Free Stormchaser by Paul Stewart, Chris Riddell Page A

yellow teeth gleamed against the bleached paleness of his lips. ‘Like I say,’ he said, turning and walking away. ‘It’ll cost you.’
    Darkness had fallen by the time Screed Toe-taker called it a day. He stopped on an outcrop of rocks and placed the lantern down. ‘We’ll stop here,’ he called back through cupped hands.
    One by one, the goblins started to arrive.
    ‘Keep that infant still!’ Screed shouted at a young female with a squawling babe-in-arms. ‘It’ll attract every muglump for miles around.’ He lifted the lantern and peered back the way they’d come. ‘And where are the others?’ he snapped. ‘Just my luck if they’ve already gone and got themselves lost.’
    ‘No, look! Over there!’ one of the young’uns cried, and pointed back towards a curious, squat figure which was shuffling towards them out of the low, swirling mist. As it grew closer, the one figure became three. It was Mim, trudging purposefully on with a youngster on her back and an arm around old Torp.
    Screed smiled. ‘All present and correct,’ he said.
    Buoyed up by the gleeful cheers of the others, Mim staggered across that last stretch of sucking quicksilver mud and up onto the rocky outcrop. Old Torp released himself from her supporting arm and sat down. ‘Well done, old-timer,’ she whispered breathlessly. ‘You made it.’ She pulled the sleeping youngster from her back, laid him gently down on the ground and covered him with a blanket. Then, groaning with the effort, she pulled herself upright and looked round.
    ‘Well, it's certainly not the most comfortable place I’ve ever spent the night,’ she said. ‘But it's dry. And that's the main thing. So, thank you, Screed, for bringing us to this place.’

    ‘My pleasure,’ he said, ignoring the sullen faces of the others – it was, after all, an expression he had seen a thousand times before. ‘And now,’ he said, ‘you must all get some sleep.’
    The gnokgoblins didn’t need telling twice. Within seconds, all of them were rolled up in their blankets, like a row of woolly cocoons – all, that is, except for Mim. ‘And yourself?’ she asked Screed.
    ‘Me?’ he said loftily, as he perched himself on the top of the tallest rock. ‘Oh, don’t you worry about me. I have little need of sleep.’ He gazed round the flat landscape, glinting and glistening like burnished silver beneath the moon. ‘Besides, someone has to keep watch.’
    Mim was reassured. Despite what she’d said earlier, she hadn’t liked the sound of the muglumps, oozefish or white ravens one tiny little bit. She wished Screed a good night, snuggled up between two of the young’uns and, by the time dark clouds rolled over the moon a couple of minutes later, she was, like all the others, fast asleep.
    Screed listened to the rasping chorus of snoring and smirked to himself. ‘Sleep well, little dwarves,’ he whispered, ‘or goblins – or whatever you are.’
    He brought the lantern nearer as the clouds rolled in, and pulled a knife from his belt which he began sliding gently back and forwards over the smooth rock. Occasionally he would spit on the metal, and inspect the blade in the yellow light. Then off he went again, slowly, methodically – whish, whish, whish – until every point along the blade was sharp enough to split a hair in two.
    Woe betide the creature that thought it could get the better of him. Screed stood up, lantern in one hand, knife in the other. Woe betide any who fell into his clutches.

    Abruptly, the clouds rolled back, and the bright moon shone down on the grisly scene, turning everything to black and white.
    White blankets. Black blood.
    White bony body, lurching on into the mud. Black shadow, stretching back across the rocks.
    White ravens, already scavenging. Black deeds. Monstrous deeds.
    With his leather bag full of bloody booty clasped in his bony hand, Screed Toe-taker picked his way across the Mire. Far away in front of him, the moon glinted on the