by Tom Holt
Archie closed his eyes and forced himself to speak. “I’d like a flower, please.”
“Sure. Plain or self-raising?”
Bloody silly question. “Self-raising, of course. I’ve got better things to do with my time. Right,” he went on, “chocolate.”
Apparently there were all sorts of different varieties. He chose one at random, which happened to be the cheapest, so he bought six bars. Then he caught the bus to the crossroads, and walked the seven miles back to the film set. There he changed into the plain grey suit he’d borrowed from one of the cameramen, sneaked into the stores for the finishing touch, polished his shoes with axle grease till they practically glowed, and set off for the trailer the Elf shared with one of the continuity girls. He knocked on the door and waited.
“Oh,” said the Elf. “It’s you.”
Here goes nothing, he said to himself. “I got you these.” He handed her the plastic carrier bag. “Um, would you like to—?”
She peered into the bag. “Did you want me to bake you a cake?” she said. “Only if you do, we’ll need some eggs.”
“Cake?”
“A pound of self-raising flour and six bars of cooking chocolate. I’m quite clever, you know, I can draw inferences. Why are you dressed like that?”
“I, um, wanted to look nice.”
“Really. What’s that plastic thing round your neck for?”
“It’s a tie.”
“It’s a cable tie. Hold on, though.” She looked at him as though he were a thousandth of a millimetre wide and lying on a glass slide. “Are you asking me out?”
“Well, yes. Sort of.”
“Sort of. It’s not exactly a grey area.”
“Yes. I’m asking you out. All right?”
“Hold on,” she said. “I’ll get my coat.”
There are few things as disconcerting as unanticipated success. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, it might rain. Won’t be a second.”
He realised he was still holding the carrier bag. “Don’t you want your—?” he called after her, but the question seemed fairly superfluous. He put the bag on the ground and nudged it under the trailer with his foot.
She must be a very untidy person, he thought, it’s taking her a long time to find her coat. When eventually she reappeared, she’d done something to her face. In spite of himself, he was impressed. He never knew Elves did that. “Right,” she said. “Where shall we go?”
He thought for a moment. “Well,” he said, “round the back of the equipment store, there’s a place where they’ve dumped a load of big galvanised iron sheets. We could try under there.”
The way she looked at him suggested that maybe they were at cross purposes. “You what?”
“Rat-hunting,” he said.
“Rat-hunting?”
“Well, yes. I mean, I thought—” He paused for a moment to regulate his breathing. “You’ve put some sort of anti-glare agent on your face,” he said, “to stop your skin shining. It’s what we do when we go rat-hunting, so the rats don’t see us coming. Only we use brick dust. And the red stuff round the mouth is sort of symbolic of the kill. Isn’t it?”
She was perfectly still and silent for a moment. Then she said, “Of course it is. Let’s go hunt some rat.”
A couple of hours later, Archie began to wonder if there wasn’t something in this human idea of a good time after all. It soon became apparent that she hadn’t done much rat-hunting before, but she was a quick learner, and her reactions were excellent. Thirty-seven rats, four mice and a hedgehog later, she looked at him with shining eyes and said, “How many do we need?”
“Excuse me?”
“For the pie, or whatever it is you’ve got in mind. Do we need any more, or will these do?”
He shuddered as discreetly as he could. “You want to eat them?”
“Well, no, actually. Don’t you?”
“No. It sounds disgusting.”
“Oh. Then why are we—?”
He blinked twice. “Rats are a pest,” he said. “They spread disease, contaminate foodstuffs and gnaw the coating off the electric cables.”
“Oh. Right. Silly me.” She looked down at her hands, which were covered in blood and grime. “Do you think we’ve controlled them enough to be going on with?”
“Probably,” he said. “Before now, the most I’ve ever caught in one day was four.”
“Four?”
“That’s right. I think it could be because back home we use a net, not our hands and teeth. But your way seems to work much better.”
She breathed out heavily through her nose, then smiled at him. “I think I’d like to wash my face and hands,” she said. “And then we could have a drink or something.”
He nodded. “All that dust,” he said. “Makes you thirsty.”
