You Ain't Seen Nothing Yeti!

by Steven Butler

  Oh, I think I forgot to mention that the statue in our reception was once my great-great-aunt Zennifer.

  Yep! I told you my family were weird…

  Years before I was born, Zennifer got into an argument with a Gorgon guest about the right shampoo for glossy snake scales. Needless to say the Gorgon won and Aunt Zennifer has been a stone art installation ever since.

  ‘Oh, ignore me,’ Maudlin said, waving a hand back and forth like she was swatting flies. ‘Me clunkered old memory is dusty and dog-eared – it must be playin’ tricks. Anyway, Mr Banister, you were sayin’?’

  ‘Ah … umm, yes … I manage the hotel along with my wife, Rani, and our son,’ said Dad. He nodded in my direction and Miss Maloney laid her cold stare on me again.

  ‘Aha! So the chatterish quarterling belongs to you?’

  ‘H-hello,’ I stammered, wondering how she knew I was a quarterling. Something about this gristly old grunion made me even more nervous than Great-Great-Great-Granny Regurgita did. ‘My name is—’

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ she barked, holding up a three-fingered hand. She stepped close and sniffed the air between us. ‘You are Francis Gringus Banister.’

  I gasped in surprise and could feel my cheeks burning. How did she know my middle name? It’s even worse than Francis and I absolutely hate it.

  When naming me, Mum and Dad thought it would be a great idea to go with something super traditional, so they took inspiration from a distant relative, Gringus the Great, a flatulence-wump who once split a mountain in half with the power of his … well, never mind. It’s so awful and I’ve never shared that fact with another living soul. It’s my deepest, darkest secret and Mum and Dad are sworn to silence.

  ‘Haha!’ she cooed, when she saw the expression on my face. ‘Manky old Maloney knows everythin’.’ She tapped a crooked finger against the side of her nose, then winked and turned away.

  ‘Gringuth!’ the molar sisters shouted down from the balcony. ‘What a gorgeouth name!’

  ‘That’s my second cousin’s name,’ the pine dryad called out from the crowd. ‘And come to think of it … that’s my name too!’

  I was so embarrassed! This ancient bad-luck fairy was more powerful than I’d imagined.

  I hope the blizzard arrives and ruins your summer trip, you miserable goat! I thought to myself.

  ‘As I was sayin’, Mr Banister, before I got rudely interrupted with all this talk of families,’ Maudlin Maloney said to Dad, ‘you can keep your gigglish games and happy-clappy Trogmanay. I’m just here to warm me whelks. It’s sunbathin’ for me, in lots and lots of snuggly, goldish sunshi—’

  At that moment I looked out of the window. I don’t remember much about what happened next, except for seeing something twisting and gigantic crashing up the beach towards the hotel, and the deafening roar as it blew the front door inwards and shattered the windows into a thousand tiny pieces...

  WHOOMMFF!

  Suddenly everything went white!

  Hail and sleet thundered in through the open front door and spiralled up the great staircase, engulfing everyone in seconds.

  For a moment the shock of the cold made me catch my breath and I struggled to see as I was hit with blast after blast of rushing snow.

  Opening one eye, I found myself lying on the black and white tiles, and I watched in surprise and wonder as fingers of frost crackled across the floor from outside, covering everything in silvery blue swirls and patterns.

  ‘Frankie!’ Dad’s voice called over the roar from a little way off. I peered through the howling blizzard and saw my parents huddled against the reception desk, half-buried in a snowdrift. ‘Frankie, close the door!’

  I gritted my teeth, pushed myself up onto my knees and glanced about. Everywhere looked like the churning insides of a ginormous frozen washing machine!

  Jagged icicles were erupting in spikes from every ledge and corner, jutting off the staircase and chandeliers. Great-Great-Aunt Zennifer’s statue at the centre of the fountain had suddenly become a twisted sculpture of glittering ice, and our smaller guests (mostly the moss gremlins and bogrunts) were spinning through the air, desperately grabbing at anything they could.

  I hauled myself along the floor, trying my hardest to keep low and not be flung across the room in the screaming wind, but I could feel myself slipping with every movement.

  ‘AAAAEEEEE!!!’

  Gingiva Molar zoomed over my head with an enormous grin on her face, followed by Dentina and Fluora. ‘Thith ith amathing!’

