Softy the Troll Read online

  The light from her scar flashed twice and faded. Hanging in front of Jenny were some things that were definitely not there before, a pair of long, sharp, glistening swords. The two trolls started to back up. Before they could get too far the swords swooped and hovered over their heads. They swooped again and slashed thin lines across their skin. Their skins became paler as if they had suddenly grown even sicker because the swords had scratched them.

  They dropped to their knees. “We are sorry, me lady, we did not realise who you were. Please be merciful upon us.”

  “Who is he talking to?” asked Jenny.

  “You, of course,” said Softy, fear and wonder in his voice.

  Me?”

  “Yes, you. You conjured the swords did you not?” he asked.

  “Um, I suppose, but I have no idea how. What do I do?” she mouthed at Softy.

  “You either kill them or let them go,” he mouthed back, horror crossing his face as he suggested something that made him want to be sick.

  Jenny stared back, not sure she had fully understood him.

  “Slay them or let them go,” he whispered, making it certain.

  She turned to see the two monsters who had been threatening to eat her grovelling in the dirt.

  “Get up. Go, and do not let me see you bullying any creature again.”

  They looked up with glares of hate but also fear and slowly stood, staring at the blades all the time. Then they turned and ran quicker than Jenny would have believed such big creatures could move. The blades turned and swooped back to hover just in front of her like a pair of dogs.

  “Now what do they want?” asked Jenny, freaking out.

  “Either give them a command or dismiss them.”

  “Do what?”

  “Dismiss them, send them back to wherever they came from.”

  “Send them back, how do I do that?”

  “I do not know how. Use the word of dismissal.”

  “The what?”

  “The magic words White must have given you to summon and dismiss the blades.”

  “Words? What words? White did not give me any words.”

  “He did not?” Softy’s eyes went huge in surprise. “Then how did you summon the blades?”

  “I do not know,” said Jenny starting to get really freaked now.

  “Okay, I believe you. It’s nothing to panic about. We will just have to wait until White can banish them. Until then, I am afraid you will just have to put up with them.”

  “Put up with them. That’s easy for you to say, you do not have a pair of floating swords constantly about to stab you in the eye every time you want to step forward. What am I saying? If I move they follow or block me. What am I supposed to do, stand here until White turns up? If he ever does.”

  “Give them an instruction,” urged Softy.

  “Um, guard our backs,” requested Jenny not knowing what else to say.

  The blades turned and flitted behind Softy to hover behind them. Softy peered over his shoulder, obviously not happy about the fact they were behind him.

  “Brilliant, as if we did not already stick out like a sore thumb. Is this Fix-Its much farther?”

  “No, it’s there.” he pointed to what looked like a shanty cobbled together with all bits of metal. Jenny did not think much of the look of it. But W keeps telling me that I should not judge things here by what they look like.

  Softy picked up a small metal bar about a handspan in length and used it to tap on the metal sheet hanging from the front of the shack by a rusty chain that served as a front door.

  “Come in,” buzzed a voice that was neither male or female.

  They pushed the swing door open and went in. It was surprisingly bright inside. Hanging from the corners of the ceiling were powerful electric lamps. Every space of wall surface was covered with shelves filled with tools and bits of electric gizmos. Standing in the middle of the room behind a metal table was what at first Jenny took for a robot, but as she looked more closely she realised that with the smooth lines of its shape and its smooth flawless movements it could not be a robot. It looked like a short, dwarfish man, except its skin was not flesh but metal. Hair thin golden wire tumbled from its head onto its shoulders.

  “Greetings, dear people, how might we help you?”

  “Greetings, Fix-Its, I know it is unlikely since this is a human thingy, but we wondered if you could fix it. Here, show him, Jenny.”

  Jenny placed her cracked and broken mobile on the table. It leant over the table to look more closely at the mobile. As it did so the lights shone through it, and Jenny realised that what she had first seen must have been a glamour for he was not skin and bone but made up of unbelievably complex and intricate intertwined wires and tiny moving components of different colours with electricity crackling across the wires.

