Another laugh answered the first, from off to the side. Then a deeper, more menacing laugh came from behind.

  Turning, Trevor saw a clown in full makeup dragging himself out of his grave. Orange hair clotted with soil, striped outfit streaked with grime, the clown shoved a heavy stone out of his way. The clown stared into Trevor’s eyes, grinning and chuckling as he hobbled to his feet.

  Trevor wanted to run, but instead remained rooted where he stood. He tried to call out a warning to Pigeon, but only managed an exhalation coupled with a reedy squeal.

  Standing upright, the clown shuffled toward him, his nostrils flaring in little pulses as if tracking Trevor by scent.

  Trevor heard the honk of a bugle horn, followed by high-pitched giggling. He glanced over his shoulder, his thoughts in disarray. On some instinctive level, he knew that if he ran, the clown would charge. What would the clown do if it caught him?

  A metal arm reached behind Trevor’s knees and scooped him into the air. Cradling him, Pigeon started running. Trevor put an arm around Pigeon’s steel shoulders. They were inhumanly hard, as if his friend had become a robot.

  Another slovenly clown dragged himself from the ground by clutching a headstone. A badly burned clown crawled on charred arms and legs. Clowns in various stages of decomposition were approaching from multiple directions, wading through the mist.

  Pigeon dodged around them in a frantic dash toward the mausoleum.

  The clowns did not hurry. There were dozens of them, and more kept rising out of the fog all over the cemetery. Overlapping giggles and laughs assailed Trevor’s ears. One clown used a loop of string to blow huge bubbles. Another tried to ride a miniature tricycle, but it was missing a back wheel so he kept tipping over. Most trudged implacably toward them.

  “If I eat my Drip Drop, I can run,” Trevor managed to say.

  “Do it,” Pigeon replied.

  Trevor put the licorice into his mouth and chewed it up. They were nearing the mausoleum, but the clowns ahead of them rose up to block their way. A hefty clown, his mouth a maroon rictus, stood at the front, flanked by many others.

  “We’re trapped,” Trevor said.

  “What should we do?” Pigeon asked, setting him down.

  Trevor could find no words, overwhelmed by fear.

  “I’ll get us out of this.” Pigeon’s voice was unsteady but determined. “I doubt these bozos ever fought a kid made of pure steel.”

  The clowns continued to encroach from all sides.

  The hefty clown inflated a long, slender balloon. “What kind of animal do you want?”

  “You’re not funny!” Pigeon stammered, clenching his fists. “And you’re not scary! You’re like a bad joke that won’t die!”

  Pigeon rushed at the hefty clown and seized the front of his shirt. The clown tried to grab him back, but Pigeon swung him around like a club, bashing the neighboring clowns. Having bludgeoned a hole in their line, Pigeon charged forward, tossing the hefty clown aside.

  Trevor followed closely, the remaining undead clowns turning slowly to follow him.

  Moonlight reflected off the glossy dark stone of the dignified mausoleum. Pigeon reached for the large bronze doors, bracing to pull them from their hinges.

  “Stop!” Trevor shouted. “It’s better if we keep them intact so we can lock out the clowns.”

  The crack between the double doors was only a fingerbreadth wide, so Trevor turned to liquid and slurped through the narrow gap. Solidifying on the far side, he undid two latches and pulled the doors open. Pigeon came through and slammed the doors on the mob of undead clowns staggering in their direction. Trevor refastened the latches.

  Inside the mausoleum, globes of light near the ceiling shed a faint blue glow. Pigeon pointed at a wall of crypts labeled Ventriloquist Dummies.

  “This isn’t fair,” Trevor mumbled numbly. “Dummies too?”

  Pigeon led the way down a corridor between two walls of crypts, steel feet noisy against the stone floor. Based on the markers, both clowns and dummies were interred within the walls, stacked six high at either hand.

  “Let’s do our job and get out of here. We’re supposed to go deep.”

  The crypts on both sides of the aisle began to rattle. Pigeon and Trevor broke into a run.

