Chapter One: A Much Madder Hatter

The soft knock on the door sends the room’s occupant into a frenzy of activity.
 

“Oh! Oh, you’ve arrived! At last. Come in, come in!”
 

A tea cup is inspected for dust and other unsightly blemishes before being set down once again on its saucer. It wobbles precariously before sliding into its niche safely. By that time, however, two pieces of silver have been polished on a slightly wrinkled waistcoat, the tea ball – minus the necessary tea – has begun to steep ineffectually in the tepid water of the blue teapot, and the plate of cucumber sandwiches has been turned over to prevent anyone from attempting to eat them now that they’ve been aged in the open air for several hours.
 

“Don’t dawdle by the door! The tea is ready! Long past ready! Although I... well, that’s not to say you’re late... No, no, I wouldn’t say you’re late, but I am so very glad you’ve come! Sit down! Sit down!”
 

The man in the room hurriedly strides toward the open door and gestures as if waiting for a lady’s hand to be presented to him. He then mimes guiding her, his invisible guest, to the table. A chair is pulled out and then gently pushed in.
 

“It’s been so very long since we’ve had tea, hasn’t it, Alice? Would you like a scone? No, no, not one of those.” The offending pastry is thrown in the general direction of the bay window, but bounces against the curtain, releasing a puff of dust.
 

“Let us see... How about a cake? Here, I know I have a very nice slice of lemon cake here for you... Ah, finally!” The slice hovers over an empty plate for a moment.
 

The man tilts his head to the side as if listening to his guest. “What was that? No cake?” The serving ware trembles in his pale hands and the slice plops down upon the pristine tablecloth. With a flick of his wrists, the gleaming utensils are tossed over his shoulder, clattering against the wall, and a tray of fruit is slammed down on top of the fallen slice of cake, obliterating it.
 

“Very well, very well,” the man continues in a calm tone, taking his seat. “Are you quite comfortable with your teaspoon?” he asks seriously and seems to listen quite intently to the reply.
 

He steeples his fingers and leans toward the chair opposite. His bushy red brows draw together over green eyes that nearly glow with their intensity.
 

“Alice,” he begins, and the tone of his voice is significant, his lisp endearing, “why is a raven like a writing desk?”
 

Standing in the doorway to her beloved Hatter’s rooms, Mirana, the White Queen of Underland, closes her eyes and turns away from the scene: nothing has changed. Every week she stops by his apartment in the castle to see how he’s getting on and every week his delusions grow more and more elaborate. She knows what comes next – she’s heard it dozens of times before – but she flinches nonetheless.
 

“You must speak louder, Alice, I cannae hear ye...” the Hatter murmurs softly, his Outlandish brogue thickening the words and deepening his voice.
 

And then more forcefully: “I wi’nae speak teh a figment o’ yer imagination!”
 

And finally: “What things have ye finished, ALICE?! WHA’ NEC‘SSARY DUTIES HAVE YE DISAPPEARED TEH?! YE‘LL FINISH YER TEA AFORE YE TRY THAT UPELKUCHEN!! WHY MUST YE INSIST ON BEIN’ TAE SMALL ‘R TAE TALL FER TH’ TEA SERVICE, ALICE?!”
 

Mirana flinches as the teapot with its empty tea ball and tepid water crashes against the wall just an arm’s length from her face. The Hatter leaps upon the table, stomping the overturned plate of cucumber sandwiches with his boot.
 

The first dozen times she’d seen this particular opera, Mirana had tried to reason with him, calm him, bring him back to the here and now in Underland. And, the first dozen times, it had worked.
 

However, interrupting his teatime delusions have not been possible for some time now.
 

Now she knows there is no comfort she can give her very dear old friend that he will accept. No, only one person can reach him. The one person he has been waiting for ever since she’d drunk the blood of the Jabberwocky and disappeared from the checkered battlefield.
 

Mirana closes the door behind her. And barely a moment later, a teacup – or some other piece of china – explodes against it. For months, Tarrant Hightopp has been waiting for his dearest Alice to return as she’d promised. For months, he’s been hosting these lonely, weekly tea parties before destroying the contents of his parlor. For months, the Queen of Underland has merely watched and waited for a single promise to be kept.
 

But no longer.
 

To the casual observer, Mirana seems to wander gracefully through the castle, in the general direction of her office, but actually, the queen is quite intent on her destination. She drifts into the room and, pivoting neatly, closes the door behind her. She considers the calendar on the far wall and sighs. Mirana had hoped to give her dearest Champion a bit more time to return to Underland on her own. After all, there is still time, a bit of time before she will be required to attend to her duties.
 

However...
 

The sound of broken glass startles her. Hand fluttering over her heart, Mirana glances outside in time to see a small tea table, draped in a white tablecloth, with a good half of the surviving tea service and silverware settings, crash to her balcony.
 

Perhaps she shouldn’t have offered Tarrant the room above her study after all...
 

She approaches the pile of broken engagements slowly, dreading the sight of a certain Hatter following them in his despair. In the open doorway, out of sight, she pauses.
 

A sob escapes the broken bay window above.
 

“Alice...”
 

Mirana closes her eyes, recognizing that soft lisp.
 

“You promised, Alice...”
 

His tears are silent but not his pain. She flinches as a strangled cry echoes through the valley. Mirana waits, not sure of what she would or could do if her Hatter decides to join the tea table on her balcony. But, in the end, all is silent.
 

Wiping a tear away, she calls her footmen.
 

“Please see that Mr. Hightopp is comfortable and, if he is sleeping soundly, perhaps this would be a good time to straighten up his rooms a bit.”
 

“As you wish, Your Majesty.”
 

As the frog in the pale gray waistcoat bows himself out, Mirana settles down at her desk and tries to focus on the royal decrees awaiting her seal and signature. But she can’t. With a frustrated growl, she stabs her quill back in its stand and lets her mind wander where it undoubtedly wants to go.
 

It saddens Mirana that she cannot simply ask Alice to come back for the sake of the Hatter. After all, Alice had promised him she would return. Mirana certainly hadn’t expected Alice to be so long in getting back to him on that. So there had been no reason not to agree to Hatta’s request all those months ago when he’d still been speaking to actual people at teatime:
 

“Promise me ye wi’ nae bring her back teh Underland. Promise me ye’ll leave her be...”

“Of course, Tarrant. It won’t be long now...”

What a silly, stupid promise Mirana had made.
 

And she’ll have to keep it.
 

 

*~*~*~*

 

The White Queen of Underland has been spying on – No, no! Watching over! – her wayward Uplandian Champion for nearly three years.
 

It had taken a bit of doing, naturally. Absolum’s information had been invaluable in helping Mirana locate the mirror in Alice’s room in Upland and then, when she’d made preparations to sail, both Alice’s ship and the correct mirror aboard it.
 

Those first few months of Alice’s journey had been a pleasure to watch. The White Queen’s Champion had glowed with pride and purpose. Mirana had nearly pushed through the mirror to ask Alice all about the challenges she must have faced and defeated in her journey thus far. It had been quite obvious that Underland’s Champion had indeed won the right to sail away on that grand vessel on a wondrous journey. Yes, those first months at sea, Alice had been a thing of beauty.
 

Mirana had even thought to invite the Hatter to share these looking glass visits:
 

“My dear Hatter, your work is wonderful!” Mirana had exclaimed, modeling the tiniest cap she’d ever seen. It sparkled and shimmered and she imagined it would look undeniably fetching if she put her hair up and perched the hat just so. “I do wish Alice could see your creations! In fact, I should like to ask her what she thinks of this one! There is a way, you know, to see her where she is now, speak with her...”
 

Still smiling, she’d turned to behold an odd sight: her Hatter, Tarrant Hightopp, staring unblinkingly at the terribly crushed once-had-been-a-hat in his hands.
 

“Tarrant?”
 

So very softly, he had murmured, “I was nae talented enough teh keep her. ‘Tis best this way. Were I teh see her again... Nae... Nae. I woul’nae b‘able teh let her leave again...”
 

Slightly alarmed, the White Queen had pressed, “Tarrant? Are you all right?”
 

The Hatter had shaken himself, losing his Outlandish brogue. His eyes had flashed peridot green, but his lisp had been light and lilting: “The Alice in my memory is mine. She can’t be taken from me as I’ve already caught her, you see. So, there’ll be no more talk of... Oh! Oh!” He’d finally noticed the remnants of the hat clutched in his fists. “I’d rather liked this one. Pity.”
 

And then, with bright smile and a cleansing breath, he’d tossed the scraps over his shoulder and reached for another. “Never mind. Never mind. Would you like to try this one, Your Majesty?”
 

Mirana had glanced at the orange fez he’d offered her. The hat had been so obviously wrong for Mirana that the queen had known immediately that Tarrant had been desperate to change the subject of their conversation. The poor man could barely focus enough to offer her the correct hat!
 

“Perhaps something in a dark red or violet?” she’d suggested. And she hadn’t imagined the relief in his eyes when he’d jumped to comply.
 

The White Queen regards her vanity mirror with a sad shake of her head. Oh, how she’d wanted to show him Alice all those months ago! But she’d sensed that seeing Alice with that triumphant smile curving her lips and that light in her eyes, looking every bit the Champion she is... It would have broken her friend in ways she couldn’t have borne. So, the queen had kept this secret window to herself and had contented herself with checking on Alice only once in a while. In silence, Mirana had shared Alice’s good fortune... for as long as it had lasted.
 

Mirana can’t put her finger on when exactly Alice’s fortune had changed, but recently it has been undeniably obvious how very miserable Alice has become.
 

Perhaps she misses her family?

Mirana had watched as Alice had written letter after letter to her mother and elder sister. In those times, Alice had seemed to marshal her resolve not cry her heart out. No, those miserable moments had come after the letters to her family had been sealed and put into her jacket pocket for safe keeping.
 

Time after time, Mirana has watched as Alice had placed a fresh sheet of stationary on her writing desk, had filled her pen from the inkwell, but had written nothing at all. Not with ink at least. Those inkless letters she’d only ever composed with tears.
 

“Who do you send your tears to, Alice?” Mirana wonders for the ninety-times-ninth time.
 

With a sigh, Mirana gently waves a hand in front of her vanity mirror and waits as her reflection melts into the dull, shadowy cabin aboard the ship that is carrying Alice across the oceans of Upland. Once again, Alice is at her writing desk and Mirana looks down upon the young woman as she finishes off a letter to her mother. (It had taken a good deal of practice to master the ability to read letters upside-down and through a mirror and Mirana is quite proud of the fact that she’d accomplished it!)
 

Once again, Mirana watches as Alice folds her letters, seals them in envelopes and once again tucks them into the inside pocket of her jacket, which has been hung on the back of her wooden chair. Again, the White Queen watches as Alice places a fresh sheet on the desk, inks her pen and, with teary eyes, begins the third letter she’s never before managed to write:
 

My dearest Hatter,

Mirana gasps and presses her face closer to the glass.
 

I am writing in hopes that you will be able to forgive me for leaving Underland. Although I knew I’d had to go back to England after slaying the Jabberwocky, I should not have kept you waiting so very long.

Alice pauses, bites her lip, and appears to mumble. Unfortunately, due to the glass between them, the queen cannot hear anything from Alice’s side.
 

Alice takes a deep breath, inks her pen once again, and continues:
 

I can’t say I regret taking this chance. (I never told you I’d gone into the trading business.) At first, I’d been quite good at it. However, things have not turned out as well as I’d hoped. In fact, I’ve failed miserably.

I wish I’d never left Underland. I fear going back now. I’ve nothing to tie me here but it feels as if I’m running away. A coward. What has happened to the girl who slew the Jabberwocky? When I look in the mirror, I no longer see her. I can’t help but wonder if I might find her reflected in your eyes, were I to sit with you at your tea table again.

I think I’ve lost my muchness. And I’m not sure I’ll be able to find it again. So, perhaps this is all for the best: you deserve a much better friend than a woman who passes each hour wishing for nothing more than to hide from her troubles.

I am so sorry Hatter. I miss you dreadfully. Would you welcome me back if I were to come? Would you think any less of me for running away from my failures?

You are, as always, in my thoughts.

Yours utterly,

Alice

Mirana sniffs delicately and wipes a tear from her eye. After a series of eyelash fluttering blinks, she notices that Alice is speaking again and this time, Mirana dares to hear the words. She presses her face against the glass until the salty, humid sea air assaults her senses. She wrinkles her nose when she notices the air is heavy with not only the ocean’s breath but with the scent of unwashed bodies and closed doors and latched windows. She presses a bit further until one ear passes through the glass.
 

“Ridiculous, Alice. What was gained by writing that rubbish down? Do you feel any better now? Of course not. Why not stare at your failures a bit longer? Perhaps give yourself a paper cut and rub a bit of salt in it for good measure!”
 

Mirana presses a bit further until her entire face and both ears have emerged from the glass. Alice does not notice. The White Queen looks down upon the young woman’s unwashed hair as she pillows her forehead on her folded arms. In her right hand, the letter to Tarrant has been crushed, reminding the queen of the hat she’d never had the opportunity to try on.
 

Oh, Alice. How I wish I could ask you to come back...

Mirana closes her eyes and withdraws from the cabin mirror.
 

“This cannot go on,” the White Queen declares to her lace handkerchief.
 

Of course, she would never have expected Fate to overhear her... much less agree.

 

*~*~*~*

 

“Tarrant, thank you so much for making this delivery today.” The White Queen rises and drifts over to the tea service. “Can I offer you a cup of Throeston Blend?”
 

In unnerving – but unfortunately characteristic – silence, the Hatter sets a smallish hatbox down on the flagstones and takes a seat. “Thank you,” he replies demurely, accepting the beverage.
 

The queen tries not to stare at him but Tarrant Hightopp’s un-Saturday behavior never ceases to frighten her. (In a quiet way, of course, as her Hatter is so much more quieter on these days. As silent as an asteroid that falls from the sky without appearing to move. She cannot help waiting for the inevitable impact.)
 

Mirana takes note of his eyes and reads his mood: again those once-was-ever-bright green eyes have dulled to a wishy-washy, foul-storm green-gray. She sees dark shadows beneath the mercury stains around those eyes as well. Over the years, his hair has grown longer, but she guesses that it has not been washed in days. Perhaps not since last Saturday. The queen redirects her gaze to her cup and reaches for the cream, trying not to look alarmed at how completely her Royal Hatter is falling apart.
 

After a moment, Mirana clears her throat. “I would like to ask for your advice, if I might.”
 

Tarrant takes an automatic sip of his tea and stares into its depths. “If it pleases Your Majesty.”
 

Ignoring that frustratingly bland acquiescence, she forges onward, “I’m in a bit of quandary: A very good friend of mine is in trouble. This trouble could easily be remedied if not for one complication.”
 

Mirana watches her guest gaze into his tea, his neglected eyebrows twitching occasionally but his eyes remaining that horrible, lifeless, muddy green.
 

“It’s a promise, you see,” Mirana continues. “My promise to you, Tarrant.”
 

The Royal Hatter says nothing. His fingers curl tighter around the tea cup.
 

“Please, permit me to break it...”
 

“NO!” An instant after the outburst, the teacup explodes in his hands.
 

The queen ignores the droplets of tea staining her dress and dripping down her nose. “Stop this, Tarrant! She’s miserable! You’re miserable! Allow me bring her home!”
 

Tarrant’s eyes begin to simmer a yellowish green-gray. She ignores his anger and pulls him toward the vanity mirror against the wall of her office. “Cease this exercise in foolishness, Tarrant, and just look at her.”
 

Mirana grips his shoulders and holds him in front of the mirror. She can’t force him to open his eyes or even turn his head toward it, however. But she can see the dingy cabin well enough over his shoulder. Alice is there, as she nearly always is at this time of day. She’s sitting on her bed, pulling on her boots. Despite the steadiness of the image, Alice has trouble standing and she looks alarmingly pale and worn. The queen watches her stagger to the door and disappear into the hall.
 

Although there’s nothing much to be seen in the mirror anymore, Mirana doesn’t dispel the image. She drops her hands from his shoulders and – grasping his elbow –turns him toward her so that she might look Tarrant in the eyes. Seeing them pressed tightly closed, she sighs.
 

“Did you even look at her?”
 

“Ye...” The arm under her hand shudders. “Ye’ve been... watchin’ her?”
 

“I have.”
 

“Ye... promised me...”

“I promised I wouldn’t bring her back to Underland. And that promise, Tarrant Hightopp, has become Alice’s punishment! Do you understand what I’m telling you? She wants to come home! Not in a month or a year but right this instant!”

Tarrant steps back. His expression is meek, his eyes murky once again. Mirana is not surprised to hear his courteous lisp rather than the impassioned brogue. “Then she’ll have to find her way back to us on her own.” He bends and retrieves the hatbox from the floor and places it on the vanity. “Your hat, Your Majesty. If you have further requests, please advise me.” With that, the Royal Hatter turns toward the door.

Deflated, defeated, and dreadfully frustrated, Mirana tells him, “I’ll not bring her through, but I’m not closing this mirror to her.”

Mirana watches him hesitate to take his next step, and hope rises within her...

And then is squashed flat as he continues out the door.

He doesn’t even slam it behind him.

Mirana stares after him for a moment before sinking down onto her vanity bench. With the closed office door before her, and the secured cabin door behind her, Mirana has never felt more trapped.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Unfortunately, it’s her chief of staff, a gryphon called Fenruffle, who suffers from her distraction that afternoon.

“Your Majesty?” he prompts her.

“Yes, yes, I’m listening.”

“Ah, of course.” He clears his throat. “Then, what has Your Majesty decided to do about the Wooing Rites?”

“Yes, that’s fine.”

“I beg your pardon, Your Majesty, but, as reassuring as it is to hear you say that, it won’t help me allocate castle resources should you decide to host the customary banquet at the opening of the event.”

“A banquet? For whom?” She blinks in an attempt to clear her thoughts.

Fenruffle closes his golden eyes and, with an air of regal suffering, explains, “The candidates, Your Majesty, for the Wooing Rites.”

“Well, but, it’s a bit early to be thinking about that just yet...”

“It’s a well-known fact that Your Majesty has chosen a Champion. And, according to the laws of Underland, any eligible male may ask for your hand in marriage. We’ve received several inquiries. Especially recently.”

Mirana smiles away her irritation. “Ah, yes. I see. Well, they are welcome to try to win my favor as soon as my Champion returns.”

Fenruffle gives her a long look. “It has been three years, two weeks, and six days since the Jabberwocky was slain by your Champion...”

“Yes, of course. I have been keeping an eye on the date.”

“Hmm. So I shall instruct your secretary to dispatch replies explaining that your Champion will be available to answer their challenges by the Dimmer Solstice? That will give Alice more than sufficient time to evaluate the candidates before her other obligations become pressing.”

The White Queen smiles at him. “I haven’t decided on the banquet yet. I’ll just... consult with... and I’ll... let’s see... How does next Monday morning sound? We’ll have a full discussion of these issues then.” Is it wrong of her to hope that something woefully catastrophic will happen before then that will relegate the issue to the waste bin? Mirana winces.

Fenruffle gathers himself. She pretends not to see his fierce frown. “Very well, Your Majesty.”

Mirana watches him go, sighing with relief only when the gryphon is out of sight. She stares around her at the Royal Library and slumps very uncharacteristically in her very comfortable chair. Her intention of spending her one free afternoon this week by researching other ways of bringing someone to Underland unintentionally has been completely circumvented.

Botheration.

She returns the dusty tomes she’d selected to their places and sweeps out of the room, up the stairs, and down the hall to her office. She reaches out a hand to open the door, but the doorknob stops her.

“The Hatter’s inside,” the latch says with a disdainful sniff. “Sitting at Your Majesty’s vanity. Can’t see what he’s doing, but I’ve a bet with Seamus across the hall he’s trying on Your Majesty’s rouge.”

“Thank you for the warning,” Mirana whispers and eases open the door.

She smiles with relief at the sight of a man with wild, orange hair sitting on her vanity bench. He reaches out a hand to the mirror in front of him.

He says nothing, but she can hear the echo of a name in the room nonetheless: “Alice...”

Mirana glides across the threshold and closes the door. Tarrant doesn’t move from his seat. The White Queen crosses the room and lays a hand gently on his shoulder.

“How is she, Tarrant?”

“If not for the weariness about her... rather... thwumpished.”

“Indeed she is,” Mirana says, glancing in the mirror at Alice as she sits at her writing desk, attempting to complete a report. The pen leaps across the page so much that Mirana can barely make out two words out of ten.

“It must be a very bad storm,” she murmurs.

On the bench, Tarrant stills. “Storm?”

“Undoubtedly. It’s been going on for quite a while. Since this morning.” After all, Alice doesn’t normally stagger from left to right on her way out the door. Eyeing the report through the looking glass, Mirana frowns as she reads the following words:

Lost five men...

Sails irreparable...

Alice puts her pen down and presses a fist to her mouth. Mirana winces at the woman’s pallor and the dark circles beneath her eyes. Now that she’s looking, she can see Alice’s clothes are completely soaked and her hair is a tangled mess!

Without any warning whatsoever, Alice tumbles from her chair and over her upended bed. Mirana gapes as Alice crashes against the wall, raising her arms just in time to stop the chair from striking her in the head. She manages to twist out of the way before the writing desk tips over onto her against the wall.

Tarrant gapes. “That...! What...?”

In the mirror, Alice scrambles for the door, pushing up against the wall and bracing her arms against the ceiling, as if the ship has turned on its side. She reaches for the door latch, but pauses. Mirana follows her Champion’s horrified gaze to the seawater rushing in between the door and the frame.

Frozen with horror, the queen doesn’t even flinch as Tarrant stands, grasps the vanity mirror with both hands and bellows: “ALICE!”

The water in the tilted cabin has risen to Alice’s ankles now and Mirana wonders how much longer the flimsy-looking door will be able to withstand the weight of the water.

“Tarrant,” she whispers. “Let me save her. Please.”

She places a hand on his arm. His fingers uncurl from the mirror frame and fist at his sides but his gaze never wavers from the looking glass. “No.”

