MoonChild
Chapter One: Lily
King Peppy's pod was a mess of hair, scrapbooks and old maps. Branch couldn't believe the former pop leader had ended up being someone so disorganized. It gave him the chills just to walk in there for his daily duties.
Queen Poppy had kindly asked him to help her dad with his yearly cleanup. It had reached the point of the king almost being noticed as an accumulator and the weight of the pod was responsible for a new crack on the tree branch where it was hanging. The teal troll had noticed that it was just a matter of time – and some more hair deliveries – for it to come down in a terrible accident.
The heroic troll who led the infamous Escape from the Bergens and saved their civilization was nearly senile, Branch made a mental note. He was about three time his age so… about seventy five to eighty years old. He knew older and saner trolls around the village. Perhaps the stress of being King had deteriorated his health through the years.
"King Peppy this is the last hair trash I promise." Branch tried to calm his future father-in-law when the old man started whimpering at the discarded green hair that he was planning on using… for something… someday. "Then we can move to the old scrapbooks and see if there's any that is suitable for a library, what do you think?"
"My beloved scrapbooks? In the library exposed to everyone?" He was scandalized by the mere thought of it.
"Well," Branch used the best psychology tricks he knew to convince the old king. "Your audacious adventures are all described there. And you are a great king. It's only fair that your stories became public. You know… from stories to history. To be studied and all that."
King Peppy's chest puffed up with pride. He even smoothed down his mustache with his fingers, temporarily lost in self-praise thoughts. Branch took the minutes of distraction to open up some old boxes where he found pictures and even older maps. After the World Tour, he could only imagine the things the old King kept to himself to protect his dear daughter.
"Nothing from that box can be discarded." The box was abruptly snatched from Branch's hands and its contents went flying everywhere. "Oh… cupcakes."
"It's okay, I'll get them. I wasn't planning on discarding anything without your consent." Branch offered a smile, making the king visibly relax.
"I'm sorry, my boy." He also bent down, with great difficulty and cracking a few bones, to pick up one shiny ring that immediately got Branch's attention. "These are very precious memories."
"I can see that." The teal troll was really curious about the jewel, but he figured it was probably from Poppy's mom, which, as far as he knew, nobody in the village had personally known. "It's a beautiful ring." He complimented, testing the waters to see if the king would open up.
"It was in the family for ages." The orange troll half smiled. He tried to slip it in his finger, but it didn't even go halfway down. "I keep forgetting to show it to Poppy." He gave it to Branch, so he could inspect the delicate object. It was engraved with a small coat of arms… he could barely identify the animals in there. Perhaps an eagle... and a wolf? On top was a beautiful pink stone.
"Is it a King's ring?" Branch asked, admiring its beauty.
"Queen's, actually." King Peppy laughed. "My mother was the last one to wear it."
Branch wondered why Poppy's grandma wore it and her mother didn't. If she was married to the King she was queen herself, wasn't she?
With the wise understanding of an old man, King Peppy knew Branch had some wandering thoughts as the young troll grew silent, staring blankly at the ring. He reached inside the box, picking up an old photo album and flipping a few pages until he stopped at an old and faded portrait.
A lady troll was holding an egg with a wide smile. She was just like Poppy and Branch smiled. Finally he had met his girlfriend's mom. And she looked like a piece of work with a royal mantle over her shoulders and a crown full of jewels on her head. She looked more majestic than their king himself.
"Poppy looks exactly like her." Branch smiled, giving the picture back so King Peppy could safely put it away. "Well," He sighed, straightening his back. "I'll get these scrapbooks to the library."
"It is quite early to mention it…" King Peppy said just before Branch stepped out of his new clean and organized pod. "… but if you plan on proposing to my daughter, you can use that ring."
"Uh!" The redness and heat rose to Branch's cheeks.
"I advise you to take a long time to get there." The orange troll's expression darkened, his eyes were suddenly looking threatening and Branch gulped.
"I… I… thanks? Gotta go." The poor teal troll quickly jumped out of the pod, using his hair to hold himself. He could swear he heard an evil chuckle right after safely landing on the ground outside.
