Trolled: The Complete Saga (The Trolled Saga)

by D. K. Bussell

  Then the hell-beast dived, snatching the two of them in its mass of dangling feelers and sweeping them off into the sky.

  Chapter Six: Splitting the Party

  TERRY STARED AT a row of lead miniatures on his bedside dresser, lost in idle thought. He remembered every coat he’d applied to those little models—every colour, every glaze, every stroke of drybrush—so why couldn’t he remember a single thing that had happened during his trip to Epping Forest? He had to know. His parents had to know. The police had to know. The parents of his missing friends were dying to know. Even Nat’s mum—who took two-and-a-half, alcohol-soaked days to realise her daughter had vanished—showed up at the door demanding answers. Terry had none. Not a single thing to offer. Not one ounce of hope.

  The doctors put Terry in a PET scanner to figure out what was wrong with him but found nothing abnormal. The police made him report to the station for a second interview, and took his statement in writing. They dragged him back to the woods and had him retrace his steps. They asked questions about his bloodied knuckles and the cuts on his stomach. They accused him of being a self-harmer and asked him whether he carried knives. They swabbed his cheeks and took his fingerprints. In the end though, all they could do was take Terry at his word that he knew as little as they did. He had no motive to do his friends harm, and there were no bodies. Besides, it didn’t add up that a kid like Terry would be able to overpower four people single-handedly, one of which was a six-and-a-half foot rugby player.

  More likely, Terry was set on by the same group of attackers that had killed or kidnapped his friends, and lost his memory as a consequence of the trauma. That’s was the leading theory anyway.

  The authorities assured Terry they’d be keeping tabs on him, and insisted he not leave town. Fat chance. Terry could hardly summon the wherewithal to crawl out of bed, let alone turn fugitive.

  Terry’s mum called up the stairs. “Do you want breakfast, Tel? I can make you some Ready Brek. It’s got Get up and Glow.”

  When that didn’t get a response, a knock on the bedroom door followed.

  “I’m not hungry, mum,” Terry moaned. He couldn’t even stomach the idea of food. Nothing tasted right anymore. The few morsels that had passed his lips since he arrived home had tasted like vending machine soup.

  The bedroom door opened. “You need to eat,” his mum told him, edging her way around the door jamb. “Your ribs are sticking out of you like a greyhound.”

  “Go away, please.”

  “Just give it a try.”

  “Get out,” Terry snapped, and threw his pillow at her.

  “I only want to—”

  “—I said, get out!”

  She sniffed, welling up. “Okay,” she croaked, and closed the door.

  Terry knew he should have felt something then, but there was no feeling to be had. He was numb. A ghost of himself. A cold lump of scar tissue. What happened out in those woods? Why couldn’t he remember? Were the police right? Was he repressing some terrible memory? He felt as if he’d seen something he wasn’t meant to see, and had been struck blind for it. Like someone had given him the red pill and he’d accidentally chased it with the blue one.

  “Just give it a try.” His mum’s voice, echoing in his ears.

  “Just give it a try.” He heard his own voice this time.

  He’d said those words. In another time. In another place. He concentrated on the memory. Concentrated on it so hard it made his head hurt. He remembered more words.

  “Get into it.”

  “Commit to the fantasy.”

  What fantasy?

  What did that mean?

  He buried his head under the duvet and closed his eyes.

  He saw trees. Woods.

  He needed to go there.

  To go where there were no distractions.

  To go where people weren’t.

  He needed to go back to those woods.

  “THIS CHAIR IS wicked,” said Neville, who’d moved from his wheelchair to the Durkon throne and already made himself quite comfortable. “Slap a couple of axles on it and I’m a king on wheels, baby!”

  Ashley sat beside him on a regular wooden stool looking uncharacteristically small.

  Since the two of them had been tasked with stewarding the citadel, they’d seen the throne room cleared of all but the most essential furniture. The room was laid out to receive guests now, of which they had many.