“Tarrant!”

Mirana stares at him but his voice is calm, steady. His Outlandish brogue is a vague memory in his words: “No, I’ll do it. Just be ready to pull us through.”

The queen lunges as he tenses, readying himself to leap through the mirror. “You can’t! The mirror’s not large enough on the other side! Just your head and one arm. Do you understand? That’s all that’ll fit.” And thank the Fates she’d investigated those dimensions herself not too long ago!

She examines his profile. Mirana knows they don’t have time for this conversation, especially when she still needs to locate the dose of Pishsalver Alice will need. But they have even less time for ill-prepared heroics that get both her Champion and her Hatter killed.

“Only your head and your arm, Tarrant!”

He nods, whips off his hat, and leans down, pressing his face against the mirror. Mirana doesn’t linger, watching him sink into the looking glass up to his neck. The water’s at Alice’s knees now. And there’s a Shrinking Potion to be found.

Chapter Two: A Devastating Homecoming

Tarrant Hightopp barely notices the reflection of his own eyes, burning orange, before he presses first his forehead, then his nose and chin through the looking glass. He scrambles for leverage in order to shove his right hand through even before his face is free.

The smells hit him first: fear and wet wood and salt water.

“Alice!”

She turns at the sound of her name. Tarrant watches as she struggles with the door. The weight of the water has bowed the wood.

“Hatter!” she calls. And despite her panic, Tarrant sees such relief in her eyes it nearly distracts him from his urgency. “The ship’s sinking. I think...”

“’Tis nae time fer thinkin’!”

Beside his face, the thin, slender hand of the queen pushes through the looking glass, holding a vial of Pishsalver.

Tarrant struggles for self-control. “Drink it and take my hand! I’m pulling ye through!”

Alice glances at the door she’s bracing with her arms and body. “But, if I move...?”

His precarious control snaps: “’Tis nae time teh a-grye ‘n’ a-gimble!”

Tarrant watches resolve tighten her expression. She dives from the door toward his outstretched hand. In the same instant, the flimsy latch gives way, the door bangs open, and a wall of seawater crashes inside.

Alice doesn’t swim so much as she’s shoved at Tarrant. He hastily grabs her arm and curls his fingers around her jacket sleeve and the soft flesh beneath. Alice reaches frantically for the Shrinking Potion and gulps it down. Tarrant hears her sputter and gasp just before the water submerges the mirror. Eyes stinging in the rushing, swirling salty seawater, Tarrant Hightopp pulls her toward him before she manages to shrink right out of his grasp completely.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Never, in all of his life, has Tarrant Hightopp been so happy – so deliriously fantastically ecstatically happy – to be choking on seawater. He smiles through his coughing fit as a doll-sized Alice vomits bile and more seawater all over his waistcoat. He thinks he hears the White Queen calling for water and blankets, but he doesn’t care. Tarrant stares at the shivering, pale creature in his arms, weighted down with the clothes that had jumped through the mirror with her rather than on her.

Alice!

Tarrant closes his eyes, minds his hands – it wouldn’t do at all to crush Alice less than a minute after saving her from a sinking ship! – and laughs.

“He certainly is a mad one, isn’t he?” someone croaks froggily.

Tarrant opens his eyes wide enough to locate and then snatch the towels draped over the servant’s arm. He drapes the first tea towel over Alice and wipes his own face with the second. Cups of water are pressed to both his lips and Alice’s. Out of the corner of his eye, he watches as she struggles to hold the tea towel up as she gulps down as much water as she can from the goblet being held obligingly by the White Queen.

He tries not to stare at her bare shoulders. He really does. Shoulders really ought not to have such attention-demanding properties! It’s surprisingly difficult, but he manages not to gawk.  At least, he thinks so...

“Alice! You’ve made it back to us!” the queen enthuses softly.

Alice nods and coughs. “As... long... it’s... Thank you... Your... Majesty.”

The White Queen smiles. “There’s my Champion. Rest for now.” The queen tucks the tea towel around her securely and helps her slide down from Tarrant’s stomach. The sensation of her small feet sliding across his side is actually rather ticklish, but he doesn’t giggle.

Tarrant Hightopp is staring blankly up at the ceiling, considering the odd qualifier Alice had choked out: “As long... it’s...” As long as it’s what? Tarrant wants to know.

But not right now. He doesn’t want to know right now. Actually, he has a stomachache, which is odd as he hasn’t done anything to upset his stomach. (Well, not that he can recall!) And, he’s not entirely sure, but he thinks it’s odd for a stomach to reside in the center of a person’s chest. Still, it’s a stomachache. It must be! It can’t be anything else!

“Hatter?”

Tarrant startles and looks down into a very familiar yet very, very small face. An Alice face.

“Alice?”

She smiles at the sound of her own name, lisped just as softly as the last time she’d arrived in Underland. He studies her hair – he’s never seen it wet before and it’s a darkish, tangled mass. He notes with relief that her shoulders have been covered by someone’s handkerchief – the queen’s perhaps? He doesn’t recognize the lace... Tarrant experiences the fleeting urge to tell Alice she looks rather fetching in borrowed handkerchiefs, but his unanswered question – As long as it’s what? – locks his throat and his stomachache flares again.

“Thank you,” she says simply. Tarrant watches as she reaches out to straighten his cravat. “And I’m sorry I... I’m sorry about your waistcoat.”

“It’s seen far worse treatment than I ever have, I assure you,” he hears himself say.

Alice laughs in that silent, breathless way of hers. She sits down on the flagstone and accepts a teaspoon – finally a receptacle scaled to her size! – of water. The handle is a bit unwieldy but she seems to manage.

With a sigh, she leans back against Tarrant’s shoulder. “I don’t want to wake up this time,” she murmurs groggily.

Forgetting the presence of the queen and her footmen milling about as they gather up Alice’s sodden clothing and refill her teaspoon and his goblet, Tarrant chuckles. “You won’t. This time, it’s my dream you’re in.”

Oh, how he would like that if it were so – if it truly were his dream she’d appeared in! Why, she’d be the right, proper Alice-size and she’d be dressed in that luminous tunic that she’d been wearing when he’d made it back to the White Queen’s castle after escaping execution. And her hair would be down and her scent would drift on the breeze to him and he never would have had to miss her for a single day because she would have kept her promise:

“Be back before you know it!”

In his dreams, he wouldn’t have had to wait three years for her to come back to him. In his dreams, she would have come back to him in the very next instant, all on her own, of her own choice! In his dreams, she would look at him like she... as if he...

Tarrant closes his eyes briefly and damns his stomachache. Instead, he focuses on the weight – so slight! – against his left shoulder. When he opens his eyes again, the White Queen is leaning over him, smiling.

“Shall I move our Champion to the settee so you can get up?” she asks in a whisper.

Tarrant glances down. Alice has curled up against his shoulder and appears to have drifted off to sleep.

“Nae,” he murmurs. “’Twon’ do teh force me inteh bed now that I’ve made myself comfortable here.”

The queen nods and moves off. With her white dress and mincing steps, she almost looks like a fluffy cloud. A cloud in the Royal Office... and salt water in his hair and eyes... and a doll-Alice leaning against the dripping brocade of his jacket...

And she remembers me!

Tarrant grins up at the ceiling, for certainly, that’s something to be pleased with!

Although it doesn’t do much for the odd center-of-his-chest stomachache.

 

*~*~*~*

 

When Alice opens her eyes, the first thing she notices is the ache throughout her entire body. She winces at the pain stabbing her through the temples and forehead and moves, very slowly, to cradle her head in her aching arms.

The second thing she notices is that she’s lying on a very nice – but enormous! – settee in a lady’s study.

And then, as she sits up in order to get a better view of her surroundings, she realizes that she’s clothed in a towel and a handkerchief.

“Ah, Alice, welcome back.” Alice looks over her shoulder as the White Queen moves toward her with a wide smile. “How are you feeling?”

Alice tucks the tea towel more securely around her. “I... Am I dreaming?”

“No, dear Alice, I’m quite certain you’re not.”

“The Hatter...?”

“Pulled you through the mirror in your cabin.”

Butterflies erupt in her stomach at the memory. “So he was here earlier...”

“Yes. It’s nearly dinnertime so I sent him off to get changed. He’ll be rejoining us shortly.”

Alice nods. “And Lord Ascot’s steam clipper? The ship, I mean?”

The White Queen’s smile fades. “The mirror is completely dark now.”

“Dark?” She follows the queen’s gaze to the nearest mirror – a looking glass under a lovely, carved arch atop a vanity. The top of the vanity bureau has been cleared of everything and she thinks she sees a few droplets of water stubbornly clinging under the face of the drawers. Alice swallows thickly. “It’s sunk?”

“I’m afraid it has.”

Numb, Alice nods. She briefly closes her eyes and thinks of the thirty-seven men that had been aboard.

“Come, Alice. Let’s get you back to your proper size and into a bath.”

Alice lets Mirana carry her through the castle to a luxurious bathroom. A bit of Upelkuchen and a hot bath later and Alice follows a silver fish in a very fine mint-green brocade waistcoat to the dining room. As she approaches the door, she hears the queen’s quiet voice and beseeching tone.

“Please, Tarrant, she is here now. Let us not dwell on what cannot be changed.”

Alice strains to hear the Hatter’s reply, but there is only silence.

“Your Majesty,” the fish announces suddenly, startling Alice. “Alice.” He gestures her into the room and closes the door behind her.

Mirana smiles and sweeps toward her. Collecting Alice’s hand, the queen turns them both toward their seats. Alice stares at the long table with its shimmering table cloth and gleaming, covered platters. The room is predominantly white and silver and just exactly how she remembers it. The only blotch of chaotic color and darkness in the entire room is the Hatter, who sits quietly in a chair to the left of the queen’s, staring at his empty plate.

“You look somewhat refreshed,” the queen says as she maneuvers Alice to the table.

Alice watches as the Hatter stands automatically. Eyes still downcast, he strides to the opposite chair and pulls it out.

“I... yes, thank you, Your Majesty.” Alice pauses beside her chair. She looks up at the Hatter. “Thank you for saving me, Hatter,” she says, feeling suddenly shy.

His gaze flickers briefly in her direction. She glimpses solemn green rather than the radiant emerald she remembers.

“I... Well, that is... you are welcome,” he mumbles.

Alice sits and watches as the Hatter also sees to the queen’s chair before returning to his own. As they eat, the White Queen tells Alice of the events she’d missed. It’s a relief to know that Mallymkun, Thackery, Chessur, Bayard and his family, Absolum, the Tweedles, and even the Bandersnatch are all well and, in several cases, reemployed. Mirana regales her of the celebrations following her return to power.

“I’m sorry I missed that,” Alice replies, imagining Chessur and Bayard in a paw-wrestling match. “But I did get to see some rather amazing Futterwhacken.” She smiles across the table and the Hatter’s startled gaze meets hers briefly.

“I’m sorry I was away so long. I wish I’d been able to come back sooner,” Alice murmurs, thinking of how impossible it had been to escape the clipper once she’d boarded it. She frowns. “And without paying such a heavy price.”

The Hatter sits up straight. “And just what sort of price did you think you’d pay for a broken promise?”

For a moment, Alice simply blinks at him. “I... what? Price?”

The silverware shakes in the Hatter’s hands. “Di’nae yeh ken tha’ a promise can only be stretched so far afore it breaks?”

Alice can think of nothing to say for a long moment. “Are you... are you saying promises... Here in Underland, broken promises hurt people?”

The Hatter draws in a breath and his eyes flash. Mirana holds up a hand and turns toward Alice. “Yes. Broken promises have terrible consequences in Underland. Is this not the case in Upland?”

Still watching the Hatter, Alice shakes her head. “No. Of course, legal contracts and the law – if broken – have consequences. But those are enforced by the justice system, not...”

“Underland is quite different, then,” the queen says. “A promise is the most sacred of things here. And although they can be broken, the price is always... considerably high.” Alice notices the stern look the queen sends in the Hatter’s direction.

“But... I haven’t broken any promises... have I?”

The Hatter’s eyes flash a bright yellow. His chair squeals against the floor as he abruptly stands. Without another word, he strides from the room. The door slams behind him. Alice stares at it for a long moment. “I don’t understand...”

Mirana sighs, drawing Alice’s attention back to her. “Yes, I see that you don’t.” Expression regretful, the queen explains, “When you left us on Frabjous Day three years ago, you told Tarrant you’d be back before he knew it. You promised him, in a way.”

Alice gapes at her.

“And, I’m afraid, he did know it. For a very long time. And Fate got quite irritated with you for making him wait when you’d said you wouldn’t.”

“Wait... you mean... the storm? The ship? The thirty-seven men who died? This is all my fault?”

“It is no one’s fault!” the queen replies in a frustrated tone Alice has never heard from her. “It is the law of Underland: promises must be kept.” The queen’s expression turns pensive. “Do not blame yourself. And do not blame Tarrant for trying to keep you here. You don’t know how powerfully you affect him...”

“Who cares?!” The shout echoes in the white room. Alice pushes back her own chair. Her entire body heats with rage. “Thirty-seven people are dead! Why didn’t someone stop him from...” From what? Trying to convince me to stay after the battle had been won? “... or stop me from promising him?! How could this happen?!”

Alice paces the room four times before the queen quietly offers, “How could it not, Alice? How could it have not happened? Tarrant invited you to promise to return and you made it. Ignorant of the consequences, but you made it nonetheless. Time gave Tarrant two years to wait for you. But this last year, his madness has deepened... greatly. And not from hat-making.”

Slumping into her chair again, Alice thinks for a long minute before arriving at a possible solution to the situation. A solution that hadn’t been played out until this afternoon. Alice wearily asks, “The mirror. If you could have pulled me through the mirror sooner, why didn’t you?” Perhaps then the shipwreck, the deaths, might have been avoided...

The queen leans back in her chair, suddenly looking very tired. “I couldn’t pull you through the mirror, Alice.”

Alice remembers those frenzied moments in her cabin: the Hatter’s blazing eyes, his outstretched arm, his hand reaching for her... “The Hatter pulled me through. Why then? Because I was about to die?”

Mirana gazes upon Alice with such a look of compassion and regret that Alice isn’t sure she really wants to know the answer to her question. “Tarrant has been waiting for you to come back to us. He did not want to force you to return, or even persuade you to give up your life in Upland... I think, perhaps, because he feared you’d soon have to leave us again. He felt so strongly about it he made me promise not bring you back to Underland myself.”

“He...?”

“Do not be angry with him, Alice. This was my mistake. I should not have made that promise. I regret it. Very deeply.”

“But, he...?!”

“Yes, it’s true; perhaps, Tarrant wasn’t thinking very clearly. He rarely seems to, but he does. Perhaps the most clearly of all of us, in fact. I’ve never known him to let details cloud the truth. But this... I do not know why he did what he did. I have not asked him.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be sure to have that conversation with him shortly.”

Alice stands once again and heads for the door.

“Wait! Alice!”

Her hand on the doorknob, Alice hesitates.

“He’s hurting so much... The madness... you’ve no idea!” Mirana sighs. “Alice, please don’t hurt him more than he already has been.”

And because Alice isn’t sure she can keep that promise, she says nothing as she leaves the room.

She looks up the hall and down, but it’s completely empty.

Alice’s fury dies down just enough for a frisson of loneliness – of lostness – to intrude. Conflicted, consternated, confused, Alice follows the hallways, turning at random, until she finds herself on a terrace lit by moonlight. She crosses the flagstones and leans against the railing. Studying the moonlit orchard in bloom below, Alice remembers wondering at this sight all those years ago on the eve of Frabjous Day. The Hatter had found her then. He’d been a friend to her then.

“Alice, why is a raven like a writing desk?”

“Let me think about it...”

Missing him, Alice sighs and buries her face in her folded arms. “What sort of place cares for the promises people make each other?”

She’d always thought the making and keeping of promises was the measure of someone’s character. Of course, she hadn’t done all that well with her promises. Alice knows she never should have promised to return to Underland so carelessly. But certainly, the consequences far outweigh the infraction!

“It’s not fair,” she whispers, feeling the hot rush of tears at long last.

Alice tries not to sniffle. On a ship with walls as thin as paper, sobbing would only lead to knowing looks from the crew and lips curled with disdain. Over the previous six months, Alice has gotten quite good at keeping her misery quiet. The lack of sobs forces out twice as many tears, but at least they are silent.

She looks out over the orchard as it weaves and wavers and blurs and she wonders, How much of my misery was my own experience and how much of it was Fate’s punishment for breaking my promise?

And then, when she realizes that it doesn’t matter, her heart breaks.

Indeed, none of that matters. She’d missed Underland – she’d missed her friends and she’d missed the Hatter! – more than anything in the world. The excitement of her apprenticeship and first voyage had eclipsed her need to see him again, but only for a brief time. Alice knows she’s always wanted to be here. But now...

At the cost of thirty-seven lives, how can I just... carry on?

It seems hopelessly callous for her to be happy in the wake of their deaths. To be healthy and whole and content because the entire crew had died. All to bring her here.

If only she hadn’t promised to return.

If only the queen hadn’t promised not to bring her back to Underland.

If only...

Exhausted, Alice closes her eyes and curls her legs under her. She’s nearly asleep when she feels someone strong gather her in their arms. She knows she ought, but she’s too tired to fight their assistance, so tired...

Alice curls toward the solid warmth and breathes deeply. This scent... She frowns briefly as a memory tickles her gently before drifting beyond reach.

I know you, she thinks and wraps her arms around the man’s neck as she falls asleep.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant Hightopp stares at the girl – Nae, the woman! – who has never called him by his given name. He wonders if she even knows it. Had he ever given it to her? If he has, she’s never used it. And a name’s meant to be used! (Otherwise no one would have one!)

A ray of sunlight slips through a break in the curtains, falling across Tarrant’s hands where they rest on his knees. He should leave. He knows this. I would not do at all to be caught in Alice’s bedroom, no matter how innocent his intentions. And his intentions have not been innocent at all.

Ye let her make that promise on Frabjous Day. Accepted it.

He knows he should have refused. Until today, he has never regretted it.

Ye never released her from her promise.

He’d been too afraid to cut that last thread between them that would have set her free – truly free – of Underland... and him. Instead, he’d attempted to compensate:

Ye should nae have tried to make amends by preventing the queen from bringing Alice back teh Underland.

He tells himself he’d tried to give her a choice. But there’d been no choice after Alice had trapped herself with that promise. And he’d wanted her to keep it too much. Far, far too much. He’d panicked.

Tarrant Hightopp, for all his imagination and contorted wisdom, had not known what he would do if Alice did return only to leave him again. Like a child playing with a less-than-favorite toy.

He’d wanted – needed! – her to return not to Underland, but to him!

Tarrant shudders in his armchair in the sunlight. If he closes his eyes, he can smell what he’s been missing: the scent of her hair and skin. When she’d ridden on his hat and then on his shoulder through Tulgey Wood, the breeze had blown her essence right under his nose. He vaguely remembers reciting the prophecy of the Jabberwocky slayer to her. He’d practiced several times during the quiet moments of the never-ending tea party in front of Thackery’s house while the March Hare had been twitching in his sleep and Mallymkun had been dozing in her teacup. He’d been quite proud of his inflection and tone, making the prophecy into something more like a poem, a sonnet. But with Alice’s scent filling him, he’d heard himself utter the prophecy in his rough, native brogue, had felt tension and something intense – best not think about that! – infuse him. Burn him from the inside out. If it hadn’t been for her utter lack of muchness, he might have...

No, no. I wouldn’t have.

Of course not. Of course not.

Tarrant studies the woman bundled up in blankets on the bed and wonders how much muchness she’s managed to hold onto. The sunlight is warm, but it doesn’t stop the shiver that slips down his spine.

He wants to touch her, so he curls his fingers around the armrests of his chair. He wants to wake her, so he swallows back the words he would say. He wants to look into her eyes, so he closes his own. Fate save him, but he wants Alice too much to bear her presence.

A slight rustle from the bed reaches his ears and he tenses. Of course, as he isn’t the slightest bit ready to face her, she awakens. Bloody Fate.

“Hatter?”

He swallows. “Tarrant Hightopp,” he replies calmly, opening his eyes and looking directly into hers. Her hair is tangled again, her eyes glazed with drowsiness, her frown sleepy.

“Shall I call you Mister Hightopp?” she wonders aloud.

Tarrant winces around that damnable stomachache. He thought he’d lost it hours ago. “Whatever you prefer,” he manages, despite the odd sensation rushing through his body. As if he’s both dying and dying to move all at the same time.

Call me by my name...

Alice looks away and clears her throat. “I seem to remember drifting off on the balcony last night... Thank you for... Is this my room or...?”

Tarrant’s hands curl around the armrests even tighter at the thought of watching her awaken in his bed in his room...

No! No, d’nae think it, lad!

“Yours,” he chokes out. “Or so Pondish croaked.”

“Pondish? Oh, the frog in the waistcoat?”

“Perhaps.”  In all truth, it might have been Lakerton, not Pondish...

She nods, looking distracted. He watches as her expression changes. Bit by bit, he can see the memories assembling themselves. Bit by bit, a mulish expression settles over her face. “I’m really... irritated with you right now,” she says haughtily.

Tarrant blinks. “You... are... irritated?”

Alice looks at him, her eyes flashing with something much more beyond irritation. Something much, much, much, much...

Muchness, he muses, dismayed to feel his stomachache pulse in response.

“No, actually,” she replies flatly. “I’m furious. I’m absolutely furious! Why did no one tell me what could happen if I didn’t come back soon enough?! Was McTwisp too busy?! Has Absolum lost the ability to speak with his new form?! Would it have been too much of a bother for you to at least try to talk to me through a bloody looking glass?!”

Tarrant stares at her, shocked. Her cheeks are flushed, her hair tangled, her impassioned gaze focused completely and utterly on him...

And the lass is still in bed, isn’t she?

He growls. “’Tis nonsensical teh think tha’ broken promises hav’nae consequences!”

“There’s a difference between consequences and the hand of Fate sinking my employer’s ship and killing the entire crew!”

