Only Forward (32 page)

And came to immediately to find myself standing on grass. I was trembling so violently I could hear the bones in my wrists cracking, but at least I was clothed. I reached into my jacket without looking up to see where I was. Until I had a cigarette lit, I didn't want to know.

I was standing on a small island, about ten feet across. The island was flat, and covered with thick grass that was a deep rich green. About ten yards away there was another island, this one slightly smaller. There were others behind me and to the side. I walked to the edge and looked across. There was no water between the islands. There was nothing at all between them, in fact. The islands were just the tops of ragged columns of stone, huge natural pillars which plunged thousands of feet down into mist. The sky above was opaque, with the texture of frosted glass: a sky that promised snow.

I stood and stared wildly around for a few moments. There was nowhere to go. The islands stretched out as far as I could see in all directions, varying in size and distance, but I couldn't even reach the nearest ones. I knew I'd been here before, been here in very early dreams, but I couldn't work out what the hell I could do. I felt like a legendary racing driver tempted out of retirement, climbing nonchalantly into a car and finding he couldn't even remember how to start the engine.

I paced restlessly round the island for a while, flapping my arms to keep warm, a cloud of condensation shrouding my face. I couldn't remember. I couldn't remember the tune.

The worst of it was I knew the castle had only been a warm-up. It had been no fun, no fun at all, but by Rafe's standards it was a wet dream. It had been eight years since I'd had to face myself, eight years in which I'd been able to lead the occasional sufferer safely through Jeamland, secure in the knowledge that I was relatively safe, at risk only from other people's monsters.

I wasn't any longer. I wasn't safe at all. The person I'd been for so long wasn't there any more. It was undercut, pre-dated, its veils torn asunder. I was just me again, and I was afraid. I was out of practice at being me, and as I walked fretfully round the island, waiting for whatever the hell was going to happen next I worked my memory. I had to go back a long way, remember a person I'd once been. Paradise Lost, or Paradise Regained? You tell me.

Then with sudden intuition I turned and looked behind me. There was nothing there.

Three minutes later, there was something there. Not on the island I was standing on, but in the distance. About twenty islands away, front-runner of a storm and coming in my direction, was a Something. I still couldn't see what it was yet, but I felt confident about one thing. I didn't want to meet it, had no desire to make its acquaintance, and no wish to interact with it on any level at all.

What are Somethings? Well, fucked if I know, actually, hence the name. They're just bad things. They're like vicious little powerboats, stirring up the water and creating waves in Jeamland. You don't see them so much as experience their effects. They've always been there, though I think there are more now than there used to be, and they're certainly much more virulent. Most of the people I've led through Jeamland have been suffering the effects of a Something which has randomly latched onto their stream and started stirring them round. There have been cases where a Something has been pushed in someone's direction, but not often, and not recently. Not for eight years, in fact.

In the normal run of things I can deal with Somethings fairly effectively, though it's by no means an exact science. It's also far from easy, and leaves you unbelievably tired: that's why I'm fit for nothing for a few days after each job. They're like invisible sticky spheres, rolling through a room full of dust. The further they go, the more dust they pick up, the heavier they get and the faster they roll. The trick is knowing how to stop them from chasing your client, from rolling through his dust in particular. I've got better over the years, more skilled at deflecting them, while they've stayed more or less the same.

But now things would be different. Now they would be stronger, and stickier, and bigger and faster. I would have to face one sooner or later, but I didn't want it to be now. I was still feeling at a very low ebb after the castle, still nervously looking down every now and then to check I was wearing some trousers. Facing a Something takes a good deal of mental strength and resolve, and though I was recovering from the castle a damn sight quicker than anyone else, could have done, I didn't want to risk taking on more than I could deal with. I don't own Jeamland any more than anyone else does. There are no special dispensations.

