Trolls: Gladiola Trollkonge
Chapter 13: Return To Bergen Town
Gladiola really hated the return trip.
For one, when they got through the portal, they literally got spit out by what turned out to be a hill monster (which weirded out the princess). Then, she had to struggle with keeping herself on her feet while Chef held her cage and moved it along as they walked across the forest.
Gladiola remembered the stories her parents told her about how the forest hid camouflaging creatures that could go from jolly to bad, but when she did see the fluffy critters, she only saw a bunch of scared animals dissolving into the natural environment when they saw the evil trio marching they way into the forest, not caring to make a break stop or if they stepped on the poor animals. The only thing that mattered to them was that they reached Bergen Town, which they did at dawn.
Seeing her hometown should have been a relief to Gladiola until they stepped through the main gates and she saw the horrors. All the Bergens she had known and befriended since she was born were shackled like slaves and forced to grovel before them. Even the guards, still loyal to the monarchy, looked unhappy at the concept of being forced into bullying their friends. The Trolls were treated far worst: rather than being held altogether in a cage, they were each trapped in individual glass cases like rats waiting to be used for dissection.
The moment they saw them coming, the people screamed.
"You won't get away with this!"
"Witch!"
"Traitor!"
"Murderer!"
"How dare you murder your own?"
"I see you've made excellent work, Dårlig," Chef said with dry appreciation as the young Bergen stepped in and did a bow. The female Troll on his shoulder also did a curtsy. "I didn't actually expect you to saddle up two civilizations at once!"
"You won't fool us again!" A Bergen shouted.
"If you think you can use a similar trick, then you are wrong!" A Troll shouted.
"I must admit, the task was a bit challenging," Dårlig said smoothly while ignoring the complaints of the crowd. "Kidnapping Princess Gladiola has provoked quite a traumatic chain reaction to all the citizens who love her. When we came to demand their complete surrender, they behaved as if you had already come to ruin them all."
"Eesh, some of them even went suicidal!" The Troll female nodded. "Why, by the time we came with the cages, around a dozen of the Troll women killed themselves by ripping off their stomachs!"
Gladiola perked in her cage. "Liar. A Troll would never be as insane as to commit such an act!"
"I don't know." Dårlig shrugged. "If a Troll can turn grey from despair..."
"Did you find the Night Soul Tree?" Chef interrupted.
The two lackeys stared at each other in discomfort. Gladiola frowned when she saw those 'stares of discomfort'. They didn't look like the uncomfortable stare you'd give to someone when you were afraid of admitting something. No, it looked more... calculative.
"I'm... afraid we have some bad news," Dårlig said, with anxiety that seemed genuine to others but surprisingly fake to the caged princess.
"Feige, what's going on?" Creek demanded at the Troll female. The latter sighed and freaked.
"I admit, we tried to locate the tree using the map, but when we found the place, all we found was THIS!" She used her hair to pull something out of a small purse that Dårlig carried. Her hair threw on the ground what looked like a pile of dead branches sucked out of wood, dried willow leaves, and a pile of ashes. Everyone gasped when they saw what looked like the remains of a dead tree.
"It appears that the Night Soul Tree was destroyed." Mr. Darwin leaned and picked up something well hidden in the mess. His fingers held up what looked like strands of green hair and blue hair. "Judging by the hair color, it looks like the Bergen and Troll Kings have burned the Night Soul Tree during our absence."
"WHAT?" Chef was enraged.
"That can't be true!" Gladiola snapped and failed to shake against her cage. "My father would never burn a tree, even a dangerous one!"
"If Troll fire created the Tree and Bergen fire destroyed its offspring, then it would make sense that a Bergen and a Troll burning the Night Soul Tree would destroy it." Mr. Darwin got up and looked at Dårlig and Feige. "Have you dared to punish them?"
"We did." Dårlig confessed and pulled something out of his uniform, a pocket-sized urn. He opened it and tossed the content right into the pile of the Night Soul Tree's corpse. This time, Gladiola really felt shattered when she saw the black ash smaller than a grain of sand pouring like a waterfall and its sparkling value forming a familiar colored flower.
"YOU BURNED MY STRIPPED GLADIOLA!" She screamed.
