The Parodies Collection

by Adam Roberts

  ‘Something terrible is abroad,’ said one broad-bearded man who had come to trade metal for smoked fish, and fabrics woven by Eärwiggi’s mother. The trade had been made, and now he sat in their hearth drinking ale. ‘Some say that Sharon has made a pact with the Dragons of Making, a terrible spell. They say that he will cast the world in an endless winter.’

  Eärwiggi was sitting under the table, holding its leg, as he sometimes did. And he could see his parents exchange a mysterious look between them.

  The trader noticed it too, by the firelight. ‘Yet you are free of the curse here,’ he said. ‘The land outside your walls is fresh with late spring, when the rest of Blearyland is frozen and dead. How can this be?’

  ‘We do not know,’ said Eärwiggi’s father.

  The trader stared hard at both of them. When he spoke eventually, it was with a grim tone: ‘Some say that you are enchanters. Is it so?’

  Eärwiggi’s father shook his head sorrowfully in the firelight.

  But the trader would not stay. Though it was dark outside, and bitterly cold beyond the borders of this house, yet he gathered his things and left. After that very few traders came, and soon Eärwiggi was left with none but his parents for company.

  Eärwiggi reached the age of eleven, which is an important age of transition to the elvish people, the age they say when a boy ceases to be a child. And on this day Eärwiggi’s father took him to the copse by the river to teach him the arts of boat-building. And they worked at this in the day, although it was no labour for Eärwiggi delighted in it and accounted it play. And they worked again the following day, and the day after.

  As they worked together, Eärwiggi said to his father: ‘Father, I am worried.’

  ‘Worried about what, my son?’

  ‘It seems to me that I am akin to the travellers who come here, and not akin to you and mother.’

  ‘Aching?’ asked his father.

  ‘Akin,’ clarified Eärwiggi.

  His father laughed aloud at such a strange statement by his son, and said, ‘Why would you say so?’

  ‘The travellers who come here have two hands, as do I. Yet you and mother have each but one hand. Are you a different race to the Elves and the Men of whom you have told me?’

  His father shook his head, and wiped sweat from his beard with the crook of his arm. ‘No, son,’ he said. ‘I lost my hand to a wild beast, and your mother lost hers to – an accident. Together they are only a pair of accidental injuries. But you are our son, created by the two of us together.’ And he drew his son to him and hugged him.

  That afternoon, after the boat-building was done, Eärwiggi knew his last purely happy day. And in later years he thought back to this day, and thought that there must be such a moment in all lives; a transition point from the carelessness of childhood to the anxieties of the fully grown. Such a moment can only be known afterwards, when time has already swallowed it; but it remains sweet for all that.

  The moment was by the river. The landscape in the distance was austere; the mountains in the east cold and tall, and even the hills to the south were capped with snow. Yet the land around Eärwiggi’s home was green. He stood knee-deep in the grass watching the river flow smoothly past; and the surface of the river was touched by motes like stars in a moving sky as water boatmen stood upon the water. Fruit trees that grew behind the house were feathery with blossom. A cicada hidden somewhere in the grass tried its voice by fits, as if practising upon a long unused instrument.

  He heard shouting from the front of the house, and the moment broke.

  Running round to the front he found his father and mother standing in their doorway, and a band of men on horseback in the road before them. The leader was the spade-bearded trader who had sometimes visited. ‘Sharon has walked an army across the frozen River Raver into Blearyland,’ he called, and his face was red with choler. ‘The King has ordered all Men to join the army, for we must fight the last great battle now.’

  Eärwiggi’s father said nothing, but it was clear from his face that he did not intend to go with these people.

  ‘Are you not a Man?’ bellowed the trader, leaning down and shaking a sword in his wrath. ‘Can you deny it?’

  This puzzled Eärwiggi, for he had thought his father elven, and had assumed that he himself was elven also. But his father did not deny that he was a Man, only folded his arms across his chest.

  ‘Why would you not fight?’ growled the trader, ‘a man with a family in the face of such a threat? Are you a coward? Or – are you in truth a sorcerer? Have you made some deal with Sharon?’

  ‘No!’ said Eärwiggi’s father, fiercely.

