The hero of the seven novels

Appearance

Sun did not suit Artemis. He did not look well in it. Long hours indoors in front of the monitor had bleached the glow from his skin. He was white as a vampire and almost as test in the light of day.

Intelligence

How does one describe Artemis Fowl? Various psychiatrists have tried and failed. The main problem is Artemis's own intelligence. He bamboozles every test thrown at him. He has puzzled the greatest medical minds and sent many of them gibbering to their own hospitals.

You are wearing handmade loafers, a silk shirt and three gold signet rings. Your English has

a tinge of Oxford about it and your nails have the soft sheen of the recently manicured. You

are not a waiter. You are our contact, Nguyen Xuan, and you have adopted this pathetic

disguise to discreetly check for weaponry.'

Nguyen's shoulders sagged. 'It is true. Amazing.'

'Hardly. A ragged apron does not a waiter make.'

Artemis generally had that effect on people. A pale

adolescent speaking with the authority and vocabulary of a powerful adult. Nguyen had heard

the name Fowl before - who hadn't in the international underworld? - but he'd assumed he'd

be dealing with Artemis Senior, not this boy. Though the word 'boy' hardly seemed to do this

gaunt individual justice.

'And now to business,' said Artemis, placing a micro recorder on the table. 'You answered our

web advertisement.'

Nguyen nodded, suddenly praying his information was accurate.

'Yes, Mister ... Master Fowl. What you're looking for ... I know where it is.'

'Really? And am I supposed to take your word for this? You could be walking me straight into

an ambush. My family is not without enemies.

The bodyguard reached into a pocket and drew out a half-pint of the finest Irish whiskey.

Artemis took the bottle and held it teasingly beyond the shadows. He barely had time to

remove his goggles when the claw-like hand darted from the gloom to snatch the whiskey. A

mottled green hand. There was no doub

There was no doubt.

Artemis swallowed a triumphant grin.

'Pay our friend, Butler. In full. Remember, 20000 us dolkar

'I am perfectly healthy, madam, apart from a slight dust-mite allergy, and I don't think even

you can do anything about that. No. What I want from you is your Book.'

The hag froze. Bright eyes glinted from beneath the shawl.

'Book?' she said cautiously. 'I don't know about no book. I am healer. You want book, go to

library.'

Artemis sighed with exaggerated patience. 'You are no healer. You are a sprite, p'shóg, fairy,

ka-dalun. Whichever language you prefer to use. And I want your Book.'

For a long moment the creature said nothing, then she threw back the shawl from her

forehead. In the green glow of the night-vision goggles, her features leaped at Artemis like a

Hallowe'en mask. The fairy's nose was long and hooked under two slitted golden eyes. Her

ears were pointed, and the alcohol addiction had melted her skin like putty.

'If you know about the Book, human,' she said slowly, fighting the numbing effects of the

whiskey, 'then you know about the magic I have in my fist. I can kill you with a snap of my

fingers!'

Artemis shrugged. 'I think not. Look at you. You are near dead. The rice wine has dulled your

senses. Reduced to healing warts. Pathetic. I am here to save you, in return for the Book.'

The sprite's pointed ears quivered. Options?

'One, you refuse to give us the Book and we go home, leaving you to rot in this sewer.'

'Yes,' said the fairy. 'I choose this option.'

'Ah no. Don't be so eager. If we leave without the Book, you will be dead in a day.'

'A day! A day!'The healer laughed. 'I will outlive you by a century. Even fairies tethered to

the human realm can survive the ages.'

Not with half a pint of holy water inside them,' said Artemis, tapping the now empty whiskey

bottle.

The fairy blanched, then screamed, a high keening horrible sound.

'Holy water! You have murdered me, human.'

'True,' admitted Artemis. 'It should start to burn any minute now.'

The fairy poked her stomach tentatively. 'The second option?'

'Listening now, are we? Very well then. Option two. You give me the Book for thirty minutes

only. Then I return your magic to you.'

The sprite's jaw dropped. 'Return my magic? Not possible.'

'Oh but it is. I have in my possession two ampoules.

One, a vial of spring water from the fairy well sixty metres below the ring of Tara - possibly

the most magical place on earth. This will counteract the holy water.'

'And the other?'

