Curse of the Weretroll (rewrite)

Chapter 54

After the whole... incident... was thankfully done and over with... Poppy decided to walk Branch back to his bunker against the gray troll's many complaints to the contrary...

     He still didn't want to be anywhere near her... at least... not until he could get this wolf thing under control... He just... he couldn't stand the thought of hurting the one troll he cared about more than anything else in the world...

     But... Poppy insisted on making sure her friend got back to the village safely... and he knew well that once the young princess put her mind to something... there was no changing it...

     Besides... he couldn't make her walk home all alone in the dark forest! Even if it wasn't him who attacked... it could easily be some other dangerous predator to take the pink troll's life away far too early... the survivalist just had to protect her...

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     The two trolls walked together through the forest in complete silence, Branch keeping a carful watch over their surroundings while also trying his absolute hardest to keep his wolf side in check as the sun slowly began to rise up in the sky, not yet poking it's way above the treetops surrounding them...

'Come...' the voice suddenly called out yet again to Branch, echoing loudly in the survivalist's brain over and over again to try and regain control over the little Weretroll, the head splitting sound causing the poor boy to wince sharply as he stopped dead in his tracks...

"Ow..." the village grump moaned as he reached up to clutch his head in both hands, the young boy squinting his eyes tightly shut in pain....

Hearing the pained whimper of her best friend, Poppy looked back to the only gray troll in concern before placing a gentle hand on his shoulder...

"Are you ok, Branch?" she asked softly, worried out of her mind about his safety...

Slowly, he looked up at her, his squinted eyes reflecting a look of pure pain even though he was clearly trying to hide it...

"Y... yeah..." he grumbled, still clutching his head tightly. "I... I'm... I'm fine..."

He took another step forwards, just trying to get the princess back home to safety, but was immediately forced to stop yet again, the pain just too much to handle as his brain throbbed violently inside his skull, feeling almost as if there were a tiny person inside his head going hard on a major drum solo...

'Come...' the voice whispered again, not giving up on it's mission to take control of the little gray troll once more... 'Come to me... come...'

"You don't look fine, Branch..." Poppy said in a concerned tone, freaking out even more than she usually would as she remembered what had happened only a few hours before...

     Poppy knew... she could see from the struggled look on her best friend's face... Branch was clearly fighting whatever took over him earlier... it was trying to take him back... but he wasn't letting it... What was wrong with the gray troll that he kept losing control of his own actions? More importantly... how could Poppy help him?

"I'm fine... really," Branch lied, trying to calm his friend's nerves as well as his own. "Just a little... ugh... headache..."

'Come!'

"Ugh..." Branch groaned, closing his eyes tight once again, the poor boy feeling as if he were about to lose his lunch all over the ground in front of him...