  And the horses of the band of Men started and shuffled their hooves. And the trader leant back in his saddle; until one of the other Men said, ‘Kevin, he’s crippled, a one-handed man – maybe that’s why he’s loath to fight.’

  And the trader glowered, and said nothing. And then the Men wheeled their horses and rode away, except for one man whose horse farted as he spurred it, and danced up on its hind legs tossing him to the floor.

  And it was peaceful in Eärwiggi’s home once more.

  Week followed week, and Eärwiggi heard no further tidings of the world outside. Yet he wondered about the great battle being fought to the south; and he tried to imagine the clash of weapons, the stern charges of soldiery, the bravery and the dying. But one morning Eärwiggi got up from his bed to find his parents sitting downstairs simply staring at one another.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.

  ‘Eärwiggi,’ said his father. ‘A dark hand has touched our hearts. Some dreadful thing has happened in this land, and it has touched our spirits. We fear the worst. If anything should happen to us, you must travel far from here: to the north and the west, on the northern bank of the river, and far away. Do you understand?’

  Eärwiggi said he understood, although his heart was unready.

  The weeks continued to pass, and Eärwiggi and his parents went about their usual business, but something had changed. His father and mother were spirit-broken, oppressed by some heaviness within their hearts that saddened Eärwiggi even though he could not understand it. And though they had no tidings, yet they knew that the battle had gone badly for Mankind.

  And one day a band of Orks appeared and at their head a strange shrunken figure, with something of an elvish cast to his features and yet without the dignity or beauty of an elf. His large lips wriggled like slippery ropes, alternately revealing and concealing a set of teeth that a good-sized goat would have been proud to own. Inverted J eyebrows of exaggerated size gave a supercilious cast to his protuberantly gobstopper eyes. He was wearing motley like a jester, but motley full of holes and covered in many splattery stains. It was, in fact, mottled and mothy motley.

  ‘I am Bleary,’ he announced, ‘and I am your new King, or more strictly your sub-king, a sort of junior king or kingling, serving the community here under the overlordship of Sharon. Who is Big King. I heard in the town upriver that a patch of ground here is still in spring, when the rest of Sharonia is in winter, and I see that it is true. Can you explain it?’

  ‘We cannot,’ said Eärwiggi’s father.

  ‘Hmm,’ said Bleary. ‘Hum. Most odd. Ah well, I like it here. I shall make this my official country residence. You,’ (he pointed at Eärwiggi’s father) ‘and you’ (he pointed at Eärwiggi’s mother) ‘are commanded by Sharon himself to make your way to the place formerly known as Elfton, to help with municipal construction.’

  Eärwiggi’s father stepped forward at this command, and Eärwiggi clutched his leg, saying ‘Father, do not obey this command!’

  And his father replied, in a low voice. ‘I cannot help myself. Run, son. Flee this place. Do not go south, for that way will lead you to Sharon and your doom. Go north, and west, and find if there be any free place left in Blearyland.’

  And he walked through the door, and his wife walked with him, helpless against the command; and they walked without resting until
they reached Elfton, and a dark fate.

  But Bleary, looking over his new property, and shooing away Orks who were chasing chickens across the yard, came upon Eärwiggi sitting underneath the table in the hearth room. ‘What’s this?’ he said. ‘Sprog, is it? Thinking back, I did specify the man and the woman with my command. This damn Dragon magic – you’ve got to be so careful to phrase these things precisely, or objects fall through the net. Alright, you little tyke. I am ordering you, on behalf of Sharon the mighty, to follow your parents – walk south, do not stop until you reach Elfton, and join in the construction work. Off you go.’

  So confident was Bleary of the power of the command that the Dragons’ magic gave him, in the name of Sharon, that he paid no more attention to the boy; and his Orks were gorging themselves on the home-stead’s livestock in the barn, and he hurried out to remonstrate with them. So Eärwiggi hurried from the house.

  But he did not walk south. Instead he crept down to the river, and the boat that he had built with his father, and he pushed this into the water and climbed in, lying down in the bottom of it, and allowing the waters to carry him west.

