The Accidental Troll

by Dakota Cassidy

  As they began to wander down the corridor, and she tried to numb herself to what they were going to do, the digging got louder, and Nova’s grunts grew.

  Marty squeezed her waist. “Just let me guide you, honey. I can see in the dark.”

  Murphy followed her, her arms aching and sore, her legs wobbly. When they turned another corner, Murphy finally saw her sister by the dim light of a lantern, crouched in a hole surrounded by a pile of dirt and gravel taller than all of them, her small arms flying. She caught her breath.

  “Nova!” she cried out, running toward her, tripping and slipping.

  “Don’t touch her!” Marty reminded with a yelp.

  Instead, she dropped down next to her in the dirt and began to talk. “Nova, if you can hear me, I’m here. I won’t leave you, no matter what. I love you, Nova. Help is coming, I promise you!”

  Nova’s straw hair was saturated with sweat, her face screwed up and distorted and flame red. Marty sat next to Murphy and put her hand on her back. “It’s okay, Nova. Everything’s going to be okay. Nina’s going to take care of everything.”

  Wanda wasn’t far behind them, and as she ran into the room and dropped down with them, she whispered soothing words to Nova.

  But the moment they settled next to her, there was a rumble and a husky scream.

  Murphy’s head flew up in time to see the wall in front of them begin to shift. “It’s going to collapse!” she said, fighting hysteria as she knelt in the dirt, watching Nova dig her life away. “If she keeps digging, it’s going to collapse, or she is! We have to get her out of here soon! What’s taking so long?”

  But Wanda put a calming hand on her arm, her eyes speaking volumes, her confidence in her friend obviously unshakeable. “We have to wait for Nina.”

  But waiting for Nina wasn’t to be.

  “Muuurphyyy!” she heard Leonard’s tiny voice call to her as he skittered into the room and ran up her leg. “He woke up before they could finish him and zapped ’em outta here! He’s loose, Murphy! Run!”

  She didn’t know where the energy came from, or why, but she hopped upward just as Sten’s brother flew into the room and the walls began to loosen and crumble, the rumble almost deafening.

  Her head throbbed, her eyes were grainy, her body was on fire—but the hell he’d get his hands on Nova.

  Dirt began to fall from the ceiling and gravel slapped her cheeks, making it hard to see where Sten’s brother was.

  Marty and Wanda were yelling, but she couldn’t focus on what they were saying.

  Her sole focus was getting her hands on him.

  And then she saw him. He came at her like a freight train, his face, so like Sten’s, a mask of pure hatred. “I’m going to kill you, you fucking bitch!” he screeched.

  Anger welled up inside her in that moment, for all he’d put them through, for his jealous, petty hate. For the mess he’d left Nova in. For taking advantage of Bellamy and holding Sten’s mother hostage. But worst of all? For killing Sten’s father.

  For all of it, he had to pay.

  So as he came at her, Murphy geared up to go at him. She wasn’t leaving this world without a fight.

  “Get away from her!” Leonard howled, flying across the air to latch onto his face, making it impossible for him to see.

  And that’s when she reacted. As he ran toward her, she ran at him, head down, eyes focused on the middle of his body.

  With a hard grunt, she hurled herself at him, using the strength she wasn’t used to—using all of it—using so much of it, every muscle she owned hurt.

  She rammed into him so hard, he flew backward with a roar, smashing up against the jagged wall of rocks. His head flew backward, cracking against the wall with a sick thud, a thud so loud, she heard it above the thunder of the collapsing walls.

  Murphy falling on top of him, he struggled for only a moment, one long, eerie moment, but when Leonard scrambled off his face, his eyes popped open and he stared at her, his gaze still angry and intense.

  “My name is Lars. I’m Lars,” he spat…before he took one last shuddering breath, then stared sightlessly at the ceiling.

  Murphy gulped, horrified by what she’d done, but she couldn’t get away from him fast enough, pushing back with the heels of her hands until she was as far away as possible.

  “We have to get out!” Marty screamed, grabbing her by the arm.

  “Nova! Where’s Nova?” As she asked the question, the ceiling began to cave in, more dirt flew into her eyes, more rocks pummeled her face.