"Here's your healthy checkup exams, Queen Poppy." Dr. Moonbloom said, stamping down her name and medical register on the last paper she read. Poppy smiled happily seeing that she was completely fine.
The doctor adjusted her eyeglasses and stood up from her chair, opening up a safe that was placed inside the hospital clinic's pod to add the queen's exams to the file she had stored since she was born. A queen's medical file was top secret and nobody aside from the village's doctor had the authorization to get them.
"I feel obliged to inform you that you're taking too long to go through the… gynecological routine."
"Oh…" Poppy giggled to hide her embarrassment. "That's sort of why I asked for the exams."
"Right. Say no more." Dr. Moonbloom sat down behind her desk again and fetched some boxes from a drawer. "Take one every day and in a month you should be safe."
"Okay… a month." Poppy nervously hid the box in her hair, looking at the door. She knew Dr. Moonbloom was one of her father's best friends, being the few older trolls of their generation that weren't eaten by a Bergen. The queen hoped she wouldn't let it slip during one of her afternoon tea with the king that his daughter was finally planning on having sexual intercourse. It would be very embarrassing… especially if she used her dramatic voice to announce it.
"After your situation is taken care of…" The doctor said, surprising the Queen just after she stood up to leave. "Return so I can have some… deep examinations done."
That couldn't have been more humiliating, Poppy flushed as she walked towards the cotton candy shop. There was no way she couldn't think that she had a 'situation', as was put so smoothly by the doctor. She needed some sugar to restore her bright humor.
"Queen Poppy!" Biggie was just getting his own cotton candy when she showed up. "What a lovely surprise to see you."
"Hey, Biggie. Hello, Mr. Dinkles." She petted the yellow worm who 'meep-ed' in return.
"We're just getting a snack on our way to the library." Biggie explained, waiting for Poppy to get a big white and fluffy amount of sugar for herself.
"Oh, did the new scrapbooks get delivered already?" She asked in excitement. Her dad had been hiding adventures and she was dying to read them. It was the best idea to ask Branch to help him clean his pod. King Peppy wouldn't say no to the survivalist.
"I saw Branch walking in there with a pile of them not long ago." Biggie cheered, seeing the queen's eyes tinkle just to mention her boyfriend's name. She got a bite of cotton candy and the combination of tastes and names made her rocket herself to a sweet daydream. "Oh dear… I've always known you've got it bad, but now it feels like you've got your prize from all of the years of waiting."
"Oh, Biggie." Poppy blushed. "It's not like I knew my feelings."
"But you never gave up on him." Smidge joined the conversation, grinning from ear to ear at her queen's lovesick eyes. "Do you remember that big gift you were carrying? It was how I helped you for the first time."
"Yeah, what was it, anyway?" Biggie asked, realizing they never got to know much about Poppy's attempts to get on Branch's good side..
"A bed." Poppy answered, looking down at her cotton candy. It had been several years ago and she was so desperate to be friends with that grumpy troll that she didn't know how to make him see her. She had tried many scrapbooks, many invitations and all of them ended up stepped over or torn apart right in front of her. At least the bed got accepted. She had left it by the trapdoor and when she checked on it the next day it was gone. Several years later, when he finally accepted her inside his bunker, she was glad to see it in his room.
"Oh, so thoughtful." Biggie said, hugging Mr. Dinkles close.
"Oh my Guh, I always thought that was an excessively huge present and it makes sense now."
"Our queen is so persistent." Satin walked into the conversation with her Siamese sister, Chenille grinning at her side. "If I got rejected that many times I'd totally date someone else."
"And altruistic. I mean, she gave him love all those years without even expecting to be corresponded." Biggie added more spice to the mix, making Poppy feel uncomfortable. She had never seen the attempts to befriend Branch as any of those things they were saying. She just… wanted to be part of his world, somehow.
"Do you think they are soulmates? That would be so romantic." Chenille squealed, getting Guy Diamond's attention to join the group. They all walked towards the library and Poppy felt like they weren't walking fast enough.
"Guys…" Poppy called just before opening the library doors. Her friends stared at her with knowing grins. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't talk like that in front of Branch."
"Uh, too rebellious to talk about his feelings?" Guy said dramatically.
