He bent down, seized the Troglotroll by the throat, and whispered to him, baring his teeth in an ominous way. ‘Remember what’ll happen to you if a hair of Bluebear’s head is harmed?’
‘I remember,’ the Troglotroll said humbly. The recollection clearly didn’t appeal to him.
Rumo wished us luck. Then he handed the torch to the Troglotroll and disappeared into the darkness.
Doubts about the Troglotroll
Anyone who has been led astray by a Troglotroll remains a lifelong sceptic where that labyrinth-dweller’s qualifications as a guide are concerned. The further we followed him into the bowels of Atlantis, therefore, the greater my misgivings became. We began by wading through sewers knee-deep in brackish water while green-eyed rats scurried between our legs and squeaked at us malevolently. Then we descended a long, steep, slippery flight of steps, largely overgrown with moss, that took us at least a mile into the depths. Where did it lead?
‘It’s a short cut,’ said the Troglotroll, as if he had read my thoughts. ‘These are the Invisibles’ ruins. No one ventures down here except rats and Sewer Dragons. This part of Atlantis must have originated many thousands of years ago. Nothing here is like it is on the surface, ak-ak!’
Pullulating on every side were shadowy creatures: rats, woodlice, millipedes, spiders, caterpillars, and multicoloured glow-worms that twinkled in the darkness. Bats kept fluttering around our heads. The walls streamed with moisture that seemed, in some curious way, to be flowing up them.
The tunnels became steadily bigger, and overhead, flashing at brief intervals, were blue and green lights resembling jellyfish attached to the roof by suction. We waded on through an evil-smelling soup. Something slimy wound itself around my leg.
‘Just a Snake Leech,’ the Troglotroll explained. ‘They don’t bite, they only suck a little.’
After walking for half an hour we came out in a spacious tunnel illuminated by even more roof lights. Lying at the far end was something big – something alive. It looked like a breathing mound of scales. ‘Oh!’ said the Troglotroll. ‘How unpleasant! A Sewer Dragon!’
From the
‘Encyclopedia of Marvels, Life Forms and Other Phenomena of Zamonia and its Environs’
by Professor Abdullah Nightingale
Sewer Dragon, The. Socially debased member of the Great Lizard family [Saurii] formerly resident on the surface. A cold-blooded, forked-tongued creature of elongated stature [up to 75 feet long], it is generously equipped with teeth [as many as 900 incisors and molars] and covered with a scaly hide consisting of multicoloured plates of horny skin abounding in warty humps, crests, and folds. Sewer Dragons thrived in the marshy terrain Atlantis used to be before it dried out and became a built-up area. Unable to cope with life in the metropolis, they retreated to its extensive sewers. Sewer Dragons feed on anything assimilable by a Sewer Dragon’s efficient digestive system, which means almost anything including wood, basalt, animals, human beings, Halfway Humans, and – not to put too fine a point on it – other Sewer Dragons.
The dragon filled the whole width of the tunnel. To get past it we would have had to climb over it, and that was a course of action which only a madman would have contemplated.
‘We’ll have to climb over it,’ said the Troglotroll. He turned to us. ‘Don’t look at me as if I’m crazy, I’ve done it a hundred times. The creature’s asleep. It won’t notice a thing, ak-ak-ak!’
Sewer Dragon, The [cont.]. Sewer Dragons are somnidigestors, which means that they devote half their lives to hunting and devouring prey and the other half to digesting it in their sleep. Those who come across a sleeping Sewer Dragon can congratulate themselves on not having encountered one in its active mode. They should remain on their guard, however, because it is one of the Sewer Dragon’s predatorial techniques to pretend to be asleep.
Behind us were Smyke and all the criminals in Atlantis; ahead of us lay an omnivorous Sewer Dragon. We had a decision to make. The Troglotroll was the first to climb on to the dragon. He marched firmly along its back.
‘You see? It’s asleep, ak-ak-ak!’ he crowed, rather too loudly for my taste.
To prove to us how soundly asleep it was, he clumped around on the creature as if it were a rocky outcrop.
