by David Sinden
Ulf was beside her. He felt a drip on his head and looked up. Another drip fell, then another. All around, drips began splashing on to the floor of the Troll Chamber. It was as if it was beginning to rain deep inside the mountain. He wiped his hair. Black liquid clung to his fingers. “What’s happening?” he asked.
Dr. Fielding shone her flashlight on the roof of the chamber. “It looks like oil,” she said.
Ulf could hear it trickling down the walls.
“Where’s it coming from?” Orson asked.
Trolls started beating their chests. “Oof! Oof! Oof! Oof!”
Some banged the walls with their fists.
As more oil poured down from the roof of the chamber, Tiana darted into Ulf’s pocket to protect herself.
Suddenly, there was a roaring sound as the oil caught fire. Flames swirled around the ceiling and spread down the walls.
“Take cover!” Orson yelled. He threw his arms around Dr. Fielding and Ulf, shielding them as flaming oil splashed to the ground.
The trolls charged for the exits.
The chamber was filling with smoke – thick, black smoke that made Ulf’s eyes sting and bit into the back of his throat. He pulled his T-shirt up over his mouth.
“Get out!” Orson shouted. “I’ll get the trolls.”
Ulf tried to run, but in the thick smoke he could hardly see. He was coughing and choking. Flames were roaring around him. Trolls were crashing past him, barging him to the side as they raced to escape.
“Ulf! Over here,” he heard.
Ulf caught a glimpse of Dr. Fielding’s flashlight and staggered toward it. But at that moment, a sheet of flames fell in front of him. He shielded his face from the fire. “It’s no use!” he called. He was being pushed back by the heat.
A troll thumped into him and Ulf was knocked to the ground.
“Get up, Ulf,” Tiana called from his pocket.
He scrambled to his feet and staggered to the back of the burning chamber, following a group of stampeding trolls into a narrow exit. He’d lost Orson and Dr. Fielding.
“We’ve got to get outside,” Tiana called. “Run!”
Ulf ran as fast as he could up a back tunnel, slipping and sliding over the rocks. He heard a blast and glanced back as the chamber erupted in a fireball behind him.
The fireball hurled him through the air, and he landed with a thump, his head crashing against the tunnel wall. The lamp on his head was smashed.
“Ulf, are you okay?” he heard from his pocket.
But everything was a blur. The bang to Ulf’s head had injured him. He felt dizzy.
Then he felt his ankle being gripped by a bony hand. He was being dragged along the floor of the tunnel, and pulled into a cool dark cave. He heard a boulder being rolled across the entrance, cutting off the smoke.
Ulf felt himself losing consciousness. Tiana flew from his pocket, and in her glow he could just make out the face of a beast with white eyes, pointy ears, and a fat snout.
A goblin was leaning over him.
“Gumball!” Ulf managed to say. Then everything went black.
Chapter 11
ULF OPENED HIS EYES. HE WAS LYING ON HIS BACK, staring up at the roof of a cave. He sniffed. The cave smelt musty. He felt his head. There was a big bump on his scalp.
“Give that back!” he heard.
Ulf sat up and coughed. His mouth tasted of smoke. At the back of the cave, he saw Tiana’s light. She was buzzing angrily above Gumball. The goblin was in the shadows, his bony hands clutching Ulf’s broken headlamp.
“Mine now,” the goblin said. “My shiny.”
“It’s not yours,” Tiana said indignantly. She pulled the strap of the headlamp as hard as she could. “It’s Ulf’s.”
“Tiana, what’s going on?” Ulf asked.
Tiana glanced over at him. “Ulf, you’re awake! You’ve been out for hours,” she told him.
At that moment, the goblin yanked the strap of the headlamp from Tiana’s grip. “Bad luck, fairy,” he told her. “My shiny now.”
Ulf looked around. He was in Gumball’s Grotto. By the light of Tiana’s sparkles, he could see shiny metal objects dotting the walls: tin cans, bottle tops, and coins.
“Let him have it, Tiana. It’s broken anyway,” Ulf said.
“But he’s a thief,” Tiana replied.
“He saved our lives,” Ulf told her.
“He only wanted your headlamp.”
