The Great Troll War

Cloud Leviathan

The Australopithecine had a flattish face, a protruding lower jaw, deep-set eyes that were a bright blue and was covered all over in short coarse hair. He wore no clothes at all except a set of very worn Converse All-Stars and his only possessions were carried in a large handbag that always sat in the crook of his arm. Handbag and shoes aside, he looked like the sort of hominid that is often featured on the cover of National Geographic, along with weddings in Azerbaijan and men on rickety ladders collecting honey.

Ralph had originally been Homo sapiens like us but when he suffered a potentially fatal self-induced overdose of magic, Perkins had to subject him to a Genetic Master Reset – that is, he had taken him back to the time when he wasn’t really quite human – a sort of hominid on the cusp, just between ape and man. It had saved Ralph’s life, but left him 1.6 million years behind in human development. And while Ralph had trouble remembering where he left stuff or following even the simplest episode of Bergerac, he knew a whole bunch about friendship and loyalty – and could ride a Cloud Leviathan like a master.

‘Hello, Ralph,’ I said, and he grunted in reply.

Swapping gifts is usual when you meet an Australopithecine. He gave me a Hot Wheels VW Baja – one I did not yet have in my collection – and in return I gave him a pretty marble, six marshmallows and a box of matches, while Tiger offered up a half-used scented candle and a pack of Zetor Tractor Top Trumps, and received, in return, a mousetrap and a used Q-tip. Ralph examined his gifts very carefully and, when satisfied, popped them into his handbag.

‘How are you?’ I asked.

‘Good I am me better never,’ he said cheerfully, his sense of word order not yet fully evolved. He had trouble with grammar and making plans more than a week in advance, and would often steal stuff that he liked, not really understanding the concept of ownership. But all things considered, he did pretty well on a third of a modern human’s brain capacity. To be honest, he fared a lot better than many humans I knew with a full brain capacity.

‘What do, Jen?’ said Ralph, and I outlined as best as I could where I needed to go. A modern map was useless as his more primitive visual cortex could not interpret the writing, so I handed him a picture map I’d drawn that gave him landmarks to follow all the way to Hereford, then a picture of the River Wye and the castle at Clifford, a stone’s throw from the orphanage.

The small hominid nodded, then started to look around, calling the Leviathan by name – it seems he had dubbed it ‘Basil’.

‘How can he lose a Leviathan?’ asked Tiger as Ralph ran around the place, covering the ground urgently like a demented spaniel trying to find a lost stick.

‘A Leviathan has chameleonic skin,’ I explained, ‘to merge into the background. They can’t be counted, studied or even hunted because … well, you can’t see them.’

The Cloud Leviathan was also known as an ‘AltiHippo’ or ‘Skywhale’, the latter giving the origin of the name of their native country, Wales. The creature was a coach-sized flying mammal that had so far escaped scientific scrutiny. Kept aloft by a diet of gravity-defying Angel’s Feathers and propelled by four massive flipper-like paddles on the side of its body, it had a large blunt head with a horizontal mouth that could swallow a thousand starlings at one go, or strip a single tree of apples during a high-speed swoop. The tail was long and ended in a small triple fluke which was used for directional purposes, as well as fanning itself in hot weather, and arranging things in its nest.

‘What’s that?’ asked Molly, who was driving past in her Mini, the window open a crack so she could talk, the car’s suspension sagging under her weight.

‘An Australopithecine friend of mine named Ralph.’

‘A what?’

‘I’ll explain later—’

‘That’s it!’ said Molly, pointing at the hominid. ‘That colour. Yukky yukky yukky. I’m off.’

And she drove rapidly off down the promenade in the direction of Newlyn without a backward glance. I looked at Ralph, who had painted his body with blue warpaint, presumably the shade of cerulean that Trolls don’t like. I made a mental note to ask him for the recipe.

‘I think I’ve found the Leviathan,’ said Tiger, pointing at a huge eye that had opened up in an area of shimmering emptiness, and was staring at him with a great deal of interest.

We called Ralph over. He climbed onto its back and he too promptly disappeared until a hand popped out from behind the chameleonic skin and helped us aboard. On the back of the creature was a very comfortable wooden wheelhouse built of recycled wooden pallets and lined with Welsh blankets.

We were off as soon as Ralph had donned a small pillbox hat and completed a largely unintelligible flight safety announcement – it seemed that his previous life as a human had been spent travelling a lot by air, and this had filtered through as the only way one should fly. On the one-hour journey we were served lunch and a beverage, then persuaded to buy duty-free chocolate, a model of a Leviathan that seemed to be Lego but disappointingly wasn’t, and then a couple of scratch cards which Ralph had designed himself. Tiger won a ‘good-quality stick suitable for burning’ and I won a large brass button.

The journey took us up the north coast of Cornwall and Devon, then cut across the Severn estuary after we had circled twice so Ralph could act out the over-water flight safety briefing. We made landfall at Cardiff over the deserted airport, then carried on north before eventually descending on the far side of the Black Mountains to Clifford, the castle prominent on the river, and home to the Blessed Ladies of the Lobster for over six centuries.

