They walked back toward the trailer in silence.

  The beanstalk forest stretched around them—massive green stalks spiraling into the clouds, leaves the size of cars filtering the grey light into something almost golden.

  Locke padded alongside Maggie, pressing his side against her leg every few steps. Warm. Solid. Present.

  She looked down at him. The husky's blue eyes met hers—not guilty, not apologetic. Just there.

  "Hey," she said quietly. Her hand found his fur, scratching behind his ears. "Thanks for staying with me. Back there."

  His tail swayed once.

  They kept walking. The silence stretched, but it wasn't uncomfortable. Maggie found herself matching Mark's pace, Locke still close against her leg.

  "Mark."

  He glanced back.

  "My mother." The words came out before she could second-guess them. "She was in the car with me. When it crashed. I don't know if she's—" She stopped. Swallowed. "I don't know what happened to her."

  Mark slowed his pace until they were walking side by side. His expression didn't change, but something in his posture shifted—listening.

  "You're here," he said after a moment. "In the Dreamscape. Alive."

  "Yeah."

  "If you died in that crash, you wouldn't be here. You'd be gone. And you came here because of your father. The trauma of his death. Not the accident."

  Maggie frowned. "What does that mean?"

  "It means the accident didn't break you. You were already broken before that—carrying around the weight of what happened to him. The crash was just..." He searched for the word. "The last straw. But your body survived. And if your body survived, your mother's probably did too."

  The logic was cold. Clinical. But something in Maggie's chest loosened anyway.

  "Probably," she repeated.

  "No guarantees. But the odds are good." Mark looked at her. "You could leave. Find out for yourself."

  Maggie thought about it. Waking up. Hospitals. Questions she didn't have answers for. Facing whatever waited on the other side.

  "I'm not ready," she said.

  Mark nodded. He didn't push.

  They reached the trailer—still parked where they'd left it, battered and ordinary-looking from the outside. Mark stopped and turned to face them.

  "So," he said. "Where do you want to go?"

  The question hung in the air.

  Martin had been walking a few steps behind, giving them space. Now he moved closer, thinking. Then his face shifted—something lighter entering his expression.

  "What about Dracula?"

  Mark's eyebrow rose.

  "I love that story," Martin continued. "Read it when I was a kid, must have been twelve or thirteen. Scared the hell out of me." He smiled at the memory. "The atmosphere, the mystery, Van Helsing tracking the Count across Europe—"

  He stopped. Mark's expression had gone flat.

  "Too dangerous?"

  "Much too dangerous." Mark leaned against the trailer door. "Dracula is one of the oldest, most powerful stories in the Dreamscape. He's been retold so many times that he's become something... else. Patient. Calculating. And unlike the Queen of Hearts, he doesn't just kill people—he turns them. In the Dreamscape, that means something different than in the stories."

  Martin's enthusiasm dimmed. "That bad?"

  "Worse. Trust me. Not a place we want to visit."

  "Alright." Martin held up his hands. "Bad idea. I get it."

  Silence settled over them. The beanstalk leaves rustled overhead.

  Martin drummed his fingers against his thigh, thinking. Then his face brightened again.

  "What about Romeo and Juliet?"

  Mark was quiet, considering.

  "It's a love story," Martin said. "Tragedy, sure, but no monsters. No vampires. Just two families fighting over old grudges."

  "The Montagues and Capulets."

  "Exactly. How dangerous can a feud between Renaissance Italians be?"

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  Mark was quiet for a long moment, weighing options.

  "It could work," he said finally. "Romeo and Juliet woke up a long time ago—left the story behind. Which means the original plot doesn't repeat anymore. The families just... exist. Fighting their endless war." He paused. "It's not safe, but it's safer than most alternatives."

  "So we're doing it?"

  Mark looked at Maggie.

  She shrugged. "Fine by me."

  Martin glanced at her—checking, assessing—but didn't push.

  "What should we expect?" he asked Mark.

  "Fighting. Lots of it. The Montagues and Capulets have been at war for so long that it's become their entire identity. When the story stopped repeating, they didn't stop. They just kept going." Mark opened the trailer door. "Their rivalry escalated over the centuries. Swords became pistols. Duels became skirmishes. Last I heard, they'd gotten their hands on rifles—early twentieth century stuff. The townspeople stopped trying to intervene and started treating it like entertainment."

  "Entertainment?"

  "They watch. Place bets. It's become a spectacle." Mark's voice was dry. "But don't expect romance. Whatever love story existed there died a long time ago. Now it's just violence and vendettas."

  He stepped into the trailer. Martin followed.

  Maggie lingered at the threshold, looking back at the beanstalk forest.

  "What about Johnny?" she asked. "Where did you send him?"

  "The Woke settlement," Mark said from inside. "It's where awakened characters gather—the ones who left their stories behind. Jack will recover there. And Johnny knows the way."

  "Will he be able to find us?"

  "We have places we leave messages for each other. He knows to check them." Something that might have been affection crossed Mark's face. "He always turns up. Usually when you least want him to."

  Maggie stepped inside.

  · · ·

  Verona was not what she expected.

  The trailer door opened onto chaos.

  A street stretched before them—cobblestones, old buildings, balconies draped with flowers. Then a bullet cracked past her ear and she stopped noticing the architecture.

