The Land of Somewhere Safe

by Hal Duncan

  Surely he didn’t whoosh through the air by wishsnuff, scamps, but hurtle in the Addanc’s thrall, eh? Surely it puppeted him to play the pipes and nick the Stamp, then skitteryslithered him away, just a helpless ragdoll in its grip? Oh, if only. If only it’d been just his limbs that dread thing danced, why then that day he might’ve blurted his burden, blinked his peepers in Morse Code, wept a single tear to warn em scruffs of his plight, done summat. But an Addanc on yer back, scamps, oh, that cold wet horror seeps deep, clamps round yer heart.

  So it’d slothered his heart in despair and shame, wormed its writhings into him, found a disgust to feed on, to fuel. Sissy, it hissed inside him. And the way that bastard Blackstone thought to gaslight Lily, it worked its wickedry on Peter, with a warpy lying fuckery that he were too weak to fight, which made the shame worse, which proved he were weak. A vicious cycle it were, scamps, and that were the true dark power of the Addanc, that it could make him do the master’s bidding, betray them scruffs, simply because he thunk himself wretched wimpy.

  It didn’t need to puppet him then, hurtle him off the front steps of Dunstravaigin Castle into the sky and away. That were the darkest thing in the dark of that Longest Night for Peter, that he’d just buckled and obeyed, not digging his heels in on the step, not clinging to the doorframe. No, he just opened the wishsnuff tin with hands so trembly he fumbled the first pinch – oh, how useless he was! So he just pinched another peck – how rotten and useless he was! And he give his nose a wipe, sniffed that wishsnuff, and was off.

  • 2

  North east he flies now, scamps, and he ain’t even sure now if it’s the Addanc guiding him or some silent wish of knowing where he’s going, what he’s doing. Out he flies over them hills he skimmed with Lily, but not due east for Portree, no, on a norther course, from the shores of that loch Dunstravaigin Castle looks out over toward the peninsula of Duirinish, northeast across the peninsula of Waternish what Duirinish sprouts out of, across Loch Shizort Beag to Trotternish what Waternish sprouts out of, across the great rising ridge as is the backbone of Trotternish.

  It ain’t nearly so long a route as that planned by the scruffs to Dun Scaith, but here’s a curious thing, scamps, as might make yer wonder if maybe Peter weren’t such a basket case as he thunk, cause the first half of his flight takes a good two hours, but from there going halfways of what’s left takes another two, and the next halfways takes the same again. To be sure, he’s nearly there by the next halfways, but by now, why, there’s that half-light of ochenin out to the east, over the sea and beyond the mainland.

  So maybe’s there’s hope for him, scamps, even if Peter don’t know it yet, in how for all’s he knows himself doomed – just knows it – he still goes slow to his gallows. Yer might even say he drags his heels when’s he’s touched down at the coast, near Invertote. He is hopeless, eh, so it only makes sense how’s he takes soooo long on the trail down to the beach, steps so cautious over the treacherous holes between boulders as slickly cold and wet as the Addanc upon him. Even as he comes to the False Church, maybe’s there’s hope.

  He don’t think there’s hope as he comes to the jagged Eaglais Bhreugach, that forty foot high crag bored through by a cave, where’s in olden days they roasted cats for the rite of Taghairm. He don’t think there’s hope, seeing Blackstone unbind a blindfold as he rises from a great stone slab at the door, where’s he’d lain himself to sleep through the dark of the Longest Night, when the Land of Nod has all the hours, dreaming a glorious vision of his Father’s Land. As he holds out the rucksack, Peter just wishes there was hope, bitterly. Fiercely.

  • 3

  Nine o’clock, scamps. It’s an hour since our traitor Peter delivered the Stamp to his master, in treason and treachery, and oh, how it burns in him, his bastardy betrayal. Huddled in the dank cave he sits, hunkered down, hugging his knees, hid from a sun what’s only now rising. He should flee as the coward he is, he thinks, dart past Blackstone, scramble over the rocks, away. No, he should shove Blackstone to slip on the wet rock, grab back the wishsnuff snatched with the chanter in a ransack through Peter’s pockets, to fly – and take the Stamp too.