"And by doing that, I burned your chances of saving your people," Dårlig said.
"We thought it was the right thing to do," Feige agreed. "If they destroyed the Night Soul Tree, then we should destroy their precious Torch of Happiness before they can use it against us."
"So let me get this straight," Chef said firmly. "They burn the Night Soul and you decide to burn their stripped gladiola?" The lackeys gave her nervous grins begging for mercy. Chef did not lose her frown but what she did do is firmly hold Dårlig by the spare shoulder. "For once, you did something and I don't feel like hitting you is the reward!"
She thrust the cage up in the air, which made Gladiola wobble and see her friends and subjects look at her. "Pay attention, everyone! We could have done this cleanly, but instead you stuck with violence!" Creek shouted.
"Therefore, returned violence is in store!" Mr. Darwin agreed. "Tomorrow at dawn, we were supposed to hold a new Trollstice feast where everyone would watch the Bergen royalty die from poisoning, but instead it's both the Bergen and the Troll royals who shall die, executed by your selfishness!" He waved a hand at Gladiola. "And the one princess who was unable to save you will be the last one to die, forced to watch her loved ones perish and her Troll fellows die as we will force you Bergens to devour them once again!" The crowd gasped and failed to fight back.
"Dårlig! Feige!" Chef shoved the cage into Dårlig's arms. "Despite how much you exasperated during the last seventeen years, you've proved your loyalty! I know abdicate my position of Chef to you! The kitchen is all yours!"
"You never were the Chef!" Gladiola muttered.
"Eh, whatever keeps the clock ticking," the vile woman said before throwing a cloth over the princess' cage.
Meanwhile
Gladiola's human friends had managed to sneak behind them. Once they had reached the gates of Bergen Town, they took the advantage of everyone being distracted by the game of surrendered princess by climbing up on the crooked and spying from the chimneys.
"I don't get it," Art said while they took turns taking a view with the binoculars that Alice had brought.
"Dude, you're telling me!" Boogie Max, who was having his turn on bird watch, said. "How do these Trolls manage to breathe in those glass cages?"
"Not that! Though I do have to agree with you." Art shook his head. "What I mean is how come the bad guys go all this way to kidnap Gladiola to get to the Night Soul Tree and the welcoming committee declares it destroyed?"
"Yeah." Mattie peaked at the dispersing crowd while Dårlig and Feige headed to the castle with the caged Gladiola and Chef, Creek, and Mr. Darwin headed to the sewage system. She tapped a finger at Boogie Max and pointed him the directions of the villains. "Now that I think about it, how come we didn't see any caged royals with the crowd?"
"Mattie's right." Alice agreed. "Normally, when people accuse you of something, they bring you before a huge crowd when you have no proof of your innocence..."
"Dudes!" Boogie Max lifted his eyes away from the binoculars. "I just saw Mr. Darwin pull up a copy of the map, only his had a red X on it and the riddles weren't on it!"
"But that can't be!" Art waved his phone. "Ours had riddles and no X on it!"
Willy rubbed his chin. "Unless..." He gasped. "Unless they had a fake map!" The others looked at him. "First, they had a copy of the Apothecary Manual without the pages. Then, they get a second copy of the book with pages that look nothing like the ones we have and we were the first to have a look at them. Not to mention that when Licene and Gladiola snooped into Mr. Darwin's office, they just happen to stumble upon a piece of paper that directs the location of the portal in this world and ours."
Alice seemed to have caught where he was going. "And who do we know who constantly does errands for Chef, 'failed' to collect Gladiola at the same time as the Trolls Apothecary Manual, and bought ink remover?"
They frowned in realization as their eyes hit the castle.
Later in the night
Now Gladiola couldn't tell what she hated the most: the fact she was stuck in a cage, unable to figure out what was going on, or the tantalizing smell of good food. For hours now, she heard the same sounds she used to hear whenever she passed the kitchen and the cooks were preparing meals (Gladiola wondered what happened to the current Chef). She didn't know how Dårlig did it, but he made enough racket for someone cooking so fast and pushing the doors to bring the food to the adults up in the dining hall all by himself. And God, the smell of the cooking food was more divine than anything she had smelled!
