Troll Daddy's Arc

Chapter 10 of 13

The ninth ribbon hung from a pine branch twenty steps ahead when Troll Daddy saw the glass-front ranger station through the trees. Light glowed in the windows. Someone was inside at this hour, after midnight, waiting. Troll Daddy stopped walking. He told Troll Mother to keep the children at the den and walked forward alone. The ranger station sat in a clearing beside an old stone monument covered in moss and vines. Someone had placed a photograph against the glass door, facing outward. Troll Daddy recognized the compass in the image before he reached the steps. The same worn brass casing. The same carved name. The person inside had known his father and brought proof. A small log cabin stood thirty yards behind the station with smoke rising from its chimney. Whoever this was had settled in and was prepared to stay. The door opened before Troll Daddy could knock. A woman in her sixties stood in the doorway with her arms crossed. She looked at him with the same expression his father wore in the one photograph Troll Daddy owned. She said she had been waiting three days since she heard someone was carrying her father's compass through these woods. She said Troll Daddy's father had promised to deliver it forty years ago and had disappeared instead. She said she didn't come to forgive anyone or offer comfort. She came to take back what belonged to her family. Troll Daddy felt the absence of weight in his jacket pocket where the compass had rested for days. He told her he had given it to his son because he thought it was his father's to pass down. She said it never belonged to his father in the first place. Troll Daddy looked back toward the trail where his family was sleeping and understood the choice he needed to make. He could keep the compass hidden and walk away, teaching his children that broken promises deserved protection. Or he could wake Troll Brother and explain why some things must be returned even when it hurts. He asked the woman to wait until morning and walked back to the den to teach his son the hardest lesson yet.