  Ten o’clock. But what the fuck they waiting for, scamps? In the Addanc’s grip, Peter’s just wrestling with his misery, but Blackstone...? Oh, he has a plan. Cause his squad of twerps, his Christian Cadets, they’s out on an orienteering exercise, innit, one that’ll lead em right here... to the Stamp. Only it’s not Scruffians he’ll be Fixing, Blackstone gloats to Peter, oh no. It’s Uberjugend he’ll be making of em.

  Imperishable. Loyal. Crusaders for correctitude.

  – They won’t follow a Nazi spy! says Peter. They’re British!

  – Won’t they, dear child? says Blackstone.

  And he twirls the chanter in his hand.

  Eleven o’clock, scamps. Nah, let’s calls it oneteen, eh? Oneteen o’clock, and though the sun ain’t even at the nowhere-near-overhead as is noon on the Shortest Day, for all’s it’s at its weakest of the whole year, there’s a heat in Peter now, scamps, a fire. He’s spent a long time raging at himself for what he’s done, fucking fuming, and now’s there’s plenty of fire to go round, at the bombs as took his mum and his home, at the fates what brung him here, at Blackstone and his blasted monster.

  Yes, he thinks. Blast that monster.

  Midday.

  – Let! Me! Go! shouts Peter.

  He thrashes in Blackstone’s grip, thrashes against the wild thing, pinned and flailing, between his back and the rock, so wild he can’t tell if it’s furious to retake him or escape.

  – Hold him! roars Blackstone. I command you!

  But it’s gone, scamps, squirmed loose to squither away, and Peter’s shouting Ha! in Blackstone’s face – till a backhand smacks his gob.

  – You will play the chanter.

  – No, I ruddy well won’t, spits Peter.

  Another backhand sends him sprawling, and Blackstone towers over him now, murderous, seething.

  Simmering down. Growling though gritted teeth:

  – No. Matter.

  • 4

  – Plan A, says Blackstone, smirking.

  He turns, steps out to meet the dozen twerps now scrambling over rocks toward the crag.

  – Well done, boys, he calls, well done.

  Bundled back into the cave’s shadows, dumped there on his side, Peter squinches to peek round the reverend’s rucksack, mumphing yowly warnings muffled by the gag. He struggles in his ropes like Houdini himself. Only burns his wrists.

  Out on that great stone slab, Blackstone unscrews the lid of a thermos flask.

  – A sip of hot cocoa to warm you? Might be a wee splash of something in there, eh, wink, wink!

  Oh, if only he’d a penknife, thinks Peter, to tease from his shorts pocket with finger and thumb, to saw his bonds. If only he could inchworm across the cave, while Blackstone’s busy, to the shelf of rock that ruddy Nazi’s sat the chanter and wishsnuff on, heave himself over and get his lips to the pipe, whistle a shrill alarm to rouse them Christian Cadets now sprawled all across the bouldery beach. Or smack the wishsnuff off its perch so’s it whacks open on the ground and...

  Oh, but it ain’t like them movies, scamps. That shit ain’t happening.

  So he can’t do nuffink except scowl and yowl more through the hankie in his gob and rope betwixt his teeth, in language his dear mum would’ve had his guts for garters for. He can’t do nuffink as Blackstone gazes at the setting sun, checks his watch and turns, picks his way over the cave floor’s slips and bumps to ferret a torch from his rucksack. Out to the shore goes Blackstone then. And Peter can’t do nuffink but watch him point that torch out to the sea and flash it, signalling... a shape in the water.

  A U-Boat.

  To try the chanter on them Christian Cadets, Blackstone grandiloquises while’s he’s waiting for them Nazi sailors to row their rubber dinghies ashore, that were but a whim, an experiment, as he’ll get round to in good time. No, indoctrination back in the
Fatherland were always Plan A for these future Uberjugend spies – assuming this experiment works. The Stamp must be tested, naturally, before’s they uses it on the SS, and the Gestapo, and High Command.

  – The Fuhrer first, naturally, he says.

  – With only one bollock and that mug-slug over his mush? Be better off Fixed with the shits, mate.

  • 5

  And it’s flipping Flashjack, innit, flipping in with a tumble under a Luger whipped out from Blackstone’s coat. Flashjack shooting one hand up to snatch that pistol, shooting one foot out to BOOF! Blackstone in his guts, to send him flying. Flashjack rising on one leg, lowering the other, dropping a molten lump of Nazi gun to splat and hiss on wet rock. It’s Flashjack to the rescue – and Lily too, nibbling through Peter’s ropes so’s suddenly he’s loose, ripping gag from gob.

