No one says another word. Rocco falls asleep, cradled and swayed by the ride in Apollo’s pocket. The only sound is the crunch-crunch, crunch-crunch of their footsteps against rock, set in the eerie silence of bad stuff about to happen.

  Henry looks up. The evergreens and pines are immense and ancient, and their boughs reach out like the arms of giants. In that forest . . . Well, who knows? Who can tell? Anything might be in there. It looks dark and deep enough to get lost in forever.

  Henry shivers. The fur on Button’s back is up. Pirate Girl walks beside him.

  Up ahead, he sees Jo take Apollo’s hand. This seems the wrong order of things. Henry shouldn’t be back here with the girl who has stuffed pockets and leather boots. He should be up there, with the girl who has the brown eyes and shiny hair, but this is no time for romantic troubles.

  Now Henry can also hear the sorts of rustles and cracks and snaps that you always hear in the woods. The kind that make shudders sneak up the back of your neck. Oh, it’s creepy.

  “Wait,” Pirate Girl says. “What’s that?”

  “What’s what?” Apollo says.

  They stop, standing as still as possible to listen.

  “That.”

  It’s the sound of thunder moving in, but it isn’t thunder. It’s the rumble of tires and the growl of an engine heading up the mountain. And laughter, getting closer.

  It’s a truck. Trucks.

  Scary Face with Mutton-Chop Sideburns

  The children hunch together at the side of the road. Dust kicks up as the first truck rolls and roars by, carrying the strange and huge insect-like contraptions of fair rides. And then another passes, packed with machinery and signs. Henry spots two of them: GIANT CORNDOGS, one reads. SLUSHY YUMEES, reads another. When he was little, the good workers from Everything Storage set up the parade and fair in town. Now the trucks say Everything Vlad’s, and the fair is on this mountain, and the drivers of the trucks are tower people who have scary faces with mutton-chop sideburns.

  “At least we know there’s really going to be a fair,” Jo says.

  “I told you. He likes to celebrate himself,” Pirate Girl says.

  They keep walking. It seems like they’ve been on that road forever. “This is the longest, tallest mountain in the world,” Apollo pants.

  That’s how it feels, anyway, even if they all know that the longest, tallest mountain is really somewhere in the Jaggeds. Still, the children are dragging their feet and growing quite weary. Now that they’ve gotten higher, Henry can see huge, nerve-racking drops where the cliff face plunges all the way down to the ground. In other spots, Henry can hear trickles of water, as if there’s a cool, thirst-quenching stream somewhere inside those woods. But more than anything, they see the tower growing larger and larger as they get closer. It is so, so much more colossal than it seems from below. Fifty-eight stories, but fifty-eight immense stories.

  Finally, Jo says, “Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing?” They stop. Pirate Girl wipes the sweat from her forehead. Henry’s face is shiny from heat and sweat, too. Jo has her hoodie tied around her waist.

  “Holy stromboli. A wall,” Pirate Girl says, but her words are filled with awe.

  “Is that gold?” Apollo asks.

  When Best Farriver was their RM, anyone could ride up the mountain road, and once you were at the top, you were in a wide, open space, with a small village and a little town square and grassy park in front of the old stone tower. But now, in addition to the horrible iron barrier on the bottom of the mountain, there is this wall at the top, circling the tower and whatever else is inside.

  But it’s an astonishing wall, they can tell as they get closer—beautiful and shimmery. It’s so bright and gleaming, it’s almost hard to look at. Apollo puts a hand over his eyes to see better. He steps toward it slowly. The children and Button follow, and Rocco is awake now, too, his tiny lizard head twitching left and right at the sight. Even Button seems mesmerized. The gold wall is beautiful, and it is impressive, and even Henry wants to run his hand along it, because evil things can compel you and stir you and draw you forward.

  “I wonder if it’s real,” Apollo says. “I wish I had a magnet, and then I could test it. A magnet doesn’t stick to gold.”

  “Just a sec.” Pirate Girl reaches into one pocket and hands over a U-shaped bar.

  Apollo holds it to the wall, and draws it away again. “It’s real.”

