And so Bill had noticed a wider range of people walking the ever busier roads as they went south. None of them looked like goblins, however, so they’d been forced to cover Rasha in one of Brianna’s old travelling cloaks on which they’d painted the symbol for leprosy (a four fingered hand). This had achieved the desired effect of keeping strangers at a distance.
The little goblin sat silently, his head bowed, staring into the fire.
“Are you alright, Rasha?” said Bill, who’d grown attached to the little creature over the past days.
Rasha looked up and shrugged. “Rasha is feeling lost. Each day, we step further from home. Rasha wonders what is to become of him.”
Bill moved so that he was sitting beside the forlorn figure. “We’ll look after you,” he said, “and you know the portal was broken, so moving further from it doesn’t really mean anything.”
Rasha shook his head. “There is more than one gate, friend Bill.”
“What?” Bill slapped his hand over his mouth as the cry echoed around the brickwork then held up his arm to silence Brianna, “Rasha, why haven’t you mentioned this before?”
“Rasha thinked you knew. Rasha thinked everyone knew. Many gates there are, not just the one in the palace of the king,” the goblin said, becoming animated for the first time in days, “but none lie this way, all are to the east and south.”
“But you knew we were heading to the south-west, you helped us open the box, you know what was inside.”
Rasha nodded. “Rasha thought he would help because kind Brianna saved him. But he didn’t realise how far he would travel and how lonely he would feel.”
Bill put his hand on Rasha’s arm and stroked his wiry fur. “Do you know how to find a portal?”
“Rasha feels more lonely when he steps further but he could not point a direction and say ‘go that way’ when he got nearer. He could step around for years and not find a gate even if it was near.”
“Then I don’t know how we can find you a way home,” Bill sighed.
Brianna looked at the sad goblin and smiled. “We may not know where the other portals are,” she said, “but if that information is held anywhere, it’s in the Great Library at Varma, and that’s where we’re heading. We’ll find you a way home, Rasha, I promise.”
Rasha’s mood changed in an instant. He leapt up and began dancing around the fire in joy. “Rasha is going home! Rasha is going home!”
Bill watched him with a mixture of sadness and nervousness. He caught Brianna’s gaze, and she smiled sheepishly. The goblin was happy for now, but how long would that last?
#
Chortley was two hundred miles due east of where Bill, Brianna and Rasha camped. He was sitting beside a campfire outside his tent, mulling over what he was about to say. His two female passengers had, at their own direction, been set up in a tent outside the picket line on the other side of the camp. So far, he’d been surprised at how little trouble they’d been, especially Mother Hemlock. Miss de Vere had been more of a distraction than anything else but, aside from the occasional gripe about when someone might invent suspension and regular criticism of camp food, the senior witch had kept a mercifully low profile. Good, Chortley had enough in his cauldron without those two stirring the pot too much.
As a rule, he didn’t consider himself to be a negotiator - he generally made demands and waited for them to be met - but this was going to require delicate handling. He was, after all, in the middle of a barren scrub-land with a regiment of urban soldiers whose previous experience of a route march amounted to popping to the bakery for a Nibbler7. Grumblings had reached his ears8 of sore feet, aching legs and a distinct lack of hospitality on a road that, it turned out, wasn’t paved with gold. In fact, they now considered themselves lucky if it were paved with paving. Well, hospitality, he could do something about.
“Ah, McGuff. Come and sit down,” Chortley said, gesturing to an upturned log next to him.
The sergeant snapped a salute, bent at the middle and sat. “Yessir, thank you sir.”
“How is the mood amongst the men9?”
There was a pause. McGuff was about as sharp as a chocolate axe but he did, at least, know when to allow time for his wits to catch up with his tongue. “Well, sir,” he said, when the risk of Chortley’s patience expiring finally outweighed the danger of speaking, “they are impatient to do their duty and see these rascals off to their own rightabouts.”
Chortley looked across at the sweat gathering on the forehead of his sergeant. “You mean, they’re fed up and want to go home.”
