Never Trust a Troll! Read Free

through the dining hall.
    “Run fer yer lives!” the troll shouted. “Dragon outside! Terrible dragon!”
    “A blue dragon?” yelled Erica.
    “Yah!” shouted the troll.
    “With a red horn on his head?” yelled Wiglaf.
    “Yah!” shouted the troll.
    “Is he swimming in the DSA moat?” yelled Janice.
    “Yah!” shouted the troll.
    “It’s Bubbles!” cried everyone at the Class II table.
    “To arms!” yelled Mordred. “Grab your swords, lads and lasses! Slay that dragon!”
    “But we don’t have swords!” cried a Class I lad.
    “Then improvise!” cried Mordred. “Use whatever’s handy.”
    All the lads and lasses leaped up. Many held spoons as they ran from the dining hall.
    Wiglaf’s heart pounded with fear. Bubbles was right outside in the DSA moat! Janice was right. School was starting off with a bang.

Chapter 3
    A s Wiglaf ran, he drew his rusty sword. He would never stab Bubbles. He hated the sight of blood. Yet waving Surekill made him feel brave.
    All the future dragon slayers ran out to the castle yard. They streamed over the drawbridge.
    “He’s in the moat!” yelled the troll. And then he ran back toward school.
    Erica stood at the foot of the drawbridge, giving orders.
    “Go left!” she said to a group of Class I lasses waving sticks for their weapons. “Those of you with spoons, go right! We’ll encircle the moat while Bubbles is underwater. When he comes up, he’ll be surrounded.”
    Weapons aloft, the DSA students stood ready. All eyes were on the moat. They waited for Bubbles to surface.
    “Bubbles can hold his breath a very long time,” Wiglaf said at last.
    Angus peered down into the water. “All I see are eels. No dragon.”
    “Perhaps he is down in the deepest part,” said Wiglaf.
    “If a dragon were in the moat,” said Angus, “wouldn’t the eels be thrashing around?”
    “You would think so,” said Wiglaf.
    “Bubbles!” called Erica, drawing her silvery sword, which was an exact replica of Sir Lancelot’s. “Come up and meet your doom!”
    Bubbles did not come.
    “Bubbles!” called Janice, pounding her lance on the ground. “Are you a cowardly worm?”
    Maybe he was, thought Wiglaf, for there was still no sign of any dragon.
    Now Wiglaf heard a faint sound: “Guh-huh! Guh-huh! Guh-huh! Fooled you!”

    He looked up. There at the slit in the castle wall stood the troll, laughing his head off.
    “’Tis a trick!” cried Wiglaf. “Bubbles is not in the DSA moat. Look!”
    Wiglaf saw Bilge and Maggot poke their heads out next to the troll. And Dudwin. He was there, too. All four lads were laughing.
    “Fooled by Class I lads!” cried Janice. “What an insult!”
    “’Tis indeed!” Erica said angrily. “Wiggy, Dudwin is falling in with a bad lot. You’d better teach your brother how to behave.”
    “’Twas a harmless prank,” Wiglaf said lamely. Once classes began, the troll would probably calm down. He hoped Dudwin would, too.

    That afternoon, Wiglaf put his thin blanket on the not-too-lumpy cot next to Angus’s cot. He took out the few items from his bundle, and he was unpacked.
    Wiglaf walked down the hall and peeked in the doorway of the Class I lads’ dorm.
    Dudwin was sitting in a circle on the floor with Bilge, Maggot, and the troll. They were playing cards. Other Class I lads were watching.
    “I won, didn’t I?” the troll shouted. “Hand over yer pennies.”
    “But we don’t have any pennies,” said Bilge.
    “Yeah,” said Maggot. “Not a one.”
    “Ye have any pennies?” the troll asked Dudwin.
    “I did,” said Dudwin proudly. “But I gave them to Mordred.”
    “So, ye can’t pay,” said the troll. “That means ye owes me, understand?”
    “Yeah,” said Maggot and Bilge and Dudwin.
    Wiglaf crept away from the door. What did the troll mean that they owed him? He didn’t like the sound of it.
    At the henhouse, Wiglaf found Daisy sitting in the straw, surrounded by softly clucking hens. She had her snout in a book: