TWELVE

  I’d imagined a fairy-tale sky, with cotton-ball clouds and singing birds. Not this.

  I squinted, standing up. Everything was dark. There was nothing here. It was a wasteland. A desert. The sky was filled with thick clouds of sickly yellow dust. It was hard to see anything but outlines in it.

  “Hello?” I called out. But my voice barely carried through the dusty air.

  As I started to explore, I stumbled over a slab of bricks, worn from age.

  I crouched to get a better look. They were yellow, like the dust in the air, and as my finger ran along the surface of one, the top of the brick dissolved into more dust, falling to the sand below.

  This was a crumbling place. A forgotten place.

  “Hello!” I shouted again.

  This can’t be right, I thought as I walked farther into the nothingness, blinking back against the dust.

  I held the watch, now a glowing Smoke Ball, in front of me in an attempt to light my way. This isn’t Twelve. It couldn’t be, where was the castle? The trees? The people?

  A horrible realization turned in my belly. I must have fallen asleep at the wrong time. But I’d been to so many other worlds, and none of them looked like this.

  There were slick stones under my feet. I bent down low to brush away the sand and saw that I was standing on a pocked-tile walkway. At the end of it sat a very tall, wide building. The roof and walls had caved in, as though having lost in a vicious battle.

  But there was no mistaking the drawbridge in front of it or the towering stained-glass windows that remained on one side and were scattered across the ground on the others in shards.

  This was the castle. Or, at least, it used to be.

  No. This was a trick. It had to be.

  I walked over the drawbridge toward the entrance. I could see the structures more clearly now, holding up my Smoke Ball to light the places where solid walls and towers should have been.

  Then I went through the front door, bracing myself. At least the Smoke Keeper had to still be alive, right? They lived forever. But the inside of the castle looked no different from the outside.

  “Mr. King? Mrs. Queen?” I called out. “Anyone?” I waited, but no answer came.

  Maybe… maybe if I could figure out what the magic was here, I could use it to find someone?

  I tried drawing on the ground, punching a wall, holding a brick and willing it to grow or shrink. I tried to fly, to scream, to do anything. Nothing worked. I was just a normal person here, and I hated it. I didn’t know what to do.

  I wanted to give up.

  Jo used to say that, in Three, if you felt sad or angry, a fire would light beneath your feet, sucking you into it. If you didn’t get out fast enough, you’d burn up. The only way out was if you managed to make yourself get rid of the anger—which is a particularly hard thing to do when, you know, you’re being murdered by your own feelings.

  She used to remind me of that whenever I complained about something: if you let one bad thing get to you, then you’re bound to attract all kinds of other bad things.

  I sighed. Saving Jeremiah would be absolutely impossible if I couldn’t find the Smoke Keeper of Twelve, so that’s what I had to do.

  Get out of the fire. I was going to make things right.

  I took a step forward and promptly slipped on something. I screamed as I fell hard on my tailbone.

  “Ow!” My back hurt from the fall, my head hurt from the stress, and my lungs hurt from the dust in the air.

  Never mind, you know what? Let the fire eat me. I’m basically the unluckiest girl in the world.

  Just as soon as I thought that, though, my skin felt funny. Warm. I looked down to see that my whole body glistened with smoke.

  My magic. It’s working.

  I sat up and saw that something else also gleamed with brown smoke: the thing I had slipped on.

  I scrambled over to see. It was a portrait, I think, a big one. I could just see the head of someone underneath the thick layer of sand and debris.

  I rubbed my sleeve over it, revealing the face.

  I gasped.

  I knew that face—that mustache and those eyes. It was Amisi, and he was wearing a crown.

  I picked up the painting with shaky hands.

  But how? And where is he?

  “Amisi!” I called out, desperate.

  I searched the castle all night, the grounds, holding his picture and screaming his name the whole time: “Amisi!”

  But still, I found no one.

  THE LAST-DITCH EFFORT

  By the time I woke up, I was certain of one thing: Jeremiah was going to die.

  I hadn’t found Amisi, or anyone else for that matter. There was no way for me to collect the smoke.

  I’d failed.

  I lay back in bed. There was no point getting up. Even if I went back into Twelve at noon and miraculously found the Smoke Keeper that time, I would have missed my chance at getting into Eleven this morning. And if I saved Eleven until tonight, it would be too late—there was no way I could guarantee saving Jeremiah before the deadline. I needed the smoke from Twelve first.

  It’s already the last day.

  I stayed in bed until Mom knocked on my door to get me up for school, too sad to move.

  * * *

  I trudged to class wearing my pajama pants. I hadn’t had the energy to change. Kids stared at me, but I didn’t care.

  What’s the point anymore? It’s over. Even if I came up with an excuse to get out of class before 11:00, it didn’t matter without the smoke from Twelve.

  I collapsed in my seat before the bell even rang—a first for me—then laid my head down, but moments later someone was tapping on it.

  “What?” I asked, annoyed, expecting Samantha to make fun of my clothes or Mr. Topinka to tell me to wake up.

  Instead, it was Alejandro. His eyes were big and his voice was frantic.

  “Where did you get the idea for this?”