  “Never mind the wall,” Jo says. “Look at the tower.”

  Henry looks beyond the wall and up. This close, that tower is enormous. The black mirrors of it rise until he can barely see the top. They glisten and reflect the gold, promising treasure and more treasure everywhere you look. He blinks and blinks. It’s very hard not to feel captivated by it all.

  Pirate Girl claps her hands. “Snap out of it, people! Never mind all the shiny stuff. Remember why we’re here. Check it out.” She hooks her thumb toward the gates a few steps away. These gates are gilded, intricate and radiant. And they’re open, too, same as the frightening iron ones at the bottom of the mountain.

  “Another wall, another gate,” Henry sighs.

  “Look at the banner up there,” Apollo says. It’s blue and gold with satiny fringe, stretching from end to end across the top of the entrance.

  FAYRE, it reads.

  Pirate Girl snickers. She makes that terrible ckkk sound in her throat again.

  No one dares to cross the threshold yet. Jo tries to peer inside from where she stands, rising on her toes, craning her neck. “It’s hard to see, but there’s a fair for sure.”

  “It seems very quiet for a celebration,” Henry says.

  “Too quiet,” Apollo says.

  They stand in a huddle at the entrance. Henry’s scared to cross to the other side, but he feels slow and confused, too, as if he’s under a strange spell. The gold is just so dazzling. His heart pounds, ba-bamp, ba-bamp, as if to keep reminding him who he truly is.

  Henry shakes himself from the glint and enchantment. Or maybe that’s Pirate Girl, shaking his arm.

  “Come on, guys. Ready? Let’s go turn a lizard back into a boy,” she says.

  CHAPTER 22

  Rocco’s Moment Arrives

  And strangely, this time they are ready, the way you’re ready when you’ve waited and worried for a terrible thing for so long that finally, finally, the waiting seems worse than the terrible thing itself. As they step through that gate and under the banner, Henry’s surprised to see that they’re in the same little village that was there when Best Farriver was their RM. He had no idea what they might find, but a familiar town square stretches in front of them, with shops and little thin houses on either side, and beyond that, the grassy park, which sits in front of the tower. Now, though, Vlad’s workers live in the village’s tall thin houses, and the shops all seem to sell a variety of objects featuring images of Vlad Luxor, and many rides and games are going up in the grassy park, and the tower is a gleaming pillar of black.

  Way up ahead, on the left side of the park, Henry sees the Swing Zing and the Loop de Loop and the Tummy Twirl and the Cage Lurch. The scary men with the mutton-chop sideburns wrench and screw bolts into place, and then hurriedly take their tools to the next rickety display.

  On the right, Henry spots booths of food. Dino Toes, Banana Sticks, Rainbow Bloops, and more. Tower workers seem to be frying and freezing and dipping things into Candied Dashes and Dots. There are games over there, as well—the Ring Bottle Toss, the Water Zapper, the Clown Mouth Chuck, the Rodent Blammer. But no one else is on the street.

  “It’s so . . . still,” Jo says.

  It’s the kind of still that makes you hold your breath. And it’s eerie, how chilly Henry feels even in the heat of summer.

  “We’re the only ones here, except for those few workers,” Apollo says.

  “No,” Pirate Girl whispers, turning pale. “No, we’re not.”

  Henry follows Pirate Girl’s gaze, through the entire village, past the displays on the grass to the tower itself.

  He sees him now, too.

  Vlad Luxor.

  Vlad Luxor, one of the most evil HRMs in history, exiting the tower doors, taking the steps to the grass. He strolls the cleared path that runs through the middle of the fair, veering right and left to greet every single person present. He interrupts the work of the scary men, who rise to their feet when he approaches. He pumps their hands, and thumps them on the back, and smiles a big smile. Then he heads to the food booths to do the same with the workers peeling bananas and dunking Bloops into frosting.

  “I’ve never seen him this close before,” Jo says.

  “Me neither,” Henry says, his voice quivering like violin strings.

  They can hear him, too, even at that distance. “Welcome!” Vlad Luxor booms. “Greetings!”

  “He’s coming this way, I know it,” Apollo whispers.

