There was a gate in the wall, closed against the night, as vast and intimidating as the scrubland around it. Looking at that gate, it was difficult to believe that it would ever open, or that it could ever open. It seemed more like a decorative flourish than a functional thing.

“Whoa,” said Jillian.

Jacqueline was cold. She was bruised. Worst of all, she was dirty. She had, quite simply, Had Enough. And so she marched forward, out of the bracken, onto the hard-packed dirt surrounding the wall, and she knocked as hard on the gate as her soft child’s hands would allow. Jillian gasped, grabbing her arm and dragging her back.

But the damage, such as it was, had been done. The gate creaked open, splitting down the middle to reveal a medieval-looking courtyard. There was a fountain in the center, a bronze-and-steel statue of a man in a long cloak, his pensive gaze fixed upon the high mountains. No one stirred. It was a deserted place, an abandoned place, and looking at it filled Jillian’s heart with dread.

“We shouldn’t be here,” she murmured.

“Indeed, you probably should not,” said a man’s voice. Both girls screamed and jumped, whirling around to find the man from the fountain standing behind them, looking at them like they were a strange new species of insect found crawling around his garden.

“But you are here,” he continued. “That means, I suppose, that I’ll have to deal with you.”

Jacqueline reached for Jillian’s hand, found it, and held fast, both of them staring in mute fear at the stranger.

He was a tall man, taller than their father, who had always been the tallest point in their world. He was a handsome man, like something out of a movie (although Jacqueline wasn’t sure she’d ever seen a movie star so pale, or so seemingly sculpted out of some cold white substance). His hair was very black, and his eyes were orange, like jack-o’-lanterns. Most surprising of all was his red, red mouth, which looked like it had been painted, like he was wearing lipstick.

The lining of his cloak was the same red color as his mouth, and his suit was as black as his hair, and he held himself so perfectly still that he didn’t seem human.

“Please, sir, we didn’t mean to go anywhere we aren’t supposed to be,” said Jillian, who had, after all, spent years pretending she knew how to be brave. She tried so hard that sometimes she forgot that she was lying. “We thought we were still in our house.”

The man tilted his head, like he was looking at a very interesting bug, and asked, “Does your house normally include an entire world? It must be quite large. You must spend a great deal of time dusting.”

“There was a door,” said Jacqueline, coming to her sister’s defense.