by Becket
“So look at what we’re standing in,” Good said.
The goblins got out of the crater and walked backward to get a better look. And when they had walked many paces, they now saw that they had been standing in a large footprint.
“That is the first clue,” Good said. “Someone who is not a goblin, not a troll, not a witch or a vampire came through here and smashed the Hall of Mirrors to pieces. And I’m guessing that someone might be a giant.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The Giant
The bug goblin raised her hands to her eyes and looked into the distance. “Does anyone else see that? It looks like a large rock walking on two legs.”
Everyone turned around to see what she was talking about.
“That’s not a rock,” the bed goblin said a little fearfully. “It looks like a great big boulder.”
“No, not a boulder,” the cobble goblin said trembling all over. “It looks like a mountain that has picked itself up and is heading to the sea.”
“What could it be?” the clock goblin asked.
“There must be some sort of spell on that mountain,” the tall goblin said rationally. “Perhaps it’s just going for a walk and will settle down again in a few minutes.”
“That’s a giant!” the bed goblin shrieked. “I know it is. Keep quiet now or else he might hear us, turn around, see us, and then pop us in his mouth like peanuts.”
“No, that can’t be a giant,” the hobgoblin said, but his voice sounded very nervous and his hand was on the hilt of his sword.
“Oh no, that is a giant!” the bed goblin repeated with greater emphasis. “I know it. I know it!”
“He’s right,” Good said. “That’s another clue. A giant is the only one who could have made that giant footprint.”
The more she and the goblins looked the more they realized that this was true. It was a giant. He was the most gigantic giant they had ever seen!
For a whole minute and a half, no one could say anything. They just stood there with their mouths open, staring at this giant in total disbelief.
“Let’s just say for a moment—I would never admit that the bed goblin is right—but let’s just say for a moment that it is a giant,” the hobgoblin said, looking at Good the Goblin Queen. “What should we do?”
Just then the giant appeared to have heard them. He turned around and looked at them with large hungry eyes. Seeing that they were goblins he raised his hands and started charging toward them with strides longer than a football field.
In one voice and with wide-eyed fear, all the goblins shouted together, “EEK!”
The giant dashed up to them in a moment. He lowered down and glared at them. His eyes were so huge that they all saw reflections of their terrified faces in his big black pupils.
The giant then opened his mouth and out came the loudest roar they ever heard. It was louder than thunder! It rattled their teeth and bones. His teeth were the size of barrels. His tongue was larger than a killer whale. And his mouth was so massive that it could have eaten them all at the same time and had extra room for a whole herd of cattle.
The goblins were shocked into action. Some ran in all directions while others fainted backward.
The cobble goblin, who had not fainted, was shrieking at the top of his voice, “We’re finished now! He’s going to gobble us and swallow us and we’ll never get out of his tummy alive!”
“For once I agree with you,” the hobgoblin said, who was hiding behind a nearby shrub.
“No, don’t eat me!” the cobble goblin was shouting back at the giant. “I’m too young to be eaten. I have so many more cobbles to cobble.”
“There must be something we could do,” the bug goblin said, looking nervously at Good, hoping she might be able to do something to get them out of this terrible situation.
The other goblins heard this, even those who had passed out. They all looked up now and stared with piteous expressions at their queen.
“Help us,” the bed goblin pleaded. “Please, please, help us.”
The tall goblin stood beside her. “What should we do, your majesty?”
The other six goblins gathered around her and watched her, hopeful that she could get them out of this, while the giant stood back on his feet and was looking down on them from such a great height that his head was wreathed in clouds.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Good’s Good Plan
Good the Goblin Queen thought for a very long and tense moment. She put her hand in her pocket and it was then that her fingers touched something. She pulled it out and looked at it, and what she saw gave her a great idea!
“The Crinomatic!” she exclaimed. She gazed at the other goblins with a look of excitement. “I think I know what to do, but—” she hesitated, “—but I’m not sure if it will work.”
“I don’t care if it doesn’t work,” the hobgoblin shouted. “Even if it fails, doing something is better than doing nothing!”
“Quiet, everyone,” the tall goblin said, silencing them. “We’ve only got a minute before the giant realizes that he can lift his foot and squash us like bugs—”
“Hey!” the bug goblin protested.
“—so,” the tall goblin went on, ignoring her, “let the Queen finish.”
They all drew a little closer to Good. They didn’t want to miss a word of her idea.
“Ready,” the cobble goblin said. “You can tell us now.”
As they were eagerly waiting for Good to share her idea, the giant was scratching his head with his large club, which was actually several tall trees tied together. An idea was coming to him too.
“Your Highness, hurry!” the bed goblin hissed. “We’ve only got a few precious seconds left.”
“I’m sorry,” Good said after rethinking her idea. “I realize now that this idea might not work. The Crinomatic is broken. I dropped it right before I met you all. It needs to be repaired first if the plan is going to work, and I don’t know how to repair it.”
“Here, let me take a look at it,” the clock goblin said, putting on a pair of glasses that had several swiveling lenses of different sizes.
She handed it to him and he turned it over in his hands, as if he were examining a pocket watch.