'The other is a little shot of man-made magic. A virus that feeds on alcohol, mixed with a

growth reagent. It will flush every drop of rice wine from your body, remove the dependence

and even bolster your failing liver. It'll be messy, but after a day you'll be zipping around as

though you were a thousand years old again.'

The sprite licked her lips. To be able to rejoin the People? Tempting.

'How do I know to trust you, human? You have tricked me once already.'

'Good point. Here's the deal. I give you the water on faith. Then, after I've had a look at the

Book, you get the booster. Take it or leave it.'

The fairy considered. The pain was already curling around her abdomen. She thrust out her

wrist.

'I take it.'

'I thought you might. Butler?'

The giant manservant unwrapped a soft Velcroed case containing a syringe gun and two vials.

He loaded the clear one, shooting it into the sprite's clammy arm. The fairy stiffened

momentarily, and then relaxed.

'Strong magic,' she breathed.

'Yes. But not as strong as your own will be when I give your own will be when I give you the second injection. Now, the

Book.'

The sprite reached into the folds of her filthy robe, rummaging for an age. Artemis held his

breath. This was it. Soon the Fowls would be great again. A new empire would rise, with

Artemis Fowl the Second at its head.

The fairy woman withdrew a closed fist.

'No use to you anyway. Written in the old tongue.'

Artemis nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

She opened her knobbly fingers. Lying in her palm was a tiny golden volume the size of a

matchbox.

'Here, human. Thirty of your minutes. No more.'

Butler took the tiny tome reverentially. The bodyguard activated a compact digital camera and

began photographing each wafer-thin page of the Book. The process took several minutes.

When he was finished, the entire volume was stored on the camera's chip. Artemis preferred

not to take chances with information. Airport security equipment had been known to wipe

many a vital disk. So he instructed his aide to transfer the file to his portable phone and from

there e-mail it to Fowl Manor in Dublin. Before the thirty minutes were up, the file containing

every symbol in the Fairy Book was sitting safely in the Fowl server.

Artemis returned the tiny volume to its owner.

'Nice doing business with you.'

The sprite lurched to her knees. 'The other potion, human?'

Artemis smiled. 'Oh yes, the restoring booster. I suppose I did promise.'

'Yes. Human promised.'

'Very well. But before we administer it, I must warn you that purging is not pleasant. You're

not going to enjoy this one bit.'

The fairy gestured around her at the squalid filth. 'You think I enjoy this? I want to fly again.'

Butler loaded the second vial, shooting this one straight into the carotid artery.

The sprite immediately collapsed on the mat, her entire frame quivering violently.

'Time to leave,' commented Artemis. 'A hundred years of alcohol leaving a body by any

means possible is not a pretty sight.'

Artemis?'

Artemis looked up from the screen of his PowerBook. He was getting a head start on the

translation.

'Yes?'

'The sprite. Why didn't we simply keep the Book and leave her to die?'

'A corpse is evidence, Butler. My way, the People will have no reason to be suspicious.'

'But the sprite?'

'I hardly think she will confess to showing humans the Book. In any case, I mixed a slight

amnesiac into her second injection. When she finally wakes up, the last week will be a blur.'

Butler nodded appreciatively. Always two steps ahead, that was Master Artemis. People said

he was a chip off the old block. They were wrong. Master Artemis was a brand-new block,

the likes of which had never been seen before.

Artemis's search had begun two years previously when he first became interested in surfing

the Internet. He quickly found the more arcane sites: alien abduction, UFO sightings and the

supernatural. But most specifically the existence of the People.

Trawling through gigabytes of data, he found hundreds of references to fairies from nearly

every country in the world. Each civilization had its own term for the People, but they were

undoubtedly members of the same hidden family. Several stories mentioned a Book carried

by each fairy. It was their Bible, containing, as it allegedly did, the history of their race and

the commandments that governed their extended lives. Of course, this Book was written in

Gnommish, the fairy text, and would be of no use to any human.

Artemis believed that with today's technology the Book could be translated. And with this

translation you could begin to exploit a whole new group of creatures.

Know thine enemy was Artemis's motto, so he immersed himself in the lore of the People

until he had compiled a huge database on their characteristics. But it wasn't enough. So

Artemis put out a call on the Web: Irish businessman will pay large amount of US dollars to

meet a fairy, sprite, leprechaun, pixie. The responses had been mostly fraudulent, but Ho Chi

Minh City had paid off.