The goblin hugged the headlamp and started polishing it against his chest. “My shiny shiny,” he muttered.
“You’re a selfish beast,” Tiana said to him.
The goblin looked across at Ulf and grinned. His teeth were black and broken, his face was dirty, and wispy gray hairs sprouted from his wrinkled skin.
“We’ve been looking for you, Gumball,” Ulf said. “We got your message.”
“What message?” Gumball asked.
“Your messenger bat. It arrived yesterday.”
The little goblin smiled. “My bat’s safe?”
“It’s at the RSPCB.”
The goblin stopped smiling and started trembling. “I didn’t send the messenger bat,” he said. Gumball stepped back into the shadows, clutching the headlamp. “He did.”
“He?” Ulf asked, puzzled.
Gumball placed the headlamp on a ledge on the wall, then started rearranging his shiny objects.
Tiana flew over and kicked a shiny tin can to the floor. “Goblin, what are you talking about?”
The little goblin picked the can up and started polishing it.
“Who sent the messenger bat, Gumball?” Ulf asked.
The goblin’s hand was shaking as he polished. “Nasty man,” he said. “Nasty man took my bat.”
“What nasty man?” Tiana asked.
The goblin raised his shaky hand and turned down his little finger. “Nasty man missing finger.”
Ulf and Tiana gasped.
“Marackai!” Ulf said.
“Marackai’s here?” Tiana shrieked.
“When did you see this man, Gumball?” Ulf asked.
“A day ago. Out there.” Gumball pointed to the ceiling.
Ulf looked up and saw a hole. He stepped to the wall and climbed up, poking his head into the hole. He felt cold air on his face. “Come on, Tiana.”
Ulf squeezed through the hole and began pulling himself up a long craggy shaft, gripping hold of its rocky sides.
“Where are you going, Ulf ?” Tiana called, flying after him.
“We have to warn Dr. Fielding,” he called to her. He climbed higher and higher until he saw a layer of snow above him. He pushed up through the snow into bright daylight. Ulf squinted, wiping the snow from his head. He was at the top of Honeycomb Mountain. The blizzard had stopped and the sky was clearing.
Ulf climbed out and saw trolls lying on the ground. Tiana flew out behind him.
“What’s happened?” she asked.
Ulf rushed to a troll and found a feathered dart stuck into its arm. It was snoring. “They’ve been tranquilized,” he said, puzzled.
Ulf saw bootprints in the snow where humans had been walking. He traced them to a hole that was black and oily. On the ground was a matchbox. He picked it up. “That fire was started on purpose!” he said.
Just then, Gumball the goblin poked his head out from his hole. “Nasty man smoked out the trolls,” the little goblin said. “He took the young ones away.”
“Ulf, look!” Tiana called. She was hovering over a backpack that was half buried in the snow. It was Dr. Fielding’s. Orson’s lantern lay smashed a short distance away. Ulf ran over and saw a crater in the snow the size of the giant and a long trench running to an icy track as if Orson had been dragged away. Ulf could see tire marks on the track that led down the mountain. He looked across at the RSPCB helicopter. Its blades had been bent.
“Tiana, it was a trap!” he said. “Marackai sent that message. And now he’s taken Dr. Fielding and Orson!”
“Taken them?” T
iana asked. “Where?”
Ulf turned to the little goblin. “Gumball, did you see where the nasty man went?” he asked.
“Bad place,” Gumball muttered.
“Gumball, we need to know,” Ulf said.
Gumball scurried over and tapped the matchbox in Ulf’s hand. Ulf looked at it. On the matchbox was a picture of a wooden building. “Loadem Lodge,” he read.
The goblin scuttled to the edge of the mountain.
“Where are you going?” Ulf called, running after him. Ulf stopped suddenly. It was a sheer drop down.
Gumball pointed north to the far end of a long valley. In the distance, Ulf could just make out a wooden building at the base of a hill. A thin trail of smoke was rising from its chimney . . .
In the hunter’s lounge of Loadem Lodge, Baron Marackai was standing at the fireplace, a log fire crackling behind him as he finished telling a story. “And that’s how I bagged my first troll,” he said, smiling.
The guests cheered.
“Awesome!” Chuck Armstrong said.
