The Mammoth Book of Comic Fantasy
Page 13
WITHDRAWAL
THANK YOU
WITHDRAWAL FROM—
SAVINGS
CHECKING
CREDIT LINE
OTHER
“Excuse me. Are you two going to see Gilded Palace of Sin?”
“Shit. Look who’s back.”
“I was just at the theater and the newspaper had the time listed wrong. According to the box office, the movie starts at 6:45. So you have nine minutes.”
“I thought you were at the other machine.”
“There’s a line and I didn’t want to stand outside in the rain.”
“Rain? Bruce, look!”
“It’s just a light rain. But I’m wearing my good suit.”
OTHER
“Emily it’s 6:37 and you’re pressing Other?”
“Don’t you want to see what else this machine can do?”
“No!”
THANK YOU
CHOOSE OTHER ACCOUNT—
ANDREW
ANN
BRUCE
“Who the hell are Andrew and Ann? And how the hell did my name get in there?”
“You told me the machine ate your card.”
“That was – another machine.”
“Excuse me. Ann is my fiancée. Well, was. Sort of. I thought.”
“Are you butting in again?”
“Wait! You must be . . .”
“Andrew. Andrew P. Claiborne III. You must be Emily. And he must be . . .”
“He’s Bruce. Don’t mind him if he’s a little uncouth.”
“Uncouth!”
BRUCE
“Hey, that’s my account, Emily. You don’t have any right to press Bruce!”
“Why not? You say you wanted to pay for dinner and the movie, but the machine ate your card. So let’s go for it.”
GO FOR IT, EMILY
PLEASE ENTER DESIRED AMOUNT—
$20
$60
$100
$200
$60
SORRY. INSUFFICIENT FUNDS. WANT TO TRY FOR $20?
$20
SORRY. INSUFFICIENT FUNDS.
WOULD YOU LIKE A BALANCE CHECK?
“No!”
YES
BRUCE’S BALANCE: $11.78
SURPRISED?
“Surprised? I’m furious! Some birthday celebration! You didn’t even have enough to pay for a movie, much less dinner! And you lied!”
“Excuse me, it’s your birthday? It’s my birthday too!”
“You stay out of this, Andrew or whatever the fuck your name is.”
“Don’t be vulgar, Bruce. He has an absolutely perfect right to wish me a happy birthday.”
“He’s not wishing you a happy birthday, he’s butting into my life.”
“Allow me to wish you a very happy birthday, Emily.”
“And to you, Andrew, the very same.”
“Plus he’s an asshole!”
NO NAME CALLING PLEASE
WOULD YOU LIKE ANOTHER BALANCE CHECK?
BRUCE
EMILY
ANDREW
ANN
“Ann is your girlfriend?”
“Was. She just stood me up for the last time.”
“How terrible! On your birthday! Andrew, I know exactly how you feel.”
“As a matter of fact, you’re both a couple of assholes!”
NO NAME CALLING PLEASE
EMILY AND ANDREW,
PLEASE ALLOW ME TO TREAT YOU
TO A BIRTHDAY DINNER AND A FILM
“A hundred dollars! Andrew, look!”
“It says it’s treating us. Take it, Emily.”
“You can call me Em.”
“I can’t fucking believe this!”
“We’d better hurry. Excuse me, Bruce, old pal, do you have the time?”
“6:42. Asshole.”
“If we run, we can catch the 6:45. Then, how about Sneaky Pete’s?”
“I love Tex-Mex!”
PLEASE REMOVE YOUR CARD
DON’T FORGET TO TRY
THE BLACKENED FAJITAS
“You’re all three assholes! I can’t fucking believe this. She left with him!”
WELCOME TO CASH-IN-A-FLASH
1342 LOCATIONS
TO SERVE YOU CITYWIDE
PLEASE DON’T KICK THE MACHINE
“Go to hell!”
PLEASE INSERT YOUR CASH-IN-A-FLASH CARD
“Fuck you.”
GO AHEAD, BRUCE
WHAT HAVE YOU GOT TO LOSE?
