Jasper Fforde - The Great Troll War

‘Funny how things turn out, yes. I never thought I’d be an earl and a key part of a transition government before my twelfth birthday. You know what?’ he said.

‘What?’

‘I wish I’d had you as my big sister.’

‘It would never have worked out,’ I said with a smile. ‘I’d be forever on your back to do your homework and wash behind your ears and chewing you out for messing with my stuff.’

He smiled back at me.

‘Even so.’

I opened the door of the Volkswagen and the Quarkbeast jumped inside. I climbed in, shut the door and wound down the window.

‘Look after the remaining sorcerers,’ I said. ‘Zambini Towers will need rebuilding, and Lady Mawgon, Boo, Monty and Full Price will require a lot of help to restore the mystical arts into a useful and well-regulated power only for good. We can’t risk another Shandar.’

I paused.

‘So long, Tiger. It’s been good.’

‘So long, Jenny. I won’t forget you.’

He waved at me and I drove off. I didn’t look in the rear-view mirror, and blinked away my tears. Even without my own family, I’d still had one. Sure, Zenobia and the other nuns had been harsh, but there was love there. At Zambini Towers it had always been hard work, but they looked out for me, even Lady Mawgon.

I stopped to say goodbye to Once Magnificent Boo, who was waiting on the corner.

‘Good luck,’ she said. ‘If I’d been into the whole “having a daughter” thing, I’d have hoped she’d be just like you.’

‘I’d love to have had you as a mum, Boo.’

She squeezed my arm.

‘Thank you, Jennifer. That means a lot to me. Give the centre of the galaxy my love.’

‘I will.’

I put the car in gear, meaning to be off, but Boo leaned closer.

‘It must be wonderful,’ she said in a brooding tone, staring at me with her dark eyes. ‘With eternal life must come unlimited power. Do you understand?’

‘Not really, no.’

‘You will.’

She then handed the Quarkbeast a transfer gearbox 56 56 A ‘transfer gearbox’ is the secondary gearbox that engages four-wheel drive and lowers the gearing ratio. from a MkII Land Rover for him to chew on the journey, winked one of her dark eyes, clasped my shoulder with a rare sign of affection and stepped back.

I drove on, but soon realised I wouldn’t need to figure out the route to the Tower of Knowledge. Word had got about through the worrier network that I was leaving with Shandar, having secured the sun’s continuing ability to pour bounteous warmth and light onto the planets, and all the fencers, marksmen and other support personnel were lining the route, eager to see me on my way. As I drove through the shattered remains of the Kingdoms, I realised just how much damage had been done in such a short time by the Trolls. It was all rebuildable, but at least now with the Kingdoms united and under wiser and more considered leadership, they could come back better.

After a couple of hours, I came within sight of Shandar’s mighty tower. I took the motorway exit where it was signposted ‘Shandar Plunder Traffic Only’ and drove along the newly built access road. There were still trucks moving in and out, but the Hollow Men, far from regarding me with suspicion, simply inclined their empty hats in my direction as I passed.

I drove down a ramp to the first sub-basement and was directed to a large, roped off area in which to park. I turned off the engine and climbed out, the Quarkbeast at my heels.

‘Ah, Jenny!’ said a voice behind me. ‘Welcome to your new home.’

Shandar seemed more relaxed now I had agreed to his terms and the question marks over my compliance had at last been lifted. He shook my hand warmly.

‘So glad you could make it, my dear,’ he said as a team of Hollow Men heaved the blast doors closed behind us. ‘Don’t think me suspicious, but you were once a formidable opponent so I want to make trebly sure there are no tricks up your sleeve or well-laid plans in your mind. Is there anything you’d like to tell me about now? For I will insist on searching you – mind, body and luggage.’

Just me being here was the plan, but I suppose he was right to be suspicious.

‘I have a Pollyanna Stone,’ I said, digging it out of my pocket. ‘I used it to conjure up who I thought were my parents in times of stress.’

‘Family are overrated,’ said Shandar. ‘When you need them they’re not there, and when you don’t want them they’re on your back wanting part of Cumbria or a castle or a pet Leviathan or something.’

The Mighty Shandar’s family were now assumed casualties of his Soulectomy. Wagging tongues said they were turned to stone and used as garden ornaments.

‘You are to surrender the stone and anything else with an enchantment attached,’ he said. ‘It’s a wise precaution, I think you will agree. Where is Exhorbitus?’

‘I gave it to Tiger.’

I didn’t tell him, I just left it in his bedroom with a note.

‘Just as well you did,’ said Shandar, ‘for I would have had to destroy it. There will be no magic in Shandar’s Tower aside from mine.’

I handed over the Pollyanna Stone and Shandar crunched it to powder between thumb and forefinger, the residual wizidrical energy fizzing out as orange sparks.

He put out his hand to touch my head, fingertips glowing a bluish colour.

‘Do you mind?’

‘Knock yourself out.’

He placed his fingertips on my temple. I had thought it would feel creepy, but because I was made of the better parts of him, it felt weirdly as though I were touching my own head, only with thick gloves. I could also feel his mind inside mine, teasing and looking, searching and ferreting, as though drawers were being pulled out and the contents dumped on the floor in a search for well-laid plans or magical contraband, similar to the early-morning raids the nuns used to pull on us back at the orphanage. As Shandar delved I had little flashbacks of the past couple of weeks as he teased the information from my head, but I feared nothing. There was no plan; I had agreed to his deal, and was quite willing to keep my side of it.

‘Nothing sinister there,’ he said, ‘but I can feel the goodness that was once mine – it comes across as old fashioned and stale, like listening to the tiresome and idealistic rants of a naive youth. I can also sense you despise me. A couple of hundred years will bring you around to my way of thinking. I’m really quite endearing when you get to know the better of the worst parts of me.’

‘I’ll have to take your word for it.’

He ran his hands over my small amount of luggage, and then the Volkswagen.

‘Any spells hidden anywhere? A sorcerer miniaturised and hiding in the glovebox? A Dibble Jar full of crackle waiting to do me some mischief?’

‘Nothing,’ I said.

‘I still need to be cautious,’ he said. ‘There are always a few naysayers who want to rain on your parade when you contemplate galactic domination.’

He gently laid his fingertips on the Beetle’s bonnet, and there was a low humming noise. Shandar paused, like a tuner listening to a piano. He moved down the rear panel, then reached right under the car in the area of the engine and pulled out a small Bovril jar that had been tightly stoppered with red wax.

‘What’s this?’ he asked.

‘You’ve just been inside my head,’ I told him. ‘I don’t know – and you know I don’t know.’

He sniffed it delicately, then covered it with both his hands.

‘Well, well,’ he said, ‘a timed thermowizidrical explosive device, due to go off in twenty-six minutes and eight seconds. Written in ARAMAIC V3.4, to give a low wizidrical signature. It looks like one of Monty’s. I will concede he’s a good spell-writer. If he’d been able to do magic as well, he may even have been relevant. It’s a little crude, though. A bomb ? I thought they would have been more imaginative.’