Fairyland is the world of nature spirits. The Land, its creatures and its Queen are one great, magical, living Being. Its inhabitants play different parts, but they know life is a game and the parts they play are not what they really are – unlike us humans, who believe in our various roles and take them very seriously. Human beings look funny to Fairies; they see us as plodding, serious beings who think too much.
To a human, Fairyland is like a lucid dream – the type where you know you’re dreaming. In a lucid dream you may even be able to control what happens, but once you’ve realised you’re dreaming, you soon wake up. In Fairyland, you don’t wake up – the lucid dream feeling goes on and on. If you’re not used to Fairyland, it can feel pretty scary.
It’s impossible to map Fairyland because it’s always changing and there are parts of it you can only reach by teleporting. A human being can easily get lost there, but Fairies never do. They know they’ll always end up where they expect to be, and they know how to expect what they want. Fairyland is less dense than our world, so it’s easier to change things with a feeling, or a belief, or an expectation.
Some humans think magic is all about magic words, but there’s more to it than that. Magical power is somewhere between thought and feeling. You have to use the sort of psychic muscles you use in a lucid dream, and that takes practice. Most humans don’t bother practising, which is why Fairyland feels so scary when you first arrive – if your psychic muscles are rusty, you can’t control what happens. But once you get the knack, you can have a lot of fun there.
The Literate Lurcher 