As the boys and Bombo slept peacefully for thirty minutes, night rolled by on a wheel at sixteen times the speed of a normal night cycle.

  They, of course, didn't know that.

  As soon as the sun rose, a rooster crowed, and they were up feeling as if they hadn't slept at all. But the problem was quickly forgotten; each left to pee and returned to what was the most amazing breakfast known to man.

  “Where did we get all this?” Bombo asked, literally shoveling pancakes onto his plate and setting it on the table only to return with another plate for eggs, sausages, bacon, biscuits, and then another again for fruit, creams, butters, honeys and honeycomb, and then another for donuts, cakes, cookies, and so on – the options seemed, and were, endless, limited only by the imagination.

  “I don't know, but I'm starving,” Frem said.

  “Same,” said Windston.

  And they ate. And ate. And ate. And ate. All the while a soft flute played somewhere in the distance, pausing only for brief bouts of cheering, which comforted them; somewhere close, there were people, and they sounded very pleasant, although they could only be seen in fleeting glimpses in the peripheral.

  “These are seriously the best pancakes,” Frem said.

  “I like the waffles,” Windston said.

  “Pancakes,” Bombo said, nodding at Frem.

  “It's just... the syrup is so good, and the eggs are so fluffy,” Frem said between bites.

  “And the fruits,” Bombo said. “Windston, have you had your tangerine?”

  Windston nodded. “I got one,” he said, rubbing his belly, which was sticking out quite a bit under his shirt.

  They were all quite full and bloated, full of drink. They had drunk first the clearest, coldest water, and then milk, and then juice, and then more milk. All the drinks were nice and cold – except for Bombo's coffee and Frem's tea – and the food was hot and steamy. The syrup was warm, and the butter melted nicely in it. Nothing was overly sticky, and messes seemed to all but clean themselves. There were no flies, no bees – no bugs at all. And, when they were done, their beds were just right there around the fire, under that pavilion, ready to be....

  At 8:00 on the dot, there was a gunshot, though the boys and Bombo didn't know what that was. They only heard a very loud shot very close by, and then barking.

  “Ruff, ruff, ruff, ruff, ruff!” the dog barked. “Ruff, ruff, ruff, ruff!”

  It didn't sound too big, but there was also a voice with it, and it said, “Who are you, and what are you doing eating my food in my garden!”

  “Oh no,” Bombo said, looking at Frem and Windston, who, lying on their sides on little beds in a circle under the pavilion and out of the sun, took turns glancing at each other, relaxed, bloated and smiling.

  “Who's there, I say?! Eating from my garden! Stealing my pea coupes and plum dries! Be gone with ya!” Ka-pow! “Be gone or I'll get my dogs!”

  “Not farmer Pot-pot!” they all said at once, sitting up as the sound was upon them. The woods had changed while they hadn’t noticed; what was all very typical browns and greens of the area became pokey leaves, thorny vines and trees with prickly fruits. It was very hot there, particularly humid, and sandy where compact dirt had been as what had been a forest became a foreign jungle swapped from somewhere far, far away.

  They ran away all the same. They packed up and dispersed, all in different directions, a dog at each of their heels and random gunshots firing.

  “Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo!” a dog barked. “Get out of here!” it barked, nipping at their heels.

  It did this to each of them independently for a while until, out of nowhere, each realized at separate occasions that this dog was very small for a hunting dog, about the size of Bombo's boot, and all alone.

  Each gave chase.

  Frem shot blasts at it like mad, missing every shot.

  Windston swung from trees and launched attacks at it from above with his sword, missing every swipe.

  Bombo grabbed at it and threw rocks at it, kicked at it and stomped at it.

  All the while it barked, the fat little yellow dog with fur so smooth it might as well be skin, eyes so narrow there's no way it could see; its nose was pink like a cat’s, its legs stubby like its stumpy waggy tail. “Get out of here! You're gonna get it! You don't wanna be here when the farmer gets here!” Or “Foxtrot on the job! He's yellow, he's mean, and he means business!”

  This went on for hours. A chase this way and then a chase the other way. It was weird how they would suddenly fear the dog and the invisible farmer. It was equally weird when they would not and chase the dog. They ran all over that jungle, covering all the southern parts. They had made their way closer to the middle by noon, cussing and yelling, slowing and panting, speeding and swinging, shooting, swatting. They were exhausted, out of breath, and very thirsty.

  At 12:00 noon on the dot there was one final shot, and then nothing. They each individually found themselves alone, out of breath, and parched.

