by Tom Holt
“So, since I’m stuck in this shithole, I may as well take it over.”
At which point, Ms. White saw what was wrong with him. Sticking out of the back of his neck, roughly where the spine runs up into the head, was a splinter of glass, deeply embedded. There should have been blood, of course, lots of it, but there wasn’t. I wonder if he knows about that, Ms. White thought; and then she remembered, there had been something distinctly odd about that mirror.
Oh, she thought.
He was talking to her. “I’ll need someone I can rely on,” he was saying, “on the inside, someone who knows how to handle these freaks. And it’s either that or I have you buried alive in an anthill, so I’m guessing you won’t need too long to reach a decision. Well?”
“Sorry,” Ms. White said. “What was that?”
“Try and pay attention, will you? Here’s the deal. You work for me, or you’re ant-food.”
Hence the expression, she thought; he’s got eyes in the back of his head. Only in this case, Eye, singular. Oh dear. “Out of interest,” she said, “how were you planning on doing it? Taking over, I mean. You see, there’s an awful lot of them, and they’ve got weapons—”
That made George chuckle. “They ain’t got one of these.” He reached inside his coat and pulled out a little wooden box. “Three guesses.”
“Chocolates? Flowers? A very small coffin?”
He shook his head. “Neutron bomb,” he said. “And the boss goblin knows all about it, because I had a couple of my boys explain it to him. I don’t think there’ll be any trouble on that score.”
Ms. White’s eyes were very big and round. “That’s—”
“Yes,” George said smugly. “And if I’d had any sense I’d have let the damn thing off ages ago and saved myself all this aggravation. Too soft-hearted, that’s always been my problem. Now,” he added, getting to his feet. “Let’s go and see some people. We’ll start with that dwarf of yours, King Drain. I’m sure he’ll be reasonable, once you’ve talked to him.”
This is silly, she thought. He wouldn’t do it. Not because killing every living thing in the Realms would bother him very much, provided he had a nuke-proof shelter to cower in while the actual dying took place (and he’d got one, she’d happily bet on that), but because total vacant possession wouldn’t be in his interests—nobody to fetch and carry for him, clean the windows, scrub the floors, grow food, all that stuff. He’s bluffing.
An inch of razor-sharp glass, driven into his neck more or less where they got Trotsky with the ice pick, and he was still talking and walking about, and no blood. He might be bluffing, or he might not. And it might not be up to him any more.
Nuts, she thought.
Mr. Bullfrog was enjoying the fresh air for the first time in forty thousand years. It fanned his embers, making his toes and fingertips flare agreeably, though he noted with regret that the passing centuries hadn’t done anything much for his hay fever. Still, it was undeniably pleasant to be above ground and outside again, something that wouldn’t have happened without his new friends the Lushingtons.
He thought about them as he strode across the downs, leaving a trail of gently smouldering footprints behind him. He’d known as soon as he saw them that they weren’t humans from the Realms, and they’d confirmed as much in so many words. The impression he’d got of the place they’d come from was still somewhat hazy, but he’d sensed that life there probably hadn’t prepared Pat and Barry for the rather more robust cultures of the Realms, and he was a little bit concerned in case they got picked on, or taken advantage of, or eaten. There was also the suggestion that Pat had made; take back his place on the council. Now there was a thought.
Of course, all that had been a long time ago, before the Realms were broken and Snororogrim was cast down and the first Elves came over the western sea in ships, complaining bitterly about the catering and threatening to write to someone about it. Since then—well, he’d had enough, and who could blame him? He had dwelt among Men, and they’d shot arrows at him. He had sought out the goblins, who’d fallen down and worshipped him, which is always disconcerting. The dwarves had tried to hook him up to their central heating system, and the Elves—that hadn’t been his fault. Well, it had, strictly speaking, and all the old maps had had to be redrawn; Elvenwood crossed out and Ashfield written in over the top, all because of one little sneeze, and how could he have been expected to know that marshmallorn pollen would have such a drastic effect on his hay fever?
