ArchEnemy (18 page)

“I need to ask you something . . . personal,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to for some time.”

“Dodge.”

But he was on his feet, an AD52 in each hand and aimed past her as a figure stepped from the brambles, a figure Alyss recognized as one of Redd’s assassins by the spike-tipped whip coiled at his hip.

Oxford, England. 1875.

 

 

O
N UNSEASONABLY warm, sunny days, streets from Longwell to Mill, Thames to St. Giles, filled with open carriages bearing leisurely men and women, with bicyclists and strollers and window-shoppers; the green expanses of Christ Church Meadow, Merton Field, and Magellan Grove crowded with picnickers, footballers, cricket players, and countless others. Revelers in nature, enthusiasts of every manner of outdoor activity—all emerged from the confines of four walls and a roof to partake of
al fresco
pleasures. But on one unseasonably fine day in 1875, along with this variegated lot, a certain trio were enticed to a certain sycamore tree on High Street between All Souls and Queen’s College, though not by the sun and breeze, nor by the tree itself, however closely Reverend Dodgson seemed to study its bark.

“It’s not that I doubt the validity of w-what you’ve told me
in toto
,” the reverend explained to Hatter and Molly, “so much as . . . as there is a point or two that could use c-c-clarification, the foremost of which . . . if Alyss is in Wonderland, housed in a prison or some such, how do you explain
her
.”

Dodgson poked his head around the tree and with a darting bird-like jerk of the neck indicated a group of ladies congregating before a tea shop. The ladies were similarly dressed in ankle-length skirts, in flouncy blouses ruffling out at cuffs and collar from beneath short-waisted jackets, yet Hatter and Molly instantly recognized one of them as Wonderland’s queen.

“That’s Alice Liddell,” Dodgson said, noting their reactions, “the same young lady who told me of her Wonderland trials so many years ago.”

“Not the same,” Hatter said, catching his daughter’s eye.

“It is, I t-tell you,” the reverend sputtered. “She’s no longer as young as she was, of course. N-none of us is.”

How to explain to this timid, squeamish fellow the aftermath of Redd Heart’s leap into the Heart Crystal? How to describe in believable detail the post-battle lull inside Mount Isolation, with Hatter, Molly, Bibwit, Dodge, General Doppelgänger, the white knight and the white rook as witnesses to Alyss’ immediate assumption of Wonderland’s crown? Could Reverend Dodgson, already beyond the limits of what he’d grown up believing, credit an account of Bibwit Harte suggesting that Alyss conjure a double of herself to occupy her place in the Liddell family—the place she’d rightly vacated to be Wonderland’s sovereign? Would the reverend empathize with Alyss’ self-doubt as she questioned whether her powers were strong enough to birth a double even as she reached out to the Heart Crystal with both arms and—
popzzzzlllpipipopzzzx!
—caused the room to disappear in a wash of light?

It was an unprecedented feat—the conjuring of a live, independent being—but Hatter had never doubted the queen’s ability to perform it, though he was only now seeing the result: a young woman in front of a High Street tea shop who’d never been anyone other than Alice Liddell. And if it was strange for the Milliner and his daughter to palpably confront the existence of this Alyss/not-Alyss, it was quadruply so for Charles Dodgson who, hearing from Hatter how this Alyss/not-Alyss had come to be, kept shaking his head and exclaiming, “It’s too much. Too much.” He was not, however, left to feel his dismay for long.

“It’s my duty to return to Wonderland,” Hatter said. “Molly will stay with you.”

The girl started.

“What?” the reverend protested. “N-no, please, it’s highly improper she should stay with me. Highly improper. If people were to find out—”

“Don’t let them. But I have to do all I can to help my queen.”

Dodgson continued to plead. Silent, Molly glared at nothing. And Hatter didn’t say what he was thinking: that if he gave his life in Alyss Heart’s service, which he was prepared to do, he would not be back.

“Molly will stay with you,” he’d said, as if it was his decision and he could tell her what to do. She’d spent her whole life without a father and now he thought he could make up for the years he hadn’t been around? What a joke. Did he really believe that in his absence she would answer to Dodgson? Because she didn’t have to answer to
anybody
. She’d do whatever she wanted. No one could tell her what to do.

“I’m not abandoning you,” Hatter said, leading her several paces away from Dodgson for privacy.

“I don’t have to do as you say. I didn’t even want to come here and now you think you can leave me with
him
,” Molly gestured at Dodgson, “while you go back?”

“But you’re not . . .” Hatter picked his words with care, “. . . yourself.”

“How would
you
know?”

The Milliner’s hand twitched toward his top hat, as it would to ward off a physical threat, then fell to his side. “You act as if you’re the only one grieving the loss of your mother,” he said quietly. “I’ve seen how you’d rather mope and feel sorry for yourself than wield Milliner blades with the skill I know you have. And since I don’t know the extent of the dangers I face by returning to Wonderland, it’s best you stay.”

There he went again, making pronouncements on what was allegedly best for her! She hated him twice over—for belatedly trying to play father and also for making her hate him, because to be overcome by any emotion, especially a negative one, was un-Milliner-like and reminded her that she was a halfer.

“Why don’t you keep alert for anything you think will benefit Queen Alyss,” Hatter suggested, “no matter how far-fetched it seems? When we don’t know what’s important, we should assume everything is.”

