The Great Troll War

Humans v. Trolls

The Princess and I were ready and waiting as the sky lightened into a rich pre-dawn the following morning. Mist had formed in small pockets around the Button Trench, and the Trolls, up at first light, had shaken the sleepiness from their heads and were now waiting, motionless, and hungry.

General Worrier was with us, worrying as usual. His fret-based command system, whereby all possibilities of failure had been erased by the very real and unacceptable spectre of failure itself, was probably the most efficient command and control system that I had ever seen. He and his team had done all that was humanly possible. A failure now would not be theirs, but the result of an unsound overall plan or poor communication of orders.

Aside from the general, the Princess and myself, there was also Tiger, who wouldn’t leave my side, a small contingent of royal guards to protect the monarch if things turned sticky, and a semaphore communications officer. It was their job to signal to another communications officer waiting at a phone box a hundred yards down the street, who would relay commands to the control centre back at the hotel, and from there to the resistance cells up and down the country.

In truth, the Princess shouldn’t have been there, but had refused all entreaties to be taken to a safe place because ‘she would never command others to face dangers that she was not willing to face herself’.

In due course it would cement not only her popularity, but the moral leadership required to rule a newly United Kingdom. She leaned closer to me and touched my hand.

‘Is this going to work?’ she asked.

‘We’ll know in half an hour,’ I said, ‘or at least you will – I’m on the First Eat List.’

We stared at the massed army of the Trolls facing us. If things went well, we at least had a sporting chance – and with a bit of luck, without a sword needing to be drawn, or a shot fired.

Actually, not a bit of luck – a lot of luck.

It had been a long night, but the fencers and marksmen, along with the team of terrible worriers, had been of inestimable value – far more than a traditional army. Killing a Troll would not diminish their numbers at all, for a new one would be generated to sustain the density ratio, and all that would be gained would be tired muscles and a blunted sword. No, we needed to build barriers. We needed not soldiers but fencers – and not just any old fencers, but masters of their art. Ones who could build in the dark, build stealthily, across rivers and streams, hills and forests, and who could instruct others in the craft over the phone if necessary, and call upon others to build the single greatest network of button barriers that was ever created – and do it all in a single night.

I looked towards the east, where already the sun was beginning to burnish the trees on a distant hillside, edging them with deep orange. Shandar’s bridges across the Button Trench had already begun to build themselves. They were of tree roots, growing and entwining together so to eventually give a firm base upon which the Trolls might walk. The Trolls reacted by picking up their clubs and ensuring their salt and pepper grinders were loaded and in their holsters, ready to be utilised in case of emergency seasoning requirements.

The reason that we had left it so late to launch our counterattack was simple: we had no idea how much of our grand plan had been carried out and we needed to leave it as long as possible to ensure that it had. The marksmen and women were not quite so well organised as the fencers, but on the plus side anyone with a brush could in effect be a marksperson, so long as the paint had been mixed to the precise hue.

‘General Worrier,’ said the Princess, ‘give the order.’

He nodded to the man holding the semaphore flag, who signalled to the woman in the telephone box, who gave the order to Lady Mawgon, who relayed the order to the Regional Commander of the Devon Resistance Group, who signalled his deputy to order that the flare be fired. We could not see it from here, but the flare that arced up out of Bridgwater was significant, for teams of marksmen had been busily painting a continuous unbroken cerulean blue line between the estuary at Bridgwater on the northern coast and the inlet near Axmouth to the south. It mostly followed roads, as it was easier, but there it was: a thin blue line, which would, so long as it was unbroken, bind the Trolls within Devon to a fixed geographical area.

As we found out later, the team standing by to finish the line responded with a flare back to their regional command centre as soon as they had, and the ‘order completed’ signal was relayed back to us. The message took about thirty seconds in each direction.

‘The Thin Blue Line has been completed, ma’am,’ said the communications officer. ‘Thirty-eight miles of unbroken paint.’

‘Good,’ said the Princess but without much enthusiasm, as annoyingly the Trolls were undiminished in number. It didn’t seem to have worked, and the bridges across the Button Trench were now half complete. The Trolls were limbering up, drawing weapons, sharpening spoons and readying themselves for breakfast.

‘Well,’ said the Princess, ‘it was a good idea. Maybe what works in sports halls doesn’t extend to entire peninsulas.’

‘So it’s Plan B,’ I said, drawing Exhorbitus out of its scabbard. ‘Fight like hell. I suggest you retreat, ma’am.’

At that very instant the first rays of the new day bathed the scene in an amber glow.

‘Ma’am, your retreat path is waiting,’ said Tiger, pointing towards where the open door of my VW was waiting for us, engine ticking over. Colin would be waiting at the hotel, ready to whisk her off to the Isles of Scilly, where there would be no Trolls.