THANK YOU
IT WASN’T ‘EATEN’ AFTER ALL, WAS IT?
“You know it wasn’t. Asshole.”
NO NAME CALLING PLEASE
WOULD YOU LIKE—
SYMPATHY
REVENGE
WEATHER
ANN
“Excuse me.”
“Jesus, lady, quit banging on the door. I know it’s raining. Tough shit. I’m not going to let you in. This is a cash machine, not a homeless shelter. You’re supposed to have a card or something. What?”
“I said, shut up and press Ann.”
TROLL BRIDGE
Terry Pratchett
Terry Pratchett (b. 1948) certainly didn’t invent comic fantasy – many of the writers included in this anthology were at it long before he was – but the success of his brilliant Discworld novels, starting with The Colour of Magic in 1983, certainly created the publishing niche for comic fantasy that didn’t previously exist. Pratchett has been writing for most of his life – his first story, “The Hades Business”, was sold when he was scarcely fifteen – but he didn’t start to write regularly until after his third novel, Strata (1981). That’s when the Discworld novels began to flow. Since then he’s been so busy producing them and the occasional non-Discworld book, that he’s had little time for short stories. In fact, Pratchett says he doesn’t feel comfortable working in the limitations of the short story, but you wouldn’t think that from the following, which is loosely connected to the Discworld series.
The air blew off the mountains, filling the air with fine ice crystals.
It was too cold to snow. In weather like this wolves came down into villages, trees in the heart of the forest exploded when they froze.
In weather like this right-thinking people were indoors, in frońt of the fire, telling stories about heroes.
It was an old horse. It was an old rider. The horse looked like a shrink-wrapped toast rack; the man looked as though the only reason he wasn’t falling off was because he couldn’t muster the energy. Despite the bitterly cold wind, he was wearing nothing but a tiny leather kilt and a dirty bandage on one knee.
He took the soggy remnant of a cigarette out of his mouth and stubbed it out on his hand.
“Right,” he said, “let’s do it.”
“That’s all very well for you to say,” said the horse. “But what if you have one of your dizzy spells? And your back is playing up. How shall I feel, being eaten because your back’s played you up at the wrong moment?”
“It’ll never happen,” said the man. He lowered himself on to the chilly stones, and blew on his fingers. Then, from the horse’s pack, he took a sword with an edge like a badly maintained saw and gave a few half-hearted thrusts at the air.
“Still got the old knackaroony,” he said. He winced, and leaned against a tree.
“I’ll swear this bloody sword gets heavier every day.”
“You ought to pack it in, you know,” said the horse. “Call it a day. This sort of thing at your time of life. It’s not right.”
The man rolled his eyes.
“Blast that damn distress auction. This is what comes of buying something that belonged to a wizard,” he said, to the cold world in general. “I looked at your teeth, I looked at your hooves, it never occurred to me to listen.”
“Who did you think was bidding against you?” said the horse.
Cohen the Barbarian stayed leaning against the tree. He was not sure that he could pull himself upright again.
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“You must have plenty of treasure stashed away,” said the horse. “We could go Rimwards. How about it? Nice and warm. Get a nice warm place by a beach somewhere, what do you say?”
“No treasure,” said Cohen. “Spent it all. Drank it all. Gave it all away. Lost it.”
“You should have saved some for your old age.”
“Never thought I’d have an old age.”
“One day you’re going to die,” said the horse. “It might be today.”
“I know. Why do you think I’ve come here?”
The horse turned and looked down towards the gorge. The road here was pitted and cracked. Young trees were pushing up between the stones. The forest crowded in on either side. In a few years, no one would know there’d even been a road here. By the look of it, no one knew now.
“You’ve come here to die?”
“No. But there’s something I’ve always been meaning to do. Ever since I was a lad.”
“Yeah?”
Cohen tried easing himself upright again. Tendons twanged their red-hot messages down his legs.
“My dad,” he squeaked. He got control again. “My dad,” he said, “said to me—” He fought for breath.
“Son,” said the horse, helpfully.
“What?”
“Son,” said the horse. “No father ever calls his boy ‘son’ unless he’s about to impart wisdom. Well-known fact.”
