Age Twenty
Trolls are miracles of nature, as I learned going through Cait's books. They regenerate incredibly fast, regrowing a limb in as little as a month. Which is twice as fast as a lizard can regrow a tail, and a troll arm is a lot bigger than a lizard tail. They can eat almost anything organic and extract useful nutrients from it. To top it all off, their large size, dense bones, and incredibly efficient muscle tissue makes them stupidly strong. A male troll averages ten feet tall, a female is closer to twelve, though these numbers don't include their hunched posture. A fully grown troll can break a bull's neck, sling the corpse over one shoulder, and run off with it. At full speed, with no visible effort. Adult female trolls have been recorded ripping trees out of the ground to bludgeon each other with.
The thing that makes them so amazing is that all of this is purely biological. Sure, their regeneration has nothing on, say, a Phenex, nor does their strength measure up to any acceptably powerful rook. But they do all of it with no magic involved. Honestly, why trolls are hidden with the rest of the supernatural, I have no idea. They are, though, which will make poaching them much easier.
So my thinking is that if I'm eventually going to get supernatural boosts to my physical abilities, then it makes sense to get the highest starting base that I can. After all, if the rook enhancement multiplies the recipient's strength by ten, then ten times a troll's strength will leave me much better off out of the gate than my five foot one female self.
The plan was simple. I know where Troll country is in the British isles, I'd get Cait to drop me off there with a backpack, camping supplies, and everything I'd need to make Script traps. Then using my bloodhound given sense of smell, and some help from the local spirits, I'd track down some trolls, restrain or nearly kill them with Script, finish them off with one of my test knives and call it good. I wanted eight trolls total. Four for strength and four for regeneration, since Pua thinks that taking the same trait multiple times might reinforce the new part of me, if not have an outright additive effect on performance in some circumstances.
I am also, on occasion, a moron.
The plan starts to fall apart almost immediately. Cait refused to go anywhere near the British Isles for reasons she refused to explain. The best she'd do is drop me off in France, which is still better than just flying the whole way.
The second problem didn't appear until I was already in the middle of nowhere, in a British forest. While I have the sensitivity to scents of a bloodhound, my brain, thus the part processing the scents, is still entirely human. I can get all sorts of information from the scent of things. Health, age, emotional state, and a hundred other things. What I can't do is track like a bloodhound. With time, I'm learning to identify all those scents and what they mean, but the subtle gradient of scent age that indicates direction and how far behind a target I am, are utterly beyond me.
Also, I have no idea what a troll smells like.
And the last part where the plan died is the idea of eight trolls. Somehow, in all my research, I hadn't put together that as large, territorial, omnivores with predatory leanings, they would have huge territories. Thus be pretty rare and miles apart at any given point in time, at best.
Which leaves me where I am now, camped out in the forest with no real clue where I'm going. I would have been utterly screwed except once again my friends, the little spirits, came through for me. As it turns out, dryads and hamadryads have a vested interest in knowing where trolls are at all times. Just in case one comes along and tries to rip up the wrong tree.
They're more than happy to point me in the direction of as many trolls as they can find for me. Which is two. Not nearly as many as I want, but enough to get everything I want out of them.
Which means, for the moment, the most useful thing I can do is sit in my camp wishing I knew more about staying in the wild, and waiting for some nature spirit to get back to me. The early morning light is somewhat spectacular to see, but I'm cold enough that I wish I'd thought about what England is like in early autumn. So instead of drawing the fantastic scenery, I huddle next to my anemic fire and clutch my lukewarm chocolate.
Waiting is not something I'm really suited to, so I'm practically vibrating in place, or shivering, when the sound of buzzing wings fills the air. They look superficially like butterflies or dragonflies, brightly colored gossamer wings carrying the giggling creatures in a swarm around me.
Slightly awed, I hold out a hand and one of the colorful four inch tall fae lands and holds on to my thumb for balance. Soft looking lavender skin under a simple looking dress and dark blue hair make the pixie look absolutely adorable. Even for a tiny flying piranha, I think as the little fae smiles hugely up at me revealing shark like teeth.
