Trolls.

  That was the word on my brain when I woke up, and the first thing I wao do was find out if Xy was okay.

  But I had errands to run. I didn’t know what trolls were like, but I knew I didn’t want them oh. There were boxes of things I’d ordered online on the porch. I’d almost fotten about them, but I brought them ihen I went on a hardware store run to get locks.

  Kathy popped out of her house when I got home, as if she’d been looking out the window waiting for me.

  “Abel!” she called.

  “Oh, hi.” I hated that I didn’t have time to chat with my pretty blonde neighbor. “How’s it going, Kathy?”

  “Pretty good. You get all your packages?”

  I nodded.

  “I was surprised that you left them there ht.”

  I shrugged. “I guess I got kind of ed up in my work.”

  Kathy ughed. “Or ed up in something. I saw that girl in the green paint.”

  I guess that was, from her perspective, a more logical clusion than green skin. “Ah, yes, I had a friend over.”

  “Cute friend. I’m not surprised that you have ‘friends.’ Although maybe not py in front of the windows, hmm? Anyway, when you didn’t bring the packages in I started to be worried that something happeo you. Neighbors o look after neighbors.”

  “Nope, I’m fine.”

  “I look forward to seeing what you’ve doh the old pce,” Kathy said.

  I nodded. “Well, let me get it a bit more in shape first,” I said. “It needs a lot of work. Speaking of which…”

  “Yes. I’ll let you get on with it,” Kathy said, looking disappointed, which firmed my guess that she had been fishing for an invite.

  I installed the first lo the door to the basement, which didn’t have one on it before. I didn’t want anyone wandering down there, for obvious reasons, but Sandra would want to be invited over, and it sounded like Kathy might e knog at some point, too, just being neighborly. They’d probably all want a tour, but the basement had to be off limits. I wasn’t going to keep it locked all the time, because that would be annoying to me, and anyone who could get through my front door could get through the one in the basement, but it gave me an option if someone came over.

  The basement was dangerous. Someone could fall through. But my nightmare sario is someone inf the gover.

  I took all the boxes to the basement and opehem there. A pass, and new clothing. Jeans. Skirts and cute tops. A bra. I wao try them all on, and of course I couldn’t do that in the basement. I reminded myself that I had to foore important things, but I’d opehe box because I still o wear something in Amaranth today, unless I was going to run around the woods naked, in a dress, or in clothes I’d been wearing for days and whieeded a wash.

  I repacked everything I wao take down into a couple of boxes, stripped, a down to Amaranth carrying the boxes. Temporarily, the boxes would serve as downstairs dresser. At some point I’d pick up something at a yard sale, maybe. In my copious free time.

  The transition was feeling more and more normal, now. Being Abby was feeling more normal, too. It wasn’t just a strange body I turned into. It was me, just as much as Abel was.

  Once downstairs the first thing I did ut on the bra. It felt pretty strange, although pared to suddenly getting breasts nothioo peculiar. I wondered if it fit right, and I remembered seeing some ad or article that cimed that most women wore the wrong-sized bra. Apparently there was more to it than just measuring in a couple of pces, or maybe bra sellers just figured it was smart to make women nervous and want to buy new bras.

  In any case, it didn’t seem to give me double boob — I checked in the mirror — and it wasn’t too tight for me to breathe, so I thought I’d give it a try today. I had things to do, and I didn’t want to waste too much time.

  I’d also gotten some underwear designed for trans women and cross dressers. It fit pretty well, looked feminine, and did a pretty good job of keeping my penis tucked away, at least as long as I didn’t get hard. I felt a little ridiculous in it, but not as ridiculous as I’d feel in Abby’s sexy body wearing boxers htie whities. I wao have options besides hanging free.

  I finished with a tank top and a short skirt, and thought when I was dohat no one could tell that I was anything but a very hot girl. Why did that make me so pleased? The jeans would probably have been a more practical choice, but I wore jeans all the time, and I liked the idea of wearing a skirt for a ge.

  In any case, I had more work to do. I got out the drill, ao it, installing a moder of locks on the a doors.

  The previous day, when I was out in the woods with Xy, it occurred to me that anyone could wander in. That didn’t seem that important in a world full of deer and squirrels and one sexy dryad, and everything else far away. But trolls? No. They were not getting to Earth on my watch if something as simple as a lock could stop them.

  Oher hand, I didn’t want to get locked out from my home p because I fot my keys somewhere. So I had two lock boxes with keys in them, and binations. My iion was to bury them nearby, not deeply, for emergewo might seem overkill, but it wasn’t as if I could call a locksmith if things went wrong.

