"You have come all this way simply to tell us you are a traitor?" The High Elf warrior purred.
"I am nots a traitor! I just gots more sense dan de rest of yous!" Skwisgaar growled.
In what universe was it fair that he had gotten so used to speaking the languages of man that he now stumbled over Elvish? He had an accent no matter what tongue he tried to speak!
"You don'ts even knows why you's goings to war! Dis am dildos!"
The Elf Queen, Lequevanna SilverHair, blinked large, lavender eyes at her nearest advisor.
"What is a dildo?" she asked in a voice like tinkling bells.
The advisor looked uncomfortable for a moment, but Skwisgaar stepped in to fill the void.
"If yous don'ts knows whats a dildo ams, no wonders you goes to war for no reasons!"
Queen Lequevanna only looked more confused.
"Hold your tongue, spellsinger!" General Jydda Aranwion spat. "You should be executed for daring use such vulgar language before a noble lady! To spout such ignorant drivel before the Queen while refusing to fight will earn you that punishment immediately!"
Skwisgaar tested the strength of the two warriors holding his arms and wondered why he hadn't taken Toki up on the offer to accompany him into the elven camp. Oh, because a troll spellsinger at his side would have gotten them both filled full of arrows immediately.
He looked longingly at his duar set before the Queen. If only he could get out a few chords . . .
"How do you live with yourself for being such a coward?" Jydda asked. "You must feel like a woman."
Skwisgaar instinctively bristled at what was, in elf society, the most degrading insult imaginable.
"General Aranwion!" A foot soldier stuck his head into the Royal tent. "A troll's been caught on the edge of camp!"
'Oh no,' Skwisgaar thought. 'Toki, you idiot!'
"You see?" Jydda sneered. "Troll kind encroaches on our very doorstep!"
"Dis camp is on de border wit' de troll lands," Skwisgaar pointed out. "Stands whats to reason joo finds some here."
"I've never actually seen a troll," Queen Lequevanna announced. "Bring it here so that I can see it."
"My Lady, you would not want to see such a beast in person," an advisor to her right told her gently, as one would speak to a very stupid child. "They are ugly and they smell terrible."
"Only when dey eats too much pickled herring," Skwisgaar muttered cryptically.
"I want to see one," Lequevanna repeated. "How can I say we go to war with trolls if I do not even know what they look like?"
"My lady is already being much too bold by simply coming to the war camp!" an advisor on her left stated. "My Lady is a Queen, not a King! She should be doing ladylike things!"
"Bring the troll!" Jydda ordered. "It will please the Queen's little whim. Surely as Royal warriors we can protect her from the beast."
The foot soldier nodded and left the tent.
'They won't even search him,' Skwisgaar thought miserably. 'He'll make his duar invisible or make it look like a club and they'll drag him in here. Toki's probably stupid enough to think killing off the Royal Court will stop the war. I've never seen him spellsing in person, but they say he could slay with one line of lyrics.'
When duar music started up outside of the tent, in the camp, Skwisgaar was glad Toki had the sense not to unleash Hell right in front of him.
Then he recognized the tune.
General Jydda actually started at the look of sheer horror that sleeted over the elven spellsinger's face.
"Skwisgaar? Is the troll spellsinger so deadly that it terrifies you?"
"Dat â dat song won'ts make a papercut," he wheezed.
Oh God, why had Toki picked that song? The Norwegian troll used to play it on his guitar when he first joined Dethklok because he knew it pissed Skwisgaar off. At least when the Swedish elf was chasing Toki screaming death threats and throwing things, the rhythm guitarist was being acknowledged.
But . . . that was with a guitar.
With a duar to make the lyrics real . . .
"Backstage we're having the time
Of our lives until somebody say
Forgive me if I seem out of line
Then she whipped out her gun
And tried to blow me away"
"(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady!"
A commotion began outside. It started with aggressive shouts, which quickly led to startled cries, then to outright screams. They sounded like . . . women's screams.
"So never judge a book by it's cover
Or who you're going to love by your lover
Love put me wise to her love in disguise
She had the body of a venus
Lord imagine my surprise!
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady!"
The tent's curtain-like door flew open and the same solider who had reported Toki's 'capture' collapsed on the ground, surrounded by blue spell-song.
"Pull yourself together!" General Jydda ordered. "Stop acting like a frightened . . . wo-man?"
The elf warrior let out a screech as his bones contorted, growing even more gracile and slender. His tortured voice suddenly shot up several octaves. Two prominent bulges grew on his chest, straining the fabric of his tunic.
