The Eyre Affair_ A Novel - Jasper Fforde [579]
“Come along, Thursday my love,” she screeched, the hissing of the snakes almost drowning her out, “gaze into my soul and feel your body turn to stone—!”
I strained and cried out as her fingers pulled my eyelids open. I swiveled my eyes as low in their sockets as I could, desperate to stave off the inevitable, and was just beginning to see glimmers of light and the lower part of her body when there was the sound of steel being drawn from a scabbard and a soft whoop noise. Medusa fell limp and silent on my chest. I opened my eyes and pushed the severed head of the Gorgon into the shadows. I jumped up, slipped once in the pool of blood issuing from her headless corpse and ran backwards, stumbling in my panic to get away.
“Well,” said a familiar voice. “Looks like I got here just in time!”
It was the Cheshire Cat. He was sitting on an unfinished airship rib and was grinning wildly. He wasn’t alone. Next to him stood a man. But it wasn’t any ordinary man. He was, firstly, tall—at least seven foot six and broad with it. He was dressed in rudimentary armor and grasped in his powerful hands a shield and sword that appeared to weigh almost nothing. He was a frightening warrior to behold; the sort of hero for whom epics are written—the likes of which we have no need of in our day and age. He was the most alpha of males—he was Beowulf. He made no sound, knees slightly bent in readiness, bloody sword moving elegantly in a slow figure-eight pattern.
“Good move, Mr. Cat,” said Kaine sardonically, stepping from behind the gondola and facing us across the only open area in the hangar.
“You can end this right now, Mr. Kaine,” said the Cat. “Go back to your book and stay there—or face the consequences.”
“I choose not to,” he replied with an even smile, “and since you have raised the stakes by invoking an eighth-century hero, I challenge you to a one-on-one invocation contest pitting my fictional champions against yours. You win and I stay forever in At Long Last Lust; I win and you leave me unmolested.”
I looked at the Cheshire Cat who was, for once, not smiling.
“Very well, Mr. Kaine. I accept your challenge. Usual rules? One beast at a time and strictly no kraken?”
“Yes, yes,” replied Kaine impatiently. He closed his eyes and with a wild shriek Grendel appeared and flew towards Beowulf, who expertly sliced it into eight more or less equal pieces.
“I think we got him riled,” whispered the Cheshire Cat from the corner of his mouth. “That was a bad move—Beowulf always vanquishes Grendel.”
But Kaine didn’t waste any more time and a moment later there was a living, breathing Tyrannosaurus rex tramping the concrete floor, fangs drooling with saliva. It whipped its tail angrily and knocked the engine nacelle onto its side.
“From The Lost World,” queried the Cat, “or Jurassic Park?”
“Neither,” replied Kaine. “The Boy’s Bumper Book of Dinosaurs.”
“Ooh!” replied the Cat. “The nonfiction gambit, eh?”
Kaine clicked his fingers and the thunder lizard lunged forwards as Beowulf went into the attack, sword flailing. I retreated towards the Cat and asked anxiously, “This Beowulf isn’t the original, is it?”
“Good Lord no, quite the reverse!”
It was just as well. Beowulf had made mincemeat of Grendel but the Tyrannosaurus, in turn, made mincemeat of him. As the giant lizard slurped down the remnants of the warrior, the Cat hissed to me: “I do so love these competitions!”
I wiped my scratched face with my handkerchief. I must say I couldn’t really share the Cat’s mischievous sense of glee or enjoyment. “What’s our next move?” I asked him. “Smaug the dragon?”
“No point. He’d invoke a Baggins to kill it. Perhaps it would be best to make a tactical retreat and introduce an Allan Quatermain with an elephant gun, but I’m late for my son’s birthday party, so it’s going to be . . . him!”
There was another shimmer in the air about us and, with a whiffling and a burbling, a bat-winged creature appeared. It had a long tail, reptilian feet, flaming eyes, huge sort