by Joan Lennon
‘What happened?’
‘She gambled, like I said… and she lost.’
As Hurple talked, Jay felt as if she’d been there herself. She could see it so clearly – the Library, and Dewey Decimal, and Hurple. And their mad plans.
‘When… it… happened, she didn’t seem to think of herself at all. She just yelled at me to get out.
‘ “Go! Save yourself!” she said.
‘For a moment, I honestly didn’t understand what she meant. Go? Go where? The Library was my home – the Librarian was my family! I just stood there, chittering uselessly, until she picked me up and looked me in the eyes.
‘ “Back wall,” she said. “By the window. Where the Celtic Mythology section meets Sci-fi/Fantasy, there’s a gap. It’s tight, but an exceptional ferret should just fit. I’m counting on you,” she said.
‘And then she gave me such a look. It had hope in it, and resignation and belief and at the same time acceptance that what she was desperate to believe might very well not be true at all, and sadness, and affection…
‘There were so many things I should have done. I should have made her come with me, somehow. I should have reassured her there wasn’t a book in the place that wasn’t safe in my head, and if that was the hope she was clinging to, she was right! I should have stayed to help her fight. I should have…’
He was trembling.
‘What happened?’ Jay asked gently.
‘Fire.’ He dragged in a big breath and started to talk in a strange, strained voice. ‘These things get out of hand very easily. I suspect no one really planned to set the Library alight. An incident not without precedent, of course. Similar things have occurred – the Royal Library at Alexandria, we are told, succumbed to accidental arson…’ His head dropped and he said with great sadness, ‘I panicked, all right? I smelled fire and I’m an animal and I ran.’
Jay nodded. ‘And was there a gap?’
‘What?’
A gap. Between Myth and Fantasy. Like she said.’
‘Yes. Oh yes.’
And that’s how you ended up in Eo’s world.’
Another nod.
‘Well, thank goodness for that!’ Jay exclaimed. ‘Can you imagine us having to handle all this on our own!?’
Hurple snorted, a little raggedly. ‘There’s that, isn’t there?’
FAQ 487: Do time travellers find that it helps, knowing that none of the things that make them sad have actually happened yet? Or that they happened much, much earlier? Do you know what I’m on about?
HURPLE’S REPLY: Yes, I understand the question. And it should help. But it doesn’t.
Jay suddenly scooped him up and held him in front of her face, the length of him dangling down in surprise.
‘And I think the Librarian was absolutely right to count on you, because you are without doubt the wisest wee weasel that could possibly be. Thank you for telling me.’
And she kissed him on his furry nose and set him down in a heap. And that’s enough moonlight meandering for me,’ she said. ‘Let’s get back and see what Eo and Adom are up to. If they’ve let my beautiful bonfire go out, I’ll throttle them.’
But as she started to stand up, Hurple put a restraining paw on her leg. She looked at him questioningly.
‘Please – if you don’t mind – don’t tell the boys.’
Jay raised an eyebrow.
Hurple gave a half shrug. ‘Pure vanity, I admit. It’s not my finest hour we’ve been talking about and, to be honest, I’d rather it stayed between us two. As long as the lads don’t know the facts, they can make up any number of flattering pasts for me. I’m just low enough to be willing to accept admiration I don’t deserve.’
Jay snorted. ‘You mean you’re just human enough!’ Then she leaned down and offered him an arm to climb up. ‘Don’t worry, Professor. They won’t hear it from me.’
But he didn’t move.
‘I said, don’t worry – I won’t tell,’ she repeated, but it was as if he’d forgotten she was still there. Then, suddenly, he gripped her arm with his sharp claws.
‘HEY!’
‘Can’t you hear it?’ he hissed at her. ‘There’s something coming – something big…!’
She straightened up, straining her ears. There was nothing to hear but the waves, and the wind, and… what was that? Deep, almost deeper than hearing… it was as if she were feeling it, coming up from the ground through her feet…
‘Run!’ screeched Hurple. ‘Run for the trees!’
