Muddle Earth

by Chris Riddell

  Some way to its right, a family of goblins was seated round a blanket.

  ‘There’s not enough sand in this!’ said the youngster.

  ‘Shut up and eat your snotbread sandwich, Gob,’ his dad told him. ‘Your mother spent ages preparing a lovely picnic, and all you’ve done since we arrived here is complain.’

  ‘Don’t go on,’ said Gob sullenly. He took a bite of the sandwich. ‘What’s that?’ His eyes lit up with excitement.

  ‘What?’ said his mother, her mouth full of cold bad-breath porridge.

  ‘That,’ said Gob, jumping up and running over to where the tiny teaspoon had landed. ‘Mum! Dad! I’ve found something!’ he called.

  ‘Hog poo?’ said his mum.

  ‘Stiltmouse dribble?’ said his dad.

  ‘No, it’s not something to eat,’ said Gob. He crouched down, took hold of the piece of silver sticking out of the sand and pulled. ‘It’s a . . . a teaspoon,’ he said, holding it up. ‘A tiny silver teaspoon. Can I keep it?’

  ‘If you like, dear,’ said his mother. ‘Pop it in your pocket so it doesn’t get lost, and let’s be on our way. If we set off now, we should be back at Goblintown by teatime.’ She smiled. ‘You can use your new spoon to stir your spittle tea.’

  As it dropped down into the pocket, the teaspoon let out a little sigh. It was warm and moist and smelly in the goblin’s trousers, and – the teaspoon trembled – very, very dark.

  As they approached the bottom of the Musty Mountains, the road levelled out. In the distance, Joe glimpsed the high turrets and castellations of the Horned Baron’s castle and heard garden-party-like sounds floating in on the breeze – a low murmur of voices, a chinking of teacups on saucers and, every now and then, names being announced over a megaphone.

  Norbert stopped skating and came to a halt. His heart was thumping; his legs trembled with fear and exertion.

  ‘You know,’ he panted,‘I think I’m really getting the hang of these winged boots. Why, with a little more practice . . .’

  ‘. . . You might succeed in breaking our necks,’ said Veronica coldly.

  Randalf’s eyes snapped open.‘Are we there yet?’ he said, looking round at the bleak, rocky landscape.

  ‘Almost,’ said Norbert, still panting.

  Randalf cocked his head to one side. He listened dreamily to the babble of the guests, the chinking of the cups and saucers – and the band, which consisted of a drum, cymbals, a wheezing set of bagpipes and something that sounded like a pink stinky hog having its tail pulled.

  ‘The garden party must have already started!’ he exclaimed. He glanced at his watch. ‘Three o’clock! Oh no, we’re late! What is the Horned Baron going to say?’

  ‘How about, You’re late, you useless, good-for-nothing, miserable excuse for a wizard . . .’

  ‘Shut up, Veronica!’ said Randalf. He leaned down and tapped the ogre’s head with his staff. ‘Proceed, Norbert,’ he said. ‘To the Horned Baron’s castle as fast as you . . . Joe! What do you think you’re doing?’

  Joe jumped to the ground. He put Henry down beside him. ‘If it’s all the same to you, we’re going to walk the rest of the way,’ he said.

  Veronica launched herself off from the brim of Randalf’s hat, flew down and landed on Joe’s head. ‘Good idea,’ she said.

  Norbert lurched forward unsteadily.

  ‘Whooah!’ cried Randalf. ‘On second thoughts, put me down, Norbert, and take off those boots. They’re quite unsuitable for a garden party.’

  ‘But I was just getting the hang of them,’ said Norbert, promptly falling over.

  ‘No arguments,’ said Randalf, picking himself up. ‘Follow me, everyone!’

  They continued in silence. The sounds of merrymaking grew louder. Various smells began to permeate the mustiness of the mountains – newly baked cakes, hot toffee, candyfloss. And as they rounded the corner, an imposing grey fortress rose up before them.

  ‘The Horned Baron’s castle!’ Randalf announced and, leaving the others to catch up, he strode ahead to the main gate.

  A seated guard looked up from a tattered scroll with a list of names.

  ‘I am Randalf the Wise,’ Randalf announced importantly. He waved Roger the Wrinkled’s invitation under his nose briefly, then stuffed it back into his pocket. ‘But I may be on your guest list as Roger the Wrinkled. And these,’ he said, pointing to the others, ‘are . . .’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ said the guard, stifling a yawn. ‘Whatever.’ And without even referring to the scroll, he waved them all through.