  He pulled a painting out of his bag—one of my paintings that I’d been working on in the church. It was of Eleven’s Smoke Keeper.

  “Oh, it’s just a character from a story that my aunt used to tell me. Why do you have it?”

  “Don’t get mad,” he said, gesturing wildly as he spoke, “but I was going through your paintings this morning to try to find one for the cover art of our game, and I saw this one… and I swear”—he handed me the painting before leaning in close to whisper—“I know this story too. That’s called a Smoke Keeper, right?”

  I bolted upright. “How do you know that?” I’d never used that term with him before; during our brainstorming sessions I’d always referred to the characters like the farmer and the metal lady as just the “king” or “queen” of that level.

  “Look.” His hand was shaking from either nervousness or excitement as he pulled something else out of his bag. “After I saw your painting, I went home and then came back with this.”

  He handed me a small stack of thick paper, tinged with age. A drawing of something unmistakable was on the first page.

  Long, cracked teeth, sheared nose, empty eyes, and a crown. Underneath in a looping cursive it read Smoke Keeper.

  “How did you get this?” I asked, flipping to the next page.

  “It’s been passed down in my family for generations. It belonged to my dad—his grandmother gave it to him. She said her father made it.”

  I continued flipping through the stack. I knew this paper. I knew what this was.

  “I thought he came up with this story himself, but is it like a legend or something? I’ve never heard anything like it apart from these drawings and notes. Where did you hear about it?”

  Though it was considerably more worn and the drawings were sketchier—made by a less talented hand—there was no denying it: this was the missing part of Jo’s book.

  “And what was the name of your great-grandmother’s father?” I asked, ignoring his question.

  “Oh, him? Uh. Olaf, I think. Olaf Amisi.”

  My heart thudded in my chest. This wasn’t possible. How could this be?

  There were sketches that I had never seen before, including one with a sparkling kingdom—a place where the clouds looked perfectly puffy and the trees dripped with leaves of silk. Like the kind of place that didn’t exist anymore. Like it was magic.

  There were notes scribbled all along the sides: Harold, everything is white like marble. The air smells like cut grass. The people are golden. They have the ability to control luck. But if you use too much one way, it has to make itself equal again.

  Above the largest and most detailed drawing of the realm looped the words Twelve: My Kingdom.

  These must have been the notes that Amisi had given to Harold Marks, my own ancestor, when he illustrated the book.

  This was all too much to process. I needed to think. What were the chances? Could I really be that lucky?

  The bell rang, but I didn’t have time for class.

  Clutching the pages close to my chest with one arm, I grabbed Alejandro’s wrist with the other and pulled him toward the door. On the way out I bumped into Fallon.

  “Oh, hey, sorry—gotta go,” I mumbled, brushing past her.

  “Where?” she called after me.

  But I was too frantic to answer. I needed to get him to the church—somewhere private we could chat.

  * * *

  Once we got inside, I started splaying the pages across a long pew. These pictures were not in Jo’s book, but I was certain what they were. There was a Wall made of energy, a sword with twelve stones embedded in the hilt, and a diagram showing how to melt the sword down into a watch. Is this how the watch was first made? It must have been. Amisi used the sword to create it.

  Alejandro wheezed behind me, catching his breath. “We’re missing class, Rose. Why? Are we here just to talk about my father’s book? Because it could have waited till lunch…”

  “No, we don’t have time. It can’t wait till lunch.” I spun around to look him straight in the eye. “Tell me everything you know about this book.”

  “Oh, uh, right. Okay. Well, like I told you, it belonged to my great-great-grandfather. He said he wrote the book for his daughter about his ‘real home.’ ” Alejandro used finger quotes around that last part. “He claimed he was from this magical place and ended up in Arizona by accident. That’s what my family says, anyway, and that he was planning to go back. So he was writing a book for his daughter so she’d remember him when he was gone.”

  “Why did he want to go back?”

  “He told my great-grandma that there was a war going on there that he had to stop. He’d been fighting in it before some big blast of magic energy or something shot him here, into our world. I always thought that part was cool; it reminds me of this game actually—”

  “And then what happened?” I cut him off, leaning forward.

  “He just disappeared at some point, leaving behind these pages, his story, for his wife and daughter…”

  I gasped. Could he still be in Twelve?

  “… and a watch.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, didn’t you see that page?” He shuffled through the drawings spread out on the bench and picked one up. “Here.” He handed me a page that included a diagram of a watch. I examined it closely.

  “It wasn’t just a picture—supposedly, there really was a watch and it looked just like that.”

  A round watch with twelve petals. The very same one my hand grazed over in my pajama pocket.

  “What happened to it?” I asked.

  “It was stolen.”

  “What? By who?”

  Alejandro leaned over, leafing through the pages again. “Ah, here it is.” On the back of a portrait of Amisi was taped a story from an old newspaper. No photos, just lettering that looked grainy and stamped on, with the headline MAN MISSING.

  “After Amisi disappeared, no one ever found him. Rumors were that he’d been kidnapped. Days after he went missing, his wife said the watch was stolen from her room.”

  “Who did it?” My heart thumped so loud, I thought Alejandro must have been able to hear it.