“It’s my reminiscence.”
“Sorry.”
“He said . . . Son . . . yes, OK . . . Son, when you can face down a troll in single combat, then you can do anything.”
The horse blinked at him. Then it turned and looked down, again, through the tree-jostled road to the gloom of the gorge. There was a stone bridge down there.
A horrible feeling stole over it.
Its hooves jiggled nervously on the ruined road.
“Rimwards,” it said. “Nice and warm.”
“No.”
“What’s the good of killing a troll? What’ve you got when you’ve killed a troll?”
“A dead troll. That’s the point. Anyway, I don’t have to kill it. Just defeat it. One on one. Mano a . . . troll. And if I didn’t try my father would turn in his mound.”
“You told me he drove you out of the tribe when you were eleven.”
“Best day’s work he ever did. Taught me to stand on other people’s feet. Come over here, will you?”
The horse sidled over. Cohen got a grip on the saddle and heaved himself fully upright.
“And you’re going to fight a troll today,” said the horse.
Cohen fumbled in the saddlebag and pulled out his tobacco pouch. The wind whipped at the shreds as he rolled another skinny cigarette in the cup of his hands.
“Yeah,” he said.
“And you’ve come all the way out here to do it.”
“Got to,” said Cohen. “When did you last see a bridge with a troll under it? There were hundreds of ’em when I was a lad. Now there’s more trolls in the cities than there are in the mountains. Fat as butter, most of ’em. What did we fight all those wars for? Now . . . cross that bridge.”
It was a lonely bridge across a shallow, white, and treacherous river in a deep valley. The sort of place where you got—
A grey shape vaulted over the parapet and landed splay-footed in front of the horse. It waved a club.
“All right,” it growled.
‘Oh—” the horse began.
The troll blinked. Even the cold and cloudy winter skies seriously reduced the conductivity of a troll’s silicon brain, and it had taken it this long to realize that the saddle was unoccupied.
It blinked again, because it could suddenly feel a knife point resting on the back of its neck.
“Hello,” said a voice by its ear.
The troll swallowed. But very carefully.
“Look,” it said desperately, “it’s tradition, OK? A bridge like this, people ort to expect a troll . . . ’Ere,” it added, as another thought crawled past, “ ’ow come I never ’eard you creepin’ up on me?”
“Because I’m good at it,” said the old man.
“That’s right,” said the horse. “He’s crept up on more people than you’ve had frightened dinners.”
The troll risked a sideways glance.
“Bloody hell,” it whispered. “You think you’re Cohen the Barbarian, do you?”
“What do you think?” said Cohen the Barbarian.
“Listen,” said the horse, “if he hadn’t wrapped sacks round his knees you could have told by the clicking.”
It took the troll some time to work this out.
“Oh, wow,” it breathed. “On my bridge! Wow!”
“What?” said Cohen.
The troll ducked out of his grip and waved its hands frantically. ‘It’s all right! It’s all right!” it shouted, as Cohen advanced. “You’ve got me! You’ve got me! I’m not arguing! I just want to call the family up, all right? Otherwise no one’ll ever believe me. Cohen the Barbarian! On my bridge!”
Its huge stony chest swelled further. “My bloody brother-in-law’s always swanking about his huge bloody wooden bridge, that’s all my wife ever talks about. Hah! I’d like to see the look on his face . . . oh, no! What can you think of me?”
“Good question,” said Cohen.
The troll dropped its club and seized one of Cohen’s hands.
“Mica’s the name,” it said. “You don’t know what an honour this is!”
He leaned over the parapet. “Beryl! Get up here! Bring the kids!”
He turned back to Cohen, his face glowing with happiness and pride.
“Beryl’s always sayin’ we ought to move out, get something better, but I tell her, this bridge has been in our family for generations, there’s always been a troll under Death Bridge. It’s tradition.”
A huge female troll carrying two babies shuffled up the bank, followed by a tail of smaller trolls. They lined up behind their father, watching Cohen owlishly.
