He placed a palm against the wood, feeling for vibration. Nothing. No machinery then. Butler
curled his fingers around the knob, twisting gently. With his other hand, he drew a Sig Sauer
automatic from his shoulder holster. No time to fetch the dart rifle, it would have to be shoot to
kill.
The door swung open noiselessly, as Butler knew it would, having oiled every hinge in the house
himself. Before him was…Well, to be honest, Butler wasn't quite sure what it was. If he didn't
know better, that is at first glance, he could have sworn that the thing resembled nothing more than
an enormous quivering ...
And then the thing exploded, jettisoning an amazing amount of tunnel waste directly at the
unfortunate manservant! It was like being battered with a hundred sledgehammers simultaneously.
Butler was lifted bodily and flung against the wall.
And as he lay there, consciousness slipping away from him, he prayed that Master Artemis hadn't
managed to capture the moment on video.
Holly was weakening. The bedframe was nearly twice her body weight and the ridges were tearing
cruel welts in her palms. But she couldn't stop now. Not when she was so close.
She slammed the post into the concrete again. A cloud of grey dust spiralled around her legs. Any
second now, Fowl would tumble to her plan and she'd get the hypodermic treatment again. But
until then ...
She gritted her teeth against the pain, heaving the bedframe to knee height. Then she saw it. A
sliver of brown among the grey. Could it be true?
Pain forgotten, Captain Short dropped the bed, sinking quickly to her knees. There was indeed a
small patch of earth poking through the cement. Holly fumbled the acorn from her boot, clasping it
tightly in bloody fingers.
'I return you to the earth,' she whispered, worming her fist into the tiny space. 'And claim the gift
that is my right.'
Nothing happened for a heartbeat. Perhaps two. Then Holly felt the magic rush up her arm like a
jolt from an electrified troll fence. The shock sent her spinning across the room. For a moment the
world swirled in a disconcerting kaleidoscope of colour, but when it settled Holly was no longer the
defeated elf she had been.
'Right, Master Fowl.' She grinned, watching the blue sparks of fairy magic seal her wounds. 'Let's
see what I have to do to get your permission to leave this place.'
'Drop everything,' sulked Juliet. 'Drop everything and check the prisoner.' She flicked blonde
tresses expertly over a shoulder. 'He must think I'm his maid or something.'
She hammered on the cell door with the flat of her hand.
'I'm coming in now, fairy girl, so if you're doing anything embarrassing, please stop.'
Juliet punched the combination into the keypad. 'And no, I don't have your vegetables, or your
washed fruit. But it's not my fault, Artemis in-sis-ted I come right down ...'
Juliet stopped talking, because there was nobody listening. She was preaching to an empty room.
She waited for her brain to pass on an explanation. Nothing came. Eventually the notion to take
another look filtered down.
She took a tentative step into the concrete cube. Nothing. Only a slight shimmering in the
shadows. Like a mist. It was probably these stupid glasses. How were you supposed to see anything
wearing mirrored sunglasses underground? And they were so nineties, they weren't even retro yet.
Juliet glanced guiltily at the monitor. Just a quick peek, what harm could it do? She whipped up
the frames, sending her eyeballs spinning around the room.
In that instant a figure materialized before her. Just stepped out of the air. It was Holly. She was
smiling.
'Oh, it's you. How did you -'
The fairy interrupted with a wave of her hand.
'Why don't you take off those glasses, Juliet? They really don't suit you.'
She's right, thought Juliet. And what a lovely voice. Like a choir all on its own. How could you
argue with a voice like that?
'Sure. Caveman glasses off. Cool voice, by the way. Doh ray me and all that.'
Holly decided not to try deciphering Juliet's comments. It was hard enough when the girl was in
full control of her brain.
'Now. A simple question.'
'No problem.' What a great idea.
'How many people in the house?'
Juliet thought. One and one and one.
And another one? No, Mrs Fowl wasn't there.
'Three,' she said finally. 'Me and Butler and, of course, Artemis. Mrs Fowl was here, but she went
bye-bye, then she went bye-bye.'
Juliet giggled. She'd made a joke. A good one too.
Holly drew a breath to ask for clarification, then thought better of it. A mistake as it turned out.
'Has anyone else been here. Anyone like me?'
Juliet chewed her lip. 'There was one little man. In a uniform like yours. Not cute though. Not
one bit. Just shouted and smoked a smelly cigar. Terrible complexion. Red as a tomato.'
Holly almost smiled. Root had come himself. No doubt the negotiations had been disastrous.
'No one else?'
'Not that I know of. If you see that man again, tell him to lay off the red meat. He's just a
coronary waiting to happen.'
Holly swallowed a grin. Juliet was the only human she knew who was probably more lucid under
the mesmer.
'OK. I'll tell him. Now, Juliet, I want you to stay in my room, and no matter what you hear, don't
come out.'
Juliet frowned. 'This room? It's so boring. No TV or anything. Can't I go up to the lounge?'
'No. You have to stay here. Anyway, they've just installed a wall television. Cinema size.
Wrestling, twenty-four hours a day.'
Juliet almost fainted with pleasure. She ran into the cell, gasping as her imagination supplied the
pictures.
Holly shook her head. Well, she thought, at least one of us is happy.
Mulch gave his rear end a shake to dislodge any clumps of earth. If only his mother could see him
now, spraying mud on the Mud People. That was irony, or something like it. Mulch had never been
big on grammar in school. That or poetry. He'd never seen the point. Down the mines, there were
only two phrases of any importance: 'Look, gold!' and 'Cave in, everybody out!' No hidden meanings
there, or rhymes.
