THE RULES

Andrea shot upright, half expecting to wake in her room. That Margaret Grace, the lights of Reverie, the strange leather pouch would have all been a bizarre dream, even though she had pinched herself outside the circus gates. But the hammock surged to one side, forcing Andrea to grasp at its golden braided edges. She gripped them tightly until the swaying slowed to a stop. Once stilled, Andrea reached up toward her eyes, which watered and stung like something sat stuck inside them. An eyelash, a piece of dust . . .

Grains of silver sand.

Andrea rubbed at her eyes, fast and hard, until the few remaining grains fell out and dropped to the forest floor. It had definitely, actually happened. She was really here.

In those brief, fleeting moments between the sleeping world and the world of the awake, Andrea could still feel the fragments of the memory she had lost as the price of her admission. It was less a feeling of an existing thing than an awareness that something was gone. A hole lived inside her now that she couldn’t quite account for, as if she’d lost a piece of a puzzle to a dark and dusty corner. According to Margaret Grace, whatever she had lost would be used for Reverie, become a dream tent that children could experience if they so chose.

Andrea swung her legs over the side of the hammock and found the ground with her feet, lighter than before, like gravity bound her a bit less tightly to the earth. She shook her head, flinging off the grogginess that stuck to her mind like a crawling fog until her gaze landed on a leather pocket nailed to one of the birch trees nearby.

A piece of parchment rested inside it, which glowed, slightly, in the light of the full moon. Andrea snatched it from the pouch.

Printed in deep blue ink, the ticket read:

Admission to Reverie

“Land of Dreams”

One Night Only

Paid in Full

Her ticket to Reverie.

She had done it. She had earned her ticket inside.

Andrea lifted her face toward the noise up ahead and marched to the ticket booth.

“Welcome to Reverie,” Margaret Grace said, her eyes gleaming. She held out her palm. “Ticket, please.”

Andrea handed over her ticket. Margaret Grace looked it over with approving, hungry eyes, then tucked it somewhere under the counter and folded her hands over the edge of the opening in the booth.

“There are a few rules that you must agree to before entering Reverie,” she said. “Nothing too alarming, but make sure you pay attention and follow them for the ultimate Reverie experience. One,” she held up a single finger. “Reverie is a land of dreams. It is very important that you remember that. Sometimes dreams can feel very real. Two,” she held up a second finger. “The dreams are what they are; they’re already in place. Don’t go thinking you can change what happens in them, because you can’t. Think of them like a ride at a theme park. In some dreams you have choices, but you’re always following a track. You follow the track, you’ll find the exit. Three,” a third finger joined the other two. “Whatever you do, don’t stay too long in a nightmare. And, lastly,” she added a fourth and final finger. “Don’t try to remember the dream you gave up for admission without going through its tent.”

“Why not?” Andrea asked, confused. “And what do you mean about the nightmares?”

Margaret Grace offered Andrea a reassuring smile. “It’s the rules, darling, and dreams can be tricky. Nightmares can be fun, but if you stay too long inside one, or try to remember the price of admission you just paid without going through the tent it turned into, it can cause your mind to react in some strange, strange ways. Things get rather . . . confusing, and nothing good can ever come of that. Of course, nightmares can also be fun, but if you’re in one, make sure you get out quickly. And if you want to remember what you gave up to enter, simply find the tent and go in.”

“I won’t break the rules,” Andrea said, trying to keep her voice steady. She was sure she wouldn’t want to end up in any nightmares if she could help it, and she was even more certain she would have no reason to remember whatever she had been so eager to forget.

“Wonderful.” Margaret Grace beamed. “Then just sign the waiver.” She held out a clipboard with a gaudy feather pen attached by a string. “This says that you’ve heard the rules and understand it’s your responsibility to follow them. And that it isn’t our fault if you make a mistake.”

Andrea signed her name without hesitation.

Margaret Grace looked over Andrea’s signature approvingly. “Now then, I think it’s time, don’t you?”

Andrea nodded, her eyes wide and her heart yearning to immerse itself in the promises of a night of escape.

Margaret Grace hopped out of the booth, and both girls walked with purposeful strides toward Reverie’s gate, stopping next to a wide metal lever stuck into the earth.

“Welcome to Reverie,” Margaret Grace said as she pulled back the lever. Andrea watched as Reverie’s impressive gates opened with a giant creak.

The warmth and buzz and delicious aromas of Reverie wound around Andrea and seeped through her lungs and the pores of her skin, filling her from the inside out as she entered into its glow, one hopeful step at a time.