There was a perfectly good stream nearby, where they could have washed up and drunk something without having to go any further, but for some reason she insisted on going to the canteen. “Let me guess,” she said, as they sat in a corner with two glasses of lemonade, “this is your first time going out.”
He nodded. “For all I know, it’s the first time a goblin’s gone out ever,” he said. “You see, back home—”
She nodded. “Vats,” she said. “Beige goo. Parthenogenesis. I’ve always assumed that’s why goblins are so bad tempered. Because they never get any.”
“Any what?”
“Quality time with a soulmate,” she replied. “But that was there, and we’re here. Might as well make the best of it, don’t you think?”
“That’s what Kurt thinks,” Archie said.
“Kurt.”
“This was his idea,” Archie said. “Going out, I mean.”
“I see. Thank you for telling me that.”
“But actually,” Archie said, “it wasn’t as bad as I expected. In fact, it’s been—” He frowned, searching for the right word.
“All right?”
He nodded. He’d heard that the humans regarded finishing each other’s sentences as one of the hallmarks of true love. “Better than sitting around all afternoon with nothing to do, certainly.”
“As good as that.”
He considered. Another thing humans prize in their relationships, so he’d been given to believe, was perfect honesty. “Yes. Not much better, but definitely as good as.”
“Mphm.”
“So,” said Archie. “How was it for you?”
“I think I can truthfully say it’s the most fun I’ve ever had rat-hunting.”
He smiled. “That’s great,” he said. “Kurt will be so pleased. We must do it again sometime.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Why not?”
“All right,” Archie said. “That’ll be, um, fine. I’ll look forward to it.”
She nodded, then looked at him a bit sideways. “Did you actually want to go rat-hunting?”
“No,” Archie said. “I thought you did. That’s why you put the anti-glare stuff on.”
He got the impression she was counting under her breath. “It’s not actually anti-glare stuff.”
“But you said—Oh well. No harm done. So what is it? Insect repellent?”
“Yes.”
He nodded. “Well, it works. Haven’t heard so much as a mosquito all evening.”
She stood up. “I think I’ll go back to my trailer now. Same time, tomorrow, then.”
“If you like.”
“Thank you for a lovely evening.”
“It wasn’t that good.”
She smiled at him and walked away quickly. Archie finished his lemonade, then went to find Kurt. After a long search he found him in makeup. “Why are they painting your face that peculiar colour?” he asked.
“To make me look natural.”
“Orange?”
“Under the lights,” Kurt explained, “if I didn’t have this stuff on, I’d be white as a sheet. How did it go?”
“Oh, all right,” Archie said. “Actually, I think you’ve just
solved a bit of a mystery for me. It wasn’t insect repellent, or so her shiny nose wouldn’t frighten the rats. It was to make her look natural.”
Kurt forebore to comment, or maybe he hadn’t been listening. “So what did you do?”
“Well, first we caught some rats.”
“Right. And then?”
“Then we got washed and went for a lemonade in the canteen.”
“Get many rats?”
“Thirty-seven.”
“My God. I’ve never had more than three in an afternoon.” Kurt shrugged. “Well, that doesn’t sound so bad. Did she–I mean, she didn’t mind?”
“She said she had a lovely time.”
“Ah.” Kurt had to hold still while they stuck on his eyebrows. They’d shaved off his real ones. The false ones looked exactly the same. “Just as well you did the recon for me. That stupid mare Jenny’s been dropping so many hints, if I don’t ask her out soon there’s going to be trouble.”
“Jenny?”
“The female lead. Tall woman, skinny arms. Barely enough on her for a good dinner. Oh well, if they like rat-hunting, that’s okay.”
“Oh, and don’t give them flowers. Not unless you want a cake.”
“Noted,” Kurt said. “Actually, I don’t mind cake.”
“Then be sure to take some eggs.”
“Will do.” The makeup artist was painting broad blue rings under his eyes. “I was right, then. She does fancy you.”
“I don’t know.” Archie picked up a stick of greasepaint, bit the end off, chewed it (too salty) and spat it out. “It’s so hard to tell. Most of the time she gives me the impression she finds me really annoying, but she wants to see me again tonight. I don’t know what to make of it, really.”