She grabbed him tight and ran as the herd had first come stampeding back round the headland towards them. The earth shook and the dull thunder of their pounding feet was punctuated by bellows of panic. They surged past, a great, many-backed monster in the moonlight, until, as suddenly as it had appeared, the herd was gone.
Jay stood in the shelter of the trees for a moment, breathless and stunned.
Then she was running again, frantically, back the way the herd had come, back to where they had left the boys…
It was hard going on the churned-up sand, but every time she fell flat she was up again in an instant, shaking the sand from her face as she ran. Surely they would have had time to… they would have heard it coming… they wouldn’t just sit there…
Then, as she cleared an outcropping of rock, she collided with them both, running in the opposite direction in search of Hurple and her.
They grabbed each other’s hands.
‘Are you – ?’
‘Did you – ?’
‘What happened?!’ they panted to each other.
‘My fire!’ Jay wailed, looked over their shoulders.
The bonfire had been scattered by hundreds of feet, bits of it flickering about the beach like the aftermath of an explosion.
They scraped some of it together and huddled round. No one knew what to say. It was Adom who first noticed that Jay was crying. He nudged Eo, and the two exchanged horrified glances.
‘Er…’ said Eo.
Jay scrubbed at her face with her hand. ‘I really liked it here,’ she said in a strangled voice. ‘I really did. It was… nice.’
Hurple reached up and licked her cheek comfortingly.
‘I…’ he started to say – when the earth lurched.
They scrambled to their feet, their eyes showing white.
‘Did you feel that?!’
‘It’s the whatsits! They’re coming back!’
‘No, it was bigger than that.’
‘BIGGER whatsits!’
With a groan, the ground moved again, making them all stagger.
‘Earthquake,’ whispered Hurple.
For a moment, that was enough strangeness. But then Eo cleared his throat.
‘I don’t want to worry anybody,’ he said, sounding plenty worried himself. ‘But don’t you think the tide’s a bit… wrong? I mean, it’s gone really far out now. Would you say that was normal round here?’
‘Could just be very shallow,’ suggested Hurple.
Everyone gazed out over the expanse of wet sand and mud. Outcrops of coral reef and seaweed-draped rock threw strange shadows in the moonlight, and everything glittered weirdly.
They weren’t sure they could see the line of the sea at all.
‘Way too far out,’ muttered Adom.
And then it began to snow.
It was a grey, acrid-smelling snow, neither wet nor cold. It filled the air, so that there wasn’t so much left to breathe. It made the fire stutter and smoke, blurring the moon. It began to collect on their shoulders and hair.
‘What is it?’ whispered Adom.
Hurple delicately put out his tongue and tasted. Ash,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Volcanic ash. There’s been an eruption. Somewhere. A huge eruption.’
‘Some people say it was a huge eruption that wiped out the dinosaurs.’Jay’s voice sounded strange and far away. ‘So huge it threw ash high into the atmosphere, where the winds took it and carried it right round the world.’ The moon and the stars were only faint
ly visible now, and the children shuffled closer to each other in the grey fog. ‘Other people say an asteroid hit the earth and did the same thing – heaving tons of dust kilometres into the sky. It lasted for a long time – for years – the sun was blocked out – no light, so nothing could grow – no light – only grey…’ A sob stopped her.
‘Don’t think about it now. Our time’s almost up here, anyway. The Traveller’s coming and then we’ll be gone. Here, take my hand.’ Adom reached out and held her hand with both of his, trying to be a comfort.
‘That’s right,’ said Eo. They could dimly see him settle Hurple round his neck. ‘Hold tight, Professor!’ He took Jay’s other hand.
There was crashing in the forest as more animals were caught up in the strangeness and the fear. Hurple wished with all his heart he didn’t have to hear those sounds. He was starting to pant and his eyes stung. He let go of Eo with his front paws and rubbed at his face, but that only made the stinging worse. A tiny part of his brain was still able to consider the chemical components of the gases they were now inhaling, and the possible effects these might have on patterns of perception – but no other part of his brain was prepared to listen. Hurple’s enormous mental capacity had been overloaded by memory and emotion, in particular that all-consumer, guilt.
