The Alchemaster's Apprentice - By Walter Moers Page 0,103

cupboard. As she did so, Echo thought he glimpsed a movement on one of the shelves inside.

‘What was that?’ he asked.

She instantly slammed the cupboard doors.

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘I saw something move in there.’

Echo noticed only now that the worm-eaten cupboard itself resembled a gigantic cheese.

Izanuela gave a little cough. ‘You’re imagining things.’

‘Come on,’ he said, ‘what are you hiding in there?’

She blushed. ‘Nothing,’ she mumbled. ‘Nothing at all.’

‘Something moved. I saw it with my own eyes.’

Izanuela shuffled from one foot to the other. ‘But you must promise never to tell anyone,’ she said.

‘I promise.’ Echo raised one paw.

She deposited the Crumblecrust on the kitchen table, opened the cupboard again and reached for the shelf on which Echo had seen something moving.

‘Come here, you …’ Izanuela made several attempts to grab something, but it appeared to evade her every time. Could it be a mouse?

‘Got you at last!’ she cried eventually.

Turning round, she held out a cheese the size of a clenched fist. It had numerous legs, all of which were waggling furiously.

‘A…a live cheese?’ Echo looked dumbfounded.

Izanuela shrugged her shoulders.

‘All cheeses are alive, strictly speaking. They mature like other living creatures. I simply give the process a helping hand - in a spirit of Caseinian fun, so to speak.’

She held the kicking cheese close to her face. It emitted a fretful whine.

‘I’ve christened it Inazuelan Brie - in my own honour. It’s my personal Caseinian creation. Live yoghurt cultures are partly responsible for its animation, as you can imagine, but I also use some Ugglimical essences strictly prohibited under the provisions of Ghoolion’s Municipal Ordinance No. 52736.’ She laughed.

‘What put the idea into your head?’

Izanuela sighed. ‘If you abstain as rigorously as I do from foods that used to be alive, you sometimes feel the urge to eat something that moves as much as possible while you’re eating it. It’s like that with me, anyway.’

‘I understand.’

‘If that brings me down to the level of a Demon’s Gulch Cyclops, so be it. But I should point out that the cheese feels nothing while you’re eating it. It resembles a Leyden Manikin in possessing no nervous system, so it can’t feel pain.’

As though in contradiction of the last statement, the cheese uttered a high-pitched whimper. Izanuela stuffed it into her mouth and devoured it in a few bites.

‘Mmm!’ she said, looking at Echo. ‘Yes, I know it’s a blot on my Ugglian escutcheon.’ She shrugged. ‘But who is free from guilt?’

‘So everything is alive in this place,’ he said. ‘Even the cheeses.’

‘Would you like one?’ Izanuela asked. ‘There are some more in the cupboard. They taste really delicious.’

‘No thanks,’ he said, ‘that Miner’s Breath was quite enough for me. Besides, I’d like to get my trip to the Toadwoods over before dark. It’s getting late.’

Izanuela recited again in vibrant tones:

‘You’re feeling terminally sick?

Off to the Toadwoods with you, quick!

All alone you there will be,

with no one else around to see.

So dig yourself a grave to fit

and then, my friend, lie down in it.’

Echo left the house as fast as he could.

The Toadwoods

The foliage in the Toadwoods was so dense that a kind of permanent twilight prevailed at ground level. Moreover, visibility was further reduced by the thin skeins of mist forever rising from expanses of marshland and drifting around the blackened trunks of the ancient trees.

‘Well, I suppose I’ll have to press on,’ Echo said to himself. ‘I opened my trap too wide, so I deserve to have it stuffed with Toadmoss. I can already smell the stuff, fortunately. I must head in the direction of those fallen tree trunks.’

The fallen tree trunks resembled the backs of gigantic lizards lying in wait for him in the grass. His progress was hampered by the prickly weeds and stinging nettles proliferating everywhere. Izanuela had a nerve, sending a little Crat off into a wilderness like this. Still, she’d risked her life on the mother of all roofs and he wanted to repay her. It would be shameful to return with nothing to show for his trip. He sniffed the air again.

‘I must go deeper into the woods. I’d better follow that mist.’

A wisp of vapour was drifting ahead of him. It reminded him of the Cooked Ghost and their joint excursions along the passages in Ghoolion’s castle. Ah, the castle! The Alchemaster’s sinister old ruin seemed like a luxury hotel out here. The trees appeared to be drawing ever closer together the further he went. He could see plump beetles and