A Place Beyond The Map

Phinnegan Qwyk thought he knew everything there was to know about fairy tales. But when the notorious Faë Periwinkle Lark snatches him from his cozy home in Ireland to a Place-Beyond-the-Map, Phinnegan discovers that reading a fairy tale and living in one are two altogether different things.
When Phinnegan escapes from the mountain prison of Féradoon, he must travel a treacherous path riddled with dangers both fair and foul - where the wild hounds of the Faolchú await a single misstep and gholems stalk their quarries unseen from the shadows. Forced into a daring match of wits with a beautiful troll, Phinnegan may find the way home if he wins – but if he loses, he will be her pet. Forever. 

CHAPTER 1

Phinnegan Qwyk

Phinnegan Qwyk drummed his fingertips on his desk, oblivious to the hair-raising screech of chalk grating across an old blackboard as Mr. Rowlands scribbled arithmetical figures. Phinnegan had always disliked the cold, unforgiving nature of numbers, even on an ordinary day - and today was anything but ordinary.

No, today was special – or at least it would be once the final grains of sand trickled from top-to-bottom in the large hourglass seated on Mr. Rowlands’s desk. Phinnegan had never understood why it was called an hourglass. The ornate timepiece held three hours of sand, not a moment less or more. At home, Phinnegan’s mother used a similar glass to time her baking, but it ran through in a neat half-hour. The term “hourglass” wasn’t appropriate for either.

But whatever it was called, Mr. Rowlands began each morning with one “run of the sand” before allowing the children a break for lunch and recess. The afternoon likewise consisted of a single run of the sand, which, much to Phinnegan’s pleasure, was at an end.

As the final grain slipped through the narrow waist of the glass, Phinnegan sat straighter, anticipating the dismissal of the class. Mr. Rowlands was always prompt in ending his classes, reasoning that he had once been young and knowing full well that such restless minds would ignore him once his time had run its course.

Today, however, Mr. Rowlands seemed not to notice.

Phinnegan waited a minute, then another, and then a third.

Any moment now
.

But the screeching continued, as did the drone of Mr. Rowlands’s mundane voice. On an ordinary day, Phinnegan would not have cared in the least. He did not mind school as much as many of the other pupils.  But as the moments passed, not a single schoolmate sought to inform the teacher of the time. His impatience mounting, Phinnegan rustled his papers, packing away drawings he had created during the day’s lesson. Still, Mr. Rowlands continued in his unrelenting monotone. At last impatience won out. Phinnegan raised his hand, and spoke without waiting to be noticed.

“Excuse me, sir?” he said, his voice just escaping his throat. Two boys in front of him turned toward him, but Mr. Rowlands seemed not to hear. On he went, scratching out a set of numbers while he prattled on about their significance.

Clearing his throat, Phinnegan tried once more.

“Sir?” he said more forcefully. This time, Mr. Rowlands heard him. Pausing, the chalk in his hand a mere inch from beginning a new string of figures, he turned to face his class.

“Yes?” he said as he surveyed his pupils. Spying Phinnegan’s hand, the ghost of a smile touched his lips.

“Ah, Phinnegan. A question?”

“Yes, sir,” Phinnegan said, lowering his hand. “Well, err, not really, sir. You see, it’s the sand.”

“The sand? What about it?” Mr. Rowlands said, his smile fading to confusion.

“Well, it’s gone, sir.”

“Gone?” Mr. Rowlands asked, using the back of his chalk-dusted hand to nudge a tattered pair of glasses back onto the bridge of his nose. Glancing around, he caught sight of the large hour-glass on his desk.

“Oh! I see.” With a forlorn look to the figure-laden blackboard, he let his arm drop and waved a hand.

“Off you go, lads. But remember, tomorrow there will be-”

The ruckus that ensued overpowered Mr. Rowlands’ thin voice so that none could discern his words, least of all Phinnegan, who sprung from his seat like a rabbit. He was out of the class and down the hall before most had gathered all of their materials.

Just as he reached the exit, Billy Fagin sauntered into his path.

Not today…

“In a bit of a hurry, Qwyk?”

“Yes,” Phinnegan said with a grimace, dropping his eyes to the floor to avoid looking up into the older boy’s eyes. He glanced quickly to the right and left, for wherever Billy Fagin was, Patrick Keene was as well.

“Shame, that. Thought you might fancy a game of cricket.”

“Cricket?” Phinnegan questioned, his head snapping up, expecting to see the mocking face he knew would be there. But it wasn’t.

“You want . . .
me
to play cricket?” Phinnegan asked, his eyes wide.

