It seems a little strange that I haven't posted my only finished work here already. I wrote a short story about two years ago, during the summer holidays after I had left school. I was inspired to write it by a dream I had about horse riding, and it had such a fantasy-like atmosphere that I had to try to pen it and recreate it in a story. I think I did capture the atmosphere in the story. It was my most inspired work, because it took only four short days to write it. I called it 'Olympus'.
Olympus
It was an extraordinary day, the day that my father, the King, rushed breathlessly into the room where I, Princess Anna, was inspecting some armour plates and weapons in the museum section of the castle. I looked at him quizzically, for my father never runs so fast that he loses his breath.
"The Prince is in trouble," he puffed.
And so we went down to the stable, mounted our horses and galloped as fast as we could without taking time for him to catch his breath.
It was a sunswept morning, in which fat white clouds soared across in the vast blue ocean in the sky, and my robes fluttered wildly against the horse’s flank. My father was beside me riding his white steed. I had a dappled grey one that I had had since my birthday several years ago. I think perhaps that morning is the most vivid memory I have ever had. I remember stumbling down dales, catching my auburn hair on branches, and the horse panting severely so I felt cruel to drive him faster. But we had to save the Prince.
Prince Theodore Olympus. My future husband. We were a very close pair, sometimes acting more like friends than lovers, but I did love him dearly. I would never marry another as long as I lived. Not with his memory so near to my heart. If I lost him now, I would grieve for him forever. And yet, here we were on a windy summer’s day, forcing our horses to go faster, on our way to rescue my Theodore from an angry gang of Trolls. The sneaky so-and-so’s had crept up on him while he was fishing down by the stream. They hadn’t even given him a chance to fight. What cowards we were dealing with! They did not honour our Prince but instead kidnapped him as he minded his own business. They might have been just a gang of troublemakers, but on the other hand, they may have been taking orders from their King. We would soon find out.
The Troll Kingdom was a day’s trek across open fields and grass, if you followed the stream Nubea, in which poor Theodore had been fishing, unaware of the scoundrels that would soon be his captors. Theodore was a marvellous fighter, but what chance did even the best swordsmen have if they were unprepared?
I hoped to God that we were indeed only tracking an antisocial gang of Trolls, and not a whole kingdom of them.
We arrived after one especially hardy section of our journey, and that was the Grimlar Forest. I lost count of how many times my robes and hair were snared on twigs and branches, and my poor exhausted horse lost his footing in the uneven ground between tree roots. And then we splashed our way through the deepening stream and followed it along the right hand side until the castle of the Troll Kingdom poked through the trees.
It was a very dull and dingy sort of place. I had been here before several times when the Trolls had been on more friendly terms with my father, but now we were here strictly on business. The sentinels at the wall of the city had seen us coming and let down the drawbridge, which we had expected. We entered the city over the Nubea Moat and picked up speed on the straight cobbled streets, heading directly for the castle at the opposite side.
It was a spindly old construction, which I could not imagine ever getting used to living in. All the towers ended in sharply pointed roofs, there were stony spines all around its perimeter and on the walls and roof tiles, supposedly to prevent intruders getting in. As an added precaution the river ran down its side and towards the back.
I did not notice until we were halfway there that all the Trolls had stopped their business and were watching my father and I speeding towards the castle with wide eyes. It made me wary and I tried to force my steed on faster, but he could not manage it for exhaustion.
We continued to speed up towards the keep, the ground beginning to slope up, and the horse slowed to a trotting pace. At the gates the guards asked us what business brought us here.
"We wish to speak with the King," my father replied.
The guard that had questioned us turned to his partner with a questioning gesture, but went inside the castle. A number of minutes later, he returned with someone more superior to him, but obviously not the King. He was dressed in unflattering purple robes tied in at the waist with a length of silken rope, and a pair of hideous purple boots. Now I saw why most trolls did not wear shoes.
"The King wishes not to see you," he said with grandiose. "But he supposes it is necessary. Hand your horses and weapons to the guards and follow me."
I had no weapons with me but a small dagger I kept mostly for personal security, and I reluctantly handed it to the guard along with my precious, but rundown steed. My father did likewise.
The castle was chill, and the corridors dull. Not a single decoration was anywhere to be found, and everything was grey and stony and dark. At one end of the corridor you couldn’t see the other. All that was visible was blackness.
I gathered in my skirts about me in my faint fear of the place, and absently stroked my hair in plain nervousness. My father seemed immune to the stark dinginess of the corridors, which all seemed to be identical to the one before it.
We arrived at a set of heavy oaken doors with brass door handles. The Troll in the purple robes turned to us and told us to stay where we were. He entered alone.
My father seemed particularly disgruntled at the way we were being treated, and he voiced his thoughts to me as we waited. I strained my ears to try to hear what was being said in the closed room, but I could hear nothing but the steady drip-drip-drip that had followed us through every corridor.
The door creaked open a touch, and the purple-robed Troll asked us to enter.
I glanced a nervous look at my father but he remained unperturbed, and we went inside. The room was vast, but it was exactly how I’d imagined it. There were still no tapestries or paintings or any signs that they had tried to make it look pretty. But there was a red carpet leading up to the throne on which the Troll King was seated. The named throne was a stone block carved into the rather uncomfortable-looking seat shape. But the Troll King looked very much at home in it. I felt disgusted at the sight of him – the green-grey warty skin and repulsive yellow and red robes he was wearing that almost – but not quite, unfortunately – covered his webbed feet. His legs were crossed in a relaxed fashion that did nothing for his posture. He reminded me distinctly of an overgrown toad.
