Fakespeare--Something Stinks in Hamlet

by M. E. Castle

  Kyle nodded his approval of Hamlet’s kingliness and noticed Halley doing the same. They smiled at each other. Was Halley turning into his friend? He wasn’t sure if that was more or less weird than Hamlet’s ghost father appearing to help them out. Hamlet’s talk about justice and fairness made Kyle think that maybe he hadn’t given Halley a fair shot. Maybe.

  “Furthermore,” Hamlet continued, “to honor the strange guests Kyle, Halley, and Gabe for their help, I declare them all Knights of the Order of, um, let’s see…” He scratched his head.

  “I don’t think you’d fit well in any of our knightly orders, so I’ll just make a new one. I am king, after all! I hereby decree that you are the first three Knights in the Order of the”—he looked around and his eyes settled on a guard’s spear—“the Order of the Spear.”

  “Shinystick!” Gross Gabe said, crawling up to the throne.

  “No spears,” Kyle said quickly, hopping from leg to leg. “He’s not great with sharp things.”

  “Order of the Fake Spear, then,” said Hamlet, picking up Gross Gabe. “Are there any requests I can grant you?”

  “Yes!” Kyle shouted. “You can tell me where I can finally pee. Please. Your Majesty.”

  “Go down that hall,” Hamlet said, pointing. “There’s a latrine right outside.”

  Quick as a flash, Kyle bolted down the hall … and finally found relief.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER … EXCEPT THE GHOST, WHO WAS NOT ALIVE

  When Kyle arrived back in the throne room (about a gallon lighter), he saw the guards had returned … but without Claudius.

  “We searched the castle from attic to cellar,” one of them said to Hamlet. “He’s gone.”

  “He might be in the secret passages,” Ophelia said. “We should search there, too.”

  “Actually,” Hamlet said, “why don’t we just put guards at all of the secret passage entrances? It’s not like there’s food and water in there. If that’s where he is, he won’t last long.”

  The guard nodded, turned, and left. Hamlet’s head sagged a little. The big crown almost fell off. “He probably isn’t, though. I bet he’s long gone from the castle by now.”

  Unbeknownst to them, Claudius had somehow managed to stumble upon a different, long-forgotten secret passage. A moment of inspiration had led him to it.

  “Inspiration,” Kyle whispered. “Sure. You helped him escape, didn’t you?”

  If you wish to lodge a complaint, please contact the Unsatisfactory Plot Twist Department.

  “Really? You have one of those?”

  No.

  “It’s possible he did get away,” Ophelia said. “But what matters is that he’s not the king anymore, and people know how terrible he was. If he tries to come back, we’ll be ready.”

  “You have the kingdom’s thanks for helping defeat Claudius,” Hamlet said. “I have a feeling there are more villains in store for us.”

  “Oof,” Kyle said. “I hope not. Can you take us to the library now? All I want to do is find the Narrator’s book and read the end so we can go home.”

  “I beg your pardon,” the ghost said, reappearing from nowhere. Half the people in the room yelped with shock. Kyle, inches away from where he had reappeared, fell flat on his back.

  “Oh, um, sorry,” the ghost said. “I was just hovering around a bit to make sure Claudius didn’t come back. Did I hear you mention the Narrator?”

  “Yeah,” Kyle said, wobbling back to his feet. “Why? Do you know the Narrator?”

  “Nobody does,” the ghost said, shaking his head. “But ghosts spend a lot of their time watching the living world and eavesdropping. Word is, the Get Lost Book Club is a permanent membership. Once you’re in, you’re in. I’ve heard that you can maybe get off the list if you can find the Narrator, but like I said…” He drifted off.

  Kyle let out a sigh that felt about a year long. “I’m too tired to figure this out right now. Can you at least help us get home?”

  “Yes,” the ghost said. “I’ll accompany you to the library.”

  Kyle and Halley shook hands with Hamlet and Ophelia.

  “It’s been fascinating,” Halley said. “I have so much to think about and read. There’s a lot of interesting stuff about castles and royalty and everything that I don’t know much about.”

