Tales of the Trollhunter 1: To Tell the Truth

Chapter 3

As Jim and Barbara descended the stairs into the basement, Jim felt his mom rest her hand on his shoulder. The contact probably was reassuring to her, he thought, so he just smiled over his shoulder at her, then at Blinky.

Surprisingly enough, at just Blinky. Neither Draal nor Aaarrrggghh were in plain sight.

"Where's Aaarrrggghh and Draal?" He asked as he stepped onto the basement floor, while his mom for the moment stayed on the bottom step seemingly torn between standing her ground and fleeing back upstairs post-haste!

"While you were upstairs discussing things, we did some discussing of our own and decided that perhaps it would be best for Barbara if the, shall we say, least intimidating and most familiar Troll to her, at least by voice, would be the first one she encountered." The scholarly Troll inclined his head respectfully to Barbara, giving her his most friendly smile. "A pleasure to meet you again, Barbara. I am Blinkous Galadrigal, but you can call me Blinky, as Master Jim does." Perhaps it was his familiarity with Trollkind, but as Blinky was talking – and thus drawing the focus of his mom – Jim realized he could tell where his other Troll friends were hiding. He couldn't help but give a small grin as he spotted Draal's shadow behind the furnace (seriously? How did he fit back there so easily?) and Aaarrrggghh they had simply thrown a large tarp over. But to Jim's eyes the gentle giant's tail made a noticeable lump, and one foot was half uncovered simply by his height, even sitting.

Thankfully, Blinky had Barbara's full, wide-eyed attention. For a moment she just stared, then blinked her eyes and gave her head a small shake to clear it.

"Jim – said we'd met before." Hesitantly she took a step down.

"Yes, when I'd had the interesting fortune to be turned into a human for a time, then again when you were injured due to being magically connected to Strickland. I am very pleased that you recovered from that horrid incident. I mean really! To use you as a means to get to Master Jim – simply uncouth behavior, even for a Changeling." A quick huff cleared the rest of his annoyance with said Changeling, and his smile returned. "I do want to thank you for your concern when I last parted from you as a human. You believed I was having something called a 'heart attack' and were quite determined to offer medical assistance."

"At the - café," Barbara said slowly and suddenly.

"Why, yes!" Blinky was surprised as well.

"I didn't go into that detail," Jim was quick to put in, rather caught off guard himself.

"That memory should've been erased by the undoing of the Binding Spell, yet you seem to be at least faintly remembering it."

"It's... like something I half-remember, like a movie I saw a long time ago or something I dreamed up."

"Hmm... perhaps Vendel might be able to explain that at a later point. But for now it is unimportant. What is important is helping you understand Master Jim's role in Trollmarket and to us."

"That is something I wanted to ask. Jim said that this is something that can't just be handed over to someone else."

"No, the mantle of Trollhunter is something that once given cannot be surrendered," confirmed Bilnky. "It is passed along only after the present Trollhunter falls in battle." Barbara paled and Jim was quick to interject.

"But that's why I train so hard all the time!" He patted the air as he spoke, trying to calm her down from an impending heart attack. "Blinky's in charge of that, and I've come a long way."

"Yes, Master Jim certainly has. I apologize if I alarmed you; I was thoughtless to phrase it that way."

"I – I think I'm okay." Barbara sat down on a nearby box. "Okay, so he can't give it up. And he told me that he feels it's what he's meant to do."