Samuel Blink and the Forbidden Forest by Matt Haig Page A

pot. All trolls have three-toed feet and they are universally ugly, but the type of ugliness varies greatly. There are two-headed trolls. No-headed trolls. One-eyed trolls. Four-armed trolls. Despite their differences of appearance, trolls are all equally dangerous and should be avoided at all costs.
    Weakness: Trolls have no weakness at all. They are pure evil.
    Samuel shivered with terror after he had finished reading, and flicked through the pages, catching glimpses of other creatures’ names—Slemps, Truth Pixies, Tomtegubbs and many others. He decided to keep hold of the book, tucking it in his trousers and hiding it under his sweater. He then put the checkered cloth back over the tea chest. He stepped across the creaking floorboards, toward the ladder that leaned against the opening in the floor.
    I’d better go . He realized his aunt would have probably finished taking the dry washing off the line.
    As he placed his foot on the ladder he noticed an object like a spear leaning against the corner of the room.
    Aunt Eda’s old javelin .
    But there was no time to inspect.
    He heard Aunt Eda downstairs, so he quickly climbed down the ladder and tiptoed back to the bedroom where he had left Martha.
    â€œMartha, there’s a jav—”
    Samuel’s sentence was left unfinished, hanging in the air as he scanned the room for his sister. But it was no good.
    Martha was nowhere to be seen.

Martha Goes Missing
    â€œMartha?…Martha?”
    Where was she?
    Samuel ran downstairs and looked in the living room but the only presence was that of Ibsen, his four legs jerking as he lay in his basket, lost in cheese-fueled dreams.
    Martha wasn’t in the hallway or the kitchen either. Maybe she was in the washroom, helping Aunt Eda sort out the dry clothes. This possibility led him through the length of the kitchen to the yellow door with the wobbly handle. He opened it and walked inside the small room, which had once been used as a tiny cheese factory. Aunt Eda was grumbling to herself in Norwegian while trying to match socks together on top of the washing machine. After she finished with the washing, she was going to phone Oskar and ask if it would be all right to stay with him until she had found somewhere else for them all to live. These thoughts preoccupied her so much that she was completely unaware that Samuel had stepped onto the stone floor beside her.
    â€œWhere’s Martha?”
    His question made Aunt Eda jump. She turned from her half-rescued pile of washing.
    â€œGood heffens, Samuel. You shocked the life out of me.” Then she remembered his question, and frowned. “Martha’s upstairs. In the bedroom. With you. By the way, I haff made a decision. Today we are going to moof—”
    â€œNo,” Samuel said. “She’s not there. Martha. She’s not in the bedroom.”
    Aunt Eda turned toward Samuel, and as she looked him in the eye a sudden terror seemed to grip her.
    â€œWhen did you last see her?” she asked him.
    â€œTen minutes ago,” Samuel said. “I went to—” He managed to stop himself from telling her “the attic.”
    Aunt Eda looked around the small, windowless washroom. After all those years, it still smelled of cheese. “I haff been in here fife minutes,” she said, as much to herself as Samuel. Then, with a sudden urgency: “Look out of the window.”
    Samuel went back out of the yellow door and looked out of the kitchen window, with The Creatures of Shadow Forest still under his sweater. He saw nothing except empty fields with the fjord and the mountains in the distance.
    â€œNo!” barked Aunt Eda, behind him. “The window at the back of the living room!”
    They ran toward the living room, but Aunt Eda paused by the doorway.
    â€œHer shoes,” she said. “Her shoes are missing.”
    Samuel looked out of the window that was positioned above Ibsen’s basket. (Ibsen,