By the time it was what Gladiola presumed to be 10pm from what the kitchen clock said, she heard and smelled more cooking, only this time Dårlig sounded like he was taking more time to cook. Eventually, she heard the sound of pots clanging into the sink and burning ovens turning off.
"Feige, sweetie!" Dårlig called out. "Dinner's ready!"
Gladiola froze. Did that Bergen just call that Troll...sweetie? This time, she had to see it for herself. She laid on the floor and used her hair to cautiously pull up the bottom of the cloth so that she could see what was going on.
The kitchen table had been cleared of any cooking utensils and covered by a white tablecloth. Laying all over it were silver dishes and bowls full of roasted meat with caramel brown sauce, fancy arugula and olive salad dosed with ranch dressing, martini glasses with floating olives, and a wild berry custard pie. Two cups were full of black oil-colored liquid that came from a wine bottle the size of a Bergen hand. She didn't know what that last one was, but judging by the others' delicious scent, she could tell Dårlig nailed at cooking.
While Dårlig used a match to light a candle on the table and spit on the match before throwing it away, Feige hopped on the table. Gladiola saw that the Troll female had changed her attire to a sun orange wrap dress with a black choker necklace and matching sandals. Blue flowers were braided into her hair. Now that I think about it, Gladiola thought, why does her complexion look familiar?
"You really know how to make a feast, don't you, Bergy Wuggy?" Feige said in a teasing voice as she leaned on one of the glasses. Gladiola wanted to gag. Bergy Wuggy.
"I sure do." He held out his hand and she jumped on it. Dårlig pulled out what looked like bendy straws from his cooking shirt. "Any preferences?"
"The orange one." Feige grabbed it and forced it into one of the black liquid cups while Dårlig grabbed the spare. They both looked at the cups nervously. "So... how hard was it to make it?"
"I had to make it while I was cooking for those jackasses," Dårlig said bitterly. "A good two hours!"
"Gosh!"
"Don't get me started. I hope this is the last time I ever have to grind Troll gemstones!"
Gladiola froze as words echoed back in her head: a dozen of the Troll women killed themselves by ripping off their stomachs.
Troll females had Troll gemstones implanted in their stomachs since birth, even Gladiola had an indigo one pierced on her navel while she was being hatched in her flower. If a dozen had died from ripping off their stomachs and Dårlig just happened to have grinded Troll gemstones for his juice, that could only mean one thing.
He was the one who killed twelve Troll females by ripping off their Troll gemstones, which was fatal to them since pierced gemstones were leashed to the females' metabolism.
Gladiola continued to watch as the duo made a nervous cheers and took cautious sips. They both gagged at the first sips and gagged even more as they forced themselves into drinking the rest of it. The more they drank, the more their mouths begged to spit the stuff out. Twelve sips later, the cups were empty and Dårlig flunked them into the sink and filled his mouth with tap water while Feige took Troll-sized mouthfuls of the pie.
"God, that was foul!" Dårlig gagged.
"Eesh, you're telling me! I feel like I just drank water from the Inner Harbor!" Feige choked and looked at the black bottle. "How long before the transformation?"
Gladiola frowned. Transformation?
"A good seven hours." Dårlig took a deep breath and finally recovered from his gagging and went back to the table.
"And once they're dead, we can finally leave? Feige asked hopefully. "We'll finally be free?"
"It will happen, Feige." Dårlig knelt down so that his eyes could be at the same level as Feige. Gladiola was more confused then ever. "Those jackasses will die, I'll be immune and you'll be my height. By the time Chef, Creek, and Mr. Darwin die at dawn, we'll be running out of the palace and meet up with our correspondents. By this hour tomorrow, you and I will finally find our freedom in Villainapolis. Together."
Gladiola wasn't sure about most of the words she heard, but she definetly understood the words 'you'll be my height' and 'together'. The pieces were too quick to place together.
"It was you!" She said. They must have heard her because the sound of upcoming footsteps made Gladiola stand up and lower the curtain before Dårlig threw the curtain off the cage, exposing the little spy before the big Bergen and his small Troll friend sitting on his shoulder.
"It was us what?" Dårlig asked, his eyebrow frowning firmly at the princess.
