UNWELCOME DINNER GUESTS
Fa-Dunk! Fa-Dunk! Fa-Dunk!
The noise was distant and low at first, but it rumbled menacingly off the dining-room walls and made everybody stop what they were doing to listen.
Fa-Dunk! Fa-Dunk! Fa-Dunk!
‘What’s that?’ asked Zingri.
‘It’s probably just Nancy coming back with the mango chutney,’ Mum replied.
FA-DUNK! FA-DUNK! FA-DUNK!
Unless my ears were playing tricks on me, the sound was getting louder. It seemed to be coming from underneath our feet, like something was shuffling about on the floor.
FA-DUNK! FA-DUNK! FA-DUNK!
There was an ear-shattering squeal as something nudged the chair backwards away from the table and everyone cried out in alarm.
Fa-Dunk! Fa-Dunk! Fa-Dunk!
The sound was different now … softer! Whatever was down there had just hopped up onto the chair.
‘Can you see what it is?’ Mum said. ‘If it’s Hoggit snaffling for scraps, there’s going to be trouble.’
I walked to the edge of the table and nervously peered over, being careful to keep my balance. Far below on the wooden seat were three leathery brownish lumps. If I had been normal-sized, they’d each be about the size of an apple, but right now they were as big as hot-air balloons.
‘What can you see, Frankie?’ Dad called over to me. ‘Anything?’
I was about to yell back to Dad and say I thought they were extra-large minkle-meatballs when the middle one opened its yellow eyes and glowered up at me.
After that, everything was a bit of a blur if I’m honest. I barely had time to run back from the edge before…
FA-DUNK! FA-DUNK! FA-DUNK!
I dived out of the way as the monstrous things bounced up onto the table with deafening booms! Scurrying back towards my family, I spun round to get a good look…
I recognised all three of them instantly. They were the disgusterous bad-luck charms we’d seen strung to Maudlin Maloney’s belt, and now the shrunken heads – which were not so shrunken any more – were very much alive and, by the looks of things, ready to have a feast of their own.
Everybody froze in terror. In our tiny state, the gruesome little lumps were COLOSSAL and towered above us all.
‘BLAAAAAGH!’ one of the heads groaned, lolling a black tongue out of its mouth and dragging it across jagged teeth.
‘BROOOOAAAAAAAAHHH!’ the heads roared and all at once chaos broke out across the tabletop.
‘Run fer it!’ Orfis howled as the head with a ring through its nose bounced towards us with its mouth open wide. ‘THEY’RE TRYING TO EAT US!’ CRASH!
The head landed on the edge of the trog-hog platter, sending boulder-sized balls of sage-and-bunion stuffing bouncing high into the air.
‘Go, go, go!’ Dad yelled, grabbing me by the arm and dragging me away as the shrunken head flopped out its crusty tongue again. ‘Get to higher ground!’
Ahead of me, I could see Mum and the Kwinzis sprinting across the tablecloth as balls of stuffing came thundering down like dreadful savoury bombs.
‘OOOF NO LIKE!’ Ooof bawled as we passed him. He swung a breadstick like a club and knocked one of the gruesome heads over on its side. It was the super-leathery one that Maudlin Maloney had introduced as her Aunt Influenza. For a second I thought our handyogre might just have defeated it, until the horrible thing wobbled upright and screamed in Ooof’s face, sending a green cloud of rancid breath billowing out in front of it.
Dad and I raced round an immense jug of grappleweed gravy and came face to face with the third horrible head. It had a patch over one eye and the faded remains of a blue anchor tattooed on its chin which meant that this dreadful thing had once been a Squall Goblin, just like Captain Calamitus Plank.
‘GAAAAAAAH!’ it bellowed so loudly that the tabletop rumbled under our feet. ‘BLAAAAARRG!’
‘Over here, Frankie!’ Dad yelled as he pulled me up onto a great hill of crab-curd koftas. ‘Get to the top!’
I scrambled as fast as I could, but the enormous fried blocks of food were greasy and it was difficult to grip the edges as I climbed.
‘This way, grub!’ Unga called to me. She was a few levels higher on the stack of crispy snacks and I could see she’d already helped Mum, Orfis and Zingri up onto the pile. ‘Wiffly now! As quinkly as you can!’
She reached down and grabbed me by my jacket collar, then lifted me straight up to the top of the crunchy peak.
‘THIS IS DISASTEROUS!’ Orfis howled as a plate of iced bumble-wheat buns was upended and they crashed into the side of our food mountain like meteors. ‘We’re gonelies!’
From the top of the crab-curd koftas I could see the terrible scene unfolding all around me. It was like everything was moving in slow motion…
I watched as the ugly blob with the ring through its nose cornered Reginald Blink and his family by the dish of rat-tail terrine. With one foul SLUUURRPP, it sucked them all straight off their feet and gobbled all four of them down at once.
Aunt Influenza’s head was now splashing about in the cauldron of cursed snotty soup like some nightmarish tea bag. It was guzzling down mouthfuls of the green liquid, then spitting jets of it back out as guests ran past in a panic, sending them flying across the table.
‘Aaaeeeeeeee!’ I turned just in time to see the pirate head blow an almighty gust of wind at Berol Dunch who had somehow shimmied up a drinking straw to escape the chaos.
The geriatric mermaid spiralled into the air, flapping her fishtail this way and that. Then, as she started to fall back down, the tattooed head bounced up towards her and swallowed her whole with a reverberating GULP!