  Having taken in the halflings a few days ago, they’d since seen a second crop of refugees come crashing onto their shores – a few hundred humans displaced by Clive’s rampaging giant. The survivors had arrived at their portcullis the day previous, begging for sanctum and bearing tales of a monster made from hundreds of fused-together trolls. It made Neville and Ashley shudder to hear of how their old friend had taken to flattening settlements, murdering men and women alike and using their corpses as cogs in his infernal machine.

  One by one, the newcomers sought audience with the citadel’s stewards, and Ashley and Neville did what they could to attend to their needs. The hungry were fed, families guided to shelters, and the injured shown whatever care they could provide. The procession went on for several hours, until the two hosts became thoroughly exhausted.

  They were just about to call time when one last face appeared before them, an elf by the name of Emerdor. He was a council elder of their tribe, and had been with the gang since they were forced to flee the Whispering Woods together. Since Drensila’s trolls had made refugees of them all.

  “A moment of your time, sirs, if I may,” requested the elf, taking a bow.

  Despite his status, Emerdor was as timeless as the rest of his kin, with a boy band face and a mane of glossy, blonde hair that looked like it belonged in a Pantene commercial.

  “What’s up?” sighed Nev, lounging almost horizontal in his throne.

  “It’s about the refugees,” said the elf, his expression downcast.

  “What about ‘em, fam?” asked Ash.

  “I’m concerned that we don’t have the means to accommodate so many visitors.”

  Neville squinted at the elf. He recognised Emerdor now, he was one of the elders that questioned Nat’s pedigree as The Chosen One and voted to leave the treetop village to the mercy of the trolls.

  “I’m sympathetic to their plight of course,” the elf went on, “but asking three disparate groups to share a space such as this is simply asking for trouble.”

  Ashley cut straight to it. “Is this about race, bruv?”

  “No,” Emerdor assured him, bluntly, “this is about resources. We have scant supplies as it is, and soon we’ll have even less. To allow this many to live within these walls will only cause us all to suffer.”

  Ash shrugged as if to say “We’ll make do.”

  Nev sat up though. “He has a point,” he told his co-steward. “Where are we going to get the food we need?”

  “We buy it,” said Ashley, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

  “You said that once already, but where from? I don’t see a Nandos around here.”

  “Racist.”

  “Amazon one-click, then!” He leaned in closer. “The point is, there’s nothing to forage for around these parts and it’s not like we’ve established any trade routes. Pretty soon we’re going to have a lot of hungry mouths to feed.”

  Ashley went to answer back but came up short.

  EATHON AND TIDBIT tore down the river rapids, shunted along by a hissing, gurgling torrent. The water crashed against Eathon so hard it felt solid, as though he were being assaulted by an unending tide of cobblestones. Gasping for air, he managed to force his head above the suffocating spray to see what lay ahead. Coming at him from the opposite direction was a waterfall that thundered like a huge, bellowing drum. The only thing separating the elf from his certain end was a large boulder set in the centre of the river, which bore down on him like a wrecking ball.

  Steering himself towards it, Eathon shot out a hand and mana
ged to dig his fingers into a crevice just big enough to allow purchase. He felt a tremendous pull on his shoulder accompanied by a sharp stab of pain as his arm threatened to break free of his torso. Fighting the agony, he strained against the deluge, summoning all his strength to haul himself out of the river and up onto the slippery lid of the rock.

  Much as he’d liked to have collapsed onto his back and rested his aching muscles, there was no time for respite. Scanning the rapids with his elf eyes, he succeeded in making out a second figure, bobbing helplessly along with the flow. Tidbit approached at some speed – fast enough that the elf would only have one chance to seize him before he was lost over the falls.

  He thrust out his arm and reached for the dwarf, shouting for him to grab the lifeline. Having never encountered a river before, let alone swam in one, Tidbit could do little more than tumble head over heels, buffeted by the whitewater.

  By chance, he found himself upright as he passed by the elf, and snatched at him with his tiny hands. His stubby fingers dug into Eathon’s forearm just below the ivy tattoo, and the elf dragged him from the downrush and onto the boulder.

  “Flippin’ ‘eck, that were close,” exclaimed Tidbit, coughing up half a gallon of freshwater.