“Oh, they’re like that,” Kurt said airily. “Courtship rituals. You can see why the First Goblins went over to vats. So much less aggravation for all concerned.”
Like most Elves, Efluviel wasn’t a morning person. She was not best pleased, therefore, when someone came hammering on her tree-house door just as the Beautiful Golden Face peeped over the horizon.
“Oh,” she said. “It’s you.”
King Mordak took a moment to catch his breath. “Suggestion for you,” he panted. “Buy a fucking ladder.”
She smirked at him. “Bit of an effort, isn’t it? Especially if you’re not used to it. Of course, Elves learn to climb trees practically as soon as they can walk.”
“Like monkeys.”
“Indeed. What do you want?”
Mordak grinned at her. He was carrying, she noticed, a rucksack crammed with every sort of junk imaginable. “The good news is,” he said, “I’ve decided to assign you a partner for your fact-finding mission.”
“That’s the bad news,” Efluviel replied. “What’s the good news?”
“Your partner is me,” Mordak said. “Mind out of the way, that’s a good girl. This pack is killing me.”
A strange sort of numb feeling crept down Efluviel’s spine. “Why are you carrying all that stuff?”
“For the journey.” Mordak slid out from under the rucksack’s straps and grounded it with a crash. “Bare essentials, that’s all.”
Efluviel could see the handle of an omelette pan sticking up from under the flap; also the eyepiece of an astrolabe and a small rosewood box of the sort that usually contains geometrical instruments. “Are you going somewhere?”
“We’re going somewhere,” Mordak corrected her, massaging his collar-bone. “Talking of which, why aren’t you packed yet?”
“Going where?”
“To find the truth, of course.”
“That’s a reason, not a destination.”
Mordak sighed. “Fine,” he said, “little Miss Hair-splitter. Wherever the quest takes us, all right? Talking of which, you weren’t thinking of wearing those shoes, were you? You’ll get the most dreadful blisters.”
“I’m not—” She checked herself. “I wasn’t planning on going anywhere involving much walking,” she said. “Down to the Face building, to check the archives. Maybe up as far as the University. For which,” she added, “I don’t suppose we’ll need all that lot, unless you feel the need to stop every fifty yards and fry something.”
He was grinning again. “Don’t be silly,” he said. “You won’t find anything useful there, my people have already looked. No, I thought we might head out to Farn Snefir and check out the Unconventional Sisters.”
She could feel the blood drain from her face. “Are you mad? That’s miles away. It’s dangerous. There’s wolves and bears and—” She stopped dead.
“And goblins, yes. That,” he added firmly, “is not a problem.”
“There’s no public transport.”
“Shucks.”
“There’s no road.”
“Indeed.” Mordak picked up his pack and wriggled into it. “Hence my concern about your footwear. Still, you know best. I’ll make a start and you can catch me up, after you’ve packed.”
Ten minutes later she fell in beside him on the road. This time, she was the one fighting for breath.
“About time,” Mordak said. “What’s that you’re carrying?”
“My suitcase, of course.”
“Ah.”
She shifted it to her other hand. “Where’s the cart?”
“What cart?”
“The cart to take us as far as possible along the road.”
“Oh, that cart. There isn’t one. Try and keep up, there’s a good girl.”
“Why isn’t there a—?”
Mordak sighed. “Oh come on,” he said. “Goblins like horses but horses don’t like goblins. You should know that, being a journalist.”
As indeed she did, having covered the Gork Pies scandal, when Goblinland’s biggest bakery chain was accused of adulterating its popular range of horse pies with cow-meat. She’d written editorials about it, now she came to think about it. “You mean we’re going to have to walk the whole way?”
“Good healthy exercise,” Mordak said cheerfully, as Efluviel stopped to wrap a handkerchief around her hand, where the handle of the suitcase had bitten into it. “So much better for you than being bounced around in a cart all day.”
Editor of the Face, she told herself, what’s a little stroll in the country compared to that?