  Eärwiggi’s boat took him down the long stretches of the River Optik and into the broad amber waters of the Lothlomondwisky. He paddled the boat to the northern shore, and pulled it into the sand. Using a fallen bough he levered it over to make a roof, and burrowed under the sand at the stern to make an entrance. With thread and hook, and a twist of his hair as lure, he caught a salmon in the stream, and cooked it on a driftwood fire.

  But the land here was barren with snow, and Eärwiggi underneath his boat-roof slept poorly because of the cold. He was still tired when the morning came, and he rubbed his eyes and pondered his fate as he walked beside the lake. The shore of the lake was sandy, with pebbles set in the sand. And when he looked more closely at the sand he saw that it was composed of tiny fragments of thin shells, broken by waves into patterns of miniature crescents and stars and other shapes, shells frail as paper. He thought to himself: did shrimp and watersnails think their shells would keep them safe in such a world?

  Now, the winter was severe across Blearyland, but more severe still further north; and the wolves of the far north had been driven south by weather extreme even for them. They flocked from the Wa!-Wastes into Illbhavior, and roamed the northern shores of the River Optik. And as Eärwiggi wandered lone and lorn, a pack of wolves scented him. And they came in a tight pack, loping across the sand.

  Eärwiggi saw them approach, and thought quickly. He looked to the frost-furred trees at the top of the beach, and looked to the swiftly approaching pack of wolves. And he ran, fast as his eleven-year-old legs could run: but not to the trees. Instead he ran straight into the amber waters of the lake, and swam out. The water was cold as death is cold, and Eärwiggi gasped; but still he swam.

  The wolves gathered on the water’s margin, but did not come any closer. They turned and turned in tight circles, with their long shaggy muzzles and yellow eyes always pointing at Eärwiggi, waiting for the time when he was too tired and was forced to come ashore. For a while Eärwiggi trod water, and wondered what to do.

  But then he heard somebody speaking a language he did not understand; and the words of this language were as follows: ‘Bach! glub! glub! over yeer! Look you!’

  And looking around Eärwiggi saw a figure floundering in the water, a little way from where he was. So he swam over to the figure, crying aloud with the cold as he pushed his arms through the water.

  ‘Hello,’ said the figure. His broad head was just visible above the water, but Eärwiggi was aware of the furious action of his limbs underneath the surface.

  ‘Hello,’ said Eärwiggi.

  ‘Bit of bother, look you,’ said the figure. ‘A little help would be very special.’

  ‘Alright,’ said Eärwiggi. ‘What’s the problem?’

  ‘The problem is that my beard, like, is tied to a boulder under the water. On the lake bed, do you see, blub-glub.’

  ‘How did that happen?’

  ‘Oh, it’s a long story, actually. But, you see, what with the beard tying me here I’ve been treading water. For quite a long time in fact. We Dwarfs we’re strong, and good on endurance, but there’s a limit, and I’m not far off that limit now, I’d say.’

  ‘Oh dear.’

  ‘If you’d be so good as to swim down – you can feel your way down the beard like a hairy anchor chain. Unsnag it, and I’ll be forever in your debt.’

  So Eärwiggi took a deep breath, and dived under the water. It was many yards to the lakebed, and he pulled himself down the dwarf’s beard through the peat-red waters. He could see his way as he swam, but he felt down to a slimy smooth boulder, around which the dwarf’s beard had been wrapped and tied. Though the water was cold enough to chill his heartbeat, and though he worked blind, yet Eärwiggi had nimble fingers and he was soon able to unpick the knot.

  He struggled to the surface, and took as deep a breath as his frozen lungs allowed him. ‘I can’t thank you enough,’ said the Dwarf. ‘I was on the verge of going under the water then, I don’t mind telling you. Let’s get over to the shore.’

  ‘There are,’ Eärwiggi panted, ‘wolves . . .’

  ‘Bah,’ said the Dwarf. ‘Wolves? Neither year nor there.’

  ‘Year?’ said Eärwiggi, who was confused and weary with the great cold.