“Well, you know best, sir,” responded McGuff, breathing a little more easily now that the bad news had been successfully transmitted, and he’d survived.
“Unfortunately, we have a mission to complete before that can happen,” Chortley said, “but I think they deserve some rest and recuperation in recognition of their sterling efforts so far.”
McGuff looked sideways at his commanding officer. “I’m sure they’ll appreciate that, sir,” he said, his voice etched with caution.
“Indeed. Now, it so happens that 10 miles further along the Wong Way, there’s a town called Triungulates and in that town is a tavern called the Crooked Gibbet which, according to its reputation, serves the finest beer between Montesham and the southern deserts. I am minded to allow our troops one night’s hospitality in the vicinity.”
McGuff’s face froze like a punter taken in by a street magician. He knew there was a catch, there had to be, but, like a dodgy goat curry, he would only find out about it when it was too late to do anything except hold onto his trousers. For now, he realised, the best plan was to play along. And a nice warm pint of ale would be welcome even if it was followed by a kick in the nuts.
“Thank you very much, sir, I’m sure the lads will be pleased.”
Chortley’s smile would have shamed a child-eating alligator, “Well, in that case, they’ll be delighted to learn that we’ll also be stopping there on our journey home.”
McGuff sensed the axe falling but was still missing the blade. “I shall look forward to telling them sir, yes indeed,” he said.
“Good, good,” purred Chortley, “it’ll be a fitting reward for the heroes of Cake Pass.”
“Cake Pass?” The words had erupted from McGuff’s mouth before he could stop them, “...sir?”
Chortley nodded. “Indeed, for that is our destination.”
“But sir, the pass is guarded by Stone Trolls and beyond is an underground maze full of zombies and dwarfs and giant spiders and traps and all sorts of things what eats normal folk for breakfast.”
“The legends exaggerate,” said Chortley, pretending to be more confident than he actually felt, “I’ve never heard of dwarfs in the maze. But, whatever dangers may lurk there, the maze also holds the portal at its centre so, I’m afraid, we must venture it.”
McGuff said nothing. The bulk of the men and women of the garrison sat around the larger fire in the camp’s centre and all that Chortley could hear was the general hubbub of camp life and the gears turning in his sergeant’s head.
“May I speak frankly, sir?”
This was it, thought Chortley, as a series of images involving ropes and nooses appeared unbidden behind his retinas. “Yes.”
Sergeant McGuff’s face contorted into a constipated expression that Chortley knew, from many conversations with the man, heralded what passed for deep thought.
“Seems to me it would be suicide to take the garrison into them mazes, and I reckon we’d have mutiny on our hands if we tried it. Many’d ask why we didn’t just send the prisoners into the maze and leave ‘em to it.”
Chortley opened his mouth to protest when the sergeant, who hadn’t noticed, continued. “But if we picked a cracked squad of our very best men and women, say a half dozen in addition to ourselves, and sent them in ahead, the prisoners could follow ‘em and we’d post the rest of the men at the entrance to make sure they don’t come back out.”
Breathing a
gain, Chortley said, “A cracked squad; good thinking sergeant. They’ll be well rewarded. In fact, I’m pretty sure protocol demands that the second in command of a cracked squad would need to be a Sergeant Major. Perhaps you should think about who might be in line for such a promotion.”
Chortley winked at McGuff and watched as the penny didn’t so much drop as float gently downwards before landing. The soldier smiled, “Oh, yessir. Yes indeed, sir.”
“Very well. Keep this to yourself for now, McGuff. We must assemble a discrete half dozen, but the others mustn’t find out until we’re too far into the desert for them to, ahem, desert. For now, though, you are dismissed.”
“Yessir, very good sir,” McGuff whispered theatrically before unfolding himself again, saluting and disappearing into the darkness towards the main camp.
But, of course, we’ve still got to get past the Stone Trolls, thought Chortley. One thing at a time.
