‘If we worsted the most dangerous creature in the bowels of Bookholm, we can dispose of the most dangerous creature on the surface of the city.’
‘That’s the spirit!’ I cried. ‘Let’s go!’
‘But there’s something I must attend to first.’
‘What’s that?’ I asked. There had to be a snag, of course.
‘I must rid the Leather Grotto of those verminous invaders. I want to leave my kingdom in good order. You can help me to do that too.’
I’m bound to admit, dear readers, that my joyful sense of anticipation was blighted by the prospect of accompanying Homuncolossus back to the Leather Grotto and tackling the most vicious and ruthless of the Bookhunters à deux. I was already wishing myself back in the Library of the Orm, but it was too late to renege on our bargain now.
Farewell to Shadowhall
We were followed at first by only a handful of Animatomes when we prepared to leave Shadowhall Castle. The Shadow King strode resolutely on ahead, never hesitating for a moment when we came to an intersection.
‘How do you manage to find your way out every time?’ I asked him. ‘Is there a special method?’
‘I don’t know what Pfistomel Smyke did to my eyes,’ he said, ‘but I can now see things I never saw before, even microscopically small things. These walls don’t look the same to me as they do to you. I can detect every tiny little difference between them. To me it’s as if they’re all covered with different wallpapers. That’s an aid to finding my bearings. Even though they occasionally surprise me by changing their location, they always resume their original places in the end. It takes a bit longer on some occasions than others, but I’ve never failed to find my way out.’
I noticed that the number of Animatomes following us had doubled in a very short time. We were now joined by a few Weeping Shadows, which sobbed as they flitted after us. More and more of them appeared, transforming our departure from Shadowhall into a regular procession. More Shadows glided out of every passage and more Animatomes came scuttling, crawling or fluttering out of every dark corner until our retinue was thousands strong.
Nor was it only the Weeping Shadows that made mournful noises: the Animatomes sniffed and whimpered as if aware that their Shadow King was leaving them for ever. My own mood darkened too. I had developed a great affection for Shadowhall Castle and its weird inhabitants; in fact, it had temporarily become my second home. Having experienced and learnt so much there, I would always remember it with nostalgia. However our adventure turned out, it was unlikely that I would ever see the place again.
The Shadow King himself was not unmoved, I could tell. His steps became steadily slower and he occasionally emitted sounds that betrayed his emotional turmoil, so it was with a combination of gloom and relief that we finally emerged from the castle. I would never have believed that this long-awaited moment would inspire me with such mixed feelings.
Once outside we were greeted by moist heat and the crimson glow of molten lava. The Animatomes, which had streamed out of the castle in our wake, climbed up its walls for a long-range view of our departure. The Weeping Shadows remained in the entrance, sobbing with such abandon that we could still hear them when we had already ascended the long flight of steps and passed through the gateway into the next cave.
Back to the Leather Grotto
I entered the Leather Grotto on my own. It was an appalling spectacle. The shelves were almost denuded of books, the furniture had been reduced to mounds of ash, the leather sheathing dangled from the walls in shreds. The book machine, which was a defunct wreck, had evidently served the Bookhunters as a source of scrap metal. Whole stairways and ladders, handrails and shelves had been removed and dismantled. A smell of burnt paper hung in the air.
I counted fourteen Bookhunters, all armed to the teeth as usual. They were seated on the ground in small groups, passing bottles of wine from hand to hand. One of them had climbed up the book machine and was trying to wrench off a handrail. Rongkong Koma was nowhere to be seen.
‘I must request you to leave the Leather Grotto at once!’ I called in a slightly tremulous voice. Those were the words Homuncolossus had told me to say. I was acting as bait again.
The Bookhunters, who appeared to be in various stages of intoxication, noticed me for the first time. They scrambled to their feet and made noises expressive of amazement. One or two of them burst out laughing.
‘It’s that fat Lindworm who disappeared into the machine,’ said one. ‘But he isn’t as fat as he was. He’s lost weight.’
