worry.
“To Draal the Deadly,” said Ballustra. “The greatest warrior Trollkind shall ever know!”
Continue Reading…
The Way of the Wizard
Richard Ashley Hamilton
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
RICHARD ASHLEY HAMILTON is best known for his storytelling across DreamWorks Animation’s How to Train Your Dragon franchise, having written for the Emmy-nominated DreamWorks Dragons: Race to the Edge on Netflix and the official DreamWorks Dragons expanded universe bible. In his heart, Richard remains a lifelong comic book fan and has written and developed numerous titles, including Trollhunters: The Secret History of Trollkind (with Marc Guggenheim) for Dark Horse Comics and his original series Scoop for Insight Editions. Richard lives in Silver Lake, California, with his wife and their two sons.
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DreamWorks Trollhunters © 2018 DreamWorks Animation LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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ISBN 978-1-5344-2862-1 (hc)
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Angor Reborn Page 9
