Emma rose and ran to the center of the chamber. “The sun is rising!” she shouted.
Apollo understood her idea immediately, intuitively. If the troll feared the sun, then it might run from the light. If he could get it outside, Emma and Brian would be able to slip out, too. He ran for the tunnel. He looked over his shoulder and shouted, “The sun is rising!”
The troll shivered with confusion. First its head darted toward the sound of Apollo’s voice, but then it looked upward, throwing an arm out as if it could bat away the threat.
“The sun is rising!” Apollo shouted again, his voice trailing down the long throat of the tunnel.
The troll spun left, then right, unsure, confused. The battery life of the iPad was nearly depleted, but for the moment Emma wielded a shining star. Apollo escaped the passageway and into the open night.
The troll turned, determined to follow, but then it sniffed the air once again and reached back one enormous hand. Its fingers found the child and plucked him up and with a single gulp the troll swallowed Brian Kagwa.
APOLLO SCRAMBLED UP the hill of bones, and now that he was out of the cave, free from the cloistered air down there, he could smell himself. He carried with him a cloud of spiced gasoline. The bath he’d taken in the old man’s Brennivín remained in full effect. Maybe that’s what had saved him down in the darkness. The troll hadn’t been able to smell his flesh. But this would only be a moment of grace—in seconds that troll would be up the hill, and then what?
Why did I tell you that story? What did I want you to hear?
Jorgen’s voice sounded so loud in his head that he expected it to echo through the woods. The words so surprising, so unexpected Apollo could hardly register what they meant. Then there was no time for parsing out the meaning because a sound played from the tunnel, a long low rumbling roar, and a moment later an arm emerged from the cave mouth, the tips of the enormous hand baring those jagged nails. The nails slammed into the stones—the children’s bones—and sent them flying in all directions. The beast dragged itself out of the passageway, into the open air. It stood more than three stories tall.
Apollo stiffened at the top of the hill. How could he defeat such a thing?
Why did I tell you that story? What did I want you to hear?
The troll lumbered up the hill. It moved with such gracelessness that Apollo wondered if it might be wounded. Had Emma hurt it before it got out here? As it clambered up the hill toward him, it made faint coughing sounds, sputtering, as if something was caught in its throat.
Apollo took three steps back, but where would he go? The Northern Forest surrounded him. Even though the modern world was less than a half mile away, he might as well be in some German wood a thousand years ago.
Something silver shined in the moonlight and caught Apollo’s attention. The serving lid still there, right where he and Emma had left it. And if the lid was still there, then the sheep’s head would be, too.
Why did I tell you that story? What did I want you to hear?
Apollo rose to his feet and lifted the lid of the serving tray. The sheep’s head’s remaining eye watched him. Apollo picked up the head and held it in front of him, balanced in one open palm. In the other hand he held the lid. The troll might not be able to smell him because of the Brennivín, but this boiled flesh might tempt.
The troll’s head jutted forward like a hound’s. A moment of stillness, then the thing sniffed the air, snorting. It croaked again, but the gagging soon passed. Apollo held the sheep’s head out and watched as the troll sniffed a second time. It squeezed its enormous eyes shut and cocked its head, listening for a sound.
“I’m right here, you goddamn troll!” Apollo shouted. “But you’re too stupid to catch me!”
With that, Apollo turned and ran, holding the sheep’s head high and the serving lid in his other hand. Like Askeladden, he sprinted deeper into the Northern Forest, the troll tearing after him through the trees.
—
Apollo scurried like a wild rabbit, weaving through the thickest stands of trees, places even the troll couldn’t penetrate. He hid inside while the creature stalked in circles, bellowing and bashing at the branches, stopping occasionally to stoop forward and paw at its throat, slapping at an irritant, then righting itself.
He used such moments to dart out again, aiming for the next copse of thick trees, pursued again by the predator, then hiding inside and shivering with adrenaline and fear. They moved like this as the night passed, and Apollo hardly felt the cold, hardly registered fatigue. There were moments, when he wasn’t running, that he swore he heard Emma’s voice on the wind, calling out to him. But he knew that if the troll was here with him, then Emma and Brian had escaped. This idea fueled him, fired his courage.
Apollo remained tucked inside a circle of pignut hickory trees. The troll soon appeared. It heaved loudly now, and its mouth dripped a jelly as green as its skin. The troll spat this out and coughed loudly, sounding like a car engine that wouldn’t turn over. It sniffed at the trees, bumped the side of its head against the hickory, testing them. Nearly dawn now. When the sun rose, it would turn to stone, and that would be the end of it.
Not twenty yards from here Apollo saw the large clearing he’d come across when he’d followed Emma the day before. Apollo rose to his feet and bolted. When he reached the open ground, he set down the sheep’s head and the lid. He placed the head so it was cradled in the lid, face up and exposed, easily scented. Apollo ran straight on from there, back into the trees on the other side of the clearing. He found a scarlet oak with branches low enough to scale. It hadn’t lost all its leaves, so he disappeared among them when he climbed.
“My head is right there on the ground!” Apollo shouted. “Why don’t you just try and crack my skull!”