  “A challenge at last.”

  “Can you fix it?” asked Jenny.

  “Of course, I can fix anything, that is why I am known as Fix-It, but it will take time.”

  “How much?” asked Jenny guessing the price would be high.

  “The price is that Fix-It will do it for free, won’t you, Fix?” came a familiar voice.

  They all turned to the front door. There leaning against the door was White.

  “Ambassador, it has been too long. Do you know these people?”

  “Yes, I do, and I hate to have to do this but I must ask that as a personal favour that you waive your fee.”

  “The brightness of the energy crackling across its face dimmed. It cocked its head in thought.

  “As it’s you and I owe you my life I will do it, but please do not tell anyone about this. It’s very bad for business, you understand?”

  “Of course,” agreed White, his face deadpan. “How long will it take?”

  The creature picked up the phone in a small hand. How could it move, Jenny wondered. There were no muscles all, it was made of wires.

  It weighed the phone in its hand. “A few days.”

  “A few days?” squeaked Jenny.

  “If I have to rush the job I am bound to get something wrong,” explained Fix-It.

  “Very well,” agreed White. “Sof, Jen, would you please join me outside.”

  They followed him outside.

  “Do you still have Jenny’s dress and shoes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, please put them in the rucksack.”

  Softy did so. White ran his hands over the two boxes. “Here Softy, the supplies are in here,” he said patting the large rucksack after fastening it. He passed it to Softy.

  “Why are you giving me this?” asked Softy in surprise.

  In answer he began to speak in that magic speech. “Sleas stakes stses shrees soofs stoots stses sreens soods.”

  The world once again wobbled. Jenny reached for something to steady herself and leaned against something hard and rough. She turned to see what it was. It was a large tree. Turning again, she saw White doubled over and rushed unsteadily over to him.

  “W, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, just recovering from spell casting. Such a powerful spell takes it out of me,” he wheezed.

  She took his hands and pulled him up, nearly dropping him when she saw his face. It was a sickly blue with deep circles around his eyes. He looked ancient and his hump had returned.

  “White!” she cried in shock.

  “It’s all right Jen, it looks worse than it is,” he soothed, patting her hand.

  Softy loped over and helped her to sit White down on a boulder just behind him. He patted either side and they sat down beside him.

  “So, Bat, why have you brought us here?”

  Softy’s question prompted Jenny to really look around her at where they were. She could not see much because it was dark, but what she could see led her to believe that she was not in Britain anymore, at least not a part of Britain she knew. The trees around them, like the one she had leant against, looked normal enough, but now she realised that rathe
r than these being full grown trees as she had thought, they must be saplings for they were dwarfed by trees the size of mountains. Their bark and leaves were strange colours that glowed in the darkness. Then as a breeze parted the thickly tangled canopy she saw strange constellations glittering in the sky. Her suspicion that she was somewhere out of this world was confirmed when three moons rose above the trees.

  “Where the hell are we?”

  “Do not mention that name in this sacred place,” snapped White.

  “What, I only...”

  “I know, Amazon, I am sorry. Long range reality shifting makes me cranky but you must never mention that name here, it is blasphemous. To answer your question, we are in the other world.”

  “The what?”

  The other world, the land of the fey.”

  “If you were a nature nut then this would be your version of heaven,” explained Softy, a look of rapture on his broad face.

  Jenny looked around again. Now she noticed the many moths flitting about them. Like the trees they were colours that you would never see in her world. On the exotically scented breeze came the footfalls and cries of huge creatures that sounded like they belonged in a dinosaur movie.

  Softy picked up a handful of rich brown earth in his hands, sniffed it and let it run through his hands with a look of deep reverence.

  “So, Bat, much as I am forever grateful for bringing us here, why have you?” asked Softy.

