Gribblebob's Book of Unpleasant Goblins

by David Ashby

  “No, sorry, no. Not like that. I mean that the ripriders, who now exist as… wraiths, spirits, ghosts—call them what you will—they can settle on anyone, rip into them, ride them. Possess them, I suppose you might say. Make them do whatever Mara wants. And they’re powerful, not in the same way as Mara, but they can dip into her magic, tap into her darkness.”

  “It really is just so horrible, horrible, horrible,” repeated Anna.

  “But what happens if one gets you?” asked Nils, one hand gripped tight on his glass of cordial. “Can’t you do anything to get rid of it? How does it feel when they get you? Does it hurt?”

  “Well…” began William.

  Just then Frasier McCurdey came over to the table with a little notepad in his hands.

  “Will you be wanting anything else?”

  “No, I don’t think so, Mr McCurdey, thank you,” replied Anna, keen to return to the conversation they had been having.

  “We have soup now. Leek and potato.”

  “No, honestly, I think we’re all fine,” she said again.

  “Homemade. Not any of that tinned rubbish you get at Pippa’s Pantry.”

  Anna shook her head and forced the most polite smile she could manage in the circumstances.

  “It comes with a roll and butter.” He glared over at Jack. “And we have bread knives.”

  Jack sipped his cordial quietly.

  “Sharp ones,” he went on.

  “No, thank you. Nothing more. Thank you,” said Anna, still smiling.

  “So you’ll be wanting your bill then? Be wanting to get on your way? Before the late-night rush starts?”

  “Well, we thought we’d finish our biscuits first.” Anna waved a ginger snap at Mr McCurdey as politely as it is possible to wave a ginger snap at anyone.

  The tea shop owner snorted and turned back towards the kitchen, where Isla was smiling at William, who in turn was beaming back at her. Nils could hear the café owner mumbling under his breath as he moved away.

  “Pippa’s pigging Pantry.”

  “He reminds me a bit of you,” Nils said to Gribblebob very quietly.

  “HIM?” spluttered the goblin loudly, and Mr Broadchip dropped his last bit of welsh rarebit. “That old, grizzled gabblesnoot? Well, thank you kindly, but I’m much better-looking than that average-sized lumpling.”

  “I meant more personality-wise,” Nils said.

  “But back to The Book of All Tomorrow’s Dreams,” William said firmly.

  “It’s all very well talking about that book,” Anna said, “but I’m more worried about Gribblebob’s book, which is all over my brother’s hand.”

  “Actually,” said William, “that is something we should talk about. It might have a bearing on things.” He looked over at Gribblebob. “Tell us about your book.”

  Gribblebob drained his blackcurrant cordial and burped the loudest and most disgusting burp he had in his wide selection of deeply unpleasant noises. Mr Broadchip dropped his empty plate with a clatter on the table and turned his hearing aid off.

  CHAPTER 24

  “My book,” started the goblin, “is a very important book. It is called Gribblebob’s Book of Unpleasant Goblins and Other Unnecessary Shadowfolk. It’s a book I worked on for a very long time when I was living on my side of the veil. It took me mumps and mumps and mumps and mumps and mumps to finish and it’s very useful indeed.”

  “So, is it basically just a list of goblins that aren’t so nice, then?” asked Nils. Gribblebob gave him a dismissive look.

  “You could put it that way,” he shifted on his chair slightly, “if you were pignorant.”

  “Ignorant,” corrected Anna, and Gribblebob nodded.

  “Yes, yes, you too. Me knows, me knows.”

  Nils looked over at the goblin. “Why’ve you started talking all funny like that?” he asked.

  “Funny?” repeated Gribblebob, raising a bushy eyebrow. “T’ain’t funny at all. It’s only that now these two big shamoozles are here and you know all about me, I don’t need to put on flares and braces no more, do I? Don’t need to blend in with you fussy thumbjabbers. I can let me be me. Let it all hang out. It’s a messy belief, to sell the truth.”

  “Tell us about the book,” snapped Jack impatiently.