"Big thing looking for smelly huge?" she asks, tilting her head cutely. Her voice sounds like a tinkling bell.
"Smelly huge! Smelly huge!" the rest of swarm cheers.
"Uh..." They're kind of stunning. The sound of their voices combined together with the visual cacophony of their wings to make something almost hypnotic. Shaking myself, I refocus. If I'm a 'big thing' then I guess the trolls would be 'huge', "I don't know how they smell, but huge would be an accurate description."
They cheer again and several of them grab onto my clothes and try to pull me along somewhere. Laughing, I gently pull myself free and head back to my tent, stretching as I go, my limbs stiff from the cold. "Hold on, let me get my stuff. I wouldn't want to run into the 'smelly huge' unarmed."
Ignoring the perching pixies, I collect one of the knives that Pua, the smith, and I prepared, and the Script supplies. I figure that I can figure out where the troll goes frequently and set up an ambush. Failing that, set out some bait with the same plan.
The pixies lead me into the forest in a swirling storm of colorful wings and giggles. The route they lead me on has no path attached to it and I hope they'll be willing to show me back to my campsite. Because between my own lack of knowledge and the way the pretty colors of the flitting pixies keeps drawing all my attention, I have no idea where we are.
###
The music is something of a surprise.
I have no idea how long I've been walking, but the forest has changed as we go. The air has warmed, and bright sunlight streams through the emerald green leaves of the trees. Bird songs fill the air, providing the perfect accompaniment to the mesmerizing harp music that draws me forward. Vaguely, I wonder when the pixies had left, but it doesn't seem important.
I break out of the trees into a sunny clearing, and for a moment I'm blinded by the sudden light. I flinch backwards, holding up a hand to shield my watering eyes. Hissing, I wait for my eyes to adjust, blinking furiously.
The clearing is covered in long grass and wildflowers that fill the air with their scent. A stream meanders its way through the break in the trees, adding the pleasant sound of running water to the ambiance. In the center of the clearing is a blanket made of rich, beautiful cloth that looks as soft as clouds. A feast is laid out across it, sandwiches, meats, fruits, and pies for dessert that smell so good my mouth begins to water. Sitting on the blanket playing a lap harp is the source of the heavenly music, the most beautiful man I've ever seen.
Long, blond hair frames a finely sculpted face with the most intensely blue eyes I've ever seen. His clothes are finely made, stitched with patterns of vines and leaves in greens and blues that almost make him seem like part of the forest around him.
Then he smiles at me and it's like the clouds moved away from the sun. He stops playing, which makes me sad, then he speaks and his voice is more than musical enough to make up the difference.
"Hello, stranger, I find I have too much food and will need some help to eat it. Would you care to join me?" He waves a hand at the blanket and food.
I find myself hurrying over to him and nodding like a bobble head. I stop, blushing the moment I register what I'm doing. I don't slow down my fast walk to join him on the blanket, though. My cheeks are burning but I can't seem to stop grinning like an idiot anyway.
"Might I know the name of my lovely guest?"
"I'm... um... I'm Ericka, Ericka Rhostana," I babble out as fast as I can. Oh god, this is so embarrassing, but nobody has ever called me lovely before. I'm blushing even harder, to call me that when she... he, he's so pretty...
He leans forward and thumbs my chin, derailing any thoughts I might have, "And what brings you all the way out here, Ericka?"
Oh god, just the way he says my name makes me shiver. "I'm hunting trolls," I chirp. Ugh, that's so embarrassing.
I glance up at him through my eyelashes, fortunately he doesn't seem to hold my embarrassing noises against me. "Really?" he seems surprised, instead. Well, that's fair, who in their right mind goes hunting trolls?
I wonder what that says about me...
He slides next to me, and suddenly I can't think about anything other than how close sh... he is, "Only trolls? Not fae?"
I shake my head and smile, happy that I haven't embarrassed myself, "No. Nothing to do with the fae."
She pulls me into leaning against her side... his side, and holds a slice of some sweet tasting fruit to my lips. I bite into it letting the juice run down my throat, god that's the best thing I've ever tasted, another bite and the fruit is gone and I take another moment to suck the remaining juices off her fingers.