He stopped. It occurred to him to wonder whether, back in the old days, he’d have concerned himself with the welfare of mortals, wretched creatures of a day; actually, probably not. Back then, it had all seemed so wonderfully clear and obvious; so much to burn, so little time. But there had turned out to be rather more time than he’d anticipated, and the sad fact was, once you’ve reduced one world to dripping lava, you’ve reduced them all. Was it possible that he’d gone soft, down there in the endless dark of Snoria? Maybe mellowed would be a better word. He smiled. He liked that.
So, he was going to take back his seat on the council, and his mission would be to look after the new humans; in which case, it might be a good idea to get to know them. With that in mind, he’d set off for the old wizard’s tower, where (according to Pat Lushington) lived the charming and sociable Barringtons; he was something important in something or other and she did something he hadn’t quite understood, and he was sure they were going to be great chums.
On the edge of the greenwood he stopped again, took out his asbestos handkerchief and held it in front of his nose. The marshmallorn was in bloom again; once torched, twice shy.
In the distance he could see a lot of people: all the goblins, if he wasn’t mistaken, and all the dwarves, and quite possibly all the Elves, too, which was handy. He’d be able to make his announcement without having to traipse round the houses telling everyone separately.
Also, he observed, a rather fat little human, who was standing on a box making a speech. It didn’t seem to be going down too well, to judge by the muttering, head-shaking, beard-tugging and gnashing of fangs, but nobody was throwing anything or ripping anybody apart, so clearly the conventions of debate had changed a bit while he’d been away, and probably no bad thing. He edged closer, and an overpowering scent hit him like a hammer. He raised his head and sniffed. He was hungry.
Come to think of it, when was the last time he’d eaten anything? He tried to remember, but even he couldn’t cast his mind that far back. Presumably at some point in the distant past he’d had something, because even his kind had to eat, but—and just over there, near the big crowd, was something that smelt so utterly mouthwateringly delicious that he could hardly think straight. Yum, he thought. Let me at it.
When he came to think about it later, he wasn’t proud of what he did next. Two enormous strides, a quick swish and grab, and he crammed the delicious morsel into his mouth, spat out the rind and chewed ecstatically. Whatever it was burst in his mouth, flooding his senses with the most indescribably gorgeous jumble of flavours. He blinked, burped and smiled. Wow, he thought. Never had one of them before.
(The rind, whose name was George, sat up and discovered that he was still alive; remarkably, since he’d just been scooped up by a fifteen-foot-tall pillar of fire and swallowed whole. He looked round for the little wooden box containing the neutron bomb, but it didn’t seem to be there. In which case—
He shot the fire monster a horrified look, but nothing happened. For which, he rationalised, there were two possible explanations. Either the monster had swallowed a fully functional neutron bomb and survived, or else the rogue Ukrainian scientist he’d got it from had sold him a dud. Bastard, he thought. Still, as things had turned out, probably just as well.
Something else… He tried to figure out what it was, but he couldn’t. His hand instinctively groped for the back of his neck, but there was nothing there.)
Not having eaten for hundreds of thousands of years, Mr. Bullfrog had forgotten about heartburn, a condi
tion with which he’d once been painfully familiar. He frowned. No, not heartburn. Something else. Definitely something he’d eaten—
Oh, he said. It’s you.
Hi, Dad.
Junior.
Yes, Dad, it’s me.
Did I just eat you?
Yes, Dad. I was inside the human.
Mr. Bullfrog sighed. If I’ve told you once, he said, I’ve told you a thousand times—
Yes, Dad.
Cut it out, do you hear? I don’t want you doing that stuff any more.
No, Dad. Sorry.
Oh dear, thought Mr. Bullfrog. Just as well he’d come back, if Junior was up to his old tricks again. He was a good boy at heart, of course, and the trouble had only started when he’d got mixed up with the wrong crowd; my fault, he decided. The kid needs a father. Just as well I’m back.
I won’t do it again, Dad. I promise.
He’d heard that one before. Still, what can you do? Sure, son, he said. I believe you.
Can I come out now?
