The Great Troll War

‘The building is just north of Exeter,’ said Feldspar, ‘presumably for convenient access to the M5 inter-Kingdoms motorway.’

I stared at the pictures. Although incongruous, the seventy-seven storey Art Deco skyscraper was peculiarly lovely, with tasteful decoration in stone, glass and steel. If I had vast amounts of power and money and was an overly flamboyant character with a penchant for conspicuousness, I might have created something similar.

‘I flew lower for some oblique views too,’ added Colin, ‘but they’re a bit blurred as I was travelling quite fast.’

The skyscraper had steel shutters on the lower windows and main entrance, and what looked like a heavily guarded service entrance that gave handy access direct from the motorway.

‘How do we attack it?’ asked Tiger.

‘Right now I’m not sure we can,’ I said. ‘Shandar would detect a thermowizidrical device – even a small one – long before it got close enough to do any damage.’

‘And,’ said Lady Mawgon, ‘we don’t have enough crackle to levitate a chair, let alone build a TWD.’

‘What are the defences like?’ I asked.

‘Anti-aircraft fire opened up as soon as I was within a thousand yards,’ said Colin, taking a large handful of food and tipping it down his throat. ‘And look, you see these white dots scattered around outside the building?’

We looked at the picture closely. Although the image was blurred, I knew what they were.

‘Hollow Men,’ said the Princess, who had lost her right hand to one. ‘I hate Hollow Men.’

We’d battled Hollow Men before in the Cambrian Empire. They were basically dark suits and white shirts, a hat and a pair of gloves given life by the Mighty Shandar. When not in use they were simply a folded parcel of clothes with a hat on top, but would spring into life in a moment ready to do Shandar’s bidding.

‘Can we defeat them the same way we did last time?’ asked the Princess.

‘Without any magic we’re not doing much of anything,’ said Full Price. ‘The HENRY is sucking up the wizidrical energy as a sponge absorbs water. I tried mining my own life-force to see if I could utilise that in the same manner as Moobin,’ he said, ‘but I have nothing left on tap.’

Since magic was essentially based on emotional spirit, using one’s own remaining life-force was always a ready solution if you needed a lot of crackle in a short amount of time. It would, unfortunately, take years off your life – literally. My good friend Perkins had sacrificed himself in this manner during our adventure to find the Eye of Zoltar only a few weeks before. Wizard Moobin had done the same to construct the Button Trench. But I also knew what Full Price meant when he said he had ‘nothing left on tap’. His life would probably end soon – he was like a battery that was almost flat.

‘Firstly,’ I said, ‘no one is using up their own life to do magic. I’ve seen too much of that. Secondly, I’m sorry to hear you have nothing left on tap, Mr Price – how long do you have left?’

‘Not sure but not much,’ he said. ‘For any sorcery you’re going to have to rely on Lady Mawgon or the Mysterious X – that is, if he exists at all.’

We all looked at the Mysterious X, who wasn’t eating, obviously, but was just sitting on the table in his Kilner jar, the charged electrons glowing like glow-worms and moving languidly in orbit around one another. X’s existence was as nebulous now as it had ever been, but even with twenty sorcerers a lot more solid than X, they’d all be useless without any wizidrical energy.

‘I managed to salvage a couple of Dibble Jars35 from Zambini Towers after it was destroyed,’ said Tiger. ‘Any use?’

‘You are close to redeeming your worthlessness,’ said Lady Mawgon, which was about the closest thing to a compliment Tiger was ever likely to get. ‘They’ll hold about 720 KiloShandars of wizidrical energy each and are self-filling – all we need do is take them to the source of the HENRY.’

‘Good idea,’ I said. ‘We’ll leave at first light tomorrow for Dartmoor, and we’ll go by Dragon.’

Colin snorted two jets of milk out of his nostrils when I said this.

‘Wait, what?’ he said.

‘You and Feldspar can take us. You fly us in, we fill the jars and then you fly us back.’

‘Oh, so we’re just the same as carpets now, are we?’ said Colin.

‘Or little better than a horse?’ added Feldspar. ‘What do you want to put on us? Saddles? You might as well feed us with a nosebag.’

I looked at Tiger, who shrugged. Stupidly, we’d assumed that we could ride on them. Colin picked up on this immediately.

‘Oh, I get it,’ he said. ‘You think we’re being unreasonable? Well, it’s just that Dragons fit into so many humancentric stereotypes. When we’re not guarding princesses or turning knights to charcoal, we’re wise and thoughtful and ponderous – and then all meek and compliant, allowing ourselves to be flown. Is that how you see us?’

‘You do actually do all those things,’ said Tiger.

‘Maybe we do,’ said Colin, ‘but it’s not necessarily because we’re Dragons.’