#
They’d found a road lined with yellow bricks as soon as they’d entered the trees at the foot of the mountain. Humunculus couldn’t say whether the journey had been arduous or not by the time they reached the huge green gate that marked its end as he had no memory of it. He found himself increasingly frustrated at the way this place, whatever it really was, seemed to mess with his perceptions of time, or his sensation of actually being.
Having said that, the company he kept would hardly have made any journey memorable. Negstimeaboi had uttered no more than a couple of sentences as they’d tramped along and Ambler had spent most of his time with his nose to the ground as if looking for a trail. Nothing Humunculus could say would convince the idiot to just follow the road since it was clearly heading in the right direction and, when he did get a word out of Ambler, it was invariably cryptic. Indeed, he was beginning to think that discorporialation might be a blessing in his case. A blessing for all of them.
Negstimeaboi banged on the gate with her fist and stepped back. A hatch opened, and a face peered out, “What do you want?” it said, looking at Ambler.
“We would like to see the speller, 6 letters,” Ambler sighed.
“What?” The dark brown face frowned.
“We see wizard,” Negstimeaboi said, bending down to look the face in the eye.
The head shook. “He’s not at home, especially to those whose wits are wandering and those who had none in the first place.”
“You do not know to whom you command to fido, 5 letters,10” Ambler cried, pulling his sword from its sheath.
“Fetch?” ventured the face, “in any case, he is not here to the likes of you.”
The hatch began to slide back and then stopped and snapped open again. The face reappeared, staring at Humunculus, who’d appeared like a rising moon over Negstimeaboi’s event horizon.
“What a minute,” the face said in a voice shaking with excitement, “are you, by any chance, a faerie?”
Chapter 5
Bill didn’t need the milestones to tell him they were nearing Varma. They’d been travelling for nearly four weeks now and their cloaks were stowed in their backpacks - except the one worn by a sweating Rasha. Over the past week, they’d seen monument after monument beside the road, dedicated to each of the multiple gods worshipped by the Varmans.
And so many different people now travelled the roads. Bill had seen skin colours ranging from as pale as his, right through to skin so dark you couldn’t see any eyebrows. And, since the road from the western mountains, the Via Minisculis, had joined the main road to Varma, Bill had met and pissed off his first dwarf family. He hadn’t meant to, he’d simply believed them to be particularly lifelike statues as they sat and meditated by the site of the road. He’d touched the hat of the largest and had been surprised, mortified and, finally, terrified, as it fell off and revealed a large bald head atop a muscled, angry, body. Fortunately, Bill could run faster than them and had waited, a mile down the road, for Brianna (who’d had a stitch from laughing so much) to catch up with him.
Now, two days later, they were approaching the outskirts of the city and were seeing more and more soldiers on the road. Most appeared to be hurrying from place to place on unknown and, if the military mind here was the same as elsewhere, utterly pointless errands but some were stopping travellers and asking them their business.
So far, none had dared to look under Rasha’s cloak but it was only a matter of time.
“We’d better head off the road tomorrow and find a quieter route towards the city,” Brianna said that night as they lay waiting to fall asleep.
“That’ll get us closer, but we need to have a plan to get Rasha through the gates once we arrive. I’m sure there’ll be customs officials at the very least, I’ve heard nothing gets into, or out of, Varma without paying a toll.”
Brianna snuggled closer beneath their shared blanket. “I know we’ve done some pretty stupid things in the past six months, but I reckon this takes the digestive.”
“It feels pretty good to me,” Bill murmured, allowing his lizard brain full control over his tongue and drawing Brianna closer.
“Not this, you idiot, I mean, look, we’re travelling to the greatest city in the world to visit its library to look up clues to a magical staff which we’ve lost. And we’ve got to smuggle in a goblin. What sort of idiots would do that?”
Bill stroked her hair, still unwilling to interrupt his reverie. “Our sort of idiots, apparently.”
“And then, having done all that, we’ve got to find a magical portal which, like the staff, is ‘location unknown’ and send the goblin back to his home,” Brianna continued, her relentlessness gradually draining Bill’s sense of transitory contentment.