  “Marty! Gimme your fucking hand!” Nina screamed.

  Murphy looked up to see Nina above them, peering down through the hole created by the crumbling ceiling, and as the others began to climb out, Murphy saw Nova’s transformation back to her human form had begun.

  As though she were watching a sci-fi movie, Nova’s body began to shimmer and quake, her image becoming blurry.

  When she realized what was happening, Murphy ran to Nova to grab her and get her out.

  “Get out, Murphy!” Leonard bellowed, leaping toward the hole to safety.

  She reached for Nova, her limp body almost fully returned to its former shape.

  “Murphy! Give me your hand!” Sten hollered. “Give me your hand!”

  But she was determined to get Nova out first. Grabbing her up, she lifted her enough that Sten was able to reach her limp arm and pull her up nearly all the way, but he suddenly lost his grip, and she fell limply back into Murphy’s arms.

  “Murphy! You have to get out now! Get the fuck out!” she heard Nina call, but just as she moved Sten out of the way to jump back down into the mine to grab Murphy, there was a loud explosion, knocking the vampire backward and out of her line of vision.

  And then Nova was slipping back into the hole and everything was falling down around her. Still, she had one goal.

  Get Nova out first. Throwing her sister over her shoulders, she lifted her over her head and literally threw her at Sten, who successfully caught her, passing her off to Wanda.

  Then he stuck his hand back in and reached for her, his face a tight mask of concern. “Grab hold, Murphy! Hurry!” he yelled.

  She gritted her teeth, stretching her arm as far as it would go. She heard everyone screaming as she reached—just before the entire room shifted under her feet and the world went dark, with her solidly buried beneath it.

  The world exploded around them, knocking everyone off their feet. Lights flashed and crackled, the air grew thick then expanded, and then everything went silent except for his heavy breathing.

  Mounds of dirt were everywhere, and as Sten sat up, trying to get his bearings, he heard Marty yell, “Arch!”

  “I got him, Marty! You go help find Murphy,” Darnell ordered.

  He pushed his way up to assess the situation only to find his mother, struggling to get to her feet. Sten helped her up. “Are you okay, Mom?”

  “I’m fine! I’ll help Darnell. You help the women!” his mother cried, pressing a dirty hand to his cheek before leaving to aid Arch.

  And that was when he saw it. A pile of dirt almost as tall as he was, with Nina at the base, her face covered in smears of mud, her eyes frantic.

  Oh, God, Murphy was in that mess. Jesus Christ.

  “We have to dig! Dig, goddammit, dig!” Nina screamed as they all fell to their knees, side by side, knee to knee, trying to dig Murphy from the rubble.

  Even Nova, weak and exhausted, was on her knees, pulling at dirt, her face streaked with mud and cuts, right alongside Leonard, who moved his little feet at rapid speed.

  Bellamy drove her hands into the hard soil, pushing past gravel and chunks of rock, frantically digging.

  “Dig faster!” Wanda screamed.

  And then Sten saw a fingertip. One lone fingertip—and he prayed it was Murphy’s. “Stop!” he bellowed and pointed. “Here…look here!”

  Nina sniffed the area, her nostrils flaring. “It’s her! Dig her the fuck out!”

  Pushing t
he mounds away with careful hands, he saw her face first, and then her limbs. He pulled her out of the pile of dirt and held her to him.

  “Murphy!” he yelled, brushing the dirt from her mouth and face as Marty and Wanda hovered over him, their faces full of concern.

  When he didn’t get a response, her gave her a light shake. “Don’t you dare do this now! Do you hear me?” Clinging to her limp body, Sten whispered in her ear, “Wake up. Wake up now. C’mon, Murph. Don’t give up yet. There’s so much more to do. So much more for you to see!”

  When he still didn’t get a response, he sat her forward as the dirt fell from her face and the loose gravel fell around them. Her body complied, but she was limp and unresponsive.

  Nina came up behind her. Crouching down, she gave Murphy’s back a solid thwack, then listened. “She’s got something stuck in her airway!” she yelled, before she tore Murphy from Sten’s arms, hauled her upward, wrapped her arms around her waist and began to press her fists into Murphy’s sternum.