  “True,” Kyle admitted, nodding. “As crazy and dangerous as this has been, we’ve seen a lot of new things. I guess there’s more to be found in books than I gave them credit for. All of this throne stealing and graveyards and ghosts was pretty cool.”

  “And don’t forget you saved your brother!” Halley said. “And helped Hamlet save his kingdom.”

  “We both did,” Kyle said, and Halley smiled.

  “We’re so glad that Claudius is gone,” Ophelia said. “Thank you.”

  “Visit whenever you like,” Hamlet added. “Heroes are always welcome in Denmark.”

  Kyle’s heart sent out a warm pulse. The prince had called him a hero. Maybe he was more like Mal and Cal Worthy than he had thought.

  “It’s been weird,” Kyle said. “But, you know, it felt really good to do something important and exciting. If we have to do something like this again”—he glanced at the ghost—“I hope it’s also about helping people in danger, and that we meet people as good as you two.”

  “Safe travels,” Hamlet said. Kyle picked up Gabe and followed the ghost out of the throne room.

  The main library was bigger and less cramped than Hamlet’s private library, although it felt a little colder and less friendly. The ghost led them through towering shelves to a spot near the very back and pointed to a book.

  “That one look familiar? I was hiding—I mean, doing important spirit stuff—in here earlier today and it just appeared there.”

  Kyle handed his spear to Halley and grabbed the thick, leather-bound book. Hamlet was in gold on its cover. He ran his hand over the smooth leather. The cover was dull and lifeless on the outside. He never would have expected such a wild world inside.

  “Oook! Oook!” Gabe giggled on Kyle’s hip.

  “This is it,” he said.

  “Finally,” Halley said. “Amazing how much trouble that’s caused.” She looked around. “It’s too bad we can’t browse here for a while. I bet there are some great books in this collection.”

  “Uh, hello? Snake moats and stink bombs?” Kyle said.

  Halley smiled. “Don’t worry. I want to get out of here right now as quick as we can.”

  “Good.” Kyle riffled through to the back of the book. He cleared his throat. “Ready?”

  Halley put her hand on his shoulder. “In case we get separated. I don’t want to be left behind.”

  “Okay, here goes nothing!” Kyle said, and gave Gabe a slight squeeze. He began to read: “HORATIO: Good night, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest…”

  He tried to read on, but the words blurred—and not the way they usually did in school. The ink actually blurred, as though it had been left in the rain too long.

  The book shook and twitched, doubling in size in seconds.

  Kyle dropped the book to the floor, and it got even bigger, bigger than he and Halley and Gabe combined.

  When it was so big they were in danger of being crushed into the shelves, it opened wide, and a tornado of pages erased the world around them.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  THE END?

  The fall into Kyle’s living room felt like getting spit out by a giant frog. Kyle wrapped Gabe up in his arms to cushion him and rolled through the landing. Letting his brother go, he picked himself up off the floor and took two dizzy steps.

  Kyle blinked.

  Then blinked again.

  It wasn’t until the third blink that he realized he wasn’t seeing things: Becca and her stepbrother, Sam, had just appeared in the room as well, along with their huge, clumsy dog, Rufus. Not only that, it looked like only a few minutes had passed here while hou
rs had gone by in Elsinore.

  “You made it!” Kyle and Becca said at the same time.

  “Where were you?” Sam and Halley asked, also at the same time.

  “That was crazy,” everyone said together.

  “Did you get sucked into a book, too?” asked Becca.

  “Yes! Where did your magic trap book take you?” Kyle said.

  “Right into the middle of a pizza-based civil war in an Italian town,” Becca said. “The unlikeliest love story I’ve ever seen, between this girl named Juliet and a guy named Romeo. There were tomatoes flying everywhere, and an angry swordsman with terrible cologne, and cheese theft.”

  “Whoa,” Kyle said. He gave Sam and Becca a very quick version of what had happened to them.

  “Hey, Roodly Roo!” Halley said as Rufus walked over to her. She bent down to pet his head. “I bet you had a tough time, huh, pups?”

  “He’ll probably never eat a tomato again,” Sam said.

