He swept the thought from his mind. He refused to even consider the strange emotions. It wasn’t worth the wasted effort when he couldn’t even look at her right now.
Heavy footsteps approached the dungeon, and he heard Elva suck in a deep breath. “I have to go. I’ll be back. Be ready.”
Oh, he would be ready. He could face a den of lions now that he knew for certain she was here. She was going to get him out, and he would return to the waking world with a renewed sense of vigor.
He could survive this as long as she was beside him.
Donnacha listened to her leave the cell, gently close the gates behind her, and then the fading sound of her sneaking away. No one else would have heard those footsteps. Elva was impossible to hear when she didn’t want to be heard.
Except by him. He knew the sound of her sneaking. He’d heard it in the castle for so many months now. He knew how to find her when she didn’t want to be found.
Then other footsteps rang through the dungeon. Footsteps he also recognized and hated more than any other.
The Troll Queen approached.
Donnacha’s chest seized. This was the worst person to be alone with. She’d want to kill him, or maim him, or give him to her daughter while he couldn’t do anything.
He’d never thought to know what Elva had endured firsthand. The helplessness of immobility. The fear of what another person would do to him while he was still awake. The drug wasn’t even beginning to wear off. He still couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything other than wheeze in a breath that was a hair deeper than the other.
The Troll Queen leaned down at his side, her claws dragging down the length of his arm. “Oh, my dear dwarf, this is how I like to see you.”
When he didn’t respond, she laughed. He hated her all the more in that moment, a burning contempt that made his chest ache and his head hurt. He wanted to destroy her. He wanted to run a blade between her ribs and feel her blood pour out over his hands. How dare she? How dare she laugh in this moment when he was incapacitated?
The Troll Queen touched his face with her claw. “I want you to know that I saw her. It’s not hard to see when someone new is in this kingdom. I know every troll and every rock they are made out of.”
She knew Elva was here? Did that mean she was going to attack her?
He wanted to shout for Elva to run. It didn’t matter that he needed saving. The Troll Queen would never let him go, and he couldn’t bear be the reason she could be caught as well.
Their plan was ruined. She should run before things got even messier.
A long fingernail touched his lip. “I’m going to let her run around my kingdom, and we’ll see what she does. I’m curious what this little faerie thinks she can accomplish. I don’t know where she is or where she’s staying but…this will be fun. I can’t wait to see your face when I kill her.”
Donnacha wanted to scream that he’d like to see her try, but he couldn’t. Instead, all he could do was lay there as his cell door closed again.
Screaming only in his mind.
----
Elva returned to the hill where the buggane had first dropped her off. Her breath came in sharp gasps. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do next. He was in a dungeon, barely even alive, and there was nothing more she could do. The trolls had him well and truly. She couldn’t walk him out of that cell with so many eyes watching him.
The bushes beyond the hill rustled, and beady red eyes stared out at her. “Well? Did you do it?” the buggane asked as it clambered toward her.
“Do what?” Elva shook her head. “I thought you said you were going home.”
“I did. I went home, and now I’m back.”
The lumbering bulk of the buggane looked very much like the trolls. Elva could understand how some people might mistake them. But now she knew there was a kindness in the buggane’s eyes that wasn’t in the vacant expression of the trolls. This creature wanted to help others. She wanted to see stories come to life and live through the happiness of others.
The buggane was trustworthy, where the trolls wouldn’t know the meaning of the word.
Elva sat down on the hill, drawing the cloak tighter around her shoulders against the chilly night air. “I don’t know what I’m going to do now.”
“You could have tossed him over your shoulder and ran?” the buggane suggested, settling down on the ground next to her. “Or maybe you could have gone in with your sword raised, ready to take the heads of all who tried to stop you.”
“That only happens in stories. In real life, people who do that don’t live longer than a few seconds.”
The furred faerie harrumphed. “Well, that makes things a lot more difficult.”
Yes, it did. Elva had seen what was within the fortress walls, and it wasn’t good. They had Donnacha under constant guard. And if he was always drugged like that, then he wouldn’t be able to help her get him out. Which meant she was going to have to figure this out on her own.
Or maybe not. She looked up at the buggane with a calculating look. “How did you know he was in the dungeon?”
The creature shifted awkwardly, scooting a little further away from her. “I just did.”
“You were watching me, weren’t you?”
“Maybe.”
“Well, did you see anything useful then?”
The buggane shrugged. “I saw a few things.”
Elva rolled her eyes, then shivered as a gust of wind pushed through the cloak. “All right. Out with it