  “Goddammit, Troll, spit it out!” Nina rammed her fists into her sternum again, as Sten drove his finger into her mouth to clear any leftover debris.

  Her lips were going blue—and that was when he saw his own life flash before his eyes.

  No way was he going to let her die.

  “Murphy!” Nova’s hoarse cry sounded in his ears. “Don’t you die on me. Not after all this! I love you, Murphy!”

  Yanking her from Nina, Sten repeated the process one last time, firmly pressing his fists into her breastbone. “C’mon, Murphy, spit it the hell out!” he roared—before she coughed, a long, raspy sound, the deep hack music to his ears.

  Her breathing was shallow and reedy as Sten lifted her into his arms, and when she put a weak arm around him, he blew out a shuddered breath of relief.

  “Oh. Oh, God. I didn’t know you had tractor trailers in Troll Hill,” she said on a weak laugh, followed by a hearty cough.

  “Tractor trailers?”

  “Yeah. I feel like I’ve been run over by one.”

  Sten laughed and hugged her close. “Well, it does look a little like one came through here. What the hell did you do to him?”

  Her voice sounded weak, but it also lowered an octave. “Can we talk about it later? I don’t…”

  Sten carried her to a nearby log. Sitting down, he held her close, shutting his eyes, so grateful she was alive. “We don’t ever have to talk about it if you don’t want to, Murphy.”

  She inhaled, the breath she took clear and not so labored. “Are you okay?”

  “Me? I’m fine. But let’s talk about what you just did. That was some throw, Troll. You chucked a whole person at me.”

  Letting her head fall to his shoulder, she chuckled. “Which should be a sign of how careful you’ll need to be not to make me angry. Because I will throw a whole person at you.”

  Running his knuckles down her cheek, he smiled. “You’re kind of something else.”

  She averted her eyes, then closed them. “I’m kind of trashed. I hurt everywhere.” Then she sat up as though she’d been startled. “Nova! Where is she? The others? Where is everyone?”

  “She’s fine, kiddo,” Nina said from behind Sten’s shoulder. “She’s making kissy-face noises with diva number two.”

  “You’re kidding,” Sten mumbled, craning his neck to see Nina was right.

  “Would I fucking kid you? Now, let’s get this motherfucker on the road. I want out of the land of the crayon-colored people. I need to check on Carl and see my kid and my man, in that order.”

  His mother came running toward them over the piles of dirt, with Wanda in tow, kneeling in front of them. “Sten! Oh, son, thank Odin you’re alive!” She gave him a quick hug before she turned to Murphy. “You are one brave lady. I couldn’t ask for more for my Sten.”

  Murphy sputtered, trying to sit up, only to flop back into his arms. “But we’re not—”

  “Oh, bullshit,” Nina crowed, brushing dirt and debris from her lustrous hair as she shook it out. “What did we tell you about denying shit? Knock it off and let it happen.”

  With tired eyes, Murphy saw Darnell racing toward them with a limp Arch in his arms, Arch’s wilted legs flapping. “He’s turning blue, Nina! We gotta do something!”

  Birgit quickly stood—and burst into laughter. She put her hand on Darnell’s beefy arm to reassure him. “Oh, my Odin! Look, Sten!” she said. “When that monster died, his magic must have unleashed itself. That’s what the colored lights were. Your Archibald is morphing into a troll!”

  There was a long silence while mouths hung open—until Sten threw his head back and laughed, and then everyone joined him.

  “I told that old bastard he wasn’t gettin’ away from us!” Nina said on a howl.

  “Cinnamon buns forever!” Marty cheered as she and Wanda hugged.

  Leonard shook his furry purple tail in the air. “Viva la trolls!”

  While everyone was laughing and chattering happily, Sten rose and carried Murphy, this woman he’d grown so enamored of, to a quiet spot under a tree.

  She snuggled into him with a sigh that left his chest tight with this mysterious feeling she evoked in him. “I’m sorry you found out about your father and your half-brother this way. Like you said, we don’t ever have to talk about it, but I’m here to listen if you need me to.”

