The Great Troll War

Aboard the

Bellerophon

I was handed a towel and while I dried my hair I looked around. I was inside what looked like a storeroom of circular cross-section about thirty feet long and no more than fifteen feet wide and high. The hull was constructed with multiple circular bulkheads of riveted iron construction, and fore and aft were watertight doors. The sub had been awaiting our arrival beneath the waters of the quarry, and we had dived down and entered by way of a series of hatches between the craft and the water-filled quarry above.

Feldspar was dry almost straight away, and thanked the captain for the speed at which she had managed the rendezvous. She replied that, with a common enemy, all national differences were set aside. I thanked her too, and as we we watched, crew members busied themselves sealing the hatch in the ceiling and then stowing the breathing apparatus they had used to dive out into the quarry to guide us back to the craft. The crudely engineered interior looked very like one of the vast tracked landships that had often been used to wage war in the Kingdoms, but I knew I wasn’t in one of those. I was in a Subterrain, essentially, a submarine that travels not through water, but land.

‘You’ll need some clean clothes until yours dry off,’ said Captain Lutumba. ‘My number two will take you to my cabin where you can change. I will expect to see you ASAP in the control room.’

The second-in-command took me to the captain’s cabin, where I changed out of my wet things and handed them over for drying. Although I’d never been in a Subterrain I knew of their existence, or at least supposed existence. The Duchy of Cotswoldia, denied a land army or airforce as part of the peace treaty with the neighbouring University City State of Oxfordia, embarked on their own version of a land-locked navy: not one that worked in rivers or lakes, but underground. The sleek burrowing craft often spent months at a time submerged, and aside from a trembling of teacups in the corner cupboard, there was little sign a Subterrain was close – until one of their burrowing torpedoes hit home. They were almost impossible to detect – crucially, not even by magic. We could creep up on Shandar and he’d not suspect a thing.

I found Feldspar in the control cabin chatting with Captain Lutumba. The sturdy riveted iron construction was evident here, too, and the hull sides where not covered by dials and gauges were lavishly decorated with polished brass and wood, with several fine oil paintings. There was a small kitchenette from where a rating was about to serve tea along with several custard tarts, which I can reveal were very fine indeed. The control cabin was far less complicated than the bridge of a submarine as these vessels moved a lot slower, and were rarely in danger of sinking. The crew were composed mostly of engineers and geologists, who navigated the ground beneath the UnUnited Kingdoms by avoiding hard rock and instead opting for alluvial flood plains, clay, coal or, even better, soil.

‘The DCSV Tamaraire was down here half a century ago assisting the Kingdom of Devon’s unrestricted clotted cream campaign during the Scone Wars with Cornwall,’ explained the captain to Feldspar as I walked in, ‘so we used the TransDartmoor Subterranean Expressway to meet you. We can traverse Dartmoor in about an hour, barring roof cave-ins.’

‘How long have you two been in touch?’ I asked.

‘A week,’ explained Feldspar, ‘through Lady Mawgon.’

‘We accept Princess Shazine Snodd as the one true ruler and you as her proxy,’ said the captain with a respectful nod and a click of her heels. ‘The Bellerophon is now at your service. What are your orders?’

It was a no-brainer. I asked for them to go beneath where the HENRY was situated. The captain gave the order to get under way, and we set off, the craft trembling and shuddering as it moved. Navigation when in a pre-dug tunnel was fairly simple, but out in the open ground it was more about following areas of the softest rock. Because of this, the navigators had the most up-to-date geological maps complete with locations of gas mains, train tunnels and everything else, but caution was still a watchword: there could often be unmapped obstructions such as wells, concrete pilings and enthusiastically deep underground car parks.

‘We don’t even try to get across London these days,’ explained the chief geo-navigator. ‘One of our small, two-woman fast pursuit craft broke into the Piccadilly Line near Ealing Common and there was hell to pay.’

It took us only fifteen minutes to move the half-mile or so, the rubber-shod wheels that were set into the craft’s flanks driving it along the smooth tunnel. Once we were beneath the HENRY the captain ordered all engines halted. I took the storage jars from the backpack and opened the stoppers. Dibble Storage Jars glow when accepting a charge, but right now they were doing nothing of the kind. Wizidrical energy travels easily in air, but water or soil blocks its power very quickly. The captain, however, was not short of ideas and suggested we attach the jars to the periscope in a special container usually reserved for retrieving stores of pâté, ciabatta, avocados and so forth from resupply trucks, generally disguised as roadside catering vans.

The Dibble Jars so placed, the captain gently raised the periscope up to ground level, which also allowed us a quick view of the inside of the HENRY. There were six Trolls sitting around looking bored, and next to them, a large cage on wheels. Feldspar had been right. It had definitely been a trap.

‘The Mighty Shandar is clearly unable to catch you himself if he assigns the task to Trolls,’ said the captain, also having a look. ‘He fears you. Where do you want to go once the jars are filled?’

‘Time spent on reconnaissance is never wasted,’ I replied. ‘Think we can get beneath Shandar’s skyscraper? It’s just north of Exeter.’

Feldspar and I marked on a map where the replica of the Chrysler Building was sited, and the navigators pulled out their charts and found that they could follow the trans-Dartmoor Expressway, then hook up with the Sticklepath fault-line before hanging a right into the Crediton trough – and all through ready-dug tunnels.

‘If we clear all traffic from the tunnels ahead of us we can get to Dig-Zero in three hours,’ said the captain. ‘After that it will take us seven more hours to burrow the mile to Shandar’s tower, although I think we might be able to shave half an hour off that if we hoof it and don’t stop for lunch.’

I told her that would be admirable.

‘By your command,’ said the captain, again saluting smartly, and the crew readied the craft. And as soon as the jars were full, we were off.