He kept picturing all those animals, trapped in terror, about to die…
They have no idea what is happening to them, no idea what to expect. How could they? And yet they could be saved so much suffering if they had someone to tell them what to do. Guide them through the dangers. Show them. A leader. I could save them – not all of them, of course not, but some. It’s what D. D. Hamilton would have done. D. D. Hamilton. It’s strange how much that bush over there looks like her… just like her. Bless me, it’s her –
‘D. D.!’
In the bell of silence, no one heard his cry.
Hurple launched himself with all four paws and hit the ground running.
‘– ?!’ Eo started to turn, not understanding what was happening.
‘Hurple, NO! Jay shrieked silently, keeping tight hold of the G’s hand. ‘Come back?
Then the Traveller was there, and took them.
15 The Travellers’ Return
This time, instead of shrinking as it approached, the Traveller streaked across the exposed sand and seaweed and on to the G beach at full size – and exploded in mid-air, soaking everyone and flinging three bodies hard on to the sand. Eo was up at once, spitting grit out of his mouth, throwing himself at the Queen.
‘ What have you done to my friend?’ he screamed. ‘ Where is he?!’
Even in his frenzy he stopped short of touching her. Nevertheless, the Kelpie rocked back on her heels a little. She was not accustomed to being menaced by filthy, wet, half-crazed boys. From the main vortex, her minions clacked and wailed in agitation till she gestured abruptly and they subsided.
‘Your friend is where you left him. As you can see.’ And she indicated the G’s viewing disc, shimmering on the sand.
Eo flung himself down on his knees and peered frantically into the disc.
‘There’s nothing there,’ he shrilled. ‘I can’t see him! You’re lying! There’s nothing –just grey and –’ He broke off and, before anyone could stop him, he’d plunged his arm, up to the shoulder, into the viewing disc.
‘Where are you?’ he grunted, groping blindly about. ‘ Where – are –you – HA!’ There was a jolt from an unseen source that shook his whole body, so violent it was as if he’d been knocked free of the earth’s pull for a moment, so that there was nothing to keep him from being dragged down into the disc…
Eo’s head and both shoulders had already disappeared when Adom hit him. The tackle had a lifetime of hard manual labour behind it and it dragged Eo back out of the disc with a horrible sucking sound and smashed him on the G beach. Hurple, clutched by the scruff of his neck, came too, but the crash-landing loosened Eo’s grip and the ferret flew in an arc over the heaped boys. He hit the sand like a wet sock and lay there without moving.
‘Is he…?’ gasped Adom.
‘Hurple!’ cried Jay.
She rushed over, scooped him up and cradled him in her arms. There wasn’t a great deal of dignity in his position, on his back with all four legs in the air like that, but there was no mistaking her concern. Eo and Adom stumbled over, and the adult G clustered around as well.
‘Give him here, girl,’ said Market, not unkindly.
‘He’s breathing, anyway.’
‘Thank goodness for that. I wasn’t looking forward to doing mouth-to-mouth!’
‘Why won’t he wake up?!’ wailed Eo.
‘How can you ask such a thing? Collars don’t wake up. How odd, to call a collar your friend. An unusual collar, that speaks and moves and interferes through six full Tides, and now has excited such conjecture over its heatth! The Queen was livid. ‘You’ll find that that is a collar that will not wake up. I may choose to revive the creature when our entrance to your world is established, since a conscious soul is so much more… tasty. Fear is by far the best sauce. Yes, I suspect I will choose to wake him then – but not before!’
Her voice had risen to a shriek on the last words, but she regained control of herself.
