Free The Brave Apprentice by P. W. Catanese

eyes and groaned.
    “Hallooo! Oh, it’s him, it’s really him! What luck! Hoo ha!” Simon still had the troll’s rope knotted around his waist, and it trailed thirty feet behind him. When he reached Patch, he lifted him off the ground, hugging him, and began to twirl. “My hero, my prince, my savior!” He planted a wet, loud kiss on Patch’s cheek.
    Patch slapped at the fool’s shoulders and snarled, “Simon—stop it! Put me down—no, we’re going to fall—” And they did fall, because the rope had wound around their legs as Simon spun.
    Simon sat up, looking at the rope and scratching his head. “Where’d that come from?”
    Patch kicked the loops from his legs and stood up. “The trolls tied you up, you half-wit! You dragged that rope a mile across the lake.”
    Simon snapped his fingers. “I think you’re right! Wait
—what
did you call me?”
    Patch grimaced. “I’m sorry, that was an awful thing to—”
    “You called me
Simon!”
Simon gasped and clapped his hands to his head. “The hero knows my name! How can this be?”
    “I’m not a hero,” Patch said.
    Simon kept his hands on his head, but his face grew serious. “Are you saying the wine
wasn’t
poisoned?”
    Patch winced. “No, it was poisoned all right, but—”
    Simon dropped to his knees and seized Patch’s hands. “Then I would be dead if not for you.” Patch wrestled his hands out of the fool’s grip and stepped back, out of reach. Simon grinned up at him like a puppy.
    “Well,” Patch said, “how’d you get away from the trolls?”
    “They forgot all about me when they charged after you. What tempers they have! Why, once they—hold on! Halloooo there,
halloooo!”
Simon jumped to his feet and waved gaily at another approaching figure, a man on a horse.
    “I’m in the middle of a lake,” Patch muttered. “What is everyone doing here?” He just wanted to be left alone on his way back to Crossfield.
    A soldier of Dartham approached, a thick-necked young man who peered down at Patch with a satisfied look on his face. “You’re the apprentice, aren’t you? Patch Ridling? I have orders to bring you to Dartham.”
    “Sorry, that’s not me,” said Patch.
    “It isn’t?” said Simon, utterly confused.
    The soldier eyed Patch doubtfully. “Come on, you must be him. How’d you get that cloak then? That’s royal purple, a gift from the king. I was told you’d be wearing it.”
    “Found it,” said Patch through gritted teeth.
    “I never find
anything,”
Simon said, with his lower lip thrust out.
    The soldier looked behind Patch, toward the shore. “Looks to me like you came from the very spot where this Patch was last seen.” Patch turned and saw the incriminating tracks in the snow.
    Simon put his hand to Patch’s ear and whispered, “Are you
sure
you’re not Patch?”
    Patch stared back at the soldier with red-rimmed eyes. “I’m not going back,” he said.
    The soldier jumped nimbly off his horse and loomed over Patch. “Son, our orders were clear: ‘Track down the apprentice and bring him back.’ And I don’t mind saying that there’s a generous reward for the man who finds you. So you’re coming with me, even if I have to tie a rope around you and drag you through the snow.” He cracked his knuckles.
    “What fun!” shouted Simon, leaping up. “Can you tow the both of us? You can use my rope!”
    The soldier looked at Simon from the corner of his eye, and back at Patch. Patch shrugged. “Don’t ask,” he said.
    The soldier led his horse and walked with Patch, down the lake toward Dartham. Simon skipped alongside them. He whistled and laughed and told the soldier how Patch had saved his life. “Yes, heard all about that,” the soldier said, looking at Patch and shaking his head.
    Simon began to sing, loudly and badly, some nonsense song that Patch had never heard, nor wanted to hear again:
    “Listen to the hound
’Cause he smells the fox’s blood
When he’s running through the