Nurd sighed. There was a discarded match on the ground beside him. He picked it up and flicked at it with a curved fingernail, causing it to ignite.

“Wormwood?” he said. “Will you do the honors?”

He held the match out by his side. Wormwood leaned in close, took a deep breath, and blew hard.

The match disappeared in a torrent of flame that continued in the direction of the elves. If they thought the petrol was bad, the effect of Wormwood’s lit breath on them was a thousand times worse. Nurd wasn’t sure what Wormwood’s digestive system was like, but he decided that whatever was happening inside Wormwood must be very horrible, and certainly explained where a lot of those smells were coming from. The elves didn’t even burn. They just went straight from wood to black ash without any steps in between.

“Thank you, Wormwood,” said Nurd. “Well done. Indeed, they’re probably very well done now, come to think of it.”

Wormwood stopped blowing. Nurd dislodged the remaining pieces of charred elf from his tail, and lifted the tip to examine it. It, too, was on fire. He gave a little puff of breath, and the fire went out.

“What now?” said Wormwood.

“We go to Wreckit & Sons,” said Nurd.

“Why there?”

Nurd picked up an elf foot that had survived the blaze and pointed to the sole of its little painted boot. On it were written the words PROPERTY OF WRECKIT & SONS.

40. You should not play with fire. You are about to discover why.

XXV

In Which Battle Commences

DOZY AND MUMBLES COLLIDED with Angry, Jolly, and Dan, who had just been reunited. They came together next to a pile of old yellow boxes marked, peculiarly enough, ODD SHOES, although nothing could have been odder than what they’d already encountered in that basement.

“You won’t believe what happened to us!” said Jolly, then remembered that, not too long before, they’d all been trapped in Hell together. “Hang on, you probably will believe it.”

“You won’t believe what’s still happening to us,” Dozy managed to gasp as the first of the running eyeballs rounded the corner and pulled up short. It had been expecting to encounter two dwarfs, but was now facing four, and a human. If it had been gifted with hands, it would have rubbed itself just to be sure that it wasn’t seeing things.

“Is that an eyeball on legs?” said Angry.

“One of many,” said Dozy. “The rest are on their way. Oh, look, here they are.”

More eyeballs appeared, and paused to consider Dan and the dwarfs.

“They’ve got teeth,” said Jolly. “That can’t be right. Why are they chasing you?”

“Because I stood on one of them,” said Dozy. “I stamped on it hard, to be honest, but it was an accident.”

“Messy,” said Jolly.

“I think I still have some of it stuck to my heel,” said Dozy.

“Nasty,” said Angry. “Just so we’re clear, you stood on one, and then the others got angry, so you ran away from them?”