Terry Pratchett - Troll Bridge

Mica hung his head. 'And here's me with this apology for a bridge. I feel really bad about it,' he said, 'you coming all this way and everything...'

'And there was some king or other,' said Cohen, vaguely, looking at the water. 'And I think there were some wizards. But there was a king. I'm pretty certain there was a king. Never met him. You know?' He grinned at the troll. 'I can't remember his name. Don't think they ever told me his name.'

About half an hour later Cohen's horse emerged from the gloomy woods on to a bleak, windswept moorland. It plodded on for a while before saying, 'All right... how much did you give him?'

'Twelve gold pieces,' said Cohen.

'Why'd you give him twelve gold pieces?'

'I didn't have more than twelve.'

'You must be mad.'

'When I was just starting out in the barbarian hero business,' said Cohen, 'every bridge had a troll under it. And you couldn't go through a forest like we've just gone through without a dozen goblins trying to chop your head off.' He sighed, 'I wonder what happened to 'em all?'

'You,' said the horse.

'Well, yes. But I always thought there'd be some more. I always thought there's be some more edges.'

'How old are you?' said the horse.

'Dunno.'

'Old enough to know better, then.'

'Yeah. Right.' Cohen lit another cigarette and coughed until his eyes watered.

'Gone soft in the head!'

'Yeah.'

'Giving your last dollar to a troll!'

'Yeah.' Cohen wheezed a stream of smoke at the sunset.

'Why?'

Cohen stared at the sky. The red glow was as cold as the slopes of hell. An icy wind blew across the steppes, whipping at what remained of his hair. 'For the sake of the way things should be,' he said.

'Hah!'

'For the sake of things that were.'

'Hah!'

Cohen looked down.

He grinned.

'And for three addresses. One day I'm going to die,' he said, 'but not, I think, today.'

The air blew off the mountains, filling the air with fine ice crystals. It was too cold to snow. In weather like this wolves came down into villages, trees in the heart of the forest exploded when they froze. Except there were fewer and fewer wolves these days, and less and less forest.

In weather like this right-thinking people were indoors, in front of the fire.

Telling stories about heroes.