‘Go round a couple of times, would you?’ I asked, and Ralph gently prodded the Leviathan, which began a wide orbit around the orphanage, which we could see was besieged on all sides by Trolls. The nuns were putting up a spirited defence, and were holding them at bay.

‘Okay,’ I said, ‘take us down into the courtyard.’

The Leviathan swung around elegantly, paused to swallow two geese that had the misfortune to be flying past at that moment, then settled onto the grass. Ralph passed me an Angel’s Feather tied to a house brick.51

‘Release when ready.’

Tiger and I disembarked and the Leviathan lifted off behind us. A nun came out to greet us. It was our old PE instructor Sister Asumpta, who had roundly terrified us as children. She recognised us both instantly.

‘Ah!’ she said. ‘Jenny and Tiger. Come just in time to take over the batting, have you? We’re six players down and on a sticky wicket.’

Sister Asumpta always talked in cricket metaphors, taught cricket, thought that cricket was the best game ever, and always carried a cricket bat to stop the orphans – and anyone else – getting out of hand. Tiger and I bowed and curtseyed without even thinking. I explained that I needed to talk to Mother Zenobia as she could have information that would help us defeat Shandar and the Trolls.

‘Very well,’ she said. ‘I think you’ll find her in the rose garden. Tiger, you’re with me – see if we can bowl a googly and knock the Troll for six.’

Tiger, who feared Mother Zenobia more than potential death at the hands of a Troll, needed no second bidding and went off with Sister Asumpta while I headed into the rose garden, a small nuns-only sanctuary on the sunny side of the house. As I walked through the orphanage the smell of gruel, cheap sausages, bleach and freshly clipped ear came back in a rush. I’d spent twelve years of my life here, and although never luxurious, the time had been on the whole happy and not without comedy, as the nuns generally had a good sense of humour. I passed through the main hall where during lessons we had learned skills relevant to our expected station in life as part of the UnUnited Kingdoms Orphan-Based Economy. We learned about retail, hospitality, mining, heavy manufacturing and fast-food operations. I’d been a diligent student. Even today I’d easily be able to flip burgers, drive a heavy goods vehicle or even sand-cast an eighteen-ton ship’s anchor. I thought it was luck that had sent me off to Kazam, but now it looked more like a plan.

‘Ah!’ said Mother Zenobia as I walked into the rose garden. ‘Jennifer Strange. How are you, my girl?’

‘I am well, Mother.’

She invited me to sit.

‘I thought it was you. You are wearing two socks on your left foot, the change in your pocket is three shillings and ninepence plus a brass button, three washers and a glass bead – either green or blue.’

‘Blue,’ I said. ‘That was quite remarkable.’

‘Pah!’ said Zenobia, but it was remarkable. Zenobia was over one hundred and twenty-six years old, and had been blind for so long that the skin had grown across her empty eye sockets. Her powers of hearing had developed into something indistinguishable from a super-power.

‘The Trolls have come,’ she said.

‘Shandar helped them,’ I told her, ‘to divert the Kingdoms from upsetting his own plans.’

‘Sneaky of him. You are part of the resistance down in Penzance, I hear?’

I told her that we had achieved very little, but suspected that Shandar had spelled a memory fog to occlude the knowledge of how to beat the Troll.

‘I know little of Trolls,’ said Zenobia. ‘Tell me everything.’

So I explained about Shandar, how he wanted me to accompany him on his journey to the stars, his plan for galactic domination, the harvesting of the Quarkbeasts and even the power of the sun to further his ambitions – and how he was telling me it was all about the pursuit of knowledge, nothing more. As I spoke she nodded her head wisely, and when I had finished she went quiet for almost a minute. But when she spoke, it wasn’t about Shandar.

‘You did not come all this way to tell me that. You found the photograph in the VW’s glovebox, didn’t you?’

Mother Zenobia was always astute.

‘I did.’

‘It was only a matter of time. You were not abandoned, you were not orphaned. We could have told you more, but we did not. We lied to you. But it was necessary. Are you angry?’

I thought for a moment.

‘Yes,’ I replied, truthfully enough.

Mother Zenobia took a deep breath.

‘Twenty years ago Zambini came to me with evidence that Shandar was planning something of unprecedented evil. I agreed with his findings and we discussed countermeasures. Zambini and I could be the only ones who knew of our plan – even a whiff of our scheme against Shandar would have seen us both killed – and you, too.’

‘Zambini was vanished,’ I said. ‘You think Shandar suspected something?’

She gave me a small and almost imperceptible smile.

‘It’s equally likely Zambini self-vanished so he couldn’t reveal anything. He had … weaknesses that could be exploited. Me, I’m of sterner stuff. Luckily, your trajectory was already determined – when you saved the Dragons it would have been obvious to Shandar what you were, and just how difficult it would be for him to destroy you.’

‘So who am I?’ I asked.

Mother Zenobia took my hand in hers.

‘To defeat the Mighty Shandar we needed to use something that he could never destroy, something that all tyrants come to fear and which eventually defeats them.’

‘You know that superheroes aren’t real, right?’

‘I’m talking about their weaknesses. Whether it is incompetence, greed, stupidity, arrogance or, in Shandar’s case, common decency.’