  Two groups faced each other across a plaza, trading shots from behind overturned carts and crumbling walls. One group wore red sashes; the other, blue. Their weapons were an odd mix—rapiers and revolvers, crossbows and bolt-action rifles. One man was reloading what looked like an old Mauser.

  "Down!" Mark grabbed Maggie's arm and pulled her behind a fountain. Martin followed, moving with practiced efficiency despite his age.

  Stone chips sprayed her face. Her heart hammered against her ribs.

  "What the hell?" she hissed.

  "They escalated." Mark peered around the fountain's edge. "Red sashes are Capulets. Blue are Montagues."

  Across the plaza, a man in blue took a crossbow bolt to the shoulder. He staggered, cursed loudly in Italian, and kept firing his pistol one-handed.

  "He's not going down," Martin observed.

  "They're part of the story. They don't stay dead. They just reset." Mark watched the battle with something like resignation. "Watch the crowd."

  Maggie followed his gaze. Along the edges of the plaza, townspeople had gathered. They sat on benches, leaned out of windows, clustered in doorways. Watching. Some had food—bread, cheese, wine. A woman was knitting. Children pointed and cheered when someone took a hit.

  "They're treating it like a show," Maggie said.

  "Because it is." Mark stood as the fighting shifted away from their position. "The families perform. The town watches. Everyone plays their part."

  A Capulet—young, handsome, wielding a rapier in one hand and a revolver in the other—vaulted over a cart and drove his blade through a Montague's chest. The crowd applauded. The Montague looked more annoyed than hurt.

  "This is insane," Martin said.

  "This is the Dreamscape." Mark started walking, keeping to the edges of the plaza. "Come on. Let's find somewhere quieter."

  They moved through the streets, the sounds of battle fading behind them. The town was larger than Maggie expected—winding alleys, hidden courtyards, buildings stacked on top of each other in ways that defied architecture. Laundry hung from lines overhead. Cats watched from windowsills.

  Eventually, Mark led them to a small tavern tucked away from the main thoroughfares. Inside, it was dim and quiet. A few patrons sat at tables, drinking wine and playing cards. They glanced at the newcomers without much interest.

  Mark chose a table in the corner. They sat.

  "So," Martin said after a moment. "What now?"

  He looked at Maggie. "You could be Juliet. Play the role, see the story from inside."

  Maggie shook her head. "Not in the mood."

  Martin nodded. No argument. No push.

  He shifted in his seat, thinking. Then turned to Mark. "What about you? You could—"

  "I won't be Juliet."

  Martin laughed—a short, surprised sound. "That's not what I was going to ask."

  "Sure it wasn't."

  "It wasn't." But Martin was grinning now. "I was going to ask about something else. You mentioned the eagle—that you programmed her to scout. That she doesn't have a personality. She's just an extension of you."

  "Yes."

  "Could you do that with a person?"

  Mark's eyebrows rose slightly. "Create a person?"

  "Not a real person. A construct. Like the eagle, but human-shaped." Martin leaned forward. "You said creating people is dangerous—that they come out wrong, try to kill you. But what if she didn't need to be real? Just... follow a script. Play a part."

  Mark was quiet, thinking.

  "Possible. I'd need a reference image. And she'd have no personality—just programmed responses."

  "That's fine."

  "You have someone in mind."

  It wasn't a question.

  Martin smiled—a small, private thing. He closed his eyes.

  For a long moment, nothing happened. Then something began to form in his hands—a photograph, materializing piece by piece. The edges first, then the colors bleeding inward, details sharpening until the image was complete.

  He opened his eyes and looked at what he'd made.

  The photo showed two people. A man and a woman, standing close together, smiling at the camera. The man was clearly Martin—younger, maybe early forties, with fewer lines on his face and more color in his hair. He wore a casual shirt, his arm around the woman's waist.

  The woman was beautiful.

  White, with curly blonde hair that caught the light. Around forty, but with the kind of face that made age irrelevant. She was laughing at something—or about to laugh—her eyes bright with warmth.

  Maggie leaned closer without meaning to. "Wow. She's really pretty."

  Martin's smile widened. Pride, unmistakable and unashamed.

  "I know." His voice was soft. "Most beautiful woman in the world. The universe. The multiverse." He glanced at Maggie, a hint of mischief in his eyes. "Of poems and poetry. Of all verses. That's what I tell her all the time. She rolls her eyes every time."

  Maggie found herself smiling too. The first real smile in what felt like hours.

  "I guess I can add the Dreamscape now," Martin added. "She'll hate that."

  Mark studied the photograph.

  "The construct won't be her. No warmth. No personality. Just an image following a script."

  "I know." Martin's voice was steady. "I'm not trying to replace her. I just thought it would be nice. To see her face."

  Mark held his gaze for a moment. Then nodded.

  "I'll need an hour or two." He took the photograph carefully.

  "There's something else," Martin said. "I want to change the story a little."

  He leaned in and spoke quietly—too low for Maggie to catch all of it. Mark listened, expression unreadable. When Martin finished, something crossed Mark's face. Not quite a smile, but close.

  "The families won't like it." He stood, photograph in hand. "Should be interesting to watch. Their reactions."