More to establish that it wasn't a viable option than through any sense of hope, I lay on my front at the edge of the island and looked down. The column of stone I was on top of was heavily weathered and worn, with a few adequate and tempting niches. The immediate feeling of vertigo that I felt, however, told me what I'd already known. This wasn't like the column up to the castle. Here, climbing was the issue, and I knew that if I tried clambering down I'd find that the gravity would be working just fine. The footholds I could see were a trick, an attempt to lure me into climbing down. That meant two things. Firstly that whatever was down there was not going to be good news. Secondly, and worse, that Jeamland was beginning to distort as someone tried to bend it to his own ends once more.

I stood up again and looked into the distance. The Something was now much closer, only about five islands away. There was still nothing to see, but I knew it was coming. There's something about the air when one is close, something about the way the back of your neck feels. It's like looking at a haunted spot or watching a graveyard at night: by the pricking of your thumbs you know that something wicked this way comes.

Shutting my eyes, I concentrated hard and tried to imagine myself somewhere else. It isn't easy, particularly under pressure, but it can be done, if you dredge up the right memories, press the correct internal buttons. When I opened my eyes, I was still on the island, and the patch of bad was closer still. I tried again, but knew it was useless. It felt like I was trying to jump with my feet tied to the floor.

In a way it was just as well. There was a chance I was not too far behind Alkland, and it was him I had to look after. Suddenly I felt cold.

'Is this your island, sir?'

'I turned round to see two policemen standing behind me. They were both tall and dressed in dark blue uniforms and black boots, and had tall helmets capped with chrome. They didn't look in the least endearing. With their identical moustaches and piercing black eyes, they looked like trouble, and I immediately began to feel guilty again.

'Er, no . . .'I stammered, cursing myself for not getting away before the Something arrived.

One of the cops raised his eyebrows. "No, sir?' he said, somehow getting the 'sir' to positively drip with derision.

'Er, no.' What were they talking about? How could it be my island? The policeman turned to his colleague, whose eyebrows were also flamboyantly raised. They looked like a pair of sarcastic owls.

'Well well well, Constable Perkins,' he said. 'What about that then, eh? Gentleman stands here on an island, clear as day, and says it's not his.' He folded his arms and looked at me sardonically as Constable Perkins snorted and took out a small notebook, shaking his head.

'It's not' I said. 'I mean, I don't own it, do I?'

'You tell us, sir,' said Constable Perkins, taking a pace forward and staring hard at me. 'Are you standing on it, or not?'

'Well, yes,' I said, trying not to sound guilty, and failing. 'In that sense it's mine, yes.'

'Oh, so now it is yours, is it?' said the first policeman woundingly, taking a step forward of his own. 'Mind if we see your licence?'

'What licence? What are you talking about?'

'Are you refusing to co-operate with us, sir?'

'No! I don't have any licence.'

'Ah-ha' said the policeman smugly, and Constable Perkins nodded knowingly in the background, as if this was what they'd suspected all along. 'Note that down, Constable.'

'Right you are,' Perkins said, wetting the tip of his pencil with his tongue and starting to take notes. 'We were proceeding along our beat in the usual fashion when we came upon the suspect, who was, without the slightest shadow of a doubt, absolutely definitely, standing on an island. Suspect at first claimed the island was not his, but then confessed under the telling interrogation of Constable Jenkins.'

Thank you, Constable Perkins.'

'Not at all, Constable Jenkins: your line of questioning was both apposite and effective.'

'Look' I said. 'It's not my sodding island, all right?'

The policemen looked at each other with mock astonishment and then took a simultaneous step closer to me. I took a pace back to keep them at arm's length, conscious that the edge of the island could only be a couple of yards behind me.

'Suspect used foul and intimidating language towards an officer in the pursuance of his duties,' muttered Constable Jenkins to his colleague, and Perkins noted it down. 'Right,' he continued, turning to face me. Think we'd better take down a few details. I'd advise you to tell the truth, sir. Save a lot of trouble later on.'

I sighed, trying to stay relaxed, trying not to let the guilt get to me. Somethings are gluttons for guilt.

'Right,' said Constable Perkins. 'Let's take it from the top again. How big is your nose?'

'What?'