“Yeah, we’re one short. Think of it as a peace offering,” the larger boy said, a slanting smile showing two rows of crooked teeth.

Phinnegan stared. Were the older boys really asking him to play cricket? And of all people, Billy Fagin - the same Billy who had bullied him since he first came to school?

“Why?” Phinnegan managed to ask.

“Like I said, Qwyk,” the older boy said while holding up a finger. “We’re one short.”

Phinnegan wondered for a moment if it were some sort of trick, but then a group of boys Billy’s age sidled over.

“Game on or off then, Fagin?” one of the larger boys said with a smirk.

“Hang on a moment,” Billy said. “I’m rounding up another. So how ‘bout it, Qwyk? Grow up from your stories long enough to play with the big boys?”

While Billy had meant the remark as a taunt, Phinnegan remembered that he was in a hurry.

“Um, thanks, but I really should be getting home,” he said, trying to push his way past.

“Why, got a girl waiting for you?” one of the boys mocked.

“Qwyk, a girl?” Billy snorted. “More like a leprechaun riding a unicorn. Come on, Qwyk, have a game will you. Half an hour.”

Phinnegan stood, frozen as his mind evaluated each choice. But Billy’s loud voice broke his thoughts.

“Oy! Doyle! Fancy a cricket match?”

Phinnegan turned in time to see a red-haired boy with freckles wave past him to Billy.

“Cricket? I’m in!”

Billy pushed past Phinnegan, jostling him with his shoulder.

“Maybe next time Qwyk. Run along and read your books.”

More than an hour later, Phinnegan rounded the final corner before the small pond at the end of Mr. O’Toole’s property and the beginning of his parents’s. Once past the back edge of the pond and hidden from O’Toole’s troublesome dog by the trees that divided the properties, Phinnegan broke into a slow trot and then into a run. He sped by his own dog, Bergin, pausing only long enough to tousle the dog’s fur.

Crashing through the back door, he came to a screeching halt as he nearly barreled into his mother, who was bustling about the kitchen preparing the evening meal.

“Careful!” she said, raising a stone cookpot laden with a hearty roast over his head.  Mrs. Qwyk was well acquainted with the enthusiasm of school-aged boys.

“Sorry, mum,” Phinnegan mumbled as he scurried from the kitchen.

“Your father’s in his study,” she called after him.

She needn’t have told him. Where else would his father be? Now that he was home, that is. He had been away on one of his trips to the north and had only just returned.

Phinnegan came to a stop just outside the slightly open door to his father’s study. The scent of burning pipe tobacco wafted through the crack, and he could hear the familiar rustling of a newspaper. Phinnegan inclined his chin and stood tall. He smoothed his hair and straightened his shirt before rapping three times on the door.

“Enter,” his father’s voice called. Phinnegan obeyed and found his father much as he had expected, relaxed in his favorite chair, a pipe in his mouth and a newspaper in his lap. On his left, three cork-stopped glass bottles, each filled with a different tobacco, stood on the polished wood table.   On his right, a half glass of whiskey. His feet were propped on the shaggy old ottoman his mother had tried to add to the rubbish collection on more than one occasion.

“Phinnegan,” his father said, removing the pipe from his mouth as he smiled. “Come, you simply must smell this blend,” he added, tossing his paper aside and gesturing for Phinnegan to come forward. Clenching his pipe between his teeth, its bowl bobbing up and down as he spoke, Phinnegan’s father removed the cork from one glass jar that held a dark tobacco that looked like ribbons of black velvet.

“Here,” his father said, handing him the open jar. “William McDowell in Dublin blended it at my request. It’s a luxurious blend of Cavendish and Turkish latakia, cured slowly with molasses.” Leaning back in his chair, his father took a long, slow draw on his pipe. When his lips parted, the expelled smoke was thick and almost white, so dense that it sank in the air, falling like a marshy fog around Phinnegan’s feet.

“Heavenly,” his father sighed, closing his eyes and crossing his arms behind his head. The smoke indeed smelled delightful as it sifted through the air past Phinnegan’s nose. Bringing the jar up, he inhaled the aroma of the dark ribbons. The tobacco itself had much the same luscious smell as the smoke, though more earthy than the smoke’s biting, yet not unpleasant, spiciness.

“It’s wonderful,” Phinnegan breathed as he corked the jar, ensuring it was snug to prevent the precious contents from drying, just as his father had taught him.  He placed the reassembled jar alongside its companions, each of which contained its own precious cargo, one a light brown and the other a reddish color with yellow flecks throughout.

“Phinnegan, my boy, you do not know what you are missing,” his father said, his lips curling in an impish grin while his teeth maintained a hold on the pipe. Phinnegan smiled at the jest.