I was going to fill the night with terrors.
Jesper
Inej crept towards the sound, with Jesper trailing right behind her. The weight of his guns in his hands helped temper his nerves, but they still shot up when they got closer. Who knew what kind of dangers these lands harboured? Soon, he saw the fire, as well as being able to smell it. He could also see the three gigantic figures looming beside it. Jesper crouched down behind a fallen tree (which had no business being there, since there weren’t really any trees around) and nudged Inej. He pointed in the direction where he hoped Kaz and Wylan hadn’t murdered each other by now, and mouthed “Let’s go back.” He wasn’t necessarily scared, yet didn’t feel like stirring up trouble when there was no reason to. Unfortunately, Inej did not shy away from danger. She threw daggers at people, ripped them out of their bodies and licked their blood off of them while smiling. Metaphorically. Inej did not actually do that. She was, however, crawling closer to the fire. Jesper cursed softly and followed. Up close, the figures did not look any less like trouble than from afar. They even smelled like trouble; bad hygiene, something mouldy and slightly burned meat, though that last thing was more likely to be the meat roasting on a spit, and which Jesper thought looked awfully much like Oregano, the horse he had set loose only two hours ago. Inej apparently thought so too, since she staggered backwards and fell into Jesper. Jesper didn’t mind this, since Inej wasn’t heavy and Oregano truly had been a sweet horse. He did, however, mind the immense racket she had made. Three heads looked their way and spotted them, though not as fast as Jesper had anticipated. Nevertheless, he immediately went full action-mode. In a matter of seconds, he made the decision to not waste any bullets on potentially bullet-proof creatures (their skin looked like really tough leather), instead slamming one of the beasts on the head with the handle of his gun. The hit didn’t knock him out, but it gave Jesper enough time to get Inej on her feet and hit another beast. Inej started hacking in on the third one. Jesper was glad he hadn’t tested his bullet theory, since it appeared he had been right; even Inej’ daggers, which were sharp as anything, barely left a scratch on the skin of the beast. Inej quickly realised this, opted for the eyes of the beast instead, and had it down in a matter of seconds. Jesper was struggling to keep the other two beasts from strangling him. Inej attacked one of them from the back, but the other one got a hold of Jesper, holding him by his wrists, so he had to drop his guns. Maybe they weren’t as thick as they looked. The other beast shook Inej off of it. Jesper was glad the third beast was at least still down. It wasn’t much of a consolation, though, because Inej was now on the ground, not looking great, and Jesper was still being held painfully by his wrists. “What’ll we do with you, then?” the beast growled way too close to Jespers ears. He didn’t respond, instead doing the only thing he could think of. He started screaming. Intense, almost feral screams left his mouth. And, soon enough, he saw something moving towards them. Jesper could see Kaz hesitating in the distance when he took in the full situation, hopefully devising a plan to get them out of this. Then Kaz turned around, to where another figure, probably Wylan, was standing. Jesper couldn’t feel his arms anymore, and he was getting pretty scared about what this thing would do to him if Kaz and Wylan didn’t hurry the fuck up.
Kaz
Kaz turned to Wylan. “What do you have on you?” he snapped, sounding more aggressive than he had meant to. Wylan luckily seemed to understand the gravity of the situation and didn’t mention it. He did start explaining some science stuff about all the different powders and potions he was apparently hiding in his jacket, which Kaz did not care about at all. “Right. Perfect. Go distract them,” he told Wylan, who was in the middle of an elaborate explanation about what would happen if he threw a grainy, black powder and something else together. Wylan shot a sharp look at Kaz and begrudgingly started walking towards the trolls. Despite what it might seem like, Kaz had actually prepared pretty well for this trip. How could he not have, with the amounts of money involved? And so it happened that Kaz knew exactly what they were dealing with here. Trolls. Hard as rocks and almost as powerful. It didn’t surprise Kaz that Jesper and Inej had run headfirst into unknown danger, which was much bigger than they’d probably anticipated, nor did the situation they were in right now shock him. It merely made him worried. Wylan had reached the fire. Kaz looked at it from afar. Wylan had managed to get behind the troll that was holding Jesper. He threw something straight into the fire, and it shot sparks all over the place, temporarily blinding the trolls. Jesper got dropped, which was more than Kaz had hoped for, but the troll that had been holding him had enough wits left to take a hold of him again immediately. Wylan kept out of sight, continuously throwing unknown powders and liquids that exploded with lots of noise or light. They were almost childish, not doing any real harm, but they did exactly what Kaz wanted them to do; distract the trolls and thus opt for time. Inej had been laying very still thus far, but now she seemed to come back to life. However, after Kaz saw her moving around once or twice, she lay back down. Kaz knew she’d assessed the situation and thought it better to keep quiet and wait this one out. It was a long, tiring night for everyone. The trolls, including the third one who had come to, were growling at each other in between explosions. Kaz, who kept a safe distance, ready to jump in whenever it was needed but staying in the shadows for now, couldn’t hear what they were saying. Probably discussing what was happening and what they were going to do with their newly acquired food. Wylan surprisingly hadn’t run out of exploding stuff yet, nor had he been discovered by the trolls. He was tirelessly running around, hiding and throwing things, with just enough time in between to scare them every time. Inej and Jesper had grown scarily quiet, exhausted by being up all night and scared for their lives. Just when Kaz thought things might not end in their favour after all, he saw a tiny pink edge in the sky. When he looked up, he could see the stars slowly fading. Minutes crept by, while the sky got lighter and lighter and Kaz prayed to the saints he didn’t believe in that the trolls wouldn’t notice. They didn’t. At the exact moment Wylan seemed on the verge of collapsing, and the trolls looked like they had come to a decision about the way Jesper and Inej should be cooked, the first rays of sun were visible. The trolls turned around to stare at the dawn in disbelief. It was the last thing they would ever see. Kaz could think of worse ways to end.
Jesper
When the beasts turned to stone, Jesper was too tired to ask any questions. He collapsed on the ground, and had a vague impression of Wylan doing the same a few steps away from him. Inej had never gotten up. “We can’t stay here. You need to get back to our camp,” Kaz said. Jesper grunted while heaving himself up. The three of them staggered back to the place where they’d set up camp hours ago, with tents Kaz had gotten from Valinor knows where. Jesper dove inside his tent, almost immediately snoring. The last thing he heard was Kaz saying: “I’ll take the first watch then.”