Immortal and the Island of Impossible Things (The Immortal Series Book 4)

by Gene Doucette

  I found Unfer on the floor on the other side of the table. He was looking for his sword.

  “I struck a killing blow, Beuvulth. Did you see?”

  “I saw. Yet it didn’t kill him. Most killing blows meet that standard. Do you want some help?”

  “I drew blood, though, I saw it. The beast is not invincible. I need my sword.”

  “Not invincible but very, very large. You’ve lost four men already, and I believe your killing blow shattered your sword. Here is the end of it.” I kicked the haft of his sword in his direction.

  “Then tell me what it is, and give me yours, so I can go end this!”

  “It’s a troll, my friend. And you should stay down.”

  * * *

  Trolls are basically gigantic people. That’s an over-simplification, but it’s about right. They’re the things legends are usually talking about when they’re describing giants.

  Your average troll is about 60% chest and arms. They have short, thick legs, which makes them terrible runners but excellent close-combat fighters, and they’re great if you want a bunch of heavy somethings lifted. I’m told two of them helped move Stonehenge to its current location, and while I didn’t see any trolls in Egypt I had to leave town before they began work on the great pyramids. I wouldn’t put it past Khufu to have employed at least one.

  My first-hand experience with them came way back before the pyramids and before Stonehenge, and… well, before everything else, too. For a short time, we had one in our tribe. He helped us hunt mammoths.

  Before science proved me wrong about this, I would have said trolls were humans, only they were the megafauna versions. Back when most of the game we hunted—and most of the animals hunting us—were enormous, trolls made perfect sense. I think we found one as a baby and raised him as one of us, and that was how we ended up with a troll in our tribe, but my memory is a little shaky here, and it’s hard to be positive how much is recollection and how much is just something that sounds like it probably makes sense. In this case, I also just described The Jungle Book, and the beginning of the movie Elf, so it’s hard to be sure how accurate it really is.

  What I do remember is how we employed our troll, once he came of age. He couldn’t run with us, so he couldn’t chase down game like we did. But we could drive our prey in a particular direction, with said direction being advantageous to us in some way. A lot of times, this was toward a wall (so they would be cornered) or toward a cliff face (so they would fall to their death.) With a troll, we could drive them toward him, and he could punch them very hard until they fell over.

  Honestly, there are maybe only one or two things in the world that are cooler than watching a troll drop a wooly mammoth with a roundhouse punch.

  If you asked me, back in the seventh century, if trolls were still around, I’d have said no, which was why when embarking on this little adventure to de-monster king Hroar’s mead hall, troll wasn’t on my mental list of possible creatures.

  * * *

  I jumped up on the table, which put me approximately eye-level with the troll.

  “Ho, monster,” I said. “We speak, now.”

  “What are you doing?” Unfer asked, from behind the table.

  “What does it sound like?” I asked him. “I’m starting a conversation.”

  “Monster?” It was the troll who spoke. His voice was a thunderstorm. “You are monster.”

  “It speaks!” Unfer muttered.

  “I am Beuvulth, the thane.”

  I wasn’t a thane, but that was how Unfer knew me, for the most part. I’ve always found it easier to claim lineage with a local tribe when I could, especially when the claim couldn’t be validated independently. I still do this sometimes, only instead of identifying as a thane I call myself a Canadian. Nobody bothers Canadians.

  “What shall I call you, besides monster?” I asked.

  “Beuvulth the thane… I am Gren the… I am Gren.”

  “Gren, it is my honor to speak with you. Do you not know what you are?”

  “I am Gren.”

  “Yes, so you said.”

  He grunted.

  “Come closer with that pointed metal, and I will show you what I am,” he said.

  “I think we’ve had enough of that for now, do you agree?”

  “It is never enough for you small monsters. Gren is ready.”

  One of the warriors in the room was agitating for a renewed assault. I could see him creeping forward, to the right of Gren.

  The man seemed to think he was catching Gren unawares. The troll took a step forward and into better lighting, ostensibly to look me in the eye. The truth was, the forward position improved his range of movement for the attack about to commence. And he saw that I knew this as well.

  “Gren is ready,” he repeated.

  I looked at the warrior to Gren’s right, and shook him off wordlessly. I would have called him by name, but I wasn’t paying attention when we did the introductions. It’s all I can do to recall the ones I already know, including whichever name I’m using at the moment.

  The man lowered his sword and stepped back.

  “I mean no treachery,” I said to the troll.

  He remained at the ready—knees bent, hands curled into fists, head forward—until I realized he was not ignorant of the fact that I still had a sword in my hand. To that end, if I were to launch myself from the table and bring the tip of the sword forward, I might have had an opportunity to spear him in the eyeball. I’d say the odds of success were approximately equal the odds of failure. Risky, certainly, but it was still the best attack at our disposal.

  I knelt down and put the sword on the table instead, then stood again. Gren relaxed a little.

  “I am not a thane,” Gren said, after a lengthy silence.

  “I can see that.”

  “You ask if I know what I am. I am not a thane.”

  “But what are you?”