  “Say,” an annoyed voice called from inside a crypt. “Let me outta here! Nobody packs away Chuckles before his time!”

  “A fella can’t breathe in here,” a different voice cried. “A fella can’t stretch!”

  Trevor tried to block out the voices as he ran alongside Pigeon. A staircase came into view ahead, broad stone steps flowing down from one landing to the next. The top was chained off, but Pigeon charged through the feeble barrier and raced down the stairs. Trevor remained a couple of steps behind him. At each landing, more rows of crypts were visible, but Pigeon continued downward until the stairs reached the bottom.

  “Don’t read the wall,” Pigeon suggested, turning down the only available aisle.

  Trevor could not resist looking.

  DEEP PLACES ARE FOR BAD CLOWNS

  “I could have done without that,” Trevor scolded himself. He pelted down the aisle behind Pigeon. Stacked crypts rose high on either side, below the arched ceiling. The crypts began to rattle, and voices grumbled.

  “Who’s out there?” one female voice called harshly. “Open this up! I’ve got a surprise for you!”

  Pigeon and Trevor kept running. The aisle ended at a large burial vault with a heavy stone lid. A single word was etched in the side of the stone box.

  GROWLER

  “This is it,” Pigeon said. “The Dreamstone should be inside.”

  Pigeon grabbed the edge of the granite lid with his metal hands and heaved it off the box. The substantial lid slammed down with a boom. Trevor felt the floor vibrate.

  A skeleton wearing Growler’s pin-striped suit sat up inside the burial vault. “What are you slackers doing here?” the skull asked in Growler’s voice.

  Trevor wanted to reply. He just couldn’t get any words out.

  “We need the Dreamstone,” Pigeon said.

  “Over my dead body,” Growler replied.

  “Exactly.” Pigeon reached for the skeleton, but his hands passed through the ghostly figure without physical contact.

  Growler laughed. “You can’t hurt what you can’t touch.”

  “Then you can’t hurt us either,” Pigeon countered.

  “Don’t be so sure,” Growler said. “The second you lay one of your grubby fingers on that Dreamstone, I’ll have every clown corpse in this cemetery on you like a school of piranha.”

  “Then there are going to be a lot of broken teeth,” Pigeon said, reaching into the vault and withdrawing a glossy, spherical stone swirled with fine, colorful lines that shimmered and shifted as they caught the light.

  “You asked for it,” Growler said, his voice rising to a wail. “We’ve got a couple of bandits in here! To arms! To arms!” The skeleton flew out of the burial vault and raced along the crypts, tearing them open. Apparently, Growler could interact with physical material when it suited him.

  “Superspeed,” Pigeon said. “Say it, Trevor.”

  “Superspeed,” Trevor whispered.

  Everything around them seemed to slow down. Crypts opened with syrupy sluggishness. Dead clowns tediously clambered out of their enclosures, moving at less than one-tenth normal speed. Laughter and words stretched deeper and lengthier.

  Trevor and Pigeon started running. At their high speed, dodging the emerging clowns was easy. They made it up the stairs with hardly any interference, but at the top, clowns and animated ventriloquist dummies flooded the aisle.

  “Follow me,” Pigeon said.

  He charged forward, shoving clowns to either side and kicking ventriloquist dummies out of the way. Some of the more decayed clowns broke apart as Pigeon bullied past them. Trevor followed, dodging around slowly grasping hands. At the end of the corridor, Pigeon hastily unlatched the mausoleum doors, only to find a mob of cackling clowns awaiting them outside.

  Lowering his head, Pigeon rushed forward like a running back. Clowns dominoed away from his brutal charge, and Trevor darted through the gap. After several steps, they broke through the decomposing crowd and began weaving their way through the crowded tombstones ahead of them.

  When they reached the track for the dune buggies, Pigeon turned to follow it. They ran so fast that they easily caught up to the nearest dune buggy.

  “I’m getting tired,” Trevor said. “Let’s not pass them.”

  “Want to ride piggyback?” Pigeon offered.