  Somewhat peeved, Randalf stepped through the archway and into a courtyard. A goblin in a grubby costume approached, with a megaphone in one hand. ‘I’m the herald,’ he said. ‘How would you like to be announced?’

  ‘Randalf the Wise,’ Randalf told him. ‘Grand wizard.’

  ‘Could have fooled me,’ muttered Veronica.

  ‘Eh?’ the guard shouted. ‘Speak up. I said, speak up.’

  ‘My name,’ he bellowed, ‘is Randalf the Wise! And these,’ he continued, introducing the others in his loudest voice, ‘are Norbert the Not-Very-Big, Joe the Barbarian and his battle-hound, Henry, and Veronica, my familiar.’

  The guard turned and raised the megaphone to his lips. ‘Dandruff the Wide,’ he announced. ‘Halfwit the Non-Furry Pig . . .’

  ‘Give me that!’ said Randalf impatiently. He seized the megaphone from the guard and announced himself.

  ‘Stop that!’ said the herald, grabbing the megaphone back and hiding it behind his back. ‘Announcing the guests is my job.’ He turned to Joe and Henry. ‘What did you say your names were again?’

  ‘Hurry up and get on with it,’ said Randalf irritably.

  ‘Hurry-Up! and Getonwithit!’ announced the herald through the megaphone.

  ‘Come on,’ said Randalf, ushering the others through the gate. ‘Let’s find the Horned Baron. Maybe there’s still time.’

  Veronica snorted. ‘Time for what? In case you hadn’t noticed, they’ve started without us.’

  A waiter approached them, a wooden tray balanced on his upraised hand. ‘Cup of spittle tea?’ he said, gruffly. ‘Cough sandwich?’

  ‘No, thanks,’ said Joe, feeling slightly queasy.

  ‘Did I hear someone mention spittle tea?’ said a toothless goblin who was passing by.

  ‘That’s right,’ said the waiter. He poured some of the frothy liquid from the pot into a grimy looking cup, added some brown sugar lumps and a pencil, and handed it over.

  ‘Ooh, lovely,’ said the goblin. ‘But what’s the pencil for?’

  ‘Sorry,’ the waiter said. ‘I’m afraid we haven’t got any spoons.’

  ‘Never mind,’ said the goblin, tossing the pencil over his shoulder. He spat into the teacup and stirred it up with a dirty finger.

  ‘Ugh,’ Joe groaned, and turned away.

  In front of him were stalls, booths, tents, trestle tables and marquees all crammed together, higgledy-piggledy, inside the castle garden – though garden was hardly the right word for the courtyard, with its high surrounding walls and single dead tree.

  In one corner was a pot filled with limp pansies. In the one opposite, was a lawn the size of a tablecloth – cast in shadow by a large sign warning visitors to Keep off the Grass. And in the middle – in the shadow of the dead tree – was a small birdbath, with several lazybirds asleep beneath it.

  If the garden bit of the garden party was a disappointment to Joe, however, the party bit was not. Everyone was eating cake with pointy twigs and stirring their tea with pencils. On a tatty bandstand, a tatty band played an assortment of tatty instruments. Joe smiled. The instrument that had sounded like a pink stinky hog having its tail pulled, was in fact a pink stinky hog having its tail pulled. Next to it, a small goblin hit himself on the head with a cymbal, and a large troll played a wheezing solo on a battered set of bagpipes.

  ‘Roll up! Roll up!’ came a voice from his left, shouting above the music. ‘Smells in a Jar. Come and
try my Smells in a Jar.’

  Joe joined a small crowd of trolls, goblins and assorted others clustered in front of a big trestle table. He saw the stallholder at the front select one of the tall jars from the table and hold it up.

  ‘You sir,’ he said. ‘You look like a goblin of discernment.’

  He held the jar out towards a lanky goblin, who nodded. The glass stopper was removed. The goblin leaned forwards, closed his eyes and sniffed.

  ‘Mmmmmm!’ the goblin rolled his eyes. A huge smile spread across his face. ‘Don’t tell me, don’t tell me . . .’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I’m getting smelly sock – left foot, I’d say. And just the faintest hint of ogre’s underpants.’

  ‘Very good,’ said the stallholder. ‘I call it Gym-Kit. It’s one of my most popular smells, after Spilt-Potty.’

  Chuckling to himself, Joe continued through the jumbled maze of amusements and refreshments, exhibitions and competitions. He paused by a big striped tent with a handwritten sign tied up above the open door-flaps.