"We're not... Ready to discuss it in public." Poppy explained and her friends were visibly disappointed.
When they walked inside the library, a different atmosphere fell among the Snack Pack. They had been dying to tease Branch about his hidden feelings for the queen. The teal troll greeted them with a smile when they were spotted. He was above a ladder, organizing the books and scrapbooks from the top shelf to open up some space on the King Peppy's adventures in the shelf below.
"Uh, look at all those new adventures!" Biggie immediately picked up a green covered scrapbook. "It's that one about the Peril Patch!"
"I've always wondered how the King got so many adventures if we were imprisoned at the troll tree for decades!" Smidge asked, checking two different books.
"He always escaped to find help." Guy explained.
"Hey." Poppy left her friends with their new entertainment and walked towards her boyfriend, shyly holding her hands behind her back and with a short expectantly smile.
"Hello." He smiled back, wondering if he should climb down to greet her. He avoided hugging her when there was an audience.
"Thank you for helping my dad."
"My pleasure." He smiled down at her and silence fell once again. He had a weighting awareness that the others were paying attention to their conversation, so he cleared his throat and returned to the books. Poppy awkwardly looked away and picked a scrapbook to flip until he was done with his work. It would take a while; after all, he had to read everything so he could rate them before opening up for everybody.
Trying to take the longer he could, Branch opened a book that was really dusty. It was on the history section and he had moved it to an almost unreachable height. He looked at the first page, not really concentrating in what he was supposed to be reading. His girlfriend sat on the floor, leaning against the bookshelves, engrossed in an adventure about wild cats.
He turned a page and briefly stared at it before turning another. A ring caught his eye and he returned to the previous page with a small curious frown. Six rings with similar coats of arms. All of them had eagles and each had a different animal and a different gemstone. All of them surrounded a bigger ring with a simple white stone in the middle of it.
Six Strings… six rings… it wasn't difficult making that association, even because each ring had the same string color. He wondered what meant the white one in the middle. Was there another tribe? What was King Peppy hiding this time?
Branch quickly hid the book in his hair and went for another one he had previously looked at. He was hiding that one in a part of the library where kids couldn't reach, but he changed his mind. The adventure on how the King met Poppy's mother got hidden inside his hair as well so he could read it later, in the privacy of his bunker.
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
The colorful book couldn't be more surprising. With the steaming hot coffee completely forgotten by his side, Branch turned the pages and the knowledge washed over him like an icy water bucket.
The story had started pretty enough, like it usually did. Pop trolls were incarcerated in the troll tree in Bergen Town, and the king was done watching his subjects being eaten day by day. The community had been reduced considerably and he was done hiding the children from the gloomy monsters.
King Peppy knew that the only way to save his people was to cross the deep forest, to fight unknown perils until he could reach the heart of Troll's Kingdom and beg for help to free everyone. He needed permission to get another place for Pop without invading other trolls' territory..
King Peppy had left Mags Gumdrop in charge until he returned. To Branch's surprise, his own Grandma, Rosiepuff had been a great help while the King was away, cooking food for the hidden trolls inside the hollow tree trunk while taking care of her toddler grandson and even more surprisingly, he read that King Peppy had taken a troll with him; the head of pop trolls defenses: Pine. His dad. A honored general. Wow.
The story had become more entrancing as Branch read. His light bugs turned on one by one as the night fell. He checked his hug watch and saw that he still had three hug-times to go until it was time for his daily visit to the queen's pod to go through the next day's agenda.
Turning his attention back to the scrapbook, he saw his dad was exactly how his primitive baby memories painted him. With teal skin, bright purple hair and nose and he wore a brown armor, matching King's Peppy's. It felt like he had just opened up a treasure chest. Branch finally could follow a real adventure of his dad, someone who - until that moment - felt like a stranger, like someone he used to know.
Both male trolls had difficulties in their journey, coming across fire bugs, hungry mountains and a very hot lava river that made Branch unconsciously map the path in his mind, presuming they had made it through Volcano Rock City until they would reach their destination. Also, they arrived at a yellow sand beach after another day walking until they stopped at a port.