"State your business," the Troll King ordered in a feeble voice. He looked as though he could be well over a hundred years old, and had never been out of his throne for years. His chin – if he happened to own one – was slouched against his chest and his knobbly fingers rested over the edges of the arms of his precious chair. But for all he looked like an ancient toad, his eyes were vivid, icy blue with tiny black pupils like the frogspawn he might well have grown out of. He fixed his gaze on me and I tried hard not to recoil, but to remain polite and well mannered as a Princess should. I stood coolly, and gently returned his piercing gaze. He looked to my father.
"A messenger was sent to me this morning with news that Prince Theodore Olympus had been kidnapped by a gang of Trolls, and were seen headed this way. Tell me, Troll King, is this your doing?"
The Troll King cackled and his fat belly jigged against his chin. Then he began coughing and the purple-robed Troll looked to him curiously, wondering what he should do. However, the Troll King recovered quickly, much to my dismay.
"What business would I have kidnapping your measly . . . prince?" he returned at last. The pause before the word ‘prince’ was one with which he seemed to question the title of the man.
"You have a way of getting what you want," my father replied. " What if you were suddenly to not get your own way? What would you do to ensure that you got it? Murder? Kidnap? Who knows, but you, Troll King, what your motive was? But I put it to you now – what is it you want from us so that we can reclaim our dear Prince Theodore?"
"It is a price you cannot pay," the Troll King said calmly. He looked to me again with an evil glint in his eye.
"Name it," my father declared.
"If you hand over your kingdom to me, and all the people in it, I will most gladly give you back your darling little prince."
My father almost snorted in reply.
"What gives you the right to take and rule my kingdom as you please? Your request is not accepted. Indeed, it is unacceptable."
The Troll King grinned a most unpleasant grin that showed his brown teeth.
"Foolish king!"
"I am not the foolish one," my father returned. "My troops will be waiting for you at sundown tomorrow."
And he sloped off towards the doors as I followed obediently behind him.
"We’ll be ready," the Troll King called after us. "And I would keep a careful eye on my pretty daughter if I were you."
Both my father and I spun round at this remark.
"You never know who might snap her up before Prince Charming can save her," he said, widening his toothy grin.
My father put his arm around me and led me out of the room before I could retort. I was burning with anger even as we remounted our horses and galloped away from that wicked place at top speed. In fact, I was fuming.
It was way past midnight by the time we arrived back home, and I was still going over what the ugly Troll King had said in my head.
The first thing my father did was to send a group of messengers into the city and tell all able men to prepare for war against the Trolls at sundown tomorrow, so that we could save our pure Prince Theodore, who would one day be king.
"Go to your room and prepare for the event that we will be defeated," he said to me afterwards. "I will send a messenger to you when the battle is over, and he will tell you the outcome. If we have failed in our task, you must gather all our people and flee to the Elven Kingdom, to our allies."
"No father," I said. "I want to come with you. I want to fight against that awful Troll King and win back my Theodore!"
"Daughter, you cannot fight," my father said, annoyed. "You are too weak."
"I do not care if I die," I said boldly. "But I will certainly not stand back and watch everyone else fighting for me, for my Prince, when I am the one who is to marry him. I have a right to fight if that is what I want."
"And you have a right to remain alive and well for your country," my father said. He placed his hands on my shoulders and looked me squarely in the eye. "You will not survive in battle, Anna, it will be like suicide. Allow more able men to fight while you take care of my people, for that is a more noble duty, the noblest duty a woman can do."
I brushed his hands away.
"I want to fight for Theodore," I said. "I want to have earned his heart even if it means I will fall. At least I know I will have fought for a good cause and not let others do my work for me. At least I know my life will not have been in vain. I will do it, father. You know you can’t stop me."
I ran to my room without waiting for a reply. I planned to gather a sword and shield and find some armour from the weapon room but instead I began to cry and directed for my room, seating myself heavily on my dressing table stool.
My father followed slowly.
"Daughter," he said. "Anna. If you fall in battle our country will surely be in the hands of the Troll King. And it is an almost certainty that you will die. There is no logic."
I turned my tear-stained face towards him.
"No father should have to bury his children," he said quietly. "It would be a selfish act to go into battle knowing that you will die, when you know how I must suffer when you do."
"No, father," I said in reply. "I will die respectfully, and you must be proud that I risked my life for our people, for my Prince. It is more selfish for me to let others die for me."
"You have no choice," my father said. "You must stay here. It is wise and lawful. And our people will be grateful when you become Queen."
I shook my head. "I could not live knowing that I left Theodore’s life in the hands of others and let my kingdom hang in the balance of someone else’s fate. If it is to be my kingdom, I should fight for it. Besides, I will not have my dignity ripped to shreds by some giant toad who wants to rule the world."
My father began to get angry now, and I could tell by the note of his voice.
"No, Anna. You will stay here. It is forbidden for women to go to war, and I will not have my daughter killed by a worthless Troll when it is not necessary. You have a duty to your people to stay and help them and not to be disrespectful to them! If you go into battle I will not be able to live with my remorse. Now have a little respect Anna. Do your duty, and help your future kingdom."
