In which Megan escapes into a worse situation

A Chapter by Hannah Estar

Chapter 3 of The Time-Teller

Chapter 3
In which Megan escapes into a worse situation

“Mad fantasies?” Pyralis chuckled. “You are the most ignorant young one that I have ever met.” Pyralis paused here slightly as if remembering some painful or disturbing memory. “Well, perhaps not the most ignorant. Have you any idea how lucky you are to even be alive in this place?”

“I’d rather be dead than eat that stuff,” Megan retorted a little too boldly for Pyralis’ tastes.

“You are trying my patience little one,” Pyralis muttered. “Have you any idea what I have done for you?”

“Does it matter?” Megan said angrily. Pyralis pulled a large, rather intricately carved gold pocket watch from an inside pocket of his great cloak. He glanced at it and replaced it, nodding slowly to himself.
He walked slowly to her foot and began peeling off the oozing makeshift bandage. Suddenly, Megan was in so much pain that she couldn’t feel herself breathing. She felt tears flowing freely down her face and into her mouth and nostrils as she moved back and forth in pain until finally she fell unconscious. When she awoke, she was still in the same position, but the pain in her ankle had ceased and she had dried tears all over her face. She looked around and realized that she was alone.

“Ugh,” Megan realized that there was a horrible taste in her mouth as though she had been chewing on cat fur and grass. She moved her head over the side of the bed and spat out something green.

“Unpleasant as it is, you shouldn’t be hungry for at least two days,” Pyralis said as he walked through the door carrying both his staff and white crutches that appeared to be almost as dirty as Pyralis’ table.

“You despicable, horrible monster!” Megan shouted, unable to contain her rage.

“Perhaps,” Pyralis whispered. “But at least I am wise enough not to bite the hand that feeds me.”

“What about the hand that gets you into trouble and then, saves you from only a tiny portion of it and claims to be your rescuer.”

“I did not get you into this,” Pyralis stated firmly. “Whoever tampered with my spell must have known that I am too soft hearted to let you get into any real trouble even if you are a sharp-mouthed wart gubbler.” It sounded as though it was intended as an insult.

“Soft hearted?” Megan shouted. “Yeah! Taking off whatever was making my ankle feel better and leaving me in so much pain that I fell unconscious was real nice.”

“But now, you have sufficient warning not to be too bold with the ones providing your shelter,” Pyralis smiled slightly as if at some inside joke. “Besides, I’m the one who put the bandages there in the first place, and it was nearly time to change them anyway.”

“I hate you,” Megan breathed, and she said no more for a very long time. Pyralis moved around busily with a silver bag that Megan was sure he had pulled out of his overly large sleeve. He put many different things into the bag, opening several cupboards and boxes to retrieve small items that Megan couldn’t make out from where she lay. She was almost positive there had been no storage compartments or cupboards before and wondered if perhaps she were imagining the whole thing. Pyralis began humming a sweet, mystical tune. Listening to it made Megan feel curious even in her strange and rather upsetting predicament. She thought, as if in a trance, of all the things it could be about, and her mind filled with images of heroes and adventures, damsels and towers, great dragons, and magical streams. Finally, Pyralis stopped scurrying about and tied the silver bag to his waste with a fascinating silver belt. It looked like gothic artwork folded into a rope. Megan closed her eyes. She wondered whether her parents were worried about her.

“Come along,” Pyralis said. Megan’s eyes opened instantly. Pyralis handed her some extremely shiny crutches, which appeared to be the same ones he had come in with. Although, now, they seemed to be sterile. Pyralis cut the vine, which had held up Megan’s ankle, with a knife he’d taken from his, now jingling, silver bag. He put Megan’s leg down slowly and carefully. Her ankle immediately began to throb. She swung her legs over the side of the bed, and, with some help from the crutches, stood up. Pyralis walked out the door. As soon as he stepped into the marshy forest, he began to feel his way with his staff. Megan followed him, bouncing up and down on her crutches as though she were some bizarre clown.

Several hours later, Megan felt lost, as though there were no end to the forest full of bugs, puddles, and the occasional glimpse of a moving tree. Pyralis kept stopping more and more frequently. Every once and a while, he would turn in a completely different direction then they had been going before and continue. To Megan, it seemed as though they were going in circles.

“Where, exactly, are we going?” Megan asked. Pyralis didn’t answer. He walked on as though she hadn’t said anything.

“Hello? Did you hear me?” Pyralis kept walking. He stopped. Then he turned left, shook his head, turned right, and kept going. This gave Megan an idea. When he began to walk in a different direction, she kept going straight. Pyralis seems to be lost, and it will be much easier for me to find a way out of this forest if I keep going the same direction. I mean, he’s obviously lost too, but I, at least, can see where I’m going, Megan judged. She hobbled on and on. Her legs began to ache, and the pain in her ankle worsened. Her hands felt numb where she held the crutches, and her arms felt as if they were about to fall from her body. She saw a stump that looked as if it would be a comfortable place to rest. It wasn’t, but Megan was too exhausted to notice. She put the crutches on the ground beside her and closed her eyes.

