(The “Dawn come and stone take you all!” kind, not the online troll kind.)
“To you I would give the twelve great mares
And to you I would give the twelve fine mills
That stand between Tillo and Terno
Oh, Mannelig, Sir Mannelig
Would you marry me? For all that I’d gladly give thee
You may only answer with a yes or no.”
-German traditional ballad (the Troll said ‘no’.)
Because nothing says “romane”…that is, “romance….” like moss-covered shoulders, a bridge you’ve guarded for three centuries, and the slow geological realization that you’ve finally met someone you like better than even the really interesting granite with cool blue veins.”
“Hey there, big fella. I usually charge a toll to cross this bridge, but for you I’d pay double just to watch you walk across it in those lichen-covered mossy boots. Are those thighs, or did you decide to wear some tree trunks as pants today?”
“You must be made of diamonds, because even my favorite club can’t seem to crack the way I feel right now.”
“I may live under a bridge, but I’d crawl out into the sunlight for you…even though I sunburn like a redhead. I mean, it’s embarrassing for a creature made of stone. Okay, that’s my embarrassing secret. Now, tell me something about you?”
“Are you a billygoat? Because I want to connect with you in confusing physical ways, and that usually means head-butting.”
“Are you a brutal beam of sunlight? Because one look at you and I’m already rock-hard, frozen, and completely speechless.”
“I’m mostly silicon, but the tiny carbon-based part of me is currently experiencing a rapid metamorphic shift in your direction. I either like you or we’re about to have an earthquake.”
“You’re more beautiful than the tectonic plate which supports Atlantis.”
“My brain runs at roughly 0.3 thoughts per hour, yet every single one of those thoughts has been about you since you stepped onto my bridge. I was barely even distracted by eating that pigeon..”
“In the long geological scale of things, meeting you was the single most significant igneous event since Krakatoa, and I don’t think you even smoke.”
“I don’t always understand emotions, but when I look at you my magma starts bubbling and my tectonic plates being shifting. Are you…by any chance…a sexy ice age?”
“I may eat the occasional traveler, but I’d share my bridge, my club, and even the last dry spot under the arch with you. And some of the traveler.”
“Most people run screaming when they see me. You just smiled. I’m tempted to ask you to dinner, but I think I’m going to run away screaming just to be on the safe side.
“You’re so hot, I’m genuinely thinking that if we embrace each other, I may heat up enough that I can cook us dinner on my stomach at the same time. Or is that not how sentience works?”
“I regenerate from any injury. So feel free to break my heart — I’ll just grow it back bigger and stupider for you. If I can get stupider.”
“I’m not one of those fancy cave trolls with shiny armor and eloquent poetry. I’m just a simple bridge troll who knows a once-in-a-millennium treasure when he sees one. Would you like to see my bridge?”
“You’re so beautiful you made me drop my club. On myself. I’d chase you, but I think I just broke all my toes. What a woman!”
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Graphic by Epic Ioci.
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