“Got you!” Alyss shouted, and ran away.
The gwormmy prank hadn’t been nice, not nice in the least, but Bibwit was willing to forgive. Alyss was young, she needed to be taught. She might remind him of Redd in certain things, but he was confident that she wouldn’t grow up to be like her. He wouldn’t let it happen. Besides, he couldn’t blame Alyss for needing to occupy herself somehow. There were hardly any children her age at the palace.
He cast a last gaze about the gardens. The blue caterpillar had slithered off somewhere. Frog, the palace’s internal messenger, was hopping about in his finest clothes, no doubt longing for some guest to entrust him with a message for another guest. Generals Doppel and Ganger were again in one body and they, or rather he, General Doppelganger, was conversing with Sir Justice Anders, head of the palace guardsmen. Hatter Madigan, following the queen like a protective shadow, remained as unexpressive as ever.
Bibwit retired to the library, where picture books from Alyss’ earliest youth sat on shelves next to a ten-volume chronicle of the civil war, written from various points of view-the card soldiers who’d
fought on the front lines; members of the chessmen militia; General Doppelganger and his sergeants; even Queen Genevieve herself. It came complete with lists of those killed in each of the battles and explanations of the strategies that had called for the sacrifice of Wonderlander lives. Bibwit took down the first volume of the chronicle and set it with the other books and papers he’d collected for Alyss’ lessons. The book contained a catalog of atrocities committed by Redd-torture, the slaughtering of
prisoners, mass graves. The tutor had always viewed Redd’s fall into the diabolical as his fault, a failure in her education.
“It’s never too soon for a future queen to become familiar with the uglier contingencies of ruling a land,”
he said to himself.
CHAPTER 4
K ING NOLAN and his men left Outerwilderbeastia behind. They passed through a narrow stretch of the Everlasting Forest and were stampeding through the eastern edge of Wondertropolis, the most rural area of the capital, home to farmers and those favoring the quiet country life, when their spirit-danes stopped and reared up on their hind legs, agitated. Speckled across the tranquil landscape, looking harmless, and partly camouflaged by the day’s lengthening shadows, were Redd’s undealt card soldiers, lying flat one on top of another, each deck fifty-two soldiers thick, awaiting orders.
“Redd’s decks are stacked.”
So whatever King Arch decided, it would no longer matter; Wonderland didn’t have the luxury of waiting for his answer.
“We have to warn the palace,” said King Nolan.
One of his men removed a looking glass communicator from his saddlebag and began tapping out a coded message on its keyboard. If the soldier had had time to hit the Send button, his message would have appeared on a crystal viewer in the Security Oversight Room of Heart Palace. But with a sound akin to the metal blades of scissors rapidly opening and closing, an unseen deck hidden in nearby underbrush fanned out and surrounded the king and his men. The air filled with adrenaline-induced war cries from Redd’s soldiers, agony-infused moans from the throats of King Nolan’s men. The looking glass communicator fell against a rock and shattered, its owner dead before the device hit the ground.
The Wonderlanders were outnumbered five to one. At the center of the skirmish, slashing his sword this way and that, was King Nolan, still atop his trusted spirit-dane when a figure in a scarlet cloak passed through the fighting, untouched, and stabbed him through the heart with her pointed scepter.
“My queen…” he moaned, slumping into death, blood leaking from the corners of his mouth. “My queen…”
G OT HIM, I got him, I got him! A laughing Alyss left Bibwit Harte frowning at the half-eaten gwormmies in his hand and ran into the palace’s Issa Room, where (finally!) she found Dodge Anders standing to attention, waiting for her. He looked as if he would have waited for her all his life, if necessary.
“I was wondering where you were,” she said, breathless. “I thought you were ignoring me.” “I had to get you a present, didn’t I? Why’re you running?”
“No reason.”
“Uh-huh.” Dodge knew she must have been up to something, she was always up to something, but he let it go. He handed her a small box tied with red ribbon and bowed. “Happy birthday, Princess.”
“Cut it out.”
Alyss didn’t like her best friend bowing to her and he knew it. Hadn’t she told him so countless times,
saying she didn’t care if he was a commoner, she just didn’t want him doing it? He was her elder by three years and four months. Did he like bowing to a younger girl? And what was so bad, or lowly, about
being a commoner anyway? It gave Dodge the freedom to venture out beyond the palace grounds, and Alyss wouldn’t have minded that. For all her rebellion and free spirit, she had never been outside the luxurious confines of Heart Palace.
She opened the present and stared down at a gleaming, sharp, triangular-shaped tooth resting on a bed of puff.
“Jabberwock tooth,” Dodge said.
“You didn’t kill the beast yourself, I hope?”
Jabberwocky were huge, ferocious creatures living in the Volcanic Plains-a land of active volcanoes, lava rivers, and geysers of noxious gas, extremely dangerous for any Wonderlander to enter. But you never could tell what Dodge might do. Ever since the age of three, when he toddled into the coat of his father’s guardsman uniform and saluted, the direction of his life had been known. Dodge wanted nothing more than to be like his father, Sir Justice Anders, who had distinguished himself with his bravery in the civil war and been awarded his current position by the queen herself. Dodge now stood before Alyss in his own guardsman uniform, complete with fleur-de-lis badge.
“No, I didn’t kill the jabberwock,” he said. “I bought that in a shop.” “I’ll keep it forever,” Alyss said.
She slipped the tooth onto her necklace. She had grown up with Dodge, couldn’t remember a time in her life when he hadn’t been her partner in adventure. By her bed, she kept a holographic crystal that
showed him, at four years old, kissing her cheek as she sat in her royal baby carriage. Officers of the court stood frowning in the background. What their problem was, Alyss never understood, but she cherished the crystal all the same.
Dodge became embarrassed whenever she showed it to him, so she showed it to him often. He knew why the court officers were frowning: the importance of class distinctions, of consorting with your own kind. Alyss might not care about such stuff, but Sir Justice had explained the situation to his son and Dodge understood that part of being a successful guardsman meant abiding by what was considered proper, by not allowing his affections for anybody-especially Alyss-to compromise his duty.
“You can never marry the princess, Dodge,” Sir Justice had explained, sympathetic, even a little proud that the princess had taken a liking to his son. “She will one day be your queen. You can show your affection by serving her to the best of your ability, but she has to marry someone from a suit family, and Jack of Diamonds is the only boy of proper rank close to her age. I’m sorry, Dodge, but you and the princess…it’s not in the cards.”
“I understand, Father.” But this had been only half true; Dodge’s head understood, his heart did not. “Don’t you have to practice any military exercises?” Alyss asked now.