  There it was, a table simply covered with untouched goodies and surrounded by a host of dignitaries saying, “No worries, we're not hungry anyway – all yours,” or the likes as they left.

  Ham, turkey, chickens, roasts, salmon, stews, soups and sandwiches; wine, beer, juice, water, milk, liquor and mixers; ice creams, cakes, cookies, donuts, puddings. They stuffed themselves, alone, sparing little time to wonder where the others were or what might have happened to them.

  This, they did for an hour. For the next, they napped. Just as before, there was a pavilion they hadn't noticed under which was a bed, and it wasn't so hot out, and the breezes were cool, and there were people listening to flute music and cheering and it was all great.

  2:00 at noon came on suddenly, and there was the sound of a roaring motor followed by a very brisk run up a playful scale on a little pipe. This abrupt interruption of the nap was paired with very spiky sparks that flew at the sleeper from the pipe, hitting him mostly in the rear, and stinging like hornets on fire.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Yeouch!” Bombo yelled, leaping from his bed and holding his butt with both hands.

  “Ah-ha-ha!” came a dignified laugh of pomp and pleasure. “Sleeping, are we? Here? In my jungle?”

  Landing on his feet, Bombo wheeled and, from over his shoulder, could see, hovering level with the tops of trees, Piper Bee the Log-rider, and he was straddling his trusty log, which bore his lady flower, a big pink rose with leaves for eyes and thorns for teeth. “You're dead!” Bombo yelled.

  “Ah-ha-ha!” Piper laughed, wagging a finger as he stood on his log, legs apart, hands on his hips. He was a very little man, about the size of the dog, with arms and legs to match, and he was the same color yellow. The only difference was that his eyes were covered with a yellow bandit's mask. He pointed at Bombo. “It is not I who has entered your jungle. You have entered mine!” With that, he put his pipes to his lips and played a tune. Sparks shot out, stinging Bombo all over as the flower laughed a vicious cackle.

  The chase began.

  Bombo ran, and ran, and ran. “Mama!” he shouted. “Oh my!” he yelled. “Yeouch!” and “Yip!” he called in pain.

  It was not so different for the boys. Piper Bee had found them too, and he chased them everywhere. Frem, who flew. Windston, who leaped from tree to tree and ran. There was no outrunning the log, which kept behind them easily while its rider shot them with painful sparks.

  “It hurts!” Frem yelled.

  “Ow!” Windston screamed.

  The pain was unbearable, searing, and seemed to occur in the same places every time.

  This too went on for hours. From 2:00 until 4:00 in the afternoon.

  At 4:00, each independently lost the piper at a bend. He could still be heard in the distance, looking for them, taunting, fainter and fainter.

  They could no longer run but rather stumbled, and the day had gotten hotter and hotter.

  By 5:45, each found himself sitting with his back against a shady tree.

  By 6:00, they heard their mommy calling.

  “Hullo?” she called. “Frem-boy! Is that you?”

  “Mom?” he asked.

  “Oh, Frem. What have you gone and done this time?”

  From out of the woods, donning a house dress and wrapped in an apron, stepped Mommy. She was huge, easily over twelve feet tall, with cropped curls worn tight against her head, and three magnificent brown eyes, the middle the biggest and prettiest.

  Frem reached up for her and she scooped him into her arms. As he smelled her bosom, so many memories came back to him that he had forgotten; that time when Mommy found him in the jungle and took him home, for dinner. And others, just like it.

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, “duh.”

  She walked gracefully and shook her head at him while smiling, rolling her eyes, asking where he'd been and was it necessary to taunt the farmer, chase his dog, and trespass on the piper's jungle?

  “No, Mommy,” Bombo said. “I've just been playing.”

  “Uh,” she sighed, shaking her head. “You're filthy. Come. It's almost time for dinner. You must be cleaning up now.”

  She headed in the yard through the garden, which was carrots and beets and turnips, potatoes and such. Chickens wandered here and there in little fences, and there were goats in a pen next to the pigs and cow.

  Inside, it was nice and cool. An overhead fan spun, and Mommy headed back to the sink in the kitchen, where she finished up the dishes she'd used to prepare dinner.

  “Nah-uh-uh,” she said, wagging a finger. “Windston, you know you must clean up for supper. Get in the bath,” she demanded with a smile.

  Windston rolled his eyes and reluctantly headed over to the pot in the middle of the kitchen, the one dangling over the crackling fire. The water was boiling, and he dipped in, clothes and all, to relax a bit, and clean up for dinner.