  Alejandro shrugged, lining the pages back up again. “My dad’s grandmother said it was a friend of his—some guy he’d hired to draw the pictures for his book.”

  I felt like I was sinking. I couldn’t believe it.

  “The friend got greedy or something. Amisi’s wife thought the friend even killed him, so that he could steal the watch and the book. But it was never published—that’s the weird thing.” Alejandro got a confused look on his face, like something was dawning on him. “So how could you know about it too—the story?” he asked, staring at me.

  My eyes slowly met his as I absorbed what he was saying.

  The artist killed him. Stole his work and the watch.

  “I think… I think it was my great-great-grandfather who was the illustrator.”

  “What?” Alejandro’s eyebrows shot up. “Why would you think that?”

  I dug my hand deep into my pocket and pulled out the watch, handing it to him with shaky fingers. I almost couldn’t let it go. “Because this has been passed down in my family too.”

  Alejandro held the watch up to his wide eyes. Thoughts whirled around in my head. If Amisi was dead, there was no way I could get his smoke… unless… unless Alejandro really was his descendant. Then he would have the same royal blood, right? He’d be the King of Twelve now, even if he’d never been there. Could this work?

  “Look,” I said to Alejandro, “I know this is a lot to take in and it’s going to sound totally nuts, but I think I need your help.”

  “With what?” His voice sounded shaky.

  “The war your great-great-grandfather wanted to end.”

  He just stared at me. “What are you talking about?”

  “I know it’s hard to believe, but…” I groaned—this was not only utterly ridiculous, but impossible to explain. “I just need you to trust me. All those levels I was coming up with for our game, all those worlds? That was me using the watch to enter your grandpa’s world.”

  “I don’t believe it. That’s impossible.”

  I peered into his eyes. “I thought so too, but look.” I gently took the watch back, clicking it open for him to see. “It’s real. The watch from your family’s story is real.”

  Alejandro gasped, staring at the pictures under the petals. I was too scared to say anything more yet, worried he might not want to help me.

  “And how do you plan to end this… war, exactly?” he finally asked.

  “I told you that I’d made mistakes too, right? Remember?” He nodded. I took a deep breath. “Well, I was the one who hurt Jeremiah.” I reached down, picking up the sketch of Twelve’s Wall. “He’s stuck in there, and if I don’t find a way to get him out of it by tonight, then he’ll never wake up again.”

  After a long pause Alejandro looked up from the watch to me. “What do you need from me?”

  “I need you to take a nap at eleven o’clock today. We’ll have less than an hour, and we’ll need all the time we can get.”

  At that his expression cracked. “A nap? But we’re at school. How are we going to manage—”

  Now that I knew he’d help, I didn’t let him finish. “I have an idea… just trust me, okay?” My mind raced with possibilities. We’d sneak back into the building between first and second periods, then maybe we could do the impossible.

  * * *

  At 10:45, in Mrs. Lee’s class, I started acting sick—taking shallow breaths, holding my face, swallowing real hard over and over. I was so nervous, I didn’t have to fake the sweating or the shaking. With the watch safely in my pocket, I made my way to Mrs. Lee’s desk and asked her if I could go to the nurse’s office. One look at me and she reached into her desk for the hall pass. “Can Alejandro come with me? I’m afraid I’m going to throw up on the way there.”

  She quickly signaled to Alejandro to follow me, no doubt eager to get the nauseated kid out of her classroom.

  When we got to the nurse’s office, it was empty. I couldn’t believe it—it seemed like my luck really had changed. I collapsed on one of the flat beds in the back room and told Alejandro to take the one right next to it.

  “Here. You hold on to the watch while I hold the end of the chain.”

  “What if I can’t fall asleep?” he asked.

  “You have to. As long as you fall asleep before noon, I’ll find you. You remember what to think about before you fall asleep, though, right?” I’d coached him on our way back from the church that morning.

  “Yes. A big graveyard in a swamp, like the one in your picture.”

  “Don’t forget. If you don’t imagine it right, you might not end up in the right place.”

  “I’ll remember.”

  We lay on our sides, facing each other in our separate beds, the watch chain taut between us.

  “But I’m not sleepy,” he groaned.

  “Trust me, if you open the watch and stare at it, it’ll knock you right out.”

  “Really?”

  “Yup, but wait until I fall asleep first, so I can help you once we get there.”

  “Okay,” he said quietly.

  I closed my eyes. I was more worried about my ability to fall asleep without the watch.

  “Rose?”

  “Yeah?”

  “How amazing will it be if you’re telling the truth?”

  I opened my eyes, smiling back at him.

  “Very amazing.”

  When I closed my eyes again, however, the smile slipped off. This was my last shot. I needed it to work.

  I imagined the graveyard. I willed my thoughts and nerves to calm down, and I tried to pretend that I was lying on Jo’s couch with her, watching the fire, feeling her fingers comb through my hair, and listening to her soft whisper.

  “You see, Rose, there’s a place where anything is possible, and when you go there, you will become more powerful than anyone you’ve ever met.”

  ELEVEN

  It was hot. That was the first thing I noticed—pure, slick heat running through my body.