"Don't play smart with me," Gladiola said. "Kings Gristle and Branch couldn't have burned the Night Soul Tree, not because they couldn't, but because nobody in Bergen Town knew where the Night Soul Tree was hidden. And I saw Chef, Creek, and Mr. Darwin head towards the Southern Sewage system with the map from the Troll Apothecary Manual, which I know can be incorrect because the last time I analyzed the map, it was directing here." She twirled her finger around the kitchen surrounding them before pointing at Dårlig and Feige. Their faces were beginning to pale up. "Conclusion. You gave them a fake map. You destroyed the Night Soul Tree. And did you honestly believe that I bought that cheesy speech you gave earlier? C'mon! Trolls committing suicide?"
"I did tell you it was a little bit over the top," Feige shrugged and told Dårlig in the ear.
"I know, but that's the only lie I could come up with!" Dårlig protested. He grumbly shook his head as he pulled a chair and sat on it, confronting the caged Gladiola. "So, you found out our little plan. What are you going to do? Tell everyone?"
"Warn me in advance if you tell Chef first," Feige told Gladiola. "Last thing I want is to hear her fifteen-minute long lecture on the Troll eating balanced diet."
"Uh...no, and yuck!" Gladiola leaned on one of the bars. "I won't tattle."
Dårlig and Feige sighed in relief.
"...Because details still aren't clear. I mean, I just don't understand how two teenagers like you work for such adult crooks to the point of wanting to kill them." She pointed at Dårlig. "You've got cooking skills and ninja-throwing knives skills and you hate working for Chef." She turned to Feige. "Well... for you I'm actually surprised you managed to live long enough without the threat of being eaten by a Bergen."
"Believe me, she lives under the threat every day!" Dårlig spat. "Every day, Chef tries to lure me into eating Feige because she wants me to believe that eating Trolls is the only thing towards happiness, but I just can't eat Feige! She's been my childhood friend ever since she hatched from her flower!" He took a deep breath and out of nowhere, he pulled out a miniature mandolin small enough to rest on his lap. Gladiola recognized it as the mandolin the current royal chef kept in the kitchens when he felt the need to take a break and do a little music. Dårlig plucked on the strings until he got into a quick beat.
Dårlig: Call me pessimistic, but it's an ugly world we live in.
Tyrants always have their slaves, and the boss just has to make things worse from within.
She says lil' Bergens should play less than they chew on their own skin
And that if you're not your own boss, than you can never really win.
Call me judgmental, but the boss never let me play with the other kids.
She says lil' Bergens like me should stay in the kitchen to do her bidding.
Scrub 'em floors, clean the dishes, go chop and roast some pigs,
But never go outside to make friends 'cause I'm forbidding.
Feige pulled out a tambourine from her hair and hit on it in a military march fashion.
Feige: Call me silly, but I hate being the perfect little girl.
I don't want others to tell me when I can sing or dance a twirl.
The boss says I should never fight because I'm a Troll as fragile as a pearl,
His comments on how I'm bound to get eaten makes me want to hurl.
Both: So away we go, far from here and there.
Our little collaboration may be strange but we don't care,
You and I see eye to eye and that's just fair.
So away we go, far from here and there.
We take our relationship like a perfect pair
And pursue our dreams by leaving this nightmare.
Dårlig: But the caged bird can't escape as long as there are still cats.
The bosses must be gone and we'll take care of that.
Feige: The Night Soul Tree is the solution to this non-debatable chat.
You heal, I grow, and they go die like rats.
Both: If you think we're being cruel
Than you'd better go back to school
Because we plan to put an end to this game of pool
And make our merry way, you silly little fool.
So away we go, far from here and there.
Our little collaboration may be strange but we don't care,
You and I see eye to eye and that's just fair.
So away we go, far from here and there.
We take our relationship like a perfect pair
And pursue our dreams by leaving this nightmare.
A second after their song was over and they put the instruments away, Gladiola found herself clapping her hands. "I must admit, you guys nailed it when it comes to the bad guy song," Gladiola admitted. "I rate it with four stars and a half out of five."
"Aw, thanks!" Dårlig straightened his shirt. "You know, it's actually the first time we do a..."
"Hey, wait a minute!" Feige jumped off Dårlig's shoulder to face Gladiola, making the latter stiffen in her cage. "Why'd we lose half a point?"