  At last I reached the base of the front door and scrabbled upwards, trying to find the handle. My fingers grazed across something curved and metallic, and I clutched it as hard as I could.

  ‘Come on, Frankie,’ I spluttered to myself as I carefully struggled to my feet. I gripped the edge of the door and pushed as hard as I could against the ferocious gale that still howled in from outside. ‘Push!’

  As I heaved against the wood, I looked out onto the deserted promenade and couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

  The daylight had completely disappeared behind the rolling clouds, and the beach was now blanketed in white, like someone had rubbed it out with the end of a giant pencil. Beyond that, the sea was a frozen mass of solid hills and humps and the pier had vanished into the storm.

  ‘Francis!’ It was Mum. She rushed up next to me, covering her eyes with her arm, and went to slam the door.

  ‘Wait!’ I yelled. I stuck my foot out and stopped it as I spotted something lumbering over the frozen waves towards us. ‘Look!’

  At first it was almost impossible to make out … just a galloping shape … but, when it reached the shore and started clomping its way up the beach, I realised I was staring at some sort of colossal beast with three riders huddled on its back.

  ‘It’s them!’ I bawled over the rushing wind.

  ‘Who?’ Mum’s eyes were enormous with surprise.

  ‘YETIS!!!’ I howled and, in my enthusiasm, let go of the door.

  WHOOSH!!!

  With one last glance at the huge animal making its way towards our front steps, I was hurled backwards into the reception hall, flying face first into a mound of snow with a painful ‘HUMPH!’

  THEY’RE HERE!

  The moment I landed in the freezing-cold snowdrift, I wriggled my head loose and turned to see what was about to trudge through our front door.

  For the teensiest of seconds I couldn’t see anything out there in the raging storm and wondered if I might have imagined it.

  ‘Where is it?’ I said out loud. ‘Where is—’

  Finally the animal’s tremendous silhouette emerged from the blizzard and I felt my eyes nearly pop out of my head as it shambled inside.

  The creature was so tall it had to duck to get under the high archway, and the enormous antlers growing from either side of its head scraped both sides of the door frame. Its plate-sized hooves clanked noisily against the frosty floor tiles and thick clouds of steam huffed out of its bulbous nostrils.

  I had spent my whole life rifling through Great-Great-Great-Grandad Abe’s books of strange and exotic animals in my bedroom, and I’d recognise this one anywhere. It was a hulking Arctic ulk and it was standing in our reception!

  ‘HOOOOOOOOOOOOOG!’ the ulk bellowed above the din. The sound was so deep and loud, I could feel it in my teeth. ‘HOOOOOOOOOOOOOG!’

  Just then I remembered the three riders on the massive creature’s back and jumped to my feet to get a better look. They were so heavily bundled in blankets with scarves wrapped round their heads that I couldn’t actually see a single hint of yeti.

  Dad had clambered out of the snow onto the stone counter and was frantically waving and gesturing up at them, although I couldn’t hear what he was yelling over the howling blizzard.

  I watched, with my heart pounding in my chest, as the tallest rider at the back of the saddle pulled out a glass jar (about the size of a briny-bean can) from the folds of its shawl and lifted the lid.

  All
at once the wind stopped and the storm whipped itself into the little container like an airborne whirlpool. The deafening roar was replaced by complete silence and the thousands of snowflakes that were hurtling about the place suddenly froze in mid-air, then floated gently to the ground.

  ‘Ahh, that’s better.’ The largest yeti replaced the lid of the storm jar with a tiny CLINK!

  ‘What’s going on?’ Mum whimpered at Dad, breaking the sudden quiet, but he was already bounding off the reception desk and sprinting round to the other side of the Artic ulk.

  ‘Orfis, my old friend!’

  ‘Orfis?’ Mum blurted.

  The middle rider yanked the scarf off his large head, exposing a furry face split in half by an enormous grin.

  ‘IT’S ME!’ the yeti guffawed. ‘Turn down the heating, it’s boiling in here!’

  MEET THE KWINZIS

  In no time, the three riders had jumped down from the ulk and were busily unwrapping themselves like Trogmanay presents.

  It had been so long since I last saw Orfis, I barely recognised him. His brown fur had started to go grey around his chin, and it was much longer and wilder.

