Jasper Fforde - The Great Troll War

‘That’s why they hate us so much,’ said the Princess, ‘for humans can do what they cannot: expand unchecked beyond the levels at which their environment can support them.’

‘There’s a moral in there somewhere,’ said Tiger.

‘So hang on,’ I said. ‘Molly told us that 6.66 per cent of Trolls were vegetarians. That’s ridiculously precise unless … she is the only one. In which case—’

‘There are only fifteen individual Trolls,’ said the Princess, who was a little quicker at maths than the rest of us. ‘But we can check. Molly, can you name all your fellow Trolls?’

‘Sure. There’s Keith, Uuuurg, Estelle, Dave, Ugrax, Gluuurg and Charlotte, who is my mum. There’s also Gretal, Grnxtly, Polly, Ug, Dexter, Simon and Daphne.’

‘Yup,’ said the Princess, ‘fifteen. Molly, as a percentage of all the Trolls named Molly that are anywhere, how many are in this room now?’

‘One hundred per cent,’ said the first Molly, while the second stared at the diagrams on the wall and then turned to us and added: ‘I bounded myself in the Mini so that I should not suffer any indignities from any Troll anywhere in the Kingdoms.’

And she sighed deeply. Monty ordered the room divided in half again, but this time not by a curtain, but by a long string embroidered with buttons. Since it was an imposed boundary, it had the same effect as the curtain, and within a couple of seconds Molly had recombined herself back into a single Troll. It wasn’t so painful, and she looked much relieved.

‘I feel better as unit one’ she said. ‘If you want me I’ll be in the Mini.’

We all thanked her and within a few moments she was happily back inside the small car. The Princess, Monty and I all exchanged looks. We knew then the method by which we could defeat them.

‘I know,’ said Monty, ‘but with only a single night to prepare, there’s only a slim chance of victory.’

‘I’ll alert the necessary parties,’ said Tiger, going to find a phone, ‘and warn Lady Mawgon to stand by to receive orders – and also to alert Mabel that everyone will be pulling an all-nighter, and to get the sandwich and coffee-makers on stand by.’

‘I’m still not sure I fully understand what’s going on,’ said Molly, munching on a cucumber sandwich.

The Princess and I were ready and waiting as the sky lightened into a rich pre-dawn the following morning. Mist had formed in small pockets around the Button Trench, and the Trolls, up at first light, had shaken the sleepiness from their heads and were now waiting, motionless, and hungry.

General Worrier was with us, worrying as usual. His fret-based command system, whereby all possibilities of failure had been erased by the very real and unacceptable spectre of failure itself, was probably the most efficient command and control system that I had ever seen. He and his team had done all that was humanly possible. A failure now would not be theirs, but the result of an unsound overall plan or poor communication of orders.

Aside from the general, the Princess and myself, there was also Tiger, who wouldn’t leave my side, a small contingent of royal guards to protect the monarch if things turned sticky, and a semaphore communications officer. It was their job to signal to another communications officer waiting at a phone box a hundred yards down the street, who would relay commands to the control centre back at the hotel, and from there to the resistance cells up and down the country.

In truth, the Princess shouldn’t have been there, but had refused all entreaties to be taken to a safe place because ‘she would never command others to face dangers that she was not willing to face herself’.

In due course it would cement not only her popularity, but the moral leadership required to rule a newly United Kingdom. She leaned closer to me and touched my hand.

‘Is this going to work?’ she asked.

‘We’ll know in half an hour,’ I said, ‘or at least you will – I’m on the First Eat List.’

We stared at the massed army of the Trolls facing us. If things went well, we at least had a sporting chance – and with a bit of luck, without a sword needing to be drawn, or a shot fired.

Actually, not a bit of luck – a lot of luck.

It had been a long night, but the fencers and marksmen, along with the team of terrible worriers, had been of inestimable value – far more than a traditional army. Killing a Troll would not diminish their numbers at all, for a new one would be generated to sustain the density ratio, and all that would be gained would be tired muscles and a blunted sword. No, we needed to build barriers . We needed not soldiers but fencers – and not just any old fencers, but masters of their art. Ones who could build in the dark, build stealthily, across rivers and streams, hills and forests, and who could instruct others in the craft over the phone if necessary, and call upon others to build the single greatest network of button barriers that was ever created – and do it all in a single night.

I looked towards the east, where already the sun was beginning to burnish the trees on a distant hillside, edging them with deep orange. Shandar’s bridges across the Button Trench had already begun to build themselves. They were of tree roots, growing and entwining together so to eventually give a firm base upon which the Trolls might walk. The Trolls reacted by picking up their clubs and ensuring their salt and pepper grinders were loaded and in their holsters, ready to be utilised in case of emergency seasoning requirements.

The reason that we had left it so late to launch our counterattack was simple: we had no idea how much of our grand plan had been carried out and we needed to leave it as long as possible to ensure that it had. The marksmen and women were not quite so well organised as the fencers, but on the plus side anyone with a brush could in effect be a marksperson, so long as the paint had been mixed to the precise hue.

‘General Worrier,’ said the Princess, ‘give the order.’

He nodded to the man holding the semaphore flag, who signalled to the woman in the telephone box, who gave the order to Lady Mawgon, who relayed the order to the Regional Commander of the Devon Resistance Group, who signalled his deputy to order that the flare be fired. We could not see it from here, but the flare that arced up out of Bridgwater was significant, for teams of marksmen had been busily painting a continuous unbroken cerulean blue line between the estuary at Bridgwater on the northern coast and the inlet near Axmouth to the south. It mostly followed roads, as it was easier, but there it was: a thin blue line, which would, so long as it was unbroken, bind the Trolls within Devon to a fixed geographical area.

As we found out later, the team standing by to finish the line responded with a flare back to their regional command centre as soon as they had, and the ‘order completed’ signal was relayed back to us. The message took about thirty seconds in each direction.

‘The Thin Blue Line has been completed, ma’am,’ said the communications officer. ‘Thirty-eight miles of unbroken paint.’

‘Good,’ said the Princess but without much enthusiasm, as annoyingly the Trolls were undiminished in number. It didn’t seem to have worked, and the bridges across the Button Trench were now half complete. The Trolls were limbering up, drawing weapons, sharpening spoons and readying themselves for breakfast.

‘Well,’ said the Princess, ‘it was a good idea. Maybe what works in sports halls doesn’t extend to entire peninsulas.’

‘So it’s Plan B,’ I said, drawing Exhorbitus out of its scabbard. ‘Fight like hell. I suggest you retreat, ma’am.’