  Catching his breath, Eathon took stock of the situation. They were stranded in the middle of the rapids upon a solitary rock. There was no way to get to the riverbank except by going back in the water, and doing that would send them over the waterfall for sure. Things could hardly get any worse. At least that’s what he thought before the boulder he was roosting on began to rumble and a pair of eyes flicked open upon its rocky surface.

  NAT AND GALANTHRE soared high through the darkening sky, borne aloft by the deadly phanta ray. She squirmed amongst the creature’s cluster of umbilical cord tentacles – a scene that belonged in one of those weird Japanese cartoons Terry enjoyed so much.

  Unable to break free, Nat screamed in frustration.

  “Easy, tiger,” said Cleaver, face on show due to being pulled halfway from his scabbard by one of their assailant’s tentacles, “don’t give yourself a nosebleed.”

  “I have to do something,” Nat shouted over the rushing wind.

  “Do what?” asked Cleaver. “Use yer loaf, will ya? You cut this thing and we’re taking a dive we won’t come back from.”

  Nat dared a look at the sawtooth crags racing beneath them. Cleaver was right, there was nothing she could do to halt the creature’s course that wouldn’t end with them splattered far and wide.

  “He’s right,” said Galanthre. “Be calm, our moment will come.”

  The phanta ray banked and steered towards a rocky peak capped with a giant nest. As they grew closer, Nat realised the nest wasn’t woven from twigs and scraps like a bird’s might be, but from bleached bones and sun-dried viscera held together with a thick layer of sputum.

  This was bad. Just awful in every dimension.

  The phanta ray settled atop its roost like a beer mat over a pint glass, leaving Nat and Galanthre to dangle below, trapped in its clutches. The flat body of the ray formed a fleshy seal over the nest’s opening, cutting off the oxygen from outside and plunging its captives into total darkness.

  “Is this it then?” asked Nat. “Is this our moment?”

  “Given that we’ll soon be out of air,” replied Galanthre, “I’d say this is as good a time as any,”

  Nat tried to go for her sword, but her arms remained pinned to her sides. “Can you reach your weapon?” she asked her companion.

  There followed a condensed tennis match of grunting as the elf fought to break free of the phanta ray’s tentacles.

  “No,” she admitted, grudgingly. “What about your sword? Can it reach you?”

  Cleaver piped up from the darkness. “I’ll give it a go, treacle.” He erupted from his scabbard like a torpedo from a submarine, soaring past Nat’s hand and landing at the far end of the nest. “Bloody Nora,” exclaimed the sword, “now the wheels have come off.”

  “What the hell was that?” screamed Nat, registering Cleaver’s voice, far from reach.

  “You were meant to catch me.”

  “How could I? I can’t even see you.”

  “You know what they say,” Cleaver tutted, “a bad workman always blames his tools.””

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Excuse me,” the sword grumbled. “A bad “workwoman.””

  “Will the two of you be quiet?” hissed Galanthre. “You’re sucking up all the air.”

  Nat huffed and went to fold her arms, except she couldn’t even manage that. This really was some top grade bullshit. If only Terry were here, he’d know what to do. She really did miss him. His kind eyes. His full, cushiony lips. The way he’d burp the word “Pardon.”

  “Hey, Chosen One,” said Galanthre, getting her attention. “How about you get it together and Choose a way for us to get out of here?”

  Nat collected her senses. An idea began to form. “Do you still have your bow?” she asked.

  “Slung over my shoulder,” the elf replied.

  “Good,” said Nat, relieved. “Listen. What I want you to do is lean forward as far as you can go and work the bow up and down.”

  “Why?”

  “Just do it, will you?”

  Galanthre sighed and did as instructed, tipping her body towards the floor as far as the tentacles would allow, then manipulating her spine to move the bow back and forth. As it rubbed against the phanta ray’s feelers, the elf began to fathom Nat’s plan. The bowstring was acting like a cheese wire, gouging into the cluster of tentacles that held her in place and working their way through to the other side.

  “Not bad, human,” Galanthre admitted, continuing to saw.

  The nest shuddered as the ray above them shifted.

