A Democracy Of Trolls Part 3

It had been a hard season, with a late frost that killed off most of the blossoms followed by a dry summer that withered up the surviving fruit. For the past few years there'd been fewer animals coming through the high pa.s.ses and precious little carrion. The dyrewolves and lions and great birds all fought over the sc.r.a.ps, so the only way a troll got a decent bit of meat was to stumble on it first. She'd said as much to Maggot, and he told her he had an idea and would catch up with her. Now he'd been gone for two whole nights. If his plan was stealing something from the wolves, he'd end up carrion himself.

She sniffed the air again.

He had promised to meet her at the falls. Maybe he waited for her there, his scent lost in the mist. She hurried on, pa.s.sing through a grove of cherry trees that had given up their fruit -- what little there was -- months ago, in the spring. It was still enough to make her mouth water. There were maples beyond them, the leaves turned crisp with the fall. She found one sprayed with an unfamiliar odor and paused to lick at the stain. It didn't taste fresh, but it wasn't that old either. In either case, it meant some young male troll marking his territory, eager to prove himself. One more danger for Maggot.

If Frosty's band was around here, then courtesy required her to let them know that she was coming. Windy reared up and pounded out a greeting high on her chest, a sound so deep it made the air tremble a mile or more away. b.u.m-ha- da-dura-dura. "A stranger, but a friend," the rhythm said to those who listened.

Not wholly a stranger, in truth, since she and Maggot had pa.s.sed this way before. But not part of the band either.

Not part of any band.

For too many years, she and Maggot had been rootless, blown about from place to place like leaves in a storm. But she wouldn't have it any other way if it meant losing her son.

She repeated the greeting and sat down. While she waited for an answer, she picked through the long gra.s.ses and fallen leaves looking for something to eat. She found nothing and heard no answer so she continued on her way. With all the thunder from the waterfalls, she doubted anyone heard her.

The gibbous Moon sat at zenith, flooding the landscape with pale, colorless light. Not a good night to be out. The panic it caused her was subsumed by her worry for Maggot and the hunger in her belly. The thick canopy of the trees soothed her, but when she reached the rocky, open area around the falls, the light hurt her eyes even if it didn't blind her.

The water dropped sixty feet, half in a single sudden plunge. Flowers of spray blossomed off the dark black rocks. Halfway down the falls, a triangular ledge jutted out at an angle, broad on the left end and blending into the straight drop on the right. The music of the water changed as it poured over this surface to crash among the jumbled boulders.

Unappetizing ferns and vines covered the hillside below the tall spruce trees and hemlocks she'd smelled earlier. Mist hung in the air, moistening her dry, cracked skin. Despite the danger of the moonlight and the trolls she hadn't yet seen, Windy ventured right down to the pool and waded out into the cave-cold water under the falls. It eased her aches and took the edge off her torpor. She bent down out among the slick, dark rocks and drank until she didn't feel thirsty.

She noticed a sluggish silver flash deep in the water. Fish. She stepped slowly over to where she saw them, dangling her hand open-palmed with one finger bent, flicking the pink-nailed tip slowly back and forth like a hapless worm.

A large, juicy trout swam almost within her reach, then zipped away. She concentrated on the movement of her finger, hardly daring to breathe as she tried to tempt the fish back again. It slid in for a second look, gliding into reach of her palm, when something splashed in the water beside her and scared it off. She looked up and saw a group of trolls gathered in the meadow beside the pond. Several had stones in their hands.

She waved to them and climbed out of the water. She counted eleven-four adult females, and three adult males, plus two little ones that made her smile. Another male and female appeared to be about twelve winters old, the same age as Maggot. Ready to mate. The oldest female was Frosty, who'd been First of the band for as long as Windy could remember. She also recognized Big Thunder and his son, Little Thunder. The young male was probably Little Thunder's boy, Fart. Although they had started calling him Stinker the last time she and Maggot visited. She didn't remember the girl's name.

"Forgive me for hunting in your pool," she said to Frosty, shouting above the din of falling water. "I didn't see anyone."