The stricken elf sat up, all discomfort apparently gone, and stared at his chest.
"I have breasts!" he howled in a high, feminine voice. The foot soldier scrabbled at the front of his trousers. "I have breasts! That troll turned me into a â it's . . . it's still there."
"Baby let me follow you down
Let me take a peek dear
Baby let me follow you down
Do me, do me, do me all night
Baby let me follow you down
Turn the other cheek dear
Baby let me follow you down
Do me, do me, do me, do me!"
The mist of spell-song, apparently satisfied with its work on the foot soldier, began to creep along the ground, seeking other victims.
Chaos erupted in the Queen's tent as elf warriors fought to flee from the gender-bending mist. Skwisgaar tore himself free of the hand that held him and lunged for his duar, snatching up the instrument and quickly strumming the backup rhythm. The blue-tinged mist retreated and held itself at bay from the elf spellsinger.
General Jydda drew his sword and slashed open the back of the silk tent to flee into the woods.
Toki stepped through the doors of the tent, the guitar solo making the duar send out blue and pink sparkles into the mist.
"Tokis, you DILDO! Whats de fucks yous is thinking?" Skwisgaar shrieked over the song.
"Ooh what a funky lady
She like it, like it, like it, like that,
Ooh he was a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady
(That, that) Dude looks like a lady"
Toki continued.
Skwisgaar felt a tap on his shoulder. He looked around into the wide, innocent eyes of the elf queen.
"Is that a troll?" she asked.
"Uh. Ja," Skwisgaar answered. "Dat ams Toki Wartooth."
The spell-mist seemed to ignore her entirely. Lequevanna studied the troll spellsinger intently, particularly his bare, muscled chest.
"He's not that ugly," she surmised.
"He ams plenty stupids, though!" Skwisgaar snarled as the song came to an end. "Tokis, you dildo! What de hells yous thinksing? You coulds have hurts de Queen! Dat only makes things worse!"
"Dats songs wouldn'ts hurts a lady. She already looks likes a lady," Toki declared. "I guesses we couldn'ts convinces her to stops de war now?"
"She don't gots a say in its," Skwisgaar muttered darkly.
"Are you going to ravish me if I don't comply?" Lequevanna asked breathlessly.
"What? No!" Toki squawked.
"Oh. Why not?"
Toki stared at the elf women in stupefaction for a moment, then turned his attention back to Skwisgaar.
"I tolds joo we should have gone to sees de Troll King first!"
"It not makes no difference if we only gets one side to backs down!" Skwisgaar snarled. "De other side wills still attacks. Even ifs de Troll King agrees, de elf generals still wants to fight!"
"I won't scream or anything," the Elf Queen offered.
There was a pause as both spellsingers absolutely refused to acknowledge what they had just heard.
"We can keeps dem from fighting by force for a whiles," Toki stated. "I's pretty sure most elves don'ts wants to gets their heads bashed in by troll clubs. We's just goes over de general's heads."
"De generals won'ts rest untils dey has your heads if any ofs dem endeds up with tits!" Skwisgaar spat.
"Or maybe you'll take turns . . . ?" Lequevanna suggested.
There was another awkward pause.
"Elf Queen needs to gets fucked bads," Toki growled.
"Dat's is Queen Lequevanna Silverhair and she don't needs fucked by a troll!" Skwisgaar said hotly.
"Skwisgaar, she ams playing with my tail," Toki announced.
The elven spellsinger leaned over to look around his companion. Lequevanna had a hold of Toki's tufted tail and was stroking it thoughtfully. The appendage twitched and jerked as Toki tried to pull it out of the Queen's grasp.
"If we hads de time, I woulds do her just so she's leaves me alone," the troll spellsinger snarled.
"She ams never seeings a troll before," Skwisgaar sighed. "But we's don'tâ"
An arrow flew through a rend in the tent wall and buried itself in Toki's chest. Both troll and elf spellsinger regarded it silently.
"Ow," Toki said.
Skwisgaar spun and lifted his duar just in time to deflect an arrow aimed at his back.
"We ams gots to bes getting outs of here!" the elf cried. "Does something!"
"Why mes? I is bleedings to death here!" Toki yelled.
Contrary to that statement, he yanked the arrow out of his chest as if it were nothing more than a thorn, drawing only a small amount of blood.
"Trolls cans summons de wind and shits! Do dats! Gets us out of here!"
"So fuckings owes me for dis, Skwisgaar!" Toki growled, holding his fingers in a complicated pattern.
A moment later, hurricane force winds ripped the Royal Tent apart and two figures disappeared into the sky.