Festival of Shadows (28 page)

“You think?” Theo asked, rummaging through the bag. “There are a ton of coins in this purse, and they’re all marked differently.”

“A thank-you would be nice. You’re as ungrateful as a toddler.”

“But how am I going to get inside the castle?” Theo asked.

“Give me some time to investigate. I’ll meet you at the festival. And Theo—don’t forget your part of the deal. I’m putting a great amount of trust in you. Don’t screw it up!”

Theo tied the coin purse and harrumphed.
 

Jiskyl leaned on his cane and gazed over the valley pensively as Theo, Lucinda, and Gasket headed back down the trail.
 

CHAPTER COMPLETE!

~ Continue.

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Jiskyl walked over to a desk and pulled out one of the drawers. It was full of glowing, magical items.
 

“Jiskyl!” Lucinda cried. “Please tell me you didn’t steal those from the castle.”

The old fish laughed impishly. “Why do you think my magic is so strong, my dear? Besides, if Stratus wanted to kill me, he would have done it by now. Now, what was I looking for? No, not a magic wand. Too typical. A crystal? No, too obscure. Aha!”

He pulled out a small coin bag. It jingled and jangled when he shook it. He opened it, and a white light lit up his face. He removed a glowing coin with a star embossed on it. “Take this. You can have the whole bag. You’ll need it later, but don’t go running off to the castle just yet. I still have to develop a plan.
But I’m quite forgetful, Theo, so just remember that the
Star Coin
is the one that you’re going to need.”

“But how am I going to get inside?” Theo asked.

“The sewers. But I don’t know if they’re still open. Give me some time to investigate. I’ll meet you at the festival. And Theo—don’t forget your part of the deal. I’m putting a great amount of trust in you. Don’t screw it up!”

Theo tied the coin purse and harrumphed.
 

Jiskyl leaned on his cane and gazed over the valley pensively as Theo, Lucinda, and Gasket headed back down the trail.
 

CHAPTER COMPLETE!

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CHAPTER 6

Wag the Dog

When they returned to the festival grounds, Theo spent half an hour pitching a tent. He couldn’t stop thinking about Jiskyl; he resented the way the old fish had treated him.
 

He spoke to me like I was an immature brat. I’m not your average toy. I don’t care about this festival. Saving Grant is more important. Why can’t he understand that a boy’s life is more important than any toy’s need?

He glanced around the festival grounds, where everyone was working hard. Heinrich plugged in a cable and lit up the midway, and everyone cheered. He flexed his muscles and shouted, “We’re almost done!”

Bethany clapped and caught Theo’s eye. She motioned for him to come over and celebrate with them, but he kept pitching the tent.

“Aw, c’mon, buddy. We couldn’t have done this without ya!”

“You are an eternal friend of our festival,” Heinrich said.

Theo ignored them and hammered in another nail.
 

I don’t belong here. They’re nice toys, but I’m not here to make friends. An Ursabrand cannot become attached to anything other than his owner. I can save Grant without their help. Now that I’ve got the Whatsamadoozle, I’m unstoppable. I don’t need that old fish. Or Lucinda.
 

The toys moved to another area, out of sight, and his thoughts raced. He kicked a nail and decided that he didn’t want to be at the festival anymore; he didn’t want to be near the caravan. As nice as they were, every minute he spent with them diminished his chance of rescuing Grant. He felt bad, but he had learned how to hide his emotions—an Ursabrand had to. He accepted that sometimes, in order to protect the ones you love, you had to push friends away. The same thing had happened with Grant’s other toys at home; they hardly spoke to him anymore. It was sad, but loneliness was the price that he gladly paid for Grant’s life.
 

Theo took to the shadows, and he had almost sneaked away for good when Shaggy stopped him.
 

The dog stood looking at him with his head cocked. “You’re leaving?”

“It’s nothing personal, Shaggy.”

Shaggy trotted up to him. “Pardon my interruption, Theo. But I have information that you will find valuable. It’s about the castle.” He wagged his tail and led Theo behind a wagon. When they were in the safety of shadows, with the moonlight between them, Shaggy spoke in his robotic voice.
 

“You want to get into the castle, right?” he asked.

Theo nodded.
 

“There’s an entrance that no one knows about. I was passing through the Dream Marshes many years ago, and I got lost and ended up at the castle wall. There was a big crack in it, and it led to the courtyard. I still have the location programmed in my GPS coordinates, and I can take you there.”

“Why are you helping me?” Theo asked.

“I want revenge against Stratus, too. He took my owner, Gregory, and I want to save him. It’s why I kept the location in my memory.” He circled Theo, wagging his tail wildly. “You’re the only toy I’ve ever met in the Stratusphere who has courage. I know that you can defeat Stratus and save us all.”

“It’s about time someone recognized my ability,” Theo said.

“What do you say? Let’s get out of here and have a real adventure.”

“How much time will it take?”

“We can make it to the castle before the moon changes.”

“That should give me plenty of time to defeat Stratus.”

He thought of Jiskyl and Lucinda again, and anger bubbled in his stomach. He sheathed the Whatsamadoozle and followed Shaggy away from the festival.