  Trevor hopped onto his friend’s back. Pigeon stayed right behind the dune buggy as they entered a pyramid. The aroma of ancient stone and unknown spices, the faded hieroglyphs on the walls, and the first shambling mummy, bandages loose around a dislocated jaw, convinced Trevor to focus on the dune buggy. He didn’t need more scary images in his mind right now, so he did his best to ignore the roaring.

  When the dune buggy reached the end of the ride, Pigeon raced through the exit, heading away from the Terror Castle. They ran under blue skies through the crowded carnival, still moving at least ten times faster than the people around them.

  The dream carnival had the same layout as the physical carnival, but the rides were all larger and grander. Perhaps most notably, in places where the physical carnival ended, the dream carnival kept going, covering neighboring hills as far as they could see.

  “Our speed is clutch,” Trevor said as they blew past people in the crowd. “It gives us a real chance.”

  “I’m just happy to leave the cemetery behind,” Pigeon said. “I’d much rather fight roustabouts than clowns.”

  The Swindler’s shop looked exactly like the building in the physical carnival down to the font on the glittering sign. But there was no barker out front, and a small notice in the window declared the establishment closed.

  After climbing the ramp to the front door, Pigeon set down Trevor, lowered his shoulder, and rammed the door down. The room beyond was still and empty, games on the counter waiting to be played. There was only one other door in the room, so Pigeon crashed through that one as well.

  The vault they entered had beige walls, floor, and ceiling. A large blob of silver dream batter occupied one corner of the room. A pedestal rose in the center of the room, and on it rested a shadow in the exact shape of the Dreamstone.

  Pigeon approached the pedestal and set the Dreamstone over the shadow. The Dreamstone immediately vanished, and the shadow turned from black to gold.

  Pigeon turned to Trevor. “I think we did it.”

  The door to the Swindler’s establishment gradually opened. Trevor and Pigeon turned to see an orangutan standing there, filling most of the doorway, backed by several roustabouts.

  “You kids are in enormous trouble,” the ape slowly said.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Dreamstone

  Nate jerked awake inside a glass container. He checked his pockets and was relieved to feel his Cannon Blasts there. He flattened his palms against the glass lid above him, then pushed, and the clear covering hinged open. He climbed out, then closed the lid.

  Summer emerged from her own case several containers away.

  Rows of glass coffins filled the room. There were hundreds, and aside from a few empty containers, each one held a sleeper.

  “Look,” Summer said. “It’s Edward. Looks like he finally fell asleep in the wrong place.”

  Nate crossed to where she was standing. Inside a glass coffin, Edward reclined on his back, hands folded across his chest, rapier at his side.

  “Or got knocked out,” Nate said. “Trevor and I just saw him last night. This must be recent.”

  Summer rushed down the row, then the next. “I’ve got one of the Battiato twins.”

  “Which one?” Nate asked.

  “Take your pick,” Summer said.

  Nate explored a different row. “Here’s the other one,” he announced. “Victor or Ziggy. I thought magical enforcers couldn’t enter the carnival.”

  “Maybe they were brought in already sleeping,” Summer said, browsing another row. “Mr. Stott has invited Mozag into his lair.”

  “Hopefully they weren’t stripped of their powers to get inside,” Nate replied. A few more rows yielded no familiar faces. Then Nate stopped again. “This lady lives in our neighborhood. She’s two houses up the street from me.”

  “Here’s Benji!” Summer exclaimed. “He really is just asleep.”

  “That’s a relief,” Nate said, trotting along another aisle and stopping abruptly. “I found Mozag! No hat.”

  “Should we try to wake him up?” Summer asked, running over.

  Nate shrugged. “Could be a game changer.” He lifted the lid.

  Summer reached inside and shook the mage’s shoulder. “Mozag!” she hissed. “Wake up! It’s an emergency. Mozag!”

  His body remained completely inert, his features blandly unconscious. Was he even breathing? Nate held a hand above the mage’s nose and mouth. Breath came very faintly. Hoping it might startle him awake, Nate temporarily covered the mage’s mouth and nose, but he remained still.

  “I don’t think we can wake them up like this,” Nate said.