It came as a surprise, once again. A small dialogue indicated they had to wait for the night to fall until a boat came to take them to the Moon Island. His hug watch tinkled, he still had two hours to go. Branch resumed the former King's diary.
The night fell and the joyful humid air filled our lungs with a familiar happiness. I had only visited the Moon Island once to be introduced to Her Highness. I couldn't see her, but the sound of her voice was so bewitching that I never forgot it.
The boat came when Pine and I had finished dinner. I got worried about my usual sea sickness; a King had to look strong to his general, right? The boatman was the same from years ago. A small troll with a mustache and thick eyebrows. Funny fellow.
"Are you sure you want to cross the sea without an invitation?" He asked, seeing that ring I wore on a chain weren't glowing, but I nodded. I had to risk it. My people depended on it. He allowed us inside and the boat was pushed off the shore, navigating with the stream that slowly transformed from liquid to vapor until we felt like we were sailing in clouds.
"Nobody's allowed to see Her Highness in years." The boatman said, with his back turned. I exchanged a glance with Pine and he just sat down and crossed his arms, grumpily, like he used to when he was concentrating on my safety. "Not since she matured." Yes... There were tales about her beauty all over Troll's Kingdom.
Beautiful and deadly. I heard from Thrash that his brother had fallen for her and went to ask for her hand. He was the rightful leader of the Rock Trolls so he assumed his high position wouldn't be an issue. But apparently she had given him a chance to conquer her heart: if he could decipher her name in a night, she'd be his, if he couldn't… well… I heard he never came back so Thrash became the new Rock leader.
The waves broke in glittering foam and we safely anchored before getting out. The Moon Island was completely white living up to the name it was given. Pearls hung from glass trees and white grass formed a path that seemed carved by the stars.
The castle where the forbidden Empress lived in was pure silver and marble. My breath was taken away like the first time I had stepped there. The Royal Guard dressed in white uniforms just moved their eyes as Pine and I crossed the faint rainbow bridge to walk into the Prime Minister's office, right before the Royal Chambers' entrance.
The old administrator she had called himself the Prime Minister and he was the one who arranged the meetings with the Empress. Actually, I heard he was the only one allowed to see her aside from her personal maid.
"I wonder if she's as beautiful as the tales." I whispered to Pine. I wanted to sound funny and doubtful, but I noticed my voice only sounded like I truly was: in awe.
"My King, I advise you to take matters as practical as they should be, if you pardon my forwardness. The longer we stay, more trolls will be eaten." Pine said and I couldn't agree more.
The Prime Minister did listen to my tale with the heart. He wasn't shocked, but he stood up from his enormous desk and walked out of the room to consult with the Empress. I was surprised and so was my loyal general.
From behind his desk was a glass window that allowed us to see the throne room. Two Royal Guards were spotted and a white screen was unfolded, blocking the view completely.
Just when I thought I wouldn't get the chance to talk the Prime Minister returned to escort us to a hearing with Her Highness. The room was small and cozy, with fluffy white mats all over and two soft pillows in front of the screen where we were instructed to sit on.
The sound of doors opening made my heart beat faster. Her perfume was the first indication that she had graced me with her presence. The air seemed lighter. I can't exactly explain, but it seemed like she cleaned the heaviness in my soul, like she scanned my deepest fears of extinction and soothed exactly where it hurt, like a healing kiss in a scraped knee.
"I hear you're Peppy, the leader of Pop Trolls." Her voice was like the sweetest music. I felt like my body was floating.
"I am, your grace." I said. Should I have called her grace? I was so insecure. She sounded so young.
"And you've come to ask to move from the tree?" She continued and I hummed my agreement.
"There are mostly children left, your grace." I continued, sure that information would make her give full consent.
"I cannot command the Bergens to stop hunting you, but I can allow you to move your people. The Pop Trolls have my permission to move to the forest." Her voice was so angelic… I was hypnotized. "You are free to move around as long as you don't invade the other tribes' territory."
I could see a faint shadow of pink behind the screen. I had never seen such bright color. She stood up and I saw how small and frail she seemed. If I was standing, too, she'd barely reach my shoulders. Right then I was sure I was in love with someone I didn't even see.