The dwarf buttoned his bum-flap, which had been blasted open by the gale emanating from his
nether regions. Time to make a run for it. Whatever hope he'd had of escaping undiscovered had
been blown. Literally.
Mulch retrieved his earpiece, screwing it firmly into his ear. Well, you never knew, even the LEP
might prove useful.
'... And when I get my hands on you, convict, you'll wish you stayed down those mines ...'
Mulch sighed. Ah well. Nothing new there then.
Clasping the safe's treasure tightly in his fist, the dwarf turned to retrace his steps. To his utter
amazement there was a human entangled in the banisters. Mulch was not one bit surprised that his
recyclings had managed to hurl the elephantine Mud Man several metres through the air. Dwarf gas
had been known to cause avalanches in the Alps. What did surprise him was the fact that the man
had managed to get so close to him in the first place.
'You're good,' said Mulch, wagging a finger at the unconscious bodyguard. 'But nobody takes a
body blow from Mulch Diggums and stays on their feet.'
The Mud Man stirred, the whites of his eyes showing beneath fluttering lids.
Root's voice crackled in the dwarf's ears. 'Get a move on, Mulch Diggums, before that Mud Man
gets up and rearranges your innards. He took out an entire Retrieval team, you know.'
Mulch swallowed, his bravado suddenly deserting him.
'An entire Retrieval team? Maybe I should get back underground…for the good of the mission.'
Skipping hurriedly around the groaning bodyguard, Mulch took the steps two at a time. No point
in worrying about creaking stairs when you've just sent the intestinal equivalent of Hurricane Hal
scurrying around the corridors.
He'd almost reached the cellar door when a figure shimmered into focus before him. Mulch
recognized it as his arresting officer from the Renaissance Masters smuggling case.
'Captain Short.'
'Mulch. I wasn't expecting to see you.'
The dwarf shrugged. 'Julius had a dirty job. Someone had to do it.'
'I get it,' said Holly, nodding. 'You've already lost your magic. Smart. What did you find out?'
Mulch showed Holly his find. 'This was in his safe.'
'A copy of the Book!' gasped Holly. 'No wonder we're in this fix. We were playing into his hands
all along.'
Mulch opened the cellar door. 'Shall we?'
'I can't. I'm under eyeball orders not to leave the house.'
'You magical types and your rituals. You have no idea how liberating it is to be rid of all that
mumbo-jumbo.'
A series of sharp noises drifted down from the upper landing. It sounded like a troll thrashing
around in a crystal emporium.
'We can debate ethics at a later date. Right now I suggest we make ourselves scarce.'
Mulch nodded. 'Agreed. This guy took out an entire Retrieval squad apparently.'
Holly paused, half shielded.
'An entire squad? Hmm. Fully equipped. I wonder ..."
She continued her fade-out, and the last thing to go was her widening grin.
Mulch was tempted to hang around. There weren't many things more fun to watch than a heavily
armed Recon officer going to town on a bunch of unsuspecting humans. By the time Captain Short
got through with this Fowl character, he'd be begging her to get out of his manor.
The Fowl character in question was watching it all from the surveillance room. There was no
denying it. Things were not good. Not good at all. But certainly not irredeemable. There was still
hope.
Artemis catalogued the events of the last few minutes. The manor's security had been
compromised. The safe room was in a shambles, blown apart by some sort of fairy flatulence. Butler
lay unconscious, possibly paralysed by the same gaseous anomaly. His hostage was loose in the
house, her fairy powers restored to her. There was an unsightly creature in leather chaps burrowing
holes beneath the foundations, with no apparent regard for the fairy commandments. And the
People had retrieved a copy of the Book, one of several copies as it happened, including one on disk
in a Swiss vault.
Artemis's finger combed an errant strand of dark hair. He would have to dig very deep to uncover
the good in this particular scenario. He took several deep breaths, finding his chi as Butler had
taught him.
After several moments' contemplation, he realized that these factors meant little to the overall
strategies of both sides. Captain Short was still trapped in the manor. And the time-stoppage period
was running out. Soon the LEP would have no option but to launch their bio-bomb, and that was
when Artemis Fowl would unveil his coup de grace. Of course, the whole thing depended on
Commander Root. If Root was as intellectually challenged as he looked, it was quite possible the
entire scheme would collapse around his ears. Artemis hoped fervently that someone on the fairy
team had the wit to spot the 'blunder' he'd made during the negotiation session.
Mulch unbuttoned his bum-flap. Time to suck some dirt, as they said down the mines. The
trouble with dwarf tunnels was that they were self-sealing, so that if you had to go back the way you
came, there was a whole new burrow to be excavated. Some dwarfs retraced their steps exactly,
chewing through the less compact and pre-digested dirt. Mulch preferred to dig a fresh tunnel. For
some reason, eating the same dirt twice didn't appeal to him.
Unhinging his jaw, the dwarf pointed himself torpedo-like through the hole in the floorboards.
His heart calmed immediately as the scent of minerals filled his nostrils. Safe, he was safe. Nothing
could catch a dwarf underground, not even a Skaylian rock worm. That was, of course, if he managed
to get underground ...
Ten very powerful fingers gripped Mulch by the ankles. This just wasn't the dwarf's day. First
wart-face, now this homicidal human. Some people never learn. Usually Mud People.
'Egg go,' he mumbled, unhinged jaw flapping uselessly.
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