Between the lines

“I was thinking more along the lines of a beautiful girl, in your arms, every time the story is read. A loyal sidekick who’ll do anything for you.” Captain Crabbe hesitates. “And fantastic gums.”

“But-”

“I’m sorry, lad. But sometimes the key to happiness is just expecting a little bit less.” The pirate smiles. “That way, you’ll never be disappointed.” With a cheery wave, he heads through the trails of the forest. “Must get back to the ship. By now, Walleye and Scuttle have probably lit the galley on fire.”

As I watch him walk off, I lean against the trunk of an ancient, weathered oak. Could the captain be right? If I’d never spoken with Delilah, would I know what I was missing?

That’s it. I’m going to go sit on page 43 and wait for her to come back to me, and I’ll tell her she’s right-that this is simply impossible. That there’s no way I’m ever going to transcend the pages of this story. I’ll tell her that-

“Ooomph!” I am knocked flat on my back, and for a moment, all I can see are stars circling my face. At first I assume this is payback from the fairies, but then I hear a very clear, clipped voice behind me.

“I don’t have all day…”

I frown. That’s the line Rapscullio says on page 45, once I’ve finished climbing the rock wall and have crept through the tower window where he is imprisoning Seraphima. I overhear him, and then I leap forward with my dagger drawn.

Except this isn’t page 45.

Rolling onto my belly, I look up and spy Rapscullio, who is brandishing one of the pirates’ fishing nets, rigged in a loop at the end. Just out of his reach is a stunningly brilliant spotted butterfly.

“Now what?” he growls.

Another line. From page 58, when he’s holding his sword to my throat.

I get up, brushing dirt off my knees. “What on earth are you doing?”

Startled, he faces me-and the orange butterfly wings its way into the Enchanted Forest. “I was trying to kill two birds with one stone: practicing my lines like Frump suggested, whilst also catching a specimen of Polygonia interrogationis.”

“Gesundheit.”

“You cretin. It’s a species of butterfly,” Rapscullio says. “One which has now eluded me, thanks to your interference.”

I realize that Captain Crabbe and I have walked more of a distance than I intended, that we are actually not far from Rapscullio’s lair: a small, dark hovel built into the wall of a cave and lit with hundreds of tallow candles. I think about what Queen Maureen told me-the rows and rows of love stories on the shelves of his library. “You know,” I say slowly, “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen your entire collection. Of butterflies, I mean.”

Rapscullio’s face lights up. “Oliver! Are you a closet entomologist?”

“Me?” I say. “Yes! One hundred and ten percent!” I have no idea what an entomologist is. I am hoping desperately that I haven’t just admitted to Rapscullio that I like to bathe in garlic, or dress up in ladies’ clothing.

“Well, come along, then! One never knows how much time one will have before the book is opened again.” Rapscullio cocks his net over his shoulder and takes off through the grove at a brisk clip.

I run after him. “Do you happen to know how many species of butterflies exist?”

“But of course,” he says. “There are five hundred and sixty-one. I have a book at home with illustrations of every single one.”

“Huh.” I pretend to mull over this information. “And how many have you managed to capture, exactly?”

Is it my imagination, or do his cheeks go pink? “Well, so far, only forty-eight. But then again, I only have sixty pages in which to collect them.”

By now, we have reached the moldy wooden door of his residence. “What if I told you that you could catch the other five hundred and thirteen species?”

Rapscullio pauses, one hand on the doorknob. “You know, it’s not nice to tease.”

“I’m not, Rapscullio. I swear it.” I follow him into his lair. I’ve been here a million times, of course, but it never fails to creep me out a bit. The walls are slightly damp to the touch, and mist rises from a mossy floor. In one corner is a cluttered desk that has been fashioned out of animal bones and rotted wood. The only natural light comes through a hole cut into the rock wall of the cave, and it illuminates an easel with a large canvas propped upon it: a half-finished portrait of Queen Maureen as a young girl, the crush who-in the story-led Rapscullio into a life of evil. There are a half dozen more pictures of her scattered around the small space, as well as some of dragons breathing fire.

“Here’s the thing,” I say, shrugging off the observation. “I think there might be a portal of sorts. A way to get out of this fairy tale into the real world. And in the real world, Rapscullio, you could spend every minute of your day hunting for butterflies you can only imagine in your wildest dreams.”

“Why would I have to do that?” he says. “I can do the same thing right here.”

“But you said there were only forty-eight types-”

“So far,” Rapscullio retorts. He elbows me out of the way, his bony arm reaching behind me for a painting that I haven’t noticed. Moving aside Maureen’s half-finished face, he sets this new canvas on the easel.

It is a perfect, realistic replica of the exact room in which we are standing. In it is an easel. And on that easel is a canvas with an exact replica of this room as well. And so on and so on. In fact, it makes me a little dizzy to stare at the picture, as if a window has opened up directly in front of me.

“Wow,” I say, impressed. “Maybe you should give up the villain thing and become an artist.”

“Watch and learn, my friend,” Rapscullio says. He lifts his painter’s palette and dips a crusty brush into a splat of crimson. Then, with careful, fine strokes, he adds a glorious butterfly to the canvas, hovering just over the desk. He finishes with some yellow and black touches, then steps back to survey his handiwork. “Voila,” he says, and as I watch, the butterfly slowly evaporates off the painting.

And reappears four inches in front of my nose, before flitting out the window.

“Make that forty-nine species,” Rapscullio says.

In one of the flashbacks of the fairy tale, we learn how Rapscullio managed to get a dragon to terrorize the kingdom and kill King Maurice. Instead of chasing one down in the Hidden Highlands, where the beasts are rumored to live, he conjures one with a magical easel. Anything painted on the canvas would peel itself free, just as three-dimensional and alive as the rest of us.

I can’t believe I’d forgotten that.

“Hang on,” I say, flabbergasted. “You can create anything you want just by painting it-even when the story isn’t being read?”

In reply, he picks up another paintbrush and sketches a steaming mug onto the desk in the painting. It immediately appears in his hand. “Some tea?” he offers.

“Rapscullio, this is huge. This is bigger than huge. You can actually put anything you want into this story?”

“So it seems,” he says. “I don’t know why it works when the story isn’t in play. Or why I can draw something other than Pyro into existence. But I must admit it’s been rather handy.”

“Do you ever paint anything other than butterflies?”

Rapscullio looks down, sheepish. “Last week I had the most intense craving for chocolate-covered gooseberries, and I painted a bowl of them and ate until I thought I was going to explode.”

“If you can paint something into the story,” I say slowly, thinking, “can you paint something out of it?”

He opens his mouth to reply, but before he does, we hear Frump’s frantic voice, as if on loudspeaker:

Places, everyone! Book is opening! We have light along the seam, people! And remember, make this performance award-worthy!

And then, all of a sudden, I am falling backward and tumbling head over heels, until I land, catlike, clinging to a sheer rock wall on page 43.