Mr. Bullfrog sighed. Not quite yet, son, he said. Probably just as well if you stay put for a little while, till I’ve had a chance to sort out any little messes you might’ve made. It’s for your own good, he added, not unkindly. And then, he added, with just a little bit of an edge, there’ll be no need to tell your mother about any of this.
Mr. Bullfrog felt a cold shudder deep inside his digestive tract. OK, Dad. You know best.
Theo Bernstein was a realist, so he hadn’t been expecting a big farewell party or a presentation ceremony or anything like that. But he was an optimist, so he’d been expecting to be pleasantly surprised. But he hadn’t been. And he was a realist, so what the hell.
“I don’t know why I’m doing this,” said Ms. White, as they trudged down the back stair of King Drain’s palace, across the ridiculously narrow bridge over the dizzying chasm of Snorod-dum (no handrail, naturally) and along the gloomy winding corridor that led to the kitchen. “It’s all your fault I’m stuck here, for bloody ever.”
Theo was about to query that, but decided not to. For one thing, she was probably right. If he hadn’t perfected the YouSpace device, and, having done that, if he hadn’t left it lying about where people like George could find it—all perfectly true. Also, he’d sort of got the impression that Ms. White was the sort of person who didn’t like being contradicted.
“Sorry,” he said. “And thanks.”
“That’s all right.”
The Kitchen under the Mountain was big, like everything else in the Dwarfhold; big and dark and grey and cold and dusty, and all the pots and pans were cast iron—not Le Creuset cast iron, more like the R & D department at a tank factory. “There isn’t time to get them to forge me a doughnut pan,” Ms. White said, “so you’ll have to make do with oven-baked. That’ll be all right, won’t it?”
“So long as it’s round, with a hole in the middle.”
Ms. White bent down and lifted a massive iron chest onto the kitchen table. It had seven locks. She kept flour in it. “Pass me a couple of eggs, will you? They’re in the rack.”
He identified them as eggs by the shape. They had a metallic sheen to them, and scales, and they were almost too hot to touch. “If I asked you what kind of eggs—”
“Don’t.”
“Ah. That kind. Two?”
“Thought I’d make a batch while I’m at it, for Drain’s elevenses.” She sighed. “I can’t believe I’m going to end up as a cook,” she said bitterly. “I had such plans.”
“Which all involved exploiting people.”
“Well, yes,” Ms. White admitted, “but so what? If you don’t do it to them, they do it to you. Anyway, that’s beside the point. What am I going to be doing for the rest of my life? Women’s work.” She shot him a look you could have kept fish fresh in. “Thank you ever so much.”
Theo nodded slowly. “And you can’t go home,” he said. “I understand.”
“Actually, I’m not too fussed about that. Believe it or not, I don’t mind it here. These people are—well, compared to the sort of people I used to know back home…” She shrugged. “Except that there’s a Swiss bank account in my name with lots of beautiful noughts and commas, so I wouldn’t have had to play with the rough kids any more. Still.” She broke an egg into the bowl and stood well back until the smoke cleared. “You heard what King Mordak said when he was selling his people on the idea of peace with the Elves. If you can’t eat ’em, join ’em.”
“Good advice.”
“I thought so. And let’s just say I’ve got a few ideas up my sleeve. Something tells me the dwarves aren’t going to be happy to go back to things exactly the way they were, not now they’ve had a taste of completely useless mass-produced consumer junk. And Drain may look like an overgrown hanging basket, but at heart he’s a businessman. A good one. I won’t be stuck in the kitchen very long, believe me.”
“I do,” Theo said, with just a hint of sadness. “I get the impression there’ll be a lot of changes around here, one way or another.”
“You bet.” Ms. White looked round, then lowered her voice. “I overheard Drain talking to the goblin ambassador—”
Theo’s eyes widened. “Wow,” he said. “Diplomatic relations. When did that happen?”
“You ain’t heard nothing yet. Mordak’s planning on abdicating, in favour of the she-goblin.”
Theo opened his mouth, but no words came.