Bill rolled over and looked across at the still form of the goblin. “That reminds me. Rasha, are you awake?”
“I is. I is thinking of home so I doesn’t forget.”
Bill could see the goblin’s bright eyes reflecting the moonlight. “If - when - we find another gate, where will that take you?”
The goblin sat up and shrugged. “I does not know. There are many gates but most are blocked, or guarded. I was born in the tunnels beneath the palace but I hopes, wherever I comes through, I will find my way home.”
“One thing that puzzles me is why all the gates are to the east of here - why aren’t they all over the world?”
“That’s a surprisingly good question,” Brianna said, “and no-one knows the answer for certain. Mother reckons the philosopher Anthony of the Phoneycians11 had the best theory. He noticed that if you plotted the known portals, most of which have since been destroyed, they formed a roughly circular shape. He believes they mean that the Darkworld, as Rasha calls it, is a twin of ours that occupies almost the same space but one dimension across.”
Bill rubbed his eyes. “I have no idea what you just said but you’re so sexy when you’re being intelligent.”
Brianna cuffed him with more force than was strictly merited.
“All goblins know that our world is sister to the Brightworld,” Rasha said, “our legends tell of a time when we could travel freely between worlds, before the great sorcerer came and made the faeries to rule over us. Since then, only one way can we travel unless great magic is used, or a portal is unlocked. And now our world is dying and our people starving.”
Now Bill and Brianna were both sitting up, gazing at the goblin. He’d not spoken so much in weeks and it was heartbreaking to witness.
“So, the faeries are not of your world?” asked Bill.
Rasha shrugged. “Yes and no and depends on which story you believes. What is certain true is the Faerie King you destroyed was worst of lot. All that once grew above ground is now dead, most animals dead. Soon, goblin-folk will be dead, I think. Unless they goes to the Beyond.”
“Then why do you want to go back if all it means is starvation and death?” she asked.
“Because it is home.” the goblin replied, his green eyes wet.
#
The wizard’s home was far more modest than
the gate and castle they’d seen from the yellow brick road had suggested. In fact, it reminded Humunculus of the insides of cottages he’d seen on his incursion into the Brightworld forty years before. Whitewashed walls, one of which contained a fireplace, and comfortable chairs arranged in a semicircle with the wizard at its apex. Humunculus occupied one chair, whilst Negstimeaboi sat with her knees under her face opposite him and Ambler squatted on the floor.
“Welcome to my humble lodgings,” the wizard said, sweeping his arms around the room, leaving Humunculus with the impression that, only seconds ago, it had looked rather different, “my name is Aligvok.”
They’d already met, of course, as Aligvok had been the face at the door, but now he was revealed to be, undoubtedly, a wizard. Aside from the customary long flowing beard, he wore lavish robes that were predominantly blue in colour with flashes of gold as he moved.
“And who, exactly, are you?” the wizard’s entire attention was directed at Humunculus. Despite her size, it was as if Negstimaboi wasn’t even there. Aside from the smell of sweaty leather.
Humunculus bowed, since it seemed the right thing to do. “My name is Humunculus, King of the Faeries.”
“KING?” Alivok whooped, then, he caught himself and brought his excitement under control. “Lord King, I am most honoured to meet you.”
Humunculus was simultaneously delighted that the correct level of respect was being shown and yet suspicious of the motives of this wizard.
Aligvok seemed to notice this and took his seat, conjuring goblets from the air; one for himself, one for Humunculus.
“Me want drink,” Negstimeaboi boomed.
The wizard turned to her as if noticing her for the first time. “You will remain silent while your betters tal…”
The female warrior’s beefy hand clasped around Aligvok’s throat and shelifted him clear of the chair, his legs flailing. Humunculus didn’t have time to wonder how it could be possible for Negstimeaboi to strangle a disembodied spirit. He leapt to his feet, grabbed a thickly muscled arm and pulled ineffectually at it.
Trolls and Tribulations Page 4
