Troll Brother

  ~~~

  Finally, the party came. Marissa did not. Robert and four of his friends took turns rotating through a four player capture-the-flag style first person game. Kile got to play, and while Rob could see improvement during each round, a few of the others would groan each time the troll came into rotation.

  Mom provided pizza which the preteens inhaled rather than ate. Kile did not care for the pizza and so he left during one of the off rounds and went upstairs to find Mrs. Johansson and ask for a PB&J, or three. Once the sandwiches were done, Mrs. J. sat down with him and visited, laughing occasionally at the outbursts from the basement from the boys.

  “Tell me about your home, then. Have you lived near Loafer Mountain all your life?” she asked.

  “Oh yes! I was hatched right here in the Morning Shadow Mountain cave and have stayed ever since.”

  “Hmmm…and you never traveled or ventured out?”

  “No, I don’t go far,” Kile said behind a muffled mouthful. “The other trolls tell me it is not safe. And the King has said, ever since humans found this land near our entrances that we should not go where they can see us.”

  “But there’s been Native Americans around here for centuries, even thousands of years. How long has that rule existed?” Mrs. J. pressed.

  “Mmmph.” Kile needed to swallow before continuing. Once he did he was as open as he could be, at Rob’s suggestion. “The queen found these mountains probably nearly four-hundred years ago. She found the cave and opened the tunnels so that all the trolls with King Karapace could travel here from what you call Europe.”

  “You mean you used magics to get here?”

  “Yes! Boy trolls don’t like water. …I don’t think girl trolls do either, but I don’t know any besides the Queen really. Girl trolls don’t like to talk with us and there’s not very many. So, she said she would find us a new place and she went. Isabel is probably bravest troll ever! She used glimmer to ride on a boat with humans, and then when they landed she moved across land until she found these large mountains. Then she created our cave home, Machsa!”

  “Very interesting. So, even though you don’t have many, it’s the female trolls which kind of run the show?” Mrs. Johansson continued to ask.

  “Mmmm, sort of. I don’t know what the girl trolls do. But King Karapace wasn’t a king then. King Teufel ruled over all trolls in the old lands, at least all the ones my family knows about. But he kept fighting with humans. Then the humans had guns, and Karapace and some of the others did not want to fight with humans anymore. They wanted to hide, or to try a treaty with them.

  Teufel banished them. So, with nowhere to go, Queen Isabel decided to find a place for us where humans weren’t so many.

  Then humans found even these mountains. Only two centuries ago, maybe less but it was before I hatched, they started moving in and taking over the valleys. So, Karapace told us we should hide and stay out of the humans’ way.”

  There was a pause while Kile worked particularly hard at getting his whole second sandwich put down. Mrs. Johansson waited, sipping a drink she had made for herself earlier, something that looked a lot like tea.

  “Why did you decide to talk with my boys then,” she asked. “I mean, you have shimmer that you could have used. Why not just stay hidden.”

  Kile toyed with his last sandwich for a few seconds. Mrs. Johansson wasn’t sure if he was figuring out that she was grilling him for details and information, or if he just wasn’t quite sure how he should answer.

  “The Queen gave me an assignment, because I had snuck down to your city sometimes and I also know how to speak the human language. She wants me to find out if humans will fight with us again, or if we can make a treaty.”

  “Oh,” Mrs. Johansson said thoughtfully. “And why would you need a treaty now?”

  Kile nodded as if confirming that was a good question. “You live higher and higher on the mountain. There are more and more of you. They say it is like the last times where we lived before and had to leave. The King and Queen do not want to fight humans, so my work is to find out if we can…get along?”

  Mrs. Johansson nodded in response to confirm for the little troll that he’d chosen his words correctly. It was all coming together now. It seemed the sprites were at least mostly correct about trolls. They had ulterior motives. The friendship of some among the humans would certainly aid in any type of exposure the trolls might risk in the human world.

