~~~
On the drive home the sun had nearly set very late in the summer evening and the car’s automatic headlights were on. The boys were asleep, and Mrs. Johansson herself, who was driving, would have passed the shadow she saw run across the road as one of the common quail or pheasants. But Mr. Johansson sat upright in his passenger seat instantly on edge.
“What?” Sara asked her husband.
“That thing! Did you see it?”
“The stupid bird that nearly ran into me? Yeah, I saw it.”
“No,” Ricky Jr. said. “That wasn’t a bird. It was too fast, and…I could see right through it!”
“Oh…c’mon. How could you tell in that half a second?” Sara replied nervously. But she knew, her husband’s senses were still on high alert and attuned to odd movements or sounds.
“I dunno…” Rick answered more hesitantly.
“Jogah,” they heard Kile whisper from the back.
“What?” Rick asked. “What’s a Jogah?”
“Messenger spirits,” the troll rasped in a secretive tone. He seemed to not be comfortable discussing it. “I think we might have a message from the queen…or someone anyway.”
“Are Jogah little things you can see through? I’ve never heard of them with the sprites,” Sara said quietly. Robert was still asleep in the back seat but she followed suit with Kile’s demeanor.
“That’s because sprites don’t know about Jogah. The Jogah don’t really like sprites…they like to take over the forests they live in. Sprites can be…bullies sometimes.”
“And these Jogah? Can you see right through them?” Rick asked.
“Yes. At least that’s what they say. I’ve never seen one. Most faeries never see them.”
There was silence for just a few more seconds as they finished coming down the street and pulled into their drive.
“Mmmm…maybe the message was for Marissa,” Kile suggested after some thought.
“Marissa?!” Asked mom.
“Yeah…or maybe someone else too,” the troll answered matter-of-factly.
Sara Johansson let the topic drop. But she made the assumption there would be a note on their back door, and unfortunately for Kile there was one waiting.
Junior had half carried, half walked his older son up to bed and returned to find Sara at the kitchen table attempting to read while Kile ate a spoonful of peanut butter with chocolate chips. He was not bothering to use glimmer at all and it surprised Rick a bit since he hadn’t seen the troll outright for a couple days with all of the holiday visits and activity going on.
The troll smacked his lips and brushed his free hand across his broad, toothy mouthful as he said, “I can read it for you!”
Apparently Sara was struggling to get through the whole text. “No, no. It says it’s for me, so let me finish it.”
“Okay,” she continued. “It says they’ve had a fight? Maybe…a skirmish? Is that what this word is?”
Kile looked at the toughened parchment and nodded. “Fight. I do not know “skirmish” yet.”
“So, they’ve had a battle, then?” Rick asked, sitting down with a glass of water.
“Yes, it sounds like it. With the goblins.” Sara continued to poke through the figures and lines on the page. “The queen seems to be pleading with me to find a way to return Kile, but says it may be very dangerous. They think the goblins may be watching several of their cave entrances. OH! God, Rick! It says Little Ricky fought…vigorously?”
Kile peered again over at the parchment. “Valiantly!” he said, with a smile and a nod at Ricky Junior, proud of his human vocabulary.
“What the heck, Kile? Why would Ricky be in a fight?” Mr. Johansson asked.
“Here, Kile. I think I’ve got it. She wants us to make the trade as soon as we can but she says to wait for her next message to ensure they have not started a war with the goblins. She says Ricky has been in a fight and got hurt, but I don’t think badly because she says he is continuing his magic lessons while they wait. I’m not sure I follow why the goblins are camping out. Are they going to attack the trolls, Kile?”
Kile was reading through the scroll. He happened to catch a few symbols that had been hidden within the main glyphs of the message. They were a warning from the queen that the goblin threat had become very serious, and though they thought they were just being observed as the goblins looked for more room on the mountain she wanted to be sure they were not going to put any of the humans at risk, including Little Ricky. She feared indiscriminate retaliation from the humans with guns.
“Yes. That is right. They will make their own scouting trips to be sure the goblins aren’t moving to attack Machsa. As soon as they know they want me to return, and Little Ricky will come home.”
The gaze with which he held both Sara and Richard Johansson’s attention was completely sincere and for the first time exhibited some maturity beyond Little Ricky or even Robert’s years. “We don’t want any human to be hurt. And we don’t want goblins to know we have contacted you. So we must do exactly as the queen says.”
“Kile…” Rick asked.
“Yes, Mr. Johansson?”
“What happens if the goblins find out we know about you?”
“Then…they might think of humans as another enemy to conquer too.”
“Despite our guns and large numbers?” Sara breathed.
“Yes. If their numbers are great enough, they will try to overrun Maple Springs. There has been no interaction between humans and faeries for many decades, even centuries. Their numbers may be very large by now. No one really knows. We assumed they did not have resources in their high mountain caverns. But we don’t know.”
“Well…they might not get very far…but the world would definitely know about faeries then,” Rick answered.
Mrs. Johansson stood and leaned against the kitchen cabinets. “Kile. Send her a reply. Tell her we’re ready when she is. Rick and I will go with you to make sure everyone’s safe.”
Kile started to protest, but the expressions he found on both parents’ faces culled it immediately. He simply nodded instead.