What if it turns out I’m stuck here, doing something I never asked to do? The whole reason I agreed to swap with Oliver was because I’d get a chance to experience adventures and thrills I’d only witnessed on a computer screen. But every time you play a video game, it’s different. In this world, it’s like I play a tape of the same game over and over again. I know what’s around the corner. I know what creature is going to jump out at me. I know when the aliens are landing, and that I will ultimately kill Zorg. The element of surprise is gone, and that was the fun of it in the first place.
Now I get why Oliver wanted to leave. But if he knew this was a prison, why would he wish it on anyone else?
“You know,” I say, “what we all need is a breather.”
Seraphima stamps her tiny foot. “I absolutely refuse to put any more gear on.”
“I just mean we need a break.” I turn to Frump. “Do you want to do the honors?”
Frump climbs back onto his perch and barks. Even though in my revised story, he’s been changed from a basset houndback to a human again, I guess you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.
“Attention!” he cries. “All characters are dismissed for the day.”
There is a moment of shocked silence on the beach, and then a bustle of excitement and activity as everyone realizes that they’re being left to their own devices. The fairies zip by my face like fireworks.
“Milady,” Frump says to Seraphima, “since we have a bit of a break, maybe you could walk me? Erm, I mean, maybe we could go for a walk?”
The princess’s eyes flicker over him. “Rain check?” She picks up her skirts and floats across the sand, toward the edge of the page.
Frump looks disappointed for only a second, then turns to me. “Guess I’ll head out too,” he says. “Someone has to make Seraphima’s bed before she realizes she doesn’t actually have handmaidens.”
Suddenly a blinding light slices the sky in half. I wince, raising my hand as a shield. The ground shifts under my feet, and I watch everyone instinctively grabbing the nearest solid object: a tree, a rock, a dangling participle. I go tumbling head over heels and smack into a troll’s bottom, which feels like the side of a battleship. “Sorry,” I mumble, and Trogg shrugs.
“No worries. We’ve all had a bit more practice.”
The sand stops whirling and the ocean settles as the pages flatten, and I find myself looking up at a giant replica of my own face.
“Oliver!” Frump says, his butt wagging. Seraphima racesfrom the edge of the page to stand front and center, her hands clasped at her chest. Queen Maureen—who appeared on Everafter Beach with everyone else as soon as the book was opened—waves with delight. The characters, excited about being pulled into place for an actual reader, are even more pumped to see who it is.
Oliver, on the other hand, doesn’t look so happy. “Is everything all right?” he asks. A second face appears beside his: Delilah’s. She looks scared to death.
Frump tugs at the hem of his shirt. “We’re fine!” he says, cheery. “You know how it goes. Business as usual. I mean, granted, we haven’t had too many Readers lately. . . .”
Their faces relax. “Then who sent the note?” Oliver asks.
I frown. “What note?”
“Hold on tight,” Oliver says, and the world spins again as he gently lifts the book, turning it away from him. It seems to be a girl’s bedroom, blurry, the way things look underwater. I see a crapload of pink, and as things slowly start to come into focus, I can make out a collage of pictures over the bed. Most of them are of Delilah with a girl who looks like a pierced hedgehog. I mean, a really pretty pierced hedgehog, but still.
I don’t understand why Oliver’s showing us Delilah’s wall, and then I notice the floating letters.
COME HOME.
“What is that?” I ask.
The book tilts and rights itself again, so that Oliver hovers above us. “I assumed you would be able to tell me.”
“Well, I didn’t write it,” I say.
“Rapscullio?” Oliver asks. “It came fromyoureasel.”
“Sorry, Ollie. The only thing I’ve drawn lately is ateinopalpus imperialis.Gorgeous specimen, with iridescent wings . . . normally found in India and—”
“Perhaps someone else has been using your easel,” Oliver interrupts. He peers at each of the characters in turn.
We all start glancing at each other nervously, wondering who is unhappy and unwilling to admit it.
Guess I’m not the only one.