Artemis was perhaps the only person alive who could take full advantage of his recent

acquisition. He still retained a childlike belief in magic, tempered by an adult determination to

exploit it. If there was anybody capable of relieving the fairies of some of their magical gold,

it was Artemis Fowl the Second.

It was early morning before they reached Fowl Manor. Artemis was anxious to bring up the

file on his computer, but first he decided to call in on Mother.

Angeline Fowl was bedridden. She had been since her hus

Page numbers might help make this much better.

I love the effort though, tag me for new ones

@battle123axe:

I did not put page numbers because they vary with the size of books and publisher.

Also, I.am.just general.copying the relevant text with my mobile so I can format them when I have my computer

Artemis, darling, where have you been?'

Artemis sighed. She recognized him. That was a good sign.

'School trip, Mother. Skiing in Austria.'

'Ah, skiing,' crooned Angeline. 'How I miss it. Maybe when your father returns.'

Artemis felt a lump in his throat. Most uncharacteristic.

'Yes. Perhaps when Father returns.'

'Darling, could you close those wretched curtains. The light is intolerable.'

'Of course, Mother.'

Artemis felt his way across the room, wary of the low-level clothes chests scattered about the

floor. Finally his fingers curled around the velvet drapes. For a moment he was tempted to

throw them wide open, then he sighed and closed the gap.

'Thank you, darling. By the way, we really have to get rid of that maid. She is good for

absolutely nothing.'

Artemis held his tongue. Juliet had been a hardworking and loyal member of the Fowl

household for the past three years. Time to use Mother's absent-mindedness to his advantage.

'You're right of course, Mother. I've been meaning to do it for some time. Butler has a sister I

believe would be perfect for the position. I think I've mentioned her. Juliet?'

Angeline frowned. 'Juliet? Yes, the name does seem familiar. Well, anyone would be better

than that silly girl we have now. When can she start?'

'Straight away. I'll have Butler fetch her from the lodge.'

Angeline glared at him with crafty eyes. 'And stop calling me Mother. I don't know who you

are, but you're certainly not my little Arty.'

Artemis blinked back a few rebellious tears. 'Of course. Sorry, Moth - Sorry.'

'Hmm. Don't come back here again, or I'll have my husband take care of you. He's a very

important man, you know.'

'Very well, Mrs Fowl. This is the last you'll see of me.'

The Book was proving far more stubborn than Artemis had anticipated. It seemed to be

almost actively resisting him. No matter which program he ran it through, the computer came

up blank

Artemis Fowl Chapter 2: Translation

18

Artemis hard-copied every page, tacking them to the walls of his study. Sometimes it helped

to have things on paper. The script was like nothing he'd seen before, and yet it was strangely

familiar. Obviously a mixture of symbolic and character-based language, the text meandered

around the page in no apparent order.

What the program needed was some frame of reference, some central point on which to build.

He separated all the characters and ran comparisons with English, Chinese, Greek, Arabic and

Cyrillic texts, even with Ogham. Nothing.

Moody with frustration, Artemis sent Juliet scurrying when she interrupted with sandwiches,

and moved on to symbols. The most frequently recurring pictogram was a small male figure.

Male, he presumed, though with the limited knowledge of the fairy anatomy he supposed it

could be female. A thought struck him. Artemis opened the ancient languages file on his

Power Translator and selected Egyptian.

At last. A hit. The male symbol was remarkably similar to the Anubis god representation on

Tutankhamen's inner-chamber hieroglyphics. This was consistent with his other findings. The

first written human stories were about fairies, suggesting that their civilization predated man's

own. It would seem that the Egyptians had simply adapted an existing scripture to suit their

needs.

There were other resemblances. But the characters were just dissimilar enough to slip through

the computer's net. This would have to be done manually. Each Gnommish figure had to be

enlarged, printed and then compared with the hieroglyphs.

Artemis felt the excitement of success thumping inside his ribcage. Almost every fairy

pictogram or letter had an Egyptian counterpart. Most were universal, such as the sun or birds.

But some seemed exclusively supernatural and had to be tailored to fit. The Anubis figure, for

example, would make no sense as a dog god, so Artemis altered it to read king of the fairies.

By midnight, Artemis had successfully fed his findings into the Macintosh. All he had to do

now was press 'Decode'. He did so. What emerged was a long, intricate string of meaningless

gibberish.

