Jim, Toby, and Blinky started talking about their experiences, starting with the amulet calling Jim in the canals. Thor had nodded at that. Most of the talk seemed to go okay, then he got to the right with Draal.

“So after I beat Draal I—”

“Hold on,” Mr. Stark said. “This was a duel?”

“Yes, Draal was very angry that the Amulet of Daylight had chosen Master Jim.” Blinky smiled. “But after Jim spared his life, he and Jim became fast friends!”

“Yeah, I’m not seeing how that makes up for the part where you put a fifteen-year-old in a stadium to fight for his life.” Mr. Stark was glaring at Blinky.

Jim gulped. Mr. Stark sounded pretty… Angry.

“What would have happened if he’d lost?” Fury asked. Fury didn’t sound angry, just curious. “If say, Draal had accidentally bashed his head in. Would you have told his mother? What about his friend?”

“They would have—” Toby suddenly fell silent and looked over at Blinky.

“I would have seen Master Tobias home,” Blinky said, suddenly sounding a little uncertain.

“Really? From what I’ve heard, you weren’t even able to stop the duel. You’re not the leader, are you?” Hawkeye asked.

“No. Vendel the Elder is.”

“And I bet he wasn’t that happy to have a human down there…” Hawkeye paused. “I mean, an ancient artifact that has always gone to a troll, and now a human—a kid has it…”

“Not at first,” Blinky said.

Fury folded his arms. “So it would have been convenient if maybe Jim died, and perhaps something unfortunate happened to his friend.”

“Please,” Blinky said. “I would never have permitted it.”

“You,” Tony said. “Not your people, but you. Would have gone better if you’d have said that Vendel wouldn’t have permitted it, six-eyes.”

“Uh…” Jim gulped. “Maybe we could talk about this, um later?” Because this really isn’t going like I thought it would…

“No, I think we need to talk about it now,” Dr. Banner said in that mild voice of his. Jim stared and then gulped harder. Were his eyes turning slightly… green?

Oh Boy.

“Before we severed ties,” Thor said quietly. “The trolls of midgard were a solitary, clannish race, and many humans attacked them, just as they attacked humanity. The end of the war, and their departure to the underground did not change things…” He paused. “How old are, you, Sir Blinky?”

“Just over six hundred and fifty years, Odinson,”

“And in that time you have spoken to how many humans?”

“Not as many as I would like,” Blinky said. “Our people fear humanity—even those who take advantage of humanity’s waste.”

“Waste?” Captain America asked.

“Socks. Yummy.” Arrrggghhh mimed eating.

“But you were warriors,” Thor said.

“Yes, but we confined our battles to among ourselves—with the Gumm-gumms gone and abundant land, most of our fights are ceremonial.”

“Which gets back to the death duel,” Mr. Stark said. Jim found himself getting really nervous.

“Yes.” Blinky sighed. “Master Jim… I did not… Make things completely clear about your first visit to Troll Market. There were many trolls who feared that a human trollhunter would reveal us, or that you had even found some way to subvert the amulet, and there were some who… felt that it would be best if the amulet went to another.”

But that would mean that I would…

Blinky nodded. “The only way for that to happen would be for you to die. Vendel did not wish this—we had made peace with the humans and for a human, especially a child’s blood to be spilled… no. But Draal was enraged and the other trolls were fearful, which is why Bagdwella agreed to be the first to approach you, to prove that you could be trusted.” He shook his head. “But the law allowed Draal to make the challenge and when you challenged him in turn, I did not believe he would have actually made it a death challenge, but I underestimated how much his grief and anger would rule him.”

And if I screwed up… Jim rubbed his tight throat. “So it was a show?” He said, and suddenly hated how small his voice was.

“What? No. You risked death. Bagdwella’s test was real and for even greater stakes than you knew.”

“Oh.”

“And the amulet cannot be removed until he dies?” Captain America said.

“No,” Blinky replied.

“So what? Jim here gets to fight until his arthritis slows him down?” Tony put his hands on the table in front of Blinky. “That’s not acceptable.”

“Jim’s got a life, it shouldn’t just be fighting,” Hawkeye said. “That’s not a good way to live.”

“I—I’m sorry,” Jim said, looking at Toby for a moment. “I know I’ve screwed up a lot, but I’ve also done good. When Bular was about to open the Killahead Bridge, Arcadia would have been invaded if I hadn’t have killed—”

“Wait.” Fury’s voice was absolutely toneless. “You’ve had to kill trolls?”

“And then I found out that my baby brother was a changeling, and we almost got killed,” Claire was in the diagnostic bed, Natasha finishing up her work. Getting her to talk was…

Easy. Mainly because she’s a sixteen-year-old girl who only has two human confidants, both of them male. Claire had wanted to talk to someone else, and it had been easy to calm her down and get her chatting, leading from Toby’s obsession with Nouget Nummies to more important information.

Including that Walter Stricklander was a changeling, he had an immortal assassin at his beck and call, and Claire had managed to steal her staff from said assassin. Apparently, Claire had a habit of trying high-risk/high-payoff strategies which explained her stunt with Tony.

But Natasha still came back to the fact that she and Clint had spoken to, worked with Stricklander, and he had never triggered her warning senses. He was a perfect copy of what a human would be, down to evidently needing dental work done.

And that was pretty scary.

It also explained why the kids were so hair-trigger paranoid. If Natasha had known what she knew now, she never would have approached them in the way she had.

“Jim promised to get him, but we don’t have the last stone yet, and we need that to open the bridge so we can go into the Darklands to get my Enrique. I mean, Not Enrique is nice, and he’s been helping us, but…” Claire closed her eyes and tears that had nothing to do with her injuries ran down her cheeks. “I want my baby brother back. I know they say he’s sleeping, but what if he has nightmares? What if he knows he’s not with us? I—”

“We’ll get him back, but I’m thinking the three of you invading a realm with its own army might not be…” Anything other than a dramatic form of suicide? And maybe your oh-so friendly baby changeling has been encouraging you to commit said suicide, since you’re the only ones who know about him?

“I know, but what else can we do?” Claire shuddered. “Gunmar already wants Jim, after he killed his son and…” Natasha leaned back, teasing more information out of Claire, while quickly typing down on her pad, sending the most important details to Fury.

FURY. CLAIRE’S BROTHER ACTUALLY A SHAPECHANGED TROLL. DETAIN AT ONCE.

And of course, Claire and her friends probably hadn’t even considered that having two conversations was giving them a great way to ferret out inconstancies in their information.

Teens. They’d been good at keeping secrets from their parents. But Natasha was in the business of learning secrets and smart as she was, in that arena Claire was out of her league.