“I think I can fix this,” he said in a rapt voice. “But I’ll need my tools.”
“Where are they?” the tall goblin asked.
“They’re in my clock shop,” the clock goblin said. “And my shop is in the middle of Goblin City.”
“We’ll never get there with this giant before us,” the bug goblin said nervously wringing her hands.
“And if we did we would lead the giant right into the heart of our home,” the tall goblin said. “He would destroy Goblin City completely.”
“Well then I can’t fix this Crinomatic without my tools,” the clock goblin said.
“I could fix it too, you know!” the hobgoblin snapped feeling left out. “I’m not bad with toes.”
“Tools!”
“That’s what I said.”
Just then the bobgoblin, who had been silent this whole time by Good’s side, started tugging on her dress. She looked down at him and he took a small box out from his pocket. The clock goblin took it and studied it carefully.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked everyone.
“Tell us!” they said.
“It’s a survival tool kit,” the clock goblin said and pressed a button on the side. A lid opened and out sprung all kinds of tools—like a pocketknife.
“I knew what it was all along,” the hobgoblin said, crossing his arms and pouting.
“Can you fix the Crinomatic with those tools?” Good asked.
The bobgoblin and the clock goblin nodded together.
“Can you do it soon?”
“I believe I can,” the clock goblin said, examining the Crinomatic afresh with the bobgoblin still nodding excitedly.
“And you’re sure it will work when you’re finished?”
“As
good as new. And perhaps a little better. But what are you going to do with it once it’s repaired.”
“I’m going to give the giant new clothes,” Good declared in a confident tone.
The goblins stopped and stared at her in disbelief. Then they all started laughing.
“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” the hobgoblin said, laughing so hard he was crying.
“It’s the best plan we’ve got,” said Good.
“I’d rather be eaten,” the cobble goblin said.
“She must be pulling our leg,” the bed goblin said. “She wants to give us all a good laugh before the giant squashes us to death.”
Only the tall goblin appeared to believe her. “Why do you think this could work?” he asked her with an expression of curiosity.
“Perhaps she wants to be a fashion designer,” suggested the bug goblin.
“Have any of you noticed his clothes?” Good asked the others.
The goblins looked up together at the giant and saw that he was wearing clothes made of all sorts of things sewn together like patches. Some looked like cloth, some like leather, some like leaves, some like metal. And he didn’t have any shoes either. He was barefoot with large callouses on his feet. He looked like a poor homeless giant. Good felt sorry for him.
“I’m going to do for him what I would do for anyone in need of clothes,” she said to the goblins. “I’m going to give him something to wear. I’ll speak to the Crinomatic, tell it what to make, and then I’ll aim it at him. The Gossamingles inside will clothe him in new pants, new shoes, new everything. He’ll be a whole new giant.”
The goblins started to complain.
“This will never work!”
“It’ll fail.”
“We’ll be eaten for sure.”
The tall goblin calmed them down and drew a little closer to Good. “How will dressing the giant in new clothes help us? No matter what he wears, he’ll still be who he is under the clothes.”
“And he’ll have shoes then,” the hobgoblin put in. “The better to squash us with.”
“Don’t you see?” Good said to them. “The clothes will only change how he is on the outside. But the good thing we do for him will change who he is on the inside. I do not think that anyone has ever been kind to him. But if we show him kindness, if we give him new clothes and shoes so that he’ll stay nice and warm in the winter, then I know he will change, maybe not from the outside in, but definitely from the inside out.”
All the goblins shook their heads. They had never been kind to anyone before. They did not know if they had it in them to do it. Kindness? It was not for them. How could being kind get them out of danger? It seemed utterly impossible.
“Trust me,” Good said to them. “I’m your Queen. “Here’s how the plan will go…”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The Hobgoblin’s Courage
The tall goblin rubbed his chin as he considered Good’s plan. “You know,” he said to the others, but looking at his Goblin Queen. “I think her idea might work.”
“We have the best queen that has ever been in the whole history of best queens that have ever been,” the bed goblin said.
“I don’t think I like this plan,” the hobgoblin said sulkily.
“But you’re the most important part of it,” Good said to him.
“No one else could do it but you,” the cobble goblin added in a buttering-up tone. “We’re not as brave as you, O Mighty Hobgoblin.”
“We’ll call you, Hobgoblin the Brave,” the clock goblin put in.
“Hobgoblin the Fearless,” the bug goblin added.
“Hobgoblin the Fancy Pants,” the bed goblin said too.
The hobgoblin crossed his arms. No one could convince him that this was a good plan. He wanted no part of it.
Good knelt and spoke to him in a tender tone. “I know you can do this. You’re the quickest and you have the courage of a lion.”
The giant was slowly putting two and two together, slowly realizing that he had big feet and they had small bodies, and that if he lifted one of his feet, he could squash them all at the same time. His eyes twinkled with understanding. Then one of his great big feet began rising high in the air.
“Get ready, everyone,” Good said. “Hobgoblin, start running and drawing his attention away from the clock goblin and the bobgoblin. Give them enough time to make the repairs.”