Pine didn't seem affected by her beauty as I was. Maybe because he had been in love before, maybe because he had a family or maybe because his love story had a tragic end. He did notice when I stopped acting like myself.
"Your grace…" I was surprised when my voice failed. She was already halfway out of the room, but stopped and waited for me to say it. "... would you allow me to see you?"
"My King…" Pine motioned to stand up to stop me, but the Royal Guards took a step forward with their hands ready to draw their swords.
"They call you King…" I could hear the smile on her lips. She sounded intrigued. "You leaders are surprisingly pretentious."
"I beg your pardon, your grace." I said, suddenly agreeing with her. "I never realized how insulting it sounded." Her pink form turned. I heard her dress rustling and I could almost picture the light clothes she was wearing.
"You sound sincere." She said and I almost melted. "I'll give you the same chance I give every suitor. If you figure my name before sunrise, I'll be yours."
I didn't have to ask what would happen if I didn't succeed. I knew I would figure her name out.
Pine had a deep frown and the guards left us alone. We were allowed to walk around the Island and ask questions. I've never seen my general so angry, but I didn't care. I was recklessly in love.
The Empress retreated to her chambers and as soon as her soothing figure vanished I felt worried about the task I was given.
"My friend..." Pine hissed at my side as we left the castle to walk around the gardens. I knew he was angry. He rarely called me like that unless we were drunk in a bar. "... we came here to save our friends and family and now we might just have lost our King!"
"She's right." I corrected my general. "We were never kings and queens. We call ourselves that, but we're just leaders of our musical tribes. We're not Royalty. We don't deserve that title."
"That's how the leaders have been called for generations." Pine retorted. "You've earned that kind of respect."
The garden was filled with blooming moonflowers. We walked in silence, trying to figure out how to decipher the Empress's name. The best idea was to ask around or bribe someone into telling us, but I knew it wouldn't be playing fair.
"If I don't make it…" Pine whipped his head at me with a horrified expression. "I want you to be Pop Troll's King."
We heard sounds of scissors and followed it. An old man was cutting down bushes that had outgrown their square shape. A gardener seemed to be exactly who I needed to question to get a small hint of the Empress's name.
I followed him around and he acted like he didn't see or heard me. Pine had mentioned that probably they all were used to suitors' impossible tasks so he stubbornly ignored me. I was about to give up my questioning when I caught sight of a marble statue in the far end of the white gardens.
It was a statue hall with several sculpted trolls. Beautiful ladies with crowns and heavenly dresses. Their names were engraved by their feet: Gardenia, Camellia, Rose, Daisy, Jasmine… and they all had the same title: Empress of Music.
"It must be a flower's name." Pine voiced my conclusion.
But there were so many flowers, what were the chances of getting it right? I wondered if I could list them down to her.
"I should give up…" I said and Pine silently agreed. If I stopped there I could walk out alive and move my people to a better place.
"You should…" I heard my general's relieved voice just as I looked up and focused on one window coming from the only room that was lit. Something shouted in my heart that it where she was.
"Maybe I could steal a glance before going." Pine panicked and I quickly grabbed the silver bricks, finding a way to support my weight up in a dangerous climb. My safety paranoid friend almost had a nervous breakdown.
It wasn't an easy climb. I dropped several feet a few times, but my heart was set on seeing her. I had to know how she looked. It was a matter of life or death.
And I couldn't have chosen a better moment to jump on her balcony. She was standing in front of a full body mirror with fireflies around her, helping her see the knots while she brushed her wavy pink hair. She was a sight from heaven, confirming all tales about her blinding beauty.
Her dress had come off in layers, they were spread on the floor, by her feet, with bigger pieces of triangular fabrics on the ground and smaller triangles on top, closing towards the center where she stood. The soft pink layers around her made her look like a flower herself.
I loudly gasped and she turned around in fright, staring at me straight in the eyes. She was about to scream but I cut her off with a certainty I had never felt before.
"Lily…" I saw as her eyes widened and I knew I had got it right. "Your name is Lily."
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Another Hug time. Branch looked down at his wrist once again. He barely had an hour to finish the tale and what a tale it was! It changed everything he knew about their history!