“Not the entire crew,” he replies after a beat of silence.

Alice struggles to sit up, slipping twice as she attempts to unwind her arms from the mound of blankets. Tarrant muses that, perhaps, seven might have been a bit excessive...

“No, not the entire crew,” she agrees through her teeth. “After all, I’m still alive, aren’t I? The only survivor! The reason for the wreck! I’m the reason they all died! Me and that bloody promise! Do you think I want to be the cause of so many deaths?! Do you think everything is just fine just because I’m still here and they’re NOT?!”

Tarrant stares at her, at her tears. There are no sobs or hysterics in sight, but the tears drip from her eyes in steady rivulets. He briefly wonders when, where, and how Alice had learned to cry like an old woman.

“How—do I—live—with that?” she whispers.

Guilt. An ocean of guilt surrounds him. He’d done this. He’d held her fast and sure to her promise – a promise that had taken her ship, its crew and had very nearly taken Alice as well!

Guilt, rage, terror... A hatter can only take so much!

Tarrant stands. Someone speaks in an Outlandish brogue: “If ye find that ye cannae live wi’tha’, ye know where th’ lookin’ glass is. I’m sure ye’ll be able teh find yer way back teh yer ship eas‘ly enough.”

In the utter and complete silence that follows, pressing in upon his ears like the salt water of the Upland ocean, Tarrant wonders if, in fact, he’d been the one to say those things. Must have! No other Outlanders here...

Shame...

Tarrant looks away from her face, pretends he doesn’t see the pain there – he can deal with no more today! One more word, one more tear, and she will break him! He clears his throat. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve left the queen’s hats hanging for too long.”

Grasping the front of his shirt, trying to stop the stomachache from exploding – or maybe imploding from the weight of it all – Tarrant hurries from the room. He doesn’t slam the door on his way out, but when he arrives in his workshop quite a few things get slammed about. And shouted at.

 

*~*~*~*

 

“Would you care for some tea, Alice?”

Alice looks up, startled out of her thoughts. “Oh, um, no. Thank you,” she manages, trying very hard not to think of tea or tea parties or teapots or the scent of tea on a battered top hat...

The queen nods and smiles to the fish in the green waistcoat. “If you’ll just leave the tea service, Algernon? Thank you.”

The fish bows and slithers from the room, closing the door behind him.

The queen turns and flutters over to the settee facing the balcony and the cherry orchard beyond and takes a seat next to Alice. The White Queen doesn’t ask Alice how she’s feeling, and Alice is unbelievably grateful for that. It has been two days since she’d last seen the Hatter. Two days of sitting in her rooms, staring at the armchair he’d sat in. Two days spent soaking her borrowed nightgown sleeves and pillows, one tear at a time, salting herself in her own guilt. Today, she’d ventured to bathe and explore the castle. It hadn’t taken as long as she’d hoped it would to find a familiar room: the queen’s office. And, unfortunately, it had been occupied when she’d cracked open the door.

“We argued,” Alice says.

“You...?”

“The Hatter and I.”

The White Queen’s eyebrows arch. “Tarrant raised his voice to you?!”

“What? No, no.” Alice sighs. “No, that might have been preferable.”

The queen sighs. “Oh, botheration.” For a moment, neither woman speaks. “Alice,” Mirana tries reluctantly, “I can only imagine how difficult this is for you. But you must believe me when I say that... what happened was not your fault.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Exactly.”

“I wasn’t told, either.” Alice winces. “Not that that excuses it. After all, I can’t blame others for my mistake. Unintentional though it had been.” She sighs. “I blamed him for it. For not telling me.”

“I... see. The argument, you mean?”

“Yes,” Alice says. “He told me...” She looks in the direction of the vanity mirror. “... if I wanted, I could go right back to...”

“Oh, that Outlander!” The queen doesn’t growl, but it’s certainly a rather forceful sigh. “Alice, he doesn’t mean it. Truly, he doesn’t. Have you not thought of how he must feel about this? He’s wanted to see you again for so long and now he learns what the price for that is... Don’t you think he’s already blaming himself?”

Alice puts her head in her hands and bows under the wave of realization. “I’m horrid.” And then: “It’s been two days. I should have apologized ages ago. The instant I’d said it. I shouldn’t have said it at all.”

A soft hand rests on Alice’s shoulder. “An apology is a wonderful idea.”

“The sooner the better.”

“Well...” the queen hesitates until Alice looks up. The concerned expression on Mirana’s face stirs tendrils of worry in Alice.

“What is it?”

“Brillig,” Mirana replies, turning away from the very fine, upstanding clock leaning against the far wall. “Four o’clock.” She sighs. “And it’s a Saturday.”

Alice watches in puzzlement as the queen looks up and out at the balcony.

“What –?”

Her question is cut short by the sound of breaking glass above them. She looks up with a start as glass shards fall and tinkle against the balcony flagstones.

Alice only manages to gasp before a very thick brogue drowns her out.

“I TOLD YEH NAE TEH EAT TH’ CUCUMBER SANDWICHES, ALICE!”

An instant later, a fully loaded tea table crashes to the balcony. Alice leaps up from her seat and rushes to the balcony doors.

“As I mentioned,” the White Queen continues softly, “Brillig on Saturdays might not be the best time for a... rational discussion.”

“I don’t understand. What has brillig on Saturdays anything to do with the fact that the Hatter has tossed a table and tea service out a window?!”

The White Queen draws a deliberate breath. “You’ve always arrived on an Underland Saturday, Alice. And, as I mentioned, he’s been hoping you would find your way back to us for... some time now.”

“But he knows I’m here! Why wouldn’t he just invite me to tea?”

The queen smiles sadly. “Perhaps because his role has always been to wait for you and your role has always been to arrive.”

Speechless, Alice stands just on this side of the threshold and gapes. For a long moment, neither Alice nor the queen say anything. A breeze plays with the gauzy curtains and rustles the cherry blossoms in the orchard below. It’s in this moment of heavy silence and gentle susurration that Alice thinks she hears her name from somewhere above.

“... Alice...? We’ll have fresh scones next Saturday. If you’ll come. Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you...? Alice...?”

She closes her eyes and leans against the wall. “I’m going to see him.”

“All right,” the queen replies serenely.

“Right now.”

“Oh, well... I’m not really sure that would be for the best...”

Alice shakes her head and pushes away from the doorjamb. “This can’t wait.” She marches toward the door but pauses just before she opens it. “If you don’t see me at dinner, send up the cavalry, won’t you?”

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant stands with his back to the open window, his hands fisted in his hair. He notices that it’s gotten quite long. Almost as long as it had been that Horvendush Day when the Jabberwocky had... When the Red Queen had...

Perhaps he should cut it. He’s too old to wear his hair so long. And too disinterested to make it presentable. Not that he ought to present himself for anyone. There’s no one to see him, in any case. He’s a milliner, not a courtier. No, there’s no one to care for how he looks, so why bother with it at all?

Alice...

Tarrant turns smartly and sweeps an arm over his desk. He stares at the floor and the pair of shears lying on the rug.

“Hatter?”

Tarrant blinks and looks over his shoulder. He stares as someone who looks surprisingly just exactly completely utterly absolutely like – but it can’t be! – Alice standing in the doorway.

“I knocked,” she says.

Tarrant gapes at the vision of her for a moment. Then, desperate for something to prove what he’s seeing is reality, he casts his gaze about, taking in the broken bits of china, the tea dripping down the walls, the remnants of cucumber sandwiches that had been squashed beneath his boots, and the occasional crumbling scone.

How odd. He’s never imagined Alice visiting him after he’d disposed of the tea things. He considers the possibility that this is some new scenario. Perhaps his mind has grown tired of the same delusion over and over and over and over and...

“Hatter?”

The feel of a hand against his cheek startles him again. He opens his eyes and looks down at that very, very, very familiar Alice-face. And no longer a doll-Alice, either. She’s still the just-right-wonderfully-spectacularly-sized Alice!

“I’m fine,” he manages in a husky whisper.

“I’m sorry,” she replies.

He frowns. “I’m confused.”

“I’m horrid.”

He gapes.

She continues, with her gaze searching his face. “I never should have said that you’re to blame for the ship sinking. I’m so sorry. I... I should have come back ages ago. Ages and ages ago. You see, I realized months ago that there was nothing left for me there. I was failing in my business, I missed y—Underland so much, and I was planning to go back down the rabbit hole at Lord Ascot’s summer villa as soon as I got back and...” Alice closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry. For all of it.”

Tarrant marvels at the fact that her hand is still resting against his cheek – could she truly have forgiven him for being so utterly slurvish? He dares not ask her. After all, Alice is touching him again! How long has he waited for this? How long has he tried not to notice how much he’s wanted this? Knowing he should let her go, he lifts his own hand – bandaged, bruised, and be-thimbled – to trap her palm there against his face.

“I’m... devastated,” he confesses to this vision. Her eyes fly open and her expression turns downward with worry. “I’ve never daydreamed you like this before. You should be smiling. I always imagine you smiling. And then there’s tea. There’s always tea. You know we’ve nearly always had tea when we first meet again on Saturdays. It’s not quite a Saturday without tea, you know.”

“Hatter?”

“That’s not to say that one must have tea every Saturday. One might indulge in coffee or chai on occasion, I suppose. Do you care much for coffee or chai, Alice? I wonder what you’ll say. This is a daydream so, really, you might say anything. Isn’t that right?”

“Hatter, this is not a daydream. I’m real. I’m really here.” A wry grin tugs at her lips. “Just really late for tea, obviously.” She raises her other hand and presses it against his other cheek. “Go on and look at me. I’m really here.”

Look? he thinks. That won’t do! Time and time again his mind and his eyes have fooled him into thinking she’d arrived for tea on Saturday. The feel of her hands is rather persuasive, but he’s imagined the sound of her voice so often he can’t trust her words. But he would trust – undeniably, utterly, absolutely trust – one thing...

Alice’s eyes widen as he leans forward and ducks his head over her shoulder. When the twisting tendrils of hair that have escaped the ribbon at the base of her neck are tickling his nose, he lets his eyelids drift shut and breathes deeply.

Alice!

He startles violently. The hand not engaged with hers fists as his side.

Alice!

Because her scent is such a miracle for what it represents – Alice is here! In my rooms! She’s arrived! – he dares to savor it again. Alice stands perfectly still. He can see the slight motion of her pulse in her neck, beneath her ear. He can feel her breaths as they stir his hair. He can feel the heat of her still-trapped hand against his face. He blinks and smiles.

And then he notices just how close she is. So close! It would be the smallest of steps to close the distance between them and –!

No! No! D’nae think it!

Clearing his throat, Tarrant retreats a step and brings Alice’s hand away from his cheek. He brushes her knuckles once with his thumb before forcing himself to release her hand. “Alice,” he says in the smooth voice he’d cultivated for use at court. “Of course it’s you. Of course. I’d know you anywhere.”

Her smile is tentative but her expression is relieved. Tarrant feels a stab of regret at disturbing her. He must do better at keeping his delusions under control!

She says, “You’ve said that once before.”

Tarrant grins. “Only once? I’ve said it twice, I’m sure.”

“Or three times?”

He considers that. “It’s possible.”

“I believe it is.”

And then she smiles. And it’s a real smile. There’s a bit of crinkling at the corners of her eyes and a mirthful light in their depths and...

“Can you forgive me for what I said the other morning?”

Tarrant watches, alarmed, as her smile begins to fade. “To my memory, there is nothing you said that requires forgiveness.”

And then, miracles of miracles, Alice reaches out to him again.

Again!

And takes his hand in hers. Tarrant thrills at the touch.

“I don’t deserve a friend like you, Hatter.”

The twinge of disappointment at the sound of his profession rather than his given name on her lips is eclipsed by the disquiet her statement causes. “And I don’t deserve the tolerance and patience of the Alice.” He smiles for her. “I therefore recommend that we agree to not deserve each other and then ignore the fact entirely.”

And there! Alice’s smile returns!

A moment later, his own smile is so stretched with delight he feels his chest might actually burst the seams of his waistcoat. The strain distracts him and he finally notices that he’s standing in the middle of his rather untidy parlor with nothing to offer Alice by way of refreshments!

Why is that? he wonders.

And then a breeze rustles the curtains framing the broken window and he recalls the tea service and the tea table and...

Oh, how embarrassing!

“I’m afraid I can’t offer you tea,” Tarrant says with a sheepish glance toward the window. “Unless you’d like to have it on the balcony below...”

“Well... it is well after brillig,” Alice replies. “What would you say to a stroll before dinner?”

“Along the battlements?”

“Are there any?”

“I’ve no idea. If there aren’t, I’m sure we’ll find them!”

She chuckles her breathless laugh and nods. Tarrant escorts her out the open door and past the line of footmen waiting to scrub down his room... again. He keeps his eyes on her, however, and his mind on the hand tucked into the crook of his arm, and tries not to dwell on the fact that this obnoxious stomachache is becoming a chronic occurrence.
 

Chapter Three: Duties of the Champion

“Ah, so the Champion has returned...”

Alice startles at the cultured drawl. “Chessur?” she asks, turning in a circle, searching for a glimpse of him. She gasps when she completes the turn to see a pair of vibrant green eyes and an up-ended grin just inches in front of her nose.

“Still jumpy,” he muses on a purr before swimming over to ogle the Hatter’s top hat. “And hello again, sweet hat. Has your current master been treating you well?”

The Hatter sweeps his hat from his head before the Cheshire Cat can paw it. Alice bites a smile at the suspicious gleam in the Hatter’s eyes.

“And how are you, Tarrant? Any luck with...?”

Alice’s attention is redirected from the sound of hearing someone other than the queen say the Hatter’s given name: he’s always been “Hatter” to Alice! Despite the rare occasion of hearing his given name spoken aloud, Alice stares at Chessur’s knowing grin and the slight flush to the Hatter’s cheeks. Alice hadn’t known the man could blush.

The Hatter clears his throat. “I’ve lost my head, of course. You can hardly expect less than that.”

“That’s true, if he’d lost his head, he would be less, wouldn’t he?”

“Contrariwise, if he’d lost it and then some, then you’d expect him to’ve lost a bit more, wouldn’t you?”

Alice smiles. “Hello, Tweedles.”

“Is that Alice?”

“Well, if it weren’t Alice, it couldn’t be Alice could it?”

“But it is Alice, so it must be.”

Alice nods as they waddle further into the queen’s office. She notices their gazes flickering occasionally toward the Hatter who seems to be having a rather animated discussion with Chessur without the aid of his voice or hands. Teeth gleam, eyes glare, and brows wiggle in a way that must be meaningful... at least to the two of them.

Alice hides another grin.

While the Tweedles argue over which chairs to sit in – “Well, if it were taken, it would be, but since it isn’t, it ain’t!” “Contrariwaise, if it weren’t taken, we’d take it, and then it would be!” – Alice indulges in a Hatter-esque pastime: she daydreams. She recalls the past day-and-a-bit that she had spent keeping the Hatter company. The stroll preceding dinner through the misplaced battlements had lead them to the orchard, which had been lovely and quite interesting – “Honestly, Alice, the trees are in bloom! You can’t very well expect them to come up with fruit as well when they’re busy enough making flowers!” – and it had been fun to watch him work in his workshop on Sunday. She’d even learned a bit about the political relations between the queen’s domain in Underland and the other territories, jointly called the Outlands.

“Thats where my clan hailed from,” the Hatter had commented. “We’re a wandering people. Craftsmen, mostly. Travel where our skills take us.” He’d added after snipping a thread and pinning a ribbon, “I’m called an Outlander here.”

“And that’s the language you speak sometimes? Outlandish?” she’d ventured.

“Aye, ‘tis.” With a smile, the Hatter’s brogue had thickened to the consistency of a very hearty pea soup. “‘F ‘twere naught teh be kennin’ aught i’twoul’nae be gratlin’, nauw!”

Alice still isn’t sure if she should be more disturbed by not being able to understand more than two words of it or discovering that she’d liked the sound of it as much as she had.

“Ahoy, Alice!”

The greeting is punctuated by a stab to her ankle. “Ouch! Mally! What was that for?”

The dormouse glares. “What d’you think, you lump?! Keepin’ us waitin’ for so long being the least of it!”

Alice follows Mally’s guilty glance and finds the Hatter at the end of it, staring at the dormouse with a very intimidating scowl.

“Yes, I did do that,” Alice replies, turning away from those unsettling eyes. “I’ll do my best to be more careful with my promises in the future.”

“Sounds a bit wishy-washy to me!”

“Mally! Leav’be!” Alice shivers at the Hatter’s guttural Outland brogue.

“Good morning, everyone!”

At the queen’s entrance, the Hatter slides into the chair next to Alice’s and Mally scrambles up to stand over Chessur who has reclined himself in the chair on the far side of the Tweedles. Alice briefly wonders why Mally and the Hatter are avoiding each other before turning her attention to the queen.

“Thank you all so much for coming today,” the White Queen begins. “I’ve an appointment with Fenruffle shortly so I hope this won’t take long.” She takes a determined breath. “Now, as you’ve all noticed, Alice has returned.”

“Finally,” Mally sniffs.

The Hatter flashes yet another glare in her direction.

“Yes, at long last,” Mirana agrees pleasantly. “Now that my Champion is in residence, there are certain expectations of the public that must be addressed.”

Turning to Alice, the queen continues, “Do not think for a moment that you will have to accept these responsibilities, Alice. They’re quite antiquated as the last Queen’s Champion lived and died... well, let’s just say it’s been quite a while since there’s been a Queen’s Champion, shall we?”

Alice nods. She notices that, in the chair beside hers, the Hatter’s hand is rather forcibly gripping his armrest. “I understand. I think,” Alice replies.

“Excellent! Now, to the heart of the matter: As I’ve yet to be married and I have a Champion now to defend my, er, honor, it’ll be expected that any male of established lineage or reputation will be welcome to participate in the Wooing Rites to petition my hand in marriage.”

Alice closes her eyes briefly and tries to ignore the sinking feeling in her stomach. “The Wooing Rites?” she asks, trying to hide her deep, deep reluctance for learning something she’s relatively sure she doesn’t want to know.

“Ah, yes. Perhaps this is another thing Upland does not share with Underland. Well, as it so happens, a queen of marriageable age is quite eligible to receive suitors. Of course, she does not have to accept any of them.”

“Unless they happen to kill the Queen’s Champion, of course,” Chessur drawls and consequently receives a burning yellow stare from the Hatter.

“Excuse me?” Alice manages, keeping an eye on the byplay.

“Don’t worry, Alice,” the queen assures her. “It’s very, very poor form to kill the Queen’s Champion. And, with the current political climate it won’t be an issue. To put it bluntly, my role in the Wooing Rites is to smile and placate my suitors until – or if – I choose one of them. My Champion’s role will be to interview them and determine their suitability and sincerity.”

“Interview?” Alice confirms. That doesn’t sound so bad, but, next to her, the Hatter has still not relaxed one whit.

Mally snorts.

The queen clears her throat delicately. “Ah, yes, that’s part of it. After the interview, you’ll be required to duel the candidate.”

“Duel? As in hand-to-hand combat?”

“More like sword-to-sword combat,” Tweedledee explains.

“Unless the fellow’s a mind to be a bit more practical with his demonstration, then it’d be an anything-you-can-throw-stab-poke-or-choke against an, er, well...” Tweedledum subsides under another furious glare from the Hatter.

Alice takes a deep breath. “All right, let me see if I’m understanding this correctly: I’ll interview and fight – with real weapons! – against your suitors, who shouldn’t try to kill me because it’s bad manners?”

“More or less,” Chessur replies with a grin.

Alice ignores the Hatter’s reaction this time and directs her gaze to the queen. “Is it more or less, Your Majesty?”

Mirana nods, acknowledging her concerns. “You will do your best to determine the suitor’s intentions toward me through interviews. You’ll then provide him with the means to demonstrate his skills in dueling. After all, my vows do not permit me to harm any living creature so I am not able to defend myself. The future king will have that responsibility. The suitors will be eager to show their skills in combat to impress both my court and myself.”

“And they’re not going to toss me down and run me through because...?”

The queen winces at the imagery. Beside her, Alice thinks she sees the Hatter’s face twitch into a brief but furious grimace.

“It’s true, if a suitor defeated you, I would be forced to marry him. However, as I said, there’s no reason for him to kill you as his primary goal will be to make a good impression upon me and killing or severely injuring my Champion would not further that goal. So he’ll show off a bit and then, graciously, let you finish it.”

“I see...” Alice muses. Glancing around at the assembled creatures and people, she asks, “If it’s my decision to accept this responsibility or not, then why are so many attending our meeting?”

“If you decide to do it, then you’ll need some training, won’t you?” Tweedledee says.

“Contrariwise, if you don’t, then you won’t but we’ll’ve gotten a rather nice tea out of it,” Tweedledum replies.

Alice stares at the assembled Underlandians: Mallymkun, Chessur, the Tweedles, the Hatter... “All of you would be teaching me how to fight?”

“You’ve got it now,” Chessur announces. “So what do you say?”

Alice can see how eager and interested everyone is in her response. Well, everyone except the Hatter who is glaring furiously at the floor. He might be mad, but Alice agrees with Mirana about him: the Hatter does see things much more clearly than most. If he has found a reason to be anxious, Alice ought to be very, very careful.

“Your Majesty, why can’t I use the Vorpal Sword? Absolum told me it knows what it wants. Surely...?”

“I’m afraid that won’t be possible, Alice. The sword only responds to the Jabberwocky. If it’s put to any other use, it will shatter.”

“Oh. A bit tetchy, isn’t it?” Alice mutters.

Mally giggles madly. Chessur grins. The Tweedles elbow each other. The Hatter does nothing.

Alice hesitates. “If I have to make a decision right now...”

“You don’t,” the queen assures her, no doubt sensing Alice’s refusal. “If you’d like a few days to consider it...”

“Actually, I’ll need a few days, and a lot of help, to even see if I have any talent at all with the sword.”

“And knife and garrote and staff and spear and...” Mally’s list dies incomplete when the Hatter growls at her.