‘Now you have another reason to regret your choice, boy. If you had paid the forfeit of your own poor soul at the start, all these others would not now be facing the consequences when you fail in the Final Challenge. When you fail to find your way through the mazes of the Dry Heart to the Centre, to the place that can shut the door –’
Behind her, the Kelpies spun faster and faster, wailing and beating their fists against the wall of water, their hunger made even more desperate now that their release into the world of the G was so close.
‘Not long, not long,’ the Queen called over her shoulder, never taking her eyes off Eo. ‘We will play out the last act, even when the end is self-evident. We will not stoop to cheating.’
‘What do you call that bright idea of burning them all up in lava? Or drowning them? Or letting them die of cold?’ yelled Interrupted indignantly.
‘Er, I think you’re upsetting the children,’ murmured Gladrag. And indeed, the three were looking pretty appalled.
‘L-lava?’ quavered Jay. ‘Nobody said anything about lava!’
‘Now, now,’ said Market reassuringly. ‘We were here the whole time. And a fat lot of good it did too,’ he added in an undertone.
Eo mumbled something.
‘What was that? Did it speak?’ sneered the Queen.
‘I said, I’m not going to fail.’ Eo’s voice sounded thin and desperate, but he kept it from quavering.
‘That’s right!’ Jay came and stood at his shoulder and tried to glare at the Kelpie without entirely succeeding.
Adom came to Eo’s other side. ‘You are a demon. Hell is where you belong, with all the fallen angels.’ He was doing his best not to look at any part of the Queen below the neck, but she was completely aware of how much she was disturbing him and smiled smugly.
‘I’ll consider myself warned, then, shall I?’ she said, mocking them all. Then she drew herself up, tall as a storm cloud. ‘It is almost time.’
There was a panicky chorus from the G.
‘Hang on!’
Just a minute!’
‘Wait!’
She paused and looked at them scornfully. ‘Well? What is it now?’
Market spluttered, ‘Um, er, right. How do they get to the Island? The Traveller exploded, for crying out loud!’
The Queen smiled and gestured towards the Kelpie vortex. ‘Why with me, of course.’
‘NO!’ Eo, Adom and Jay yelped.
‘No,’ said Hibernation Gladrag, more quietly but no less emphatically.
‘What’s the matter, don’t you trust me? Very well, then.’ And she crooked a finger. Immediately the two viewing discs detached themselves from the beach and cartwheeled into her hands. With a flip of the wrist she combined them and set the
m spinning in mid-air and then, like a potter working with clay on a wheel, she shaped them up into a brother to the Traveller. ‘There. The little darlings’ own private transport.’
The ‘darlings’ didn’t look much happier than they had been about entering the main vortex, but at least they wouldn’t be with her.
‘What other questions have you? What other pathetic attempts at delay?’
‘Who throws it?’ asked Interrupted.
‘No one. There is only one possible destination this time. The Traveller knows where to go.’
‘The Island.’
‘Yes. And that is the last prevarication that time allows.’
Before anyone could move, she turned on her heel and flung the second Traveller directly at the children. There was just time for expressions of horror to register on their faces and then they were gone. The thing launched itself into the sky and headed north.
The three G stood on the beach, an unconscious Hurple in Market’s arms. They looked as they felt: pathetic and unwell.
‘I’ll see you there, on the Island,’ purred the Queen. ‘Or not. It won’t make any difference to the outcome.’
As she moved towards the main vortex, she looked back at them over one shoulder.
‘Sure I can’t offer you a lift?’ she said with a sneer.
There was an audible gulp. Then Gladrag hastily got a grip. She shook her head. ‘No. No, thank you. We’ll, er, make our own way. Uh, see you there!’ she concluded brightly.
The Queen was still staring at them contemptuously as she stepped into the vortex, and it folded round her and spun into the night.
For a moment, the three G didn’t know why they suddenly felt so good. The air tasted delightful, and the night breeze was almost silky, and the sand felt wonderful under their feet. Even their hair began to relax out of those tight emergency buns.
‘It was that blasted vortex, wasn’t it!’ exclaimed Market. ‘It was spoiling everything, just by being there!’