Jasper Fforde - The Great Troll War

‘So,’ I said, addressing the Master Fencer, ‘five hundred fencers and swordsmen and women, eh? That’s impressive and, let me tell you, most welcome – at least that gives us something to attack them with.’

‘Ah,’ said the Master Fencer uneasily, ‘I think there might have been a mix-up somewhere. We don’t fence with rapiers and swords, we fence with fenceposts and wire. Lots of us will do hedge-laying as well. There are a few bricklayers too, if you’d prefer a wall. We’re more into keeping cattle and sheep in ,’ she added, ‘than keeping Trolls out .’

‘Those five hundred fencers,’ I said, trying to find a positive angle on this, ‘are any of them handy with a sword?’

‘They might be,’ said the Master Fencer, ‘but I know for sure they’re handy with a billhook when it comes to pleaching. 18 18 The technique by which young tree saplings are bent and woven to make a living hedge. The ‘billhook’ is a large and very sharp sort of chopper. I could always ask around, if you want.’

I looked at Full Price, who, along with the Lady Mawgon, had sent out the telepathic message. That was the trouble with magic. It often worked literally, and mistakes – or a misspelling – were common. If you were casting an enchantment, there was rarely any wiggle room for mistakes, and secondary spellings were quite common; even the simple incantation that runs temporary traffic lights could accidentally result in a shower of frogs.

‘I’ve never done a low-alpha telepathic hailing,’ said Full Price apologetically. ‘We’re lucky to have got anyone at all.’

‘No blame is attributed,’ I told him, ‘but it’s a good job we still have the marksmen. I know bullets just tend to bounce off the Troll’s leathery hide, but they might be useful for delaying or distracting them.’

The keen-eyed marksman stood up.

‘I represent the three hundred marksmen and women,’ he said, ‘and we too think there might have been an error in communication. We’re actually people who paint white lines on turf for sporting events, although we’ll also put yellow lines on roads to discourage irresponsible parking.’

‘I’m not sure a double yellow line is going to keep any Trolls out,’ I said. ‘Why do you have “keen-eyed” in your title?’

‘Most people use a string to help them keep the white lines straight,’ he said. ‘But we do it by eye alone.’

‘Very useful.’

‘It certainly saves a lot of time. I’m sorry we’re not what you thought we’d be, but on the plus side we have given the local football and rugby grounds a bit of a freshen-up, and the parking regulations on the streets of Penzance have never been more unambiguous.’

‘This is beginning to reek not of error but of sabotage,’ grumbled Once Magnificent Boo. ‘Somebody not so much jammed the magic, as subverted it.’

This was indeed possible – especially with telepathically transmitted ideas. Full Price, who had up until that moment looked downhearted given that he and Mawgon were mostly to blame for the misspelling, suddenly perked up.

‘Okay,’ I said, ‘but at least we have a thousand terrible warriors. They’ll be taking a bigger share of the fight, and if they are as terrible as their name suggests, they’ll be more than useful. They’ll be indispensable .’

‘Oh dear oh dear oh dear,’ came the voice of the third representative, who was wringing his hands in a desperate manner, ‘this is all looking very frightening – we’re all dead for sure. And what’s more, I think I left the gas cooker on when I came out this morning, I have a rash on my foot that might turn out to be fatal and the gearbox in my car is making a funny noise.’

I looked at Monty Vanguard, who looked back with a resigned half-grimace. I turned back to the so-called warrior.

‘You warriors are worriers , aren’t you?’

‘I’m afraid so,’ said the terrible worrier, ‘I don’t think there is a single one of us who is expecting anything other than complete defeat under the Trolls – and is not fretting horribly about it. Will we be expected to pay for our rooms? I’ve not much money and I may have to go and live in an abandoned car somewhere. Am I being boring? I’ve had twenty years of therapy to make me less tedious. It was thirty pounds an hour. Do you think that was too much? I do. Unless you don’t agree – and then I’ll be conflicted.’

And he put his head in his hands and issued a long and melancholic sigh.

‘It’s fine,’ I said, ‘you’re not boring and hotel management and staff are working for free while we figure out a way to beat the Trolls.’

‘Oh,’ said the terrible worrier, ‘that’s good – except for the Trolls. Do I look good enough to eat? You can be honest with me.’

‘It’s really looking like mischief now,’ said Once Magnificent Boo.

‘I’m thinking you’re right,’ I said. ‘Do we have anyone here who is militarily trained?’

Monty consulted his clipboard.

‘The Cornish army is absent as they only did it for fun at the weekends,’ he said, ‘but we do have about forty people who have some military training. Haberdashers mostly – and after having a rummage we found eighteen swords, four firearms, three spears, six dozen pointy sticks, nine daggers and a trebuchet.’

‘A trebuchet?’ I said, as this was at least a viable weapon – a medieval siege engine designed to hurl rocks at castles. Although superseded by artillery and landships they were very ‘in’ at the moment owing to a recent fad for ‘retro warfare’.

‘Not a very large one,’ said Monty, looking at his clipboard again. ‘In fact, only a model.’

‘We could bring it very close to the Trolls and hope that they don’t fully understand the laws of perspective and mistake it for a full-sized one,’ suggested the Guild of Fencer’s representative.

‘That’s kind of a long shot,’ I said.

‘Or rather,’ put in Colin with a snigger, ‘it won’t be much of a long shot.’

There was silence.

‘Long shot?’ he said. ‘Trebuchet?’

No one laughed, and Colin looked crestfallen.

‘Anyway,’ I said, ‘I think I only want to hear what we do have from now on. Assets we can exploit to bring our battle to the Trolls.’

Before anyone could say anything, the Remarkable Kevin Zip suddenly stood up.

‘Something’s going to happen,’ he said in a quiet voice.

‘What?’ I said.

‘I said: “Something’s going to happen”.’

‘Yes, I know what you said ,’ I replied, used to Kevin’s ways by now. ‘I was just wondering what important thing will happen?’

Kevin Zip looked at us all, and we all stared back. When a pre-cog with a proven track record says something important is about to happen, you take note, although uncertainties over the precise time, nature and location of the event often make the prediction either useless or irrelevant – or it comes too late to do any good at all.

‘The tea lady will arrive,’ he said slowly, ‘and she’ll be short on Hobnobs and will instead offer us digestives.’

‘ That’s the important thing that’s going to happen?’ said Colin. ‘Like … big wow.’

‘Two weeks ago I could see a month into the future,’ said Kevin Zip, ‘but when the HENRY fired up my Predict Event Horizon reduced to a maximum of eighteen minutes. This morning it had diminished to only twelve. If it carries on reducing at this rate I’ll only be able to predict things after they happen. I think there’s a word for it.’

‘Memory?’ said Tiger.

‘That’s the one. It’s all a little annoying. But,’ he added, scribbling on a piece of paper, ‘ immediate things I can often see with great accuracy.’