The Day the Trolls Started Down the Mountain

There weren't always dragons in the Valley. That’s what my gran always said her gran said. All I know is, that was a long time ago.

When my gran was dying and we couldn’t deny it was happening any more, she insisted we all say goodbye to her. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t force those words around the tears and just kept saying, “I love you, gran,” over and over.

She understood, like she always understood everything about me, unlike the rest of my family. She patted my hand and said, “Rose, dear, it’s okay. You don’t have to say goodbye with your words. I see what’s in your heart and I love you too.” Of course that just made me cry harder.

“Rose, dry your tears for a moment. I need to tell you something and it’s important.”

When gran used that tone, I always listened. Her voice may have been weaker and hoarser, but it was the same tone, and I immediately tried to stop crying. A few tears kept leaking, but apparently that was good enough for gran.

She told me things I didn’t think I could tell anyone, including my best friend, Thwyla. Especially her, actually.

There was a soft knock at the door, and I got up from the chair at the side of gran’s bed, leaned down and gave her the gentlest hug I could. Her wrinkled skin seemed translucent, and eyes looked so tired, I knew I wouldn’t see her alive again. I couldn’t speak. She smiled and blew me a kiss. We didn’t need words.

My mother opened the door and my sister Cassia tiptoed in. Literally. I gave her my “seriously?” look and she started to cry. Time to go.

As I walked out of the house, gran’s last words to me replayed in my head. “Never forget,” she said. As if I could.

I didn’t have long to think about what she’d told me before I saw my best friend flying down the long driveway. It was long enough that I couldn’t see the busy road it led to, even if Thwyla’s oncoming presence hadn’t been blocking it.

“Are you okay?” she asked as she stopped in front of me.

“I mean, no, but I guess I will be. I’m going to miss her so much,” I replied, tears welling up in my eyes again.

“Oh please don’t cry, Rose, or I’ll start crying too.” Thwyla looked alarmed. I was alarmed enough, myself, to stop crying.

“We definitely wouldn’t want that,” I laugh-cried, hiccupping a little. That set us both into a fit of giggles and made me feel a little better.

Crying dragons are very, very wet.

“Let’s go to the lake,” Thwyla suggested.

“That’s too far. I can’t be gone long.” I didn’t have to say why.

“We could fly.” She’s the most daring of the two of us.

“We would be in so much trouble if anyone sees us,” I pointed out. My heart wasn’t really in the protest, though, and Thwyla knew it.

“We’ll go out into the orchard and take off from there. Everyone’s busy in the house and no one will see us.”

She was right, and I didn’t have to say out loud how much I enjoyed flying with her, and how much I wanted to get away right then. She already knew. It’s funny how the people you’re closest to always sense how you’re feeling and what you’re thinking. Though lately I’d come to suspect that was just me.

We walked to the orchard west of the house. The trees are just beginning to blossom this time of year, holding fragrant promises of the apples and plums to come. I love being out here. There’s a clearing in the middle of the orchard at the intersection of four wide dirt lanes. It’s where we pile the bushel baskets at harvest time.

Right now it’s empty, and we look up and down the rows just to make sure we’re alone. Thwyla crouches a little and angles her arm so I can step on it and up to her neck. There’s a comfortable dip in her ridges that I fit in perfectly.

I settle myself and lean forward to wrap my arms around her neck. Because I’m older now I feel a little guilty about this. I mean, no one would ever try to harness a dragon, but maybe this really is as demeaning as everyone says. Thwyla has always been the one to insist it’s perfectly fine and it was all her idea in the first place, but maybe it’s time to talk about it again.

I bump my chin on her neck as she jumps off the ground, because I’m not paying attention.

“Are you okay?” Thwyla asks for the second time today.

“Fine,” I answer.

She flies low to the ground because carrying someone is hard work and because she’s not old enough to go above the treetops yet. Every year at licensing time someone tells a story about some young dragon who thinks he knows better – it’s always a boy, Thwyla and I snicker – and says that no one ever said what kind of trees, so he goes up near the top of the really old, really tall evergreen trees and gets caught in a downdraft and breaks a wing.

We’re pretty sure it’s an urban myth, or rural myth, or whatever. They’re just like the car crash stories we all heard right before my brother got his driver’s license.

We aren’t going very fast, but it’s still thrilling to me. Thwyla’s bronze scales are shining in the sun and warm against my arms, and my long red hair is streaming in the wind and my spirits are lifting. I think gran suspected what we do, but she never said anything, except, “you’re only young once.” Usually in reply to my mother’s scolding.

