Under the lowering rain clouds of their native valleys in the Mosweeps, trolls haunted forests of perpetual gloom. Although their doughy hides were durable as pigskin, they were very susceptible to sunburn, and any good overseer knew enough to provide his trolls with a complete covering of clothes. It was an extra expense, but trolls were worth it.
Hugg was twenty-four years old. When he was fourteen he had wandered into a village to trade some bright stones for a chisel. Trolls were much given to erecting massive edifices of raw masonry among their jungle-quilted hills, usually choosing a site that straddled a stream, so that they could have running water in every room. A troll might spend years on such a constructiort and then just walk away from it before it was complete, only to begin another two or three valleys over. Hugg had begun to feel restless and unsatisfied with the tower his parents were building. He had decided to go off and begin work on one of his own rather than continue to help on theirs. Perhaps, when he had completed two or three rooms by himself, some wandering trolless would come along to help. Meanwhile, the first thing he needed was a chisel, one of those shiny bronze ones and not the junky steel kind that rusted away in a week or so.
Ever since conquering that part of the Mosweeps fifty years earlier, the Impire had been striving to gather the inhabitants out of their dark, damp forests into specially designed model villages, hoping to civilize them and keep an eye on them and encourage them to increase their numbers. Out of the trees and into one of these villages wandered Hugg. He was at once arrested for indecent exposure and for not possessing a permit. He did not know what a permit was. He did not know why clothes were necessary. He explained patiently that he would cover himself until he departed if that was required, but normally he never saw anyone except his own reflection; and in the forest, cloth or even leather would certainly rot away to pulp within a few days. He did not understand why his offer was not an acceptable compromise.
Nor did he understand the courtroom proceedings, short and simple though they were. He was sentenced to two years’ hard labor and led off for a three-week introductory course in the value of docility. His bright stones had been taken from him, but they were not mentioned in the court records.
Ever since the reign of the Impress Abnila, slavery had been illegal in the Impire; but the army had to find some way to cover the cost of its occupation of the Mosweeps, and graft was as widespread and inevitable as weather.
As soon as Hugg had learned to do exactly what he was told as fast as possible and never to speak unless spoken to, his place of confinement was changed from Hamlet 473 to the town of Danqval, and from there he was marched in an ever-increasing brigade of other convicts down to the market in Clamdewth.
Later he and a few others enjoyed a brief sea voyage, Hugg having,an oar all to himself on the basic principle of two men or one troll. He arrived at last at a plantation somewhere to the north of Milflor and was then provided with a chance to escape, which he did.
They always did.
He was run down with hounds and horses and given a lesson that left him ever after with a slight limp and a ringing in one ear. Even trolls could learn from that sort of teaching, and they healed quickly. Never again did he try to escape.
At twenty-four, Hugg was still there. He did not know that he should have been shipped home after two years. Had he known that, and asked for an explanation, he would have learned that his file had been mislaid and he must pen a formal petition to the marshal of the armies, in Hub, as his area had been under military rule at the time of his offense. But he did not ask, and no one told him, and nothing would have changed anyway.
He dug and tilled and harvested; he chopped wood and bore burdens as he was told. He grew to be the largest and strongest troll on the plantation, and no one ever stole his supper.
Following the scent and unmistakable sounds of flight, Hugg plunged through the trees and bushes, smashing and breaking and even uprooting as required, heedless of his own noise or the damage to his clothes. After a few minutes, he realized that there were two or three persons ahead of him and he remembered old stories of headhunting fairyfolk. Perhaps he had been rash, therefore, but he had never heard of any natives coming near the plantations, and the fugitives were obviously running away as fast as they could. That was good, because their scent was not troll scent, and therefore he could outrun them in this undergrowth. Furthermore, if they were running away they were probably unarmed, and then he would not hesitate to accept odds of three to one, or perhaps even four. Trolls were placid by nature, but they could be roused to anger like anyone else. Hugg enjoyed his daily bucket of slop. He intended to win it back.
He heard a few loud oaths ahead of him, a couple of shouts, and knew from the sounds that his pursuit was to be contested. Two kept running—still carrying his meal, doubtless—but one had turned back to challenge. A moment later Hugg crashed through a dense wall of shrubbery and saw him. He was a husky youth, but shorter even than the average imp, and half the size of a troll. In the dappling shade of the branches, he seemed a very odd color. He smelled strange and his eyes were curiously angular. He was standing in a half crouch, holding out his hands and waiting for Hugg with a big toothy grin.
Trolls preferred action to thought. Roaring with joy and never breaking stride, Hugg swung a fist that should have stoved in the brat’s chest. The last thing he saw was a tree trunk, dead ahead.
“God of Mercy!” Rap shouted. “Did you have to kill him?” Little Chicken folded his arms and turned his smirk into a sneer. “You think he wanted to talk?”
No, the giant had not wanted to talk; and now he would never talk again. The bark of the tree bore more obvious damage than did his head, but his neck was undoubtedly broken. Abandoning futile efforts to find a pulse, Rap rose shakily to his feet and glared across the corpse at the goblin.
The situation was a creepy echo of the time they had faced each other across the body of the fairy child, but then Little Chicken had been as distraught and bewildered as Rap. Now he was showing his huge goblin teeth in a satisfied grin, proud of having beaten an opponent so much larger than himself.
Since the castaways had left the fairy village and headed south, Little Chicken had changed ominously. He now spoke passable impish and thus could express himself better, but there was more to it than that. He had grown in confidence. He swaggered now, he often smirked as if relishing some secret joke, he patronized Rap again, as he had in the taiga, and he treated Thinal like an unwanted and unpleasant child. He was obnoxious and unnerving.
“Used a leg throw on him, “ he said, nudging the corpse with his foot. “Didn’t see the tree there. Not much time to plan ahead when you’re about to be smeared, Flat Nose.”
That was not quite what Rap had seen with his farsight. Admittedly his attention had been mostly on his own undignified flight through the shrubbery, and he had not seen the throw, but he was fairly sure that Little Chicken had then picked the troll up bodily and rammed the tree with him. In fact the evidence was clear—the man had obviously made a right-angle turn somewhere on his journey.
Thinal was creeping back through the bushes, at the same time gobbling whatever was in the pail he had stolen. Using two fingers, he was scooping mush into his mouth, spreading it liberally on his chin, also. Rap shouted to say it was all clear, then went back to scowling at Little Chicken’s self-satisfied smirk.
Time had ceased to mean very much, but the moon was almost full now, so the refugees had been in Faerie more than two weeks. Their journey south had been aided by the equipment salvaged from the deserted village—nets and waterbottles, hats and boots made by Little Chicken, backpacks jammed with food. Those supplies had lasted them all the way to the edges of the impish colony around Milflor. Here they had been forced to detour inland, staying in the fringe of the jungle and gradually replacing the fairy kit with whatever Thmal’s quick eyes fancied. Their passage through the settled lands had been marked by a steady pilfering of local garments and foodstuffs, as the little thief looted larders, clotheslines, and even ovens.