“Ah, right,” Alice says, fisting her hand to keep from reaching out to touch the Hatter’s arm. That sort of public display would not be appropriate in this venue. Especially if the Hatter is to become one of her instructors.

Addressing the queen, Alice replies, “If Mally, Chessur, the Tweedles, and the Hatter have time this week to tutor me in... trouncing someone, then I’ll have a better idea of what I’m capable. By next week, I should have an answer for you, Your Majesty.”

Mirana smiles brilliantly. “Fantastic! By Monday, then? I look forward to your reports, everyone, and Alice, I shall look forward to your answer. Now,” the queen says with a worried glance at the clock, “I’m afraid I have a meeting with Fenruffle. If you’ll excuse me...”

As the group files out of the Royal Office and a very grumpy-looking gryphon stomps in, Mally gives Alice another poke in the ankle with her hatpin sword. “So, when are we getting started?”

Alice glances at the Hatter – the tense, silent, fist-curling, glare-hurling Hatter – and says, “After lunch let’s meet in the courtyard. Chessur, could you find a location that will allow for ease of movement and doesn’t present too many breakables?”

“My pleasure.” The cat disappears on his quest.

“Mally, Tweedles, why don’t you go ahead and start lunch? I... that is, I’d like to have a word with Hatter. In private.”

“Sure.”  “Of course.” The Tweedles shrug and head for the brunch room.

Mally giggles and follows them, lunging and jabbing at shadows with enthusiasm.

“Alice?”

She turns and takes in the tumultuous swirl of colors in the Hatter’s eyes: fierce yellow and pale, pale green and even a hint of burning orange. Alice takes his arm and steers him toward the nearest available room.

“It looks as though you’re of as many minds about this as I am,” she observes wryly, closing the door behind them.

The Hatter ignores the sofa and chairs in the very lovely parlor and beseeches, “Don’t agree to this.”

“If I don’t what will happen to the queen, to Underland?”

He hesitates, his eyes turning a lovely shade of deep green. He shakes his head and that washed-out olive reemerges. “No, please, Alice. Don’t do this.”

“I haven’t agreed,” she reminds him softly.

“Don’t!” he nearly shouts, stepping in front of her, placing his work-roughened hands on her arms. “Don’t...”

“Hatter,” she says, reaching up to grasp his elbows. “In my world, I was a business woman. And I was horrid at it. At least in the practical aspects. In Underland, what will I do with my life? Who will I be?”

The Hatter smiles. “You’ll be Alice, of course.”

“As natural as that sounds, being Alice is not a career.”

He stares at her, his eyes so pale they’re almost white.

“I need to find out if I can do this. And I need your help. Please.”

He shakes his head. “Nae, nae...”

“Hatter!” Alice places a hand on his cheek again, drawing him out of his churning emotions and the siren call of madness. “I need you to be rational right now.”

He nods and takes a deep breath. “Yes, yes. Rational. Regrettably rational.”

Alice appreciates the attempt at humor, no matter how truthful the comment had been. His hands drop from her arms.

“I took up the Vorpal Sword,” she tells him. “Isn’t that another kind of promise?”

“The queen will release you if you ask her.”

Alice hesitates. “I’m not sure I want to do that. I’m not sure what I want.” She closes her eyes and sighs, trying to organize her thoughts. “I want to try this, though. If only to eliminate it from my future career choices.”

When she opens her eyes, the Hatter’s green eyes are studying her very closely. “Don’t consider it, Alice. Ask to be released. There’s time for...”

“I want to do this,” she interrupts, surprised at the intensity of her desire. “I’m going to do it. Try, at least.” She gives him a long, level look. “Will you help me?”

Tarrant’s expression tightens with unhappiness. A moment later, he nods with visible reluctance.

Alice addresses that resistance directly: “If you help me do this, you cannot be gentle with me. I need to know exactly what I’ll be facing. I’m pretty sure Mally won’t hold back, but I think you’ll agree that she and I are not very evenly matched. The Tweedles seem... a bit easy to fool,” she admits tactfully. “And Chessur is not a typical opponent. I’ll need you to test me. You’re a man and I’ll be fighting men. You know how to fight – I saw you during the battle. I need to know what you know.”

His hands return to her arms and hold on tightly. Above her, the Hatter’s eyes fluctuate between a rich blue-green to fearsome yellow and back again with an occasional glimpse of that sickly paleness. “You don’t know what you’re asking...”

“I know I don’t,” Alice agrees, wondering why this is so hard for him. “But I’m asking you to push me as hard as you can this week so that, at the end of it, if I survive...” She adds that last bit in a droll tone. “... I can give the queen my answer. Whatever it is.”

Alice feels a chill unfurl through her as something... calculating flashes in his eyes. “Push you hard?” he repeats in a considering tone, his brogue softening and darkening the words. “Aye, that I’ll do, Alice. That I’ll do.”

 

*~*~*~*

 

“Move your feet!” Mally screeches.

Alice forces herself to jog a few steps backward and to the side. The Hatter follows her.

“Keep your head up!” Chessur reminds her lazily.

Alice feels her body jerk roughly as she counters blow after blow from the staff the Hatter is wielding today. On the first day of her training, the Tweedles and the Hatter had taken turns knocking her down and Mally and Chessur had joined the festivities by tripping her at every available opportunity. Apparently, after four hours of colliding with the castle croquet pitch, Alice had managed to figure out how to roll with the blows and come up on her feet.

Today, they’d moved on to using staffs. She’d gotten the basics down with the Tweedles as the Hatter had adjusted her stance, the positioning of her hands and grip, her posture. She’d never been poked and prodded so much in her entire life let alone in a single morning, let alone by a man. If it hadn’t been for the fierce yellow-green of his eyes, Alice doubts she would have managed to keep the blush off of her face at all.

She’d done all right with the Tweedles, but now, after lunch and a break, the Hatter – stripped down to his trousers and shirtsleeves – had taken up the second staff. And he is pushing her just as he’d promised he would: hard.

Alice mistakenly drops her guard and the Hatter shoves the end of the staff into her stomach, winding her. She keeps her own staff up, though, and manages to counter an upward blow in the direction of her chin. She follows through with pair of rather predictable blows – a right and a left – then pivots smartly on her heel and manages a strike against his shoulder then forces her bruised body to roll under his staff as it whistles through the air and gets a good whack at his ankle.

“Bloody bulloghin’ brangergain!” he barks.

Getting to her feet, Alice stumbles toward him, fight forgotten. “I’m sorry! Are you all –”

The flash of a grin is the harbinger of the attack: the Hatter grabs her staff, twists her body around, taking advantage of her poor balance, and pulls her back against his chest, her hands are trapped by his arms and the staff pressing her back against him.

“Never, take pity on yer opponent,” he rumbles in her ear.

Mute and trying to suppress a series of very distracting shivers, Alice nods.

“Now, I’ve got ye. What are ye gonna do abou’ it?”

Sending a silent apology at him, Alice lifts her leg and scrapes the edge of her shoe down his trouser-clad shin.

The Hatter yelps and Alice twists out of his grasp, scoops up her dropped staff, and, turning, strikes at the back of his opposite knee. He doesn’t go down, but it buckles enough for her to charge his back and knock him forward onto the ground. The tackle is far from graceful. Alice keeps her staff across his shoulders and her weight on his upper thighs. She tries not to think too much about the exact position she’s in. Oh, what her mother would have to say about this!

“Good,” the Hatter says, his voice strained. “But put the staff a bit lower. Yes, there. There’s a pressure point there.”

Alice nods, examining the location of staff against his back. “I’ll remember.”

He nods and pants against the grass.

“Break?” she checks, unwilling to be attacked the minute she picks herself up.

“Aye, break.”

Alice rolls away as gently as possible and reaches out to help him sit up. “Let me check your leg.” He doesn’t protest as she reaches for his dirt-covered and grass-stained trouser leg and lifts it. She winces at the raw skin on his shin.

“Hatter... I’m so sorry.”

He cocks his head and regards the injury with an objective expression. “You did well. Nothing to apologize for.”

Of course, that just makes Alice feel worse.

“Here, this should ease your conscience,” Chessur says, materializing at Alice’s side.

She takes the jar from him and applies some of the paste to the bruising scrape.

“Your form’s pretty good,” Mally tells the Hatter. “I didn’t know you knew how to fight with staffs.”

“And yet you let me coach it?” he asks wryly.

Mally shrugs. “I know swords and knives. What was I going to say about a stick that’s not even sharp?”

“Ignorance has never stopped you before.”

“Humph!”

Alice watches Mally march off, tail high. She notices the Tweedles and Chessur off near the castle wall, raiding the refreshment table. Turning back to the Hatter, she catches his wince as he gently folds his trouser leg down over the developing bruise and scraped skin.

“Are you really all right?” she asks. “I shouldn’t have...”

The Hatter raises a hand and presses a knuckle against her lips. “You should have and you did. You don’t get many second chances in a fight. You do what you have to in order to win.”

Alice blinks as he lowers his hand. His gaze is slightly unfocused as he studies her face. “You really think these suitors will try to kill me?”

“I don’t know,” he replies, his eyes snapping into focus and Alice sees the color of fear in them: that washed-out green.

Alice wants to ask him if he still thinks she should refuse, but she doesn’t. She doubts he’s changed his opinion. Alice draws her ankles close and wraps her aching arms around her trouser-clad legs. “Thank you.” When the Hatter looks up at her with a questioning expression, she explains, “For the honesty. For not holding back.”

His gaze gentles to a verdant green. “Just don’t forget to do the same. You fight as hard as you must to win. No less. Never any less.”

She smiles. Nodding once, she assures him, “I won’t.”

After the words have left her mouth and the Hatter relaxes, Alice realizes that she’d just made him yet another promise. The third one so far. Not that she’s counting...

 

*~*~*~*

 

Using swords had been... interesting. A bit painful despite the fact that they’d been dull and made of wood. Short staffs, actually. Mally had been especially bossy and Alice had jumped to obey just to keep her from screaming. She wonders glumly if anyone had appreciated her efforts.

And, true to his word, the Hatter had not been gentle with her. With his extra upper body strength, he had disarmed her nine times out of ten.

“How in the name of Fate did you manage to hold on to the Vorpal Sword long enough to behead the Jabberwocky?” Chessur had wondered aloud, looking flabbergasted.

The Hatter had shouted at him in Outlandish but Chessur had already achieved his objective: when Alice and the Hatter had squared off for the next bout, she’d been beyond mad. She’d been enraged. Of course, she’d been mad at herself, but the fire in her blood had worked just as well on the Hatter. It had been the one and only time she’d managed to disarm him, knock him down, and put the wooden “blade” to his throat without giving him time to regroup.

“That’s my Alice,” he’d whispered up at her with a smile.

If Mally and Chessur hadn’t been hovering within earshot, Alice might have happily agreed with him in that moment.

On the morning of the fourth day – Thursday and a much-needed holiday – Alice sleeps late, takes a hot bath, spends an hour stretching, then goes to find the Hatter. She stops by his workshop with some things in a basket for lunch and finds him busily forming, trimming, pinning, sewing, and weaving. The man’s hands move so fast it seems as if he is doing all of it at once. Alice leans in the doorway, content to watch him until he notices her. For two or three minutes, she tries to find a rhythm in his movements, but fails. But then an undoubtedly bad idea occurs to her.

Sliding the basket of bread, cheese, and fruit behind the full-length mirror next to the door, Alice slips into the room and, keeping low, circles around as best she can.

Don’t do it, Alice!

She wipes her perspiring palms on her trousers.

He’d be disappointed if I didn’t.

Alice bites her lip.

He’ll be furious if you do!

She tracks his movements intently.

Or he might not...

Crouching under his workbench, Alice pulls a cheese knife from her belt and slips it between her teeth. When the Hatter turns and scoops up a bolt of fabric in each hand, she strikes. Alice grabs his ankles and pulls with all her might. The Hatter falls and the bolts of fabric unravel in the air. Alice moves fast and grabs the back of his head with one hand before it strikes the thin rug even as she presses the cheese knife to his throat and tries not to wince when her bruised knees smash into the floor.

The Hatter blinks up at her, clearly startled.

“Did I surprise you?” Alice asks, in a disbelieving tone.  She'd certainly surprised herself!

The Hatter grins. “I believe you did. What an inspired attack!”

“Was it any good?”

He considers her. “You’re starting knives tomorrow.” He glances down at the cheese knife.

“And wrestling the day after that,” she agrees. With a shrug, she cheekily admits, “Maybe I just wanted a short introduction before –”

Alice squeaks as the Hatter grins wickedly and twists. With a single sinewy motion, he’s pulled the cheese knife away from his throat and has flattened her on the floor.

“A short introduction?” the Hatter murmurs, his blue-green eyes sweeping over her like a touch. “A short introduction in what exactly?”

Alice struggles to keep her breathing regular but she can hear her pulse pounding madly in her ears, she can feel it in her chest. Confused, overwhelmed, trapped in his undivided attention, she rasps out the first thing that comes to mind: “What... are you qualified to teach, exactly?”
 

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant luxuriates in the feel of her – his Alice! – against him. He forgets that they’re on the floor of his workshop. He sees nothing other than her. Feels nothing other than her. With each breath, she presses against him. And with each instant of contact, his blood zings faster and hotter through his veins.

“What,” she pants, “are you qualified to teach, exactly?”

The sheer number and variety of options overcome him. For a moment, he has to close his eyes, wary of what colors they might show. His lips curve into a small smile.

“Distraction,” he whispers, choosing the least damning of his available choices. He leans toward her. He dares not kiss her. He dares not touch her any more deliberately than he already is. He leans down and opens his eyes as his face descends toward her neck, her scent. He inhales deeply until his lungs scream from the expansion.

“Alice... why aren’t you fighting back? You promised you would.”

She gasps softly beneath him. “It’s a holiday,” she manages. She sounds dazed, lost, utterly flunderwhapped.

“But you promised.”

“Don’t make me bite you, Hatter; I might draw blood.”

“You’re soft,” he tells her, enjoying the dual meaning of the words.

She struggles weakly to pull her wrists from his grasp before admitting with defeat, “Everyone has a weak spot.”

“And have you found it?” he asks against her neck. Her skin is so close, so very, very close. It would take but a thought to press his lips there, to taste her with the tip of his tongue.

No! Mustn’t!

Of course not. Of course not. But it’s only polite to wait for her answer, isn’t it?

“It’s becoming clearer,” she finally says.

He wants to demand that she say his name before he’ll release her. Oh, what he would give to hear his name spoken in her breathless voice...! But no. No.

He leans back, in control now that there’s a bit of distance between them and he can breathe non-Alice-scented air. Opening his eyes, he regards her. “Even pinned, you have weapons. Your teeth. Bite his neck, here.” He shifts away from her until he’s sitting on his knees and draws a finger down his neck along the body’s major artery. “Or his ear, there’s another pressure point here.” He lifts his hair out of the way and points. “You sink your teeth into him and don’t let go.”

Alice sits up, bracing herself on her hands, and nods. “All right.”

Tarrant grins at her, delighted with her sign of trust. There’s no blushing, no scrambling up to her feet, no brushing off of hands. She meets his gaze directly and holds it without flinching. He can’t remember the last time someone had done that in so... intimate a setting.

“Hatter?” she asks, still watching him intently.

“Yes, Alice?”

“Your eyes... they’re blue.”

Tarrant tilts his head to the side considering her statement-that-is-a-question. So she wants to know what he’s feeling...? He replies, “I’ve been considering words that start with the letter M...”

“Munificent?” Alice guesses after a pause.

Tarrant smiles. “That is an excellent word, Alice! I shall have to keep that in Mind!”

“But it wasn’t the one you were thinking of.”

“No, it wasn’t.”

Alice smiles. “Your eyes are still blue.”

“Moonstruck,” he admits. He shares a smile with her for another moment and only one more moment, he then stands and helps her to her feet.

“I think we’ve lost the cheese knife,” she observes without bothering to look at the floor.

“Then I suggest we break cheese and cut the bread,” he replies, holding up a pair of shears.

They do.
 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant tries his best not to think about having Alice beneath him on the floor of his workshop... or at any other venue. He also tries not to think about the fact that she could make the deeply disturbing decision to accept all of her responsibilities as the Queen’s Champion and agree to fight whatever block-headed, heavy-handed, slithy-shrifty greizin’-grommer that gets it into his head to try for the queen’s hand.

Alice had asked him to push her. To show her what it would be like when faced with a foe, when faced with the loss of one’s own life. She’d asked for this treatment. And Tarrant has to continually remind himself of it.

He tells himself that if he’s harsh enough, cruel enough, it’ll convince her to turn away from her role as Champion. He tells himself that when the Trial of Threes arrives, it won’t matter.

It doesn’t have to be her.

Tarrant holds onto these thoughts ruthlessly. At least until he’s pinned to the turf with Alice’s soft body pressing down against him.

“Good,” he tells her – and, oddly enough, means it! – as she draws the short, wooden mock-knife blade across the side of his neck in a motion that would sever the blood vessels he’d told her about. “And the bones of the neck?” he prompts.

He feels her weight shift slightly and her inner thighs press against his back and sides. He closes his eyes and tries to focus on the dig of the wooden blade just there in the back of his neck. “Good,” he repeats, stifling a moan.

“Break?” she asks, a bit breathlessly.

“Aye. Break.”

As usual, she tumbles off of him with a whisper of sound. Tarrant grins as he rolls over in the grass and considers the fact that she’s very careful of how she touches him when they are not trying to... what had been the word she’d used?... ah, yes: trounce! Alice is unfailingly careful of how she touches him when each is not trying to trounce the other. Well, except for...

D’nae think about yesterday morning!

Tarrant sighs as he helplessly remembers.

“Hatter?”

He closes his eyes briefly, listening to the Tweedles and Chessur and Mally bicker and bet over by the plates of mint puffs and cheese candles. Opening his eyes, Tarrant looks up at the sky, the deep, summer blue and wonders if his eyes had been this color yesterday.

“Are you all right?”

She always asks him that. Even when he’s sure he must have injured her and not the other way around.

“Nae,” he says. Before she can scramble to her feet and go fetch the bruise ointment, he says, “D’nae accept this.” Tarrant clears his throat and struggles for calm. “Don’t continue the tradition of the Queen’s Champion.”

“Because I’m no good at it?”

Her droll tone bothers him. He frowns. “Because you’ll never know peace. Because even in times of peace, you’ll have to do this. Day after day. Once you step on this path, there will be no leaving it.”

Alice is silent for a long moment. “Where did you learn to fight?”

“Most of it I learned from my Fa. Then I relearned it after that Horvendush Day.” He’s thankful Alice doesn’t ask which Horvendush Day.

Again, another moment of silence passes. “You’ve been alone since then?”

“A hatter, alone with his hats, passes customers by attracting Time.” He giggles. “Have I made a rhyme?”

“It’s lovely,” Alice says. After a moment, she sits up and glances at their comrades near the punch decanter. “I’ll chase Chess around for a bit this afternoon. Maybe I’ll put a mint puff on the end of my ‘knife’ and try to stick it in his ear.”

Tarrant grins at the thought. “I’d like to stay to hear that.”

Alice blinks at him. “You don’t have any hats to finish today?”

“Several.” But he makes no move to get up and leave.

Tarrant stares at the sky and remembers watching Alice getting tossed around by the Jabberwock three years ago. He hadn’t been able to save her then. He’d tried, though, despite the fact that the Oraculum had predicted it would be her to fight the wretched beast. Tarrant hadn’t truly dared to defy that document; his one pathetic attempt to volunteer in her stead attests to that! And then she’d nearly gotten herself squished in the first thirty seconds of the fight! If he hadn’t intervened... Tarrant tries not to finish that thought. Instead, he prays she is smart enough to avoid the opportunity the queen is offering her.

“The battle’s long over,” he says. And, if he’s completely honest with himself, he never should have – no one should have – asked Alice to fight the Jabberwock that first time at all. Tarrant knows he’d been desperate for the Resistance to make its move. He’d been blood-thirsty and more than half-mad with the need for vengeance. He would have done anything to ensure his turn on the battlefield. And, to his everlasting shame, he had even manipulated Alice into becoming the Queen’s Champion. In his blind thirst for battle, he’d offered up Alice!

His Alice!

Although... she hadn’t been his at the time. And, quite frankly, he’s not sure if she’s his now. But, one day, perhaps... if possible... she might be. And the anticipation and uncertainty is a heady combination.

If you asked, she might be your Alice, you know.

No, Tarrant doesn’t know.

It could be so easy...

No, no it wouldn’t.

There’s the Thrice a-Vow... Remember?

He does. Tarrant shakes his head. No, no he won’t do that. He wouldn’t. Couldn’t.

“Hatter?”

Again, that hand against his jaw pulls him from his disturbing thoughts. He clears his throat. “I’m fine.”

He opens his eyes to see Alice leaning over him, her expression pensive. “And your foot?”

Tarrant giggles. “You’re rather good at crushing toes, aren’t you?”

“It’s my specialty.” She smiles.

Tarrant likes her smile. He’d like to see it every hour of every day, if possible. And it would be possible if she’d only decide to stay in Underland.

She might stay if she were the Queen’s Champion again...

Yes, that’s one option...

She’ll be killed if she stays the Queen’s Champion. The Trial of Threes...

Tarrant knows he should tell her to go back. Leave all of them to their fate. They’ve survived before; they will again.

Live, Alice.

Stay, Alice.

The thoughts are contrary. He shouldn’t be dwelling on them, inviting the madness. He’s not sure what he would do if the madness were to come upon him now, with her so close, with his need so desperate, with the others so far away...

Sometimes, Tarrant frightens himself.

Alice’s thumb caresses his cheekbone and Tarrant opens his eyes. When had he closed them? He’s not sure.

“You’re fine?” she checks.

He smiles. “Yes, and I’m ready to see you convince Chessur’s ear to chew a mint puff.”

Alice returns his grin. “Then I suggest you make yourself comfortable. This might take a while.” She stands, scoops up her wooden knife and calls, “Chess! Tweedles! Mally! Have you finished off all the mint puffs already?”

