We’d released Full Price and Lady Mawgon, who re-established the intelligence network and regained contact with our observers and resistance groups. Many had dutifully remained at their posts in case our fortunes changed, and, although patchy, the picture of the Troll invasion was generally consistent: they were now everywhere, and it did not look as though their appetite for human flesh would be appeased any time soon.
We stared at the Trolls on the other side of the trench, and they stared back at us in the sort of way we might stare into a fridge if feeling a little snacky. They had vanquished the human with little difficulty; a further small addition of land in the extreme south-west tip would not make a significant difference, the ten thousand or so souls the equivalent of just one more larder in a house not noted for its lack of larders. It was said that more people turned vegetarian during the Troll invasion that at any time in the Kingdom’s history. Being a carnivore suddenly looked a little iffy when you or your children were on someone else’s menu.
The Princess and I stared across the trench. We had asked to speak to whichever Troll was nominally in charge, and one was now lumbering up to talk to us. It looked a lot like the Troll Wife we had seen a few days ago. She recognised us both, but on reflection that might just have been the Hive Memory.
‘Yes?’ said the Troll.
‘This is the Supreme Ruler of the United Kingdoms,’ I said, indicating the Princess, ‘and she wishes to speak to the Emperor.’
‘Oh yes?’ said the Troll Wife. ‘And for what
‘It’s about the Mighty Shandar,’ said the Princess. ‘He will break any deal he has brokered. Our species will be better served by working together to defeat a common enemy before we find a peace of our own. I want to forge a new history between your people and mine so that we can live in harmony, rather than aggression.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said the Troll absently, as her attention had wandered, ‘did you say something?’
The Princess patiently repeated herself, but the Troll was no less dismissive.
‘You’re breaking my heart. But I’ll let you into a secret: the Mighty Shandar will build bridges over the Button Trench no matter what you do tomorrow at dawn, and we
We came away from the Button Trench without having made any headway, but at least some understanding of what we were to expect.
‘It looks like you were right about Shandar,’ said the Princess as we drove back into town. ‘Helping us rid the land of the Trolls was never part of his plan.’
‘Mind you,’ said Tiger, who was also present, ‘defeating the Trolls may not be relevant at all if the Mighty Shandar decides to leave the Earth as a frozen wasteland devoid of life, floating in a forgotten corner of the Milky Way. Shouldn’t we take the fight straight to Shandar?’
‘The Troll is currently the most immediate threat to our liberty,’ said the Princess. ‘We’ll fight them first then deal with Shandar.’
I liked her optimism, but wasn’t sure just how we could fight either right now.
We pulled up outside the Queens Hotel. The marksmen, eager not to sit on their hands doing nothing during a time of jeopardy, had been busy repainting the yellow lines outside the hotel, conveniently adding a ‘Monarchs Only’ parking slot.
Monty was waiting for us as we pulled up, and seemed to be looking positive about something, which might at least portend good news, even if it wasn’t
‘Did that shade of cerulean blue that I gave you work?’ I asked, since I’d passed Ralph’s warpaint on as a possible weapon of war. A gallon of paint against several million Trolls didn’t seem like much, but it was something.
‘It did,’ he said, ‘but there’s something else I want to show you. It’s over at the Leisure Centre on Claire Street. Can you drive me up there?
‘What we do know,’ continued Monty, as we drove back up the hill, ‘is that brute force alone doesn’t work against the Troll’s ferocity. So the worriers and I were looking once again at the problem and three things struck us as mutually incompatible: first was the sheer number of the Trolls.’
‘It goes against all scholarly extrapolation of likely numbers, and every reconnaissance mission ever undertaken over Trollvania,’ said the Princess.
‘Right,’ said Monty. ‘Every Troll War was fought on the same assumption: that there weren’t very many and they must be easy to defeat. But every time humans opened the massive gates in the Troll Wall to give them a bit of a pasting, there were always far more than expected.’
