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“I’m sorry?” said Wesley.
    “Me. My name. Mr Nuttendudge,” the goblin said. He held out a hand that looked much too large for the rest of him. Ben reached out with the gauntlet and shook the offeredhand. The goblin’s eyes widened when it felt the metal against its skin, but he didn’t say a word.
    “I’m Ben.” He tried to take his hand back but Mr Nuttendudge kept hold of it, his eyes firmly fixed on the gauntlet. With a firm tug, Ben pulled it free and gestured to the others. “This is Wesley; that’s Paradise.”
    “Ben, Wesley, Paradise,” said Mr Nuttendudge. He repeated their names a few times, then gave a nod. “And who is your young dragon friend?”
    “She’s, um…” Ben began. “Actually, we don’t know what her name—”
    “Burnie,” announced Paradise. “Her name’s Burnie.”
    Ben opened his mouth to argue but Paradiseshot him one of her looks. He shrugged. “Yeah, looks like we’re going with that.”
    Mr Nuttendudge nodded. “Apt. Good. Appropriate. Not often you see a dragon. Especially not in my kitchen.”
    With some difficulty he pulled a small wooden chair free of the wreckage, dusted it off then sat down. It collapsed immediately, and he barely had time to let out a panicky “Wargh!” before he hit the floor.

    Ben helped him back to his feet. “I see why you’re a Bad Luck Goblin.”
    “This? Ha! No, no, this is nothing, nothing at all,” blurted Mr Nuttendudge. “I have a measurement scale, you see? Of unluckiness. I call it the Nuttendudge Scale.”
    “You named it after yourself?” said Ben.
    Mr Nuttendudge blinked slowly. “Goodness. Yes. My word. So I did,” he said. “I thought it sounded familiar.”
    He picked up another chair, looked at it for a moment then thought better of it. “Zero Nuttendudge is a day where nothing terrible happens. Nothing terrible at all. Theoretical, of course; I’ve yet to experience one,” he said, wringing his oversized hands together. “Five Nuttendudge is the average. This? Why, thisis barely a two.”
    There was a crash as part of his house fell over behind him. “Two and a half at most,” he said, doing his best to smile.
    Wesley scurried over and peered through the gap the collapsing wall had left. Acres of cloudy grey sky stretched overhead, and just twenty or thirty metres from the house stood the edge of a tall dark forest.
    “Any sign of Scarrabus?” asked Ben.
    Wesley shook his head. “Thankfully not.”
    Mr Nuttendudge’s saucer-sized eyes somehow managed to grow even wider. “Scarrabus? Lord Scarrabus? Coming here? Why would he be coming here?”
    “He was sort of chasing us,” Ben explained. “We escaped his castle and stole his dragon.”
    “We didn’t steal his dragon, we freed his prisoner,” Paradise corrected. She tickled the dragon under the chin. “Didn’t we, Burnie? Yes we did! Yes we did!”
    Mr Nuttendudge hobbled back and forth, shaking his oddly shaped head in dismay as he muttered to himself. “Lord Scarrabus. Coming here. Not good, not good. And them just children. Terrible. Terrible thing.”
    “It’s not that bad,” said Ben. “It’s actually been kind of exciting so far. Don’t you think?” He looked to the others and smiled. They didn’t smile back.
    “No,” said Paradise.
    “It’s been horrible!” Wesley agreed.
    “Come on!” said Ben. “Castle chases, weird monsters, dragons, dramatic escapes – it’s beenpretty fun.”
    “Oh my no, oh my no,” said Mr Nuttendudge. “Lord Scarrabus is not fun, not fun at all. Terrible. Terrible man. If he finds you…” The goblin smacked himself on the forehead, trying to drive an unwelcome thought away. “No. He must not. He cannot.”
    “We’d really like to go home,” said Wesley. “Can you help us?”
    Mr Nuttendudge stroked his cheekbrows thoughtfully. “Perhaps. Yes. Perhaps. But first …” He lowered himself carefully on to another wooden chair and held his breath. The chair stayed in one piece and