"S'all right," she shouted back, looking over Windy's shoulder into the woods. "You still keep that animal around?"

There was no rancor in her voice, so Windy tried to keep it out of her response. "He's my son."

"He was one ugly little monster."

Windy didn't hide the anger in her voice this time. "Not to me."

Most of the others wandered off, turning over logs and rocks as they searched for food. Frosty shrugged, scratched herself, and waddled down to the edge of the pool. "Heard he's traveling by daylight now. Can he really do that?"

"Yes."

The old troll made a strange, noncommittal shape with her mouth. "Well, it's good to see you anyway. Your smell is welcome."

"I like the way you smell also," Windy replied, though it wasn't strictly true -- Frosty had a mossy scent, and there was something growing in the cracks of her skin. Windy wondered where the trollbirds were who plucked out such things. "Where's the rest of your band?"

"This is all of us."

She wouldn't have believed it, except she'd seen other bands dwindle just as fast. "What happened to them?"

"Accidents. Two males caught out in daylight. And then people, blackhairs, are moving through the mountains, heading east. They kill the game as they go, and sometimes kill us, though we chase them away. After they came through last year, we caught the coughing sickness. Ten of us died. Are you looking for a husband?"

"No."

"Because we have no unmarried males. But, ah, if you were willing to share a husband .... "

Windy didn't grab at that fish. "No, I'm not interested."

"Ah, well. We have two children here now, that's more than we've had in many years. It may be getting better soon."

"I hope so --"

"If she's not here to mate," blurted another female lurking behind them, Little Thunder's sister, Rose, "then make her go away! There's not enough food as it is."

Rose wanted to be First, that was obvious. Windy stayed silent.

"I don't see her taking food out of your mouth," said Frosty.

Rose slapped her hands on her chest in the mildest form of challenge.

"She's not one of us. She doesn't belong here."

"We'll take a vote then."

Windy had become accustomed to this ritual. It followed her and Maggot around like a buzzard. She was smacking her lips in acceptance when a flat, familiar drumming sound broke the rhythm of the falls. She turned and saw Maggot striding out of the trees, standing straight despite all her efforts to get him to stoop in a better posture. But her heart leapt up in joy at the sight of him. He was safe. That was all that mattered.

Rose laughed out loud at the sight of him. "He is ugly," she said to Frosty. "And a runt."

He was very small for his twelve winters, not even six feet tall, although getting close to it. She hoped he wasn't fully grown, though she feared he might be. Most trolls reached their full height by his age. He was undersized in other ways too, all viney muscle with no belly on him at all, and legs so long and slender they looked deformed. His arms couldn't even reach the ground when he bent over, not unless he crouched. His skin was pale and smooth too, so thin it broke at every quick abrasion. And his bristly black hair had grown long and horribly s.h.i.+ny. It hung down his back with ragged ends where she'd chewed it off.

But ugly?

Never. Not in her eyes.

Stinker, the young male, loped over toward him, bared his teeth, and pounded his chest in warning rather than greeting. It must have been Stinker's spray she smelled. Maggot didn't back down, and though the sound of his little fists on his scrawny chest was as feeble in comparison as the teeth he also flashed in response, something about him made Stinker stop.

"Hey, Fart," Maggot said. "Good to smell you again."

"Hey." The troll's brow ridge rolled down. "You still stink like milk."

Which was an insult. Windy hurried to her son's side, ready to intervene. "These are our friends, Maggot."

He smiled, a broad and genuine expression that contrasted sharply with the purple moons of sleeplessness puddled beneath his eyes. "Oh, good! I've been trying to catch up with you. I have a surprise."

And then without another word of proper greeting, he sprinted back into the forest. A rock flew through the air behind him -- hurled by Rose -- but it fell well short. He returned a few moments later dragging a buck deer, one of the rare and furtive white-tails with six points on its antlers. It was lashed with lengths of vine to a pair of long poles. She didn't know where he'd learned such things. A troll never thought of new things like that.

The other members of the band came running. The animal was a couple nights old and Maggot had obviously done much to conceal its scent from scavengers. It smelled of mud, and urine, and stinkweed, but underneath all those things, it smelled wonderful.

