by Holly Black
At first, when I woke up, I wasn’t sure why I’d woken. It seemed colder than before and there was a tinkling sound outside my window as the wind knocked the icicles off the gutter. But there was another sound too, like someone was messing with one of the windows.
I leaped out of bed—almost falling on the floor—and listened for the sound. It came from my parent’s room. I walked in and saw a monster through the lacy curtains.
It had a long nose, as pointed and twisting as one of the icicles, set on a huge, green face. Tiny, beady eyes were barely visible beneath shaggy, dark green brows. Long, branch-like fingers scraped at the window, then pushed it up. Cold air blew into the room, and the cat—who’d been following me—skittered under the bed.
I flicked on the lights. The creature shuffled back from the window, but didn’t disappear. I could still see it out there, watching me through the curtains, gnashing its teeth.
“What are you?” I yelled. Despite my best intentions, my voice quavered.
“Troll,” it said.
I didn’t know anything about trolls. Nothing at all.
“The light will burn out,” the troll said in a voice that was full of whispers. “And then I will come in.”
“I’ll turn on another light,” I said.
“In a storm like this, your light could die. Anything could happen.” That soft, persuasive voice made me shudder. It was right, but I didn’t say so. I didn’t say anything.
“Let’s play a game while we wait,” it said. “I will tell you a riddle and then you tell me one.”
“What happens if I don’t get one right?” I asked.
“Maybe I’ll find the way to stop all the light.”
I squeaked with terror. Could it really cut the power to the house? “What happens if you don’t get one right?”
“Maybe I’ll find another house with a child that is not so clever.”
“Okay,” I said. What else could I say? “I’ll start.”
The troll nodded and I racked my brain for ideas. We used to play riddle games in school, but I only remembered some of them.
“What has eyes but can’t see?” I asked. It seemed kind of easy, but it was the only one I could think of.
The troll made a hissing laugh, like steam in a pot. “A potato. Now answer me this: The more you take away from me, the larger I get. What am I?”
I swallowed hard. My brain felt foggy with fear. I had to calm down and think this through. If something gets bigger when you take things away from it, then it must be a negative thing. A thing like nothing. A black hole. A hole! “A hole,” I said, slumping onto my parent’s bed with relief, sure that I had gotten it right.
The troll grunted. “Tell your riddle now.” Oh, right. I straightened up. “What kind of nut has no shell?” I actually thought that this one might have a chance. It wasn’t the hardest riddle in the world, but it did assume a certain degree of knowledge about food that I wasn’t sure the troll had.
It scowled and grumbled, and for a moment, I thought I had him. But then the troll grinned toothily. “Doughnut,” it whispered. “Now it is my turn. Here is my riddle: What drapes us all in white and bites without teeth?”
I shivered in the breeze from the open window and knew I had the answer. “Frost,” I said.
We went back and forth like that, answering and asking riddles all through the night. As dawn reddened the horizon, the troll asked me, “What can’t you keep until you give?”
For the first time, I had no idea. I thought it must be something that wasn’t tangible, something like love or hope, but I couldn’t think of what.
I tried to think, but as time wore on, I knew I had no idea what the answer was supposed to be.
“Do you give up?” the troll asked, leaning close.
“No,” I said quickly. “I’ll get it.”
The troll leaned forward, eagerness writ on its features. Long fingers snaked toward the open window, caressing the sill. “Now. Tell me the answer now or I win.”
“The answer is . . . ,” I said, stalling for seconds.
Just then, the first edge of the sun was visible in the distance. Light touched the troll and its skin went gray and hard. Fingers still reaching for me, it turned to stone. No longer did it look like a troll. Now it just seemed like a huge boulder that happened to be on our well-manicured lawn.
Just then, I found the answer that had eluded me. “A promise,” I said aloud.
—Judy R.
ANALYSIS: Trolls are thought to turn to stone in sunlight. It is said that some boulders that seem to have faces in them were once trolls.
—H. B. & T. D.
This creature only comes out at night:
Here’s what else I know about it:
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Riddles I’d use to outwit a troll:
Promises I never should have made:
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Promises I’ll keep forever:
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Diagram for a board game called “TRICK THE TROLL” in which players ask riddles and move their pieces with each correct answer:
Design the game board:
Pictures or list of game pieces required to play:
Rules and instructions:
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The horn that jutted from its forehead was twisted to an end that looked sharp.
FROM BOOK 3: LUCINDA’S SECRET
UNICORNS
&n
bsp; My little sister has a ton of unicorns. She has stuffed animals, porcelain figurines, little plastic toys in pink and blue and yellow. They have the bodies and hooves of horses. Some of them have gold horns, but most of the horns are long and white, like the spiral of a shell. And, of course, they curl up in girls’ laps like kittens.
They don’t look anything like real unicorns.
Real unicorns are smaller than a horse and more slender. They look a little like deer, but they look a little like goats, too. Their toes are splayed and their horns look too big and heavy for their heads. But the most important difference is that they don’t come in blue or pink or even really white. They’re a muddy cream color, the way white socks get after you wear them a couple of times.
You’re probably wondering how I know what unicorns look like, especially since I’m a boy, especially since I live in the city. Well, I’ll tell you. I saw one at the zoo.
We had a school trip there. We were supposed to stick together and go see some boring exhibits, but there was this plan for what to do if you were lost. The teachers told us that if we got separated from the group, we were supposed to meet at the gates at two o’clock. I figured I could go off, see all the stuff I wanted to see, then pretend it was unintentional.
At first it was great. I saw the pink-toed tarantulas that live together in groups, and I tapped the glass to make the hissing cockroach hiss at me. I even saw a bat that looks like a Chihuahua. But after a while I got lonely and thought that maybe I could catch up to the group. None of those things were as much fun by myself.
I passed the lions lounging on the pretend Serengeti, and the cheetahs. I came to the petting zoo. There were llamas and chinchillas and whatnot, but in with the goats was a weird animal that I’d never seen before. It was pale and looked a little like a deer.
I turned to a janitor sitting on a bench near a garbage can he’d just emptied and smoking a cigarette. He was an old guy with a face heavily lined with wrinkles, like dry earth that has started to crack.
“What’s that?” I asked him, pointing to the animal.
“A unicorn,” he said. I expected him to smile, but he looked as solemn and bored as he had a moment ago.
“It is not,” I said. I hated it when adults tried to mess with my head.
He shrugged.
“If it’s a unicorn, then where’s its horn?” I demanded.
“Take a look for yourself.” He stood up and put out his cigarette with his heel. Picking up the butt, he stuck it in the mound of garbage already on his cart and started to wheel it away.
I leaned out my hand to the deer-goat thing. It nuzzled my palm and as it did, I saw that at the center of its forehead there was a rough circle of cut bone, as though someone had hacked a long and majestic horn from its brow.
—Alex L.
ANALYSIS: This encounter is evidence that unicorns can live on without their horns, although it is unclear what magical properties they might still possess.
—H. B. & T. D.
This creature has magical powers:
Here’s what else I know about it:
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List of magical powers I’d like to have:
“THE MOST MAGICAL CREATURE OF ALL”
is the title of each of the following:
a haiku:
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a poem:
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a song:
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A Chart of Observations of Fantastical Creatures
A Chart of Observations of My Own Fantastical Creatures
“Lucinda’s Sprites” by T. DiTerlizzi
“Puddingtoe” drawing by Sam M.