Free The Prodigal Troll by Charles Coleman Finlay

east Yvon wouldn't have noticed the three tall pines and would have missed the turnoff he meant to take.
    He turned. A squat building-the ford wizard's house-sat below the pines, down near the rocky river bank.
    Yvon went straight down to it and pounded on the wooden door. "Hey, Banya, wake up!"
    Several moments later, the door cracked open. A wrinkled face peered at Yvon through the gap. Finally, the man said, "Are you a ghost? Tell me three times, tell me true."
    Yvon wondered what Banya had heard. "Under the sky, I live. Above the ground, I live."
    The door swung wide. An older man stepped outside. He wore a woman's sleeveless dress, with big, graceless, copper bracelets on his wrists and an ill-fitting girdle about his waist. He had hard limbs, the same scoured-brown color as weathered trees high up in the mountains. Unkempt hair fell about his wrinkled face and spread across his broad shoulders. His face was stubbled where he'd scraped it clean a couple days before. He stared at Yvon. "You're a dead man."
    "You're the second one to call me that in as many days."
    "Who was the first?"
    "I didn't ask his name before I killed him. One of Culufre's men. Where'd you hear that I was dead?"
    "You're missing, that's why." Banya glanced at Xaragitte, and shielded his eyes as he stared at the baby. "They were still digging away at the castle ruins two days ago. It's presumed they'll find your body buried among the stones and ashes, with the nursemaid, the heir, and a few others."
    Yvon rubbed his fist inside his other palm. "Let them sift for a month, if it'll help us. We need to lay low until Gruethrist ransoms himself or escapes."
    Banya stared off at the morning star, refusing to meet Yvon's eyes. Finally, he said, "If you want to see Gruethrist again, you'll have to do what Sumukan did."
    "I'm too tired for riddles," Yvon said. The wild man Sumukan was the friend and companion of the ancient king, Ganmagos. "Do you mean that I must go and cut down the cedar of heaven or that I must slay the god's eight-legged bull?"
    "I mean that you must do as Sumukan did when Ganmagos died. You'll have to kill yourself and descend into the underworld to rescue him." Ganmagos returned to the living afterward, and became an immortal, but Sumukan was trapped forever in the land of death. The king wrote a famous lament before he climbed the high mountain and leaped into the heavens to become the wandering red star.
    "Speak plainly," Yvon said, still not understanding.
    "Gruethrist is dead."
    Yvon forced a laugh. "As dead as I am?"
    "More dead than you." Banya's expression never changed, but he glanced away again, a way he had when speaking bad news.
    Yvon's chest tightened. He'd served Lord Tubat as a common soldier, and stood beside him as a dam against the slaughter of the virgins during the Temple Rebellion of the last succession. When the Empress had offered Tubat his choice of rewards, all he'd asked was that his common soldiers-the handful that survived-be allowed to grow the braid of knights. The Empress granted his wish, and gave his hand to Lady Gruethrist in marriage. Without Lord Gruethrist, Yvon would only be another common soldier. "How did it happen?" he asked.
    "The story is that he rushed into the burning hall to succor some of his knights, including you. You rushed in to put out the flames, or maybe to rescue his heir-I've heard it both ways-and were trapped when the roof collapsed. The knights were burned beyond recognition, but they found Gruethrist's body under a partly collapsed wall. Crushed, but untouched by fire."
    Yvon would have discounted any story of Gruethrist's death but one such as this: he was crude enough to burn his lady's home, but he had always been loyal to his men and would risk his life for them.
    The wizard looked directly into Xaragitte's eyes. "After seeing his body, and thinking her child already dead, Lady Gruethrist tried to kill herself with poison. She still lived two days ago."
    "She died during the