"Come now. Who does the Caitsidhe want you to find? You can tell me." She leans in, and I can feel her hot breath caressing my lips. My breathing speeds up, my heart pounding. I've never kissed anyone before! The one crashing of lips at HEMA doesn't count! And with the dryads that Cait introduced me to, I was more along for the ride than anything else. What if I'm bad at it? Oh god, I should have gone to more of Sarah's sleepovers, girls practice that sort of thing at sleepovers, right?
Wait, there was a question... Caitsidhe? Cait nearly tore my head off the one time I called her that. "No..." I moan, "Cait doesn't want anything here. Doesn't even want to come here."
I lean forward trying to catch her lips. She leans back from me though, teasing, just out of reach, "Now, now, I can't give you kisses until you tell me the truth." But I want kisses!
I try to catch her lips with mine, placing a hand on her chest and chasing after her lips. Hard planes of muscle under my fingers feel... not at all like a breast. My eyes snap open, I don't even remember closing them, and lips crashed into mine.
The lips are firm and insistent, sparking pleasure up and down my spine. The kiss tastes even better than the fruit.
Everything about it feels wrong.
I jerk back, a fog clearing from my mind just enough for blazing fury to ignite and burn away the rest. Blood pounds in my ears, and my fist is moving before I realize what's happening. A primal scream of rage fills the air in a voice that sounds a lot like mine.
The punch crashes into the strange man's cheek perfectly.
A crunching sound registers, and a moment later pain consumes everything from my wrist down. Right in front of me, my fist is still pressed against the strangers face, bruising already spreading across my hand, the back slightly deformed where metacarpals had visibly broken. They haven't broken the skin, fortunately, but they'd still need to be set.
The man hasn't even shifted his head. He sighs, looking a little miffed. "I've never had somebody break from an elf striking in progress from a kiss before," he comments, sounding put out. Faster than I can follow, he grabs me by the throat, lifts me from the ground, and slams me into a tree. My breath explodes from my body and my gasping for breath is halted by the hand around my neck, "How did you do that?" My feet are dangling off the ground and my hands scrabble at his arm.
Fortunately, he seems to actually want an answer as he relaxes his grip slightly, not enough for me to escape, but enough that my desperate gasping gains me some much needed oxygen.
"Don't... Like... Boys..." I gasp out.
He seems honestly confused, "Then what good are you? Don't worry, I'm sure I can fix your thinking."
What. The. Fuck.
I honestly hadn't thought that I could get any angrier, and yet here we are.
I see red.
He's standing too close to put into a standing armbar. So I try to knee him in the ribs instead.
It works better than the punch, but only in that I don't break my knee. He just sighs and slams me into the tree again. This time the back of my head connects with the tree.
My vision swims.
"Foolish little mud child." The condescension is thick enough to cut with a fork, "As if one so sad as you could harm a Sidhe of the Tuatha De Denan. Now you will tell me why the cat queen sent you. The feel of her power hangs about you like a cloak, so do not bother to lie. I will be able to tell, and you will answer my questions one way or another."
I really want to hit him again, but it hasn't really accomplished anything so far. I probably would have kept trying anyway, but something that he'd just said sparked in my brain.
Sidhe are fae.
Fae really don't like iron.
With a snarl, I arch my back to let my good left hand snake between me and the tree to grab the knife. At the same time, I try to spear his eyes with the fingers of my broken hand. Like I'd learned years ago, a poke in the eye is a poke in the eye. It also distracts him from what my other hand is doing. Yanking the knife from my belt, I pull my arm free as he jerks his head back and away from my clumsy fingers, and plunge the former iron railroad spike into the side of his neck.
Blood fountains across my hand, as a look of shock passes briefly across his face. I know the moment he dies, though. I see the slight shimmer of the subtler Script activation run from the knife and down the tattoos, just as designed. I can feel whatever the knife has taken sink into my soul.
I briefly wonder why it activated at all. I hadn't been focusing on anything.
