Andrew Buckley - Stiltskin

Lily began to snore softly.

Rats in Thiside were very much like rats in Othaside. They were small, furry, grubby-looking scavengers with long tails and pointy teeth. The only difference was that the rats of Thiside could speak. Some could even sing. Before the Emerald City was destroyed, the Emerald Opera House often played host to the Travelling Rat Chorus, a group of rats who enjoyed wearing frilly collars and singing opera music.

The only issue with the rats of Thiside having the ability to speak was that they lacked the ability to keep their thoughts to themselves and instead verbalized every single last one of them. Everything they thought came out of their mouths.

Around the same time that the Warzgurt was fleeing into the Dark Forest, an especially grubby, overweight rat named Albert was scurrying around the remains of a burnt-down settlement. He hummed to himself as he sifted through the remains of a wooden statue looking for something to eat or possibly something shiny that he could take home to decorate his hole in the wall.

“Looking for garbage looking for garbage,” muttered Albert. “Hmm hmm hmm hmm,” hummed Albert, “ohhh that looks nice, what’s that? Could be a piece of fruit nope definitely a piece of wood ooh maybe that’s a piece of fruit nope that’s a rock definitely a rock looked like fruit boy it smells funny here wonder where the other rats are they always leave me by myself I get so nervous so nervous when I’m by myself. What was that?”

Albert wasn’t particularly smart even by rat standards and when the ground beneath him began to move around he assumed it was just his feet doing something funny.

“That’s strange,” he said, “that’s very strange my feet have never done that before nope never before.”

When a small hand exploded up out through the earth and grabbed a handful of Albert’s fur he assumed that he was experiencing a very intrusive itch.

“Hmm, that feels itchy.”

When a second hand grabbed another handful of fur, he began to worry.

“Wait a second that’s not right.”

When the hands repositioned and clamped onto Albert’s groin it began to dawn on him that it might not be an itch at all. It took a while for the electrical impulses to reach his brain telling him that he was in a great deal of pain but once they did, he took off like a rat whose testicles had been grabbed firmly by a Fairy.

“It’s got me it’s got me! Something’s got me I don’t know what it is but it’s got me by a very awkward area and it doesn’t feel comfortable at all, at all! This is bad oh this is very bad.”

Veszico held on tight and was dragged from the earth by the retreating rat. The Fairy released her grip and watched Albert run as if his testicles depended upon it.

“Help! Someone help! There’s a creature around here trying to hang on to my groin what kind of animal does that ow it’s hurting to run but I’m not stopping because that thing might still be behind me and I do not want it to grab me again no I don’t definitely not. Oh the pain’s getting worse so much worse and everything going a little blurry oh dear I think I’m passing out yes definitely passing out.”

Veszico watched as Albert the rat passed out in mid-run and slid to a stop.

Fairies were created by a random burst of magic that had transformed a group of shiny rocks into the first Fairies. The Fairies quickly discovered how to breed and the three groups of Fairies quickly became obvious. Because they were descended from rocks, Fairies were incredibly tough and could transform back into rocks at will. As their emotional state resulted in a chemical reaction through their sweat glands that caused either glowing or spontaneous combustion, they were impervious to high or low temperatures. It wasn’t the fire that had hurt Veszico, but the impact from the axe handle that had struck her. She had tried to turn into a rock but was too late and had been rendered unconscious. Why she had been buried was completely beyond her comprehension. She carefully stood up and brushed herself off. Thinking back to the Exchange, the last thing she’d heard was something to do with the Historian.

She tested her wings, jumped into the air, and began to glow bright blue. She swished and she swerved, she flipped and she spun, and then she took off into the darkness.

Robert awoke as the sun began to rise. Much like its setting, the sun had a much more adventurous way of rising. Rather than peeking over the horizon and slowly creeping out, the sun in Thiside preferred to jump out, so the transition went from dark to slightly dim as the sun approached the crest of the horizon to sudden daylight!

Robert was used to sleeping in his apartment in a dark room with curtains on the window and a comfy bed. Sleeping under the stars on the hard ground was not something that he was used to. He’d tried camping once when he was younger and, as usual, his general weirdness had intervened. He’d woken up in the morning to find an elderly badger in his tent. Finding a badger in his tent was weird enough but what was strange was that the badger appeared to be humming to him. And not humming just anything; he was humming Rock-a-bye-baby . Robert had stared at the badger. The badger had stared back, winked at him, and vanished. Since that moment, the thought of camping had disturbed Robert in ways he couldn’t describe and he chose not to sleep in the wild ever again.

The Gnomes had cooked everyone a breakfast made up primarily of large eggs and some sort of leafy herb that the White Rabbit had packed for them. As obnoxious as the two little men were, they were among the most amazing cooks that Robert had ever experienced. Their ability to make a meal out of anything was remarkable.

Lily had taken Robert’s pyjama shirt to wear and looked very much like an outdoorsy person with her thick, rough pants and baggy shirt. Her hair was messy and her face still held traces of soot. Her eyes seemed less bright this morning, and much to Robert’s joy, she had lost the sternness he had experienced in her last night. Lily’s mood swings were extremely random and always seemed worse at night. Robert was having trouble figuring her out and it didn’t help that he’d yet to figure out any female he’d ever met.

The Gnomes extinguished the fire and the foursome prepared to make their way along the dim path out of the dark forest. Robert felt like he was forgetting something, something important.

“Where’s the kitten?” he remembered.

The Gnomes finished kicking dirt on the fire and looked at Robert as if he’d lost his mind.

“What are you talking about?” asked Gnick.

“The kitten from the halfway house; he was asleep here last night and gone when I woke up this morning.”

“Maybe you dreamt it,” suggested General Gnarly.

“You guys are just screwing with me, right? Bloody hell, you didn’t cook it, did you?”

“Look, moron,” said Gnick, “I promise you, we don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Lily was looking at him in complete confusion.

“Lily,” pleaded Robert, “you must remember the cat. You told me about how there are no cats in Thiside.”

“That’s true, there are no cats in Thiside,” agreed Lily.

“I know! You told me why, about the Cheshire cat and how he vanished and the Emerald Guard were ordered to kill all the cats.”

“Where did you learn all that?”

“You told me!”

“I don’t remember that at all,” said Lily with complete sincerity.