Except the Cheesy was looking every which way, as was everyone else in the clearing. “Where?” the Cheesy cried. “Where is he?”
“Right there!” Bruce repeated and pointed hard.
Nero groaned. “We can’t see him. He’s refusing to negotiate, isn’t he?”
Cheesy continued to scream, hopping up and down so that chunks fell off him in little tiny puffs of rancidness. “You promised I could speak with the fairy prince. You promised! And if I do not, then you all are forfeit!”
“All of us?” Fucking hell. Were they all about to start spouting meaningless facts until they died?
“That’s the deal with fairies,” Josh said, his voice tight with anger. “You pulled us into the bargain, so we all pay the price—which they get to pick, by the way, because you didn’t specify the forfeit.” Then he glared at Bruce as if he was supposed to know this stuff.
Meanwhile, Bitterroot held out the apple to Bruce. “Maybe if you take a bite, you’ll figure out the answer. Maybe you just need more brainpower.”
“Asshole,” Bruce muttered, but he started reaching for the apple because damned if he could figure out a better answer. At least until Nero spoke up.
“Bitterroot, Bitterroot, Bitterroot! Show yourself, you fucker. You owe me!”
The fairy spun around to face Nero, his body and outfit changing to normal-looking elf clothes complete with a human-like body, except for the butterflies clinging to his hair. That was new.
“Not anymore, I don’t!” Bitterroot snarled. But in this, he apparently made a mistake, because all around him, the cheese fairies gasped and pointed. Then they mobbed him.
Cheeses from every direction ran, jumped, and tumbled straight for the fairy prince. It was a swarm of fairy cheese, which would have been hysterical if the situation hadn’t been so dire. Cheesy was jumping up and down, screaming, “Talk to me! Talk to me!” But all the others were repeating his name over and over, “Bitterroot! Bitterroot! Bitterroot!”
For his part, the fairy prince began fighting as Bruce and Laddin had the day before. He slapped the creatures away. He kicked, flicked, and even bit when they came near his face. In truth, it didn’t look like he meant to chomp down. It was more like he was gritting his teeth, but one of the brie was a little too close. Or maybe it squeezed between his lips—it was hard to tell. But it didn’t matter. Once it was done, the cheese was inside him.
Bruce knew what came next. He’d lived through it yesterday. But it didn’t happen all at once. First, Bitterroot threw his hands down and bellowed, “No!” while a single butterfly flew up from his hair and disappeared.
The word reverberated through the field like an earthquake. Fairies tumbled away like sand thrown up by a storm. The only reason Bruce and Laddin didn’t fall was because they were already on the ground, but the others stumbled and went down. All except Bing, who was apparently part cat. And while everyone was recovering, Bitterroot got a horrified expression on his face.
It started out with a grimace, then went to a half-lurch as he apparently tried to burp. Yeah, Bruce knew from experience that wasn’t going to work. Then Bitterroot clutched his stomach and glared. “I hate earth sprites,” he growled.
Bruce could relate. He glanced at the others as they pushed to their feet. “I’d back up. He’s going to blow.”
And sure enough, there was no stopping it. Bitterroot hunched over. His face twisted, and his back arched. And then there came the longest, most appallingly big fart Bruce had ever heard. It went on and on while everyone watched with horrified expressions. The humans scrunched up their faces in disgust and maybe a little sympathy. Because really, this had to suck. But the cheese fairies stepped forward with rapt expressions.
“Bilious Brie,” they whispered. They said it over and over again, their voices growing stronger with each repetition.
And similar to what had happened with Bruce, the pixie shot out from Bitterroot’s ass. But unlike Bruce’s experience, this fairy was not tiny. No, the cheese increased in size the longer Bitterroot farted. Brie started out the size of a finger, then became a hand, then a boy, and still it grew. While everyone watched, Bilious Brie formed into a roly-poly man of more than six feet. But true to the bilious name, the cheese had a greenish-gray cast to it.
“Whee!” he cried as he danced around in a circle of joy.
“Bilious Brie!” the cheese fairies exclaimed. Well, not all of them. The Grand Cheesy was noticeably upset.
“Talk to me! Talk to me!” he screamed, but it was useless.
Bitterroot gave everyone a contemptuous glare before he winked out of sight.
“No!” Cheesy screamed in true despair. And then he whipped around, pointing an angry finger at each man in turn. “He didn’t talk to me! He didn’t talk to me! You forfeit everything!”
“He spoke,” Bruce countered. “He said no.”
“And that he hated earth sprites,” Josh inserted. Which was true, except that didn’t seem to matter to Cheesy.
“That was to you! He spoke to you, not me!”
Unfortunately, that was probably true. And even worse for Cheesy’s mood was that all his fellow cheeses were now gathering around Bilious Brie. They leaped up on the guy, hugging him, which left Cheesy in a terrible position. And naturally, Bruce wasted no time in pointing it out.
“You seem to be losing your followers. I think the Grand Cheesy title is about to go to Billy over there.”