"Carrion?" asked Little Thunder.

"No," said Maggot, standing upright and staring eye to eye with the comfortably squatting male. She had the sudden realization that he stayed in his aggressive posture all the time simply to be as big as the nonaggressive trolls. "I hunted it and killed it."

Little Thunder hooted in derision. "How? With your fearsome teeth?" He bared his own and everyone laughed.

Everyone except Windy. And Maggot. He bent down and took something from beside the deer. "With these teeth," he said, and showed off the sharpened sticks he'd played with lately.

Little Thunder flashed his teeth again, rising up on his hind legs to his full eight feet of height, and then retreated. Some of the others banged warnings on their chests.

People used sharp sticks like that to hurt trolls, which was why trolls stole them and hid them deep in caves where people would never find them.

"These are our friends," Windy repeated.

"Then let them eat," said Maggot. He smiled at her again.

Hunger won out over any lecture she intended to give. She reached down to snap off the vines that bound the deer to the poles. In its side, she noticed the broken-off point of one of Maggot's sticks. He had to get close to the horns to do that, and she looked over him quickly for signs of new wounds. He'd suffered a lot of injuries in his twelve years. But he appeared fine. The other trolls still held back, although she could almost hear their stomachs rumbling.

"What will you eat?" she asked. They had learned long ago that carrion made Maggot ill. He had to eat meat fresh, soon after it was dead, or not eat it at all. He had so many weaknesses, and struggled so hard to overcome them.

"I've eaten," was all he said. She doubted it. He'd never put on the weight he needed or grown the way he should. She opened her mouth to say so, and saw him smiling at her, as if he knew exactly what was coming next. "I killed a striped-tail the same evening, and ate it myself."

Aha, she thought. Trying something small first, then something bigger. Very typical of him. And not waiting long before the second venture either. Also typical.

The other trolls jostled for position, pus.h.i.+ng the smaller ones back while they waited for her to take first piece. Windy chomped down on the rear flank, severing the hip joint with her ma.s.sive jaw, ripping the flesh with her nails, and pulled away a whole leg. The others crowded in as soon as she stepped away, jumping back only when the gas-swollen belly popped. The two children licked those parts up off the ground, while every other part of the animal disappeared within moments. Some of the trolls took more than others while a few had none at all, and those looked to steal any loose sc.r.a.ps.

The meat tasted sweet. Windy gobbled it up quickly, shoving moist chunks of it into her ma.s.sive cheeks.

Maggot circulated among the trolls. They curled their shoulders against him, ready to run away. They didn't know, as she did, that he wouldn't steal their food because he couldn't stomach it. When he came close to Stinker, the troll rose up and growled at him. Maggot dodged behind him and scampered away. She thought she'd seen one of the sharp sticks in his hand, but when she glimpsed him again, the wooden tooth was gone.

A few seconds later, in between the sounds of meat being ripped off bones, she heard a pop followed by a howl of pain.

Stinker danced around and around, waving his arms and slapping at his behind. As he spun away from Windy, she saw the stick poking out of his bottom. Maggot must have propped it under Stinker, where the slow constant pressure punctured his thick skin.

She couldn't help herself. She started to laugh and so did most of the others. When Stinker dropped the other haunch -- that was the piece he ripped free -- to grab at the stick with both hands, Maggot rushed in. He scooped up the meat and hurried away to the young female, who sat there with nothing to eat.

It was a courts.h.i.+p gift, all very proper. And, coming from Maggot, not proper at all. Windy's laughter died in her throat.

Frosty frowned in open disapproval. It was a glare so very like Windy's mother it made her feel at home, even though her mother had died during the past winter. The young female appeared stunned, but she made the proper gargling sound in response, grabbed the meat, and ran away to eat it.

Stinker hopped over to Frosty and asked her to remove the splinter. She did, and as soon as it came out, he grabbed some of the ribs from her pile of bones and scooted off. Soon bones crunched by thick teeth and the sucking out of marrow were the only sound in the woods besides the waterfall.