She wasn’t dumb. He was trying to give her something to do, treating her as if she were a child playing at being an adult, and she felt the familiar sting of wounded pride. Which was weird, since she didn’t want or believe she deserved any position of importance or responsibility—not as the queen’s bodyguard, a Milliner, whatever. Even weirder: She was starting to wonder if she might make up for the trauma she’d caused. Not erase her mistake from collective memory but balance it with a feat of immense good or—

Stupid, stupid, stupid. How could anything in Reverend Dodgson’s world benefit Alyss Heart?

“I’ll run off,” she said. “I won’t stay. You can’t make me.”

Hatter’s eyes grew moist. His chest rose and fell. “No, Molly,” he said finally, “I can’t make you do anything you don’t want to do. I’m
asking
you to stay with Mr. Dodgson. When I come back—which will be soon, I promise—we’ll return to Wonderland together and you can hear from Queen Alyss personally that she’ll accept no one but you as her bodyguard.”

Molly folded her arms tightly against her chest, felt the unyielding bulk of her mother’s notebooks in her coat’s inside pocket. Her mother had loved this man. She would do it for her mother, would honor the ties of family and abide by Hatter as a daughter should. At least for a little while.

She felt Hatter’s kiss in retrospect, so preoccupied with her thoughts that she registered the brief press of his lips to her cheek only after he was disappearing into the High Street crowds.

Picking at the sycamore’s bark, Dodgson glanced uneasily at her, as if to say,
Well, here we are.
He was no more than ten meters from her, though it might as well have been a hundred million for all Molly felt.

M
R. VAN de Skülle stepped from the brambles, his hands raised in surrender and his face impassive as Dodge’s AD52s took aim and—

“No!” Alyss cried.

Razor-cards spun and sliced the air.
Fith-fith-fith-fith-fith!
Mr. Van de Skülle made no move to avoid them, and just when he should have felt the stinging cut of steel—

The razor-cards parted to either side of him, shooting off into the jungle to his left and right, leaving him unharmed.

“What’re you doing?” Dodge asked Alyss.

Mr. Van de Skülle didn’t reach for his whip, made no move of aggression whatsoever. Dodge again pressed the triggers of his AD52s but the weapons were jammed. His voice rose in frustration.

“Why’re you doing this?”

Before Alyss could answer, Mr. Van de Skülle said to her, “As a show of faith, Her Imperial Viciousness has sent me to be of what service I can to you.”

Dodge whirled, his AD52s still trained on the assassin. “Show of faith?”

“Show of
what
faith? What’s he talking about?”

“Redd and I have an agreement,” Alyss heard herself say.

Dodge’s reaction pierced her as painfully as any blade: The AD52s lolled loose in his hands, too heavy to aim, and he kept shaking his head, the skin at the corners of his eyes tight with incomprehension, disbelief, mounting rage.

She hadn’t even begun to explain but already it felt like a confession. Still, she
would
explain—the how and why of her pact with Redd, the tenuous bond created by a mutual enemy. She would explain and hope that Dodge’s love for her was stronger than the resentment he would undoubtedly feel.

Dodge crouched on the opposite side of the clearing, as far from Alyss as he could be while still keeping an eye on the assassin who stood between them, waiting for something to happen.

It felt like duplicity—not just that Alyss had “partnered” with Redd, but that she hadn’t discussed it with him first. A queen didn’t have to subject her doings to anyone for approval, let alone the head of her palace guard, but shouldn’t she have
wanted
to talk it over with him? Wasn’t that partly what it meant to be in love—that two people told each other everything, confiding without reserve or embarrassment their dreams, doubts, fears, plans, ambitions? Didn’t being in love mean there was no need of secrets? Alyss had assumed the worst of him: that wanting to avenge his father’s death, he wouldn’t be able to clearly judge the strategic value of Redd’s cooperation. And just when he’d made up his mind to propose!

He sensed Alyss’ solicitous glances from across the clearing but stared into the jungle, pretending not to notice. If he couldn’t fight Alyss, he could definitely fight Mr. Skull or whatever the man’s name was. He could send the lowlife limping back to Redd to let her know what
he
thought of her deal with Alyss. But . . . wait a gwormmy-blink. Maybe he was thinking about this all wrong. He’d been counting on a larger battle against Redd Heart’s army, a battle in which he would seek a one-on-one confrontation with The Cat, but that was no longer a possibility. Maybe this new connection with Redd was his best opportunity for revenge against his father’s executioner. No matter how briefly or precariously Alyss and Redd were banded together, so long as they were in league to dethrone Arch, wasn’t he more likely than not to have dealings with the slobbering feline?

Alyss had kept a secret from him, he would keep one from her.

He would pretend to accept the new arrangement between aunt and niece. No, he’d do more than that—he’d
encourage
ever greater cooperation between them, to better ensure himself of a run-in with The Cat. He’d continue to work toward overthrowing Arch and reinstating White Imagination to its supreme position in the queendom, in the course of which he’d just happen to take The Cat’s last life.

He rose to his feet and crossed the clearing. “I don’t like it, but it’s the right thing to do,” he said to Alyss. “But you already knew that.”

“She’s agreed not to risk imagination with an attack against Arch.”

Dodge turned a doubtful, appraising eye on Mr. Van de Skülle. “What makes Redd think you can be of service here with us instead of with her?”