“This is Beryl,” said the troll. His wife glowered at Cohen. “And this—” he propelled forward a scowling smaller edition of himself, clutching a junior version of his club – “is my lad Scree. A real chip off the old block. Going to take on the bridge when I’m gone, ain’t you, Scree. Look, lad, this is Cohen the Barbarian! What d’you think o’ that, eh? On our bridge! We don’t just have rich fat soft ole merchants like your uncle Pyrites gets,” said the troll, still talking to his son but smirking past him to his wife, “we ’ave proper heroes like they used to in the old days.”
The troll’s wife looked Cohen up and down.
“Rich, is he?” she said.
“Rich has got nothing to do with it,” said the troll.
“Are you going to kill our dad?” said Scree suspiciously.
“Corse he is,” said Mica severely. “It’s his job. An’ then I’ll get famed in song an’ story. This is Cohen the Barbarian, right, not some bugger from the village with a pitchfork. ’E’s a famous hero come all this way to see us, so just you show ’im some respect.
“Sorry about that, sir,” he said to Cohen. “Kids today. You know how it is.”
The horse started to snigger.
“Now look—” Cohen began.
“I remember my dad tellin’ me about you when I was a pebble,” said Mica. “ ’E bestrides the world like a clossus, he said.”
There was silence. Cohen wondered what a clossus was, and felt Beryl’s stony gaze fixed upon him.
“He’s just a little old man,” she said. “He don’t look very heroic to me. If he’s so good, why ain’t he rich?”
“Now you listen to me—” Mica began.
“This is what we’ve been waiting for, is it?” said his wife. “Sitting under a leaky bridge the whole time? Waiting for people that never come? Waiting for little old bandy-legged old men? I should have listened to my mother! You want me to let our son sit under a bridge waiting for some little old man to kill him? That’s wha
t being a troll is all about? Well, it ain’t happening!”
“Now you just—”
“Hah! Pyrites doesn’t get little old men! He gets big fat merchants! He’s someone. You should have gone in with him when you had the chance!”
“I’d rather eat worms!”
“Worms? Hah? Since when could we afford to eat worms?”
“Can we have a word?” said Cohen.
He strolled towards the far end of the bridge, swinging his sword from one hand. The troll padded after him.
Cohen fumbled for his tobacco pouch. He looked up at the troll, and held out the bag.
“Smoke?” he said.
“That stuff can kill you,” said the troll.
“Yes. But not today.”
“Don’t you hang about talking to your no-good friends!” bellowed Beryl, from her end of the bridge. “Today’s your day for going down to the sawmill! You know Chert said he couldn’t go on holding the job open if you weren’t taking it seriously!”
Mica gave Cohen a sorrowful little smirk.
“She’s very supportive,” he said.
“I’m not climbing all the way down to the river to pull you out again!” Beryl roared. “You tell him about the billy goats, Mr Big Troll!”
“Billy goats?” said Cohen.
“I don’t know anything about billy goats,” said Mica. “She’s always going on about billy goats. I have no knowledge whatsoever about billy goats.” He winced.
They watched Beryl usher the young trolls down the bank and into the darkness under the bridge.
“The thing is,” said Cohen, when they were alone, “I wasn’t intending to kill you.”
The troll’s face fell.
“You weren’t?”
“Just throw you over the bridge and steal whatever treasure you’ve got.”
“You were?”
Cohen patted him on the back. “Besides,” he said, “I like to see people with . . . good memories. That’s what the land needs. Good memories.”
The troll stood to attention.
“I try to do my best, sir,” it said. “My lad wants to go off to work in the city. I’ve tole him, there’s bin a troll under this bridge for nigh on five hundred years—”
“So if you just hand over the treasure,” said Cohen, “I’ll be getting along.”
The troll’s face creased in sudden panic.
“Treasure? Haven’t got any,” it said.
“Oh, come on,” said Cohen. “Well-set-up bridge like this?”
“Yeah, but no one uses this road any more,” said Mica. “You’re the first one along in months, and that’s a fact. Beryl says I ought to have gone in with her brother when they built that new road over his bridge, but,” he raised his voice, “I said, there’s been trolls under this bridge—”