a grip on the handlebars as the tires thudded down the steps. Two businessmen in sensible suits and ties, on their way to the food courts, pressed against the walls on either side to avoid being mowed down.
Kim guided the scooter to the edge of the platform and launched it onto the tracks. Brendan screamed and buried his face in Kim’s shoulder. Surely now they would die.
When he looked up again, they were speeding down a subway tunnel. He concentrated on holding tight to Kim. The last thing he wanted was to fall off in the dark and crack his head open or, worse, land on the third rail and be fried to a crisp.
Light bloomed ahead as they sped toward the next station.
“King Street subway, next stop!” Kim intoned in the flat tone of a Toronto Transit Commission driver. “Change here for King streetcar!” She laughed at her own imitation. Brendan tried not to be sick.
King Street, Brendan thought. I never thought I’d see it from down here. Men and women in business suits holding newspapers and briefcases looked down at them, slack-jawed, as they motored through the station. Something in Brendan relaxed. If he weren’t going to be in so much trouble, he now thought, the ride would actually have been quite fun! A line of elementary school children, probably on a field trip, stood ranged along the platform at the far end. They waved and hooted at Kim and Brendan as they rocketed past like it was the coolest thing to see two kids riding a scooter through the subway. Brendan had never felt cool before. He had never been the centre of attention in a way that wasn’t him making a total fool of himself. He let go of Kim with one arm and waved to the kids, who cheered.
Of course, he immediately fell off the scooter.
He bounced and rolled along for a few metres and ended up on his hands and knees in darkness. He groaned. Sitting back on his haunches, he took stock. His palms hurt. They were probably skinned and bleeding. He felt his legs and discovered he’d torn his grey trousers and his knee was bleeding freely. Apart from that, there was no serious damage. Nothing broken.
Farther up the tunnel, he heard Kim screech to a halt. The headlight of her scooter swung wildly in the darkness. He heard her shout in alarm.
Light filled the tunnel. The glaring illumination seared the darkness.
Brendan whirled to stare as the blunt silver wall of a subway train swelled to fill the tunnel. He froze in terror, his expression a mirror of the driver’s in his tiny control cabin.
Faced with the oncoming train, Brendan looked to either side but there were only sheer blank walls of concrete.
“Help!” he screamed, not expecting any. In despair, he threw his arms over his face, waiting for the impact.
^55 A zephyr is a lesser spirit of the air. There are many types of spirits, all with different powers and properties based on their home elements. Water Spirits, Fire Spirits, Wood Spirits, and more are embedded in objects by Artificers to create magical tools. What’s an Artificer? If you don’t mind, I’m getting tired of this footnote. I’ll get back to you later when you absolutely need to know.
^56 Usually, Faeries are able to hide their existence very effectively from the Human populations they are hiding in. Of course, sometimes situations occur in which they have to cover up obvious breaches in secrecy (like riding a scooter through town while being pelted by balls of lightning). When these problems arise, Faeries rely on Fair Folk moles who are embedded in the media and in government positions to spread misinformation and doctor evidence to cover up Faerie involvement. The Faeries’ greatest defence is that Human beings would rather believe anything besides the idea that magical beings share the Earth with them.
THAT’S THE WAY I TROLL
He was yanked off his feet. He wasn’t expecting that. He was expecting to be smashed into bits from the front. The roar of the train filled his ears, but now it was below him.
He dared to open his eyes and immediately wished he hadn’t. He was dangling above the train, his feet centimetres away from the silvery roof of the cars as they flashed past. He felt slightly ill.
Worse was yet to come. Hanging by the scruff of his neck, the fabric of his grey RDA blazer cutting into his armpits, he looked up and saw his rescuer.
In the strobe light of the train cars passing below, he caught a stuttering glimpse of a large face as square as a concrete block with a lantern jaw and cavernous yellow eyes. A grotesque parody of a human face, it was in every way harsher and more savage-looking. One large tooth jutted from its lower jaw, poking almost into his captor’s slitted right nostril. Its skin was blue and rough like the hide of an elephant. As Brendan took in all the details of the thing’s face, the thing stared at him, wide-eyed.
The yellow eyes narrowed to slits and the huge nostrils sniffed wetly. “Hmmmmmmm.” The voice was deep and rumbling like rocks dropping into an empty oil drum. “Hello. Are you lost or what?”
Brendan was at the end of his endurance. He’d been attacked, chased, and nearly run over by a train. He’d heard squirrels talk and narrowly avoided being struck by lightning. Now a huge blue man was holding him helpless above the subway tracks. His mind decided that if this huge monster were going to eat him, it would be better if he weren’t awake for it. Brendan passed out.
When he came to, he was immediately aware of two things. One: he hadn’t been eaten, a positive development. He wanted to check his hands and feet to see if they were all present and accounted for but it was too dark to see. Two: he was moving. Well, he wasn’t moving himself, he was being carried. Something large and thick was clamped around him. It smelled powerfully. Not a bad smell but weird, like a very stinky armpit full of cinnamon. As his eyes began to adjust to the light, he was able to pick out more detail. He was being held in place by a large arm, thick as a young tree and just as solid. The arm was attached to a body of suitably large proportions. The body was draped in a thick woollen fabric, scratchy in the extreme. At the moment, they were shambling along a rough stone corridor.
As they swayed along, the giant thing hummed softly to itself. “Bum ba bum ba bum! bum ba bum ba bum! bum ba bum ba bum bum!” Brendan recognized the tune: it was the old Hockey Night in Canada theme.
Brendan felt panic begin to well up. He started struggling against the iron grip of the creature holding him. “Let go of me!”
“Na! Don’t whiggle. No whiggling, please.” The low rumbling voice echoed off the stone. “Borje don’t appreciate the whiggling.”
Brendan stopped wiggling. “Where are you taking me… Borje?”
“Patience, little master. ‘S not so far.”
Even as the creature spoke, the light was growing stronger. Brendan craned his head to look ahead and saw a bluish glow outlining what looked like a door.
Borje walked straight up to the door, a thick, heavy portal, and took out a steel key. Spraypainted slogans in a language Brendan couldn’t read covered the door, and a few crudely drawn rude pictures adorned it as well. The huge blue man named Borje tapped the key against the door, which glowed with a faint silver light for an instant before swinging open with the squeal of rusty hinges.
“Home, swheet home,” the creature Borje called as he carried Brendan over the threshold.
They were in a rough cavern cut out of the native stone. In one corner sat an overly large table with two oversized wooden chairs beside it. On the table were stacks of hockey pucks in tottering piles that covered most of the tabletop. In the far wall, a fireplace held pride of place, a merry fire crackling in the hearth. A huge overstuffed armchair sat directly in front of the flames. A smaller end table sat nearby and a large remote control lay atop it. On the wall over the mantelpiece was the largest flat-screen TV Brendan had ever seen. The place seemed quite cozy in a stone-caverny kind of way.
The door clanged shut. Borje placed Brendan on his feet. Brendan turned to look at the door, an impenetrable slab. He was trapped with the thing called Borje.
In his precarious and exhausted state of mind, he thought that the objects hanging on the wall were skulls. He blinked, rubbed his eyes, and looked again.
“Hockey helmets?”
The wall was covered in ice hockey helmets, row upon row, lovingly arranged and polished. Each had a tiny
