I tried very hard not to bare my teeth at him. He was the one who had told me just how much they stood to lose. Didn’t he see that I was trying to find a way to save both our worlds without turning them all back into ink? Didn’t he get that I was trying to keep my mother and the real world safe without sacrificing all of them?

Before I could stop myself, I said, “I don’t need your permission. I made this world. It’s mine. You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t do!”

The good news: Lej stopped scowling for the first time since I’d met him.

The bad news: he stopped scowling because he burst out laughing.

“You sound as bad as Mahishasura,” he howled. “Except he’s scary and you’re ridiculous. You’re a tiny tyrant, stamping your foot and screaming because you want so badly to be in control, and hate that you aren’t!”

I felt my entire face burn hot and tried very hard not to look at the others. I didn’t think I could bear to see the looks on their faces. “That sounds more like a toddler than a tyrant,” I mumbled.

Still chortling, Lej turned away. “If the shoe fits.”

“Why is it wrong to want just a little bit of control, anyway?” I demanded. “I had it once. I was happy. And then one day I wasn’t anymore.”

He froze. Slowly, he turned back to look at me.

The words tumbled out of me. “Thoughts would just pop into my head and I couldn’t make them stop crowding me,” I said. “I was always obsessed with something, anxious about something. So I started spending more and more time with art and stories, because that was the only way I knew how to make my brain go quiet, and then I made this world. And for a couple of months, I was happy again. I loved every part of this place. Until I found out a monster had snuck in and stolen it from me. And I couldn’t stop that, either.” I scrubbed the back of my hand across my nose, trying very hard not to cry. “So tell me why, Lej. Tell me why I should be sorry for wanting to be in control just once.”

Lej stared at me like he had never seen me before. He blinked a few times and shook his head like a dog shaking water out of its ears.

“Actually,” I said quickly, “don’t answer that. I don’t want to hear whatever it is you have to say.”

I stood and left the kitchen, fleeing up to my room. The room this house had made me, now filled with colored pencils and ink I hadn’t even had a chance to use because I’d been so busy trying to learn something useful instead, but also crammed with odds and ends I’d gotten and made in my lessons with the others. It was a patchwork room, as confused as I was, and it hurt to look at it.