They stood on the edge of a vast wetland that stretched for a great distance until it reached the castle. The air was sultry, with smoke rising out of turbid pink, purple, and green pools.
 

“So these are the Dream Marshes,” Theo said. “Why do they look so different from the rest of the Stratusphere?”

“They’re the source of Stratus’s power,” Shaggy said. “It’s where he stores all of his nightmares.”

“This looks dangerous, Shaggy.”
 

“It’s only dangerous if you don’t know where you’re going,” Shaggy said, sniffing the air.
 

Theo followed Shaggy in, and they trudged through the marsh for a while. The pools of water bubbled and popped as they passed.
 

“Why are they bubbling?” Theo asked.

“It happens as travelers pass,” Shaggy said. “Try not to think too much. The water can sense your mood and reflect your memories.”

Theo looked around him and felt unsettled. He stayed close to Shaggy, who kept moving, guided by his GPS.

Unwittingly, Theo stepped into a pink puddle, and the marsh swirled around him.
 

 
Shaggy was gone.
 

“Shaggy!” he cried, but there was no response.

Theo ran and ran. He thought he saw Shaggy ahead and hurried toward him. But then Shaggy was farther away.
 

“Shaggy!” he called.

“Theo!” Shaggy called back. “Where are you?”

Theo saw Shaggy again, swirling in the distance. When he finally caught up to him, the dog was standing near a green pool.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Theo said. He stumbled, and the marsh swirled around him again.

A wooden cage fell out of the sky and landed over Theo. Everything stopped swirling, and Theo saw Shaggy floating in front of the cage; his legs had turned into hover jets and his eyes pulsed violently.
 

“Get me out of here,” Theo said. He put his hands around the cage bars, but he couldn’t escape.

“Silly bear. You should never have followed me in here.”

Theo’s eyes widened. “You betrayed me.”

“Stratus will reward me,” Shaggy said, sticking out his tongue. “I’ll be his number one toy now.”

“Why are you working for him? He’ll just use you.”

Shaggy sped around the cage, laughing. Theo circled the cage in reverse. He didn’t dare turn his back to the dog.

“My dream is to rule a town one day.”
 

“But what about your owner?”

Shaggy shrugged. “He probably died a long time ago. It’s of no importance to me.”

“The caravan—they trusted you.”

“And now I can prove that they’ve conspired with you to overthrow Stratus. Soon, my allies will invade the festival grounds and detain them. They will die agonizing deaths, and it will be glorious.”

The Whatsamadoozle had fallen out of Theo’s sheath when
 
the cage fell over him, and it was lying on the ground near him. He inched toward it.
 

“Why won’t you join us?” Shaggy said. “You could rank even higher than me, Theo. You could have your own entourage, your own city, your own life back. No children to obey, no parents to worry about, no pets to chew on your parts at night. This is all Stratus wants for you. If you could only—”

Theo snatched the Whatsamadoozle, turned it into a buzz saw, and cut his way out of the cage. Then he shifted it into a battering ram and smashed into Shaggy, knocking him into a nearby puddle of nightmares.
 

“No!” Shaggy cried.
 

Theo turned the Whatsamadoozle into a golden sword and prepared to strike. “You betrayed me, and now you’ll face the consequence of your actions.”

Shaggy growled. He hovered into the air, and his body began to glow. A door on each of his shoulder pads opened, and he shot two fiery missiles at Theo. Theo jumped out of the way, and the missiles exploded against the ground.
 

A fan descended from Shaggy’s stomach and blew marsh water into Theo’s face.

“Marsh water won’t defeat me,” Theo said, running at Shaggy. But after a few steps, a strange feeling seized him and he lost all sense of direction. His head throbbed so badly that he dropped the sword.
 

“It’s not just water.” Shaggy disappeared, and suddenly Theo was in a factory where many hooks hung above him. Pistons were pumping, saws grinding, vats bubbling. Conveyor belts crisscrossed the room. Overhead, the moon shone through a skylight.
 

Shawn was sitting on a conveyor belt. He wore his red hoodie, with the hood over his head.
 

“Shawn?” Theo ran toward him. As he got closer, he realized that Shawn was moving across the room. He was crying, his tears pooling underneath him on the conveyor belt.
 

“Hold on, buddy,” Theo said, but then he saw Shawn again—this time on another belt. This Shawn was quiet, sitting with his hands in his pockets and his knees tucked against his chest.
 

“Two Shawns?” Theo said, stopping.

Another Shawn passed by on a different conveyor belt; this one was screaming hysterically, as if he were being tortured by an unseen ghost. The screams hurt Theo and he didn’t know what to do.
 

I can’t think straight. This can’t be real . . . I have to save him!

Before Theo could react again, he saw Shaggy hovering on a catwalk above. Shaggy pulled a lever, and the conveyor belts sped up—running toward a metal mouth in the wall that chomped incessantly.
Each conveyor belt moved at exactly the same speed, and it appeared that each Shawn would enter the mouth at the same time.
 

“Shawn is going to die,” Shaggy said. “You better save him—if you can pick the right one, that is.” The conveyor belts picked up speed.
 

“No!” Theo cried.
 

Theo saved:

~ Crying Shawn.
 

~ Quiet Shawn.
 

~ Screaming Shawn.
 

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