  But he wasn’t sorry. This fiasco had led him to Murphy, and that was the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, as far as he was concerned.

  He let his chin rest on top of her head. “I’m not. It led me to you. But you, on the other hand…you might be sorry.”

  She looked up at him, a big gash over her eye, her beautiful face covered in bruises and cuts, and said, “Why would I be sorry?”

  “Because I lied,” he admitted.

  “About?”

  “I was afraid to admit this because you said it was for heathens…but I really do like ketchup on my steak, and I wanted to be honest about that before we go any further.”

  She let out a mock gasp and clutched her throat. “You dirty, lying dog. I should—”

  But he squelched her words by planting his lips on hers and soundly kissing her.

  Something he hoped to be able to do for a long time to come.

  Note From Dakota

  Eight months later…

  * * *

  One hot troll with green hair and orange eyes who’s working really hard to bring order to his land and become the best king Troll Hill has ever seen; a girl who’s gone in search of her life outside of her sister’s orbit, and is learning how to be the best troll ever with her boyfriend, the king; an ethereal vampire with a potty mouth who has something to say about everything; a refined halfsie who’s probably the only person on the planet who can shut up the vampire who has something to say about everything; a fabulous blonde werewolf who’s learning how to use Instagram to sell her cosmetics from a couple of ex-Instagram models; the three spouses of the aforementioned; a teddy bear demon who surprised everyone with his vocal stylings; a sweet-as-the-day-is-long, broccoli-loving zombie; a very British manservant turned newly minted accidental troll with the cutest thatch of blue hair; a very-grateful-not-to-look-like-a-hobbit-anymore former Instagram model turned philanthropist: another Instagram model also turned philanthropist; the smoke show of a mother to the hot troll king, who doesn’t look a day over thirty; the handsome father of a once very spoiled brat, now happily steeped in philanthropy; a dog name Pancake; a squirrel named Leonard; a purple raven named Pete, all gathered almost a year later at a big announcement party on a beautiful fall day (phew!)…

  * * *

  “Holy shitballs! Look at this place!” Nina shouted her approval at what Sten and Murphy had done to Magnus’s house on the hill—which, in all reality, was sort of a mini castle filled with some questionable things neither Murphy nor Sten wanted to acknowledge.

  Though, they did have some good laughs over the assortment of undergarments Magnus had collected. Not t
o mention the intimate paraphernalia…

  They’d spent many nights giggling over each discovery as they shared meals, bottles of wine, and albums they took turns choosing to turn each other on to different artists—all while he taught her how to be a troll.

  Murphy smiled at her favorite vampire. “It’s really shaping up, wouldn’t you say, Vampire?”

  They’d been putting all their effort into turning the castle into a bright, airy place where every member of the community was always welcome, and where they’d begun to host a monthly meeting for grievances.

  Luckily, there were more happy trolls with very few grievances than there were disgruntled, and it had rather turned into a potluck, where everyone could gather, eat, sing and dance. Even the few shy trolls who all resembled Nova’s former image and were scattered about The Realm had come out to join their festivities.

  Nina gave her a tight hug before setting Murphy away from her and eyeballing what they’d turned into the great room. “Dude, the last time we were here, it looked like a fucking mausoleum with sex toys, now it looks like something out of a damn magazine.”

  They’d crammed a lot of anxiety and fear into the few days she’d spent with the OOPS ladies, and Murphy had been afraid she’d lose touch with these people she’d come to care so much about when the urgency of their relationship had passed.

  But that wasn’t how the OOPS framily worked, and without fail, she talked to all three of them at least two or three times a month, and during those Skype calls, Marty and Wanda had helped her choose colors and fabrics to redecorate Magnus’s den of inequity, while she gave Arch advice on how to be a troll and Nina was…well, Nina.

  “Mistress of the Night would know mausoleums, wouldn’t she?” Marty cracked with a smile, holding out her arms to Murphy. “If it wasn’t for us, she’d still have chain mail on the wall and a dusty old knight’s armor on her landing.” Pulling Murphy into a hug, she giggled and kissed her cheek. “You look terrific, kiddo! How goes the volunteer work at the dog rescue?”