Windy sniffed the air. The mood was mixed. The trolls were glad for the sc.r.a.ps of meat, but Maggot made them nervous. He made her nervous too when he went over and flirted with the girl.

He whispered to her first, drew a laugh, and that wasn't so bad. Then they rubbed faces together, and she bent over abruptly, presenting her s.e.x to him. It was neither swollen nor properly red, and she continued to eat and look around while she did it. Windy suspected that the girl was only trying to make Stinker jealous. But Maggot sniffed at it, stood up, and waved his s.e.x at her face to show he was interested. When he rubbed up against her, the adults were caught between horror and humor. But since neither Maggot or the girl gave off the proper musk, and since the girl was so much larger than he was, they treated it like an uncomfortable joke.

Windy sighed miserably.

She'd always hoped that Maggot would find a nice girl to mate with and settle down. She didn't care for grandchildren so much, but his happiness mattered to her. She knew that she and Ragweed were happy, even if it was only for a short time. She wanted that for her son.

So Maggot's earnestness worried her. However much the other trolls considered the pantomime a joke, Windy knew that he was serious about mating with the girl. The girl noticed it too, at about the same moment, because she squealed and jumped away. When Maggot stood there confused, Stinker growled and charged, shoving him to the ground.

"Wrestle him!' shouted Little Thunder.

The others in the little band took up the chant at once. "Wrestle, wrestle!"

Stinker's face wrinkled happily at the suggestion. He reared up on his hind legs, almost eight feet tall and over two hundred fifty pounds, battering his chest with the danger-death warning. "I challenge you!"

Maggot sat on the ground. He looked at Windy, his eyes cold and certain. There were times when she wished he were not so completely fearless or that he would not take risks if she refused them. But what could she do?

She smacked her lips: yes.

He stood up -- two feet and a hundred pounds shy of Stinker's size -pounding death on his chest, using cupped hands instead of knuckles to make a sharper, cracking sound in place of the deep resonant ba.s.s.

The adults formed a rough circle around the edge of the glade. Or, rather, a half circle spread out behind Stinker. Windy sat alone in the other half of the circle. The girl hovered on the edge between the two, knuckle-walking toward Windy then back again toward her band.

"You're a baby bird in a nest," Maggot said, snapping his fingers. "I'm going to crush you like that!"

"You're a worm!" screamed Stinker. "And I'm going to squish you like a, uh, like a, like a worm!"

Maggot fell forward to stand on his hands, and waved his foot at Stinker's face. "You're a snake in the gra.s.s -- I'm going to break your skinny little snake-neck between my toes."

Some of the other trolls laughed at this. It was a good trick, something none of them could do. Besides, the insults were a big part of the fun of wrestling and Maggot was good at them. Telling a troll he had a neck was like telling a twelve- year-old he smelled like milk.

Stinker was not so good at insults. He grabbed at Maggot's foot like a fish going for a fingernail. Maggot flipped backward and landed upright. Stinker rushed him, but Frosty thrust her long arms between them.

"Are you done talking already?" she asked.

"Just let me at him!" said Stinker.

Frosty looked to Maggot, who bounced up and down a little nervously. He lifted his chin. "Just have him bend over, so I can fart in his ear to see if he knows his name."

"Let me at him!"

"Not until I say ready," she commanded. "Do you both agree to this ?"

They did.

"Does anyone vote against it?" She looked at Windy.

Windy refused to raise her hand. Sooner or later, Maggot had to learn what was going to happen to him if he picked fights with other males over a girl.

"Let them wrestle already," hollered Big Thunder.

Frosty turned back to the boys. "There's to be no eye poking, or nose gouging, and no killing, but everything else is fair. Do you both agree to that ?"

"What if I smash him by accident?" asked Stinker. "What if I fall on him? He'll squish like a berry."

"What if I rip his head off," Maggot spat back. "What if I rip his head off and drink his brains out of his skull? Not that he has any."

"No killing!" Frosty told Stinker. "You'll fight until I say stop." She stepped back with her arm outstretched, dropped it suddenly, and cried, "Go!"