“I believe this is my fourteenth . . . maybe fifteenth . . . time in the Nightmare.”

Crixus shakes his head. “Unbelievable.”

“Now I get to ask a question. Am I in trouble with the Emperor or about to be rewarded?”

I’ve been hauled away for a night in jail a handful of times—mostly for getting caught with Nole when he did something illegal like breaking into research labs or stealing books from important libraries. It felt a bit like this. Except this time I don’t know how I broke the rules of this twisted universe. It’s hard to apologize to the Emperor if I don’t understand my crime.

“Save that question for the Emperor,” Crixus says for the second time.

“So he’s in charge of this place?”

“In a way.”

I’m in the Nightmare that killed my brother. Anyone labeled “in charge” is likely untrustworthy. But the man in charge is also the one with knowledge. How much does this Emperor know about this dreamscape? “He’s got to be the Draftsman.”

“Why do you say that?”

“He’s the Emperor. The villain is always the guy in power.” He must have some control. Some leg up on everyone else in this cursed place.

“He’s Emperor because he escaped the Tunnel faster than anyone else. Well, until now.”

“Until now?”

“Until you.”

The Emperor’s citadel is encased in fire. By now I shouldn’t be surprised. Flames encircle a tower that stretches far above the rest of the coliseum lighting up the turrets and spires with swirls and tongues of heat, but they don’t crackle. They don’t burn. I’m getting major Moses-and-the-burning-bush vibes the longer I’m in this place.

The citadel gives light, but it’s not the type that makes you turn your face upward to soak it in. It’s a harsh, hot thing that makes me want to turn my back on it. The more time I spend here the more I crave true light.

“Do you ever get a sunrise in this place?”

He gestures to the citadel. “This is our sun. It dims at evening and brightens in the morning.”

That’s a no then. There’s no sun, no moon, no stars. Never will be.

“The Emperor built this citadel to give us light so we’re no longer lost.”

How can someone build from fire? “So he’s the Draftsman.”

“No, he created it after he was trapped here like us.”

That’s not how ImagiSerum works. At least, I don’t think so. What I’d give to have my full mental clarity back.

We approach the citadel to silence. Crixus parts the flames like he did in the coliseum gateway, and I walk through the entry into a courtyard. Shadows contradict the glow of the fire. Moving. Almost alive and with substance. Is that a shadow—or a creature? As I turn my full attention to the movement, any shadow I thought I saw melts into the ground before I can make out specifics.

The inside of the citadel is made of stone. No fire burns inside. I expect rustic stone, archer windows, and spiral stairs into dark corridors, but the interior of the citadel is a mix of modern and ancient Rome. Stone spiral steps move as escalators, and we step on them so quickly I have no chance to glance at the mechanism. Light comes from scattered small window squares in the wall, letting in the fire glow from outside. The escalator pauses at each landing that leads to a new corridor but then ascends again after a few moments. It feels otherworldly.

We reach the top, a broad open landing with a floor-to-carved-ceiling window, completely open with no glass or lattice. If I wasn’t paying attention, I could walk right out of it and plummet to my death.

Crixus stops halfway to the enormous window, faces the stone wall to his right, and knocks. The escalator continues to slide into the floor and disappear.

Crixus knocks on the wall again, and this time it melts away. Strings of gold slither from the cracks in the ceiling and spread along the wall until it forms an elaborate peaked frame to double doors, which open of their own accord.

“Go on in,” Crixus says.

“You’re not coming?”

He shakes his head.

I shrug and walk through the doors. I likely have an hour or two left inside this place, so if things get weird or dark—well, darker than that doomed Tunnel I’d been trapped in—at least I’ll wake up soon.

“Come in! Come in!” The voice that beckons is casual and young. I’ve heard it before. In the Arena, calling out the last name of the boy who reunited with his parents.

I enter the foreign space and make it only a few steps before pulling up short. The hexagonal room has walls made mostly of floor-to-ceiling windows, open and also without glass. But what throws me most is that the room is split into what seems like two worlds.

On my left are sofas that look as though they’ve housed a thousand naps on their cushions. A coffee table with scattered cans of soda. Steam rises from a box of fresh pepperoni pizza.

The right half of the room couldn’t be more different. Thick-trunked redwoods rise through holes in the ceiling. Scattered pine-needle flooring with moss-covered stumps surrounds a low crackling campfire. Fishing poles, woodcutting axes, and old-fashioned metal lunchboxes rest in a pile beside a fallen log. Hot dogs roast over the flames.

My mouth waters.

The only thing off about these two scenes is their coloring. Dim, like a photo that needs some hardcore editing to ramp up its exposure and brightness.

“I didn’t know if you’d be more the man-cave type or caveman type, so I set up both.”

It takes me a while to locate the source of the voice. A young man—not much older than me steps forward from the center of the miniature worlds. He’s pale like he hasn’t seen the sun in . . . ever. Dark hair combed but mussed at the same time. He wears a white draped tunic, pinned atop his shoulder, and strapped sandals. A laurel crowns his head.

Hail, Caesar, blah, blah, blah. Is this their Emperor?

He studies me with a tilt of his head. “I’m sensing man cave.”

I look at the forest and a pang of longing hits my chest. Last I spent time in nature—tangible, touchable nature that wasn’t on the other side of a screen—was when Nole took me camping as a kid. Before I learned about the shadows of life.

“Definitely man cave. You look like the forest is about to devour you.” The trees melt down into the floor, the campfire turns to smoke, then ash, then dirt, and the ratty carpet from the lounge side of the room spreads across the forest floor, shoving the pine needles out a window. Beanbag chairs spring up with a popcorn cart and a big-screen TV.

The forest is gone.

“And yet you’re not afraid of it. That’s good.” He surveys me with a smile, revealing a diamond incisor. “Wary, but not afraid. Skeptical, but not dismissive. Angry . . . but not wild. You’re quite in defiance of this Nightmare world, aren’t you?”

I try to set aside the questions sending my inner Draftsman spinning. “What do you mean?”

Of course I’m defying it. Who would accept it when it’s claiming all our lives? I’m going to defeat this thing one step at a time. And hopefully get free of it forever. For Nole’s sake. For my own.

“In the Nightmare, emotions are heightened. Sudden and strong, like when our physical bodies used to dream. There’s very little balance to them here, which takes a lot more self-control than it used to in the Old World.” He waves a hand as though to brush away that topic altogether.

“Anyway, I wanted to create a space you’d be comfortable in. Maybe I should have started with asking your name.”