  “I am Gren. What does the thane care what Gren calls himself?”

  “I ask because I have traveled great distances to arrive on this table. I came because I know what Gren is, and I know how to kill Gren.”

  Gren roared, which was terrifying, but he didn’t do a lot else.

  I wasn’t attacking, which put him at a disadvantage. Trolls are really good at defending themselves—and castles, and bridges, and so on—but less dangerous on offense. Gren might not have known what he was, but he had good instincts about his combat strength.

  “Well then! Come at me!”

  “I tell you this only as a warning. I know what Gren is, and so I know Gren’s weakness.”

  “Show me! We will see how well you know what it is you think you know.”

  “But I do not wish to kill Gren.”

  From beneath the table, whispering, Unfer said, “Tell me his weakness and I will do the killing, Beuvulth.”

  I ignored him.

  “Then you lie, Beuvulth the thane,” the troll said.

  “It could be so, Gren the Gren. If I prove wrong, it will surely mean my death. But I am not wrong, and in not being wrong, my proof would be your death. Do you truly wish to see my proof?”

  He looked uncertain.

  Most trolls I’ve seen have large wide foreheads and doorknob-sized noses, which combine to make their smallish eyes nearly invisible. They’re so sunken, it’s easy to mistake them for a single eye, as was the case with the Cyclops in the Odyssey. (I knew Homer—or, more precisely, I knew one of the Homers, as there were several—and this was my biggest complaint.) It made their expressions hard to read, although the long cheeks and wide mouths betrayed a great deal. As much as it could be said that trolls can think and reason, this one was doing that.

  “How is it you came about this knowledge you claim to have?” he asked.

  “I know of all the beasts, for I have slain all the beasts: the great hunting cats and the mammoth horned monsters, dragons, demons and men, and more. All great strengths hide great weaknesses, in all things, even in G
ren. You would know my name, and fear it, but that none who have faced me have lived to speak it.”

  This was mostly all true. Eighty percent, let’s say.

  “Yet you would not kill me.”

  “I would not. I would ask you to leave this place and not return.”

  “Why would you do this?”

  “For the very reasons we have already discussed. If none live to hear my name, I must undergo this speech on each occasion, and it is tiresome. I no longer wish to rid the world of the great and fearsome beasts, for there are so few of you remaining. You must recognize this yourself. Do you know of another Gren?”

  “My mother, but she is not Gren.”

  “She is the same as Gren, though, as I am both a thane and a man.”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know of any other?”

  “No.”

  “That is because so many have been slain.”

  “By you?”

  “Or men acting for me.”

  “Then tell me my weakness.”

  “But why would I do that, Gren the Gren?”

  “So I can tell you if you are correct or not.”

  “This is a mistake on your part, Gren, for you do not believe you have any weakness, and so no matter what I say next, you would laugh and insist I am incorrect, and then we would fight and you would die.”

  “I should know my own weakness!” he shouted. It sent a wave of bad breath in my direction to accompany the body odor that was still making my eyes tear.

  “But knowing will not make it any different,” I said.

  He looked lost.

  “You say you can kill me but offer no proof,” he said. “You ask that I leave here and never return on your word that you know how to slay me elsewise. How do you expect me to accept this?”

  “You are much shrewder than any I have met, Gren,” I lied. “None have taken my word before, and so none have lived.”

  Gren roared in frustration. Aescher, halfway across the room and standing only thanks to a stubborn refusal to accept that he had broken ribs, appeared ready to attack. I knew of two other men in my sightlines with the same idea, and no doubt Unfer was eyeing my sword and thinking the same thing.

  “If I leave, and never return, how am I to know these men will not come find me?”

  “They want only for you to leave. If you never return we will swear to all that you have been slain and none who are not in this hall will look for you.”

  “I am safe here, why would I leave?”

  “But why did you come at all?”

  “I heard…” he began, before the words got caught in his throat, and I realized Gren was on the verge of tears.

  It was only at this point I realized something that should have occurred sooner: Gren was not an adult troll.

  It was difficult to get the full measure of his physical dimensions inside the mead hall, but it was clear he could stand upright near the corner, which would have been difficult for an adult troll insofar as the roof was sloped. He mentioned his mother, too, which should perhaps have been a hint.

  “You heard carousing,” I said. “And you came to see.”

  “Gren was attacked by the small monsters. They still attack me, Beuvulth the thane. I am safer here.”

  “And I tell you, Gren, you cannot stay. Were I not now to kill you, there would still be more men coming, and one day you would fall. If you wish to live, you will have to do so in whatever cavern or forest you call home, or not at all.”

  He thought about it, while I held my breath and hoped nobody screwed this up by launching a knife at him or something.

  “In truth, Beuvulth the thane, I tire of eating your dead each night. I much prefer goat and night-bird. If you secure my passage to the trees, I will permit you to not kill me.”

  “I will lead you out myself, Gren of Gren.” I bent down and retrieved my sword. “And any who would interfere with your exit will have to do battle with me first.”

  * * *

  Nobody got in the way as I walked him out, nor did anyone attempt a rear assault, which was frankly a surprise.

