The Sweetest Trolls #4: A Fine Meal -- #FridayFlash

This is the fourth installment of the Troll Serial. To read from the beginning, or to find past and future installments click here.

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Hiding behind old oaks Kratan and Kutril surveyed the village’s surroundings. All was dark and silent; the only window with a light lit was of its largest house.


"What is this smell?" asked Kratan.


They both frowned and pinched their noses. Kutril shrugged.


"It's horrible. Let's get out of here," said Kratan pointing to his left. "The goats are in that direction."


"Wait," said Kutril through his fingers, "what's that at the window?"


"I don't care. I'm gonna puke my brain out if I stay here."


Kutril squinted to understand the cooling pie at the window. He coughed and choked when his nostrils opened in search of air. Kratan's cadenced beating on his back made such a clamor that Kutril had to wave him away hurriedly.


When he managed to compose himself, Kratan was sat with crossed arms, forgetting even to hold his nose.


"It's human food at the window," said Kutril, "that's where the stench comes from."


"The what?"


"The stinky smell," explained Kutril.


"Where did you take that word from?"


"Err, humans?"


Kratan glared, Kutril shrugged, palms facing his friend.


"We could take the human food to the girl," suggested Kutril and added apologetically, "after all, she's human."


“But it smells so bad!”

This time it was Kutril who glared.

“Surely she likes goats,” said Kratan, “humans have so many of them, and goats are so tasty.” He licked his lips and caressed his flat belly.

“We can take a goat for her too, a small one.”

Kratan nodded to his feet. “Ok, you get the smelly food then.”

“Why me?” asked Kutril with a disgusted face.

“Your idea.”

They stared at each other for a moment.

“All right,” Kutril sighed, “but you better find us some big goats. And real ones.”

Kratan pressed his lips together and didn’t reply to Kutril’s remark. Instead, he spat in his right hand licked his palm and extended it to Kutril, who did the same and clasped it.

“I’ll get the goats, you get the human food and we meet at the first safe clearing,” said Kratan.

“Don’t forget to get the girl’s goat too.”

They both nodded, released their hands and hit their own foreheads with them, and then the other’s forehead.

“Uh,” said Kratan, “not so hard. I tell you every time to be gentle.”

Kutril rolled his eyes and motioned him to the direction where the goats were kept. He hunched as low as his massive body would allow, observing his pray. Everything was too silent so he hesitated approaching the mayor’s house.

At one point he couldn’t bear the smell, so he crossed the back garden as fast and as silently as he could, crouched with his back against the wall beside the window, and spread his ears wide. He could hear an alternated snoring and wheezing coming from the upper floor, but no other sound. He peered into the kitchen, holding his breath. There was a single lit candle, forgotten over the table.

He sighed heavily, took the warm pie from the window and sprinted uphill to the meeting point.


A tiny star shone to his right. He paused, thinking of getting rid of the pie as soon as possible, but the curiosity took hold of him. He turned in that direction finding a pink slipper, its delicate lacework all ripped off and a pending jingle on its top. Thinking that Kratan would take a while to capture three goats, he put the pie down and surveyed the area. It took him a while, but he managed to rescue Aimee's basket and collect some berries on his way back. 


Swiping the ants from the pie, he arrived to find Kratan pacing with a live goat under his arm.

"What are you doing?" asked the puzzled Kutril.

"What took you so long?" was his friend's reply.

"I think I found the girl's shoe."

"Oh, it's so tiny!"

"Why is your goat alive?" asked Kutril peering at the terrified animal. "And why there's only one?"

"This one is for the girl," replied Kratan, switching it to the other arm. "I don't know how they eat their goats, so I thought of bringing one alive. Ours are there," he finished pointing over his shoulder to two round shapes.

"Not stones, are they?" asked Kutril, a grin forming in his lips.
 

"No."

"Well, it's late already," said Kutril dropping the subject, "we should get going." He didn't want to repeat last night's scene.

They arrived to find the wood consumed by the fire and Aimee still asleep. After renewing it once more they put the pie, the fruit filled basket and the single slipper beside her.

Not knowing what to do with the trembling goat, Kratan put it down to think on how to prevent its escape. With a shrilling cry it skipped through his hungry fingers and hopped downhill with striking speed. Its shriek startled both the trolls and Aimee, who woke up to find herself before a warm fire and no stone trolls at all.

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