[Nell]: 226.Stories.The Fairytale.Part 5

She woke to find herself on her back and being dragged over hard-packed snow. Something had a strong grip on one of her ankles, and a loud crunching noise filled her ears. Annabella lifted her head.
A pack of gigantic snow trolls were lumbering up the mountain, grunting happily about their catch. The crunching was that of their big splayed feet over the snowy ground. She twisted herself around and peered back at the remains of her camp far in the distance and down the mountain side.
Strangely enough, she was feeling no anxiety at the notion that she was being carted off by snow trolls, and likely to end up being the main course at some horrific feast. No, she was feeling quite numb in fact. It might have had something to do with the blinding headache she was experiencing, preventing thoughts such as 'panic', 'scream', and 'struggle' from getting to the main part of the brain, where she did all her conscious thinking.
So instead, she lay back and let herself be dragged miserably through the snow, whilst starring dazedly up at a white and uninteresting sky. That is to say, uninteresting except for one small black speck circling high above her. Some sort of bird.
Snow kept getting swept into her face and inside her coat, and she knew she must be showing an indecent amount of stockinged leg, but she didn't care because the coolness on her face seemed to be relieving the pounding in her head.
Suddenly the world came into sharper focus, and she knew exactly how she felt about the prospect of being eaten. She also kind-of wished she didn't.
A desperate wail filled the air as Annabella struggled in vain; trying to wrest her foot from her captor's grasp. All she succeeded in doing was twisting her ankle and getting a face full of snow. The troll lumbered on, as unhindered as if she was still unconscious.
Panting from exhaustion, and spluttering ice and snow, Annabella turned over and once more found herself starring up at the uninteresting sky and speck. Except now, instead of physical agony, there were dozens of dark and distressing thoughts flying through her head, giving her quite as bad a headache as the troll's club had.
She reflected that the world was not nearly as romantic a place as she had been lead to believe. Where was the knight that was supposed to come and rescue her? Where was the fairy godmother to magic the monsters away? Where was good luck or a magic ring when you needed it?!?
But, above all else, right now she wished she had her mother's warm lap to snuggle into, like she had when she was young, and Rimonda there beside her to listen to her troubles. She wished she had never left home and never met that stupid little man. A tear slid up over forehead and into her already soaked hair. Her vision has blurring and there was a pounding in her ears.
Hold on a moment! That really was pounding! She picked her head up. There! A horseman was galloping through the snow towards them. He reigned in before the trolls, looking splendid in a black doublet and hose. Her knight! He took off his wide brimmed hat, shook out his long auburn hair, and…
'Long auburn hair?!?!' Her mind reeled. 'He's a she! But she's wearing pants and a sword...what's going on?'
Dully Annabella realized that her rescuer, astride the glorious chestnut stallion, was really a lovely maiden with a light sprinkling of freckles across her nose, and thin lips shaped in a pout. She had hair like none Annabella had ever seen before; it fell in a sheet of fiery brilliance, framing the lady's face and setting off a pair of blazing blue eyes.
The younger girl felt something cold trickle up her spine, and it wasn't snow. The moment she'd seen the eyes of the stranger, she knew, with a surety that she had never felt before, that this woman was filled with a pure and terrible anger.
The maiden spat at the trolls. "I tell you to go catch me a couple of caravans and you bring me this?" The snow trolls shuffled around uneasily, looking somewhat embarrassed. "Some wandering child? The caravans have passed already and we've missed our chance! What a bunch of pinheaded, numb-skulled-" the woman broke off as she studied Annabella.
The girl was sure that, if she hadn't been heavy with snow, every hair on her head would have stood on end at the malicious, calculating look the strange lady gave her.
"Hm, not so bad a catch after all…bring her! We will make some use of the sprite," she wheeled about on her horse and galloped back up the mountain.
Somehow, Annabella had the distinct impression that she preferred the idea of being eaten by the snow trolls than whatever the lady had planned for her. The trolls began their slow lumbering walk again.
This was definitely to be described as a bad day. The very badness of this bad day was more than she could possibly have expressed, or imagined. Actually, everything was going from a humble bad to downright terrible; maybe she was the most unluckiest in her family. Adventure and trouble, it seemed, came hand-in-hand.
She amused herself for a minute by throwing snowballs at the back of the trolls' heads, but she didn't have very good aim, and she only hit one. It was the one holding her, and he simply lifted her up by her sore and swollen ankle, and shook her around a bit for punishment. After that, she tried to distract herself by counting the number of laps the speck in the sky was doing.
Then speck began to grow larger, and larger, until Annabella was able make out that it was an eagle. It continued to draw closer, unnoticed by the trolls, until it was flapping around head height. Then a voice spoke in her mind.
'Don't worry, Annabella,' the voice said. 'We will rescue you.' And it flew off.