Tarrant leans against a tree trunk and folds his hands over his middle. Yes, he’ll watch. Yes, he’ll wait. And yes, he’ll find a way to keep her. Somehow.

Although whether he’ll be keeping her safe or keeping her with him, he’s not sure.

 

Chapter Four: Thrice a-Vow

The mint puff ends up not in Chessur’s ear, but stuck to the underside of his chin, like a frothy green beard. Alice had very much enjoyed his consternated glare and the Hatter’s insane giggles. Chess had vanished in a fit of pique and the puff had dropped to the lawn with a soft splat! And then Alice had raced over to the Hatter to pat his cheek and remind him to breathe.

It’s difficult for Alice to summon up the energy to wrestle the next day. She knows it’s an important skill. She’ll need to know how to outmaneuver an opponent even when she’s pinned down. Again, she’s paired with the Hatter as none of the others are large enough to present much of a challenge.

“Right,” the Hatter says brusquely, shedding his coat and top hat. “Let’s start.”

“Ahem,” Chessur gently interrupts. “You seem to be favoring your left side a bit. You know I could...”

“No!” The Hatter clears his throat. “I’m fine.”

Alice hesitates. She had been noticing his reluctance to use his left arm to its fullest. “Is it your shoulder or your ribs?” she asks, glancing about for the medicinal paste that’s become her constant companion this past week.

“Neither. I’m fine.”

“Then why is Chessur trying to... Actually, what are you trying to do exactly, Chess?”

The Cheshire Cat shrugs. “Merely take Tarrant’s place in your fight. He needs a rest.”

Mally giggles. “Oh, I never thought I’d hear you volunteer yourself for a hair-pulling, toe-stomping, hand-biting free-for-all!”

“Indeed,” Alice agrees, startled. If Chessur – snobbish, selfish, self-obsessed creature that he is – is offering to roll around in the dirt and grass in the Hatter’s place, there must be something wrong. She glances at the Hatter. “Perhaps we should just save this for another day...”

“No need to do that!” Tweedledee insists.

“Right! Just sit this one out, Hatter,” Tweedledum says.

Alice watches his lips pull back over his teeth in hostile response. Eager to make peace now, Alice says, “Let’s just take the rest of the day off...”

“But the queen’s expecting your answer the day after tomorrow!” Mally interjects.

Alice winces.

“She d’snae have teh agree teh anythin’ afore’r after Monday,” the Hatter snarls.

But Alice wants this decided. She wants to make a choice, once and for all, and stick to it. Wandering aimlessly around the castle indefinitely is not something she’s looking forward to. She sighs, “Hatter, just let me take a look at you before we decide to continue.”

It’s a reasonable request.

So, naturally, he refuses.

“I’m fine.”

Alice grits her teeth.

“Alice, if I might be so bold as to ask why you’ve declined my services?”

She turns to address Chessur. “Well, frankly, your evaporating qualities –”

“Will not interfere. I give you my word.”

Alice blinks, surprised that he’d promise that despite the damage she could do to him. “And, then there’s your... size. I don’t think I’ll be fighting any cat-sized suitors, so...”

“Oh, but Chessur can change his size!” a Tweedle announces.

“That and more!” the other interjects. “Didn’t he tell you how the Hatter and Mally escaped execution?”

“Oh, um,” Alice struggles to remember. She’d been so glad to see him in one piece, she hadn’t really focused on the details. She looks at the Hatter. “You said something about disrupting the peace and stirring up the anti-big head sentiment, I think.”

“Trust you to leave out my heroic contribution,” Chessur sighs in disappointment.

“Chessur disguised his-self as the Hatter,” Mally explains.

Alice regards the Cheshire Cat with eyes that must be comically wide. “You can do that?”

“Oh, yes. Well enough to fool even the executioner. I am a shape-shifter, you know.”

“I didn’t. I just thought it was the evaporating qualities you’d mentioned.”

He grins. “As Tweedledum has pointed out, I do do that... and more. With your permission, Alice?”

“It’s not necessary!” the Hatter insists. “I. Am. Fine.”

Alice whirls on him. “If you are then you won’t have a problem unbuttoning your shirt and giving us a look at your left side, then will you?”

His hand reaches for the first button, but rather than open it, he clutches it in a tight fist. “I’m fine.”

Making a decision, Alice turns toward her other tutors. “Can you become anyone, Chess?”

“Well, yes, but it takes quite a bit of time to learn the shape...”

“So, it’d be easier to choose someone you’ve already been.”

“Quite.”

“And how many shapes do you know?”

“Well, this one, of course. And Tarrant’s...”

Alice waits. When it becomes clear that those are her only two options, she gapes. “You’ve never learned anyone else’s shape?”

“Well, as you said, with my evaporation skills, where would be the need?”

“I see.” Alice looks from the Hatter to the Cheshire Cat and back again. She closes her eyes and sighs. “I accept your offer Chess.”

“Excellent!”

An inarticulate growl is the Hatter’s response. An instant later, he’s standing so close to her she can feel the heat of his temper. She opens her eyes and is slightly surprised that the others have given her and the Hatter a bit of space. Having never seen Chessur transform into anything other than air and cat, the Tweedles and Mally are quite engrossed on the slow morphing taking place in the clearing.

“Alice...”

“Hatter,” she replies, turning to face him.

“You asked me to do this.”

“Yes, I did.” She reaches out a hand to him and touches his left elbow. “And I’ve injured you. That’s inexcusable.” She studies his face as she moves her hand along his arm then up to his shoulder. “Show me where it hurts the worst.”

“Hurts the best,” he corrects her, shortly. “If it hurt worse, it wouldn’t be much of a hurt, would it?”

“I suppose not.” Her hand drifts over his shoulder and down the left side of his chest. He stands there in silence and bears the examination. Alice wonders at her own actions. A week ago she never would have imagined touching the Hatter – or any man, for that matter – with so little regard for propriety. But she’d been spread eagle on the ground under this man more times than she can count over the last few days. And she’d had him on his stomach, pushing his hips down, pinning his back to the pitch. She’d had her arms around his neck in a headlock and her legs around his chest to keep him from using any leverage against her. She’s... well, if not for the clothes... she’s been intimate with the man. Practically.

When Alice’s fingers probe along one of his ribs, he draws a sharp breath. Exploring the area, she maps out an area the size of her knee. A wave of remorse floods her. “I did this yesterday.” She vaguely remembers striking him right about here with her knee to knock him off of her when he’d tried to grab her knife. In the end, she’d twisted his arm behind his back and managed to pin him to the pitch. She’d thought it had ended a bit too easily. Now she knows why.

Alice lifts her gaze to his. It disconcerts her to find that his brilliant green eyes are watching her intently. “I’m sorry.”

He doesn’t reply as she starts working on his shirt. She doesn’t open every button, just the four that will give her enough room to see the bruise. Alice looks down and squeezes her eyes shut. “It looks pretty bad.”

With shaking hands, she opens the jar of ointment and scoops out a bit. Warming it in her palm, she speculates, “I think I might have broken your rib, actually. Maybe you should wrap it...”

Avoiding his stare, Alice applies the paste as gently as possible. She tries not to think too much about the fact that she’s standing in a sheltering copse of trees, alone with a man who is barely dressed – at least according to her mother – with her hand inside his shirt. Alice keeps her eyes on what she’s doing with effort. The Hatter’s stare is a presence in and of itself.

When she’s finished, Alice removes her hand with what she hopes is clinical detachment and re-buttons his shirt. Stepping back and collecting the jar from the grass, she clears her throat and informs him: “All finished.”

“Is it?”

Startled by his tone, Alice meets his gaze and... oh. Oh! She swallows with difficulty. This is the first time she’s ever seen his eyes anything approaching that shade of violet before. The part of her mind not frozen in shock, anticipation, and fear wonders what mood this color indicates...

The moment stretches between them. The Hatter’s eyes are a furious, blazing violet, but he doesn’t move a muscle. Alice feels her body slowly tense for either escape or an attack.

“Alice! We’re ready whenever you are!”

Startled by the sound of the Hatter’s voice, she turns and gapes at... well, the Hatter. No, no. Not the Hatter. The Cheshire Cat as the Hatter. He saunters over, grinning, as usual.

“The voice, too?” Alice wonders aloud. For some reason, that’s both comforting and deeply, deeply disturbing.

“I’m nothing if not thorough,” he assures her.

Alice risks a glance at the Hatter’s eyes. Peridot green. Not the best of his moods, but certainly better than an orange, murderous rage or whatever that violet had represented.

“If you don’t want to coach me this time, it’s fine,” she tells him.

The Hatter glances at her. Barely. “No, it isn’t.”

Alice watches as he strides into the clearing, stops just outside the line of trees, and crosses his arms over his chest.

“What is going on here?” she murmurs.

The Cheshire Cat Hatter leans closer to her and Alice is relieved when the scent she breathes in is very much that of cat hair and windswept fields. “You know I can’t ruin the surprise,” he rumbles. “But you might want to figure it out a bit sooner rather than later.”

Alice notes the Hatter’s stiff posture in the distance. She nods.

“Wonderful. After you, Alice?” He gestures her into the clearing and she goes, already regretting opening her eyes this morning. Deeply.

 

*~*~*~*

 

The White Queen drifts into her office just after morning tea on Monday. She barely has time to wonder how Alice has been getting on or when she’ll make her decision when she’s startled by a shadow separating quite distinctly from the free-standing time piece along the wall.

Heart racing, the queen presses a hand to her chest and struggles for a smile. “Alice?”

The intruder takes another step and the queen relaxes. “I’m sorry I startled you.”

“Ah, Alice. No harm done. How are you?”

“Fine. And you, Your Majesty?”

Mirana smiles wistfully. “As always, our rest days are far too short.”

Alice nods and takes the seat Mirana gestures to. Slipping into the adjacent chair, the queen comments, “You look tired, Alice. Are you sure you’re all right?”

Her Champion nods. “Yes. It’s been a trying week. Everyone worked very hard to train me. I really appreciate the opportunity,” Alice thanks her.

“I did nothing!” the queen protests with heartfelt modesty.

“You organized this. And you probably had a few words with the Hatter on several occasions.” Alice grins wryly. “I don’t think he would have stuck it out if you hadn’t.”

Mirana blinks. “I’m afraid I haven’t spoken to Tarrant all week. What do you mean by that Alice?”

For the first time since the interview began, an expression other than calm self-assurance is shown on Alice’s face. “You didn’t? But I thought...” She shakes her head and sighs. “I’ll never understand him... Which is odd because I thought I did.”

“Alice?”

The Queen’s Champion sighs. “It’s nothing.” When the queen merely fixes a severe stare on Alice, the younger woman finally relents: “I just wish he’d figure out whether or not he wants me to do this. He certainly gave me the what-for when I told him I wasn’t going to slay the Jabberwocky. But now he... I don’t know. He’s taught me all week, but he kept asking me to refuse your offer... but sometimes he’d look so... pleased with my progress... until Saturday, that is. Then it was all business. I just... don’t understand.”

“What happened on Saturday?” the queen inquires.

Alice leans back in her chair and crosses her trouser-clad legs. “We were due to start wrestling...”

The queen blinks, startled. Dear Fate, wrestling?! What sort of combat has the Hatter and his cohorts been teaching her Champion? Whatever happened to white gloves and rubber-capped foils and padded shirts?

“... but the Hatter was hurt. My fault. I think I fractured one or two of his ribs the day before...”

“His ribs?” Mirana murmurs, astounded.

“With my knee.”

“Your... why?”

“To get him off of me and flat on the ground.” Alice doesn’t say “of course”, but the queen can hear it in her tone.

“I... see.” But she doesn’t. She’s alarmed to realize that she hadn’t given much thought to what the training of a Champion would involve. Or how... thorough her Hatter would be. Mirana clears her throat. “Please, continue.”

“So,” Alice obliges, “I was wrestling with Chessur. But he wasn’t Chessur. Did you know he’s a shape-shifter?”

“Yes, since Tarrant and Mally managed to escape the...” The queen’s eyes widen at the implication. Alice confirms it with her next breath.

“I was wrestling Chessur, as the Hatter. On Saturday. Before the throwing-knives and spears. Sunday was garrotes and more wrestling...” Alice frowns. “He wants me to say ‘no’ but he won’t tell me why.”

Mirana summons a serene smile despite the disjointed summary. “Well, let’s look at this logically. His attitude changed on Saturday so there must be something that precipitated it on that day.”

Frustrated, Alice throws up her hands. “I’ve been going over it again and again, but nothing makes sense!”

The phrase startles a revelation from the queen. “Perhaps not. So, let’s look at it from the perspective of madness.”

“I... beg your pardon?”

“Think like Tarrant,” the queen invites.

Alice barks out a laugh. “No one thinks like him.”

“Try, Alice.”

With a huff, Alice closes her eyes. The queen watches her expression as it changes. Irritation makes way for concern, then anger and sorrow... too many emotions to count. After a very long couple of minutes, the queen sees something she’s been waiting for.

Alice opens her eyes. “The Hatter... could he... might he think he’s attached to me?” she asks wonderingly.

“Do you think he wants to keep you for a pet?” the queen challenges, doing her best to subtly poke Alice in the direction she should be looking.

“... no.”

The queen waits.

“He can’t... he doesn’t think he...” Alice swallows. For a moment, the queen wonders if she’ll turn away from the thoughts she’s quite obviously having. But, of course, her Champion would find the courage in the end: “Does he think he loves me?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“And he wants me to stay in Underland – being your Champion would guarantee that – but he doesn’t want me to get hurt, which is bound to happen if I continue to be your Champion...”

A bit taken aback by that observation – well, the last half of it anyway – Mirana rushes to assure her, “You must believe that I’d never intend for you to be hurt because of me, Alice. Honestly, the Wooing Rites are a formality. Although the Queen’s Champion must participate, the duel itself was never intended to be a true... conflict. I don’t know what sort of techniques the Hatter’s been teaching you, but I highly doubt they’ll be needful in the duels.”

Alice nods. “But he’s acting like he expects differently.”

The queen leans back in her chair and sighs. “He’s probably thinking of the Trial of Threes.”

“What is it?”

“It’s to do with the Jabberwocky. Yes, the one you’ve already slain.”

“I don’t understand... is it not dead?”

“Oh, you did slay it. Quite hard to miss that!” The queen shudders at the memory. “The Trial of Threes has to do with the fact that there is only one Jabberwocky in Underland. And there must be one. After all, without the darkness we cannot see the stars...”

After a brief pause which she uses to collect her thoughts, Mirana explains, “Three years, three months, three weeks, three days, three hours, three minutes, and three seconds – three and a third years precisely – after the Jabberwocky is slain, it will rise again. Reborn. The first hour of its reincarnation is very important. The Jabberwocky will be considerably more impressionable at that time than at any other in its life. My sister took advantage of this when she recruited it into her service. The previous barer of the Vorpal Sword had died shortly after killing the Jabberwocky. Iracebeth sent someone – probably her Steward, Ilosovich Stayne – to negotiate with it when it reemerged.”

The queen takes a deep breath and speaks bluntly, “In less than three months, I’ll ask you, my Champion... if you choose to remain my Champion after hearing this... I’ll ask you to go to the battlefield – to the Jabberwocky – to negotiate an alliance. And, Alice, you will have to go alone.”

In the silence that follows, the ticks and tocks of the clock mark the time.

Finally, just when Mirana thinks she’s going to have to start counting off the seconds in the thousands, Alice whispers, “I don’t think I can do that.”

“I know it sounds dreadful, having to face it again when you’ve already faced and defeated –”

“No, that’s not...” Alice takes a deliberate breath. “The Jabberwocky killed the Hatter’s clan, didn’t it?”

“Under Stayne’s instructions,” the queen speculates.

“I’m not sure if that matters. The Hatter... we both know he’s not entirely sane. Especially about that Horvendush Day. He can’t be rational about the Jabberwocky. If you make peace with it... if I help you...”

“He may never forgive us.”

“He may never have a moment of sanity again.”

The queen frowns. “Then, perhaps there is another way. I will consult the historical records. Perhaps there is some other option.”

Alice nods. “Maybe someone from the Outlands could do it.”

Mirana doubts that will end in anything other than disaster, but she doesn’t put the thought into words.

Alice concludes, “If the Jabberwocky doesn’t agree to keep to itself far away from this castle and the Hatter, I’ll kill it. And we’ll do this again in another three and a third years.”

The White Queen hesitates to endorse that plan. “Alice, reconsider, please. The Jabberwocky will not have forgotten you and the fact that you defeated it once. And it will remember every time you defeat it thereafter. Our best chance for peace is in twelve weeks. Slaying it again will only inspire a grudge that may very well be insurmountable.”

Alice slumps in her chair. “This place doesn’t do things by halves, does it?”

“No, I can’t say it does.”

The queen watches as Alice runs a hand through her unbound hair. After a moment, she inquires, “Did the others give you their report on my progress? Am I any good at dueling?”

The queen shakes her head. “This decision must be yours alone, Alice.”

With a slight scowl, Alice stands and walks out onto the balcony. She braces her arms on the railing and looks out over the sea of ever-blossoming trees. After a moment, the queen follows her but stops before stepping out onto the balcony. She’s seen far too many plummeting tea tables to feel comfortable crossing it without a very good reason.

Alice drums her fingers on the stone and the queen notices that her hands, surprisingly, don’t look any rougher than they had last week with the exception of a few red spots: half-healed blisters that will become calluses. Not for the first time, Mirana wishes the Oraculum had called for someone else to slay the Jabberwocky. Anyone else. Alice should not be forced to bear this destiny. And that is why the Oraculum has been tucked away in a very well-concealed container ever since that Frabjous Day: it’s ridiculous and juvenile, but the queen hopes that if no one knows Alice’s future as it’s foretold, then she will be able to make her own.

Oh, how we fight against you, Fate. Whether you are friend or fiend...

Alice turns around, regards something over head for a moment, and then crosses the balcony, stopping at the queen’s side.

“I’ll do it,” she says quietly. “But don’t tell anyone yet.” Her gaze shifts upward again, no doubt in the direction of the window to Tarrant’s rooms above them. “I’ll try to explain it to him, but it might take a few days. And, please, no banquets or balls or celebrations about it.”

“Why are you agreeing if you don’t feel it’s something to be celebrated?”

Alice closes her eyes briefly. When she opens them, there’s an acceptance about her that the queen’s never seen before. “I want to belong here. I think I’m good at fighting, actually. I think I could be even better. It feels like this is what I’m meant to do. Nothing’s ever... stirred my blood like being your Champion. And I... whatever happens, I don’t want to leave again.”

“You don’t have to accept this position in order to stay,” Mirana hurries to say.

“I know that. But, like you said, we all have our roles. The Hatter waits for me and I arrive. The Jabberwocky destroys whatever is in its path and I fight it. You shine light all across Underland and I do what I can to keep back the shadows.” Alice gives the queen a confident grin. “I’m ready to accept that.”

Mirana blinks back against the heat of sudden tears. “Thank you, Alice.”

Alice nods and turns toward the door.

Mirana drifts over to her desk and collects an assortment of parchments. “Oh, and Alice?”

A few paces from the door, Alice turns.

Lifting the first document, the White Queen reads, “’It can’t be said how good Alice will be at dueling stuck-up scumbags, but she’s trounced the Hatter more often than not.’”

The queen smiles at the look on Alice’s face. “That was from Mallymkun.”

“I could tell.”

“And this one: ‘Alice might need another month before she can duel, but, contrariwise, she might not. She’s a natural at fighting, a natural fighter.’ From the Tweedles.”

Alice blinks. “I wonder how long it took them to word that.”

The queen chuckles and picks up the next parchment. “’Tell Alice to cut her hair. If that tove’s nest gets in her eyes, nothing good will come of it. Otherwise, I expect she’ll perform quite admirably.’”

“From Chessur?” Alice asks.

The queen nods and reaches for the final parchment. She glances down at the handwriting. The words are too dark, too slanted. The vellum has been permanently dented by the pressure of the writer’s hand. Having heard Alice explain her experiences over the last week and the inner turmoil Tarrant must be facing down every minute of every day, the queen is quite surprised by his conclusion.

She reads, “’Any queen would be honored to have a Champion with as much muchness.’”

“Tha...” Alice clears her throat. “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“Thank you, Alice.”

The queen watches her Champion exit the office. Alone now, the queen allows her smile to fade. She looks back at Tarrant’s report, her eyes drawn to the nearly illegible scrawl that takes up the lower three-quarters of the page:

If she dies I shall never forgive her she will not leave me again don’t die Alice stay live stay live not the same go back to Upland and live stay with me and never pick up a sword if you die I shall never never never NEVER...

The queen looks away. She doesn’t have to read the entirety of it a second time.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant Hightopp is a hatter. He is not a fighter, not naturally, not without a campaign of vengeance to lift his sword. He is a hatter and hatters make hats. It’s a trying process with many inconceivably meticulous details in each stage of creation. Tarrant Hightopp is a hatter and he plies his trade again with a fierce focus he has not enjoyed for some time.

As he works, he is not burdened with worry and fear and anguish and terror over Alice and her future.

As he works, he does not feel the bruises on his shins, knees, and ribs. He only feels the tiny war wounds on his fingers as he fights with his materials.

As he works, he does not see Alice and himself – no, not Tarrant but that imposter! – grappling on the ground. He does not see her eyes flash with determination. He does not see her face flush from exertion. He does not see her chest heave with labored breaths. He does not see the way she moves. He does not marvel at her grace. He does not wonder at her strength of will. He does not see or think of her at all.

But, sometimes, he smells her.

Sometimes, like now.

Tarrant bends over his creations with renewed intent.

The scent does not leave him, however.

He slams his things down on the worktop. Oh, how utterly, unforgivably, mercilessly cruel his memory is! Just last week, he’d savored this fragrance and now it eviscerates him!

Perhaps it will overcome this persistent stomachache. A new pain would be welcome. Anything different would be welcome.

