Too many, thought Artemis. There are too many. We can never make it.
But there was no future in giving up. So they kept going, taking two steps forward and one step back.
A crafty bull ducked low, avoiding Holly’s first sweep. He reached out one talon, cracking the pod’s waterproof casing. Holly stumbled backward, knocking over Artemis. The pair keeled over into the river, landing with a solid thump in the shallow water.
Artemis felt the air shoot from his lungs, and took an instinctive breath. Unfortunately he took in water rather than air. Holly kept her elbows locked, so the ruptured casing stayed out of the river. Some splash drops crept into the crack, and sparks began to play across the screen.
Holly struggled to her feet, simultaneously aiming the screen at the bull troll. Artemis came up behind her, coughing water from his lungs.
“The screen’s damaged,” panted Holly. “I don’t know how much time we have.”
Artemis wiped strands of hair from his eyes. “Go,” he spluttered. “Go.”
They trudged through the water, stepping around thrashing trolls. Holly chose a clear spot on the bank to climb ashore. It was a relief to be on dry land again, but at least the water had been on their side, as it were; now they were truly in troll territory.
The remaining animals encircled them at a safe distance. Whenever one came too close, Holly swung the tele-pod in its direction, and the creature skipped back as though stung.
Artemis fought the cold and the fatigue and the shock in his system. His ankle was scalded where the troll had snagged him.
“We need to go straight for the temple,” he said through chattering teeth. “Up the scaffolding.”
“Okay. Hold on.”
Holly took several deep breaths, building up her strength. Her arms were sore from holding the tele-pod, but she would not let the fatigue show in her face, or the fear. She looked those trolls straight in their red eyes and let them know they were dealing with a formidable enemy.
“Ready?”
“Ready,” replied Artemis, although he was no such thing.
Holly took one final breath, then charged. The trolls were not expecting this tactic. After all, what kind of creature would attack a troll? They broke ranks in the face of the arc of white light, and their disconcertion lasted just long enough for Artemis and Holly to charge through the hole in the line.
They hurried up the incline toward the temple. Holly made no attempt to avoid the trolls, running straight at them. When they lashed out in temporary blindness, they only caused more confusion among themselves. A dozen vicious squabbles erupted in Holly and Artemis’s wake, as the animals accidentally sliced each other with razor-sharp talons. Some of the cannier trolls used the opportunity to settle old scores. The squabbles chain-reacted across the plain until the entire area was a mass of writhing animals and dust.
Artemis grunted and puffed his way up the ravine, his fingers wrapped around Holly’s belt. Captain Short’s breathing had settled into a steady rhythm of quick bursts.
I am not physically fit, thought Artemis. And it may cost me dearly. I need to exercise more than my brain in the future. If I have a future.
The temple loomed above them, a scale model, but still over fifty feet high. Dozens of identical columns rose into the holographic clouds, supporting a triangular roof decorated with intricate plaster moldings. The columns’ lower regions were scarred by a thousand claw marks where younger trolls had scampered out of harm’s way. Artemis and Holly clambered up the twenty or so steps to the columns themselves.
Fortunately there were no trolls on the scaffolding. All of the animals were busy trying to kill each other, or avoid being killed, but it was only a matter of seconds before they remembered that there were intruders in their midst. Fresh meat. Not many of the trolls had tasted elf meat, but those who had were eager to try it again. Only one of the present gathering had tasted human meat, and the memory of its sweetness still haunted his dull brain at night.
It was this particular troll who hauled himself from the river, carrying twenty extra pound’s of moisture weight. He casually cuffed a cub who had come too close, and sniffed the air. There was a new scent here. A scent he could remember from his short time under the moon. The scent of man. The mere recognition of the smell brought saliva flowing from the glands in his throat. He set off at a pitched run toward the temple. Soon there was a rough group of flesh-hungry beasts hurtling toward the scaffolding.
“We’re back on the menu,” noted Holly when she reached the scaffolding.
Artemis unhooked his fingers from the LEP captain’s belt. He would have answered, but his lungs demanded oxygen. He whooped in gulps of air, resting his knuckles on his knees.
Holly took his elbow. “No time for that, Artemis. You have to climb.”
“After you,” Artemis managed to gasp. He knew his father would never allow a lady to remain in distress while he himself fled.
“No time for discussion,” said Holly, steering Artemis by the elbow. “Climb for the sun. I’ll buy us a few seconds with the tele-pod. Go.”
Artemis looked into Holly’s eyes to say thank you. They were round and hazel and . . . familiar? Memories fought to be free of their bonds, pounding against cell walls.
