Page 46 of Sky and the Grumpy Troll

“I’ve never seen anything like it. Your people carved an entire civilization out of a mountain.”

“Very many trolls were involved, not just ones related to me. It was built over the past eight centuries, from a fortress cut into the mountain during the wars.”

I stared up at it and something in my chest went quiet and wide. Not my usual reaction to things. My usual reaction was to make a joke. But Highmark didn’t want my jokes. Highmark wanted me to shut up and look.

We rode through the lower gate and up through the city, until we reached a small inn built into the mountainside. We stabled Clover and settled Poppy into our room, which was the most luxurious we’d stayed in, complete privacy with its own water closet and a bathtub I wanted to fuck Moerrven in.

He eyed the bathtub, then eyed me. “We spent nearly a week coming here; we should do what we came for, and fuck later.”

“Fuck later?” I asked. “Does not compute.”

He laughed and took my hand, leading me out of the room and locking the door behind us, leaving Poppy purring on the bed. We picked up hand pies from a market stall and ate them as we walked higher up the mountainside, passing homes and shops. I looked at the stonework, the workshops, the market stalls, the massive facades of troll businesses. The library was the size of a city block.

It occupied the entire eastern face of the upper tier, with polished gray stone, columns carved to look like stacked books, a doorway tall enough for the biggest troll to walk through without ducking. When Moerrven looked at it, his chest expanded, and his eyes went soft, like a man in front of something holy.

We were the same about libraries, it seemed.

We climbed the steps. My hand found Moerrven’s as we walked through the doors, and I’m not sure he even noticed, because the reading room had opened up in front of us and his attention was gone.

Three stories of vaulted stone ceiling arched overhead. Shelves were carved into every wall, floor to ceiling, with rolling ladders and narrow stone walkways to reach them. Light poured down through skylights cut into the mountain itself, catching dust motes in angled shafts. Books were everywhere, leather-bound, cloth-bound, stacked on reading tables where scholars sat in concentration.

“Holy shit,” I whispered. “Moerrven, this is like if the Library of Congress and a dwarven stronghold had a baby.”

“I do not know what those things are, but I will accept the reverence in your tone.”

I squeezed his hand. He squeezed back. And for a moment the quest, the road, the sex, the complicated question of what we were to each other went quiet, and there was only this: a room full of books and the man beside me. I wanted answers. I wanted to find out what happened to me, whether it had happened before, whether there was a way to control the mirror. Whether I could travel freely. Whether I could see Connor again.

This place might have those answers.

The head librarian’s office had a brass nameplate that read RUNHILDA STONEGRIM, HEAD ARCHIVIST, and beneath it, in smaller letters, KNOCK FIRST OR LEAVE.

Moerrven knocked. A voice from inside said, “What?” in a tone that suggested this was the only greeting she’d ever offered, and she was not open to feedback.

Runhilda was tall even by troll standards, gray-skinned, spectacles perched on a nose designed for looking down at people. “Mossren. Long time no see. You know where the good books are. Go.” She waved us off and went to turn away.

“Hello, Runhilda. We are here for more than books. We have research to do,” Moerrven said. “This is Sky, my traveling companion.”

“The children’s section is on the ground floor.”

“I’m not a child. I’m twenty-five.”

“You say that as if it’s some advanced age.”

I liked her immediately, but I pretended to be grumpy about it, because that was part of the fun.

“My friend here comes from a different land,” Moerrven said. “And we are wondering if you may have any texts that cover his circumstance.”

She eyed me. “Like County Farrend? Those folks sure are different.”

“No. He came here by magic, through a mirror that was perhaps some sort of portal or passage. His world is entirely different from ours, with no trolls, no magic—”

“No magic? Well, I find that hard to believe. Magic is the very essence of us. How is he even alive with no magic?”

“Runhilda,” Moerrven said, “I’m asking if you’ve heard any stories similar to his. Stories where someone comes from a world they describe as quite different from our own, and arrives in our land confused and alone.”

I stepped forward. “I’m not the only one who has been transported via this portal, you see. A friend of mine is somewhere in Qoksmere too, alone and afraid.”

She tapped her pencil on her chin, studying us both. “It’s interesting you ask today, because I had never heard of such a thing, and not a fortnight ago, the Queen sent a missive, asking me to look into a similar circumstance.”