  – However did you find me? he gasps.

  – That little pinch of wishsnuff you left! Oh, quick thinking, Peter!

  And they ain’t as nimble as an otter or a Flashjack, but here comes Squirlet, Foxtrot, Janie too. Ain’t no time for Peter to ’splain how, um, he weren’t aktcherly kidnapped though, cause Blackstone’s back, swinging a flagpole hunted down by em twerps in their orienteering, brung by em without guessing its part in Blackstone’s plans: an axle for the Stamp, for its rolling over their chests to read and write em.

  – Ooh! I’m having that, says Flashjack.

  And with a scallywag’s somersault, handclamp and headbutt, Blackstone’s staggering backward, and Flashjack’s twirling that flagpole overhead like some fucking Shaolin Majorette.

  – ADDANC, roars Blackstone though, fingerpoint targeting. SEIZE THESE –!

  – NO! cries Peter, launched at ramming speed, bonce first, BAM into Blackstone’s belly.

  But too late, scamps. WHACKETY! THWACKETY! SHLOOPETYSPLACKETY! Them scruffs attacking goes flying like skittles, and Flashjack’s smacked back, he’s sideswiped, whiplashed, flailed in its grasp.

  Can an Addanc latch on a scruff’s dischuff though, scamps? Can it fuck! Can it worm in to warp yer will with wickedry? Not bleeding likely! Them scruffs is Fixed – resilient, resolute, resistant. It can pummel and tangle, all round and invisible, their shivs slashing blindly, but it can’t nab and nobble em, ha!

  So it’s another tack for Blackstone as Flashjack breaks free in a pirouette to strike pose, bo staff flagpole pointed a tick at the Nazi – just for flair, like – then whirling again as he advances.

  – ADDANC, bellows Blackstone, and sics it on them senseless twerps now, to wrapple their slumpen flesh, latch into dullwitted dreams, sluggardly hearts. Behind the scruffs on the beach, like zombies they rise, like floppety clockwork toys in a nipper’s grip, lolloping at em. While’s behind Blackstone on the shoreline, jackboots splash in surf. Mausers point: Hande hoch!

  Five hands and one paw flicks the vickies.

  • 6

  Back into that cave of the False Church they dives for cover, scamps, as them Mausers opens fire. Being Fixed, yer might spring back from having yer head blown off, but it ain’t fuckin ice cream in the park, is it? And all em holes a machine-gun puts in yer Stamp, the random fuckery of tweaking... well, yer saw how’s Quippersnap were after that raid. Fucking half a day of staples and superglue to get his face...

  Anyways, there’s the Stamp planked in that cave, in the rucksack Janie grabs now – and oh, the chanter and wishsnuff, Peter minds.

  – Guard the Stamp! shouts Foxtrot, and Janiemalinky’s legs bestrides it, them other longpins of her monicker readied, the fourteen inch steel spike of a rapier-sharp knitting needle in each fist. To the landward exit it is for Foxtrot and Squirlet though, atop the stone slab, side-by-side, first and only line against the Addanc’s puppets. To the seaward side it is for Flashjack, lobbing the flagpole back to Peter – Catch! – hunkering down to grab a stone, superheat it in a hand white-hot now, fire it. Blackstone ducks, but it makes smashed flaming horror of one stormtrooper’s fizzog.

  From this front to that, Peter looks, at Foxtrot and Squirlet slashing and stabbing, at Flashjack ducking out to fire stone after stone, dancing bullets, pausing to pick a stone, feel its heft, eyeball its shape – why’s he ruddy well dawdling? – then he whirls to fire it, but past them Nazis now, out to sea, skipping, skimming the waves.

  He’s only going for the bleeding U-Boat!

  But what can Peter do? He looks to Janie, to Lily, back to the Addanc’s puppets... and beyond.

  Then to the wishsnuff.

  Oh, he has a ripping idea, does Peter. Jolly well ripping.

  Out over them twerp’s heads rockets Peter, even as the sub goes boom – YAY! – as a bullet in the bonce sends Flashjack birling – NOES! Over the Addanc, landing beyond it, amongst the scattered kit: rucksacks and rifles.

  Yeah... rifles. To his shoulder goes one, aimed for the cave where’s two silhouettes struggle. But there’s twerps in his path, Foxtrot and Squirlet, and he’s no sharpshooter. Oh...