  “I think we’re upsetting it,” said Nat. “You’d better go faster.”

  In truth, the phanta ray’s tentacles possessed few nerve endings. Having one sawn off hurt about as much as a hook in a fish’s mouth – not enough to cause it pain, but enough to give it a growing sense something was afoot. It shifted again, and in doing so, managed to pump the last of the remaining air from the nest.

  “Come on,” urged Cleaver. “Lickety split.”

  “I’m going as fast as I can,” grunted Galanthre, creating all the friction she could. The string sheared through one tentacle, then another. The exertion wore her out quickly though, and soon she was finding it impossible to breathe. Her muscles burned from lack of oxygen and white spots appeared in her vision.

  In the darkness, Nat heard the elf go quiet. “Gal?” she wheezed. There was no answer. All the phanta ray had to do now was wait a little while and its victims would be good for the eating. This nest would be Nat’s tomb. She gave one last gasp. “You were right,” she rasped, “about me and your brother… he had a thing for me and I led him on... I knew it was wrong but I flirted with him behind Terry’s back anyway.” She wanted to tell Galanthre she was a shitty person, but those were all the words she could muster. Her neck gave out and her chin hit her chest. Her eyelids fluttered and closed.

  There was sound. A frantic VUURR VIPP VUURR VIPP as Galanthre used what little fight she had to saw through the last of the tentacles keeping her captive. The sound was superseded by a squelch as the tentacle landed on the bottom of the nest, and a thump as the elf followed.

  “Cut me free,” Nat gasped.

  “Can’t... find my knife,” Galanthre replied, her voice little more than a whisper.

  “God Almighty,” said Cleaver, “pick me up and stick the bastard!”

  “But, I’m not… the Chosen One,” the elf wheezed.

  “I’ll make an exception!” the sword cried.

  Galanthre went to the source of the voice and raked her hands across the floor of the nest. Her skin brushed against something cold, but when she closed her fingers around it, it turned out to be the femur of one of the phanta ray’s previous meals.

  “Go on, girl, n
early there,” encouraged Cleaver.

  The elf scrabbled around some more, chest pumping like a stricken fish. Finally, her hand settled on a leather-bound hilt.

  “‘Ave it!” Cleaver demanded.

  Galanthre aimed the sword’s point to the sky and thrust the blade into the phanta ray’s underside. By pure luck, the tempered steel drove through the creature’s brain stem, dealing it a mortal wound. The beast made an ear-splitting scream like a crow shrieking through a kazoo, then collapsed, lifeless into the nest. The ray’s victims found themselves lost beneath the great wet doily of its slippery flesh, until finally two lumps appeared and Nat and Galanthre emerged, gasping for air.

  “What a bleedin’ carry on,” said Cleaver

  Chapter Seven: Out of Character

  FEELING LIKE A killer returning to the scene of the crime, Terry went back to the woods. He went there in search of answers. The woods represented an end point—the full stop of a sentence he could no longer recall—and he yearned to pick up where the tale left off. To discover the chapter that lay overleaf.

  A fingernail moon hung overhead as Terry crunched through the wet leaves blanketing the outskirts of Epping Forest. He’d walked the whole way there, all the way from Ongar, through tiny villages and wide open farmland. Where he was heading exactly he didn’t know. He moved on instinct, attracted yet afraid, like a prepubescent boy looking through a peephole at a naked woman.

  He eventually arrived at the same dirt car park of their fateful visit, at the spot where Clive had left his van. It was gone. The sodium glare of a lamp post illuminated its tyre prints, preserved in the mud and ringed off by scraps of police tape. Terry pictured himself sat in the van. Remembered its upholstery held together by strips of duct tape, its gear knob shaped like a human skull. He pictured Clive in the driver’s seat and felt his stomach clench. His hands went to the scars on his stomach, though he didn’t know why.

  Terry trudged on, deeper into the woods. His feet found a trailhead and he followed it, though it wasn’t long before his gut told him to cut away and forge his own path. He pushed on through rougher terrain, shielding his eyes from dangling branches that clawed at his face through the gloom. Every shadow seemed fraught with menace.