  White did not answer straight away. He seemed to be distracted by the music of the fast flowing river behind the rock they were sitting on. At least that was what it looked like. What did he hear in it? Or did he hear something Jenny could not?

  “I have brought us here because I hope to cause as little damage to all concerned as possible.

  “Damage? What damage?” they both asked.

  From the left came a deep growl. They looked that way and beheld, what? A dream, a nightmare, definitely a nightmare. It was a hound, but a hound unlike anything Jenny had ever seen before. It was eight feet tall. Its body was glowing white and its pointed pricked ears, in contrast, bright red. Even from this distance they could feel its eyes upon them, burning black coals, but its most frightening features were its fangs. More like tusks they curved out of its moth in all directions and glowed with an inner fire. Just looking at them cut the eyes, making them tear. The moonlight glowed down on it revealing what they had not seen before. Its body was made up of squirming corpses, some of them newly dead and others nothing but bones. It howled, the tortured scream not coming out of its mouth but the many mouths of the bodies that comprised it.

  “A hound of the wild hunt,” whispered Softy. Jenny had never heard such fear in anyone's voice before.

  “They are hunting me,” whispered White.

  “Why?”

  “The Summer Court have somehow got it into their heads that I am joining the Winter Court, so they have sicced them on me to stop that from happening.”

  They expected the beast to spring on them but it just crouched there. Then from far away, from at least three directions came similar echoing cries.

  “It’s waiting for its fellows,” whispered Softy, frozen with fear.

  For once Jenny was grateful for the swords. “Attack,” she whispered. Only then did she realise they were no longer anywhere to be seen. When had they disappeared?

  White stood up and to their surprise, moving with more speed and strength than he should have, he used some kind of martial art move to throw them both over his shoulders and the rocks into the river below. The water rushed up to meet Jenny. It hit her like a punch to the gut and closed over her. The cold settled in her bones and the river seemed to speak to her.

  “Just stop fighting. Stop breathing. Float in my embrace forever.”

  She struggled to the surface and swallowed a gulp of precious air. Over the rush of the river she heard two sounds colder than the river. The sound of a bone crunching and a scream that came from the depths of the soul. Then she went under again and when she came up something hit her on the head, and everything became hazy and dream like, then blackness claimed her.

  Haven

  Jenny came around to the feeling of warm towels being rubbed over her. She opened her eyes and bright light lanced into them, so she shut them and groaned. Trying again, she opened them more slowly to find that the light was not very bright. She was in a room, lying on a rug next to a bright, heavenly warm fire.

  “The lady is awake,” came a female voice with a strong Scottish accent. Jenny turned in the direction of the voice. Two people were crouched over her. One of them was Softy. At first, she thought the other was White, but at a second look she realised it was someone not known to her. She felt sure that if they had met before she would have remembered. She was four feet tall and very stocky, but despite this she still seemed to have all the right curves in all the right places under a simple brown tunic and leggings. The main feature that drew Jenny’s attention was the glossy blue beard.

  “Are you all right?” asked Softy anxiously.

  “I think so,” she said uncertainly. She slowly stretched her limbs and wriggled her fingers and toes. “Everything seems to be working, except my head feels like a mountain fell on it.”

  “Good, here, sit up slowly, lass, and drink this. It will help the headache,” said the dwarf in a kind but gruff voice.

  Jenny was handed a large clay bowl decorated with flowers, full of a steaming creamy soup. She warmed her hands on the heat of the bowl.

  “Ye still cold. Here, wrap this round ye for now.” The dwarf wrapped a thick blanket around Jenny’s shoulders. Only then did Jenny realise that under the towels and blanket she was naked.

  “Where are my clothes?”

  “They’re there by the fire, drying.” Blushing, Softy pointed to a corner near the fire. Her clothes lay neatly folded on a wooden rack, slowly steaming.