‘Where have you been all this time?’ asked another, who had sewn himself a horrific mask out of strips of leather wallpaper. ‘We missed you.’
‘That’s a great trick of yours,’ cried a third, ‘disappearing into the machine and walking in at the door months later. You should perform it on the stage, except that the audience might get bored waiting all that time.’
They were now converging on me from all directions - all save the one on the book machine, who remained where he was.
‘I must request you again to leave the Leather Grotto at once,’ I called. ‘That’s an order from the Shadow King.’ My voice sounded even more half-hearted this time. Where had Homuncolossus got to? He might at least have told me how he proposed to extricate me from this situation.
‘The Shadow King, eh?’ cried a Bookhunter. ‘Why doesn’t he come and tell us to leave himself? The price on your head has been increased, Lindworm. Lucky for us you’ve been away so long, it’s boosted your value immensely.’
My repertoire was exhausted.
‘I must request you to leave the Leather Grotto at once!’ I said again, for want of any better idea.
‘You’re repeating yourself,’ one of the Bookhunters retorted thickly. ‘An inhabitant of Lindworm Castle ought to have a better way with words.’
The others laughed sarcastically. The individual who had remained high up on the ruined book machine was cocking a huge crossbow, I noticed. It seemed that he was planning to scoop the reward with a leisurely shot fired at long range.
‘I must request you to leave the Leather Grotto at once!’ I croaked yet again. Where the devil was the Shadow King? I would be dead within seconds!
The Bookhunter raised his crossbow and took aim. Just then, Homuncolossus emerged from the machine’s shadowy interior without a sound. He came up behind the Bookhunter and gripped both his arms. Before his captive could say anything, Homuncolossus had aimed the crossbow at another Bookhunter and pulled the trigger. The bolt caught its target in the back, at a spot where he wore no armour, and he collapsed in the midst of his startled companions. Homuncolossus released the crossbow and leapt back into the machine.
Utterly at a loss, the Bookhunter picked up his discharged weapon. ‘Listen, friends, I—’ was all he managed to say before six crossbow bolts hit him. Five bounced off, but the sixth found its way through a crack in his armour and lodged there. He toppled over the handrail, crashed to floor of the cave and lay still.
The others were utterly flummoxed. They didn’t know what merited their attention more: me or the corpse of the fellow Bookhunter whom they had just instinctively shot.
Then a familiar sound came drifting through the Leather Grotto. It caused the Bookhunters to spin round and grip their weapons more tightly. To me it meant I must turn on my heel and quit that scene of devastation.
It was the sigh of the Shadow King.
The Memorial
That was the prearranged signal. Homuncolossus had ordained that, as soon as the sigh rang out, I should take to my heels and hide outside the cave.
Only too glad to! I sprinted outside and hunkered down behind a boulder. If the Shadow King had instructed me to behave like a coward, I wasn’t going to miss this opportunity to do so. I listened tensely.
Silence at first. Then came a startled exclamation. Someone yelled, ‘Look out!’ The clash of weapons, hectic words of command, a bestial cry of pain. Then utter pandemonium: the din of battle, a babble of screams a
nd oaths, the Shadow King’s hoarse breathing. An apelike bellow of fury. The clatter of a heavy suit of armour being hurled against a wall complete with occupant. Horrible gurgling sounds. The whistle of crossbow bolts. A cry of mortal agony. And another. Someone sobbed, but not for long. Another apelike bellow.
Then silence.
Again I heard the clatter of armour. Then a Bookhunter came staggering out of the cave, streaming with blood. Homuncolossus followed at his heels.
I emerged from my hiding place just as they both came to a halt.
‘Why don’t you kill me?’ whimpered the Bookhunter.
‘You should know,’ Homuncolossus replied. ‘There must always be one survivor left to tell the tale, or there would soon be no stories left to fill the pages of books and you’d be out of work, since books are what you live on. So go and spread the story of the battle of the Leather Grotto. And be sure to tell everyone that the Shadow King will be living here from now on, and that anyone who dares to disturb him will suffer the same fate as your cronies. And now be off with you!’