People riding dragons is totally forbidden. We get it. Dragons aren’t horses. Or trucks. It would be like servitude, like we read about in history books. But Thwyla says that it’s different for us because we’re young and sworn blood sisters. Like, real blood sisters, with cutting ourselves and mingling our blood and a ritual and everything. It’s something dragons do and we don’t know if a human and dragon have ever done it before we did. We’ve never asked because we’re pretty sure it’s on the forbidden list.

We’re only halfway through the orchard when a siren screeches through the air.

“Oh shit!” we both say at the same time. That happens a lot. I think it’s the blood thing.

Thwyla lands quickly and a little clumsily, and I bump my chin again.

“What do you think is wrong?” I ask. I know my eyes are wide and scared because I see them reflected in her larger and faceted eyes. Multiples of scared eyes.

Her scales have darkened so I know she’s scared too.

The day is beautiful, there’s no smoke in the air, and we heard nothing but birds before the siren went off.

“Maybe something is happening in the city,” Thwyla doesn’t sound too sure, but it’s helpful.

“Yeah, that’s probably it,” I reply. “We better get back quick. And we better walk.”

“Well, I can fly. You can walk.”

“That’s not nice or fair.”

“I’m just kidding you know.”

“I know.”

We hurry back through the orchard, heading to the house. When we get closer I hear cars coming up the driveway and see adult dragons flying in above the treetops and circling down toward the east field near the house. Some of them have little ones on their backs.

There’s a very large pavilion set up in the east field. It was built as a community gathering place when my gran was a little girl. Everyone in the valley helped and it’s big enough to hold all the dragons and humans who live here. It’s that big. I mean, it’s nothing like they’ve got in the city. Those buildings are huge. But still.

Since this seems to be an emergency gathering, the outdoor kitchen on one side of the pavilion isn’t going and no one has had time to spread out chairs and blankets. Thankfully the siren has stopped. Not good for little ears and it looks like everyone is here or on the way. Even the babies. Now I’m really scared.

Thwyla and I find a spot up against a pillar near our families. I assume gran is in bed in the house. Our parents are also best friends, but of course not like me and Thwyla. Her dad, Thoron, has a wing around her mother, Thylstra and my parents are sitting in camp chairs next to them. All the kids are scattered in groups around us with their friends. I see my brother and his girlfriend standing behind my parents. She looks scared, too. This kind of gathering has never happened before even though we’ve all been trained on what to do when the siren goes off.

The parents look around and spot us.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

“We’ll find out in a few minutes when everyone is here,” my father calmly answers. People and dragons are still coming in from all sides.

“In the meantime, are you both done with your college applications?” Thoron asks.

“Really, dad? Now?” Thwyla can’t believe he’s asking this now. I can tell by looking at her.

“Yes, now. It’s as good a time as any to find out if you’ve been doing what you’re supposed to be doing,” he answers sternly.

Thwyla and I are going to college in the city in the fall. It’s not a huge city or a big university so we’ll get in easily, given who we are, but it’s in the next valley over the mountains, so it’s kind of a big deal. We’ll be living away from home, on our own. We have plans.

And, in point of fact, we are done with our applications. We were just waiting to make an appointment with the postdragon, who I can see on the other side of the pavilion with his large blue pack strapped on his back. He must have been flying his rounds when the siren blew.

“You don’t want to end up like your Uncle Therlon,” Thwyla’s mother adds. Her brother, Thwyla’s uncle, works as a laborer in the city. He flies construction supplies up to the top of buildings. We’ve heard there used to be machines for that, but dragons are quicker, safer and cheaper. He’s a really nice dragon, but kind of the black sheep of the family.

Our parents are all nice people, but they’re really snobby about education. Wait until they hear about our plans. Luckily there’s no time talk any more because a hush is falling over the crowd and the co-mayors are gesturing for attention.

The human mayor stands on a table next to the dragon mayor. Dragons are smaller now than they used to be, people say, but they’re still twice as tall as humans. The human mayor speaks into a megaphone.

“There’s no good way to say this, but the trolls are coming down the mountain.”

Trolls. Everyone starts shouting at once. A few people scream. We can’t hear either mayor even though I can see they’re talking.

Trolls. The trolls that drove the dragons out of the mountains into the valleys so long ago. This is bad. Really bad. I look at Thwyla and she’s staring at me because somehow she knows I need to tell her what my gran said to me. It’s that blood thing again, I think. And I don’t know how we’re supposed to uphold the magic when gran dies. I didn’t even know we had magic until today. So much for our technological society. This is so bad.