‘Not yet,’ she said. ‘General: order every barrier closed.’

The general transmitted the new order, but this went not just to one regional headquarters, but all of them: to the 173-mile fence that had been constructed along the old Offa’s path by an army of over ten thousand, who built the barrier from whatever was to hand, at night, by the light of torches and lanterns. It was decorated with buttons, and the last gap was completed, as we found out later, just as the sun rose. The fencers, their work complete, their hands and fingers bleeding, collapsed exhausted on the grassy flanks of the huge earthwork that would, for the second time in history, stand as a bulwark against the Troll.

Offa’s Dyke wasn’t the only one. Nine other barriers had also been constructed or painted, each restricting the open area in which the Troll could expand. From north to south and from east to west, following canals, and rivers, and estuaries, and roads. Sometimes walls, sometimes a blue line, sometimes a dyke built from earth, and at other times a beautifully pleached hedge – all decorated with buttons or painted cerulean blue. We learned later that over a hundred thousand people had worked on their construction, and from all walks of life: princes shoulder to shoulder with peasants, geeks alongside lingerie models, game-show hosts beside epidemiologists. All were committed to the destruction of the common foe, the cause of freedom, and to have vengeance for those who had been killed and eaten.

The sun’s face was only just clear of the distant horizon when the root-bridges touched the opposite side of the Button Trench, and the Trolls, savouring their moment of triumph, tied bibs around their necks and gave out silly grumpy chortles. They were taking their time, and they wanted us to know it.

‘It’s a beautiful morning, isn’t it?’ said the Princess.

And it was. A perfect late summer’s day, the distant clouds tinged with orange. It would be warm today, with a light breeze, and puffy white clouds would play across the sky. It was a shame I wouldn’t get to see it. I would take out a few, even many, but their numbers would eventually be too much for me, and I would be overcome. There was no running, no hiding – this was where it ended. The Mighty Shandar could just walk in and take the Quarkbeast – there would be no one left to defend it.

‘This is all my fault,’ said General Worrier, sobbing quietly. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘No,’ said the Princess, ‘the plan and execution were sound, we just didn’t have enough time. I promote you to field marshal.’

‘I really think you should retreat, ma’am,’ said Tiger.

‘No,’ said the Princess, looking up at me, ‘shoulder to shoulder, side by side. See you on the other …’

She had stopped talking as the Trolls had changed behaviour. Instead of waiting to invade, they were instinctively seeking out an identical partner and reabsorbing into one another, like spilled mercury. They did it without noise or complaint, just stoically accepting their new density ratio as their biology dictated. In less than half a minute their numbers had decreased by about a half.

‘That’s a relief,’ said Field Marshal Worrier.

It was indeed. We didn’t know it at the time, but the planned final gap of the Thin Blue Line that cut off Devon had not been the last one: farther down the line and unknown to the rest of the team was another group of painters, and it was this group that completed the line and precipitated the Trolls’ sudden reduction in numbers. Many of the surviving Trolls turned to go in order to seek partners to conjoin, while others stood there, looking foolish and unsure what to do next.

But their defeat was not yet complete. We knew we couldn’t get rid of them entirely since even the area the size of a sports hall could accommodate at least two – hence the second phase of our plan, when Field Marshal Worrier gave the order that the Troll Gates were to be closed. We knew the gates had been heavily guarded, but with the Troll numbers depleted by their enforced geographic bounding, their numbers might be small enough to be defeated by twelve hundred ‘gate pushers’ picked for their strength, bravery and willingness to be painted head to toe in cerulean blue. The field marshal gave the order, and we waited.

‘I don’t know about you,’ said the Troll Wife, who was one of only perhaps thirty left at the Button Trench bridges, ‘but I fancy a working breakfast.’

And they started once more to walk across the bridge. I drew out Exhorbitus and readied to do battle. But I didn’t need to, for every single Troll stopped, merged with a partner if it had one and, if not, wandered off to find one. It would take another six days for them to merge back into a minimum of fourteen,53 and two weeks for that small group to reach the Troll Wall, their progress assisted by the button barriers being raised and lowered as they walked.

The invasion was over. We had won.

But we didn’t celebrate or jump up and down, we just felt … relieved. Generally speaking, those who celebrate at the end of a conflict are the ones who were not directly involved. For those of us in the front line, for all those who built fences, dug trenches and painted blue lines while at risk of being eaten, all we wanted was to get home and back to normality – and to try and forget that our mother, brother, sister or children ended up in a large cauldron to be eaten with badger sauce, or boiled down into a sticky mass, frozen and then sold on a stick at a Troll carnival.

‘Bravo,’ came a voice accompanied by a slow handclap, ‘that was really very impressive.’