He left with a swish of his cloak and I sobbed bitterly through the night. Until a sneaky plan formulated in my head.
At sunrise the next morning, I dressed quickly in a modest white gown and left the palace on foot. I walked towards the green where all my father’s troops had gathered and weapons were being handed out to those who didn’t already own one. There was a group of about a hundred bowmen and the rest of the men were all preparing to fight in hand-to-hand combat. I ignored these men and began looking for the man I needed. Sir Ratcliffe Turnbull. After much searching, I found him. He was one of the leading officers and so was handing out a collection of swords when I found him.
"Ah, young Princess Anna!" he greeted me fondly. "What brings you down here to what will soon be a bloody battlefield?"
"I am in need of your help, Sir Ratcliffe," I said.
"Well, yes, young Princess. I will help you if I can. What is it you need my assistance for?"
I flinched a little under his strong gaze but nevertheless told him my plan, and how it must be secret from my father.
"I see how you are in a tricky predicament," he mused, stroking his beard thoughtfully. "I know someone, a woman living in the city, who might be able to help you."
I looked at him eagerly, awaiting her name, her occupation, her address.
"She is called Marvita Crosswood. She lives near to here, in the main avenue. It is the most central house in the street, on the right. She knows the kingdoms well, her husband having researched them when he was alive. However, he was old and died five years ago, but she continued to do his work for him as a mark of respect. She will gladly help the Princess."
"Thank you, sir," I said. "I am very grateful. But please – not a word to my father. He must continue to believe I am safely in the castle."
"I promise, dear Princess."
We departed – he to attend to his soldiers, I to find the named Marvita Crosswood. I passed by several women in the city who curtseyed my approach and I nodded in recognition. I reached the main avenue and headed for the middle. Knocking on several doors, I eventually found the house I was looking for.
It was a patchy stone building, slightly more updated than the houses around it, and it had a humble varnished door which I rapped on. The women passing by double took when they saw me, probably wondering what sort of dealings the Princess could possibly have with a poor old widow woman.
She answered very quickly, a small, stout looking woman. She was very wrinkly but kind of face and gave a welcoming smile when she realised who I was.
"Oh, good morning, Your Highness," she curtseyed awkwardly. "What might I do for you?"
"I have a rather large favour to ask of you," I said.
"Well, don’t hesitate. Come in and tell me all about it."
She gestured for me to enter and then she bustled into the room after me.
"Cup of tea?" she offered.
"No thank you," I replied. "I’m afraid my favour is urgent."
"Oh," she said, sobering up a little. She sat herself on a well-worn armchair and motioned for me to take a seat on the settee opposite, which I did.
The room was warm – there was a crackling fire in the corner of the room, which had probably been burning all morning. It was a neat little abode with wooden flooring and a rug set cosily on the hearth. The window was small but I could see there was a tree planted outside and it wavered in the wind, casting a writhing shadow across the floor.
"I am planning a rescue for Prince Theodore," I explained. "And I wondered if you might help me. You were recommended to me by a good friend who says that you may have the knowledge I need to break into the Troll King’s castle and find where Theodore has been imprisoned."
She nodded her understanding. "Yes, I know a little about the castle and its layout. My husband, you see, he was a historian and he was fascinated especially by the Trolls, though I fail to see why. He passed away in recent years."
"Yes," I said. "I am terribly sorry for your loss. My friend said that you carried on his work for him even after he’d died. How very respectable of you."
"Well, I was quite interested by it myself," she replied modestly. "I thought it was only right that I should get his work published before his life’s work was forgotten and buried. Some of the mysteries he pondered he never was able to answer, so I thought I would finish what he started. It’s what any decent wife would do."
I nodded.
"Would you be able to come with me to the castle, then? You know the way to the prisons and how to free him from them?"
She nodded eagerly.
"I often perused over Grundy’s maps of the castle, and have recently made some copies myself. We can take the maps with us. The key to the prisons will be hardest to find, but I think we could manage."
I smiled in gratitude, wondering how odd we would look – a widow and a Princess attempting to rescue a Prince from the Troll King. But my pride had been hurt and I was going to win some dignity back for myself.
"The best way to go," I said, "Would be down the river Nubea where it widens and heads towards the moat of the castle. The Trolls will be gone to war and they won’t expect us to be there. We can sneak in quietly. Do you know of any entrances other than the drawbridge?"
"They are very dangerous," the widow replied. "One is through a hole at the foot of the castle, but that is under the moat and means we would have to swim down. But there is a way in at the back. It will take longer, but it is safer and closer to the prison cells than the front entrance."
"We must set off quickly if we are to arrive while the battle is fresh," I said. "We must take the maps and whatever else is required."
And so we left with scrolls of paper under our arms, a length of rope and a darkened cloak. We headed towards the Nubea stream. At our kingdom, set against mountains and hills, the Nubea was just a shallow stream, but if you followed it towards the Troll kingdom it got deeper and wider until it was big enough to be deemed a river. We remained as inconspicuous as we could as I explained that our mission was a secret from my father, and so we travelled past my father’s army unnoticed. We walked up the stream until it seemed deep enough to launch a boat in; I tested the water by throwing a rock into its centre. The water seemed to be deep enough, the white spray flaying up and sounding back down to its source with a dull smack! I untied one of the many boats which were moored a little further along for the purposes of fishing, and we climbed into it steadily.