‘It doesn’t notice a thing, ak-ak!’ he chortled, and jumped up and down on its back with both feet, over and over again. ‘Come on up.’ Chemluth climbed up next, followed by me. The Troglotroll was now performing a sort of tap-dance on the dragon’s scaly hide.
‘Stop it, can’t you?’ I begged him. ‘You’re making me nervous.’
‘It doesn’t notice a thing, I tell you!’ cried the Troglotroll. ‘It’s asleep!’
He leapt in the air once more and landed heavily on the dragon’s armour-plated hide. It was hard to tell whether that woke the dragon or whether it had been feigning sleep all the time. Whatever the truth, it opened its gooey, lizardlike jaws with a sound like a horse being ripped apart and uttered a startlingly human cry. Then it abruptly reared up, and Chemluth, the Troglotroll and I tumbled off its back.
Its tail lashed the tunnel like a snapped hawser. Armed with pointed, yard-long horns, the tail whistled over our heads more than once, but we ducked just in time and hugged the ground.
The Sewer Dragon drew in its tail and howled like a whipped cur. Then it hissed, emitting a jet of flame that briefly bathed the scene in a harsh glare and projected our fleeing shadows on the walls as we sprinted out of range. The creature craned its lizardlike neck and gave a furious snarl, evidently unable to turn around.
‘It’s wedged in the tunnel – too fat,’ the Troglotroll explained. ‘It’s always the same with Sewer Dragons. They eat too much. In the end they become so fat they can only move in one direction. It can only go forwards, ak-ak-ak!’
At that moment the dragon began to move backwards.
It’s incredible how fast a Sewer Dragon can travel. It simply pushed off with its powerful thighs and slithered a good twenty yards towards us along the tunnel’s sludgy floor.
Whoosh!
At the same time, it lashed its spiked tail to and fro like a flail. We ran off, but we couldn’t cover the slippery ground anything like as fast as the dragon.
Whoosh! Another twenty yards.
Whoosh! Twenty more.
The Sewer Dragon must have been perfecting this predatory technique for a very long time. It couldn’t see behind it, admittedly, so it wasn’t able to take aim, but the frequency with which it lashed its tail made up for that. Sooner or later it would hit us. It could skewer its victims on the horns and convey them to its mouth with ease.
Whoosh! Twenty yards.
Whoosh! Twenty yards.
‘See those holes in the roof?’ the Troglotroll said breathlessly during our next sprint. ‘Between the lights? We must get up there, it’s our only chance, ak-ak-ak!’
Every fifty yards or so there was a circular manhole in the roof of the tunnel, but the latter was at least twelve feet from the ground. ‘We must climb on each other’s backs,’ panted the Troglotroll. ‘The first one up can pull the others up after him.’
An utterly crackbrained idea. We would have only a few seconds in which to complete such an operation, and that was when the dragon paused between thigh-thrusts to lash the air with its tail.
‘Now!’ yelled the Troglotroll. The dragon had come to a halt.
There was no point in arguing. Chemluth had already leapt on to my shoulders.
The tail whistled past, missing us by a couple of feet at most, and cracked like a whip as it lashed thin air.
The Troglotroll climbed up me. He went about it in a terribly clumsy way, wrenching at my fur and putting his calloused feet in my face, but he managed to reach the manhole via Chemluth’s shoulders.
The Sewer Dragon was preparing to strike once more. It rolled up its tail like a licorice bootlace.
‘Quick!’ I cried. ‘Hurry up!’
The Troglotroll hauled Chemluth up. With a groan, my friend clambered throu
gh the opening.
The dragon’s tail sliced the damp air of the tunnel like a guillotine. This time it flashed past me on the left. Next time, if the creature had a system, it would aim at the centre of the tunnel.
In other words, at the place where I was standing.
It slowly rolled up its tail again.
‘Are you trying that roof trick?’ it snarled. ‘Behind my back? It wouldn’t be the first time!’
I had no idea that Sewer Dragons could speak.
Sewer Dragon, The [cont.]. Many eye-witnesses claim that Sewer Dragons are capable of articulate speech. This is impossible from the biological aspect, because they belong to the Pyrosaurian family and are dragons with short, fireproof vocal cords. There is, however, a theory that thanks to the singular electrical conditions prevailing beneath Atlantis, which may be associated with the nefarious activities of the so-called Invisibles, certain mutations have come into being.