“Tell us another one,” Lady Semolina said.
Baron Marackai fetched a large leatherbound photograph album from a cabinet at the side of the room. “You’ll enjoy this,” he said, laying it on a coffee table in front of his guests.
The guests turned the pages of the photograph album one at a time, their eyes wide with excitement.
“Those were the days,” Baron Marackai said. “Oh, to have lived then!”
The album was full of old black-and-white photographs of beast hunters, each proudly holding up the head of a dead beast mounted on a plaque.
“Now zat iz vot I call hunting,” Herr Herman Pinkel said.
“Those guys were real experts,” Chuck Armstrong added.
“Great men, all of them,” the Baron said. “Real men.”
He gave Lady Semolina a wink. She giggled and licked her moustache.
Then the door opened. The Baron looked around as Blud stepped in. “What is it, Blud? Can’t you see I’m enthralling these people with my stories?”
“It’s all done, sir,” Blud told him.
“Splendid,” the Baron replied, ushering the small man back out into the lobby. He closed the door behind him. “Were they all there?” he asked.
“No, sir,” Blud replied. “Just the vet and the giant.”
“Are you certain?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Oh, what a shame,” the Baron sighed. “I had hoped the werewolf would come too. It’s a full moon tonight. I wanted his beast head for my wall.”
Blud sneezed, then wiped his nose with his snotty red rag. “What shall we do with the prisoners? Can we kill them now?”
“Not yet,” the Baron told him. “I have plans for them. We’re going to have a little fun tonight!”
Chapter 12
“COME ON, ULF. WE HAVE TO GET TO LOADEM Lodge,” Tiana called, flying toward the long winding track that led down the mountain.
Ulf unfolded Professor Farraway’s map. “Wait a second,” he told her. On the map was a long hollow shaft that spiralled down through the center of the mountain. “The Corkscrew,” he read. “There’s a quicker way.”
Ulf took the silver compass from his pocket to check his bearings.
The little goblin reached out and touched the compass. “Shiny,” he said.
Tiana came flying back. “You can’t have that, Gumball,” she said.
“Sorry, Gumball, I need this,” Ulf told him, checking which way the compass needle was pointing. He looked at the little goblin. Gumball’s eyes were fixed on the shiny silver.
“Thanks for your help,” Ulf said. “But I’m afraid we have to go now.”
Ulf turned and ran off through the snow, looking for a square-sided cave. “In here, Tiana,” he called.
Tiana flew over and darted after Ulf into the cave. Her sparkles illuminated the walls.
Ulf navigated using the Professor’s map. He squeezed along narrow passageways and ducked through openings. Every so often he heard the sound of little footsteps behind him.
Gumball was following.
“What’s he doing?” Ulf asked.
“He wants your compass,” Tiana said.
“Maybe he just wants to help,” Ulf told her.
Ulf stopped and glanced back up the tunnel. The goblin scurried behind a rock.
“Gumball!” Ulf called. “It’s okay. You can come with us.”
Gumball was hiding.
“Goblins are so shifty,” Tiana said. “Come on, leave him.”
Ulf turned and continued down the tunnel. He led the way to a round chamber with damp walls. In its center was a large hole in the floor. Water was trickling into it.
“Are you sure this is the way?” Tiana asked.
“It says so on the Professor’s map,” Ulf replied. He peered down the hole. It fell away into blackness. He picked up a stone and dropped it down. He heard it clattering against rock, counting to twenty as the sounds became fainter. “This must be the Corkscrew.”
“It sounds a long way down,” Tiana said. “Are you sure it’s safe?”
“We have to hurry,” Ulf replied. He slipped the map and compass into his pockets, then sat on the edge of the hole. “See you at the bottom.”
Ulf dropped feet-first into the hole and shot downward, sliding against the wet walls of a narrow shaft. Water sprayed into his eyes and mouth and a whooshing sound roared in his ears as he gathered speed. The shaft was pitch black. It twisted and turned round and round like a corkscrew. He was hurtling faster and faster down through the mountain.
Suddenly, he felt the walls vanish. He was falling through air. Below, he could hear the roar of rushing water. He landed with a splash, plunging into an ice-cold underground river. Ulf sank, tumbling and twisting. He kicked his legs and swam to the surface.