We had decided to let the flow of the stream lead us downstream to the Troll kingdom. In order to remain unnoticed by man or Troll, we covered ourselves with the cloak and left the rope trailing the water so it looked more like the boat had accidentally come loose and drifted off with its booty. The only way we could see where we were going was through a tiny slit in the cloak that we could see out of, but that nobody from any considerable distance would notice. And so we lay still with baited breath, swiftly floating down the Nubea on our rescue mission.
Not far down the stream, we appeared to be drifting towards the bank and our thoughts were realised when a gnarled-looking Troll lifted up one corner of the cloak, probably hoping to find some delicious fish as a free meal. However, he came face-to-face with the point of my dagger and he stepped back, disappointed, only to rebound and attack me with his bare hands. He reached out for my throat, but I fought him off and slashed at his hands with my dagger. Still, he was a determined fellow and did not seem to want to give up. Marvita huddled at the other end of the cloak, as far away from the ugly Troll as possible while I attempted to chase him away. It just was not working.
Instead, I stepped out of the boat into shallow water, soaking my feet and the hem of my dress, and stepped forward menacingly. He pulled a gruesome, menacing face back at me. Then it came clear to me that I had little choice but to kill him if I could. Besides, if he ran free he might chase us to the castle and hinder our mission further. I jumped forward again, swishing my knife and using my other hand to stop his attacks, and his attempts to grab my throat. But every time I jerked forward, he jumped back nimbly, protecting himself with his hands. He again reached out for my throat, and this time I let him. As his fingers closed around my neck, I thrust out my modest-looking dagger and stabbed him between the ribs. He paused for a second, eyes glazing over as they looked to the distance, then he fell limply forward, falling over me as we crashed into the water, his hands still wrung loosely around me in the bubbling current. I prised them away, released my dagger from his bloody chest and rolled him over, standing up and looking down at my drenched white gown, now splattered in various places with deep red Troll blood. Disgusted, I rinsed it in the water until it faded to a pink stain.
Sighing, I climbed back into our boat and told a shaken Marvita what had happened. Without comment, she took an oar and pushed off from the shallow water until our normal flowing state was regained and we picked up speed.
It took little more than a few hours to reach our destination. We flowed down the middle of the Troll kingdom until we reached the castle. With aching backs and cramped limbs, we took the oar from the boat, uncovered the cloak and began rowing towards the foot of the castle. It was hard going but we got there eventually, even as our muscles groaned in resentment.
I realised then how vast the castle really was, and how dreary it was for every single corridor to be exactly the same. I supposed it was a defence against intruders such as ourselves, because it was so easy to get lost in its many identical corridors like a foreboding hedge maze. Still, we had the maps to guide us.
Around the back of the castle, I noticed the moat was a little narrower and to my surprise there was ivy creeping its way up the stone surface.
Marvita pointed to a window two floors up the castle that was wide enough to allow us through.
"We have to climb the wall and get into that room," she explained.
I looked to her questioningly, but she didn’t seem to notice.
She hauled herself up onto the side of the castle, using gaps between the stone blocks as hand and footholds. She was a swifter climber than I had imagined for an old woman of her stature. But I climbed up the wall regardless. She reached the window and pulled herself inside, then tossed me the rope for stability. I gladly held onto it, and towed myself up using the footholds in the castle wall. It seemed like things were going well so far, but I wasn’t banking on our luck holding out for much longer.
I was right to be doubtful. We found the prison key in the trophy cabinet in a hidden room and found our way to the prison cells easily enough, but to my utter horror, there were Troll sentries guarding the way into the prisons. They were four burly-looking beings, dressed in chainmail and armed with spears as sharp and shiny as lightning bolts, and probably a thousand times more lethal in the hands of the Trolls.
Marvita and I hid round a bend in the corridor and talked in whispers.
"Is there another way in?" I asked her.
She unrolled the parchment in her hand and pointed conclusively at a corridor leading off from ours.
"Yes, but that’s bound to be guarded, too," she whispered.
"It’s worth a try," I replied, and we pushed ahead for the other entrance.
This time, there were just two guards, but dressed and armed identically to the other.
"What now?" Marvita asked.
I thought for a moment about our desperate situation, but my mind was too horrified at our predicament to be able to concentrate enough. Marvita spoke first.
"The floor in the prisons is stone, but just outside of them the floor is wooden, and we could try breaking through from underneath – from the cellar. We would get past the guards then if we are quiet."
I nodded and we crept to the stairway that led down to the cellar. There were several torches blazing on the walls to light our passage, but we didn’t dare move one in case it should attract attention to us. By the light of the torches, Marvita found the spot exactly outside the prison cells. I got my dagger ready and stabbed at the wooden ceiling of the cellar so that I could find a weak spot when to our astonishment, the floor lifted up when I pushed it with my dagger.
With the hilt, I lifted it up again and found that it was in fact a crudely made trapdoor that some clever prisoner or rescuer had already carved into the floor of the prisons.
Carefully, on tiptoes, I peered up into the room above and found it was empty as I had hoped. I lightly lifted the cleverly made trapdoor to one side, climbed through with as little noise as possible, and helped Marvita up after me.
