Trolls World Tour: Forever My King

Ch.9: Unknown Territory - The Night

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We found Barb standing in front of a stone bridge that stretched over a saltwater river and led to the other side of the island. There was an old wooden sign next to it with faded text. My niece had her arms crossed and was staring straight ahead.

"Hmm..."

She turned her head towards us and looked up at the sun, shielding her eyes from its blinding light. "Uh-huh..."

"What is it?" I asked curiously.

"I'm no meteorologist, Auntie, but isn't the sun supposed to move across the sky or something during the day?" she asked. I raised an eyebrow at her.

"Yeah...why?"

She shrugged. "Well, it hasn't moved an inch since we got here!" Barb exclaimed while pointing at the sky. "The sun has been positioned at high noon for the past three hours."

Katheryn and I looked at each other, then shielded our eyes as we looked in the direction of the sun. I was stunned! Barb was right! But that's impossible! It has to have moved at least a little bit.

"Wait, Barb how do you know how to read what time it is by where the sun is located in the sky?" Katie suddenly asked. Barb scoffed.

"I was bored and read one of the books in Auntie's giant library once-"

"Oh my goodness, YOU READ A BOOK?!" Kat shrieked, obviously shocked. She ran towards her and hugged her tightly. "I'm so proud of you!"

This was a big deal since I had never seen Barb read a book before and, until this very moment, I thought she didn't even know HOW to read.

Barb was very startled by this sudden gesture and let out a growl, obviously annoyed. "Don't do that! You know how much I hate it!"

"Sorry!" Katie quickly put her back down on her own two feet, which led Barb to start brushing herself off like someone had just thrown glitter on her.

This isn't the first time I've seen her react like this towards Katheryn's hugs. However, I've seen her hug other trolls without a second thought, but when it came to my sister's hugs, she always seemed so...disgusted by them. It wasn't like Katie's hugs were terrible, they were quite comforting, so why was Barb always acting like she would rather hug a cactus than her own mother?

I would give anything to hug my mother again...

I lost my train of thought as Barb continued to speak.

"That's not the only impossible thing..."

She pointed towards the other side of the bridge. About halfway across it, the light from the midday sun seemed to halt in its path, almost like an invisible wall was preventing it from going any further. Not a single drop of sunlight could be seen on the other side. It was completely shrouded in a veil of darkness.

"Well..." Kat said. "That's not normal."

"Oh, you think?" Barb answered sarcastically.  Curious, she picked up a rock and threw it as hard as she could into the darkness. We could hear it hit a few tree branches before it landed on the ground with a thud.

"Alright, looks safe to me!" Barb said rather cheerfully. "Let's go!"

I was about to blindly follow her when I heard my sister's voice behind me.

"Beyond this bridge, judgment awaits..." she was squinting her eyes in order to read the text on the sign. "Beware the Children of the Night?"

"Ooooo spooky!" Barb said while wiggling her fingers. "If we find any, I'll make sure to dropkick them into the ocean-"