  I realized my outfit cked one very important thing — pockets. It wasn’t as if I hadn’t heard enough women pin about that. I tucked a key in my bra a outside to bury the lockboxes.

  I didn’t get to it, because I had visitors.

  Xy, wearing nothing but three leaves, would normally have held all my attention. But o her was a six-foot tall blue woman.

  I knew immediately that she was a troll. Enash had said that troll women weren’t bad looking, and in her case it was an uatement. She looked like a punk amazon goddess — okay, oh osis, but blue looked good on her.

  She had long, violet hair that was shaved on the sides, to reveal slightly pointed ears. She wore a sort of asymmetrical dark browher skirt and a baop of the same material, both of which looked like their form had as much to do with the shape of the skin of the animal as any attempt at fashion. That left a muscled stomad long toned legs bare, as well as shapely shoulders. And she did a good job of filling out the top, too.

  She held a bow in her right hand, and a long wicked knife was strapped to her belt. A gold bah red stones in it adorned her wrist. I could see the feathers of arrows poking over her shoulder, presumably in a quiver of some kind.

  There erhaps a little too much Barbara Streisand in the nose, but that was quibbling. And maybe she could sing.

  And now, she knew about my hideout.

  You keep your secret if you bash her head in with your shovel. Best way to stop people from remembering things. But maybe you want to fuck her first. Although sed works, too.

  I realized Enash had been very quiet while I’d been dressing earlier. Maybe he figured that his input might’ve driveo put on something that covered more. He robably right.

  “Abby!” Xy rushed me and nearly toppled me over with a hug. Apparently she wasn’t worried about the troll woman, so I tried to let myself enjoy the resulting boob squish as I gave her a tight squeeze. “I’m so gd you let me know you were back.”

  The troll watched curiously.

  Let her know? I hadn’t fired up the lirimmer or the saw — ah, the drill made the same kind of noise.

  “Abby, this is Princess Gren. Gren, this is Abby, I told you about her.”

  Gren nodded. “You told me she had a penis.”

  “She does!” Xy said. “Wao show you?” She k down in front of me and reached for my hips.

  I stepped back, wanting more trol over the situation. “Whoa. Um, pleased to meet you, Princess Gren. I’m Abby. I like to think there’s something more to me than just being a chick with a dick.”

  Gren giggled. “Chick with a dick!” she said. “Haha. Still, it must be much smaller than Xy said. Anyway, it is o meet you, too, Abby chick with dick. And you just call me Gren, no need for the Prihing.”

  “You just call me Abby, no need for the chick with dick thing.”

  “A deal!” she said, and spit on her hand. She offered it to me.

  “You spit on your hand and shake it, to agree,” Xy said. “It’s a troll thing.”

  Other cultures are n, they are just sometimes weird. I spat in my hand, feeling rather undylike, and shook Gren’s. Her handshake was firm a. I calibrated my pressure to match hers. She squeezed a little tighter, and I squeezed back. Then she locked gazes with me and upped the pressure again, and I responded in kind.

  “Xy said you were strong,” Gren said. “Now I know.” She let go. Apparently I had passed the test.

  “Gren and I are friends,” Xy said. “Or more than friends. We made love again st night. It was a shame you couldn’t join us.”

  Okay, now there was an image.

  “You would have been wele,” Gren said. “Even if your penis is not as rge as Xy cims. You have fantastic tits.”

  It’s good to see a troll that appreciates quality worksmanship. Not too firm, but not so soft that they sag. Big enough to draw the attention, but not so much so that you topple over. And the work I had to do on your baake sure the whole structure could be supported without injury! Making bodies isn’t easy.

  “Um, thank you. You’ve got a great rack, yourself.”

  “Yes, don’t I? I make any cock disappear between my massive jugs.”

  Okay then.

  I looked between Xy and Gren. It seemed undiplomatiention that I was uhe impression that trolls and Xy didn’t get along, but I wao know what . And I definitely didn’t like the idea that the trolls now knew about the tomb. I’d gotten the locks on just in time, although I was already thinking that maybe a bination lock would be better. You could normally break them easier, which was why I hadn’t gohat route, but I could be mugged for the key.

  I didn’t want a troll invasion of Earth. Even with magiot w, I imagihey could cause some trouble, but worse, they’d draw attention to the gate.

  For now, I’d wait.

  “Abby,” Xy said, “We have a problem we need your help with.”

  I leaned my shovel against the wall and put the lockboxes down. If we were going to be a while, I wao get folding chairs, but I wasn’t going to open up the crypt in front of Gren to do it. There probably wasn’t a good way to sit on the ground in my short skirt. I leaned against the wall, and realized I was doing hooker stance.

  Ah well, maybe that didn’t have the same otation here. “Tell me about it,” I said.