He braces his hands against the worktop, lowers his head, and closes his eyes, allowing himself to become lost in his mind. The madness surrounds him constantly now, ever since she’d touched him. Touched him with her bare hand against his skin. Beneath his shirt. And he’d almost... almost...

No! Think o’ something else! Anythin’ else!

He can’t. Perhaps he doesn’t want to. If he were honest with himself, he’d admit that he doesn’t even try to turn his thoughts away from that moment. It’s the closest thing to... to... to knowing another person he’s felt in... years.

He fists his hands as the memory loops around, repeating.

Her fingers on the buttons of his shirt and his shock.

Her gentle touch as she’d tended to his injury and his sudden, overwhelming need for her.

In that moment, he would have done anything to ensure that she would never ever dare to leave AGAIN!

He shudders. The madness holds him close and he wishes... He wishes her scent would leave him be, stop tormenting him. He wishes he could capture Time and place it as the centerpiece on Thackery’s tea table. He wishes he could keep Alice there in the neighboring seat, with her knee only a twitch away and her hand on his arm and her eyes shining with humor and...

“Hatter!”

... and the sound of his given name spoken in her voice.

“Tarrant!”

No, not like that. More softly, gently...

“Tarrant...”

Ah, yes. Just so. Just exactly unimaginably indescribably so...

“Open your eyes.”

The whisper is compelling but he resists. “Again,” he rasps.

The madness recedes enough for him to hear the silence of the room. Blessed, wondrous silence...

“... Tarrant...”

... silence and Alice, saying his name.

He opens his eyes and pivots unsteadily. “Alice,” he murmurs, feeling her hands slide down his shoulders and away from him.

No, no, not yet!

He reaches for her hand, targeting the left one at random, capturing it in both of his and gripping tightly. He wants to tell her not to go. Stay! But he can’t find any words, any breath. Only desperation answers his call for sanity.

“Ouch!”

The exclamation startles him. He looks down and opens his hands and stares...

A drop of intriguingly crimson-colored blood swells on the tip of Alice’s finger. Her third finger. On her left hand. Tarrant stares at what must be the work of providence. The wildness grips him again and...

Alice gasps.

Tarrant blinks and notices two things immediately: first, he’s holding Alice’s fingers to his lips; and second, he’s brushing his tongue over the droplet of blood, tasting her.

What have ye done?!

No, no, no. Should not. Must not!

“I’m sorry! I’m so very sorry, Alice!” Frantically trying to distract himself from the taste of her, he examines her fingers for other injuries and hopes – mostly – for none. “The pin in my cuff must have... I’m so very... I hurt you, Alice!” he concludes, devastated, disconcerted, disoriented.

“It’s all right,” she replies with maddening patience.

“No! No! It is not all right!” What have I done? It stops here. She must not... no, no, of course she won’t! Why would she want to...? “And, of all the appalling manners!” he stutters, flustered. “To take liberties on your person as I have! I’m so deeply... I can’t... I don’t know...!”

He can hear her saying “Hatter” again and again, touching his face, but it doesn’t help. His wretchedness can get no more acute, no better, no more absolutely suffocating.

A slight pain distracts him enough to focus and his nonsensical words and disjointed sentences dry up in his mouth at the sight of Alice lifting Tarrant’s own just-pricked heart-line finger to her lips.

“... no...”

The word is so soft it can barely be called a sigh. He watches, helpless, entranced, as Alice glances at the perfectly normal bead of deep blue blood before parting her lips and...

... and...

... and Tarrant focuses again. With some relief, he realizes he hasn’t moved a muscle. Yes, yes, that’s for the best. He wouldn’t want to... No, no, of course he wouldn’t. He won’t. Alice doesn’t really understand what she’s done, now, has she? No, of course not...

“There,” she says with a victorious little grin. “I reckon that makes us even.”

She’s still holding his hand. He can still taste the very odd salty tang of her blood on his tongue. And he...

“Tarrant?”

He watches as his right hand reaches for her, tangles in the hair at the back of her neck, and lifts her face to his. When had he closed the distance between them? He doesn’t know nor does he care. His lips brush against hers and he wants so much more than this shadow of a kiss, but he must not, dares not, will not!

She holds onto him. Her hands curl around his arms and she holds onto him!

Tarrant’s entire being shudders with joy and longing and...

No. No! D’nae take more than this!

But even as he thinks it, her mouth moves against his. Her lips part. Just the smallest increment.

He groans and, shaking, unsteadily trails his tongue along the inside of her lips.

STOP!

This time, he does. Breathing heavily, he gently releases her and clasps his hands together to keep them from finding their way back to her again.

“I’m sorry...” he begins, struggling to push the whirling emotions back and do the proper thing and...

“I’m not.”

Tarrant looks at her. Examines her. He clutches his hands together tighter. Her hair – he’d grasped it in his hand! – tumbles over her shoulder rather than down her back, as usual. Her lips – he’d savored them! – curl into a knowing smile. He can think of nothing to say to her. He can barely keep his mind from drowning in the frothing, churning, raging tide of everything-he’s-ever-felt-but-is-suddenly-feeling-all-at-once!

And then she places a hand against his cheek. He closes his eyes, feels his knees buckle, and...

Perhaps he hits the worktable on his way to the floor. Perhaps he lands on a pile of hats. Perhaps he falls through a looking glass and into another world entirely.

He has no idea.

Nor does he particularly care.

 

*~*~*~*

 

“Excellent work, Alice. Just spectacular,” Alice mutters as she staggers under the Hatter’s weight. When he’d swayed, she’d ducked under his arms, hoping to somehow maneuver him over to the battered sofa against the far wall, but after the third step, she suddenly feels herself overbalance and then...!  Alice scrambles to cushion his impact as best she can.  She’s just glad he doesn’t hit his left side on anything. And that she hadn’t kicked it and reinjured him.

She pulls bolts of fabric down to the floor, lifts his head and slides the softest of them under it for a pillow. She hesitates over how to make him more comfortable on the cold floor of his workshop. “Well, the cravat looks a bit tight...”

Alice loosens it and releases the top button on his shirt. Wisely, she leaves his jacket, waistcoat, trousers and boots alone. She makes a seat for herself on an assortment of fabric bolts and then spreads another – the warmest-looking – over him. With that done, she presses a hand to his forehead but he feels normal. Perfectly normal. No chills or fever. Not in the conventional sense, anyway.

With a sigh, she tidies up the things the Hatter had knocked over first when she’d surprised him and then when he’d been working himself into a frenzy of regret and, finally, when he’d passed out.

“Some Champion of kisses you are, Alice,” she murmurs, setting a bowler hat with a jade green hat band on the tabletop.

When she’s picked up everything within arm’s reach – even a few tiny pins and a dusty button, Alice turns back to the Hatter and once again places her hand on his brow. From there, it migrates into his vivid hair.

“Soft,” she muses. Softer than she’d expected. The kiss had been as well. When his irises had suddenly burst into that unmistakable violet, she’d had no idea of what to expect. But his hand in her hair had been nothing but gentle. And the way he’d curled his body down to her had been alarming only insofar as how her own body had tingled in anticipation. Then, before she could be shocked at herself for wanting to kiss him, he’d settled his mouth against hers.

Alice closes her eyes. His breath had been as sweet as his blood. Blue blood. The taste of which had been... like caramels and bergamot. How strange. But then, everything about the Hatter is strange. Always has been, at least since she’d first arrived in Underland. Alice feels that his strangeness is one of his finer qualities. Equal to his ability to see straight through to the truth of things.

Alice is not looking forward to disappointing him. Again.

In the silence, she rehearses her explanation:

I’ve decided. I’m the Queen’s Champion now. I’ll be careful but I’ll need your help every now and again when I get lazy and soft. I’m staying. And I know about the Trial of Threes. You’re half-mad and I’m out of my mind so we’ll find an answer between the two of us...

Actually, Alice muses, that’s not half-bad. “Of course you wouldn’t be awake to hear it. I’ll probably forget the whole thing by the time you come around.”

She huffs out a breathy laugh. “And here I’d always thought it was the ladies who swooned from a kiss...”

But, no, it hadn’t been the kiss that had caused this. There’d been something else in his eyes. A storm of triumph and panic and... something else. Perhaps he hadn’t meant to...

Alice tries to ignore the fact that her heart is sinking into her stomach.

Yes, there’s every possibility that he hadn’t meant to kiss her at all. Perhaps it had just been the madness. And it is madness for her to assume that anything has changed between them.

Regardless, Alice grasps his hand in hers, leans back against a nearby set of drawers, closes her eyes and waits.

Chapter Five: The Wooing Rites

“Ye’ve done WHAT?!”

The entire castle seems to wince in the wake of the thunderous shout. Luckily, it doesn’t have any adverse effects on the recipient.

Alice determinedly repeats herself, “I told the queen I’d do it. I know about the Trial of Threes. There must be another option. We’ll find it.”

The Hatter glares at her. “Another option,” he parrots. “Aye, there is one; ye can go back teh Upland!”

“I’m not going back! I’ve decided to stay, you stubborn milliner!”

Alice tenses, waiting for the next volley. She can’t say this conversation has gone very well, but it’s gone better than she’d expected... so far.

“Ye’re... stayin’?”

His hopeful expression and blue-green eyes invite her closer. “Yes,” Alice says, taking a step nearer.

The Hatter shakes himself suddenly. “Nae! Ye shoul’nae! If ye stay, ye’ll die.”

“Die?” Even for a –  mostly –  mad hatter, that seems a bit of an over-reaction.

He struggles with his thoughts or perhaps his temper or maybe both. “The Jabberwock will remember you. You cannae –” Alice resists a wince as his control unravels... again. “ – stand by and let it kill ye while ye’re tryin’ teh negotiate!”

“You’re absolutely right.”

“I –! ... Alice?”

“It’ll try to kill me. If we can’t find any middle ground, I’ll kill the blasted beast. Every three and a third years if I have to!”

The Hatter stares at her, his eyes wide, fearful.

“You think I can’t guess what it would do to you to know that... that thing was allowed to live? Under Mirana’s protection, no less?” Alice finally crosses the distance between them and stands toe-to-toe with him. “I don’t want to slay anything.” Alice daringly reaches for his hands. “But I will not let you be hurt.”

She feels a slight tremor in his fingers. Alice tightens her grasp.

In a sudden move, the Hatter curls his unsteady fingers around her wrists and pulls them up. He steps closer until her fingertips brush against his lapels. “I will not let you be hurt.”

His gaze burns. Alice tells herself not to let herself feel complacent in this apparent cease-fire. There’s still quite a lot of time between now and the resurrection of the Jabberwocky for the Hatter to get... prickly and unreasonable again.

Alice smiles. “Then, on this point, I suppose we’ll just have to agree to... agree.”

The Hatter grins and giggles. “I think you’ve made a rhyme.”

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant stares out at the assembly. He fidgets with the lace on his cuffs and tugs at his lapels. He decides he hates new suits. Too stiff. He also hates new-suit-occasions. Too obsequious . With too-bright eyes and a toothy smile, Tarrant scans the sea of Outland princes, lords, vassals, and dignitaries until his gaze alights on a woman with short, tangled blond hair in a slivery blue vest, white shirtsleeves and trousers.

Alice...

His gaze lingers on her hair, short now. Short enough to stay out of her way when she fights. His fingers curl into a fist as he remembers what that hair had felt like when it had been longer. The one time he’d touched it. He’s glad he has the memory. It’s a good one. Tarrant doesn’t have many good ones.

“Wassailin?”

Tarrant blinks and turns toward the attending frog. “Ah, thank you, Pondish.”

Tarrant lifts the slender, crystal glass and studies the pale blue, bubbling beverage. He hates Wassailin with a passion. But he’d noticed that the color very nearly matches the blue of Alice’s vest. And it precisely matches the sword and knife scabbards slung on straps of leather crisscrossing her hips.

One of Pondish’s fellows – Lakerton, perhaps; it’s difficult to be sure at this distance – maneuvers through the crowd and offers the queen and her Champion a beverage from his tray. The queen accepts. Alice does not.

In truth, this is the first time Tarrant has seen her in four days. Four unbelievably long days! And then it was just at dinner with the queen, Fenruffle, and an assortment of giddy courtiers who had demanded new hats for this very occasion. She’d looked tired then, but had smiled at him down the table. Unfortunately, the Royal Hatter’s chair is quite far from the head of the table when so many guests are present. She’d still had long hair then. But, oddly enough, he’s starting to appreciate this much shorter style. Of course that has nothing whatsoever to do with the clear, unobstructed view of her neck when she tilts her head just so or stretches up her chin to scan the crowd.

He giggles as she performs that very move for his enjoyment.

“Enjoying the Wassailin?” a cultured voice drawls at his shoulder.

Tarrant doesn’t take his eyes off of Alice. The Alice. His Alice! He murmurs, “And just how did you merit an invitation, Chessur?”

He doesn’t see the grin, but Tarrant knows it’s there. “Special security. Are you going to drink that or stare through it at Alice all night?”

“Stare, of course. Alice looks lovely in blue, don’t you think?”

Chessur purrs out a speculative hum. “There’s something different about you, Tarrant...”

“You smell it, too?” he asks, fingering the over-starched lapel with his free hand.

“Yes... You seem... quite pleased with yourself. And do I detect a certain Uplander scent on you now?”

“If you do, would you be so kind as to direct my nose to it? I haven’t had a whiff of Alice yet this evening.”

“You would if you’d go over there and talk to her.”

Tarrant’s grin wilts. “She’s working. Protecting the queen. Mustn’t get in the way of that.”

“Fenruffle, that useless excuse for a feathered hat,” Chessur growls with surprising irritation. “Are you letting him bully you away from your Alice?”

That catches Tarrant’s attention. With a frown, he turns to his odd feline friend.

Chessur leans closer and sniffs the air delicately. “Ah... Do I smell the first promise of the Thrice a-Vow, Hatter?”

Tarrant stares at him blankly.

The Chesire Cat grins wickedly. “Oh, my, goodness. That is what it is! That... newness about you. Congratulations, Tarrant. However did you manage to convince her to do it?”

Unsettled by these astute observations, Tarrant turns away, his eyes shifting guiltily. “Perhaps she’s the one who convinced me.”

“Oh, I would have loved to have been a grin on the wall for that.”

The idea, understandably, is not a comforting one for Tarrant.

“Speaking of things I love, where is your precious hat, dear Hatter?”

Tarrant turns back to the Cheshire Cat and glares.

“New suit, new top hat... you’re looking as sparkling as the royal drapes in that dove gray, but where oh ‘wear’ has your beautiful hat got to?”

“It’s quite safe and you’ll leave it right wear it is if you know what’s good for you.”

Chessur twirls in the air, mischievous grin present and accounted for. “And on that note, back to work...”

Before he has finished evaporating, Tarrant is scanning the crowd again, hunting for and – there! – recapturing the sight of her. He tenses as one of the visiting prince’s retainers sidles up beside Alice, more than a bit too close. Evidently, Alice agrees. Keeping the queen in her line of sight, she gives the encroaching booly-geber a well placed pointed toe, tripping him into an older woman with a rather unfortunately large bosom. Tarrant giggles. His Alice has turned out to be quite talented with her feet.

Although he does consider pushing his way through the crush of bodies to smell her, talk to her, watch her meet his gaze, he knows he won’t. He’ll behave.

Yes, it’s quite frustrating to have a room between them when, a mere ten days ago, there’d been nothing between them but clothing and buttons. He feels his grin stretch into something that might be a bit more... predatory. Yes, with enough time to reflect, Tarrant can’t find anything worthy of regret in that kiss, the sealing of their first exchange. The first of three. After all, that’s why it’s called the Thrice a-Vow.

He’s also had time to get used to the idea that Alice makes a rather excellent Queen’s Champion. The issue with that bloody Jabberwocky notwithstanding, the only thing Tarrant would like to change about his life is to integrate a bit more Alice-time into it.

He sighs. A look down the length of a dinner table and, days before that, a smile through the open door of his workshop and, days before that, tea with the queen and Fenruffle and Alice’s other instructors to discuss who her next battle-skills and etiquette tutors were to be had certainly not been enough time. Not enough by half!

A slight commotion in the queen’s – and, thus, Alice’s – general vicinity brings Tarrant’s full attention back around. What appears to be a pair of dignitaries are shoving at each other, working up to a good shouting match. Tarrant keeps his eyes on Alice, who plucks a flute of Wassailin off of a passing waiter’s tray and flings the contents in their precise direction. He supposes those knife throwing lessons had been useful after all...

A shocked gasp reverberates through the crowd and Tarrant giggles in the wake.

“Take your dispute outside next time,” Alice informs them without bothering to glance in their direction. Her calm, authoritative tone carries easily in the hushed gathering. Tarrant claps his hand over his mouth to keep from cheering.

Must not interfere. Alice is working now.

The deeply offended pair of lords are ushered out to get cleaned up by an apologetic Fenruffle and conversation starts again in drips and drabs.

“That’s my Alice,” Tarrant muses.

If she’s your Alice, why is she all the way over there and you’re all the way over here?

“Alice is working. Mustn’t get in the way,” he reminds himself.

And, perhaps she’d heard his murmurings because, at that exact moment, when the queen is animatedly chatting with a short, fat man in a very poorly made bowler hat, Alice looks up, across the sea of powdered wigs, coquettishly pinned hats, and swaying feathers right into Tarrant’s eyes.

She smiles.

Tarrant takes that smile – that heartfelt, revealing, glowing smile – and tucks it away in a pocket for safe keeping. Not his pocket watch pocket, of course. The one responsibility he had ever assigned it - the care of his pocket watch - it had failed miserably! Not that the pocket itself is entirely to blame, what with Time being so utterly devoted to grudge-keeping! Still he’d entrusted the pocket with his one and only pocket watch and the blasted thing has never been safe there, that’s for sure!  And he’s not about to subject something as precious as an Alice-smile to so irresponsible a keeper!

In less than a moment, it’s over. Alice is working again. He sighs.

A smile over the heads of the wealthy, greedy, and zealous is not very much. Not nearly enough. But it is a little more.

Smiling, Tarrant pours half of his Wassailin onto a potted tree. “One of us ought to enjoy the refreshments,” he explains, then leans back against the balustrade of the curving, marble staircase and, hand weaving through the air in time with the orchestra, ignores the over-starched, non-Alice scent of his new, poorly-hued suit and watches his promised one handle the crowd.

 

*~*~*~*

 

“What are you still doing here, Alice?”

Alice turns away from the clear, starlit night. Her hand drops from the curtain. “I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?”

Mirana removes her earrings and hat, setting them on her dresser. “The party’s over. It’s late. Go to bed.”

Alice nods, but she doesn’t want to go to bed. Not yet. “Do you think I was rude enough?”

The queen smiles. “Tripping people and dousing them with beverages? I think you were perfect, Alice.”

“Let’s hope it was enough to dissuade any of your visitors from causing trouble during their stay.”

“I’m sure it will be.” Mirana removes her bracelets and places each in its velvet box, one by one. “You’ve grasped the concept of the Queen’s Champion quite well. Do not worry.”

She nods. “All right, I’ll let you get some sleep, Your Majesty. There don’t appear to be any assassins hiding behind your drapes.”

“I should hope not!”

“Good night, Your Majesty,”

“Good night, Alice. I’ll see you at brunch.”

Brunch, yes. A lovely tea party with each of the queen’s five suitors and one of their ministers. Splendid. Closing the door behind her, Alice sighs. She takes the winding stairs down the castle tower which houses the queen’s chambers, her mind off on its own.

Well, not quite on its own. A vision of the Hatter, looking oddly contained in his silvery suit and top hat stays with her. His hair had been a bit less wild tonight although no less vivid. He eyes had looked blue again, but at that distance, it had been hard to tell for sure.

Alice shakes herself. Focus, Alice. There are guests in the castle. Yes, now is really not the best time to be wandering about in a daze.

She reaches the bottom of the staircase, nods to the rook and bishop guarding the entrance to the queen’s tower, and turns left. Another turn and she finds herself walking in the direction of the Hatter’s rooms.

You shouldn’t be here, she tells herself even as she notices the faint glow of light escaping from under the door. He might be busy... She tries not to think in too great detail about the personal routines that might prevent him from answering the door were she to knock...

“Well, are you going in or will you be staring at a doorknob all night?” the keyhole asks snootily.

“Was I staring?” she asks.

“Quite.”

“Sorry.”

A slight pause follows and then: “Staring again!”

“Oh, all right. I’ll go in.”

She raises a fist to knock but the door swings open at the same instant. Soft, yellow light from the oil lamps spills out into the corridor. Alice regards the Hatter in his shirtsleeves, vest unbuttoned and cravat hanging loosely around his neck.

“Alice!”

“It’s late, I know. I just... had a moment and I haven’t seen you in days...”

He invites her in with a step to the side and a tiny bow. Closing the door behind her, the Hatter says, “But you did see me this evening... didn’t you?”

“I did, but –”

“But you meant you haven’t smelled me in days,” he finishes for her.

Alice smiles. “That’s one way to look at it.”

“Are we back to looking?”

Alice’s lips twitch with humor at the teasing light in his eyes. Blue eyes. Definitely blue. “Yes,” she tells him. “I thought you’d looked moonstruck at the party earlier. Now I’m sure of it.”

“You hair’s shorter,” the Hatter says suddenly.

Alice resists raising a hand to it. “I know. It feels strange. Too light.”

“I like it. It suits you.”

Why am I blushing? Alice despairs, mortified. She can think of nothing to say in reply.

“Would you care for a chair?”

Alice follows his gesture and chooses not one of the armchairs, but the small sofa. She unbuckles her sword and sits on the right side. With a slight hesitation, the Hatter joins her. She can’t help but notice his rigid posture.

Collecting his hand – the one nearest to her – she asks, “What are you thinking, Hatter?”

“You called me by my given name before,” he points out softly.

Alice remembers. “You don’t mind?”

“No.”

“All right.” She takes a steadying breath. “What are you thinking, Tarrant?”

He relaxes and finally turns toward her completely. His tension seems to have miraculously disappeared. Or evaporated.