  “I think the fair really is to celebrate him,” Jo says. She puts her thin sweatshirt on again, and zips it all the way to her neck. She hides her hands up the sleeves.

  Now he reaches the far end of the town square. “So glad I could come! So nice to meet me!” Vlad Luxor shouts. He waves toward the shops to his right. He waves toward the shops to his left.

  “Who is he waving at? There’s no one here,” Jo whispers.

  “His reflection, I think,” Pirate Girl says. Her eyes glitter with giggles, but then she blinks and is serious again.

  “Find your spot for the parade so you can get a great view of me!” he shouts.

  “He’s heading over,” Apollo says. “I told you he would!”

  “Rocco! Do you think you can try to hide in plain sight? All you have to do is be seen but not noticed. Just stick your head out of Apollo’s pocket!” Pirate Girl says.

  “I doubt there will be any hiding in plain sight,” Jo says. “He’s staring right at us.”

  It’s true. Vlad is veering straight toward them with his hand out. Rocco ducks down into Apollo’s pocket with a tiny squeal, and who could blame him. The children step out of the street and flatten themselves as far against Vlad’s Gift Shop as they can get. Even with Henry’s eyes squinched half shut, he can see the figurines of Vlad in the window, and the dishes and mugs featuring Vlad’s face. In the bookshop right next door, he can read the titles of the books that all have Vlad’s photo on the cover: The Glory of Me. The Art of Me. My Power: The Story of Vlad Luxor.

  Henry’s knees begin to knock together, and any readiness he or the other children felt as they walked under that banner vanishes same as your shadow when a cloud crosses the sun. Henry sticks his hand in his pocket to feel for his lucky marble. He’s never needed luck more than now.

  “Oh no, oh no, here he comes,” Jo cries softly. Pirate Girl shoves her hands into her armpits so she won’t have to shake his hand. Button whimpers, and Rocco isn’t hiding in plain sight, he’s just plain hiding. Apollo is too frozen to move.

  “Nice to see me!” Vlad Luxor booms.

  “I don’t want to do this anymore,” Apollo says.

  “Me neither,” Jo says.

  “Wanna go home,” Rocco peeps from inside Apollo’s pocket.

  If you remember being afraid, very afraid, take that feeling and multiply it by the biggest number you can think of. Henry is trying hard, hard, hard to remember why he’s there. He’s reminding himself about goodness and love and little brothers and kind mothers. About friendship, and doing the right thing, and being brave, like his grandfather said. He’s trying to remember all his strengths: how he can swim a crawl stroke, and find the North Star, and identify cloud formations—cumulus versus stratus versus cumulonimbus.

  Cumulus Versus Stratus Versus Cumulonimbus

  “We never should have come,” Apollo says, as quietly as a person can speak.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Jo says. “Now.”

  Right then, though, and so very suddenly, too, a squirrel drops from the rooftop and lands on the sidewalk. Jo screams. Needleman, with his envelope-thin body and pointed nose, appears out of nowhere and shoves Henry between the shoulder blades, into the street.

  It happens so fast that Henry doesn’t even have a moment to feel shock. All at once, Vlad is grasping Henry’s hand in his. Vlad Luxor’s skin feels chilly and plump and damp, and he has thick fingers and a swallowing palm. As Vlad’s flesh touches Henry’s, it’s as if Henry can feel his spine shriveling and his blood stopping in his veins. He snatches his hand back, and then he sees Needleman forcing Pirate Girl’s hand into Vlad Luxor’s, and then Apollo’s, and then Jo’s, and a shiver goes through each of them. Every hair on Button’s back is standing up in a straight line.

  “And who are these happy little people?” Vlad Luxor asks. His breath smells like canned soup. His teeth are the color of an old pair of dice. His eyes don’t even look human. They are pointed and sharp, like two darts heading straight for a target.

  Two Darts Heading Straight for a Target

  “Who are they?” Needleman says. “Just your average children. No one special.” He lowers his brows in a threatening fashion. “Young people, say thank you for this wonderful day of joy and fun.”

  “Thank you for this wonderful day of joy and fun,” the children say.

