The tongue on which he landed was coarse and soggy, like a bed of rain-soaked ferns. It flung him toward the back of the mouth, where a vast bulb of red flesh dangled above the gaping black hole that would, Edgar presumed, be the last thing he ever saw. With a leap, Edgar grabbed the dangling piece of flesh. It was moist and slick, and far too wide for him to put his arms around. Digging his fingers into the soft surface, he hung on for dear life.

“Gunnarrrgh!” said the giant, causing Edgar’s fleshy perch to swing back and forth in a dizzying way.

When the giant’s mouth was open, Edgar could see. When it closed, he found himself in a darkness deeper than any he had ever known.

“Gunnarrrgh!” repeated the giant.

Edgar’s grip was loosening, and he was expecting to fall into the waiting hole at any second, when he heard a creaky voice call, “Over here! Hurry!”

Twisting toward the voice, he was astonished to see a flash of light—a torch!

“Hurry!” repeated the voice.

“Gunnarrrgh!” said the giant for a third time. Edgar flung himself forward, landing on the giant’s tongue once more. The great pad of flesh rippled alarmingly as the giant tried to swallow him. Digging his hands into the tongue’s surface, which consisted of pulpy red fibers thick as his wrists and long as his arms, Edgar clung to it like a barnacle to a ship’s bottom.

“Come on, come on!” cried the voice behind the torch. “I can’t hold this out here forever. It’ll make him sneeze, which will almost certainly kill you!”

Reaching forward, Edgar grabbed another handful of tongue and pulled himself along the rough surface. Fighting the motion of the tongue (which was accompanied by disgusting gagging sounds from the giant), he dragged himself hand over hand toward the beckoning torch, which was yards away. He had just reached a wart, wider than a tree stump, when the giant made a last desperate attempt to swallow him. Edgar managed to get himself on the forward side of the wart—toward the teeth and away from the throat—and braced himself against it.

“Gak gak gak!” hacked the giant.

Edgar leaped forward, landing within a foot of the torch. A withered hand reached out to him. He grabbed it thankfully and was pulled into the most astonishing room he had ever seen.

Well, it wasn’t a room, exactly.