  Mangel-wurzel Judging in Progress.

  Curious, Joe went to the entrance and peered inside. The tent was heaving with trolls, standing about in twos and threes and discussing the mangel-wurzels laid out on the table before them.

  ‘This one’s really big,’ he heard one saying.

  His neighbour nodded. ‘And so’s this one.’

  ‘Yeah. This one’s big too, ain’t it?’ said another.

  ‘Very big. That one there’s big as well.’

  ‘And that one, that’s big. The one over there, that’s big an’ all. And the one next to it, and the one next to that, and . . .’

  Joe walked on, past a toffee-nose stall, where you could dip your nose in a bucket of warm toffee, and a candyfloss stall where you could floss your teeth with candy. He was looking at an interesting display on a stall marked Broken, Missing or Useless, when he realized that neither Randalf, Veronica nor Norbert were anywhere to be seen. Even Henry had disappeared.

  He decided he’d better retrace his steps. It was only when he arrived back at the stage – where the band had been replaced by three rows of tap-dancing stiltmice – that Joe spotted Randalf.

  ‘Randalf!’ he cried. ‘Randalf!’

  The wizard turned and greeted him. ‘There you are, my boy. I was just about to ask the herald to call you. Now where have the others got to?’

  ‘I thought they were with you,’ said Joe.

  Randalf frowned. ‘What do you suppose that is?’ he said.

  Joe followed his gaze. He was staring at a flamboyant marquee – lilac and pink, with a floral pattern and silver trimmings – which stood in the corner by the wall.

  ‘The Rose-Petalled Pavilion of Loveliness,’ said Joe, reading the florid sign outside the marquee.

  ‘Sounds delightful,’ said Randalf. ‘Remind me to check it out later. But first, we’ve got business to attend to!’

  Just then a mysterious figure in a long, hooded cape pushed a pink tent-flap open and slipped out of the pavilion. He looked round furtively and scuttled into the crowd.

  ‘Randalf the Wise and Joe the Barbarian, if I’m not mistaken,’ came a petulant voice behind them. Randalf and Joe spun round to see the Horned Baron glaring back at them. ‘Where’s Roger the Wrinkled?’ he demanded. ‘He was meant to be here at two o’clock to open the garden party.’

  ‘He’s . . . errm . . . otherwise engaged. Top secret,’ Randalf added, and tapped his nose conspiratorially. ‘He sent me in his place.’

  The Horned Baron rolled his eyes. ‘I might have known,’ he said. ‘You’re late! And Ingrid’s furious!’

  Randalf tutted sympathetically. ‘That’s Elf Mail for you!’ he said. ‘The invitation only arrived this morning. We got here as quickly as we could.’

  ‘Hmmph,’ said the Horned Baron. ‘It was most inconvenient. I tried dressing up Benson as a wizard, but Ingrid wasn’t fooled for a moment. And then there was nothing to cut the ribbon with. All the cutlery’s disappeared!’ He sighed.‘Had to get an elf to chew through it! Absolute catastrophe, it was.’

  ‘Tragic,’ said Randalf. ‘Still I’m here now. If there’s anything I can do, for a small fee . . .’

  The Horned Baron’s expression darkened.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Randalf went on, ‘any awards to be presented, cups or medals to be given out, then I’m your wizard.’

  ‘You’re no Roger the Wrinkled, that’s for sure,’ said the Horned Baron. ‘But you’ll just have to do . . .’

  ‘WALTER!’

  The Horned Baron trembled from head to foot. ‘Oh, good grief,’ he muttered. ‘What now?’

  ‘WALTER! WHERE ARE YOU?’

  ‘Coming, my precious!’ he called back. He turned to Randalf. ‘Must go!’

  ‘Indeed, Horned Baron,’ said Randalf. ‘And as I say, if there’s anything I can do. Anything at all . . .’

  At that moment, the megaphone burst into life.‘Would the Horned Baron go immediately to the Rose-Petalled Pavilion of Loveliness. Horned Baron to the Rose-Petalled Pavilion of Loveliness. Horned Baron. Calling the Horned Baron . . .’

  The Horned Baron turned, then hesitated. ‘If you want to make yourself useful, Randalf,’ he said, ‘go to the marquee and find out what they want. It’s that one,’ he said, pointing rather unnecessarily at the lilac marquee with the shocking pink rose petals.

  Randalf nodded. ‘Of course, sir,’ he said, ‘and . . .’

  ‘WAL-TER!!’ Ingrid’s voice cut through the air like a rusty axe.

