“Aha! Try your tricky little mind at this, Faë.”
“Screaming, soaring
Seeking sky;
Flowers of fire, flying high.
Thunder from powder,
Color from salt,
An ancient art doth their masters exalt.”
Crimson frowned for a moment before stepping out from beneath the edge of the bridge just enough to cast his eyes to the heavens. He stood this way some time, and young Phinnegan could guess no reason why, save that perhaps he was trying to imagine what could seek the sky. A bird, a cloud? But they weren’t made of fire, of course. He wondered if it could be the sun or the stars, but they could hardly be said to scream.
Phinnegan, too, crept to where he could look up into the darkening sky. How long had they been here? They had left no later than late morning, and now it appeared as if dusk approached. The air was cool as it blew across the river that coursed along beside them, and it reminded Phinnegan of late spring nights by the lake near his home. He thought back to the last time he had been there. It had been a birthday party for the city’s mayor. There had been all manner of foods, dancing, desserts, games and to top it all off, a miraculous show of fireworks.
Fireworks
.
Phinnegan could not believe it had taken him so long to guess. Flowers of fire? How simple. He smirked and a small laugh escaped his lips.
“It seems our little friend has the answer. Tell me that you do as well, brother,” Periwinkle said with a slight smile as he spoke to his fellow Faë.
“I believe that I do,” Crimson murmured as he turned back to face the troll.
“Fairly simple, really. The answer is fireworks.”
This time the troll did not seem as taken aback. Whether it was that lengthy time taken by Periwinkle had served to raise her hopes or something else, Phinnegan could not be sure. But as her eyes left the red-haired Faë and moved to meet his, he couldn’t help but feel that she did not mind because now it was down to him. And he felt keenly at a disadvantage.
“Well, it was not that difficult after all I suppose. What else could ‘flowers of fire’ in the sky be, anyway, right?” She smiled and beckoned for Phinnegan to approach her.
“I’ll just have to make sure I can come up with a more difficult one for our little friend here. I am sure that he has a tough one for me, don’t you sweetie?”
Phinnegan looked to Periwinkle for help, but he only spread his hands in front of him and shrugged. Phinnegan got the message. He was on his own, one on one with this beautiful woman, who was in fact, a troll. He rose slowly from his place near the riverbank and shuffled closer to the troll. When he passed Periwinkle, the Faë whispered into his ear.
“Chin up, mate. At least your fate is in your own hands, eh? Just come up with a good one and all will be fine.”
Crimson nodded slightly as Phinnegan passed him by, and then he stood alone in front of the troll. She smiled broadly and rose from her place atop the rock to step forward until only a foot or two separated the two. She lifted her hands and put them on his shoulders.
“My dear little boy,” she said, her voice full of concern. “You are trembling! Certainly it is not as bad as that? Have you not come up with a riddle to ask me?”
Phinnegan struggled to meet her gaze and instead let his head fall, his chin sinking to his chest. What could he do? He had thought of no riddle that he could ask that would have any chance of stumping this troll. He could only shake his head.
“There, there,” she tut-tutted. “I suppose I can bend the rules this once and go out of turn. How would that be?”
Her voice was calm and soothing, and Phinnegan thought that this was a reasonable idea. What did he have to lose? The worst that could happen is that nothing would come to his mind, and as nothing was where he stood now, there would be little change. He nodded in agreement and the troll cooed with delight.
“Splendid! Of course, it might put a bit more pressure on you were you to guess incorrectly. But I am sure you will manage.”
Phinnegan had not given that aspect much thought, but she was, of course, right. But he had little time to dwell on this possible mistake for the troll stepped back to seat herself on the rock and began to rattle off yet another riddle.
“My home is not silent, but I am not loud;
Together we move, though I in his shroud.
I owe him my life, in he I was spawned;
At times I must rest, yet he travels beyond.
Yes, I can be faster, and sometimes much stronger;
But he stretches further, his course, much longer.
Down mountains and through valleys, we travel together;
With him I remain, or else, I would smother.”
If there is one thing that is bad for thinking, it is being frightened; and Phinnegan was certainly frightened. He considered anything and everything that had a home: snails, hermit crabs, turtles. Yet none of these even mildly matched the rhymes of the riddle.
He felt the eyes of the troll upon him, sitting there only a few feet away. He glanced up quickly, only to see her smile widening at each passing moment as he struggled with this riddle. Something about the words of the riddle tugged at his brain, like they had a certain meaning, almost as if she had given him a hint.
But Phinnegan Qwyk did not catch this hint, for his mind hit wall after wall and tears filled his big brown eyes. He had not the slightest idea what the answer to this riddle could be. Turning his back to the troll, he looked to Periwinkle and Crimson, not knowing how they could help him given the rules of this game. From the look on each of their faces, he knew that they both had solved the riddle.
