awkward moment while they both stood motionless in the middle of the street. Slowly Tristram turned to face him, brandishing a small hand gun that the boy could swear had not been there a moment before.
‘Ryan?’ he said in a hushed whisper.
The boy shrugged and smiled.
Tristram relaxed and beckoned Ryan to follow him into a dark passage between two houses.
‘Ryan, what the hell are you doing here?’ he asked, when he was satisfied that they were sufficiently concealed.
‘I’m here to help you,’ said Ryan plainly.
‘Oh no you’re not,’ said Tristram, grabbing him by the shoulders. ‘You’ve no idea what’s going on here. This is not a game.’
Ryan shrugged him off and instinctively went on the defensive.
‘Look, I know why you’re here. You’re trying to find Sophie, aren’t you? Well, she’s our friend too. That’s why we’ve come to help.’
‘How do you kn… hang on a second. We? Don’t tell me you brought Daisy too.’
‘And Billy, but I’ve lost them both.’
‘Christ. Ryan, you’ve just tripled my work-load for tonight. Now I’ve got to find all three of them.’
‘What’s the big deal? So you’ve got to overcome a few Nazi hamsters. We managed to get away from them.’
‘Really?’
‘Yeah.’
For the briefest of moments Tristram looked impressed. But his stern expression swiftly returned.
‘That’s not the point,’ he said curtly. ‘I don’t know how you know about Sophie, but you’re right. However, there’s more going on here than you know. Ordinarily we would have left her to just work her way through the dream, but one of Rasputin’s followers was seen entering it shortly before her.’
Ryan’s face dropped.
‘Exactly,’ nodded Tristram. ‘I don’t know what made her come here, and to be honest I’m not that bothered. I’m just here to put a stop to whatever game Rasputin and his buddies are playing, and to keep Sophie safe, so I can’t afford to have you tagging along. I want you to leave the dream and return to the Spire.’
‘But I’ve only just got back here,’ protested Ryan. ‘Do you have any idea how long it took me to get back to sleep after that sugar rush?’
Tristram looked confused.
‘Yes, I’ve been Dreamweaving,’ said Ryan grumpily. ‘Sorry to disappoint you, oh great master, but I really thought I could help.’
‘Well, I’m glad you are putting your skills to use, but this is not the place Ryan, really. There’s stuff going on here that doesn’t add up and I’m worried the situation may be worse than it appears. It’s too dangerous.’
‘So you’re going to do it on your own? I don’t see any of the Academy rushing to your aid, so it can’t be that bad.’
‘Something’s not right. I don’t know what, but there’s something. Even dreams can have rules too, you know.’
‘Okay fine, but you’re stuck with me until I can wake myself up. And I don’t know how to do that apart from by Dreamweaving until I run out of energy. Plus, I just ate a whole bag of sweets, so it could take a while.’
‘Okay, okay, you win,’ chuckled Tristram. ‘God, you’re annoying when you put your mind to it. You know, I could just send you back myself, but that would be a waste of my own reserves.’
‘You can do that?’
‘Oh yes, but you won’t learn Expulsion for a while yet. Anyway, I wasted enough energy making this.’
He tossed Ryan the pistol he was holding.
‘You’re giving this to me?’ asked Ryan incredulously.
‘Might as well. It’s not like I’m one of your parents. The least you can do is to watch my back, but don’t get carried away, right?’
Ryan gave a mock salute.
‘Ja. So vere are ve going?’ he asked, doing a rather good impersonation of Captain Nibbles.
Tristram pulled a folded piece of paper out of his pocket and held it up in the dim light so that Ryan could just about see what was on it. It was a map, presumably of the surrounding area.
‘I liberated this from our furry friends,’ he grinned.
‘Billy nicked one too,’ laughed Ryan. ‘I wonder if they’ve got any left.’
‘Good for him,’ said Tristram. ‘Anyway, if you take a look it’s fairly easy to read. We’ve got a few villages around here, mountains to the north and forests pretty much everywhere else. Now, being a dream, it’s extremely unlikely that any part of the tale will play out beyond the boundaries of this map, so we can assume that this is our playing field. Take a look at it more closely and see if you can work out where the story is leading us to.’