His dad had been just like him! Safety nerd, a guardian, a bodyguard, a friend… everything he felt like he was to Poppy. It looked like the fruit didn't fall far from the tree.
The story continued with a small wedding and an Empress that seemed to quickly fall in love with the leader of Pop Trolls despite the initial resistance. Her devotion to their relationship progressed giving them both a taste of Heaven. He had completely forgotten about the troll tree, about the children who were hiding in the hollow trunk.
It was his dad who continuously tried to make King Peppy remember that he was supposed to go back home. Time seemed to go too fast on that Island and as the months passed the newlyweds were graced with an egg. It was when everything changed.
The Empress seemed to grow scared and got so protective of her husband and egg that not even the Prime Minister was allowed near them anymore. The last time he was spotted near was to have a Royal Photograph taken, to portrait the generations of the Dynasty.
"It's going to be a girl." She had said to King Peppy one night. "Her name is Poppy."
King Peppy was surprised at how sure his wife sounded and the words that followed described how she stood in the balcony, bathing herself in moonlight and looking up at the sky as if defying it to come down and face her.
"I'm going to be punished." She explained, taking King Peppy by surprise. "I wasn't supposed to fall for you."
"I don't understand."
"Being Empress of Music is a heavy burden." She vaguely explained.
"I don't get how you're going to be punished for having a family!" King Peppy was seriously confused and Pine was right there, at the door, listening carefully and already tracing an escape plan.
"My child wasn't supposed to be hybrid, she was supposed to be pure." She looked intensely at the bright full Moon standing jealously in the starry sky. "Like I was … like my mother before me… like my grandma…"
King Peppy was silent. Why wouldn't she stop looking at the sky?
"Take Poppy and go back to the Troll Tree. Move to a safer place." Lily said, getting off the balcony.
"Come with me and hide!" King Peppy held the egg protectively in his arms, but he would never understand what it was all about. He would never know what he was supposed to run and hide from. She gently smiled at her husband and opened her arms, taking her precious egg and showering it with kisses. She wasn't going to meet her daughter.
"I'll leave her a gift." Lily said, giving the egg back to her husband.
The next pages were filled with tear stains and some of the characters had fallen out, unglued from all the wetness. Branch couldn't quite figure how King Peppy made it back to the tree, with Poppy already hatched, revealing to be a beautiful pink baby.
The last page wrapped the tale with his father sacrificing himself to get King Peppy and Princess Poppy home safely and a beautiful white Lily flower blooming brightly in the Moon Garden.
"Branch?" He heard his girlfriend knocking on the trapdoor. He snapped out of the story and closed the scrapbook quickly, hiding it in the first drawer he found. The elevator moved down with a grinding noise and Branch panicked. He had lost track of time. She had knocked because she was worried. "Hey…" She said quietly, walking in the lounge room, seeing him sitting down on his armchair.
"Hey…" He replied, licking his lips, as if it would give him time.
"Are you okay?" She approached, seeing that he looked a little pale.
"Can you…?" His voice failed. That was a lot he had found out and the innocent queen in front of him didn't know about her origin and he… he hadn't known how his father had passed away until that moment. It was too much to take in.
"What?" She felt his urgency when he stood up, engulfing her in a tight hug and all she could do was stand there and wrap her arms around him, giving as much comfort as she could without knowing what was going on.
"Just hold me for a while."
A/N - Yep, another fanfic… I really don't know where this one is going, I do have a script, but it could change any time! This is based on the simple idea of Lord of The Rings: One to Rule Them All. Like there's one dominant ruler of the music styles.
Anyway, I wanted to write something about Poppy's mom since I've watched the italian movie 18 Gifts and felt like Trolls World was a good field to explore a few tales that intrigued me over the years like The Tale of Princess Kaguya, the Opera Turandot (I love it so much!) and two Brazilian pieces: The myth of Victoria amazonica (if you're curious PM me and I'll send the link) and a poem called Ismália by Alphonsus Guimaraes, which I believe there's no official English translation. So, as you can see it begins with a lot of angst, but I do want to give it a lighter approach. Let's see how this mix of inspiration goes!