“Are you okay?” he heard. He looked up and saw Tiana zooming down toward him, her sparkles illuminating the water. Ulf gasped. He was being swept away. He saw his map being washed downriver, and his rope uncoiling from his shoulder in the current. Ulf grabbed its end.
“Over here, Ulf,” Tiana called, flying to a rocky shore at the edge of the river. Ulf kicked frantically, swimming as hard as he could, fighting against the current. He reached for the rocks, grabbing hold of them, then pulled himself out. Behind him, he heard a splash.
“What was that?” he asked.
Tiana flew out across the water. By her light, Ulf saw pointy ears surface in the river.
“Oh no, it’s Gumball,” Tiana cried.
The little goblin was struggling to stay afloat, his arms thrashing. “Help!” he called. He was being dragged along by the current.
Downriver, Ulf saw a line of yellow fins rise from the water. He watched in horror as the huge head of a sword serpent broke the surface. “Gumball, swim!” he called.
Tiana was flying above the little goblin. “Gumball, swim, you idiot!” she yelled. “You’ll get eaten!”
The goblin was being washed toward the serpent.
“Gumball, watch out!” Ulf called.
The serpent opened its jaws, its fangs glinting like swords.
Quickly, Ulf tied a loop in his rope to make a lasso. He swung the lasso over his head, then threw it. The serpent lunged. The lasso looped around Gumball, and Ulf tugged. The serpent’s jaws slammed shut, just missing the goblin. Ulf pulled on the rope as fast as he could, dragging Gumball through the water. The sword serpent thrashed its tail and followed. It hissed as Ulf heaved Gumball on to the rocks, then it butted the shore and disappeared back under the water. The soaking-wet goblin lay on the rocks, spluttering.
“Are you okay, Gumball?” Ulf asked.
“You silly beast,” Tiana said, darting over. “You could have died.”
Gumball squirted water from his mouth. “Gumball coming too,” he said.
Ulf smiled, then pulled out his compass, trying to work out which way to go next.
Gumball reached out his bony
hand. “Gimme,” he said to Ulf.
Tiana slapped the goblin’s finger. “You ungrateful beast,” she said. “Is that stupid compass all you can think about? Ulf just saved your life.”
Gumball drew his hand back slowly.
“Come on,” Ulf said, slipping the compass safely back into his pocket. “It’s not far now.”
Chapter 13
BLUD AND BONE WERE AT WORK IN THE DUNGEONS below Loadem Lodge.
The big man Bone walked along a row of cages, throwing buckets of water through the bars.
In each cage a troll woke up and growled.
Blud reached into a wooden crate and pulled out a meaty steak. “Dinner time,” he said, dangling it in front of the cages.
The trolls lumbered forward, clattering their tusks against the metal bars. They grunted, reaching for the meat.
“They’re hungry,” Bone said, grinning.
The trolls were drooling.
Blud wafted the meaty steak in front of them. “Lovely juicy meat!” he said.
The trolls rammed the bars of the cages, snorting and slobbering.
“But you’re not having it.”
Blud pulled the meat away and Bone laughed.
“They’re starving,” Bone said.
“That’s how the Baron wants them,” Blud told him.
From his jacket pocket Blud took out a large sewing needle and a ball of string. He grabbed lots more meaty steaks from the crate, then sat on the floor, stitching them all together.
“What are you doing?” Bone asked.
“You’ll see,” Blud replied.
While Blud stitched, the trolls rattled the bars with their tusks. They were watching him, groaning with hunger.
Bone picked out the biggest, juiciest steak he could find. “Can I eat one?” he asked.
“No!” Blud said. “Give that here.”
When Blud had stitched together all the steaks from the crate, he held up a big blanket of meat.
“What’s that for?” Bone asked.
“It’s part of the Baron’s plan,” Blud told him.
Blud carried the blanket of meat out of the dungeons, heading through a stone archway and along a corridor. Flaming torches lined the walls, lighting doors on either side. Bone watched as Blud carried the blanket of meat through a door marked BAIT ROOM. A moment later he came back out, grinning. He wiped his hands on his pants.