  “Your pleasure!” Vlad Luxor says. “Needleman! What’s next on the schedule? Where am I supposed to go now that I’ve greeted my fans?”

  “To the head of the parade, behind those buildings, where the floats are lining up. It will be my honor to show you.” Needleman glares at the children, and the look jabs Henry like a knife. “The parade will be starting any minute, little ones. Now go find your spot! You’ll have to hurry, since it’s getting crowded. Oh, look! There’s a free area. How lucky to find a patch among the throngs! Quickly.” Needleman grabs a handful of Henry’s skin under his arm and squeezes. Henry’s so thin that he feels this pinch right through his bones. And then Needleman’s icy breath shoots through his ear. “If any of you move, you’ll be sorry. Come, Mr. Reese!” he says to the squirrel.

  Needleman takes Vlad Luxor’s elbow and guides him across the square. The children watch until the two men and one squirrel completely disappear.

  “I feel sick,” Apollo says.

  Do you know that feeling when you’ve touched something extremely unpleasant—a scratchy fabric, a sticky goo, or maybe a dead who-knows-what that you accidentally picked up? This is what Henry’s experiencing now, after shaking Vlad Luxor’s hand. He wipes his hand on his shorts, trying to make the feeling go away.

  “Gross,” Pirate Girl says, and does the same.

  Apollo gazes down at his palm as if he’s expecting to see his skin change to the rippled texture of a crocodile.

  “Ugh.” Jo shakes her fingers. “We need to get out of here. This is too awful to stand.”

  “He told us not to move!” Apollo says.

  “We can’t leave!” Pirate Girl says. “And not because of Needleman! Have we all forgotten why we’re here? A real chance for Rocco to hide in plain sight, in all the commotion and crowd of a parade!” Pirate Girl looks around the empty town square. There’s not a soul around. “Well. Maybe it’s still early.” She fetches her watch from the pocket of her pants, and then sighs. “Eleven fifty-eight.”

  A Ray of Light on a Corndog Sign

  In the distance, the rides creak and sway. Smoke and smells of frying things drift their way from the food stalls. Henry spots a sign for foot-long corndogs. A ray of light hits it, a good ray, an important ray, the kind you see shooting from the sky every now and then. It seems like a signal, maybe from a faraway beam, a lighthouse beam. A ray of encouragement to go on.

  Henry gives himself a silent pep talk. It’s about being all he can be and climbing the highest mountains and getting up when you’re knocked down— the stuff you hear in ads for athletic shoes.

  “We have to at least try,” he tells everyone else. “Come out of there, Rocco.”

  “Uh-uh,” comes the tiniest lizard voice from Apollo’s pocket.

  “I understand why you hid when Vlad Luxor came,” Henry pleads. “I wanted to hide, too. But you can’t hide in plain sight without being in plain sight. Please come out. This could be your moment.”

  “Henry’s right, Rocco. We have to try.” Apollo reaches into his pocket and grabs Rocco. And, yes, a lizard’s eyes are already round and bulgy, but Rocco’s eyes are even rounder and bulgier now from terror. “This is our chance. You can sit here on my shoulder. I’ll be right underneath you the whole time.”

  “Please, Rocco,” Henry says gently. “Please just stay where Vlad Luxor can look your way but not see you. You can become a boy again! And then we can figure out how to get out of here.”

  In spite of his brave words, Henry is nervous, very nervous. Because, well, look. The children are sticking out like a bunch of zebras in a savannah full of lions.

  “Eleven fifty-nine,” Pirate Girl reports.

  “We’re all alone,” Apollo says. He looks scared out of his wits.

  “Not exactly,” Pirate Girl says. Needleman is hurrying across the square. His hands are set in small fists at his sides, and his grin gleams as sharp as those awful tools the dentist uses on your teeth.

  Those Awful Tools the Dentist Uses on Your Teeth

  “Lovely day for a parade, isn’t it, children?” He settles beside them. Mr. Reese, the squirrel, sits at his heels. “It’s a good thing you came, because Vlad Luxor wants to see happy children at his parade, and now you will be happy children at his parade.”