  Gribblebob gave him a withering stare before carrying on. “Before I got tired of all the magic and malarkey over there, I was quite a well-known goblin. My name was spoken in the highest squircles.”

  “Bobblehead,” whispered Anna to Nils really, really softly and Nils giggled slightly, despite still feeling scared about the rip-riders.

  “Whassat?” asked Gribblebob, but he ignored them and carried on. “So I was asked by the Great Goblin to put together a book of all the low, thieving, cheating, lying, spickling, downright plain nasty goblins in the world, to sort of keep a track of them all. And as I started, my task grew, and the Great Goblin also wanted me to list all the other dark, vicious, spippling shadowfolk—the ones not to be trusted, like Folkward Cagewell, the Shixster, that tribe of pixies that live down by the Glazey River, the Tylunas Twins—”

  William dipped his head and stifled a little laugh at this point, just to himself, and Gribblebob looked over at him very seriously.

  “And of course you’re in it, William Wynn.”

  William looked up and caught the little man’s stare. “You know, I thought I might be.”

  There were a few seconds of uncomfortable silence before Gribblebob continued.

  “So’s, anyways, I’d done this book, and the Great Goblin puts a spell on it, like a warning spell, so that if you’re in the book then us goblins can all recognize you if we happen to meet you on a dark night or a windy market day or whatever, and be on our guard. There’s some goblins who don’t take kindly to being in the book and would like to have the book and cross out their name or get rids of the book or whatever. Now, the book was kept back on the side of the veil where I comes from orange-a-nelly, but the Great Goblin called me—”

  “How?” asked Nils.

  “You’se is a questioning boy and no mis-shake,” said Gribblebob.

  “Yes, but how did he contact you from the other side of the veil?” asked Nils, not giving up.

  Gribblebob was quiet for a beat, then said, “Harrier pigeon.”

  “But—” started Nils.

  The little man ignored him and carried on his tale.

  “The Great Goblin called me and said he had reasons to believe that the book was in danger, that all magic books were in danger, and he wanted me to break the veil, come and fetch the book and bring it back with me to my home here, to protect it. When you bumped into me today, that’s what I was doing. I’d got the book and I was in a hurry to be finding somewhere safe for it.”

  “So why did it end up all over his hand?” asked Anna.

  “Books of magic are more than books. With the spells and whatnots, it’s almost like sometimes they can thinks for their shelves. And, thinking about it now, and hearing about the other book, the really important book,” he looked over at Jack and William with contempt, “it seems to me that my book was scared. It wanted to hides itself somewhere safe. Magic books have a knickknack of finding people of good, honest heart and kind thoughts. And, much as it spains me to say so, I reckon my book felt that in you and used its magic to hop on over out of the—what would you call it?—out of the sleeve of the book itself, out of the material and actually into you, to hide in you until the danger’s passed.”

  He stopped and looked over at Nils, and at his hand.

  “So’s I was wrong to says you stole it. I’m slurry.”

  “Do you mean ‘sorry’?” asked Anna.

  “I saids what I saids,” replied the little man, and folded his arms.

  Nils was looking deep in thought. “A good, honest heart?” he said, and then he grinned broadly. “Anna,” he carried on, “I’ve kind thoughts and a good heart!” He looked very proud. “Fancy that.”

  Anna shook her head
slightly and smiled too. “Don’t get too carried away, little brother. You’ve also got a Kindle for a hand. You’re like a living e-reader.”

  “But still,” he said, “kind thoughts, good heart.”

  “Oh, put a stock cube in it,” blurted Gribblebob. “I wish I’d kept quiet now.”

  “You know,” said William, more to Jack than anyone else, “this could be a real boon. There aren’t many people who magic books take a fancy to. Maybe he could be a help with finding The Book of All Tomorrow’s Dreams?”

  “Hmm,” was all Jack said.

  CHAPTER 25

  Standing outside The Tartan Teapot, Gribblebob knelt down and nuzzled the not-there ears of his halfway-there dog, cooing and ahhing a little as he did so. He held out his hand and opened it to reveal half a ginger snap, which Dimple happily snaffled down. It was very peculiar, seeing the biscuit disappear into the nothingness that was Dimple’s mouth. As the chomping went on, his neck and upper back began to quiver into view.