Straw was scattered on the floor, and the sickly sweet scent of dust rose from where I had disturbed the trapdoor’s resting place. It obviously had not been moved for a long time. Along the side was a row of doors, oaken with iron bars occupying a square gap at approximately head height. There were no door handles here, only a key hole in the lower half of the door.
Nervously, I whispered Theodore’s name, and Marvita called out ‘prince’, but there was no reply.
I looked to her apprehensively, my hope drifting away. Carefully I began to assess the situation in my head. There were about twenty doors in the prison room, and Prince Theodore could be in one or none of them. If we went in one, we might find nothing, or we might find someone other than Theodore, or we might find Theodore alive or dead. We would have time to check every cell. If he wasn’t here we would think of other places to look. If he was dead we could carry his body between us, take it back down to the cellar and escape the way we had came. But I hoped more than anything now that he was alive, and that he would be just as well as I had last seen him.
I told Marvita to start unlocking the cells, and she got to work straight away. The first few were empty – we unsettled the dust that had lay dormant on the floor for, possibly, centuries. The fifth cell was home to a skeleton still dressed in chainmail and bearing a shield of ancient design. The next one had a skeleton of similar attire. But the seventh:
We had trouble opening this cell as it looked as though the key would not fit. So I unclipped one of my hairpins and began to pick the lock while Marvita opened some of the other cells. At last I heard a distinct click and the door swung open. Lying in the corner of the cell, slumped onto his side was my dear Prince Theodore. I gasped at the sight of him, and ran into the cell.
"Theo! Theo! Wake up! Please wake up!" I cried, and shook him softly, then harder. He would not wake.
Marvita came in behind me and was standing in the doorway, frozen with shock.
"He is still breathing, Princess," she said. "Perhaps they have sedated him?"
There was no choice left to us either way – we had to carry him out of the dreadful castle and row back to my father’s kingdom in the midst of their battle. Perhaps we would be spotted. But if we were, they could do nothing about us. Their minds must carry on concentrating on the battle in hand and besides, all they could have done if the battle was not of priority any more would be to help us take the prince to a physician. There was no choice in the matter, for everyone involved.
"Quick, Marvita, lift his legs," I said as I struggled to lift his shoulders.
I swallowed hard at the sight of Theo’s head lolling lifelessly about, but we went on regardless. We managed to carry him down the trapdoor and then Marvita returned to his cell and locked it again, scattering the straw on the floor to make it look less suspicious.
"Hurry!" I hissed in a harsh whisper, and she quickly darted down the trapdoor, fitted it back into place and we scurried back the way we had came.
We wandered through corridor after corridor, but Marvita seemed to know where she was going, much to my relief. The window we had entered from was in sight. I hurried even faster, eager to leave the dreadful castle, trying to think how we could manage to carry the Prince down to the boat in the river.
We reached the sill and peered down awkwardly, and I knew Marvita was thinking the same thing until,
"The boat’s gone!" she cried.
"Where could it have gone to?" I said, panicking. "We tied it up didn’t we? What if someone discovered it?"
And then, a harsh voice bellowed:
"What are you doing in here?"
I turned to find one of the armed guards striding down the corridor. He took from his belt a peculiar, curved object, put it to his mouth and blew. A soft trumpeting noise emitted from it. We knew the Trolls would be alerted by the sound and we would be gravely outnumbered.
Marvita and I looked at each other in desperation.
"Jump," I whispered.
"What?" she hissed in alarm, peering cautiously over the edge of the window.
"On my count," I said.
She looked at me as if I was mad.
"One. . ."
"Where did you think you were going to go with that there Prince anyway?" the guard bellowed.
"Two. . ."
"We’ll have to teach you all a lesson for that. It’s dangerous to go against the Troll King, you know."
"THREE!"
Without hesitation, we slipped over the edge of the window and fell with a SPLASH! into the freezing water. Gasping for breath, I held Prince Theodore’s head above the water, and made for the bank.
"Hey! Where do you think you’re going!" the guard above yelled.
His five colleagues joined him in the window, gazing across the river at us. Next thing we knew, a storm of spears were raining down on us, each missing us slightly. I held onto the grassy bank, hauled myself up, dragged the Prince up after me, then helped a disgruntled Marvita up. The guards had clearly run out of spears to throw at us, and it pleased me to see them beginning to panic. They would be severely punished by the Troll King when he found out they had let his prized Prince escape with two women.
We slung the Prince’s arms around our necks, held onto his hands, and walked side by side, the Prince dragging his feet along the ground behind him.
We began the long walk home, which would take all day unless we found a boat.
We talked as we journeyed through the green hills and trees, heading towards Grimlar forest.
"My poor Grundy’s cloak in the hands of strangers," Marvita complained.
"I’m awfully sorry about the cloak," I said. "But we really must push on as fast as we can."
Marvita said no more about it, and the conversation changed to the journey ahead.
"By the time we get back there’ll be full-scale war on the green," I said grimly.
"At least we can use it as a diversion," Marvita said hopefully. "And the sooner we get back, the better."
Our clothes were still soaking wet but the chilly wind and warm sun combined soon dried them.
The Prince started to moan.
"Theodore?"
I started to shake him as we walked, hoping he would wake up soon.
We stopped after we’d travelled through the forest, and I collected late spring apples from the nearby trees to eat. We leaned Prince Theodore against a tree to sit him up and I splashed cold water from the stream onto his face.