Chemluth and the Troglotroll peered down at me through the manhole.
‘We’ve made a mistake somewhere,’ said the Troglotroll. ‘Us two are safe, but you’re still in a lot of trouble.’
‘I suppose you’re surprised I can speak,’ grunted the Sewer Dragon, ‘but I’m more surprised than anyone. I vegetated down here for centuries without saying a word, but then – crack! – one of those confounded shafts of greased lightning hit me on the head. Life has been quite different since then.’
‘You must run to the next manhole, gah!’ Chemluth whispered to me. ‘We’ll wait for you. Don’t worry, we’ll get you out!’
The dragon groaned and expelled a cloud of smoke. ‘But don’t run away with the idea that it’s made things easier for me. I couldn’t speak in the old days, but I couldn’t think either, and believe me, it’s far more agreeable not to have to brood about things.’
A sulphurous stench pervaded the tunnel. Chemluth and the Troglotroll had vanished, but I continued to stand rooted to the spot, listening to the dragon. It was showing signs of intelligence. Perhaps one could reason with it.
‘Take death, for example. I used not to have a clue when I might kick the bucket. What happy, carefree days they were! I mean, okay, so I’m a dragon with an average life expectancy of two thousand years. I’m only a thousand years old, so I’m better off than, say, a mayfly, but all the same … I used to think I was immortal, and that gives you quite another feeling, damn it all!’ The monster emitted a pathetic groan.
‘Or take pangs of conscience. I didn’t suffer from them at all in the old days. I devoured my prey and that was that. I still do today, but I feel remorseful afterwards. I wonder whether my victims had wives and children and whether they’re good for my blood pressure. All these worries are driving me mad.’ The articulate monster sighed. It was obviously in a conversational mood.
‘Then why not simply let me go?’ I suggested. ‘That’ll spare you any feelings of guilt. Besides, bear’s meat is supposed to be the worst thing for blood pressure.’
It was worth a try, I thought. What harm could it do?
‘Ah, so there you are!’ the dragon snarled viciously, and lashed out with its tail.
What a spiteful creature! It had deliberately induced me to speak so that the sound of my voice would betray where I was standing. The tip of its tail whistled straight towards me.
It was too late to turn and run, so I simply fell flat and hugged the slimy tunnel floor. The daggerlike horns scythed through the air only inches above me.
The dragon gave a disappointed snarl. ‘Hey, where are you?’
I jumped to my feet and ran off. My footsteps reechoed from the tunnel walls: splish-splash, splish-splash.
The dragon pushed off with its thighs again.
Whoosh! Twenty yards.
‘Great way of getting about, huh?’ it panted with a touch of pride.
‘That’s one of the advantages of being able to think. It would never have occurred to me in the old days.’
Whoosh! Another twenty yards.
I had almost reached the next manhole. Chemluth was hanging down into the tunnel head first, like a trapeze artist, with the Troglotroll hanging on to his legs.
‘Come on, jump, gah!’ he called. ‘We’ll haul you up!’
It was quite impossible. The Troglotroll would never manage to haul us both up at once. But in an emergency one clutches at the thinnest of straws. I jumped up and grasped Chemluth’s hands.
The Troglotroll heaved and groaned.
‘I’ll never do it!’ he moaned. Our combined weight was slowly pulling him downwards. ‘You’re too heavy!’
I knew that already. All that puzzled me was why he didn’t simply let go. He could easily have escaped from the danger zone by letting go of Chemluth.
Whoosh! Another twenty yards.
The Sewer Dragon’s rear end was right beneath me. The horny plates on its armoured back were arranged in layers, like a flight of steps.
A flight of steps! How practical! I had only to walk up the dragon’s back and into the manhole! The Troglotroll pulled Chemluth up, and before the monster knew what was happening I had climbed through the hole.
‘Now run for it!’ cried the Troglotroll. ‘We’re aren’t safe yet!’
We set off. This tunnel was much narrower than the one below. Chemluth and the Troglotroll had no trouble negotiating it, but I had to run at a crouch with my head down. Behind us, the Sewer Dragon poked its head through the hole.