  Summer poked Mozag one more time. “Use your magic! Come back to us!”

  “Not a twitch,” Nate said, closing the lid. “He’s down for the count. Should we head up to the carnival?”

  “We better,” Summer said. “Who knows how long it will take Trevor and Pigeon to do their part?”

  They dashed for the front of the room, Nate a few steps ahead of Summer.

  “Oh, no!” Summer exclaimed, skidding to a stop.

  Nate slowed, glancing back.

  “Lindy,” Summer said.

  “Really?” Nate asked, halting. “Man, she got caught fast.”

  “She looks so peaceful,” Summer said.

  “I wonder what she’s dreaming about,” Nate said. “We should go.”

  “Yeah,” Summer said.

  Nate and Summer went through the door into the room where they had confronted Growler. It was empty. Growler’s clothes were gone, and Nate detected no trace of the fumes that had put them to sleep. They went through the square door, returning to the room where the slide had deposited them.

  “Sandra told us to take the circular door,” Summer said.

  She and Nate hurried to the round door and entered what looked like the bottom of an empty elevator shaft. Looking up, Nate could see no end to the shaft—it simply shrank to a point. A ladder leaned against each wall of the shaft. The ladders were of equal height, but all ended after about twenty rungs.

  “Looks like up is the only way out,” Summer said. “But these ladders are way too short.”

  “I could Cannon Blast upward,” Nate said. “See what I find.”

  “And ditch me?” Summer asked.

  “You could eat one too,” Nate said.

  “True,” Summer said. “But Sandra specifically mentioned the ladders. Maybe they are important?”

  “There could be a secret hidden at the top,” Nate said.

  “Let’s find out,” Summer said. She stepped onto the first rung of one of the ladders, and it immediately telescoped upward at least a hundred feet, leaving Summer only nineteen rungs from the top of the ladder.

  “Are you all right?” Nate called up to her.

  “I think so,” Summer said. “I’m glad I had a good hold. But I’m going to put on my Clown Lips before I go any higher.”

  Nate walked over to a different ladder, firmly gripped the sides, and stepped onto the first rung. With a disorienting rush, the ladder extended a hundred rungs taller. Nate was still nineteen rungs from the top. He looked over to find Summer dressed as a clown. She took another step, and the rungs below her doubled in number.

  Nate continued upward, the ladder stretching a hundred rungs for every step he took. He got used to the sensation of the expanding ladder, but he still clung tightly. When Nate reached the top, the ladder ended in the center of the floor of an empty pink room with a glittery ceiling. Glancing down, the shaft shrank to a vanishing point.

  Summer hopped off her ladder and came around to help Nate, her oversized shoes in his face. The floor of the room was rubbery and had some give, as if they were walking on the surface of a water balloon. Nate stomped and sent a wave rippling across the floor.

  “Where do we go from here?” Summer asked.

  “I only see one exit,” Nate said, pointing to a revolving door made from horizontal metal bars.

  “Can you see what’s on the other side?” Summer asked.

  “It’s too dark,” Nate said. “That might be deliberate. I’ll keep my candy ready.”

  Nate started to push through the revolving door, then experimentally tried to pull it the other way. The door resisted his efforts—it was a one-way passage. The bars of the door slotted through the horizontal bars of a barrier, blocking a return trip. Beyond the revolving door, Nate found several other revolving doors, turning on their own.

  “I hope this is the right way,” Nate said over his shoulder. “I doubt we can backtrack.”

  A series of revolving doors continued to sweep Nate and Summer forward. They must have passed through ten or more revolving doors before they emerged at the top of a greasy, plastic slope.

  “More one-way travel,” Summer said beside him. They braved the long slide into a sponge pit.

  Nate clambered through the sponges until he regained a solid floor. Again, this room had a one-way revolving door.

  “Keep going,” Summer urged.

  They whirled through the revolving door into a circular room where the entire floor was spinning. Below the red walls and ceiling, a blue-and-yellow spiral remained in constant motion. The room had multiple entrances, and for the first time since returning from the dreamscape, other Fun House participants were present.