It was then, so the story goes, that Robin Hobb and his merry men (or man, since Little John was the only one alive) led Kendira and her friends to their hideout on the outskirts of the Enchanted Forest. Kendira really didn’t want to go, but the merry man himself insisted and promised them cakes and ale. And with the guys and Rachelle whining, their stomachs empty soon after their boar breakfast, Kendira didn’t have much of a choice. With a sag of her robed shoulders, she trailed behind the rest of them, her lilac cape fluttering in the setting breeze.
Robin Hobb and Little John guided them through the woods, eventually coming to stop at a gigantic oak tree, bigger than any fairy tale could describe. Its trunk was as big as a house, and though it didn’t stretch much higher than the other trees around, its leafy branches dwarfed the other trees in windy shadows. There was a door carved into the tree—two doors, in fact, one inside the other. The bigger door was large enough to admit any of the girls if they but ducked their heads. The smaller door, like a pet door, was much closer to the ground and big enough to admit any of the guys. There was a normal size welcome mat out front, fit snugly between the thick, worming branches of the tree.
“This is the home of the Elves!” Robin Hobb said. “They are not welcome in the land of Ellewyn, like us, but enemies of the aristocrats are friends of ours. I hope they will be your friends too.” He turned around and rapped his fist against the tiny door.
It opened soon after and a white-haired elf with a pointed red hat and oven mitts over his hands poked his head out the door. “Robin Hobb, you caught me at the perfect time! I was just making cookies.”
“You’re always making cookies!” Robin laughed.
“I know, I know. Who are your friends?” He gazed up at the three girls towering over him.
“This is Kim, Sister Aisha, and Lady Kendira, apprentice to the one and only Master Luna.”
“Oh, my,” the elf squeaked. “Lady Kendira, it is a pleasure.” He bowed his head and his hat blew off.
“You can welcome her with a round of your cookies,” Robin Hobb said with a belly laugh. “Come, all of you, the cookies await! Chips ahoy!”
“I really don’t have enough for three girls,” the elf started to say, but Robin put his arm around Little John and the two of them pushed their way through the door.
Kendira, Kim, and Rachelle looked at each other, shrugged, and opened the much larger door. The inside of the tree was only one big circular room with an oven in the middle. The oven’s smokestack was built into the trunk of the tree, rising further into the ceiling than they could see. The walls were made, of course, of wood and sap, which might’ve given off a nasty odor if not for the sweet aroma of freshly-baked cookies in the air. A beautiful plaid carpet graced the floor underneath their feet, and everything in the room was measured in two scales—one set of things, such as tables and chairs, fit for women, and much smaller sets of those same things fit for men, so that everybody had a place to sit.
Kim took Isaac, Mundo, and Quentin out of her quiver and dropped them on the floor so that she could sit down next to Kendira and Rachelle at the ‘big people’ table. But unlike the girls, the guys didn’t feel like sitting down. There were two more elves helping the first to bake cookies, but Quentin decided he would help out by grabbing the scalding cookie sheets from them. Unfortunately, he wasn’t wearing oven mitts.
“There goes another batch!” one of the elves cried out as Quentin dropped the cookie sheet and hopped around, screaming and flailing his red hands in agony.
“You fool!” Isaac snapped, slapping Quentin upside the head.
“Oh, my,” said the first elf. “Why…why don’t you guys meet my nephews? Oh, boys!”
Apparently that was a second floor because from it, bounding down the corkscrew stairs, were six blonde-haired kids sporting green tunics and carrying toy swords and bows and arrows. They didn’t really look alike, aside from those similarities, and each was about two years different in age, ranging from five to fifteen years.
“Hi!” the oldest boy said, shaking hands with Quentin (whose hands were still burning, so that the skin-on-skin contact only made them burn the more). “My name is Legalis!”
“And I am Legolass!” the next-in-line said, also shaking hands with Quentin.
“And I am Leegolas!” And so on.
“Leggolas!”
“Legollas!
“Lleeggoollaass!” the youngest screamed.
“And we’re elf Hunters!” the boys said, standing tall and proud beside one another.
Quentin, and Mundo, and Isaac, and all three girls, just stared at them. But it was Kim who spoke first.
“So…you’re all named after some variation of ‘Legolas’?”
“Well, no two of us can have the same name,” one of the boys explained. “So we altered the spellings.”
“…This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” Mundo said. “You can’t all be Legolas. In fact, none of you are Legolas! You’re just a bunch of wannabes.”
“Yes, we are!” they all cried.
“You don’t even know who Legolas is! This is a fantasy world, dipwads. Lord of the Rings doesn’t even exist.”
“He knows of the one ring,” the youngest boy whispered.
“He must be destroyed,” said another.
“He could be with…her.”
Robin unsheathed his sword. “Is it true, Sir Mundo? I did notice you were a Shaman, but I did not think of the evil variety! Are you with the Dark Lady Sorena?”
“What? No!”
“Liar!” Robin pinned him to the wall with the blade of his sword. “You shall lose your head for this!”
Mundo sighed. “Look, where I come from, the name ‘Legolas’ is something you only see used, in some variation of spelling, by twelve year old boys wanting to be like one of the most terrible actors of all time. It’s not a compliment. Tell him, Kim.”
“I never watched Lord of the Rings,” Kim shrugged.
“Is that some kind of play?” Rachelle asked. “It sounds awfully boring.”
“No!” Mundo yelled. “It’s a movie!”
“He talks of madness!” Robin Hobb screamed. “What say you, Shaman? Is this ‘movie’ a magic spell of yours?”
“Oh, Jesus…”
“And what of this ‘Jesus’!? Do you take me for a fool, knave? I will spill your blood on this day!”
“Not over my carpet you won’t,” said the elf in oven mitts, slapping his wrist.
“This is ridiculous!” Mundo cried. “Movies, Jesus… Oh, what am I saying? You guys don’t understand any of this.”
“Madness!” Robin cried. “Madness, I say!”
“Quentin, tell him I’m sane!”
But Quentin was too busy stuffing his whole hand into his mouth and sucking the pain away. Mundo stared at him for a moment, and so did everybody else, and then he cried out, “Isaac, tell him that I’m sane!”
“Dude, I’m not getting involved in this. I don’t watch your geek movies anyway.”
“A-ha!” Robin Hobb said, turning his blade now towards Isaac. “So the black man speakst madness as well! Perhaps you are in cahoots with this man!”
“I’m about to give you a kick in the cahoots,” Isaac said, rearing back his fist.
“Enough!” Kendira yelled, slamming her fists against the table. All eyes fell on her. “…Sir Robin Hobb, I assure you that neither Mundo nor Isaac are involved with Sorena. Whatever manner they speak of, though madness to our ears, must be native to their lands. They are not from around here. We must remember that.”
Robin nodded, drawing back his sword. “Lady Kendira, please forgive my brash actions. You are so very correct.” He patted Mundo on the shoulder. “Come, friend, we shall dine on cookies tonight.”
“That does sound good…”
But when he turned his back, Little Lleeggoollaass picked up a slingshot and pelted Mundo in the back of the head with a pebble.
Giantess World
