But ... there was nothing at Linden Avenue. Everything in the atmosphere there told him that they were hiding secrets from him.
Tengel the Evil was livid. What were they hiding? Or who?
He was certainly going to find the answer to that.
He must be on his way to Linden Avenue! Immediately!
The Valley of the Ice People ...?
His thoughts moved on, northwards. They found the Valley.
No, everything was quiet there, as he knew, of course. During his hibernation, he had often sent his thoughts there and found that everything was fine. Perhaps the Ice People had given up the Valley by now, after so many unfortunate attempts. He thought that he didn’t have to fear the Ice People any more. His own treacherous descendants.
All he had was a vague sense of unease that a new danger had arisen. Somebody who wasn’t in the Valley or at Linden Avenue.
He would have to go out in the open.
His guard – Tengel the Evil hissed in disgust – had just been here to make his usual inspection and wouldn’t be back for a while.
Tengel the Evil got up without any difficulty. This boded well. But he knew that he hadn’t reached his full strength yet. The instrument had been wrong, the signal only in snatches and incomplete.
Well, all this was good news, but the problem was how he would manage to hide himself from the Wanderer – and that damned woman with her vessel of frighteningly clear water. Oh, he really hated her! Such a young brat, walking into the grottos leading to the sources of life – and reaching them! He didn’t get it; he couldn’t fathom how that had happened. He had been in deep slumber and hadn’t discovered the danger until it was too late.
His greatest enemy – wasn’t her name Shira? – was her.
If there weren’t several of them ...? He was very unsure about that and shuddered because he feared an unknown entity among the Ice People. There was someone who had thwarted his plans time and again, although that person must be dead by now. Then there was this new thing. There was a great danger there. And a lesser one?
Tengel the Evil growled in despair. They were hiding one or several from him. They would really have to pay for that! He would wipe out every single one of them, slowly and with terrible suffering for them ...
Tengel the Evil had got to his feet and was walking the halls. The huge Postojna Cave was calm. All the tourists had left for the day.
His plan was to get to Linden Avenue as quickly as possible, but he felt despair at not having regained his full strength. Nevertheless, it was much greater than last time, so he went confidently on his way, gliding a little above the earth at a good speed, in his customary manner.
Dusk fell, and then evening. He rushed through deserted regions, more by coincidence than as a conscious act. Tengel the Evil didn’t care for people, whether they saw him or not.
A drunken man saw him in the mountainous Dolomite region. That didn’t matter. Tengel smiled wryly: a cold smile in which there was no empathy, no joy, no humour. Only icy, malicious glee and tart triumph.
His journey continued northwards. Everything went well, and he felt that he was gaining strength. He stopped in a forest somewhere in order to make a more careful plan, but a flock of crows and ravens disturbed him so that he had to get up and frighten them away. Most of them died of fright. His horrible smile appeared once more. No, he hadn’t lost his power!
Somewhere farther north, he passed a strange vehicle without a horse. Two people were sitting in that shiny object. Tengel the Evil had seen such vehicles in his questing thoughts in recent years. He had seen many strange things that he didn’t understand, though this was something he didn’t want to admit, of course.
Then he had bumped into a woman. Goodness, she had screamed and screamed! He had hissed at her and she had collapsed, dead.
Splendid!
But then ...
Tengel the Evil followed only his instinct, he didn’t consider geographical names. He had no idea that he was in Germany, not far from Berlin.
He heard something happening there. With his sharpened instincts, he could hear what was going on many miles away, and what he picked up pleased him. So much, in fact, that he changed course and made a small detour to hear and see more of it.
Nevertheless, he was concerned. His power wasn’t as great as he would have wished. Things moved sluggishly and there was resistance every time he wanted to take action. Besides, how was he to hide from the Wanderer in the long run? He had tried to make himself invisible to that woman, but he hadn’t succeeded. He wasn’t sufficiently strong, he wasn’t complete, and it irritated him, making him almost angry.
Why, oh why couldn’t that clumsy fool with the strange musical instrument play his signal properly? Why was it never played correctly and properly?
Tengel the Great didn’t deserve to be treated so shamefully.
How was he to erase his traces so that the Wanderer and the others couldn’t find him?
The Wanderer was searching.
Tengel the Evil was easy to follow. The stench he left behind him lay like a sickening streak in the air. Perhaps it wasn’t just the smell of a dried-up being that had been lying in the earth for six and a half centuries, although it hardly smelt of roses and lily of the valley. No, it was probably the stench of pure evil that was left in the grass and trees as he swept past.
The Wanderer found the place where Tengel the Evil had stopped to rest. He saw all the dead birds. He also found the dead woman before anybody else had seen her.
Immediately after that the Wanderer discovered that Tengel was no longer setting his bearings on Linden Avenue or the Valley of the Ice People.
He had turned eastwards, because he had something else in mind.
The Wanderer conveyed this news to Tengel the Good and his helpers.
Then he followed after the evil ancestor.
Tengel the Evil had hidden himself high up in a small recess next to a stage. He was in a huge stadium, and the entire place was crowded with people.
They shouted “Sieg Heil!” and gestured with their arms towards the stage.
A funny-looking, short man was standing there, shouting a lot of wonderful, hateful words. Tengel the Evil heard phrases like “Die Juden” and “Lebensraum”. Words meant nothing to him, but he could read thoughts like an open book. This little man had thoughts that pretty much matched his own. A craving for power, ruthlessness ...
Small men – be they physically or mentally small – can cast very long shadows.
A couple of uniformed men walked past below Tengel’s recess, and he pulled himself further inside. One complained about a bad smell. No, not just bad, said the other man, this terrible smell was acrid, pungent: phew, they had never experienced anything like it.
Stuck-up show-offs, Tengel snorted to himself.
He concentrated on the speaker once more, and on the men who stood right behind him.
He wasn’t all that interested in the speaker. He was too stupid, too unschooled and too ridiculous with his silly hair and clothes. A puffed-up nonentity, boastful and empty. Then there was a big, fat chap in a uniform with a lot of gongs. Tengel’s thick lips curled in disgust. There was a short, thin devil trying to look dignified. He had a sharp brain but was ludicrous.
But then ...
Tengel liked the ones over there much better. Those standing a bit farther away. A tall officer with a moustache and glass lenses in front of his eyes. Wonderfully cold and cynical by nature.
That one ...?
No, Tengel the Evil had caught sight of another