He opened his eyes slowly, and closed them again. Then he opened them and blinked.
"Theo!" I said. "You’re on the near side of the Grimlar Forest. Wake up, Theo. We rescued you from the Trolls."
"What?" he said sluggishly.
"Are you thirsty?" I asked.
He nodded, his eyes out of focus.
Marvita fetched some water from the stream.
When he’d had a drink he appeared to be much better. We told him about our rescue mission, and about the soon-to-be war. He nodded his understanding and asked us questions when he felt he needed to.
"What happened? How were you kidnapped?" I asked him at last.
"All I remember is that I was fishing in the stream when everything went black, and I realised there was a bag over my head. I was dragged along with my hands tied together and I guessed they were Trolls from the sounds of their voices. There were about five of them. I was badly outnumbered so I thought it would be unwise to fight them or attempt to escape."
I seated myself beside him and wrapped my arm about his waist. He did likewise.
"They took me to the dungeons, or prisons or whatever they call them and I kept shouting for them to let me out. I was panicking. I didn’t know what I was doing. Next thing I knew, there were a group of them in my cell, forcing some kind of solution down my throat."
I leaned my head on his shoulder and he pulled me closer. I was so glad he was all right. I wanted to hold him forever.
Marvita had settled herself on the bank of the stream and ate her apple heartily.
"It was very brave of you," Theo said quietly. "To fight the Troll."
He was looking into my eyes now and I lifted my head from his shoulder, surprised at the compliment. His eyes were sparkling like sapphires. He looked so perfect here in the bright sunshine, smiling a smile of his own. He leaned in closer to me, and I was drawn to him, drawn to his eyes. Our lips brushed.
"Shouldn’t we be going?" Marvita called from the edge of the stream.
I smiled at Theodore, and our heads parted. I stood up, and helped the weak Prince to his feet.
The journey was much quicker after he’d woken up. Marvita was especially glad that her burden had been relieved of her.
The city was in sight as the sun began to set, and I knew that on the green, the two sides would be ready and waiting to fight. The wind had calmed to a stirring breeze; the sky was orange with the sun’s last light. I felt at rest knowing that my Prince was safe, but I was still thinking about my father and the battle that lay ahead.
We kept to the stream, and stayed on the opposite side to the battlefield so we would not be injured or found wandering the hills. It was well past sundown when we reached the battlefield.
It was a frenzied array of shapes, and arrows darting here and there across the sky like shooting stars. The cries of the injured and shouts of fury were audible to my ears, but they were distant. I prayed that my father would be victorious after his long, hard struggle with the Trolls.
We made for the palace, and sent Prince Theodore to his bed to rest. Marvita and I could not sleep as deeply as the Prince, who was still weary from the sedative the Trolls had given him. I was deeply troubled about my father and worried about how he was faring in battle. The scene from my bedroom window was traumatic to view.
I showed Marvita to her room for the night, and we sat on her bed and talked in hushed voices about the war. I told her about the Troll King and his wicked remark to my father about me, and how if he wasn’t killed by the soldiers I would like to kill him myself. Marvita expressed her understanding with nods. I thanked her and explained how grateful I was for all her help, and she modestly declined my thanks, saying it was an honour to help the Princess.
I left her company many moments later, feeling a strange mixture of contentment and unease. I walked across the landing towards my own room, but stopped in mid-step when I realised a pair of eyes was on me. Across the way Prince Theodore was standing motionless outside his bedroom door. He looked more handsome than ever – a white robe outlined with scarlet and a marvellous pair of brown leather boots. His hair was dishevelled from his sleep, but his eyes were wide awake and staring into mine.
"You have been awake all this time?" he inquired.
"I could not bring myself to sleep," I replied. "You are up early."
"I had a strange dream," he said.
I walked towards him lightly, my purple gown flowing behind me; my auburn hair was loose around my shoulders.
"Do tell," I said.
"There was a door," he spoke quietly. "And through it there was a barn the size of this palace. There was straw littered everywhere. I trailed through it and climbed a set of ladders. I crept onto the balcony, past haystacks, and saw – "
"What did you see?"
"I saw – "
His face drew nearer to mine. His eyes were divinely sensitive and crystalline, and I was transfixed by them. Our lips touched and then locked, and we sidled into his room. My heart beat fast and thick, and my head swam with love. I did not fully recover until morning.
The first thing I noticed was that the morning light cast a shadow in completely the wrong direction. The next thing was that the bed covers were the wrong colour. Then I remembered. I was in Theo’s room.
I heard him breathing gently from the other side of the four poster bed. He looked so peaceful and so beautiful. His hair was scattered about the pillow in dark, wispy curls. I crept from the room in silence, taking a last glance at him before closing the door.
Downstairs, Marvita had already been awakened by one of the maids and was being served breakfast on a silver platter. She was truly delighted by the extravagance of it all.
"I had the best sleep I’ve had in years," she told me as I seated myself opposite her.
At that moment the double doors to the dining hall crashed apart and a bloody soldier marched in. His helmet had been removed and blood was coursing down his face but he seemed to pay it no heed.
"We need more soldiers!" he said to me.
"What?" I exclaimed in puzzlement.
"Our troops are severely down on men," he replied in a gruff voice. "Your father has sent orders for me to tell you to send a messenger to the Elves and request their support immediately. The battle has been stopped until sundown tonight – we may last another night, but our hopes are not high. We need Elven troops here tomorrow, or our kingdom will fall into the hands of the Troll King."