“And besides,” Mordak went on, striding ahead, “it’ll help you get in shape for when things really start getting energetic. You know what you could do with? One of those suitcases with the built-in little wheels. Though they wouldn’t be much help when we reach the Marshes.”
As it happened, the suitcase came in very useful at several points over the next three days. They hid behind it from a pack of hungry wolves, sheltered under it from a rockfall in the Anguent Pass, used it as a shield in a skirmish with bandits and pushed it in front of them like a sort of float as they waded waist-deep through the cauliflower swamps of Varn Medrith. After all that, the stuff inside it wasn’t good for anything much, so that when they had to dump it in order to use the case as a canoe for crossing the flood-swollen Fords of Nosen, it was no great loss. The case itself finally gave up the ghost after they slalomed down the shale-heaps of Onym Pal on it, but it held together until they were nearly at the bottom, so that was all right. It was just as well, Mordak graciously conceded, that they’d had it with them. Without it, the journey might have been a bit awkward.
On the evening of the fourth day they hobbled into the tiny fortified village of Farn Snefir, which perches on the southern escarpment of the Taupe Mountains like a small hat on a big head on a windy day. Farn Snepir had about thirty inhabitants, twenty-nine of whom fled as soon as they saw a goblin marching up the road toward them. Fortunately the one who stayed was the innkeeper, who charged them seventeen pieces of silver for a meal they’d have buried in a lead box back home, and told them the way to the Fountain.
Just before dawn on the fifth day, Mordak and Efluviel (wearing Mordak’s spare boots, since her shoes were buried
somewhere deep in the sand-drifts of Evlum; the boots were much too big, but she padded them out with cabbage leaves) trudged up the goat-track that led from the village to the mountain. They almost passed the cottage without seeing it, for it was set back from the track and sheltered by a screen of tall, spindly elm trees. But there was a splintered wooden board nailed to one of the trees, and if you looked closely you could just about make out
FOUNT OF ALL KNOLEDG
in faded grey lettering.
“Is this it?” Efluviel asked.
“Afraid so,” Mordak replied. “Now, whatever you do, leave the talking to me. Otherwise it could get complicated.”
“Suit yourself.”
Mordak leaned the spear he’d been using as a staff against the cottage wall, sighed, gritted his teeth and knocked on the door.
They had to wait a long time. Eventually, though, the upstairs window directly above their heads creaked open an inch, and they saw a rusty key dangling on the end of a piece of string. Mordak took the key, turned it in the lock and took it out again; immediately it was whisked away, and he heard the window slam.
The single room that comprised the lower floor of the cottage was empty, apart from a broken milking-stool and three chickens. They looked round, and on the wall directly above the fireplace they saw, scrawled in charcoal letters
Pleas hold
Yor visit is importnt to us
A coleag will be with you shortly
“The Unconventional Sisters?” Efluviel asked.
“Weird’s rude,” Mordak replied. “Listen up, someone’s coming.”
The stairs creaked, and three women trooped into the room.
Although he’d been hearing about the Fount for years and knew plenty of people who’d gone there, it was the first time Mordak had actually been there himself. Accordingly, he was partially but not fully prepared for what he now saw. The women: from the neck down, they were perfectly ordinary, in a genteel-shabby sort of a way; their dresses had been meticulously ironed many, many times and their shoes were so sensible they could practically speak. From the neck up—
The tallest woman, dressed in blue, said, “Who’s got the eye?”
A weary sighing noise from her sister in the brown dress. Blue thought about it, opened her mouth, took out a tongue (wrinkled and sort of pinky-grey) and passed it to Brown, who popped it into her mouth and said, “She has.” Blue frowned, mouthed something, snapped her fingers. Brown pulled back her hair to reveal an ear, which she pulled out with a faint plopping noise and handed over. Blue installed the ear and prodded Brown on the shoulder. “She has,” Brown repeated. Then she took out the tongue and gave it to Blue, who then unplugged the ear and held it out to the third sister, in green, who took it and stuffed it in place. “Have you got the eye?” Blue said. Green nodded. “I said, have you got the eye?” Blue repeated. Green took out the ear and handed it to Blue; Blue gave her the tongue. “Yes,” Green said.