  Kyle raised an eyebrow. He didn’t like tomatoes, but they were all right on pizza.

  “We’ll tell you all about it,” Sam said. “In fact, we should definitely, absolutely all sit down and go over whatever just happened in more detail so we can figure out what to do next.”

  Becca tapped Sam on the shoulder, and they had a conversation too quiet for Kyle to hear over Gabe’s and Rufus’s laughing and yowling as they played together on the floor.

  “Do you think what the ghost said was true?” Halley asked Kyle. “About”—she looked around, took a step closer to Kyle, and whispered—“the Narrator.”

  Kyle flinched, almost expecting a booming echo of The Narrator, the Narrator, the Narrator … to bounce around the room.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t want to find out. We know how this works now, so we should be able to avoid it.”

  “Maybe we’d better lock the books up someplace, too,” Halley said. “I won’t say that wasn’t a little exciting, but it’s not how I want every Tuesday afternoon to go.”

  “What do you mean, every Tuesday?” Kyle said.

  “Your mom didn’t tell you?” Halley said. “The meeting my mom had today is going to be a weekly thing. Maybe for a long time. And my dad’s always worked late on Tuesdays, so…”

  “Tuesday is Allosaurus, MD day…,” Kyle said. Halley’s smile faded, and he quickly finished his sentence. “… so I guess I’ll just have to record it and watch it on Wednesdays now. You’re responsible if I get any spoilers,” he said, pointing at her threateningly.

  Halley saluted. “I will guard your unspoiledness with all my might. Unless we keep getting eaten by magical books, of course.”

  Kyle smiled, and they turned back to Sam and Becca.

  “First,” Becca said, “let’s pack these books up and ship ’em back. Or bury them. Something.”

  She looked around until she saw Romeo and Juliet lying on the floor. She reached out a hand very slowly, brushing a corner of the book and then yanking her hand away. When nothing happened, she picked it up.

  “Hey,” she said, “wait a minute.…” She grasped something between her finger and thumb and pulled it out of the book. It was a piece of paper. “Ugh. Anyone else want to read this?”

  Kyle shook his head very fast.

  “I’ll do it,” Halley said, and Becca handed her the note.

  “Dear Reader,” Halley read, rolling her eyes. “I hope you enjoyed your first thrilling and educational expedition with the Get Lost Book Club. No doubt you already miss the escape our club can give you from ordinary life. Don’t worry, though. This was just the first of many adventures to come.”

  “Oh no,” Kyle said, crossing his arms. “Absolutely not. No. I’m never opening one of those old books again.”

  “I don’t know if I’ll ever open any book again,” Becca said. “What if I got nabbed by a math textbook or a train schedule?”

  “I have some great ideas for future Mal & Cal Worthy adventures, though,” Kyle said to Becca.

  “Me, too!” she replied. “If we don’t win the Storyland contest this year, we’ll definitely win it next year. But let’s talk about that after we’ve hurled these books into the sun.”

  “Yeah,” Kyle agreed. “I mean, I still want to go to Hawaii eventually, but Hamlet was pretty exciting even though I didn’t leave my living room. Not”—he quickly added—“that I ever want to get lost in a book again!”

  “I hope you’ve all been having a good time,” Mom said, walking into the living room with cinnamon-stained hands. She turned her head and saw the book lying at Kyle’s feet. “Wow, Kyle, is that Hamlet?” she said. “I didn’t realize you were studying Shakespeare. You like it?”

  Kyle and Halley locked eyes. He tried to ungrit his teeth.

  “Yeah,” Kyle said. “It was gripping.”

  “Captivating,” Halley said.

  “One of those stories you feel like you’re right in the middle of,” Becca said.

  “You can almost smell it,” Sam said.

  Mom smiled delightedly. “You three are all welcome to stay for dinner if you’d like. Mr. W. said it’ll be ready soon. He’s got a big pot of tomato soup bubbling.”

  “Erch,” Gabe said. “Wan snacksta-peez!”

  “Tomatoes aren’t so bad, Gabe,” Kyle cut in hurriedly. He’d promised his brother he’d take care of him, and that wouldn’t change just because they were out of the book. “They’ll make you grow big and strong—like me!”