"Look, I get Chef and Co treat you like abused slaves and you want to run away. No lie, I actually find your strange collaboration cute and all... though I still don't understand how you guys managed to get past the friend zone..."
"Fifteen years of growing up alone in the same cramped bedroom with no adult bothering to care for you than to merely boss you around, it helps to connect." Dårlig got up and fetched the bottle containing the black liquid. "Eventually we found out that Chef and Creek would have no use of us after they dispose of your parents and the Bergen royals, which meant that Mr. Darwin could sell us off as slaves to the next sorcerers' convention."
"So naturally, what's better than dogs biting back at the dog snatchers with cold revenge?" Feige smirked.
"Let me guess." Gladiola arched an eyebrow. "You stole the maps from the two Troll Apothecary Manual copies during your trips to the Shop of Mystics. During both trips, you ripped the first pages and hid it while claiming to Chef that the manual came like this, and instead of capturing me at AURA like you asked, you stole the second manual so that you could use ink remover to damage the writings..."
"And forge a false duplicate of the map, misleading the brutes to the south of Bergen Town." Dårlig caressed Feige's hair smoothly, which caused her to blush. "If a Troll can make scrapbooks out of anything, Feige has quite the talent in forgery." He put the bottle down for Gladiola to see. The liquid moved just like blood veins, it weirded her out. "The Night Soul Tree was already withering when Feige and I found it. Deadly powers don't mean that you can't die from a lack of sunlight and water after centuries of being locked away. We only managed to extract this much before burning it..."
"So you framed my father and Gristle?" Gladiola scowled.
"Well we couldn't just go around saying that we did it," Feige said.
"And my stripped gladiola?"
Dårlig rolled his and bent down. His fingers picked on one of the tiles until he lifted it and pushed it aside. The princess felt her hair tingle and her eyes widen as a glow came out of the tile and Dårlig pulled out a potted plant.
"You sneaky trickster!" She said to compliment him as he revealed the true stripped gladiola. Her nose took a large sniff. "I can smell its nectar... Wait, if this is the stripped gladiola, than what was the flower corpse that you showed your boss?"
"Eh." Feige shrugged. "When Mr. Darwin gave us the night off, we snuck to one of the arts and crafts shops in Baltimore, bought a fake gladiola flower, painted it with glittery paint matching your hair... Easy peasy. Did you really think we're really heartless enough to destroy something that can destroy Chef?"
Gladiola was stunned, but before she could say anything, Dårlig held his hand up.
"Look, PG..."
"PG?" Gladiola was baffled.
"Yes, your name's a mouthful. Look, PG, here's the gig: I'm appearing as an extremist in this little plot that Feige and I are developing, but I'm not crazy enough to plunge this town into despair after Chef already forced me to damage the Troll Tree to support her dramatic return. And you got to admit, even if you beat those jackasses, they'll just come back."
Gladiola bit her lip. The Bergen teen had made a point. During the last three decades and eight years, Chef got banished twice and Creek once and yet they still came back. This time, their status of never returning had to become permanent. The princess felt like it wasn't right at first to solve the solution through execution, but since they we're talking about a Bergen who tried to make Trolls a main dish and a Troll who cowardly betrayed his own race and a wizard who seemed to be doing things for his sheer amusement, death seemed like the only option. "So what do you want from me?" She sat down in a Lotus position.
"Here's the plan, PG." Dårlig tapped his fingers while Feige jumped back on his shoulder. "Tomorrow morning, everyone's going to be forced to watch the royal execution in the royal dining hall where the last Trollstice took place. Chef, Creek, and Mr. Darwin will be giving speeches. While they do that, Feige and I will give them cups full of the remaining Night Soul sap disguised as black wine and blackberry juice. They'll call a toast and drink from them all at once.
"The poison will have an immediate effect on their evil veins, and once it happens, you burst out of your cage and use your Torch of Happiness against them via superhero style, save the entire kingdoms and your friends, and as you become queen, you give us a friendly banishment while we sneak off to join our connections and leave Bergen Town, bound to never return!" As he gave Gladiola the verbal description, Feige showed her the scrapbook display, which was pretty large since the Troll actually managed to do her scrapbooking with 3D figures. "Sounds good, PG?"