  The five oddly assorted companions did look a little out of place on the Uppington Down high street. It was slightly past six o’clock and people were making their way home, but it was surprising how many of the passers-by just took into their stride the sight of an impossibly good-looking man with long hair and a bright scarlet frock coat, a tall, muscular man with a sword by his side, a little person dressed like an explosion in a lost-property room, and two children. Maybe people thought the circus was coming to town, or that they were buskers or part of an advertising gimmick, although it wasn’t the usual sort of thing Mr McCurdey did to promote The Tartan Teapot. Normally, he went for something bizarre like “Buy one sandwich, get one sandwich half price next Thursday” or “Bread pudding with a pot of bottomless custard”, which Mr McCurdey would spend AGES writing in chalk on the blackboard outside his shop, his glasses pushed back on his head and the tip of his tongue poking out of his mouth as he concentrated on swirly Gs and curly Bs. Swords and rock stars were a definite improvement.

  Anna stood there glaring at William and Jack, feeling really quite annoyed. Nils was cupping his magicked hand with his right hand, thinking about his good heart and wondering about rip-riders.

  “What are we going to do now, then?” she snapped. “You don’t want us to break the veil. You don’t want to sort out my brother’s hand. All you want is to use Nils to help solve your problem. That doesn’t seem at all fair.”

  “I don’t mind, sis,” said Nils happily. “Us kind and good ones like to help as much as we can.”

  Anna sighed. Her brother was going to be insufferable from now on.

  “Our problem,” replied Jack sternly, “is actually everyone’s problem. Mara could bring her nightmare plague to both sides of the veil. And if the book is this side, then so is she, most likely.”

  “And once we’ve tracked down that book, we can help sort out your brother’s hand.” William reached out and placed his hand on Anna’s shoulder. “I promise.”

  Despite herself, Anna shivered. It was strange with William. He looked nice and kind, and she found herself drawn to like him, but when his hand was on her shoulder she felt something else, just beneath the surface—something a little darker than she would have liked.

  “You’re in the book though,” she said, “of, what was it, liars—”

  “Thieving, cheating, lying, spickling, vicious, spippling downright nasty characters,” said Gribblebob.

  “A misunderstanding.” William smiled. “I am not always appreciated for my very singular talents.”

  Gribblebob snorted.

  “William,” said Jack, and William Wynn turned to his compatriot. “You said you had an idea of where the book might be, who might have it.”

  “Is that what I said?” William shrugged and ran his hand through his hair. “Perhaps I might have been a little optimistic there.”

  Jack sighed deeply. “You never change, do you, William?”

  “But I do know where we can start. Someone did mention a name to me.”

  “And?…”

  “Omeria Toureau.”

  “Ms Toureau!” echoed the children.

  “But she’s our school librarian,” explained Anna. “How on earth can she know anything?”

  At the mention of the word “school”, Jack seemed to blanch slightly, and he had a most disconcerting feeling, as if he was slipping out of himself, as if he was falling down and deep, as if he was passing somebody on the way, somebody he knew and yet had never met.

  “Jack?” asked William, looking concerned, but Jack just shook his head and gathered himself. He was a warrior of the True Dreamers, after all.

  “Your little friend there isn’t the only one who prefers living on this side of the veil,” he said to Anna. “I think you’d be surprised at quite how many folk there are who have broken the rules.”

  “Is Mr McCurdey one?” asked Nils.

  “No,” said Jack, puzzled. “Why do you ask?”

  “No reason,” said Nils, sneaking a glance at Gribblebob.

  “So we go to the school, then,” stated William.

  “It’s shut now,” volunteered Nils.

  “But Ms Toureau will still be there, I bet,” said Anna. “She’s always beavering away at something in the library.”

  “Fine. Lead the way, young lady, lead the way.” William bowed very slightly at the waist.

  “Ms Toureau told us she came from Trinidad though,” said Nils.

  “I could tell you I come from Cleethorpes. That don’t make me a cabbage, do it?” said Gribblebob.