  As soon as he reached the outside, I wished him well and turned around to bar the exit. This turned out to be a wise decision.

  “Stand aside, Beuvulth!” Unfer declared from halfway across the room. He was waving the end of his shattered sword around as if it was useful. “You’ve lured him out of the building; now we can finish him off!”

  “I will not.”

  “You are a madman and a coward,” Aescher declared. He was close enough to try pushing me aside. I popped him in the broken ribs with the flat of my hand, which brought him to his knees. Another man tried to rush past us as I was felling Aescher, so I had to spin quickly and sweep his legs out. Then I had my back to the doors again, and everyone held off.

  “Be reasonable, Beuvulth,” Unfer said. “That creature killed a dozen men.”

  “I know, and he ate a good portion of them while he was here.”

  “He will continue to terrorize this countryside unless we stop him, and now is the time to do that!”

  “If he terrorizes the land, it is your own fault for having nurtured his malice.”

  “How dare you…” gasped Aescher.

  “Unfer, you called me here for my experience, and I can now tell you that your monster is a troll. Trolls are not malicious by their nature. It is only because men attack without thinking that you face this mess at all. If one man had thought to speak to Gren when he came for this banquet, you would have made a valuable ally, rather than a terrible foe.”

  “But, now that he has been made enemy, we would be foolish not to strike at him with numbers on our side, in the open.”

  “Then you were not listening, for that was a young troll. The adults are much larger. All the trouble this one gave, do you believe his mother would be less difficult an opponent? I can only imagine what she might do to this land once you’ve murdered her son.”

  “But you know their weakness,” Unfer said, “and you can tell it to us. With that, we would have no fear of any in his family, should they even be real.”

  “The weakness I spoke of is that trolls are very stupid, and so, they fall prey to trickery. It was how I convinced him to leave without doing us any more harm. It will do you no good if you mean to speak to him with your sword instead of your voice. Now, you asked my help to rid your mead hall of a monster, and this I have done.”

  Aescher stood, extremely slowly, because he really wasn’t breathing well.

  “What would you have us tell our king, when he asks how we freed his hall?”

  “I don’t care. You’re Danes. Think up a good story and put it in one of your sagas.”

  8

  I stayed in the tree for another hour while the water drained off the hillside, and because I’m sort of comfortable in trees anyway. It’s a good place to hang out if you’re feeling overwhelmed, or at least it used to be back when the most common cause of workplace stress was large, ground-based predators. That was actually a brief window of time once large cats started to figure out how to climb trees, which is why I don’t like cats but I do like trees.

  Anyway. I associate the tops of trees with a certain amount of safety and peace, so I remained there and watched the world below reformulate itself.

  The town that took up most of the lower island didn’t return in that time. The water abated considerably, and buildings that had a second floor were showing up again, provided the buildings hadn’t been ripped down from the force of the tsunami.

  It seemed as if a lot of them were still there, but it was difficult to tell. I couldn’t seem to successfully contrast the way it looked after the wave with the way it looked earlier in the day. I have the same problem whenever I stand in a spot I’m told used to be the location of such-and-such an important thing, mainly because I’m the only one who remembers what that important thing looked like, and it’s nearly impossible to reconcile that with the modern world. This is basically
how I experience all of Europe.

  The difference here was that I had been looking at this landscape as recently as the day before, and yet when I saw roofs missing in the neat crisscross street grid, I couldn’t remember what kind of roofs were missing or what they sat on top of.

  The water was still at least six feet deep, which was perhaps ten or fifteen feet higher than it should have been, given the lower island was effectively at sea level. I wondered how much more it would come down, or if it would at all. Maybe this was the new normal for the place. That would be a problem when it came time to land a plane, since there wasn’t any flat land anywhere else.

  It also remained alarmingly quiet, which was really disturbing. I’ve been through quite a few earthquakes, and there’s always a moment of stunned silence when the ground stops shaking that’s nearly as memorable as the quake itself, but that moment doesn’t last all that long, and certainly not as long as this one was lasting. Even if I was too far from the town to hear people moving around and calling out for help, the forest should have been awake by now, and it wasn’t. It was silent, and perhaps as shocked by recent events as I felt.

  All except for the banshees. They wouldn’t shut up.

  I didn’t see anyone moving around down-island either. Yet there clearly had to be someone. The top floor of the hotel was still standing, and even if the water hit that floor—and the wave would have impacted the building at an angle and not head-on—the structure was solid enough to deflect the force. On top of that, there were a lot of beings living down there that were more durable than humans. Granted some of them—Paul the satyr, for instance, or Lenny the demon—bore a genetic hatred of water that likely resulted in them drowning, but the rest…

  They couldn’t all be dead. I mean, that would be awful.

  I lowered my still-bare feet onto the damp, squishy ground, and tried to imagine how much the briny ocean water was going to harm the plant life. This was perhaps an ecological question that could wait, but the mind goes in interesting places in times like this. When France fell to revolution, my first concern was whether I could still get my hands on a good brioche.