Ms. White nodded briskly. “That’s right,” she said. “Once she’s grown up a bit, of course, so probably some time next week. He said he’s seen the future and it’s got shiny pink claws with little spangly bits on them. Apparently, he reckons that Evil needs to get in touch with its feminine side. And being invincible and unkillable won’t hurt, either; stability and long-term strategic planning and all that. Also,” she added, “I gather he’s had enough of being the Dark Lord. He thinks it’s time for a change of direction.”
“Really?”
“He and that Elf secretary of his are going to start an investment bank instead.”
“I thought you said he wanted a change of direction.”
“Well, yes, but with fewer goblins. You can see his point.” She grinned. “Personally, I think he’s just being lazy. He can’t be arsed to think of a name for her, so he’s going to make her the Nameless One. Mind out, I need to get to the oven.”
Theo didn’t really want to ask, but he felt he had to. “What about George?”
A rather disturbing smile covered Ms. White’s face. “Ah.”
“Did they eat him?”
She shook her head. “I explained to Mordak about his lifestyle and we decided he probably wouldn’t taste very nice. So then I introduced Mordak to the concept of community service for life.” A slightly dreamy look replaced the disturbing smile. “Did you know goblins have toilets?”
“Actually, no.”
“Well, they do. Great big ones. But somehow they never get around to cleaning them out. Not for about a hundred thousand years, anyway.”
“And Mordak agreed to that?”
“He offered me a job,” Ms. White said. “Working for Evil. Head of Creative Thinking.”
“Did you accept?”
Ms. White shrugged. “Told him I’d think about it. But you know what? Call me a traitor to my sex and that rumbling noise you can hear is a million suffragettes turning in their graves, but I think I’d rather make choux pastry. I’ve had enough evil to be going on with. Thanks but no thanks, on that one.”
The door opened, and in came John the Lawyer. “Here you are,” he said. “We hoped we’d catch you before you left.”
Theo beamed. Maybe he was going to be pleasantly surprised after all. Then he noted the plural.
“We’ve got a message for you,” John went on. “From Mordak and Drain and the High Elf. They wanted you to know—”
“Hang on,” Ms. White said. “What’s this We? Did they just make you king or something?”
“It’s me,�
�� said a voice out of thin air. “I’m invisible again.”
John blushed. “We’re getting married,” he said. “Isn’t it wonderful?”
Ms. White frowned. “You’re marrying an invisible—”
“Yup,” John said. “I always said she’s not just a pretty face.” He reached out and put his arm around nothing. “And she’s going to be a model after all. So everything’s worked out just fine.”
“An invisible—”
“King Drain’s offered me a job,” said the wraith, “modelling his latest range of custom armour.”
“But—”
“He insisted,” said the wraith. “He said, if I was visible, the customers would be looking at me and not the product, because who wants to look at armour when there’s a pretty girl? So I asked Mordak, and he turned me back. Wasn’t that nice of him?”
Theo grinned at Ms. White. “Don’t change Drain too much,” he said. “I quite like him. Sorry,” he went on, “you’ve got a message for me?”
John nodded. “The federated races of the Realms would like to thank you for taking the trouble to come here and give us the result of the referendum—”
“That’s all right,” Theo said coyly. “It was the least I could do.”
“But they feel that you’re a disruptive influence and they’d be grateful if you’d please go away right now and never ever come back. And if you could see your way to not telling anybody in all the other Realms about us, we’d be ever so grateful. I think that’s everything.”
“Ah,” Theo said. “Right.”
Ms. White opened the oven door. “It’s ready,” she said.
She pulled out a baking tray, two inches thick and studded with rivets. On it sat a very ordinary looking doughnut. “Will that do?”
“Yes.”
“Splendid.” Ms. White heaved the tray up onto the table. “Right, then. On your bike.”
Theo picked up the doughnut. It was warm, and it smelt nice. “I’d just like to say—”
“No,” said Ms. White, “you wouldn’t. Goodbye.”
So Theo lifted the doughnut; and just before he looked through it, he chose which of the infinite (minus one) number of alternative realities that make up the multiverse he wanted to go to. He thought, I want to go to the version of reality that’s exactly the same as home, except the people voted Remain in the referendum instead of Leave, so I can go back.