She let these words soak in for a moment.

‘Shandar can’t kill you, Jennifer, because, in part, you are him.’

I rubbed my temples, and stared at the ground, where I could see a small grasshopper rubbing its hind legs together. I closed my eyes and said in a quiet voice:

‘I’m the Better Angels of his Nature, aren’t I?’

‘They are only a part of you,’ said Zenobia. ‘Zambini knew that Shandar dare not destroy a part of himself, so after four years of searching he found the Jar – and placed them in you.’

‘Am I … real?’ I asked.

‘One hundred percent human. Zambini sourced you as a baby so I don’t know who your parents were, but they were good people, who trusted Zambini when he said that the vessel for Shandar’s rejected Better Angels had to be someone with a Human Moral Worth Index that was off the scale – and you fitted the bill. Your parents understood that, shouldered the sorrow of your loss and gave you up, knowing that there was vital work for you to do in the Grand Scheme of Things.’

I was silent for a moment, trying to take this in. But I wasn’t thinking about the parts of Shandar that were me, I was thinking about my parents, and that, given the finality of Zambini’s farewell, I had missed any chance to find out who they were, and who I was.

‘So why would Shandar want me on his journey to the stars?’

‘Shandar knows that while utter ruthlessness is a useful skill for taking power,’ said Mother Zenobia, ‘it’s overrated when it comes to keeping power. To maintain a sustainable dictatorship, he needs to harness those skills he foolishly cast out: tact, diplomacy, magnanimity, mercy. They can all be powerful weapons, especially when a thousand star systems are looking to marshal their forces against him. He knows you have them, and that without you and he seamlessly working together, his empire will barely last ten thousand years – it’s amazing how quickly subjects tire of their tyrants once the mass murder begins. Tea?’

‘What? Oh, yes, yes, I’d love a cup.’

A novice nun had been hovering at the entrance to the garden, and at a signal from Mother Zenobia trotted in with two cups of tea and a couple of Chelsea buns. I nibbled on one, and wrapped the other in a napkin for Ralph and Tiger. I sat and thought for a while, sipping my tea. Now my purpose was clear, everything suddenly seemed to shift into greater focus. My function in the Grand Scheme of Things was to defeat the most powerful sorcerer the planet had ever seen.

‘So,’ I said, ‘I can get close to him, but how do I destroy him?’

‘Ah,’ said Zenobia, putting down her tea, ‘our plan was not without a few wrinkles. We have engineered only an opportunity but without clear instructions. Your power and strength lie in your Moral Worth, courage and sense of intuitive action. Sometimes it’s better not to think too much about something, and assistance, when times look bleak, can often come from unexpected quarters.’

‘Zambini said something similar. What does that mean?’

She didn’t answer, simply smiled, reached out for my hand again, and squeezed it.

‘It is up to you now,’ she said with a weak smile. ‘Goodbye, Jennifer, I hope it all works out. You were our star orphan, my girl, there was none better.’

She took a deep breath.

‘My work is now done. Will you stay with me until I am gone?’

‘I would be honoured, ma’am.’

So I held her hand until her breathing stopped. I sat silent for a minute or two until her novice returned, then kissed her gently on the forehead and returned to the courtyard.

‘What have you learned?’ I asked, meeting up with Tiger ten minutes later.

‘That Trolls don’t like cricket bats,’ he said, ‘and nuns really frighten them, especially violent ones with a steely-eyed sense of purpose.’

‘That’s not a surprise to me.’

‘Me neither. Sister Asumpta’s platoon succeeded in corralling them into the walled garden. They caught eighteen of them that way, but most escaped almost immediately.’

‘Why didn’t the others free their comrades?’ I asked.

‘They’re not sure.’

I untied the Angel’s Feather from the house brick and let it go, whereupon it started to rise into the air, along with the faint sound of a chorus and a shaft of light. As good as his word, Ralph came down to pick us up and, five minutes later, we were heading south-west, back towards Cornwall and Penzance.

‘What about you?’ asked Tiger.

‘I learned that when you have less than twenty years to defeat a plan over three hundred years in the making, it’s okay to cut a few ethical corners.’

‘Meaning?’

I explained what Zenobia had told me as we winged across the Severn estuary. He stared at me incredulously for a moment once I had finished.

‘How do you feel about all that?’ he asked at length.

‘Calm,’ I told him. ‘Now my purpose in the Grand Scheme of Things has been revealed, everything is quite clear: I am to defeat Shandar. All other concerns are secondary. Nothing else matters.’

We were silent for a minute or two until we made landfall and then followed the North Devon coastline. Tiger asked me what our next plan of action would be.

‘I guess we wait for events to unfold and act accordingly.’

‘That’s your plan?’

‘You have a better one?’

‘No.’

‘Hang on,’ I said as an idea popped into my head, ‘Let’s take a detour and see how Colin’s getting along.’

I drew a rough map of the Isles of Scilly on a sheet of paper and showed it to Ralph.

‘Ook,’ he said as we sped low across Dartmoor, annoying a group of Trolls doing their mid-morning religious veneration.

Or perhaps they were stretching to alleviate indigestion. I don’t know.