  “Do you know,” said Nils, “half the time I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Covfefe,” said Gribblebob, nodding.

  CHAPTER 26

  It was a pleasant autumn night, and the sun was starting to set as they headed to the school. Most lights were out, but they could see that the library lights, on the ground floor, were shining. The group walked around to the big windows, and Anna knocked on the glass. From behind a bookshelf, Ms Toureau’s head popped out and she made her way to the window. When she recognized Anna, she smiled and nodded with her head to the entrance door nearest the library. They waited outside, and eventually they heard the clatter of locks and the door opened.

  Ms Toureau appeared.

  “Why, Anna Bryton, hello, sweet. Bit late to be borrowing a book, isn’t it?” she said, smiling.

  “Hello, Ms Toureau,” said Anna. “We’re sorry to bother you…”

  As she spoke, the kindly faced librarian took in Nils, the little man, the wagging tail and the two tall gentlemen bringing up the rear. When she saw Jack and William, her smile faded like wallpaper in the sun.

  “Oh,” she said, “you’d all better come in,” and she stepped back and opened the door wide for them to enter.

  As Jack entered the school, he started to feel queasy. He didn’t know why, and he kept it to himself, but something didn’t feel right. He didn’t like being here. It didn’t feel safe. It felt like the world of wide-open terror. He rested his hand on the hilt of his sword again, for comfort.

  Ms Toureau led the way to the warm, welcoming lights of the library. “I must say, I’m quite surprised to see the company you’re keeping tonight,” she said to the children over her shoulder. “Aren’t you going to introduce me?”

  “This is William Wynn,” said Nils, nodding his head towards William.

  “And this is ‘Jack Broadsword’,” said Anna, saying the name as if it were in quotation marks.

  Jack gave her a funny look as she did so. He felt that stretching again, that waking-up sensation, from somewhere hidden, and the name growing within him came breathing into his ear again, louder this time. Bengt.

  “Pleasure,” said William, bowing slightly.

  “Greetings to you,” said Jack, and dipped his head.

  “Yes, I’ve heard of both of you. My name is Omeria Toureau,” replied the librarian, and she held out her hand to shake theirs, one ring of bright silver with a
small blue stone glittering against her dark skin.

  “And I’m the rat’s brother,” said Gribblebob.

  “Oh, sorry, I forgot you,” apologized Anna.

  “Ah, Mr Robert Gribble,” Ms Toureau said, with a slightly amused expression on her face, “I believe I’ve seen you around town.”

  “Never not noticed you afore,” he sniffed.

  “I’m discreet,” she said, and waved her hand towards Jack and William. “Which is more than I can say for you two.”

  “Are you really from the other side of the veil?” asked Nils, before either William or Jack could reply.

  “Well, now. How extraordinary to be asked such a question, right here in my library. So you know about all of that, do you?” The children nodded. “Then I suppose I have to admit to you that, yes, I do come from the other side of the veil.”

  “And not from Trinidad, after all?” said Nils, just to clarify. Ms Toureau shrugged slightly and held her hands out, both palms up.

  “No, sweet, not from Trinidad after all—well, not the Trinidad you mean.” She looked away from the children and up to Jack and William. “I suppose this is about books?” she said, and then carried on before anyone could answer her. “Yes, I’ve been noticing a few strange things the last few days—in my private collection.”

  “What sort of things?” asked William.

  “Books fading out. Books trying to hide themselves. Books going missing.”

  “Magic books!” exclaimed Anna. “Have you got magic books in the library?”

  “Not exactly,” said Ms Toureau. “Not on the shelves to borrow, anyway, but I brought a few select titles with me, good friends. In my office.” She nodded over her shoulder to the little room at the back of the library. “When I noticed what was happening with my books, I had a feeling there must be some kind of disturbance affecting all magic books. And with you being here like this, I would hazard a guess that I was not entirely incorrect?”

  “No, you’re not wrong,” nodded William. “I heard a whisper, from someone who knows, that you might have been contacted recently by a person who might have needed some advice from someone like you.”