  ‘Come on,’ said the Dwarf. He splashed over to the beach with strokes of his little arms. And the wolves saw him coming, and gathered in a pack. The Dwarf reached the shore as the wolves prepared to lunge for him, each animal competing with its fellow for first bite. But the Dwarf plucked heavy pebbles from the sand under the shallow water, and hurled them with his muscular arms. A first pebble struck the lead wolf between its eyes and split its skull; a second caught another wolf in the same spot, with the same result. The Dwarf drew back his arm for a third throw, and the remaining wolves turned their tails and ran for the treeline.

  The Dwarf collapsed face down in the water. As Eärwiggi dragged him up the beach, with no small effort, and many fallings-over, he murmured, ‘Glad that second stone sent the rest away. I wouldn’t have had the strength for a third throw, look you. That’s what three days and three nights treading water will do for your muscles, la.’

  Eärwiggi dragged the Dwarf to the upturned boat, and left him under cover there. Then he caught more fish from the stream, and lit a fire, and dried himself and his clothes, and did the same for the Dwarf’s clothes. And after sleeping for many hours, and eating his fill of fish, and wringing out his beard and plaiting it and tying it several times around his waist, the Dwarf became more much conversational.

  ‘My name,’ he said, ‘is Nobbi. And I am in your debt, young fellow.’

  ‘My name is Eärwiggi. And I am in yours. Debt I mean. For you drove off the wolves.’

  ‘Driving off wolves? That’s sport, that is. Don’t mention it.’

  ‘Sir Nobbi,’ said Eärwiggi, ‘where are you from? For I notice that you say thass instead of that’s, and year instead of here.’

  ‘Dwarfish accent, that,’ said Nobbi. ‘Mel. Oh. Dios. I think so, any rate.’

  ‘And how did you come to be tied to the rock at the bed of the lake?’

  ‘Ah,’ said the Dwarf. ‘Long story.’

  ‘We have time.’

  ‘Not for this story. No, when I say long, I mean long. Long. Last all winter in the telling.’

  ‘They say the winter will never end.’

  ‘Well,’ said the Dwarf. ‘Quite. What about you?’

  ‘My parents have been made into slaves by the Evil One, Sharon. He has overrun the whole of Blearyland, and made all the people into slaves; for a Dragon’s spell has given him dominion over all Men and Elves for as long as there are men and elves.’

  ‘Hmm,’ grunted Nobbi, in assent. ‘Politics, is it?’

  ‘Politics?’

  ‘Always some politics going on with Men and Elves and Orks. Good one season, evil the
next. The way I see it, good, evil, whichever: the government always gets in.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Eärwiggi.

  ‘If I was you, boy,’ the Dwarf continued, ‘I’d take a dwarfish perspective on things. I mean, if fighting the ultimate battle of good against evil actually changed anything, they’d make it illegal. Don’t you think?’

  Eärwiggi pondered this. ‘You do sound a little disillusioned with the whole political system, Sir Nobbi.’

  ‘Disillusioned?’ said the Dwarf. ‘Perhaps I am a little jaded, la, with the two-party system. Why does it have to be either good or evil, see? Why can’t we have a ethical system that truly represents the rainbow of moral positions real people adopt in the real world, see?’

  But this conversation was only puzzling to Eärwiggi’s head. ‘Surely I should be good – shouldn’t I? Strive at all times to tell the truth, for instance?’

  ‘Truth,’ said Nobbi, knowingly.

  ‘Isn’t the truth better than lies?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ said the Dwarf, tapping his prodigious nose.

  ‘At any rate,’ said Eärwiggi, ‘I still hope for the final victory of good over evil.’

  ‘You think?’ said the Dwarf. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well,’ said Eärwiggi. ‘My parents told me many stories as I grew up about the history of Upper Middle Earth, and in all of them it seemed that good was defeated, that catastrophe was inevitable, that evil was about to prevail for all time – until at the very last minute, with the last glimmer of hope, good triumphed.’

  ‘Stories,’ said Nobbi, sucking the last flesh from the bones of the salmon Eärwiggi had caught. ‘You think because it’s been like that in history so far, that it’ll be like that in the future? Why should it?’ He flourished his hand in the air with a turning motion, and said, ‘Good triumphs at the last against the odds one time. Good triumphs at the last against the odds a second time. Good triumphs at the last against the odds a third time, la. Does it seem likely to you that it’s going to go on and on like that?’