  ‘Go, Randalf!’ said the Horned Baron sternly. He tugged at his sleeves, straightened his helmet and turned to leave. ‘And whatever it is, sort it out. There’s a good wizard.’

  Randalf turned to Joe. ‘Duty calls,’ he said. ‘Go and find the others. Henry’s with Norbert in the Snuggly-Wuggly Corner I expect.’

  ‘Snuggly-Wuggly Corner?’ said Joe.

  ‘Next to to the Face-Smudging.’

  ‘Don’t you mean Face-Painting?’ said Joe.

  ‘You haven’t seen the troll who’s running it,’ said Randalf. ‘Oh, and Veronica said she wanted to check out the birdbath. Can’t think why . . .’ He glanced at his watch.‘We’ll all meet back here in half an hour. All right?’

  Joe nodded. ‘Half an hour,’ he said.

  Randalf watched Joe disappearing into the crowd. He was a good lad. It was such a shame he wasn’t able to send him home. He looked round at the lilac-and-pink Pavilion of Loveliness and sighed.

  Joe reached the Snuggly-Wuggly Corner just in time to prise Henry away from an over-exuberant ogre. Norbert was sitting beside them on the floor, sucking his thumb and hugging a frayed toy rabbit. When Joe found Veronica, she was on the birdbath discussing bird cages and small mirrors with several lazybirds.

  Back at the Rose-Petalled Pavilion of Loveliness, Randalf lifted the tent-flap and disappeared inside.

  Randalf looked round. The marquee was large, carpeted, bathed in a soft lilac-and-pink light, and seemed empty. Randalf let the tent-flap fall back behind him and stepped forward. Immediately, a fiendish booby trap twanged and whirred into action.

  A rope tightened, a cork popped, a weight dropped and a noose tightened around Randalf’s ankles. With a loud whoosh, it whisked him up into the air, where he dangled helplessly from the central pole, his head a metre from the ground.

  ‘Well I never!’ Randalf chuckled. ‘A most extraordinary fairground attraction.’ He wriggled about, sending all the blood to his head. ‘I must say, I rather like the way it makes my nose tickle.’ He craned his head up a little. ‘Most enjoyable, thank you. You can let me down now.’

  As if in response, there came a clink, clink, clink from outside. It was coming closer, and getting louder and louder.

  ‘Whatever’s that?’ he wondered.

  Outside, all heads turned towards the gates of the castle.

  ‘It’s the cutlery! It’s returned,’ shouted an under-gardener.

  ‘
Typical!’ muttered Benson. He dropped the handful of pointy twigs he was carrying as the sugar tongs rushed past. ‘And there was me thinking sugar tongs were history.’

  Cutting a swathe through the crowds, the cutlery charged across the garden. To the front were the spoons, clinking and clanging, behind them the forks and the knives, with the great meat cleavers clanking hot on their heels. Bringing up the rear was the egg slicer, plinking and twanging in an out-of-breath sort of way.

  Joe spun round. Norbert laid aside the fluffy toy rabbit he was snuggling and craned his neck. Veronica fluttered above the birdbath as the cutlery clattered past.

  ‘They’re all aiming for that marquee,’ someone shouted. ‘Look.’

  Sure enough, with the sugar tongs leading the way, the cutlery was heading noisily towards the lilac-and-pink Rose-Petalled Pavilion of Loveliness. The sugar tongs swept back the tent-flap and hurried in. The others followed.

  ‘My goodness,’ said Randalf, his heart beginning to pound furiously. ‘Powerful magic is at work here. I don’t like this. I don’t like this one tiny bit . . .’

  Just then, as the final items of cutlery – the egg slicer and a tiny silver toothpick, engraved with the name Simon – went inside the marquee, there came a roar so mighty that the ground trembled.

  ‘ROOOAAARRRGGGHHH!!!’

  The egg slicer twanged with terror as a great talon scraped across its backside.

  ‘Eek!’ squeaked the toothpick in dismay.

  Outside, someone shrieked: ‘It’s a dragon!’ as a great, winged creature swooped down on the lilac-and-pink tent.

  Horrified shouts and cries exploded all around, as everyone tried to get as far away from the Rose-Petalled Pavilion of Loveliness as possible. With their backs to the castle walls, or cowering under trestle tables, or simply crouched down and clutching at one another for safety, they watched as the dragon landed.

  It raised its head and let out a triumphant blast of flame. At last, after the long and mighty chase, the treasure was trapped!