“That’s no girl. That’s a witch.” X pointed the gun in my direction before aiming it back at Duke.
“Those things are hardly mutually exclusive,” Duke said. “And if you hurt her, I will kill you. I might even do it if you don’t hurt her—”
“Yeah, sorry, no,” I said. “You can’t protect me. I’m supposed to be protecting you. Excuse me, please. Can you scooch back a bit, Duke? Thank you.”
I held my breath, took a step sideways, and moved into the gap between X’s gun and Duke’s noble heart.
“I’m not comfortable being defended,” Duke said.
“Get used to it,” I said. “I know what I’m doing. The pen is mightier than the sword.”
“True,” Duke said, “but he has a gun, darling, and you don’t have a penora sword.”
Technically true, but I didn’t have to admit it.
“X,” I began, “what’s the plan here?”
“Same plan as always,” he said as he bent down and lifted a small can of gasoline. He set it on the table by him and patted it like an obedient dog. “I’m going to burn this world down.”
It was as bad as I’d feared. When someone in the real world burns a single copy of a book, all they’ve done is make a mess. The book still exists in other copies, other formats. But when a Burner enters a story and burns it from the inside, the story itself will turn to ash and all copies in all formats in all the world will cease to exist. Even in the memories of readers. It will be as if the book had never been published, never been read, never even been written.
“You can’t—” I paused and turned to Duke. “Can you cover your ears, please?”
“Why?”
“She doesn’t want you finding out you’re a fictional character in a book series,” X said, feigning shock. “Oh, dear. Did I say that?”
“Someone’s publishing stories about me?” Duke asked. “They must not be very good, because I haven’t seen them for sale anywhere.”
X waved the gun around the room. “This—all of this—is a book. We’re inside it right now. I thought you were supposed to be some sort of hotshot sleuth?”
Duke looked to me for help. “Do you know what this berk’s going on about?”
I wanted to lie, to tell him anything but the truth, but I couldn’t.
“We’re midway through the second book in your series,” I said. “It’show I knew how to find you. You weren’t supposed to be tied up—that wasn’t part of the story. When I said I was a witch? I’m not the pointy-hat kind with the broom and all that. I’m a Book Witch. I’m here to set the story straight.”
“None of this is real, you’re saying.”
“Some of us are,” X interjected. “Just not you.”
Duke nodded. “NowIseem to be having an existential crisis.”
“It’ll have to wait,” I told him, then turned my attention back to X. “Why? Why this book series? Why the Duke?”
“Because it’s garbage,” X said. “Drivel. Poorly written hack work.”
“If you don’t like the Duke of Chicago books, don’t read them,” I said. “But leave them for the rest of us.”
“I’m sparing you from your own bad taste,” X said. “When we’re finished with our work, there won’t be any books like this left in the world. Only the true classics.The Odyssey. The Iliad. The Aeneid.Shakespeare. Chaucer.” He smiled. “When the right people read good books once again, the world will be perfect.”
“Perfect? You know Chaucer’sCanterbury Taleswere written during the Black Plague.”
“Perfection is a state of mind. The world fell apart when people turned their backs on great literature. When we’re done, all the garbage will be taken out and only the classics shall remain. Starting here and now.”
He pulled a paperback book from his coat pocket and held it up.
“Is that…about me?” Duke asked.