“I was thinking, Alice, that I like it when you say my name. I also like it that you came to visit me. Not that I’d only like you to visit now, that is to say, at this moment. I dare say I’d like you to visit anytime you were so inclined, and what I mean by that is, well, that is, I... I...”

“Tarrant,” Alice says, squeezing his hand. “I’ve missed you, too.”

The Hatter leans his shoulder against the sofa cushion and gives her a tremulous smile. For a moment, he says nothing. His eyes move as he studies her intently. Alice watches his expressions change, his eye color shift from blue into pale green.

“I’m worried about you,” he says, sounding a little surprised by his own revelation.

Alice assures him, “I was more worried this morning, before I’d seen them. The queen’s suitors, I mean. Now that I have seen them. Well, I think that Prince Avendale might be... well. I don’t know what to think of a...”

“A lion.”

Alice nods, but Avendale is not just a lion. Although she’d never seen a live one in England, she’s pretty sure it’s impossible for lions to walk upright as Avendale does. Nor do they have long-fingered paws. Nor do they wear a rather intimidating-looking scimitar at their side.

“And then there’s the unicorn – Lord Hornsaver.” Again, an upright-walking creature with hands more closely resembling a man’s than a horse’s hooves. Despite their alien-ness, Alice doesn’t think they’re the ones to be worrying about. “The other three – Jaspien, Valereth, and Oshtyer – are more like what I’d expected.” She glances at the Hatter’s expression. “But maybe not as heartless and cutthroat as you’d thought they might be.”

“Alice... ‘twas only the opening banquet...”

“I know. It’s too soon to be making character judgments.”

“Judge them all you like, but keep yer hand on yer sword.”

She nods. “The order of the interviews and duels will be decided tomorrow after brunch,” Alice says. “The interviews will be closed to observation, but the duels won’t. Will you be attending?”

“I would be most honored to see you fight, Alice.”

She releases a long breath. “Thank you. I’d like for you to be there.” After what he’d done to help her during the battle on Frabjous Day, Alice can’t help wanting him there, just in case. And then, knowing that he’s watching, she’ll be properly motivated not to disappoint anyone. Especially him.

“When will the duels commence?”

“Next week. After I chaperone the queen’s meetings with each of her suitors.”

They stop speaking then. Sitting together, her left hand clasping his right, Alice can find nothing else to say, and oddly enough she doesn’t feel the need to. Long minutes pass before Alice reminds herself that she has to get some sleep.

“I should go.”

The Hatter nods. Standing, he holds out a hand to help her up. He waits as Alice re-buckles the sword scabbard to her waist, then escorts her to the door.

“Alice,” he says quietly.

“Yes?”

The Hatter smiles. “Please let me know if you are in need of any riddles for the interviews.”

Imagining how entertaining it could be to conduct those interviews as if she were as mad as a hatter, Alice laughs. “What an idea! Thank you.”

He smile fades as he watches her. “Alice, why is a raven like a writing desk?”

Alice squeezes his hand one last time. “I haven’t the slightest idea.”

With an oddly melancholy grin, the Hatter says, “I shall escort you to your room.”

“No, please, don’t.” When his expression sinks into sadness, she hurries to say, “Not tonight. When the queen’s suitors have gone...”

For a moment, she watches him consider that. Perhaps he’s remembering the interest that obnoxious vassal had shown in her. Perhaps he’d noticed how Lord Oshtyer had kept Alice in his sights all night. She wonders if he’d seen her smile at the Hatter. If there’s one thing she will do anything to avoid, it’s drawing the Hatter into the political games of the court. If they’re anything like dealing with the Chattaways and their ilk, Alice would rather avoid the entire experience. For now, it’s best to keep her attachment to him a secret.

The Hatter still seems confused, so Alice raises a hand and places it daringly in the center of his chest. Rather than explain her logic and fears, she settles on saying something he can keep with him in the coming weeks. “I’m your secret, Tarrant.” She’d drawn his attention at the simple touch, but now she sees his eyes widen in pleasant surprise. “Do you want the courtiers to know?”

“I d’nae care one way ‘r th’other,” he murmurs warmly, placing a hand over hers.

“Courtiers...” Alice struggles for words, for focus. “They like secrets. They like the games they can play with them...”

The Hatter’s eyes darken. “This i’snae a game.”

“Not a game.” Although Alice isn’t sure where this is going, she knows she’s quite committed to seeing it through.

“Ye’re my secret.”

“Yes.”

And he keeps it. In public, the Hatter is courteous, as always. He does not seek her out. He does not approach her. Sometimes she feels his stare on her, but remembering the speculative gleam in Oshtyer’s shrewd, black eyes, she forces herself to merely acknowledge the Hatter’s attention. Acknowledge, as any decent Champion would, and then dismiss him.

Keeping secrets, Alice muses as she trails behind Mirana and Prince Jaspien, hurts. She tries not to remember navigating this very orchard path with the Hatter that first Saturday after she’d returned. After he’d saved her from...

Alice stops her thoughts there. It will do no good to dwell on the things she cannot change.

The week drags, yet, somehow Alice doesn’t have the opportunity to visit the Hatter. Just as the princes and lords turn on the charm, vying for the queen’s attention, Alice finds herself dodging overly ambitious vassals and ministers, able to escape their simpering only when she’s performing her morning excises with volunteers from the queen’s army, behind closed doors with Mirana herself, or slamming her own bedroom door shut in their smiling faces.

As she does now.

Alice glares at her bedroom door. Despite Mirana’s offer, Alice had never accepted a suite of rooms in the castle. Thinking of how convenient it would be to be able to have a cup of tea without being swarmed, Alice regrets declining.

With a blustery sigh, she turns the key in the lock and marches over to her dresser to begin the arduous task of disrobing. She unbuttons her shirt cuffs and removes the gauntlets and the small throwing knives the Hatter had given her. She hadn’t asked, but she strongly suspects he’d made the gauntlets himself. Next, she pulls the coiled length of garrote from a hidden pocket along her belt. Then the sword and the knife are unbuckled and laid down. Taking a seat, Alice lifts her pant legs and unbuckles the knife sheathes around her ankles.

As she undresses, she finds herself thankful for not having to deal with stockings and petticoats and corsets on top of everything else. She doesn’t even have to worry about stiff jackets, not with being permitted to wear only shirtsleeves and a vest. No, she doesn’t miss the clothes she’d grown up wearing at all.

Alice had made one request from the Royal Seamstress: trouser pajamas. At first, it had seemed odd to sleep with pants on, but what sort of Champion would she be if the queen needs her urgently in the middle of the night and she manages to trip over the hem of her nightdress in the midst of an urgent situation?

Now as comfortable as she can be considering her duties on the morrow, Alice sits down at her desk and looks over the series of interview questions she’d compiled from various historical sources as well as from the queen. The idea of conducting these interviews like a mad hatter still hasn’t left her. She grins and reaches for her quill.

Perhaps just one or two riddles, then...

 

*~*~*~*

 

At precisely two o’clock, Tarrant Hightopp strides through the castle, keeping an eye out for witnesses. Luckily, with it being teatime, no one is out and about. Except for the Royal Hatter, of course.

Following the way Chessur had shown him just that morning, Tarrant ducks into the queen’s library of alchemy resource materials, ghosts into her unused supply cupboard and, leaning against the far wall, does his best to be as silent as he can.

From the other side of the thin wood, the sounds of tea being served and chairs adjusted drifts through. The mundane noises continue for so long that Tarrant wonders if he’s trying to eavesdrop on the wrong room. Or perhaps this is Chessur’s idea of a joke. A clever little joke – let’s tell Tarrant his Alice is in the parlor that shares a rather thin wall with the old potions supply cupboard where he’ll be able to overhear her every word...

“Do you take butter in your tea, Lord Hornsaver?”

Tarrant grins with both relief – it’s not a joke after all! ­– and delight as Alice’s voice comes through loud and clear. And then he bites back a giggle as he comprehends her question.

“I... I beg your pardon, madam?”

“Butter. In your tea? No? Jam?”

“Er, well, that is, no... thank you.”

Tarrant hears the unmistakable sound of someone fixing their tea. Perhaps with butter and jam.

“Impress me, then, Lord Hornsaver.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Oh, dear, that’s not a good start at all,” Alice says. “I’d rather been hoping to hear a convoluted and obviously embellished story about your achievements and personal qualities. Ah well, let’s move on to the important questions, shall we?”

“Oh... yes. Let’s.”

“Lord Hornsaver, can you tell me why a bread-and-butterfly cannot sit on the head of a pin?”

Tarrant has to clap his hands over his mouth and nose to keep his laughter silent. And that’s a simple one! he chortles as the unicorn blusters and bumbles in the other room.

“Well, would it be because, well, it’s quite obvious that a bread-and-butterfly cannot sit at all.”

“Hm... Are you quite sure? Have you asked one if it couldn’t?”

“Oh, well, no...”

“I see.”

“Well, then, madam! Why can’t a bread-and-butterfly sit on the head of a pin?”

“Because the head of a pin does not allow sufficient space for a chair to be placed upon it, of course.”

Throughout the interview, Tarrant has to dab at his tearing eyes with a handkerchief and bite his knuckles to keep silent.

“Are you quite sure you would like to work for the peace of all Underland and well-being of all of its creatures?” Alice confirms the unicorn’s response to an inquiry regarding his grandest dream.

“Oh, well, yes, of course I’m sure.”

“An odd sort of dream.”

“Is it?”

“Certainly. Dreams – especially the grandest ones – tend to be quite random and fanciful. Not about the future. It is, after all, a product of your subconscious mind.”

“I... see.”

The interview lasts for a highly entertaining hour and a half. At the end of it, Hornsaver snorts and stomps from the room. Tarrant waits a moment before leaving his hiding place. He hopes to slip into the hall and congratulate Alice on her masterful interviewing technique, but is startled by the commotion in the corridor. Frowning, he regards the ruckus from the crack between the door and the frame. Why, it appears as if every single castle occupant is pressing against each other, shouting at the unicorn to divulge the details of the interview.

Resigned, Tarrant closes the door and takes a seat in the alchemy library to wait for the fuss to die down. And, after a while, it does. Or at least the hallway is clear. He realizes, shortly thereafter, that the fuss has migrated to the dinning room where Alice is blithely ignoring any and all attempts to draw her into conversation. She sits stoically at the queen’s side, at attention.

Tarrant wishes there were a secret doorway leading to the wall behind the head of the table. Perhaps something hidden behind a tapestry... but there is no tapestry.

Perhaps I shall make a suggestion to the queen about that...

Even without the installation of a secret door, a tapestry or a screen would not go amiss, certainly, but it would require a great deal of time spent hiding behind it – entering the room well before dinner when it’s empty and waiting for hours!

With a sigh, Tarrant wishes for evaporating skills.

He considers ducking back out into the hall and begging a bowl of stew from the servants’ kitchen but thinks of Alice. Would she like for him to stay? Oh, why hadn’t he asked her for her preferences on this point last week when she’d come by to see him?

The thought actually cheers Tarrant considerably: there’s no reason he can’t sit in his customary, absurdly-distant-from-his-Alice seat while he daydreams about her visit, now can he? Humming to himself, Tarrant slips into his chair and is happily ignored by the less popular courtiers who have earned seats at this end of the table. He nods to the Royal Seamstress before beginning a careful examination of his dessert fork. Of course, he’s not terribly interested in his silverware. But it serves to keep people from trying to speak to him which allows him a plethora of opportunities to glance in Alice’s direction every few minutes.

Oh, how they must be annoying her! He can only imagine.

She’s bearing it well, though... Perhaps that had been included in her etiquette lessons two weeks ago, the lessons that Tarrant hadn’t been permitted to teach her. Of course, he knows even less about etiquette than Mally does...

Frowning, Tarrant tries to dispel the stab of jealousy. Yes, Mally and Chessur and the Tweedles had been permitted to continue to tutor her in swordplay and whatnot. Unfortunately, due to the never-ending greed of the royal court for newer, shinier baubles to wear on their heads, Tarrant had been duty-bound to his workroom.

Placing the dessert fork in his water glass, Tarrant picks up a soup spoon and holds it parallel to the table with two hands. Idly, he glances at his heart-line finger, the finger Alice had...

Now’s not the time to think of that!

Right, yes. Not the time at all!

Tarrant clears his throat and regards the small, blue dot on the pad of his finger. Staring yet doing his best not to remember, Tarrant turns his left hand over and blinks at a rather interesting development. There, circling the base of his heart-line finger is the lightest band of orange-y-pink. For the tiniest moment, he wonders at the odd color. Usually, Thrice a-Vow rings are light blue, slowly emerging after the first...

Oh! But Alice’s blood isn’t blue, is it?

Tarrant grins at his left hand.

It’s working! The vow accepts Alice even though she’s not an Underlander!

He had been wondering about that.

But in the next instant, Tarrant feels a twinge of panic.

It shouldn’t have worked quite so well...

What will Alice think when she realizes there’s a light blue band circling her finger? What will he tell her? How will he explain? Of all the ridiculous accidents...!

Had it been an accident?

Tarrant decides it’s best not to think about that. And anyway, he won’t perform the second exchange. No, absolutely not. ... Well, not without Alice’s consent. Surely, she has no idea... And if she did, she wouldn’t want to...

No, of course not.

And there’s the unfortunate possibility that she might not be pleased with learning what they’d done... and Tarrant would really rather she not be furious with him again, despite how lovely she’d looked: disheveled, glaring, flushed...

Time to examine another utensil, Tarrant decides.

Dinner arrives but the fuss doesn’t die down any less despite the consumption of food and drink. Tarrant fidgets with his napkin in his lap and tries not to admire the salmon-y colored stripe circling his finger... too often.

He can hardly sleep that night, so tied up in so many different thoughts. The excitement he feels cannot be contained. It ought to be shared! He puts on his top hat and strides to the door countless times without actually leaving his rooms. At the last moment, he always reminds himself that Alice might not be happy about their vow. And besides, Alice is working now! Tarrant cannot distract the Queen’s Champion now. Not with the first duel taking place on the morrow!

No, no, it wouldn’t do for him to tell her now.

But ye will tell her!

Yes, of course. After the foreign guests have departed... When the castle is quiet again and she’ll be able to sit with him in his workshop or he’ll be able to sit with her under the trees near the croquet pitch... Yes, that would be much, much better.

Eventually, Tarrant does fall asleep, but when he opens his eyes he realizes he’s slumped over his tea table, having never made it to bed. Blearily, he consults his useless pocket watch – perhaps it’s due for another buttering...? – and unsteadily gets to his feet and washes up.

It’s not until he arrives at his workshop – without encountering anyone in the halls – and glances at a properly functioning clock that Tarrant realizes what time it is.

In the next instant, Tarrant slams the workshop door behind him and sprints to the courtyard, slipping on polished floors as he attempts to turn sharp corners and tripping over disgruntled rugs...

When he arrives at the courtyard, of course all of the best places for viewing the duel have been taken. Tarrant moves through the trees, looking for one that won’t mind him climbing it. After a few moments, he spots a rather energetic-looking fellow with substantial branches and pulls himself up. As he settles himself on a bough and searches the clearing for any sign that the duel is about to start, a very distinct, cat-scented breeze swirls beside him.

“I was wondering when you’d arrive,” Chessur says with a lazy blink.

“Have I missed anything?”

“Gossip, sniping, back-handed compliments, figurative back-stabbing, and more gossip,” he lists dispassionately.

“Ah, excellent.” Perhaps his timing hadn’t been so bad after all.

He continues scanning the crowd, searching for the unicorn and Alice. When a furry paw presses against the back of his hand, Tarrant realizes he’s twisting his handkerchief in his hands rather... vigorously.

“She’s going to be fine. Better than fine. Wonderful. Extraordinary. Spectacular,” Chessur says with confidence.

Tarrant’s mouth is too dry to manage a word in agreement and his neck is too stiff to nod.

“Nice promise-ring, by the way.”

Tarrant growls, “Trust you to notice that with your great, greedy eyes.”

“I’m curious as to the color. Perhaps I will ask Alice to see hers...”

“No! I... I mean, well...”

Chessur smirks. “Very well then. I’ll let you leave Alice in the dark for a bit longer.”

Tarrant feels guilt well up within him at the subtle threat. But, at that moment, Lord Hornsaver and Alice appear at opposite ends of the clearing. Tarrant’s stomach lurches at the sound of polite applause. It seems as if his odd stomachache has found him again. And in a tree, no less.

Nivens McTwisp, recruited especially for administering the duels, makes a very long announcement that Tarrant doesn’t pay a bit of attention to. He’s busy examining Alice. His Alice. In vain, he drops his gaze to her pale hand, but, of course, he’s too far away to see if there’s a light blue line around her finger.

“Queen’s Champion! Challenger! Choose your weapon!”

Peripherally, Tarrant is aware of Nivens hopping back to the edge of the field to crouch beside the queen. Hornsaver unsheathes the broadsword slung across his back. Alice unbuckles the belt holding her sword scabbard, pulls her own blade out and tosses the now-useless leather off to the side. Nivens twitches as it lands just inches from him.

Tarrant curls his hands around the nearest branches as the unicorn takes a step forward and bows. Alice reciprocates and then they begin circling each other. Despite his worry, with each measured, graceful, controlled step Alice takes, Tarrant feels the warmth of excitement and anticipation build within him.

The unicorn lunges and Alice neatly steps aside, arcing her sword and smacking him in the shoulder with the flat side of it. The crowd twitters in appreciation.

Turning, Hornsaver regards the Queen’s Champion with a flat expression. He lowers his chin just a bit, his horn glimmering in the sunlight. The fight is on. Tarrant can’t close his eyes, can’t blink as Alice and the unicorn exchange blows.

“He’s testing the strength of your arm, Alice. Don’t let him wear you down!” he whispers urgently.

The crowd gasps when Hornsaver attacks, suddenly, and rather than run backwards, Alice drops and rolls past him.

“You’re faster than that,” Tarrant muses.

Again, the metal of their swords collide in the courtyard. The unicorn executes a bit of fancy footwork and the insipid audience sighs and gasps their appreciation. Alice doesn’t bother with fancy footwork. Nor does she bother with fancy twirls or twists. She takes her turn charging the unicorn.

Tarrant bites his knuckle. “No, no! He’s drawing you in!”

Suddenly, Alice backs off. She tilts her head to the side and swings her sword casually through the air as if inviting the unicorn to take his best shot. And he does give it his best. Tarrant knows the unicorn’s form is perfect. Perhaps too perfect. It’s obvious the creature’s never fought on a battlefield before. Tarrant tries not to hold that against him. No, the fact that Hornsaver is wielding a sword against his Alice is more than enough to damn him in Tarrant’s opinion.

The unicorn gets his blade underneath Alice’s and Tarrant tenses.

“D’nae let go o’ tha’ sword!” he growls.

She doesn’t. She goes with the motion – allowing the unicorn’s attempt at disarming her to pull her toward his unprotected flank – and slams her shoulder into him. Hornsaver stumbles, giving her the one instant she needs to regain control of her weapon. Again, they begin circling.

Again, Alice is a bit slower than Tarrant knows her to be.

“Smart girl,” Chessur muses. “She has four more duels. It won’t do to give away all her secrets this early.”

“’Twon’ be smart if she gets herself run through!”

Another clash of swords echoes in the courtyard before Chessur replies: “She won’t.”

As the duel progresses with periodic lulls during which Alice and the unicorn circle each other, Tarrant realizes Alice is not drawing out this tournament to torture him. She remains calm, in control. She’s doing her job. She’s giving that pompous puff ball the chance to show of his battle skills.

When a small silver bell rings out after perhaps the longest twenty minutes of Tarrant’s life, Alice’s demeanor changes immediately. Reluctantly, it seems, the unicorn steps down as she charges. With a flurry of lunges, parries, and thrusts, Alice – quick as a scorpion strike – knocks Hornsaver’s sword aside.

That should have been the end of it.

The audience begins to applaud.

Hornsaver lowers his chin and Tarrant feels his stomachache freeze rock-solid in his chest. The sunlight glimmers off of his horn in the instant before he grabs Alice’s wrist, immobilizing her sword. Tarrant watches that horn descend toward her face, his own shout of warning lost somewhere in the frozen wasteland of his throat. The crowd gasps in alarm, but Tarrant doesn’t hear them.

Alice’s left fist slams up into the unicorn’s chin and a glint of metal appears between her fingers as she presses a throwing knife to Hornsaver’s throat.

Tarrant watches, the ice in his chest shattering under the fury of his rage, as the unicorn lord takes his time releasing Alice’s right wrist and stepping back. Tarrant barely sees the bow Alice and her opponent execute to each other and the audience before Hornsaver leaves the field.

Alice approaches the queen and, re-sheathing and donning her sword, takes her place at the queen’s shoulder, her face expressionless despite her victory.

McTwisp hops forward to conclude the ceremony, but Tarrant’s too enraged to pay attention.

“I told you she’d be fine,” Chessur purrs. “You were an excellent teacher, Tarrant. And the rest of us aren’t so bad if I do say so myself.”

“If...” Tarrant replies, glancing in the cat’s direction, “you think that’s goin’ teh stop me from rippin’ out that foul, back-stabbin’, underhanded, CHEATIN’ –”

“Hatter!”

Tarrant succeeds in swallowing back the tail-end of his rage. “I’m fine.”

“Indeed. Keep it together until you’re away from the gossipmongers, would you?”

He does. Tarrant keeps his rage and temper in check until he makes it back to his workroom. And there he doesn’t so much as lose his temper as he becomes lost in his rage. A great number of hats do not survive the following hour.

And, as a final insult, Tarrant is once again separated from Alice, forced to watch her from across the crowded ball room as they celebrate Hornsaver’s valiant fight. Alice’s contributions are mentioned in passing. The unicorn’s dishonorable cheating ignored. This time, he doesn’t bother to accept a glass of Wassailin, not even for viewing Alice through.

Tarrant stands rigidly in his new, still-stiff, still-starch-smelling suit and watches the proceedings with yellow eyes. He watches his Alice endure the festivities. And she does endure them. Despite the reassuring smile Alice gives the queen, Tarrant knows her well enough to see that she’s tired.