  Whatever it was in the bowl it smelt delicious. She took a tentative sip. it was nothing more special than chicken and mushroom soup and yet it was the best thing she had ever tasted and her headache disappeared at once.

  “Good, yes?” asked the dwarf.

  “The best thing I have ever tasted,” enthused Jenny.

  “You’re too kind. Nothing but chicken, mushrooms, and a few herbs. It’s good, though I say it myself.”

  “It’s delicious,” agreed Softy. “Oh, where are my manners? Jenny Charity, it is my honour to introduce you to Dawn Greystone.”

  “It’s an honour to meet ye, lass. Why, you really do like my soup don’t ye. Well I suppose what ye have been through that’s no surprise. I would be hungry enough to eat a dragon if I had been asleep for three days. I will get some more.” She got up from the stool she had been sitting on and ambled to the side of the room where a large black kettle hung in front of the large cosy fire. She used a long handled spoon to ladle more of the soup into the bowl and brought it back to Jenny.

  She started drinking it hungrily, then she remembered what had happened. She looked up at Softy. “What happened to White?” she asked.

  “I do not know. All I know is he threw us over into the water and then I heard the crunch of bone and a cry of pain,” he told her sadly, those big green eyes filling with gem tears.

  “So he might only be hurt. We should go back and check,” said Jenny not really believing it but needing to do something.

  “I have sent a friend to check but there’s not much hope, lass,” growled the dwarf.

  Jenny was beginning to understand that this gruff way of speaking was her normal way probably under that rough exterior there was a kind soul.

  “Who did you send?” asked Softy with deep concern crinkling his rough broad face.

  “Gentle,” answered the dwarf.

  First Softy, now Gentle? “I hope he can look after himself because those hound things are...” she trailed off, not knowing how to say it.

  “That is kind of ye but Gentle canny look after himself,” said the dwarf.
r />   There came a quiet tap on a window.

  “That be Gentle now,” said the dwarf. She went to the window, pulled aside the red curtains and opened it.

  A huge face filled the window, its grey stone like skin reflecting the firelight. On seeing them an ear to ear grin spread across its face showing huge translucent fangs. Despite the monster’s look and the fangs, Jenny could tell by that smile that this was a Gentle giant that lived up to his name.

  “Little ones are okay?” he asked in a surprisingly high voice for such a big creature.

  “We thank you, Gentle, and once again thank you for pulling us out of the river and bringing us to Dawn.”

  “What else could I do?” he asked, his face becoming red-grey with what Jenny guessed must be embarrassment.

  “Did you find anything?” asked Dawn.

  “Lots of disturbed earth and a big pool of blood,” he said sadly, big pearl tears running down his rough grey skin.

  “So White might still be alive?” asked Jenny hopefully.

  “That’s unlikely,” said the dwarf grimly.

  “But there was not a body, only blood.”

  “The hounds of the wild hunt do not leave bodies. Ye die then ye body, whatever’s left, is turned to undead and added to the body of the hound. Quick, Softy, grab the young lassie, canny ye see she’s about to faint,” cried the dwarf.

  Softy just managed to get to her in time. He held her up until Dawn was able to get a chair under her. Jenny began to cry, tears running down her face and great sobs wracking her body. She hated crying, especially in front of people but she could not help herself.

  “It will be all right little one,” soothed Softy, patting her on the back.

  “How can it? White was the only one who could bargain with this Court thing and give them whatever they want for Peter. Now we will never get Peter back.”

  It seemed that no one had an answer for that.

  Jenny slowly became aware through the waterfall of her tears that something was waving in front of her. At first she thought it was a curtain at the window. Then she realised that although it was coming from the window’s direction it was not a curtain. It was a large piece of white cloth covered with red spots. It was a giant hanky. It was Gentle’s hanky. He was offering it to her. It would have served her as a full length cloak. It was not very dry, however. It was soaked with his own tears and huge snot she noticed disgustedly, but there was a clean corner which she used.