  ‘Ooooh! Four thousand five hundred miles on an ulk can give you such sore bumly bits!’ The yeti laughed as he raced over to Dad and scooped him up in a tight, hairy hug. ‘Bargeous, my furless friend!’

  ‘I DON’T BELIEVE IT!’ Mum gawped in surprise, looking like she’d just been trampled by a whole herd of ulks. ‘Is it really you?’ she spluttered, wiping snow off her face. ‘We had no idea you were coming!’

  Dad shot me a cheeky wink.

  ‘We made it!’ the tallest yeti boomed in a voice much growlier than Orfis’s. She pulled the scarf down from around her face and smiled sweetly.

  It was Orfis’s wife, Unga.

  Female yetis are much larger and stronger than the males. I knew that because I’d read it in the same book where I’d seen the Arctic ulk. Unga’s fur was paler in colour than Orfis’s, and tinged with turquoise and silver. Most of the hair around her head had been plaited and threaded with little green beads.

  ‘Rani!’ Unga said, chuckling to herself and flinging her massive arms open. ‘Come over here and give me a squelch.’

  ‘Knot my noggin!’ said Orfis as he put Dad down and turned his attention to me. ‘This can’t be Frankie?’

  ‘Yep!’ I said, barely able to stop grinning like a trinx-weasel.

  ‘I can’t believe my peepers!’ Orfis continued. ‘You’re a sight for salty eyes, if ever there was one! ’Ere, Unga! Look at how grown-uply our Frankie is!’

  Keeping Mum in a great big yeti hug, Unga glanced over at me and practically screamed.

  ‘Oh, my blunkers! The last time I saw you, Frankie, you were tinklier than a twigling!’

  ‘Where’s little Zingri?’ Dad asked, hopping about like an overexcited puppy.

  ‘She ain’t so little any more, Bargeous,’ Orfis said. He reached out and pulled the smallest figure towards us. ‘This way, loveling.’

  The little yeti was still wearing a blanket pulled right up over her head with eyeholes cut in it, but Unga quickly yanked it away.

  ‘Zingri, my lumplet!’ Orfis boomed. ‘You were a ball of tufty-fluff the last time we were here, so I doubt you’ll remember the Banisters. This here is Bargeous, Rani and the littl’un is Frankie.’

  Zingri was about two years younger than me, but she was already nearly as tall as my dad. Her hair was white and grey with blue at the ends, like all young yetis. She had a single snaggle-fang poking out from her bottom lip at a wonky angle.

  ‘Cor!’ she said, looking around the room with wide eyes and an expression of surprise on her face.

  ‘Well, go on, then,’ said Unga, giving her daughter a gentle nudge. ‘Say hello, my little nervous nelly.’

  ‘Hello,’ Zingri mumbled.

  ‘That’s my girl,’ Unga said. She planted her enormous paws on her hips and glanced around. ‘Well, here we are at the Nothing To See Here Hotel. What a Trogmanay treat!’

  I could tell by Zingri’s face that she’d never seen anything like our hotel before. She peered up the frozen spiral staircase and...

  ‘The sky is wrong!’ Zingri yelped, then darted behind Unga’s legs.

  ‘Haha!’ Orfis hooted. ‘Boogle my brains, I clean forgot. Poor Zingri ain’t never seen a ceiling before!’

  A FROSTY RECEPTION

  ‘I do like what you’ve done with the place,’ Unga said, gazing round the reception hall. ‘It’s much nicer than the last time we were here.’

  ‘I agree,’ said Orfis, snapping an icicle off the nearest picture frame and picking his teeth with it. ‘Much frostier. Lovely!’

  In all the excitement, I’d completely ignored the aftermath of the wild storm that had just bulldozed through our door and into all our poor guests who’d been suddenly transformed into living ice pops.

  It was like we were standing inside a vast igloo. Everything was covered in snow and swirling frost formations. Here and there pairs of waggling legs were sticking up out of the drifts and some of our guests had got themselves trapped behind cages of icy stalagmites.

  ‘Well, that wath a thurprize!’ the Molar Sisters cackled from somewhere above us.

  Gingiva and Dentina had somehow landed back on the third-floor balcony after being blown about and were busy brushing themselves down, but Fluora was dangling by the elastic of her blue patterned knickers from one of the chandeliers.

  ‘Motht unexthpected!’ she chuckled.