“Holly?” he said.
Holly spun him around to the bars, and the moment was gone. “Up. You’re wasting time.”
Artemis marshaled his exhausted limbs, trying to coordinate his movements. Step, grab, pull. It should be easy enough. He’d climbed ladders before. One ladder at least. Surely.
The scaffold bars were coated with gripped rubber, especially for climbers, and were spaced precisely sixteen inches apart, the comfortable reach distance of the average fairy. Also, coincidentally, the comfortable reach of a fourteen-year-old human. Artemis started to climb, feeling the strain in his arms before he had risen six steps. It was too early to be tired. There was too far to go.
“Come on, Captain,” he gasped over his shoulder. “Climb.”
“Not just yet,” said Holly. She had her back to the scaffold and was trying to find some pattern in the approaching bunches of trolls.
There had been an in-service course on troll attacks in Police Plaza. But that had been in the event of a one-on-one situation. To Holly’s eternal embarrassment, the lecturer had used video footage of her own tangle with a troll in Italy over two years ago. “This,” the lecturer had said, freezing Holly’s image in the big screen, and rapping it with a telescopic pointer, “is a classic example of how not to do it.”
This was a completely different scenario. They had never received instruction on what to do when attacked by an entire pack of trolls in their own habitat. No one, the instructors reasoned, would be that stupid.
There were two converging groups coming straight toward her. One from the river, led by a veritable monster with anesthetic venom dripping from both tusks. Holly knew that if one drop of that venom got under her skin, she would fall into a happy stupor. And even if she escaped the troll’s claws, the slow poison would eventually paralyze her.
The second group approached from the western ridge, composed mainly of latecomers and cubs. There were a few females in the center of the temple itself, but they were taking advantage of the distraction to pick meat from abandoned carcasses.
Holly flicked the tele-pod’s setting to low. She would have to time this exactly right for maximum effect. This was the last chance she would get, because once she started to climb, then she could no longer aim.
The trolls sped up the temple steps, jostling for first place. The two groups were approaching at right angles, both headed directly toward Holly. The leaders launched themselves from a distance, determined to get the first bite of the intruder. Their lips peeled back to reveal rows of carnivorous teeth, and their eyes focused solely on the target. And that was when Holly acted. She flicked the brightness setting to high and scorched the retinas of the two beasts while they were still in the air. With piercing howls
, they swatted the hated light and crashed to the ground in a melee of arms, claws, tusks, and teeth. Each troll assumed he was being attacked by a rival group, and in seconds the scaffold’s base was a chaos of primal violence.
Holly took full advantage of the confusion, skipping lithely up the first three rungs of the metal structure. She clipped the tele-pod onto her belt so that it pointed downward like a rear gun. Not much protection, but better than nothing.
In moments, she had caught up with Artemis. The human boy’s breath was ragged and his progress was slow. A slow stream of blood dripped from the wound on his ankle. Holly could easily have passed him, but instead she hooked an arm through the bars of the ladder and checked on the troll situation. Just as well. One relatively little guy was scaling the bars with the agility of a mountain gorilla. His immature tusks barely jutted beyond his lips, but those tusks were sharp and venom gathered in beads along the tips. Holly turned the tele-screen on him, and he released his grip to shield his scorched eyes. An elf would have been smart enough to hang on with one hand and use the other forearm to shield the eyes, but trolls are not much farther up the IQ scale than stinkworms, and act almost completely on instinct.
The little troll tumbled back to earth, landing on the shaggy, writhing carpet below. He was instantly dragged into the brawl. Holly returned to the climb, feeling the tele-pod knock against her back. Artemis’s progress was painfully slow, and in less than a minute, she was tight at his shoulder.
“Are you all right?”
Artemis nodded, tight lipped. But his eyes were wide, on the verge of panic. Holly had seen that look before, on the faces of battle-stressed LEP officers. She needed to get the Mud Boy to safety before he lost his reason.
“Come on now, Artemis. Just a few more steps. We’re going to make it.”
Artemis closed his eyes for five seconds, breathing deeply through his nose. When he opened them again, they shone with a new resolve.
“Very well, Captain. I’m ready.”
Artemis reached above him for the next bar, hauling himself sixteen inches closer to salvation. Holly followed, urging him on like a drill sergeant.
It took a further minute to reach the roof itself. By this time the trolls had remembered what they were chasing, and had begun to scale the scaffolding. Holly dragged Artemis onto the slanted roof and they scampered on all fours toward its highest point. The plaster was white and unmarked. In the low light it seemed as though they were walking across a field of snow.