  “Yum?” Gabe asked.

  “Yum,” Kyle confirmed. “Especially on things like sandwiches and pizza…”

  “Uh,” Sam said, looking slightly green in the face as he grabbed his basketball off the carpet, “I’d love to, but I have to … write that essay about, um, carpentry.”

  He began to back away. “Becca, you need that library book returned, right? I’ll grab that and run over to the library first. I bid thee—I mean, have a good night!” He made his exit as if he were being pursued by a bear.

  “More for the rest of you,” Mom said, smiling. “It should be almost ready—” She suddenly stopped talking and blinked once. “What’s that awful smell?”

  * * *

  DEAR READER,

  Well done! You’ve made it to the end with Kyle and Halley, who faced great peril and came out victorious. You helped topple a sinister tyrant, discovered the secret of a haunted castle, and let the people of Elsinore finally unclamp their noses.

  Still, questions remain. What did happen to Sam and Becca? Who is this strange Italian boy who needs so much help with his poetry? Where did Hamlet’s prince crown go?

  As with so many things, you can find those answers in a book.

  Shakespeare wrote many plays besides Hamlet. One in particular, Romeo and Juliet, may have some of the answers you need. It also has feuding families, clever sword fighters, and a lot of pizza.

  Like countless people before them, Kyle and Halley got lost in a book. And just like so many, they came to the end knowing more, thinking differently, and understanding each other—and themselves—a little better.

  Because sometimes the only way to find something new is to get lost.

  Until next time,

  * * *

  *By participating in the contest, entrant warrants and represents that his/her entry is original to the entrant, has not been previously published or won any award, and does not contain any material that would violate or infringe upon the rights of any third party, including copyrights (including, without limitation, copyrighted images or footage), trademarks, or rights of privacy or publicity.

  Please note that by entering the contest, you are also signing up for the Get Lost Book Club, founded by the most wonderful and splendid Narrator of all time.

  **Sorry, kids; the Narrator is a jerk, and this contest is not real. He would still like to read your stories, though. Please send them, along with any complaints about his treachery, to the address located in this book—if you can find it (Hint: it’s on the copyright page
, near a certain book curse).

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I have been fortunate enough in my life to not only write goofy, whimsical books as a job but to perform Shakespeare live on stage as a job as well. Of all my enthusiastically geeky interests, Shakespeare is hard to top. Stepping into a playing space and embodying characters from and for all time, speaking words committed to paper when the printing press was scarcely more than a century old and reigned as the cutting edge of idea dissemination, is an experience profound and thrilling enough that I couldn’t possibly give this sentence an ending that would do it justice.

  It was that deep fondness in my heart that led to these books, and the odd adventures of the characters within. They aren’t severe departures from Shakespearean tendencies, either. His plays are full of silly jokes and “lowbrow” humor. They are, for the most part, straightforward stories with big, easily relatable themes. And they are entirely capable of being appreciated—and understood—by young audiences. It’s my hope that the Fakespeare tales will be enjoyed both as stories in their own right and as a way to tell young readers not to be afraid of Shakespeare.

  I must thank the excellent people at Paper Lantern, in particular Kamilla Benko and Lexa Hillyer, the latter of whom helped with this project while preparing to have and subsequently caring for an entirely other tiny human, a task I can’t conceive the dauntingness of. I also extend heartfelt thanks to the good people at Macmillan, without whom you could read this book only if I printed it out, walked up, and handed it to you. My editor (and publisher of Imprint) Erin Stein, editorial assistant Nicole Otto, creative director Natalie C. Sousa, associate marketing director Kathryn Little, publicist Kelsey Marrujo, senior production manager Raymond Ernesto Colón, and production editor Ilana Worrell.

  I also want to thank those who led me down the path to Shakespeare: Woody Howard, one of my first acting teachers and the subject of this book’s dedication, and Paul Moser, whose Shakespeare acting course was the centerpiece of my acting training. I also want to toss some thanks to the good people of the Adirondack Shakespeare Company who keep hiring me to act in their productions even after getting to know me.