  The pine dryad’s branches were now dusted with snow and glistening. He looked more like a Drooltide tree than one of our paying guests.

  ‘Gosh! Look!’ said Dad, pointing at the nearest wall. I glanced over and saw that the vines printed on the enchanted wallpaper were wilting and shrivelling in the cold. The leaf patterns were slowly turning brown and fluttering down the walls. ‘Now it really is winter!’

  ‘Lovely juddery weather,’ Orfis said with a smile as he inspected the scene.

  Grime fairies were playing on the fountain, sliding down the loops of ice, the moss gremlins were dotted about the floor like startled little snowmen, and the anemononk was busily unpicking his frosty feelers from around the hatstand.

  The only guest who didn’t seem to have been affected by the storm at all was Madam McCreedie. She was hovering by the open front door, hungrily eyeing a small figure who was coughing and wheezing outside on the top step.

  ‘Who’s this?’ McCreedie croaked, licking her lips. ‘Haven’t seen this one before.’

  ‘Oh my goodness,’ Dad said, suddenly noticing the creature on the step. ‘It’s another guest!’

  ‘They must have got caught outside when the storm hit,’ said Mum, frowning with worry. I could practically hear the cogs clunking away inside her head. ‘Think of the bad reviews…’ she was saying to herself.

  In case you didn’t know, Mum and Dad spend most of their evenings sending fake bad reviews to the local human newspapers. They help to keep nosy tourists from wandering in off the street. The Nothing To See Here Hotel thrives on TERRIBLE human reviews. Dad even frames the worst ones over reception with pride, but Granny Regurgita would eat us for breakfast if the hotel got a bad reputation among magicals!

  Dad helped the little figure hobble inside. It was dragging a large, birdcage-shaped piece of luggage, wrapped tightly in a woven red cloth, and a snow-covered magpie bristled on its shoulder. As it got closer, I could see the creature was a gnomad of some sort, although I wasn’t sure exactly what type.

  Gnomads are solitary wanderers, which means we rarely have any staying with us. It must have had the shock of its life, being stuck outside when a magic blizzard thundered up the beach. They normally prefer hot climates. Why in the world would a gnomad be in Brighton?

  ‘Do come inside,’ Dad said. ‘We’ll have you warmed up in no time.’

  Despite being shrouded in floor-length robes, I could clearly see the gnomad was shivering and its teeth were c
hattering loudly underneath the oversized clay mask it was wearing.

  ‘I’ll just help you with this.’ Dad reached out to take the birdcage-shaped luggage from the gnomad, but the magpie on its shoulder suddenly flapped its wings and cawed loudly.

  ‘Handsss off, halfling!’ it croaked.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Dad, looking alarmed.

  ‘Don’t want sssorry!’ the bird continued, speaking for its master. ‘Want a room. One room for ussssssssssss, pleasssssssse.’

  ‘Yes! Of course!’ Mum said, quickly taking the lead from Dad and hurrying the unfortunate customer over to the reception desk. ‘My apologies for the … umm … appearance of the hotel.’

  ‘The poor little grub,’ said Unga. ‘It must have been blown about like a bog-bonker out there.’

  Mum glanced through the guest logbook, then clapped her hands together.

  ‘You’re in luck,’ she said, smiling her customer-service smile. ‘We have one last room available. It’s small, but it has a good view of the beac— umm … snow and you’ve your own private plunge pond.’

  ‘We’ll take it!’ the magpie rasped.

  ‘Well, then,’ said Mum, with a look that was somewhere between bewilderment and excitement, ‘if there are no more surprises, it’s high time we got ready for a splendid Trogmanay Trolliday.’

  Then she turned in the direction of the kitchen and gasped.

  MANKY OLD MALONEY’S CURSE

  Mum was staring at a squat lump of snow, right in the middle of the room, next to the lepre-caravan and its gaggle of chilly chickens. The sound of angry muttering was coming from inside it.

  ‘MISS MALONEY!’ Mum cried. She darted over to the grumbling mound and, using the hem of her long skirt, started to dust the top part of it away.

  ‘BLURG!’ came a high-pitched cry from inside the snow pile, as Maudlin Maloney’s grizzled face began to emerge.

  I couldn’t help but gawp. With her face poking out of the snowy bump, the leprechaun looked like a nightmarish Russian Doll.