‘Don’t go!’ it panted. ‘We could have a nice little chat.’ It drew a deep breath.
‘Watch out,’ shouted the Troglotroll, ‘or it’ll barbecue us!’
We sprinted as fast as we could. The dragon made a gurgling noise, then spat out a jet of flame that turned the water on the tunnel walls to hissing steam. By the time it reached us, however, we were too far away: it was just a blast of very hot air. We ran into a side tunnel at the Troglotroll’s heels.
‘We’ll be safe here,’ he gasped.
We rested for a moment, leaning against the wall to catch our breath. I couldn’t believe it: the Troglotroll had saved my life. At least, he had played an active part in my rescue and risked his own life in the process.
‘You really have turned over a new leaf,’ I said. ‘I’d never have believed it of you.’
The Troglotroll giggled. ‘I told you so, remember?’
‘What?’
‘Never trust a Troglotroll.’
In the Underworld
After about an hour’s descent into the underworld the architecture of the tunnel underwent a dramatic transformation. We entered a rectangular passage whose walls looked like shimmering metal but kept changing colour. But the genuinely alarming feature was that I’d never seen such colours before.
‘Stupid colours,’ observed the Troglotroll. ‘They’re enough to make one really nervous, ak-ak!’
The lighting now came, not from blue jellyfish, but from yellow globes that roamed the roof freely and emitted a cold, unearthly glow. Each of our footsteps was multiplied a dozen times by the echo. Long cables of many different colours ran along the walls, crackling with electricity. Located in the middle of the passage every hundred yards or so were contraptions of green glass that seemed to be muttering to themselves in some unintelligible language.
‘Those are the transistors,’ said the Troglotroll, as if that explained everything. ‘Don’t touch, please! Very electrical.’
Then the tunnel gave way to long shafts of solid, polished wood covered all over with artistically carved ornamentation and runic characters. The walls were no longer damp and the temperature had fallen to a pleasant level. It was like walking through a well-tended, well-heated museum.
When we entered one of the wooden shafts, living light seemed to accumulate around us, forming a pale bubble that accompanied our little party until we were taken over by another bubble in the next shaft. The light emitted a high-pitched, hostile humming sound that hurt my ears.
Next, we descended a curving walkway with
out steps, a steel spiral that wound down into the earth for about a mile. The peculiar thing about this walkway was that we didn’t have to walk on it. It conveyed us into the depths of its own accord.
Set in the walls were some big stained-glass windows like those in Atlantis’s immense cathedrals, except that their far more abstract designs resembled alien stellar systems. Pulsating behind these windows was white light.
The spiral walkway ended in front of a massive door of shiny black pyrite (or some similar mineral). Fifty feet high, it was adorned with strange-looking silver inlays.
‘Here we are,’ said the Troglotroll.
We reach our destination
He inserted his forefinger in a small, inconspicuous hole beside the door, which opened as silently as a theatre curtain going up. We stepped through the aperture into a huge hall perhaps ten times the size of the Megathon and containing what looked to me like umpteen thousands of Atlantean life forms. Venetian Midgets, Waterkins, Bluddums, Norselanders, dwarfs, gnomes, Yetis – all were milling around like the crowds on Ilstatna Boulevard during business hours, and none of them took any notice of us.
Less apprehensive now, Chemluth and I followed the Troglotroll as he swiftly threaded his way through the bustling throng. Looming over the hall were a number of gigantic machines unlike anything known to me in the field of mechanical engineering (about which, after my comprehensive education at the Nocturnal Academy, there was nothing I didn’t know).
Some consisted of dark crystals, others of rusty iron, and still others seemed to be made of polished wood with huge copper nails driven into it. From inside them came a muttering, whispering sound like that made by the smaller machines in the tunnels. The impression they made on me was one of great and reassuring beauty.
In the middle of the hall, rotating continuously, half of an immense cogwheel of high-grade steel projected through a slit in the floor. Darting around beneath the roof were harmless streaks of greased lightning of the kind we’d often seen on sultry nights in Atlantis. Someone stuck a finger in my ear. I spun round. It was Fredda.