She wasn’t sure how long she had been sitting there when, suddenly, there was a loud sucking noise, and Megan looked up just in time to see her crutches being sucked into the mud. She tried to reach out and grab them, but realized that her hands were bound behind her.

“What the…” she whispered in astonishment as she writhed her hands back and forth in an attempt to free them. Megan heard whispering behind her. She twisted around slightly, but the trees blocked her vision. She was about to scream ‘who are you’ when someone walked up behind her and tied a stinking cloth around her mouth and knotted it so tightly that her head throbbed in protest. She tilted her head back to see who had bound her so rudely, but whoever it had been, was gone now. Megan tried desperately to scream, but the cloth muted and crushed all her hopes and attempts.

Megan looked quickly around. She couldn’t see anyone and the voices had ceased. She stood up to try and make a run for it only to fall on her side because her feet were secured firmly to a tree root with a tough rope. Megan writhed and squirmed, but it was to no avail. The ropes were extremely strong and securely tied.

“I dunno, Joff,” she heard a gruff, rather slimy sounding voice. “Whadda you think?”

“Looks lost ta me,” she heard a slightly less slimy sounding more high-pitched voice. Both voices sounded male.

“E says not ta arm er less we know she’s lost,” the first voice said.

“I dunno,” the second voice, who Megan assumed was Joff, spoke. “She coulda just ben restin, ya know.”

“But, she lookso tasty,” the first voice said.

“Maybe she ain’t, an’ she just looks that way,” Joff suggested.

“We could untie er mouth an’ see what she says,” the first voice muttered. “But Ima thinkin’ she’s lost.” She felt a pair of large, rough, sticky hands pull the cloth that was making it difficult for her to breathe, and finally, the cloth was gone.

“Who do you think you are?” Megan tried to shout, but it came out as a breathless whisper.

“We is trolls,” The gruffer voice replied. “We was awonderin if you was lost.”

“No,” Megan replied feeling her voice coming back. “I am perfectly capable of finding my way.”

“So you ain’t found your way yet,” the gruffer voice said.

“Of course I have,” Megan lied franticly. “I know exactly where I am.”

“Then, which way did ya come from,” the gruffer voice said cackling.

“I… I,” Megan looked around as much as she could, but could not tell one tree from the next.

“See, now we is knowin’ she’s lost,” Joff said, and Megan felt the smelly cloth being replaced. Clunk! A sharp pain vibrated in her head as if she had been hit by something wooden, and she awoke to the feeling of an immense headache, which was not being helped by the fact that she was hanging upside-down. A scraggly vine was wrapped around her feet and tied to a thick tree branch. Beneath her was a small pond that Megan estimated was just long enough to fit her lying down. She saw creatures scurrying about the pond. There were six or seven of them, and they were the most disgusting things she had ever seen. They were large, none less than six foot five. They had bulbous, green-gray bodies. Their faces looked like skewed and distorted humans with overly long, pointed noses. Their black and yellow eyes were large and wide-set. They were throwing hot coals into the small pond, which Megan could see was almost to a boil. Their clothing was of animal skins, and they smelled like burnt flesh. The pain in Megan’s head made her slightly less aware of the searing pain in her ankle, which was made worse by the vine wrapped around it.

She heard a loud whistling noise, and an arrow shot through the air hitting one of the trolls between the eyes. The troll seemed annoyed and attempted to pull the arrow out. After a few seconds, he finally managed to pull it out along with a load of green slime. When he had finally extracted it, another arrow came flying through the air and lodged itself into his huge arm.

“Who are ya!” he shouted, angrily pulling out the arrow and some chunks of his skin. Although, he seemed to feel nothing.

“Who do ya think I am?” a huge, roaring voice echoed through the woods.

“Boss?” the troll whispered meekly. Megan looked to her left to see a giant troll about seven and a half feet tall. He wore metallic silver armor, and his eyes were ash-black.

“I told you ta not eat this one tills I talked to it.”

“But, boss,” the wounded troll replied. “We aven’t ad a good meal in days”

“And that makes it okay to disobey MY orders?” the large troll boomed.

“No, sir,” the wounded one whispered.

“Get er down now!” the large troll spoke, and immediately, Megan was surrounded by trolls on all sides. They tugged and pulled until finally, Megan was freed from the vine and tied securely to a tree near the boiling water.

“I smelled that meddlin’ wizzar on ya when I was a mile from ya,” he crouched less than a foot away from where Megan was sitting. She could smell his foul breath and her nose filled with the stench. It was as if he hadn’t brushed his teeth in twenty years and eaten every foul substance Megan could think of.

“Wha…” Megan began, but instantly choked on the air surrounding her face which, was filled with the enormous trolls breath.

“Where iz e?” the troll breathed in Megan’s face. “Where iz Prilalus?”

“I dunno,” Megan managed to choke out. The troll stood up.

“Don’t tya now?” he asked threateningly.

“No,” Megan moaned.

“See, mazzter, she don’t know,” the gruff-voiced troll Megan had first encountered said. “Can we ead er now?”

“She do look mighddy tasty,” the huge troll smiled a disturbing smile full of rotting, pointed teeth and bits of animal

flesh. “String er up.”

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