My hand was over my mouth at this point, but I took it away when he had finished and told one of the maids to go into the city and fetch Lilia Trawsky with orders for her to ride to the Elven kingdom and ask their services. Lilia Trawsky was the best female rider we knew, and she would be willing to do her duty to the King. The maid left at once, at a rapid pace.
I turned to the soldier.
"Thank you, sir, for bringing your message. What is the state of our men?"
"They are tired and many are wounded," he replied gravely. "If the same outcome occurs tomorrow, our men will surely be defeated."
"Do they need medical care? Food?" I asked.
"Yes, they will be very needy of both those things," he said.
I brought another maid to me and ordered her to gather a group of women to feed and treat the soldiers outside. In return for his news, I brought the soldier some breakfast and Marvita cleaned his wounded head. He was very grateful of our help.
Afterwards, we helped the maids collect together supplies of food and medicines and carried them out to the battlefield.
The area was a mess of blood and sprawled men. They were camped in groups around individual fires. Other men had gone wandering farther afield, retrieving lost weapons and collecting arrows from the bodies of dead Trolls. It was a dreadful scene to behold.
I met my father in my work. He appeared to be solemn and resolute.
"Anna," he said to me quietly. "I don’t think my men will hold out tonight."
"The Elves will come tomorrow," I said. "You must fight bravely for one more night before they reach us."
"We need their help now," he said. "Desperately. More than we’ve ever needed them. I should have thought carefully before declaring war on the Trolls, daughter. I should have given myself time to think and planned a surprise attack on their city. I should not have been so hasty."
"You were angry, father. Anyone whose son had been kidnapped would have reacted like you did."
"No, Anna. He is not my son yet. And my hastiness will cost my men their lives and their livelihood."
"Don’t give up, father," I said, trying to sound reassuring. "We will find a way."
The day was long and hard. We waited apprehensively for sunset.
The other women had gone inside but I was too nervous to hide from the battle behind closed doors. I had to see it for myself. I stood on the balcony of my room, watching the sun slowly disappear behind a black horizon.
Its light snuffed out completely not long after. The sky was paling into orange on the horizon and a line of silhouettes began marching towards the palace. The Trolls were on their way.
The heavy one-two-one-two clanking of armour drifted up to where I stood. Then war cries issued from my father’s people and the air was rife with battle sounds once more. The arrows darted across the sky, the chink of metal on metal combat and roars of dying beings were to be impressed in my skull forever.
My father’s side did not appear to be failing at first, and they held off the Troll nation with difficulty. But I noticed that the enemy lines seemed to be creeping further and further towards the palace.
That’s when I rushed to Theodore’s room.
"Theo! We are being defeated!" I cried in despair. "There must be some way we can help."
"I cannot help," Theodore replied sadly. "They think I am still imprisoned in the Troll King’s castle."
I thought for a moment.
"That’s it!" I said. "We can alert them that their cause for war is over. You are saved, Prince Theodore, we can show them!"
"How?" Theodore asked. "The Trolls will only become angry that you have taken what they are fighting for on uneven terms, and they will fight stronger than ever to get back what they lost. Besides, we would never get their attention while they are in battle, while our kingdom still has a chance to be saved."
"We can get our women together and outnumber the Trolls," I said. "We can attack with acids and boiling water and kitchen knives while they are unaware!"
Prince Theodore looked at me ruefully.
"It would be impossible, Anna. The battle is theirs. The Trolls have won the city now. It is almost over."
"Then we are desperate," I said. "Unorthodox behaviour can be excused. At least let’s give it a try."
"No, Anna. It will do more harm than good."
"I will do it with or without your help," I said stubbornly. "Without it will be harder."
Theodore’s expression was torn between love and hatred of his position. What was going through his mind I cannot know.
"I will help you," he said, and I embraced him in my delight.
"We must alert the women of our city!" I said. "We can ride out into the streets and declare our purpose!"
I alerted Marvita of our plan straight away and she left the palace at speed and headed straight for the city. Theodore and I informed the palace workers of our plan and asked them to follow us into the city and help us gather together the women, with any weapons they could find from burning acid to kitchen silverware.
Taking the horses that were available, we did indeed do just that, and asked the women to collect at the palace doors where a careful servant would welcome them in.
All the women that could afford to leave their homes made for the palace as we ordered, laden with all sorts of devices that could aid us in fighting back the enemy lines.
We returned soon later, after all the women we needed had gathered at the palace. I pushed past the crowds in the dining hall and stood up on the table to attract their attention.
"Faithful people!" I called. "Our plan is to go up the stream in boats while the battle distracts the enemy and fight them off from the back! We must be successful or we will die."
There was an audible hush upon them now, and they gazed wide-eyed at me.
"We will show them that in fact, Prince Theodore is in our hands now, and their cause for battle is over. We must throw acid and boiling water to decrease their number quickly, and fight them off with the items we have brought. Pray to God that we will be successful. Do it for us, and do it for our kingdom!"
The women roared their approval, as I marched them off towards the Nubea. I was wary of so many people being discovered, but who would notice if the minds of the soldiers were on survival?
We seated ourselves twelve in a boat and crouched as low as possible while one person at the fore rowed us to our destination past enemy lines. The awful sounds of ongoing battle were all too plain to our ears, but we had to disregard it in order to keep our focus.