  Mommy hummed at this point, and all sorts of wonderful birthdays and other festivities entered the mind as missed recent memories.

  Bombo was thinking the same thing, right beside him. Frem was too. Still, none had recognized the others, or even noticed themselves. They were too busy simply cooking in the pot.

  Twenty minutes later, with an open box of salt in one hand and a giant wooden spoon in the other, Mommy peered down into the pot...

  ...and screamed.

  “What are you doing in my pot not dead?!” she shouted in a fiercely deep voice.

  “What?” Windston asked.

  The other two were just smiling at her.

  The pot swayed, the water splashing. Suddenly, it was lifted.

  Mommy carried it in her arms, all the way outside.

  There, just past her garden, she grabbed one end and, after spinning around and around and around, she flung it.

  Up, up, up they flew.

  Down, down, down they fell.

  They found themselves spitting up steaming water just where they had been when they had entered the Witchee Woods, just hours ago.

  There, it all began again.

  The bed, the racing night, the splendid breakfast and the farmer dog. The lunch, the nap, the piper, the sparks. Mommy's rescue, Mommy's cooking, Mommy's fury and the tossing.

  In a loop, again, again, again and again.

  None of the three questioned it. None of the three broke out of it. Like little wound toys on a track, each did what he had done before again and again and again.

  This was the nature of the Witchee Woods of North Gorrals. It trapped and it killed, or it trapped again if it couldn't, forever and ever and ever. No thoughts of seeds, eggs or keys. No thoughts of swords. No thoughts of giants. There was only feasting, and running, and chasing, and feasting, and running, and boiling, and flying.

  Two weeks passed this way. The boys and Bombo were surely done for.

  Until something very strange happened to Windston.

  First, he saw a tangerine wherever he looked, dead in the center of his vision in both eyes or either; he had tested one by closing the other, and then reversed the process.

  Then, it fell, right on the jungle floor before him. This was during a piper cycle. It fell there, and there it lay until he reached for it; at that point, it rolled.

  It rolled first north, and then west, and then slightly southwest until it made an abrupt turn north again. Windston followed, chasing with all the speed he could muster to catch up, only he couldn't. He could only just stay right on its trail.

  And then it was gone. There, at the edge of a glade, Windston stood, perplexed, suddenly remembering his sword; he unsheathed it and stood ready. That's when he saw him:

  A man – no, a boy. A very tall boy with flowing silver hair. He wore buck skins and feathers. He was barefoot and racing, and he held in his arms a very bright, very golden orb that seared the vision with blotches when one looked at it, like the sun. He was very fast, and very much laughing. He noticed Windston and immediately looked at his sword with obvious intrigue – his eyebrows lowered, and he stared for longer than a second despite his flight.

  There was a squawk that shook the bones. “ARRRRRCHK!”

  Low, just over the trees, was the head of a mighty bird that blotted out the sky and lit the forest so brightly yellow it was as if it had been night and was now day despite that it was just past noon and cloudless. The beak was long and sharp, the eyes intense like a shoebill's, the feathers as bright and yellow as the orb.

  The boy was gone, and the bird was still passing over after him.

  The tangerine was there again. It dropped, and it rolled, and it chased after the bird and the boy. Windston chased it and chased it and chased it and chased it.

  Finally, the tangerine disappeared and there was the bird, perched on the ground, staring down at something – the boy.

  The boy was there, and the orb had engulfed him as a bright light in the shape of his body. There was a bright flash, and even the bird shielded its face with a wing.

  And then the bird leapt up into the sky and flew northeast, and it was gone.

  Windston, who was blinded by the flash, knelt and blinked, an arm over his eyes.

  The piper could be heard just off in the distance shouting curses at Windston for daring to enter his jungle.

  He appeared just over and behind Windston, and then he stopped dead, as did his threats; the boy, who was still shiny and glowing, leaped up and snatched him from his log and held him dangling by his leg.

  As Windston's vision returned to normal he was shocked to see the little dog kicking and swiveling, pathetic, quiet, and only half-heartedly trying to free himself from the mysterious stranger.

  The stranger, whose skin was a light brown and whose eyes were an emerald green, smiled playfully at the dog, his head cocked, his eyes fixed on the dog's masked face. “Strange,” he said, seemingly to himself. Looking at Windston, who was pale, dirty and drenched in sweat, he said, “Are we in the Witchee Woods?”