A normal child would have abandoned the task long since. The average adult would probably

have been reduced to slapping the keyboard. But not Artemis. This book was testing him and

he would not allow it to win.

The letters were right, he was certain of it. It was just the order that was wrong. Rubbing the

sleep from his eyes, Artemis glared at the pages again. Each segment was bordered by a solid

line. This could represent paragraphs or chapters, but they were not meant to be read in the

usual left to right, top to bottom fashion.

Artemis experimented. He tried the Arabic right to left and the Chinese columns. Nothing

worked. Then he noticed that each page had one thing in common - a central section. The

other pictograms were arranged around this pivotal area. So a central starting point perhaps.

But where to go from there? Artemis scanned the pages for some other common factor. After

several minutes he found it. There was on each page a tiny spearhead in the corner of one

section. Could this be an arrow? A direction? Go this way? So the theory would be start in the

middle, then follow the arrow, reading in spirals.

Artemis Fowl Chapter 2: Translation

19

The computer program wasn't built to handle something like this, so Artemis had to

improvise. With a craft knife and ruler, he dissected the first page of the Book and

reassembled it in the traditional Western languages order - left to right, parallel rows. Then he

rescanned the page and fed it through the modified Egyptian translator.

The computer hummed and whirred, converting all the information to binary. Several times it

stopped to ask for confirmation of a character or symbol. This happened less and less as the

machine learned the new language. Eventually two words flashed on the screen: File

converted.

Fingers shaking from exhaustion and excitement, Artemis clicked 'Print'. A single page

scrolled from the LaserWriter. It was in English now. Yes, there were mistakes, some fine-

tuning needed, but it was perfectly legible and, more importantly, perfectly understandable.

Fully aware that he was probably the first human in several thousand years to decode the

magical words, Artemis switched on his desk light and began to read.

The Booke of the People.

Being instructions to our magicks

and life rules

Carry me always, carry me well.

I am thy teacher of herb and spell.

I am thy link to power arcane.

Forget me and thy magick shall wane.

Ten times ten commandments there be.

They will answer every mystery.

Cures, curses, alchemy.

These secrets shall be thine, through me.

But, Fairy, remember this above all.

I am not for those in mud that crawl.

And forever doomed shall be the one,

Who betrays my secrets one by one.

Artemis could hear the blood pumping in his ears. He had them. They would be as ants

beneath his feet. Their every secret would be laid bare by technology. Suddenly the

exhaustion claimed him and he sank back in his chair. There was so much yet to complete.

Forty-three pages to be translated for a start.

He pressed the intercom button that linked him to speakers all over the house. 'Butler. Get

Juliet and come up here. There are some jigsaws I need you to assemble.'

Perhaps a little family history would be useful at this point.

The Fowls were, indeed, legendary criminals. For generations they had skirmished on the

wrong side of the law, hoarding enough funds to become legitimate. Of course, once they

were legitimate they found it not to their liking and returned almost immediately to crime.

After eighteen solid hours of sleep and a light continental breakfast, Artemis climbed to the

study that he had inherited from his father. It was a traditional enough room - dark oak and

floor-to-ceiling shelving - but Artemis had jammed it with the latest computer technology. A

series of networked AppleMacs whirred from various corners of the room. One was running

CNN's web site through a DAT projector, throwing oversized current-affairs images against

the back wall.

Butler was there already, firing up the hard drives.

'Shut them all down, except the Book. I need quiet for this.'

The manservant started. The CNN site had been running for almost a year. Artemis was

convinced that news of his father's rescue would come from there. Shutting it down meant

that he was finally letting go.

'All of them?'

Artemis glanced at the back wall for a moment. 'Yes,' he said finally. 'All of them.'

Butler took the liberty of patting his employer gently on the shoulder, just once, before

returning to work. Artemis cracked his knuckles. Time to do what he did best - plot dastardly

Nguyen was by now thoroughly spooked. Artemis generally had that effect on people. A pale

adolescent speaking with the authority and vocabulary of a powerful adult. Nguyen had heard

the name Fowl before - who hadn't in the international underworld? - but he'd assumed he'd

be dealing with Artemis Senior, not this boy. Though the word 'boy' hardly seemed to do this

gaunt individual justice.