'Deaf, are you, sir?'

'No, but-'

'How big is it then?'

'You can see how big it is.'

'I'd like to hear it from you, sir.'

'Look, what do you want from me?' I asked, uselessly. I knew what they wanted. They were a Something, and they wanted to screw me up. But I had to play the game, keep things at this level. If I called its bluff, it would change into something far worse. Jeamland was different now, and I have my bad memories too. There are monsters in here which are mine, you see, and I have my own bubbles which rise sometimes from beneath still waters. They're not your concern, so don't expect to hear about them. But they're there. '

'What do we want?' asked Constable Jenkins of his colleague, revelling in his rhetoric. 'What do we want?' He turned viciously towards me and when he thrust his face towards mine I had to take another hurried step backwards to avoid being: headbutted. 'Look, sir, either it's your island, in which case you have to show us your licence, which you say you don't have . . .'

'Don't have,' intoned Constable Perkins contrapuntally.

'Or it's not your island, in which case you've nicked it.'

'Nicked it.'

'Either way, we've got you bang to rights, haven't we, sonny?'

'Well, I -' I took another step back as the policeman moved in for the kill.

'Not to mention using bad language to an officer in the line of his duty,' he continued, counting off on his fingers ostentatiously, 'refusing to describe the size of your nose, and socialising with the opposite sex without due care and attention.'

'What are you talking about?'

'I think you'd better come with us,' said Constable Perkins gravely, pocketing his notebook. He took a step towards me, hand out to take my arm, and I took the last possible step backwards.

'Resisting arrest,' tutted Constable Jenkins, shaking his head. 'You're in very deep shit now, sonny.'

'Up to your neck in it.' Both policemen started to lean towards me.

'Might have to tell your parents about this.'

'It'll break their hearts.'

They don't deserve this.'

'Still, they've got to know.'

'But wait a minute,' said Constable Jenkins suddenly, his face no more than a few inches from mine. The pores in his face seemed huge, like a myriad of little wells, and a wisp of minty breath curled up from his dark mouth. I wanted desperately to move back but there was no more room, nowhere to go. 'We can't tell his parents, can we?'

'That's right' agreed Constable Perkins, 'we can't.'

'Do you know why?' demanded Constable Jenkins with vicious glee. 'Do you know why we can't tell them?'

'No' I said, in a small, frightened voice, hoping to placate them.

'Because they're dead!' he shouted at me. They're DEAD!'

'No!' I said. "They're not. They're still alive.'

'Seen them recently, have you?'

'No, but-'

'Completely dead, they are'-

'Crawling with maggots.'

'Flesh hanging off their bones.'

'And you didn't even know. Well well well.'

And suddenly I knew they were telling the truth. My parents were dead.

I felt my neck spasming, and a sudden terrible feeling of vertigo. I commanded myself to block it, forget it. Deal with it later. But it didn't work, and I saw my parent's faces in front of me, their features running like burning candles. The policemen knew they'd hit the mark, and pressed on, leaning further and further towards me.

'Must be, oh, three years since.'

'At least.'

'Be in pretty bad shape by now.'

'Piles of rot, really.'

'And you didn't even know.'

'Never called.'

'Never wrote.'

'Never said where you were.'

'Didn't say goodbye.'

'Didn't go to the funeral.'

'Didn't tell them that you loved them.'

'Too late now.'

'Far too late.'

'Dear oh dear.'

'Fuck off you, bastards' I shouted suddenly, tearing my throat. They took a step backwards, surprised, and the look that flitted across their hard faces did me good.

The Something hesitated for a moment, realising that I still had some strength, that the power that Rafe had given it might not be enough. That moment was all I needed. The information they'd been so happy to divulge, to throw in my face, had actually turned against them. Rafe had been hoping to capitalise on the guilt he knew I felt about so many things, but he'd done the opposite. Later I would feel guilty, even more guilty than I already did, but for now the pain succeeded when brute mental effort had failed before. It opened a small channel back to a younger me, a me that was harder and much more dangerous.