We arrived at the place where we were to sneak up on the Trolls. Quietly, we waited until a considerable number were out of the boats, then charged without sound to the back row of ugly Trolls.
When I raised my hand, the women got to work, pouring acid and boiling water over the faces of the Trolls, blinding them and making them vulnerable to attack. The Trolls were distracted from the war momentarily as I unveiled before them Prince Theodore Olympus, alive and well and out of their ghastly prison. Then we attacked with knives and pans, hitting and stabbing with fury, taking on no particular technique but aiming to kill. There were perhaps two hundred of us in number, perhaps more, and we drove the enemies back into the swords of the soldiers. The number of Trolls seemed to disintegrate rapidly. Some of our women died, others were injured, but we were winning the battle back.
There were less than fifty Trolls left by the end, and they fled back to their kingdom, bloody and distraught.
Our men gave a wild cheer of delight and congratulated each other quietly as the dead and wounded were carried off. I could not find my father to tell him about my rescue of Prince Theodore, but there was no time to tell stories anyway. I could tell him later. Instead I helped limping soldiers into the palace where they could be treated and fed.
The dining hall was a mass of people when I re-entered it, but along with everybody else, I got to work in helping the soldiers and the women who had been injured. I still could not find my father in the throng of people, which disappointed me, but I busied myself and soon forgot about it.
By early the next morning, everyone was exhausted. I left the hall and retired to my room to rest.
I was soon awakened by a familiar voice. It was Marvita.
"Princess Anna, your father has requested to see you," she said softly.
"My father?"
"Yes. Prince Theodore is with him already. He is in his chamber."
"His chamber?" I said questioningly. "But he should be downstairs with the others. With the wounded. He should have been organising it."
Marvita was shaking her head briskly.
"No, Anna. Your father is one of the wounded."
I sat up immediately.
"Wh – is he – is he going to be all right?"
"You should go and see him, Anna. Now."
Suddenly awake despite my lack of sleep, I wandered through the palace in a daze towards my father’s chamber. I was thinking how bad he might be injured, how awful he might look. I secretly prayed that he would be all right.
"Anna," he whispered as I walked in the door. "You have come."
"Yes, father," I said quietly. "I am here now. Everything will be all right."
"Anna," he said again, his voice gruff and unsettling. His face was pale and slicked with perspiration, the bed covers pulled up to his chest. Theodore was knelt on the opposite side of the bed, watching me carefully.
"You fought bravely, father," I said reassuringly.
"No," he replied, looking away. "It was you who won the battle. Your bravery saved the city. I should have trusted you. You will make a fine Queen."
"Yes," I said. "But there are many years to come yet."
"Tell me, Anna, how you rescued Theodore from the Trolls."
"It was with the help of Marvita," I said. "We floated in a boat undercover to the back of the Troll King’s castle and climbed in through a window. We found the key in the trophy room, crept down to the cellar and through a trapdoor in the ceiling. And we got him out of the prison."
"She escaped two Trolls in her mission," Theodore spoke up. "She killed one single-handedly on her way down the river, and escaped the wrath of another on her way back. She jumped out the window and into the river to evade him."
"Daughter, you are so brave," my father said proudly. "You deserve to be Queen. You have earned your right by doing your duty to our people. They will follow you to no end. You have their full trust."
"Shush, father," I said. "And get some rest."
"My time for rest will come," he said. "Now I wish to spend my last moments with you and my son and the woman who helped rescue my kingdom."
He looked sluggishly towards Marvita and tried to smile, but it appeared as more of a grimace. His voice was steadily quietening and my unease grew.
"Be sure she is knighted," my father whispered hoarsely.
"But women cannot be knighted," I said.
"You are the Queen, now," my father said quietly. "You make the laws, and knight whomever has earned the title. This woman fits that right and you will knight her, do you hear me?"
"Yes, father I will knight her," I said, and smiled warmly at a blushing Marvita who was seated on a stool at the foot of my father’s bed.
"And one other thing, before I go," he said.
"You are not going anywhere, father," I said, but my eyes were already brimming with tears.
"Just listen to me," he whispered. "I want you to be happy in your marriage to this fine fellow." He looked towards Theodore.
"I promise," I spoke softly. "But you did not have to request it. Theodore and I will be very happy together."
"You will get married soon," my father continued. "It is a shame I will not be there on my daughter’s wedding day."
"You will be there, father," I said.
"Yes," he replied, and for a moment I thought he meant to live. "I will be in your heart, and I will be all around and in the crown that you wear and the throne that you sit upon."
The first tears dripped down my face and moistened the bed covers.
"I will always be there," he whispered. It was so slight that I may only have thought I heard him say it. His eyes glassed over as he looked to the ceiling and his face froze in eternal hope.
My face buried in the bed covers as I felt a soothing hand rub my back and talk in a comforting voice, but I felt no comfort.
Theodore lifted me to my feet and embraced me and instead my face buried itself in his shoulder.
"Don’t cry, my Queen," he said. "We have things to look forward to."
I glanced up at him wonderingly. He took my hand in his and led me to the balcony. Marvita stood where she had been sitting before.
And we looked out on my new kingdom, the cerulean sky swept with clouds and the sun shining down on my face and lighting up the world with its radiant glow.
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