Floods 7 by Colin Thompson Page B

eating.’
    â€˜If I remember my geography lessons,’ said the Queen, ‘there is no road as such into the country, just donkey tracks.’
    â€˜Mother, it was a very long time ago when you were at school,’ said Mordonna. ‘Things have changed.’
    â€˜Really?’
    â€˜Yes, your husband, my father, got rid of all the donkey tracks years ago.’
    â€˜You mean there’s proper roads now?’
    â€˜Did I say that?’ said Mordonna. ‘No, he just got rid of the donkey tracks.’
    â€˜It’s not a problem,’ said Winchflat. ‘I told you the campervan could go anywhere and so it can.’
    He pressed two buttons and a big red knoband they slowly lifted into the air. A small dog who was in the middle of lifting his leg on one of the van wheels fainted in surprise. So did the old lady holding the dog’s lead.
    The van rose silently above the trees and vanished into the clouds that always covered the mountain tops.
    The clouds came halfway down the mountain, but only on the outside of Transylvania Waters. It had been like that for as long as anyone could remember. There were people over ninety years old who had never seen the mountain tops.
    The clouds had been put there by the first wizards to settle in Transylvania Waters, to keep outsiders from coming into their country. For the clouds were not simple collections of fluffy water vapour like they are everywhere else. These clouds contained sleeping gas so that anyone climbing up into them fell asleep long before they reached the summit. It didn’t take long for humans to learn to stay away. Sheep never learned, though, and the misty hillsides are dotted with sleeping sheep, someof whom have been there for centuries.
    â€˜Wind up all the windows,’ said Winchflat as they rose higher towards the mountain tops. ‘I knew those fog lights would come in handy.’
    â€˜Look at all those sheep,’ said Satanella to Brastof. ‘I’d love to get out and chase them.’
    â€˜Getting out would not be good,’ warned Winchflat. ‘You would fall as fast asleep as they are.’
    â€˜Well, couldn’t we open the window a bit and bark at them?’ said Satanella.
    â€˜Yeah,’ said Brastof. ‘Brilliant. I aren’t barfed at a sheep for two hundred years.’
    â€˜Don’t you mean barked?’ said Betty.
    â€˜That too,’ said Brastof.
    â€˜Do not open the window or we will all fall asleep,’ said Winchflat.
    â€˜Listen, darling,’ said Mordonna to Satanella, ‘when we get settled again, I’ll get you a sheep of your own and you can bark at it all day.’
    â€˜Wow,’ said Satanella.
    â€˜Can we barf at it too?’ said Brastof.
    â€˜If you hose it down afterwards,’ said Mordonna.
    They came over the last rise and out of the clouds. It wasn’t gradual like normal clouds, but a sudden flat wall of fog. For a few seconds the front of the van was out in the cold clear air while the back was still hidden in mist. Then they were completely free and there it lay stretched out before them.

    The deep sunless grey valley that was home.
    Transylvania Waters.
    Mordonna and Nerlin felt their blood surge with joy. Queen Scratchrot, although looking younger, had no blood left, but she felt her empty veins tingle.
    Twenty-three years had passed since they had left the land of their birth. And every single day of those twenty-three years, Mordonna had closed her eyes for a few moments and brought back the memories of its wet grey valleys and waterfalls of acid rain.
    She could see, far off in the distance, the brown fog of the evening rise out of Lake Tarnish and crawl towards the city, eating into everything as it passed, as it had done since the dawn of time. 33 The spires of the castle, green with verdigris, poked through the fog like the legs of a dead spider. It was the most beautiful sight the Floods had ever seen.
    Even