The Talisman

was still and sweet, the night perfectly silent except for a slim breeze that was blessedly warm.
    ‘Look out, Jack! Look out, Jack! Look out, look out—’
    Like a bad echo inside his head, he heard a memory of the dog-boys outside Nelson House chorusing Way-gup, way-gup, way-gup! Pleeze, pleeze, pleeze!
    ‘Look out, Jack!’ Richard wailed. His face was slammed into the earth and he looked like an overenthusiastic Moslem determined to get in good with Allah. ‘LOOK OUT! THE WOLF! PREFECTS! THE HEADMASTER! LOOK O—’
    Panicked by the idea that Richard actually had gone crazy, Jack yanked his friend’s head up by the back of his collar and slapped his face.
    Richard’s words were cut cleanly off. He gaped at Jack, and Jack saw the shape of his own hand rising on Richard’s pale cheek, a dim red tattoo. His shame was replaced by an urgent curiosity to know just where they were. There was light; otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to see that mark.
    A partial answer to the question came from inside him – it was certain and unquestionable . . . at least, as far as it went.
    The Outposts, Jack-O. You’re in the Outposts now.
    But before he could spend any time mulling that over, he had to try to get Richard shipshape.
    ‘Are you all right, Richie?’
    He was looking at Jack with numb, hurt surprise. ‘You hit me, Jack.’
    ‘I slapped you. That’s what you’re supposed to do with hysterical people.’
    ‘I wasn’t hysterical! I’ve never been hysterical in my l—’ Richard broke off and jumped to his feet, looking around wildly. ‘The wolf! We have to look out for the wolf, Jack! If we can get over the fence he won’t be able to get us!’
    He would have gone sprinting off into the darkness right then, making for a cyclone fence which was now in another world, if Jack hadn’t grabbed him and held him back.
    ‘The wolf is gone, Richard.’
    ‘Huh?’
    ‘We made it.’
    ‘What are you talking abou—’
    ‘The Territories, Richard! We’re in the Territories! We flipped over!’ And you almost pulled my damn arm out of its socket, you unbeliever, Jack thought, rubbing his throbbing shoulder. The next time I try to haul someone across, I’m going to find myself a real little kid, one who still believes in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny .
    ‘That’s ridiculous,’ Richard said slowly. ‘There’s no such thing as the Territories, Jack.’
    ‘If there isn’t,’ Jack said grimly, ‘then how come that great big white wolf isn’t biting your ass? Or your own damn headmaster?’
    Richard looked at Jack, opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. He looked around, this time with a bit more attention (at least Jack hoped so). Jack did the same, enjoying the warmth and the clarity of the air as he did so. Morgan and his crowd of snake-pit crazies might come bursting through at any second, but for now it was impossible not to luxuriate in the pure animal joy of being back here again.
    They were in a field. High, yellowish grass with bearded heads – not wheat, but something like wheat; some edible grain, anyway – stretched off into the night in every direction. The warm breeze rippled it in mysterious but rather lovely waves. To the right was a wooden building standing on a slight knoll, a lamp mounted on a pole in front of it. A yellow flame almost too bright to look at burned clearly inside the lamp’s glass globe. Jack saw that the building was octagonal. The two boys had come into the Territories on the outermost edge of the circle of light that lamp threw – and there was something on the far side of the circle, something metallic that threw back the lamplight in broken glimmers. Jack squinted at that faint, silvery glow . . . and then understood. What he felt was not so much wonder as a sense of fulfilled expectation. It was as if two very large jigsaw-puzzle pieces, one in the American Territories and one over here, had just come neatly together.
    Those were railroad tracks. And although it was impossible to tell direction in the darkness, Jack thought he knew in which direction those tracks would travel:
    West.
    2
    ‘Come on,’ Jack said.
    ‘I don’t want to go up there,’ Richard said.
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Too much crazy stuff going on.’ Richard wet his lips. ‘Could be anything up there in that building. Dogs. Crazy people.’ He wet his lips again. ‘Bugs.’
    ‘I told you, we’re in the Territories now. The craziness has all blown away – it’s