Gladiola rubbed her chin. "I'm not crazy about murder... but as long as I save my family and the people and you guys finally get your freedom, I guess there's no harm."
"As long as the world goes back to cupcakes and rainbows, we're good, right?" Feige threw the scrapbook back in her hair.
"I suppose."
"It ain't a pretty thing, but sometimes heroes need to make sacrifices for the good of others." Dårlig and Feige handed out a finger and a hand respectively close enough to touch the cage bars. "Deal?"
Gladiola looked unsurely at the finger and hand one last time before giving in and deciding to shake them together at once to seal her people's fate.
She really should have checked to make sure that they weren't crossing their fingers behind her back as they sealed the deal.
Minutes later, deep within the layers of the castle
It was a good thing that the bad guys hadn't thought of giving the local castle janitor the same bonding as his kin. For someone so old, the Bergen actually managed to be anywhere in the castle that people kept mistaking him for a ghost, which cost him quite an amount of lost salary. Fortunately, after stumbling upon him and bribing him with some of Mattie's jeweled metal plates, he guided them through the catacombs of the castle. He really knew the place like the back of his wrinkled hand.
The catacombs themselves were scary. Unlike the crooked buildings of Bergen Town, the walls and floors of these foundations were made of straight flat blue bricks and the ceiling was held up by stone statues of Bergens, commoner and royal, enjoying themselves as they stuffed small Trolls in their mouths. Alice used her flashlight to light the way. Finally, after twenty minutes of walking through this labyrinth, the janitor stopped.
"We're a good thirty feet right below the royal kitchen," he said. "If what you're saying is true, then the Night Soul Tree's hideout must be in the area."
"Or at least the passage." Willy started putting his hands all over the wall nearest him. "You know the place better than we do. What part of the kitchen am I currently under?"
"The door leading to the hallway," the janitor said flatly. They continued to scan the area by rubbing their hands on the walls or even poking the statues. Art even weirded out when he saw a statue of a Bergen in the middle of chewing a Troll. They really needed to revise their architecture.
Mattie touched all over a bunch of bricks until she knocked on a couple and stopped. She knocked again and listened. "Hey guys? Why does this sound hollow?" They gathered by the wall. Alice handed her flashlight to the Bergen janitor and used both hands to tap on the bricks. "This whole area is hollow! I wonder what's inside it?"
"We're in the area just under the kitchen's fireplace," the Bergen janitor said.
"You mean that we have to go down the chimney to find the Night Soul Tree?" Boogie Max asked. "How ironic."
Suddenly, the light coming from the flashlight turned off, leaving them in the dark. "Hey, why'd you..." Before Alice could finish her question, something grabbed her and the others like a rope holding onto cattle. The sound of moving bricks was heard and the humans found themselves being thrown into a chute. As they screamed, the moving bricks were heard again, and they fell and fell until they crash landed onto a pile of ashes and burned leftovers of what once used to be a tree.
"Is everyone alright?" Willy shouted.
Alice coughed a bunch of leaves out of her mouth. "I'm fine! Gag!"
"Dudes, hang on! I got a lighter!" In the dark, Boogie Max managed to flick a flame on. Art handed him the nearest thick branch and Boogie Max burned the top with his lighter, creating a torch. Once they got off their landing area, he bent down to light it with his torch, burning it up like a bonfire and revealing that they were in a dark chamber made of black stones and a ground covered in dirt. No exits could be seen aside from the opening on the ceiling that they fell through.
"Splendid," Mattie muttered. "How the Hell are we going to get out?"
Metal creaking and muffled shouts were heard behind them. They turned and their light showed a group of people. Four of them were Bergens, one a male with an outfit far cleaner and friendlier than Chef's and three that were short but wore crowns on their heads, and each was chained to the wall. Their three companions were by far in the worst condition: chained to extend their limbs in an attempt to rip them off and their Troll hair tied together in one knot to prevent them from using them. And next to them, chained to them, was Licene. All had cloths covering their mouths, muffling their shouts.
"Licene!" Alice was the first to run at them. One by one, she removed the gags from their mouths and used one of her trinkets to pick on their locks, freeing them one by one.