The Bookhunter tottered off, leaving a sticky red trail behind him.
Homuncolossus turned and went back into the cave.
‘You stay here,’ he called over his shoulder.
‘What are you going to do?’ I asked.
‘I must erect a monument,’ he said.
So I stayed where I was and waited to see what would happen.
He soon returned with a severed head under each arm. I was very glad they were wearing their martial helmets, so I was spared the sight of the contorted, lifeless faces inside them.
Homuncolossus deposited the heads on the ground and returned to the cave. He repeated this process several times until his monument was complete: a grisly sculpture composed of thirteen Bookhunters’ heads in their horrific helmets.
‘A pity there were so few of them,’ he said. ‘This monument is meant for the dead Booklings, but even more so for the survivors. No one but they will ever venture into the Leather Grotto again. I hope they’ll return some day and make it their home once more.’
I now felt ashamed of having made only a chicken-hearted contribution to the battle of the Leather Grotto.
‘Come,’ he said, ‘let’s go up above. We still have a giant to slay.’
The Greatest Danger of All
Go up . . . Such a simple, easy, innocuous expression for such an arduous procedure. I had begun to believe in the impossibility of ascending. How often I’d yearned to do so in the recent past, only to descend even deeper!
Homuncolossus conducted me along a series of seemingly endless passages through the rock. That they seemed endless was mainly because none of them led upwards, always straight ahead and sometimes, even, downhill. After roughly a day’s march, however, we came to a shaft that really did lead straight upwards. It was a narrow chimney just wide enough to admit us and containing sufficient ledges and protrusions for us to be able to climb it.
‘Are you sure it doesn’t become too narrow at some stage, or simply peter out?’ I asked.
‘Absolutely sure,’ Homuncolossus told me. ‘I’ve often used it.’
‘Colophonius Regenschein mentioned a shaft like this,’ I said. ‘He said it was too narrow to harbour anything very dangerous.’
‘So Regenschein knew about this shaft, did he?’ said Homuncolossus. ‘Well, he must have done, because there isn’t another one like it. He’s full of surprises, even in death. Still, he was wrong about one thing.’
‘What’s that?’
‘The absence of anything very dangerous. This shaft harbours the greatest danger of all.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’ll see when the time comes.’
The Shadow King and his mysterious allusions! I couldn’t imagine life without them now.
So we started climbing. It wasn’t much more difficult than ascending a flight of stairs, thanks to all the footholds. Homuncolossus, with a jellyfish torch strapped to his head like a miner’s lamp, took the lead. He climbed fast, but I found to my surprise that I could keep up with him quite well.
After a few hours, however, my limbs began to feel a trifle heavy with fatigue. I wondered how much longer the ascent would take. Not much longer, I surmised, in view of the distance we had already covered. Although I hadn’t asked before, not wanting to be thought a weakling, the question now seemed appropriate.
‘Another three days,’ I was told.
My legs turned to jelly and I stopped climbing. I realised for the first time how deep the shaft was. It stretched away above us for miles.
‘Three days?’ I said, aghast. ‘How am I supposed to manage it?’
‘No idea,’ he said. ‘I myself have only just realised what an impossibility it must seem to you. Nowadays it never occurs to me that someone may not be as strong as I am. What do you think?’
‘What do I think?‘ I wailed. ‘You’re crazy, that’s what!’
‘Shouting won’t help,’ he said. ‘Better save your strength, you’ll need it.’
‘I’m going back down,’ I said defiantly.
‘I wouldn’t advise it. Even I use a different route for going down. Know why climbing up is so much easier than climbing down? Because our eyes are in our heads. You don’t see where you’re putting your feet.’
I was incapable of moving in either direction.
‘It’s there already, isn’t it?’ said Homuncolossus.
‘What is?’
‘The greatest danger of all.’
‘The greatest danger of all? Here? Where? Where is it?’ Panic-stricken, I looked round for some fat snake or venomous tunnel spider, but there was nothing to be seen.