  Weaving legs, bounding boulders, darting spry, it’s Lily now, dodging magnificent, pouncing to thump his other shoulder, scrambling round his back, clamping and twisty to sight down the barrel: left a bit! more! NOW!

  • 7

  CRACK! As Blackstone spins, Janie makes her break, leaping for the stone slab, rucksack in hand. Frantic and fierce, Foxtrot mutters summat at her. Squirlet turns, locks peepers with him, nods – our only chance – and hollers:

  – Flashjack! Flagpole!

  A shape! Diving through the dark of the cave now, rolling out with the flagpole in one hand, pole-vaulting over them and whirling his staff to rattle bonces like a stick along railings, sweeping the arc of space he lands in. Flashjack tosses the flagpole back over his shoulder for Janie, hunkered over the open rucksack now, to catch.

  – Square go.

  As Janies lashes the Faerie Flag to that pole then, it’s Squirlet and Foxtrot what spins to defend as Blackstone comes roaring at em, winged but rallied. Shivs swish and slice, but he’s a trained spy, Blackstone, Nazi fucking James Bond, and he blocks, dodges, swings, blocks. Only another CRACK! from the rifle, ricocheted off the crag, breaks his attack, and another CRACK! drives him back.

  – ADDANC! he booms, in the hollow of the False Church.

  From beyond that crag it rises, a dangling of dead Nazis in spear formation, then Blackstone behind, arms raised to heavens.

  – Go! shouts Peter.

  Them scruffs looks to Peter, to Lily on his shoulder guiding – Up! To the right! – at the invisible Addanc puppeting stormtrooper corpses, hoisting Blackstone high like as it’s wrappled serpenty round his legs. Back at them not-so-imperishable orphans.

  – Come on! they cry.

  Lily’s off in a jiff, diving to dart through legs, bound rocks again, to the slab. Not Peter though. He scowls at Blackstone.

  – I do wish my aim were better, says he.

  Atchoo!

  And he aims square between Blackstone’s eyes, coolly fires. And misses.

  Shoulda specified good, see. Unfortuitously, better here’s just leveling up to shite.

  – Fly, Peter! Fly! cries Lily.

  And he’s snorting as he runs, rocketing forward as the flagpole rises, oh but low, so even as he’s nearly there, a puppeted hand latches on his boot. But Lily’s bounding along Flashjack’s arm – The rifle! Reach it out! – and as he thrusts it forward with just the butt in one hand, Lily’s near leaping from Flashjack’s hand to snatch the barrel between her ickle paws, her tail only nabbed at the last instant by a scallywag with lightning reflexes, as under the last glint of sunset, Janie waves the flag.

  And the world transforms.

  • 8

  No Faerie Queen comes to help em in their battle, nor to take the Flag back to Faerie with her – like yer groanhuffs’ travesty of fabbling’s ever right – but instead it’s like that flag’s headed home itself and taking em with it, into time gone mad. The sun zips a day’s arc through the sky, zooms back, across another’s path, light sl
icing a midnight noon where’s stars wheel clockwise and widdershins. The moon flickers everywheres, gibbous, crescent, full. Clouds swirl the heavens, closing in to an ’urricane of autumn leaves, bumblebees, snowflakes and cherry blossom. It’s a maelstrom of seasons.

  See, scamps, it ain’t so much the Land of Nod is where yer wishes comes true, simple pimple, cut and dry, more as it’s where they comes alive, wild and free, yer desires in flesh, showing emselves to yer, all at once. Imagine the whole world were a mirror what yer looked into yer own peepers with, into yer soul itself. It’s what yer might see in there the Land of Nod makes real, the part of yer as loves kicking autumn leaves, and the part as loves snowball fights, and how the fuck does it know to choose one?

  They’re the centre of it all, the Flag, the scruffs, then Lily with rifle as lifeline, Peter clinging on, the hand clamped on his boot, and – he looks back – them puppeted twerps all latched to each other now. Another glimpse of the Addanc’s horrors beyond, in the hollows of hail and dandelion seeds and conkers battering it. He’s its anchor in the whirlwind. Blast! And past Lily, Flashjack, the scruffs round the Flag, Blackstone clings to the crag.

  – Foooooooxy, says Flashjack, I think we’re taking the whole bleedin island with us.