"Thank you!" They all said.
"You must be Gladiola's parents and the Bergen monarchs!" Willy realized before turning to the Bergen in a cooking uniform. "But who are you?"
"The current Chef of the royal family," he said as he rubbed his wrists.
"We must hurry!" Branch helped his wife get up. "Gladiola's in danger!"
"Gee, you don't say." Art rolled his eyes back at the opening. "And how the Hell are we supposed to get up there before Chef decides to..." He paused and gave everyone a cold, stunned look. He waved a finger at the royals and Licene. "Uh, guys? If...you're here... than what does that mean for the execution?"
"It means that Gladiola has been tricked!" Licene said. "Chef and Creek aren't the real bad guys! Dårlig and Feige are!"
"You assumed it to?" Willy asked. "Because we figured out that they might be up to something since they hoarded the real maps and...OK, can somebody please tell me what's going on?"
"Yeah, and why are you all in this dump?" Boogie Max asked.
"After Dårlig and Feige kidnapped me, Chef and Creek sent them to Bergen Town to locate the Night Soul Tree while at the same time getting everyone to turn themselves over unless they wanted Dårlig to slice my neck," Licene said. "But Dårlig played clever and had me pretend to be Gladiola, thus making it easier for them to surrender..."
"I hate to interrupt, Licene, but how can Dårlig have you pretend to be Gladiola?" Willy pinched his nose. "She's barely the size of your fist!"
"Feige is a polyringler!" Peppy said worriedly. "I don't how she managed to learn that technique abandoned by our people, but she can use her hair to change her appearance and others!"
Alice's eyes widened. "Trolls can shapeshift?"
"If they can make wigs big enough for a Bergen to wear and hide them, a polyringler can easily cover her body with her hair and use it to take another's appearance," Poppy said. "If she presses harder, she can even have her hair camouflage her into someone taller. But it's impossible for anyone to master such a technique and yet Feige goes as far as to use her own hair to shapeshift people other than herself!"
"Feige jumped on my head and used her polyringler talent to shape me into Gladiola as well as making Dårlig look like Chef for their scam," Licene said, "and once we got gathered into the kitchen, Feige transformed some of the Bergen cooks into duplicates of us and she and Dårlig took us down the fireplace..."
"Where they chained us and prevented us from doing anything while they took the remaining Night Soul Tree sap and burned it and then left us here!" Branch jumped onto Licene's shoulder, which didn't bother her, since she got used to carrying Trolls on her shoulder.
"We'd better hurry," Licene said. "Apparently Dårlig and Feige want Chef, Creek, and Mr. Darwin to be killed during the execution and make a run for it!"
"What will happen to Gladiola?" Willy asked. "I mean, what could Dårlig and Feige want from her during this... lackey revolution?"
"Something terrible," King Peppy said as he looked at the remaining Night Soul Tree ashes burning away. "I never thought I'd live to see the day when one of my ancestors' worst creations would perish. The Night Soul Tree was confectioned to poison Bergens, grow Trolls to the formers' sizes, and rarely make Bergens immune to the poison."
"I still don't understand how the poison can also make Bergens immune to it if it's already supposed to kill them," Poppy admitted to her father.
"According to the Troll Apothecary Manual, a Bergen can be immune to the poison if he has a Troll's love or if they are related to the Bergen Chef who put an end to Prince Aster's madness," Peppy explained. "Ever since the incident, the Bergen Chef and his descendants were the only Bergens capable of being immune to the tree's poison even by touching it. But during my first days of reigns, I discovered a loophole written in a tablet hidden in the Wall of Kings. Aster was smart enough to assume the possibility of a Bergen being crazy enough to be immune, so he added a severing spell. If whoever in the Bergen Chef's family drinks the Night Soul Tree sap with the grinded gemstones of twelve female Trolls and his own tears, not only will he guarantee himself permanent immunity, but he will sever his relationship with his family's older generation and thus damn them with death the moment the Torch of Happiness' flames burn them."
"Wait." Willy stopped him. "Are you saying that Dårlig might have drunk the sap and is tricking Gladiola into murdering Chef..." He gasped in horror.
"Dårlig isn't just Chef's lackey! He's HER SON!"