‘It’s inside you,’ said Homuncolossus. ‘Fear.’
True, I was terribly frightened. I dared not advance or retreat. It was like a form of paralysis.
‘You must conquer it now,’ he said, ‘or it’ll conquer you.’
‘And how am I to do that, pray?’
‘Simply go on climbing. It’s like writing a novel. Everything’s quite straightforward at first - the early chapters go with a tremendous swing, but sooner or later you begin to tire. You look back and see you’re only halfway through. You look ahead and see you still have as much again to write. If you lose heart at that stage, you’ve had it. It’s easy enough to start something. Finishing it is the hard part.’
That was simply great, dear readers! It wasn’t enough that the Shadow King had placed me in a life-threatening situation - no, he now insisted on spouting facile words of wisdom.
‘If Regenschein knew about this shaft he must have climbed it,’ said Homuncolossus. ‘That means it can be done. We’ve already come a fair way and you’ve coped pretty well so far.’
For the first time, I became aware that I wasn’t as fat as I had been when consigned to the catacombs. I’d taken a lot of exercise lately and I hadn’t had much to eat. Even one of the Bookhunters had remarked on how much weight I’d lost. Hadn’t I kept up with the Shadow King until now? Yes, I had never been in better shape.
‘All right,’ I said. ‘Let’s keep going.’
We climbed for hour after hour without my having to request another breather. It was Homuncolossus who eventually paused and told me we had completed the first third of the ascent. We took a longish rest, just sitting on a ledge in silence, then resumed the climb.
The second stage proved more strenuous. It had been a mistake to rest, I thought, because my limbs now felt heavier and less supple than before. I was also conscious of all the cuts and abrasions my paws had sustained from contact with the jagged rock. It wasn’t long before I felt as if I were wearing a suit of lead armour. My legs were so numb, I couldn’t feel where I was putting my feet. This sensation stole gradually up my body until it reached my head and I wondered whether to ask for another rest. Still debating this question, I dozed off in mid climb. By the time I started to fall I was already in the land of dreams.
The Fire Demons of
Nether Florinth
I tried to move, but it was impossible. Every bone, every muscle hurt as if it had been smashed or torn apart. Then I remembered: I’d fallen down the shaft. Now I was lying at the bottom, breathing my last.
I strove to raise my head. That, at least, I found I could do. Homuncolossus was sitting beside me, leafing through a book. Beyond him I saw a tunnel whose walls were lined with bookshelves.
‘Maybe you should write poems instead of novels,’ he said. ‘Verse might be better suited to your constitution.’
‘What happened?’ I asked.
‘You fell asleep while climbing. I only just managed to catch you.’
I looked down at myself. I was still in one piece but suffering from the worst aches and pains I’d ever experienced.
‘You carried me the rest of the way? For two whole days?’
Homuncolossus tossed the book aside. ‘Hear that?’ he said.
‘What?’ I listened. True, I could hear noises - lots of noises. A medley of gurgles and crashes, rumbles and roars, clatters and bangs.
‘That’s the city,’ said Homuncolossus. ‘They’re the sounds of Bookholm.’
I sat up, wide awake in an instant.
‘Are we there?’
‘Not quite, but close beneath the surface. From here it would be child’s play to reach it by way of some second-hand bookshop.’ He looked at me with a cryptic expression. ‘But my own route goes via Smyke’s library.’
‘Mine too.’
‘You don’t have to come with me. I wouldn’t feel hurt if you preferred to take an easier route. I can show you one.’
‘As long as Smyke’s still around I wouldn’t get much further up there than you. There’s a price on my head, remember?’
‘In that case, let’s go.’
Homuncolossus left his torch behind. This part of the catacombs was lit by jellyfish lamps. They were everywhere, those lamps I hadn’t seen for such a long time, and so were books. Not ancient, malodorous tomes written in indecipherable runes, but normal second-hand books. Taking one from a shelf as we walked on, I flicked through it.
The City of Dreaming Books Page 42