Instead of giving him hope, this only gave him despair. He
should
know the answer! As he looked at Periwinkle, the purple-haired Faë shook his head slowly, and Phinnegan thought it was in disgust at how stupid he was, but something in his manner caught his attention.
No, he wasn’t disgusted at all; the Faë was trying to help him!
What Phinnegan had at first mistaken for a shake, was more of a nod, in a particular direction. Phinnegan peeked over his shoulder to see if the troll was watching, but her eyes searched the skies while she swayed back and forth on her rock. He returned his gaze to Periwinkle. The nod became more insistent, and then his eyes rolled in the same direction. Phinnegan followed the signs with his own eyes and saw that the Faë was pointing him in the direction of the river.
Phinnegan’s frown deepened. Did the Faë want him to escape? To swim? He mouthed the words, but Periwinkle grimaced and shook his head forcefully. No, definitely not escape.
And then Phinnegan remembered that the Faë had found the answer to his own riddle in the river, when he looked down and saw his reflection and the idea of a mirror struck him. Perhaps he thought the river could help Phinnegan as well, although the answer was most certainly not a mirror. But, perhaps, the Faë knew what he was doing. He did, after all, seem to know the answer.
Phinnegan walked towards the edge of the river. His movement must have drawn the eyes of the troll, for her voice rang out and sent a shiver down his spine.
“Don’t wander too far, little one. Time is running out and I want my prize to be close at hand.”
He had no response that he could make, so Phinnegan ignored the troll and knelt at the water’s edge. He looked down into the river and there saw his reflection. What a mess he was, his hair tousled and his cheeks pale. He looked as ill as he felt. He dipped his hand into the water, which was not too cool and not too warm. He splashed the water on his face, washing away the grime and dust that had built-up during his travels. The water was remarkably clear and Phinnegan could see that the bank sloped steeply so that the bottom was out of sight in mere feet.
He looked out to the middle of the river, which was not too far for it was no more than twenty-five yards wide. Something swam along in the middle of the river, and Phinnegan squinted to find that it was a great black snake. Probably harmless, but he was glad that it was in the river and not on the bank.
A flash of movement caught his eye and he looked down to the water just in front of him. He saw nothing at first, but then another flash and another. Soon his eyes focused on a spry little fish, darting this way and that, his silver scales glinting in the sunlight that penetrated the surface of the water. So happy this little fish must be, Phinnegan thought. Safe in the water, away from the troll and this stupid game. If only he could be a fish, swimming with current down the river, away from this place.
Fish. River.
He spun his head to look at Periwinkle, who offered a sly smile and a wink. Phinnegan leapt from his place beside the river, making himself more than a bit dizzy in the process, not that he cared.
“I know the answer!” he shouted, running past the two Faë and stopping in front of the troll, who regarded him warily.
“Oh? Are you sure? One guess is all you get.” But Phinnegan was not cowed by her attempt to unnerve him.
“One is all I need. It’s a fish! A fish and his home is the water, the river.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest and beamed a smile.
The troll, however, did not smile.
“Came up with that answer on your own, did you?”
Phinnegan’s smile began to falter, but Periwinkle quickly came to his rescue.
“Of course he did. How else was he supposed to come up with it?” Periwinkle said, but the troll regarded him coolly.
“I asked the boy the question, and as to how else,
you
could have helped him.”
Periwinkle only smiled.
“But, my dear, how could I when by the rules you have put into play I, and my friend here,” and he pointed to Crimson, “are as mute as a mouse. I could not have told him had I tried to bellow and scream. Which I didn’t, of course.”
The troll remained unconvinced.
“Speaking isn’t the only way that one can help.” She sighed, running her hands through her lustrous red hair. “But I suppose it does not matter greatly. I only have to answer his riddle correctly and we can move on.”
“But…but then we would be tied. What happens if we tie?” Phinnegan asked, his curiosity emboldened by answering the riddle correctly, even if he had been helped a little.
“Why, we fight to the death, of course.”
Phinnegan’s eyes widened and his mouth fell agape.
“To…to the death?” He looked to Periwinkle who shrugged before patting Phinnegan on the back.
“Make sure it’s a good one, eh?”
Phinnegan swallowed. All eyes were on him and he had no way out this time. Neither Periwinkle nor Crimson could help him, and the troll had finished her turn, so it was left to him. He was too young to have heard many riddles, and too young still to craft them all on his own. He racked his brain for anything he had heard in his twelve short years and he found little. Stupid jokes and nursery rhymes were all that came to him.
There was, however, one exception. A little rhyme he had learned as a child that his mother had taught him. He had always found the story quite strange and thought that the rhyme would be easy for this troll. Still, he had no other option.
“There was a man of Adam's race;
He had a certain dwelling-place;