  Having learned for a Summer from the sprites directly while her family yet lived in Des Moines, and having met a few other faerie folk by her acquaintances, Sara Johansson knew that in general most faeries had died out, and lived only in rare pockets of their civilizations. It did not help that in addition to the threat she was sure humans were perceived as, each faerie race tended to distrust and fear interactions with one another too. Modern humans swore faeries never did exist, but if faeriefolk weren’t careful they most certainly would cease to within a couple-hundred years or less. Faeries, Sara Johansson thought, were going extinct. And there was no one among humans who were going to do a recovery effort like they did for wolves and buffalo. It was more likely that most faeries would be killed as monsters.

  “How many troll cities do you think are left, Kile?” she mused.

  “Hmmm. I don’t know really. Mountain trolls always live in caves in mountains,” he responded.

  Sara smiled and nodded at the troll. He certainly seemed innocent enough, much like her own boys: growing and becoming more wise, but still very open when comfortable and mostly trusting.

  “But we only keep track of a few clans now. There are some in what humans call the Alps…oh, and also in the Andes! I’m thinking…” Kile tapped his teeth with his index finger nail again. “Oh! There are many caves still left in the Himalayas! I think maybe we talk with ten different clans.”

  “That seems like a lot of caves still,” Sara confirmed. “But how many trolls do you think there are?”

  “I’m not very sure. We don’t really keep track too much, because we have not had troll wars for thousands of years. No one really needs to know if we are not going to fight each other. Who cares who’s clan is bigger anymore? But…if there’s ten clans left, and maybe several caves for each of them…I say…maybe 100,000!”

  The troll stopped to chomp nearly all of his third sandwich in one bite. His number sounded totally arbitrary and made up from the top of his head.

  “Kile,” Mrs. Johansson said quietly.

  “Hmmm,” the troll responded, still trying to get peanut butter where he wanted it to go in his mouth.

  “There’s seven billion humans now. I’m thinking it might be better to stay hidden.”

  Kile sat and thought for a while, while he savored the remnants of his sandwiches. It wasn’t immediately clear to Sara if “billion” had any meaning for the little troll. But she let him stew about it for a while.

  “Well,” said Mrs. Johansson, “I guess it’s time to bring Robbie his present.”

  “Present?” Kile looked at her quizzically from the table as he’d finished his sandwiches. “What is a present?”

  “You know, a gift. I got Robbie a little present that I saved for today. It’s a new game and I think he’ll want to unwrap it now and share with his friends, including you.”

  She brought out a small gift-wrapped package with a bow on it and turned to show it to Kile. His mouth opened in a wide “O” having never seen reflective nor striped paper quite of the same quality as surrounded whatever was inside it.

  “We don’t have gifts on birthdays…” he mused, eyes glazed over.

  “No?”

  “Uhn-uh. We have a tradition, but gifts are for the Queen and King,” he explained. His breath whisked in as he marveled at how shiny the red and silver stripes were on top of the white background of the paper. “It’s so beautiful. But…What do you do with it?”

  Sara laughed lightly and hande
d it to Kile. “He unwraps it and gets the gift inside.”

  “Aaahhh…” the troll responded.

  Kile was mesmerized and turned the package around in his hand poking the silver bow. It was fairly flat and about a palm’s width by two palm’s width for Kile. He wasn’t sure what sort of gift would be that shape except maybe one of his paintings he had made for Queen Isabel in the past. As he started tugging at the bow, Mrs. Johansson tutted and told him to go deliver it.

  “May I give him my tradition too?” Kile asked, earnest eyes waiting.

  “Oh, sure. You go right ahead. …It’s not some weird mushrooms or anything, is it?” she kidded.

  Kile looked at her cock-eyed. He shook his head slowly as if her comment was totally inconceivable. What kind of tradition is a mushroom? he thought.

  “Never mind. Something a pixie once tried to share with me,” Mrs. J. said, trying to put Kile back on task. “Now hurry. He’s only got a couple more hours to play the game.”