It was the Mighty Shandar, who had been watching while seated on a deckchair. I hadn’t noticed him until now. With five thousand Trolls about to treat you as little more than a live buffet, I think I could be excused that.

I didn’t say anything; I knew what he’d come for.

‘Are you ready to go?’ he asked, looking at me. ‘I have a date with destiny and she doesn’t like being kept waiting.’

‘While I still have air in my lungs, Shandar,’ I said, ‘you will never have the Quarkbeast and I shall never be party to your heinous plans.’

‘Never say never, Jennifer. See there: the little fellow understands what he is, and what he was always meant to do.’

‘Quark,’ said the Quarkbeast as he trotted up. He looked up at me with his large mauve eyes. I felt him very clearly speaking in my head. Through the Mysterious X, I imagine.

‘It’s okay, Jennifer,’ he seemed to say, ‘sometimes death brings about opportunity. Don’t be afraid.’

I turned to Shandar.

‘You like deals. Here’s mine: if I come with you to be your strategic moral compass, will you spare the planet?’

He stared at me for a moment. Shandar was not called ‘The Mighty’ for nothing, and his power, against mine, was vast. There are occasions when you have to be realistic, and get the best deal you can in a bad situation. It was the first time I had put something on the table, the first time I had even conceded that he might have a winning hand. But then I think he knew I would – that the Better Angels that were once his were powerful indeed, the sort that would trade themselves for others. If he’d kept them, he might have been a good man.

‘Are those your terms?’ he asked.

‘They are,’ I said.

‘It’s a big ask,’ he said. ‘I need the power of an entire sun before I can warp spacetime significantly enough to travel the distances I need – but no matter. We’ll drop off at Proxima Centauri54 and harness the power of that star instead. It’ll take us thirty-seven years to get there, but with time eternal, I’m not troubled. We’ve got a lot of books and all the music we could want. I think I packed some jigsaws, too. With the Hollow Men and Women to wait on us, it’ll be fun. So yes, I agree to your terms – with one proviso.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘When you turn eighteen, you marry me. Not a big party. Just you and me and D’Argento and the empty suits. We’ll be a husband-and-wife galactic domination team. I’ll order the killings and the torture, and you can handle the mercy, diplomacy and soft furnishings. You’ll save billions of lives, Jennifer. What do you say?’

‘Is that a deal-breaker?’

‘It is. Marriage to me – or Planet Earth dies. What’s it to be?’

I tensed inwardly, but showed no outward emotion.

‘Deal.’

‘Then that’s all agreed,’ he said with a grin. ‘It’s going to be quite a journey, and one that I don’t think you’ll regret.’

‘I’ll need to say my goodbyes,’ I said, ‘and I’d like to bring my Volkswagen. Where I go, it goes.’

‘Agreed. I’ll have them leave a space – and I’ll get the Hollow Women to stock up with some spares. What engine does it have?’

‘The twelve hundred – and with six-volt electrics.’

‘You never had it upgraded?’

‘It has a cast pedestal55 so I couldn’t without swapping out the engine.’

He made a note.

‘Okay, then. Don’t forget the Quarkbeast, now – oh, and nothing magical is allowed on board the tower. No amulets, Dibble Storage Jars, no tricks – nothing.’

‘It’ll be just me and the Beast and the car.’

‘See you later, then.’

And he vanished, but this time without the dramatic pillar of fire.

I looked at the Princess and Tiger, who were staring back at me.

‘What?’ I said. ‘It’s a no-brainer, and a good deal in the circumstances.’

‘It’s not a good deal for you,’ said the Princess. ‘I mean … marrying him?’

I thought for a moment and took a deep breath.

‘Y’know what? Although Zambini and Mother Zenobia moulded me to defeat him, perhaps I don’t get to thwart Shandar’s plans after all, but simply to relocate them – and a long way away. Besides,’ I added, ‘I save billions of lives on Earth, and countless more on planets I’ve never heard of during eons that are yet to begin. I may even get to save alien species that haven’t yet evolved. That’s a weird one to get your head around, but it’s the best and biggest and finest gig anyone will ever get, no matter which way you look at it.’

I sighed. When Zambini and Zenobia had only a few decades to counter a threat three centuries in the making, they did what they could, not what they wanted.

I stared for a moment at the now-redundant Button Trench.

‘It served its purpose well,’ said Tiger, following my gaze, ‘and no one should forget that Wizard Moobin gave his life to build it.’

‘All sacrifices have been noted,’ said the Princess. ‘All those who gave themselves to defeat the Trolls will be honoured.’

We all lapsed into silence for a while.

‘Let’s go and have some breakfast,’ I said finally. ‘I think we’ve earned it.’