Ryan squinted in the pre-dawn light. The map was fairly simplistic, with roads joining the scattered villages and the countryside around them only vaguely mapped out. One feature stood out like no other however; a castle, nestled away in the mountains to the north. He pointed at it.
‘There,’ he said firmly. ‘Castle Meerschweinchen.’
‘Spot on,’ said Tristram. ‘You’ve done this before.’
‘Too much time spent playing computer games. Nazis always hole themselves up in castles. Do you reckon that’s where Sophie is?’
‘That’s my guess.’
‘Hey,’ said Ryan. ‘Does Meerschweinchen mean what I think it means?’
Tristram raised his eyebrows.
‘That’s the best thing about dreams; something weird and new every day.’
Ryan smiled.
‘Okay, so how do we get to Guinea Pig Castle?’ he asked.
‘Well, we’re here,’ said Tristram, pointing to a village to the south-east. All we’ve got to do is head this way.’
He traced the line of a road that led in a north-westerly direction until they were almost directly due south of the castle.
‘It looks like there’s a river to cross,’ observed Ryan, pointing to another line that intersected the road as it bent north into the mountains.
‘Just another obstacle,’ shrugged Tristram. ‘Hopefully it’s not too deep. Hey, we’d best get moving. It’ll be daylight soon and we’ll want to keep unseen since you’re not in uniform.’
‘By the way, that’s a good look,’ smirked Ryan.
‘Shut up and get moving.’
They headed cautiously back out onto the snow-covered streets, their footprints the only blemish in the pristine white carpet beneath them. The crunch of it under foot reminded Ryan of his robotic form back on the Isle, and he felt reassured despite the eerie stillness in the village. Every window was heavily shuttered against the night and no sound could be heard save their footfalls. If there were any inhabitants around they were in no mood to venture outside, which suited Ryan and Tristram just fine.
It was not until they reached the centre of the village that they encountered any form of life. They arrived in a small square, the centrepiece of which was a fountain; its waters frozen in a huge icy cone. It was a bleakly beautiful monument and they couldn’t resist taking a closer look. As they drew nearer, a solitary timber wolf appeared from behind it, sniffing the ground and occasionally stopping to forage for food. Upon seeing the two of them, it stopped and eyed them with curiosity for a few moments, before carrying along on its way.
Tristram and Ryan watched it go, captivated by the magical feel of the place. It was only when a low droning noise, which had been slowly growing in the distance, became too loud to ignore that they snapped out of it. Tristram cast a grim look up at the night sky.
‘We need to go,’ he said firmly.
At that very moment, a number of powerful searchlights cut into the low covering of cloud and an unseen – but fearfully close – flak battery burst into life, pumping shells into the night sky that would burst at altitude into shards of deadly shrapnel. A second later they heard the first whistle of an incoming aerial bombardment.
Tristram sprinted towards the far corner of the square with Ryan panting at his heels. They dived for cover behind a low wall, as behin
d them the first bomb shattered the fountain into a million pieces, vaporising the icicles and frozen water in a wide radius around it. A second bomb landed, and a third, carving a broad swathe of destruction through the south-east quarter of the village.
Now the place was starting to wake up. The blackout had failed to protect it from attack, though with the cloud cover it was impossible to tell whether or not the strike had been deliberate or just a lucky hit. There came the sound of activity from within several nearby buildings, and shutters and doors began to fly open as the residents sought to flee the raid.
Ryan looked at Tristram, who indicated that they needed to keep moving. Together they crawled to the far end of the wall, where another street led away from the square and the devastation.
‘This is the one,’ said Tristram, taking a quick glance at the map.
‘You sure?’ asked Ryan.
Rather than taking a second look, his tutor cast his gaze back into the skies beyond the square.
‘Yep,’ he nodded.
‘How far is it?’
‘Quite a way. We need some wheels.’
They darted off down the street, which was illuminated in patches by light filtering through un-shuttered windows. They kept to the walls as much as possible, but it was only a matter of time before they ran into someone. Suddenly Ryan spied a ramshackle garage that was tacked onto the side of one of the buildings. He called out to Tristram, who came over to investigate. Within its unglamorous confines, hidden beneath a tarpaulin, sat a motorbike and sidecar.
‘Perfect!’ cried Tristram. ‘Quick, get in.’
‘What? In there?’ asked Ryan, looking dubiously at the small cockpit and wondering