The hobgoblin mustered his courage and started shouting at the giant. “Hey rock face! Boulder nose! Stubby toes! Come and get me.” Then he shot an arrow into the sole of the giant’s large foot. It was like stepping on a thorn.
The giant howled with anger, grabbed his foot, and hopped up and down on the other, making the ground shake like an earthquake. Then he glared at the hobgoblin and started chasing him.
“Everyone else,” Good said, “prepare to defend the clock goblin and the bobgoblin in case the giant comes back.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The Giant Dances
It did not take long for the plan to be in full swing.
The clock goblin was repairing the Crinomatic and the bobgoblin was helping him.
The tall goblin, the bed goblin, the bug goblin, and the cobble goblin had drawn their weapons and were standing in a circle around them, to protect them in case the giant came after them next.
The hobgoblin was running around like a mad thing, taunting the giant, throwing rocks at him, shooting arrows in his ankles, and calling him the worst insults you ever heard!
The giant was working hard to step on him, as if he were a nasty little bug.
Suddenly the hobgoblin tripped and fell over.
Good saw that he was about to be squashed flat, so she ran over to the giant and waved her arms about, getting his attention.
The giant did not notice her, not until she stood over the fallen hobgoblin. Then he paused and looked at her with great curiosity.
In the meantime, the clock goblin and the bobgoblin were working frantically to fix the broken Crinomatic. They were peering through the many lenses of their eyeglasses to see tiny bolts to tighten up and screws to screw down. They were fixing mechanisms that no human had ever heard of before, things like the wompamittle and the slupadumple and the crunchaladle. Their hands were moving so frantically and so fast that their fingers were almost blurred out of sight.
The hobgoblin shouted at them, “Quick, clock goblin! Move faster, bobgoblin! I’ll feed you both to this giant if you don’t fix that thing pronto!”
“He’s raising his foot again to flatten us,” Good called over to the clock goblin. “Could the Crinomatic at least make one thing?”
The bobgoblin nodded.
“Yes,” the clock goblin stated. “Yes, I believe it is ready to make at least one article of clothing.”
The giant raised its foot so high in the air above Good and the hobgoblin that it was as tall as a skyscraper. If it came down on them, it would certainly flatten them flatter than paper dolls. But right before the giant brought his foot down, Good directed her voice at the Crinomatic, still in the clock goblin’s hands, and she gave it a command.
“Give the giant a new pair of shoes!” she shouted.
The Crinomatic shook and spluttered. Then the lid opened and out came a blinding bright light. It shone so brightly that the giant stared at it in wonder, with his foot still raised. The Gossamingles came out of the Crinomatic in a swarm and wrapped around the giant’s bare and hairy feet. His feet were so large that the Crinomatic seemed to be working overtime just to make enough Gossamingles. They poured out endlessly until both of the giant’s feet were covered in a new pair of dancing shoes.
He lowered his foot and gazed at his new shoes in wonderment. Clearly he had never worn anything like them before. He never wanted to take them off again. They were so bright and shiny, and they were absolutely beautiful!
The giant smiled at Good.
“Well done,” the tall goblin whispered to her. “Could you do it
again?”
“Yes I certainly hope so,” Good said. “But I fear the Crinomatic might need another moment to recharge. What do you think, clock goblin?”
“Yes,” he replied as he hurried to recoil some very small springs. “That took a lot out of it. But it should be ready in another moment. Just hold on!”
The giant was so impressed with his new dancing shoes that he started doing the two-step. With each step he made the goblins bounce up and down as the ground trembled.
“Ready,” the clock goblin shouted.
“Crinomatic,” Good commanded it, “give the giant a new pair of pants.”
Light shone out from the Crinomatic and wrapped around the giant’s middle. A new swarm of Gossamingles came flying out next. They wrapped around the giant and gave him a new pair of stripy pants to go with his shiny shoes. This seemed to make him happier than ever.
He began dancing all around.
The goblins took out their pots and pans and banged on them, singing for the giant. They only knew the song of the Pots and Pans Parade, so that was what they sang.
“All right,” the clock goblin said. “I think all the repairs are finished.”
Good ordered the Crinomatic to give the giant a new shirt, a stripy sweater to go with his stripy pants, and a hat that he could wave around while he was dancing.
The giant was so happy about his new clothes that he went dancing off into the distance, shaking the ground like an earthquake. He did a marvelous leap over a mountain and then he was gone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Gremlins
The next moment all the goblins surrounded Good and started cheering.
“Well done!”
“You saved us!”
“Isn’t she marvelous?”
“I knew you were a great queen!”
“The best we’ve ever had!”
The bobgoblin said nothing with his mouth, but said everything in the bright smile that lit up his face with joy. He took the hobgoblin’s hands and they leaped happily around Good. The clock goblin wiped the sweat from his forehead and shook hands with the tall goblin as they congratulated one another on a job well done. The cobble goblin was so excited that he broke his diet to share some candy with the bug goblin. And the bed goblin said he needed a little shut-eye after all that excitement, so he curled up on the ground to catch a quick catnap.