Around me the world changes. It's early autumn again though later in the day, clouds cover the sky and the sun making the light weak. I start shivering violently, my body only now realizing how cold I am. What had been an idyllic clearing is now part of a bog, my legs are covered in mud from where I had knelt in it. There's no sign of a blanket or the feast, or even the lap harp.
I glance down at my victim as my knife slides out of my hand and he hits the ground with a thud, the look of shock still on his face... Oh god, I'd kissed him.
My gorge rises and I find myself doubled over and vomiting into the mud. I blink as brown sludge that tastes of acid and dirt falls from my mouth...
Oh god, how did that sludge get in my mouth... In my stomach? The only thing I've eaten is the fruit... what had that fruit he'd fed me actually been?
I fall to my knees heaving, trying not to see the mud and dead leaves I cough up.
I fail.
I heave until nothing more comes up, and then heave a few more times just for the hell of it.
My misery is interrupted by the sound of buzzing wings. I feel a little ashamed of myself that I can't remember where I've heard the sound before. Then I actually see the pixie swarm flitting through the mostly dead trees. I recognize the hypnotic patterns for what they are this time, and quickly look away.
"Strange big killed pretty big!" one of them shrills. I'm not an expert on pixie speak, but that doesn't sound good, "Strange big, stinky big!" Very not good, "Get stinky big!"
Well, crap.
Painfully pushing myself to my feet, I get ready to run, only to find it's too late. Earlier I had compared the pixies to tiny flying piranha. I had no idea how accurate that was until just now. They spin around me, a vortex of colorful wings and sharp claws and teeth.
"Stinky Big!" they heckle and shout, darting in and out, scratching and biting, then darting away before I can do more than swat at them. I flail, the skill that I worked so hard for my entire life abandons me in my panic, and from the cold and concussion. Desperately, I hunch my head and try to protect my eyes. I've lost them once already and doing so again doesn't sound like much fun.
I stumble backwards, almost tripping when my heel hits something heavy that certainly doesn't feel like wood. Cracking my eyes and glancing down I see my railroad spike knife still buried in the unnamed Sidhe's neck. It had worked on one fae, why not more? I quickly drop, actually avoiding a few of the little monsters with the unexpected movement. As soon as I get my hand around the hilt, I spring to my feet and start lashing out around me again, this time far more effectively.
Using the flat of the blade like a fly swatter actually works fairly well. The iron weapon does enough damage on impact to take individuals out of the fight. The pixies also left contact with the blade fast enough, that if I actually kill any of them, the Script doesn't trigger. Which I count as a good thing. I have no idea what I'd absorbed from the Sidhe.
Still, the little beasts are tearing me apart, when the entire forest seems to groan. The trees twist in a way that has nothing to do with the wind. Several branches seem to reach out and swat a pixie that got too close from the air. The wind shifts and grows cold, and a moment later a cacophony of sound fills the air as a flock of crows come over the tops of the trees and descend on the pixie swarm.
The swarm shrieks in fear and flees, leaving me barely standing, exhausted, shivering violently, bleeding from thousands of tiny cuts and bite marks all over my body, and covered in mud. I can barely hold onto the knife in my hand.
I look up and see a beautiful woman in a dress made of autumn leaves. I smile slightly at the hamadryad that had agreed to help me find the trolls. She walks casually across the bog, none of the mud sticking to her.
She quickly reaches my side and rests a warm hand on my shoulder, "I had thought the plan was for you to wait for me at your camp?" Her voice sounds pleasantly of rustling leaves, babbling brooks, and bird song. She also sounds something between amused and concerned.
"Yeah," I croak, "Damn pixies caught me with glamor or something." My vision is swimming and darkness is creeping in at the edges.
"Can you walk, young witch?" My reply is to begin falling over, forcing her to catch me and lower me to the ground. Somehow my addled brain produces the thought that, in other circumstances, this might have been rather romantic, her cradling my head in the crook of her arm while my upper body leans against her. "I'll take that as 'no'. I will carry you to your camp, then."
"Thank you," I wheeze, "I'll owe you one."
"Then I shall perform the task well, and remember the debt," is the last thing I hear before the darkness takes me.