So is he.

He’s tired of this game they have to play. He wants to march over there and take her in his arms and feel her hold onto him again. Nothing could be more real, more perfect than that. His want is immeasurable, but he behaves.

Alice is working. Mustn’t get in the way.

But oh, how he wants to!

He glares at the powdered, primped, pompous people in the ballroom and counts them: four. Four more duels. Four more threats against Alice’s life. Four more days exactly like this one – except perhaps worse, depending on the challenger’s skills and tendency toward cruelty or, in the unicorn’s case, pride – before Tarrant will be able to breathe around this bloody stomachache again.

“Remember your promise, Alice. You fight as hard has you must to win. No less. Never any less.”

Perhaps she hears him.

Perhaps she doesn’t.

Tarrant just hopes she keeps her promise. This one is far more important than any of the others. The promise silently circling the third finger on his left hand included.

 

Chapter Six: The Champion and the Hatter

“Alice, are you all right?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. I’m fine.” Alice doesn’t mention the bruises on her right wrist or the swelling knuckles on her left hand. All things considered, she’d rather forget about them entirely. But with four more duels left, Alice knows she’ll have to deal with them before going to bed.

“Did your tutors congratulate you?” the queen asks.

Alice chuckles. “Yes. Mally was very impressed.” Alice remembers her hatpin-swishing enthusiasm as the dormouse had reenacted the fight with commentary. “Chessur and the Tweedles seemed pleased.” There’d been handshakes from those three. Even her former opponents among the queen’s guard had given her a salute.

The queen smiles. “Wonderful. And now, let’s see... it’s nearly midnight, so it’s time for...”

Alice sighs. Yes, it’s time for her to run the gauntlet of facetious, simpering faces back to her room for the night. This won’t last forever, she reminds herself. In two weeks or so, they’ll all be gone – things will be back to normal – and I won’t have to hide from Tarrant any more.

She doesn’t like to think of it as hiding, but she knows that’s what she’s doing. She wants to see him, more than anything, too much. If any one of the queen’s court were to notice her looking in the Hatter’s direction, the secret would be out. Alice isn’t sure what would come of that, but whatever it would be, it wouldn’t be good.

Alice opens her mouth to bid the queen good-night when there’s a knock on the door.

“Enter!” Mirana calls.

The door opens and there stands Tarrant, looking exhausted and frazzled. He stops short just inside the door, his eyes widening when he sees Alice standing not two arm-lengths in front of him.

“You’re right on time for my hat fitting,” Mirana announces. “I’m sure it’s beautiful, Tarrant. Just leave it, oh... anywhere, I suppose, before you go.” The queen then floats up the staircase to her bedroom. “Good night, Alice. Good night, Tarrant.” The queen’s bedroom door closes and silence descends.

When the door to the queen’s tower parlor swings closed on its own, the sound jars both Alice and the Hatter. He drops the hatbox clutched in his hand to the floor and Alice crosses the distance between them.

His eyes are green now, she notes. Alice smiles wearily before lowering her forehead to his shoulder with a sigh. His arms wind around her and her hands find their way to his waist. Propriety be damned; she’s too tired to bother with it.

Tarrant seems to understand. His embrace holds her up. Alice wonders if hers, weak as it is, helps him at all.

“Let’s not think about today,” she says.

“All right.”

“And let’s not think about the next ones, either.” Oshtyer, especially, worries her. Those shrewd eyes do not engender trust.

“Are you all right?”

Alice starts to tell him not to worry, but changes her mind. Of all the people in her new life, here is the one who knows her best. She doesn’t want that to change. “No,” she says. “I need some ointment, I think.”

Tarrant gently turns her toward the sofa in front of the hearth and Alice notices a familiar-looking jar on the side table. “How did that get there?” she asks.

“It flew, of course,” the Hatter says with a friendly grin. “No feet.”

Alice huffs a brief chuckle.

Tarrant scoops out a bit of paste and kneels in front of her on the rug. “Where does it hurt, lass?”

She pulls her shirtsleeve up and slides the gauntlet off her right wrist. Looking at her arm now, hours after the fact, makes her wince. Magenta and blue bruises are starting to color her skin, darker in the place where the sheathed throwing knife had been pressed into the muscles and tendons.

Tarrant’s eyes flash yellow and Alice places her hand on the back of his neck. When he glances up at her, she smiles and the moment of anger passes. He gently rubs the lotion into her skin, intent on the simple task. Slumped against the sofa cushions, Alice can do little other than appreciate the experience.

“An’ th’other?” he asks some time later.

Alice opens her eyes briefly. “Sorry,” she mumbles. “Sleepy.”

“’Tis all right.” Without prompting, the Hatter takes her left hand in his and gently smoothes the paste over her swollen knuckles. It seems to her that he spends a very long time massaging her hand. And perhaps she imagines it, but she thinks his fingertips trace over the base of her ring finger, back and forth, several times.

“Alice?”

“Hmm?”

He clears his throat softly. “Shall I help you to your room?”

She shakes her head. “I’ll sleep here. ‘S closer.”

There’s a long pause and then hesitant hands unbutton her left cuff and remove the other gauntlet. After her left wrist is freed, there’s another long pause and then those hesitant hands fumble at her waist. She hears belt buckles clinking and her knife and sword are pulled away. Another long moment of nothingness follows and then those hands are at her feet, taking off her shoes and unbuckling the knives she keeps strapped to her ankles. When those are set aside, the hands return and arrange her on the sofa.

“Belt,” she manages, reaching for it.

“I’ll do it.”

Alice relaxes against the sofa and lets Tarrant remove the belt with the concealed garrote. She lifts her hips slightly to help make the task slightly easier when she feels the belt start to slide away.

“Tarrant,” she whispers, feeling herself start to drift off.

A hand brushes across her forehead. “Aye?”

“Thank you...”

“Ye’re welcome, Alice.”

She feels his hand smooth her hair and his lips press against her forehead. A moment of rustling cloth and footsteps later and then a door opens and closes in the distance. On the sofa of the queen’s private parlor, Alice tumbles into sleep.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Alice had been right to be wary of the shifty-eyed Oshtyer: Of all the suitors, she had expected him to be the least honorable.

Alice doesn’t enjoy being right about that.

The other duels had been refreshingly civilized:

The lion, Prince Avendale, had been a perfectly poised and level-headed opponent. Not only that, but his performance during the interview had impressed her as he’d answered her silliness with creativity and humor and the occasional rumbling laugh. He’d chosen fighting staffs for his duel and despite a few dubious moments, mostly due to Alice overbalancing, she’d managed the fight well enough for Avendale to thank her for the opportunity to show his skills after he’d conceded the victory. Alice had noticed that Tarrant’s eyes had not flashed yellow across the banquet hall that night.

Prince Jaspien had chosen the broadsword and, unfortunately, he not been all that skilled at it. Alice had been repeatedly alarmed by his wild swings and off-balance lunges. She’d managed to stay out of his way when she’d had to and she’d done her best to make sure his attacks had connected safely whenever she could. She’d genuinely felt sorry for the man. Even though he’d produced the singularly most boring interview, the taciturn prince hadn’t deserved to be publicly humiliated in the duel. When the silver bell had rung, Alice had wished she’d had more experience with swordplay – if she’d had she would have tried to make his defeat look like a valiant attempt to win nonetheless. But she hadn’t so she couldn’t. Tarrant had been late arriving to that banquet and had glared at the man all night.

And then it had been Oshtyer’s turn. He’d done his best to demean Alice during the interview, criticizing her choice of questions in a gentle, patronizing tone. The man had never struck Alice as a fighter, more of a plotter. And so, on the day of the duel, Alice had cast a wistful glance at the armor she’d worn to fight the Jabberwocky before heading for the courtyard. She’d even hoped to get a glimpse of the Hatter and a private moment to whisper: “Have your throwing knives close by, please.” But alas, it had not been meant to be...

“Challenger, stand down!” Alice hears McTwisp screech. The beefy arm around her neck doesn’t budge. Oshtyer’s other hand, however, gropes various areas of Alice’s anatomy that he never would have dared to touch had she been born a man!

Alice’s dagger is long gone, but luckily so is Oshtyer’s. Still, that doesn’t mean he’s not carrying extras... just like Alice. She doesn’t want to use them unless she has to. It’d be bad form. Cheating. But, still, it’s preferable to dying... or having her shirt ripped open before all and sundry!

However, Alice hadn’t learned wrestling for nothing.

Her elbow jabs back, connecting with some part of his torso. She shoves the edge of her shoe against his leg and does her best to peel the skin right off his shin. His arm twitches a bit looser and Alice grits her teeth, braces herself and slams her head back. There’s sickening crunch and a litany of oaths but Alice is already rolling away from him, coughing, wheezing, blinking back the tears blurring her vision. Gaining her feet, she surreptitiously glances about for her lost weapon. From the back of the stunned-silent crowd, a familiar brogue shouts, “Alice, high tea!”

Looking toward the eight o’clock position – where it would be from Tarrant’s point of view up in that tree – she spots it in the grass. Keeping her eye on Oshtyer, she circles around him and scoops it up. The man is still swearing, clutching his broken nose. There’s a knife in his hand now, too. It looks very much like the one he’d been using earlier, but Alice is pretty sure it’s not one in the same.

Wretched, underhanded son of a...

And the silver bell hasn’t been rung yet.

Alice isn’t inclined to wait for it this time.

They start circling each other again. She dodges several attacks, not daring to roll under his arm. She’s too tired, too shaken to try anything fancy or well-coordinated.

Oshtyer tenses for another attack. This time, when he lunges, she focuses on the movement and manages to get a good grip on his forearm. She crushes his foot beneath her boot, kicks his knee out from under him and, as he tumbles to the ground, she uses her grip on his arm for leverage, forcing him onto his stomach. With a bit of pressure applied to his wrist, the knife drops from his fingers. Alice doesn’t have to set the tip of her blade between the bones of the back of his neck, but it feels really good to do it anyway!

Panting, Alice listens as McTwisp calls the match and summons the healers. Once the physicians have approached, Alice climbs off of the offensive man as quickly as possible, not bothering to be gentle. She puts herself between him and the queen and keeps her eyes on both him and his equally suspicious ministers.

It’s not until after she’s left the field with the queen safely ensconced in the protective formation of her guard that Alice feels shock start to set in. (After such a blatant disregard for propriety, it’s understandable that the queen would retreat to her rooms until Oshtyer and his delegates have been escorted off the premises.) Alice damns the nosey courtiers and their gossip to hell and heads directly for the Hatter’s rooms.

“You again?” the keyhole yawns.

“Shut up.” Alice flings the door open and kicks it closed.

She thinks she hears a faint exclamation from the offended lock. She doesn’t care. Alice storms back and forth in the room, pacing furiously. Every once in a while, her fist strikes out at the imagined face of her most recent opponent.

“Should have... should have...”

There are dozens of things Alice should have done differently in that duel.

“Should have...” Alice pulls a throwing knife from the sheath on her arm. She balances it across her fingers for a moment. Then, with a furious motion, she sends it across the room and into the wall. If Oshtyer had been standing there, it would have struck him in the face.

“A bit lower, maybe.”

The second knife lands considerably lower than the first.

“Try getting someone to marry you with that problem,” she snarls.

Hands fisted, she pivots to resume pacing and finds the Hatter standing just inside his own front door.

“Alice?” he asks.

Amazingly, his eyes are clear, rational green. A detached voice in Alice’s mind whispers, That’s fine – you’re angry enough for the both of you.

“That rotten, slimy, evil, opportunistic, sadistic BASTARD!”

The Hatter says nothing.

“I should have disemboweled him! I should have torn his throat out! I should have broken his fingers one by one!” She pulls her fisted hands close to her chest, trying to keep her fury from ripping her apart. “I should have...! Should have...!”

Gritting her teeth, Alice looks up at Tarrant. “Why did I just let him crawl back to wherever he’d come from?!”

The walls absorb Alice’s shouts. After her ears stop ringing, she notices that her breaths are exploding out of her like drumbeats.

“Alice?”

She struggles to calm down. “I’m fine.”

Tarrant giggles and Alice feels her lips twitch in a helpless smile.

“I know,” she whispers. “That’s usually your line.”

He clears his throat and ventures further into the room. His gaze quickly assesses her. “Is any of this blood yours?”

“It’s blue, so I don’t think so.” Her attempt at sarcasm falls depressingly flat.

He takes her hand and leads her toward the sofa. Returning a moment later, he places a basin on the floor and then a familiar clay jar. The Hatter soaks a towel in the water then wrings it out. He collects her hands and gently scrubs them, attending to each knuckle and fingernail. Once finished, he washes her face and, when she leans forward on her elbows, he rubs the cloth against her neck as well.

“Thank you.”

“Do you hurt anywhere?”

“Just my pride.”

Tarrant lifts her face and drops his gaze to her throat.

Grudgingly, she asks, “Is it bruising?”

“Aye.”

Alice gestures for the paste then sits still when Tarrant applies it himself instead of simply handing her the jar.

“Why aren’t you in the midst of a screaming fury?” she asks him while he works.

“We can’t both lose our heads,” he says with a smile.

Alice laughs humorlessly. “There wouldn’t be a stone left standing of this place if we did.”

They lapse into silence for a few minutes. Alice lets Tarrant check her neck for other injuries and reevaluate her hands. And then: “Alice... why didn’t you use your other knives?”

Eyes closed, she swallows. “I should have.”

“But you di’nae.”

“I considered it. He deserved it.”

Tarrant clasps her hands in each of his and waits.

“He was such a wretched cheat I thought... if I go for my knives then so will he and then... What’s to stop him from throwing one at the queen? Or, what if I hit her by mistake? Or someone else? I...” The nightmarish scenarios march through her head, one after the other.

“Hush. ‘Tis al’right. Ye fought yer hardest. Ye did what ye had teh.”

Alice opens her eyes.

Tarrant smiles. “An’ ye won.”

Alice marvels at the fact that she’s not capable of refusing him a smile, even in this miserable situation. “Tarrant?”

“Aye?”

“Just out of curiosity, did you have any knives on you today?”

In answer, he shakes back his lace cuffs and Alice sees his own gauntlets strapped to his forearms, the left one with three throwing knives and the right with two. She reaches for his right arm.

“Where’s the third one?”

Tarrant clears his throat and his gaze shifts guiltily toward the rather unfortunately-placed second knife that Alice had thrown at his wall. “It seems you and I were of the same mind on the nature of his punishment.”

Alice gapes at him. He blinks back at her sheepishly. Then she snorts. Covering her face with her hands, she laughs until tears are streaming down her cheeks and her nose is running and her breaths are coming in great sobs and going out helpless hiccups. Tarrant giggles with her for a bit, then hands her his handkerchief for the rest.

 

*~*~*~*

 

From the solarium terrace, there’s a lovely view of the croquet pitch. Mirana’s never bothered with it much. Croquet had always been her sister’s pastime. As children, they’d rarely spent their free time together. Iracebeth had chased flamingoes and knocked about hedgehogs. Mirana had tried to give the trees singing lessons. She likes to think her efforts hadn’t been wasted; the trees do sigh in rather nice counterpoint if someone gives them a one, two, three...

“Your Majesty?”

Mirana turns and smiles. “Hello, Tarrant. How are you?”

“I’m well...”

She takes note of his befuddled expression. She knows he’s busy turning out hats for the courtiers and guests. (Well, the remaining guests: Hornsaver had excused himself after the second duel and Oshtyer, that repugnant creature, had been asked to leave the day before. She can’t say she’s sorry to see either of them go.)

“I realize you’ve much to do today, but I thought you and I could do with a break.” Mirana motions for him to join her on the terrace. When he does, she lets him absorb the view for a few moments without interruption.

Below, one of the queen’s rooks is facing off with Alice. Both are wielding spears. Off to the side, the Tweedles are providing commentary and criticisms.

“A bit less of that, now, Alice!”

“Unless you grow longer arms, that is.”

“Don’t over balance!”

“Or under balance, either, come to think of it.”

Mirana lets Tarrant alone long enough for Algernon to enter and deliver the tea service. After the fish has left, Mirana says, “She’s down there with her tutors and a volunteer from my guard every other morning. And even I can see she’s improving.”

“Of course, she is. She knew nothing before she faced the Jabberwock.” He frowns. “That sword saved her life.”

“As did you.”

“I started a battle,” he replies, clearly remembering stepping between the beast and Alice to stab the Jabberwocky’s tail. Mirana smiles at the elated expression on his face. Yes, she supposes of all of Underland’s residents, Tarrant’s right to face the Red Queen’s forces had been the most legitimate.

But that time is not what the queen had been referring to.

“And you saved her again. Through the looking glass. And, again, after that.” She shakes her head in wonderment. “When Alice told me you’d been teaching her... wrestling, that she’d injured your side with her knee because you’d been pinning her down, I was utterly and completely appalled. I’d trusted you to prepare her for being my Champion, not teach a refined young lady to brawl like a... thug outside a Grobben pub.”

Next to her, Tarrant doesn’t look away from the activity on the croquet pitch. His shoulders curl in a bit. His expression is abashed.

“However,” Mirana says, “thank you for doing that. You saved her yesterday... again.”

Tarrant clears his throat awkwardly. “I’m just a hatter, Your Majesty. Alice saved herself.”

“With your foresight,” she concludes.

In the unsettled silence that oscillates between them, the sounds of wooden spears clanking and clapping against each other drift up.

“Missed an opening there, Alice!”

“Pay attention, Champion!”

Mirana honestly has no interest in the game below, so she takes this opportunity to study her Hatter. He looks tired, true, but there’s something about him. Something a bit more... demure. Or calm? Perhaps, centered? She looks him over, searching for any hint as to the source of this change.

When her gaze settles on his hands, pressed flat atop the low wall of the terrace, she feels a smile stretch her lips.

“Oh, goodness! Congratulations, Tarrant!” The Hatter startles and looks at her blankly for a moment before he notices the direction of her gaze and then he blushes. Delighted, Mirana says, “I take it, from the color of the ring, that your promised one is Alice?”

“Aye.”

“That’s wonderful. Truly.”

So that’s what the Cheshire Cat had meant when he’d suggested I pay closer attention to Tarrant’s hands and look for new developments...!

“These past few weeks haven’t been easy for either of you,” she sympathizes. And she knows the next few months might not be any easier, either. She’s yet to find a solution to the difficulties presented by the Trial of Threes. Mirana vows to devote all of her time and energy to that research as soon as Viscount Valereth has completed his challenge and the castle has been cleared of guests. Despite being his queen, Mirana knows she owes this man her life. If he hadn’t guided her horse away during the massacre on Horvendush Day...

The White Queen regards the man who had turned his back on his people to ensure her safety, the man who’d lead the Resistance against the Red Queen’s tyranny, the man who had protected Alice and had kept her safe right under Iracebeth’s oddly disproportionately small nose...

Mirana owes Tarrant Hightopp a very great debt, indeed.

And, someday, she will find a way to repay him. Perhaps she will never be able to compensate him in full, but she will do what she can.

Mirana closes her eyes and sighs, accepting the possibility that Alice may have the right of it: both Mirana and Alice owe it to Tarrant to make sure the beast that decimated his clan – every hatter, apprentice, and babe – is not permitted to take anything more from him: neither his home, nor his trade, nor his friends, nor his Alice, nor his sanity.

Sometimes, a line must be drawn.

Mirana looks down at the faint, rosy promise-ring on Tarrant’s finger.

This is the line, she realizes. This is the line that must not be crossed. Not for crown or country or even the Oraculum. The queen will forsake all before she lets this man lose one more thing!

Chapter Seven: The Trial of Threes

Alice stands with the queen, bidding farewell to Viscount Valereth, his vassals, and the courtiers. She does not smile or wave. After all, being pleasant to the queen’s guests is not in her job description. And it’s better not to encourage any of them to attempt friendship with the Queen’s Champion, regardless. It’s Alice’s job to be dispassionate and objective in her service to the queen. Alice would have felt a pang of loneliness if not for the fact that every single one of them make her feel nauseous.

As the party disappears beyond the grand arch at the end of the cobblestone drive, the queen sighs happily. “Alone at last!”

Alice agrees, but she’s a bit curious. “I don’t suppose you’ll consider any of them?”

“The suitors? Well... I suppose I’ll keep in touch with Dale, er, Prince Avendale, I mean.” Alice smiles at the wistful look in the queen’s dark eyes. “It really is a pity he’s a carnivore.”

“They say opposites attract,” Alice says as they head back into the castle.

“What an odd thing to say!”

“I suppose it is.” Then, remembering one of the queen’s comments about the Jabberwocky weeks ago, Alice muses cautiously, “But... we cannot see the stars without the night, can we?”

The queen gives Alice a startled look. “Very wise, Alice.”

“I wish I could take credit, Your Majesty.”

The queen laughs.

They continue up the stairs until Mirana reaches her office. There, Algernon, Pondish, Lakerton, and several other servants report that the castle rooms have been emptied. Forgotten items will be sent on to their owners posthaste and the rooms cleaned by the end of the day. After they hop or slither out, Mirana turns to Alice and, laying a hand on her shoulder, announces: “I hereby relieve you of your duties as Queen’s Champion until further notice.”

Alice returns her smile with more enthusiasm than she’s felt all day.

“Go and visit Tarrant. It’s nearly brillig.”

“On Saturday,” Alice adds. She very nearly rushes to the door but then remembers: “Tomorrow, shall I meet you in the Royal Library? After breakfast?”

“Yes, if you don’t mind. It takes two heads twice as long to ache as one!”

Alice chuckles. “I’ll be there.”

And she is. Alice’s days settle into a pattern: breakfast with the queen then research until lunch, which she usually takes to Tarrant’s workshop, followed by a leisurely tea, then exercises on the croquet pitch with one of the queen’s guard... unless it’s a Wednesday. On Wednesdays, Alice practices fighting not one but two members of the guard at once. Sometimes Tarrant joins her and the queen for dinner and sometimes he doesn’t. Alice often sees Mally, Thackery, and Chessur in the halls of the castle, coming and going. Probably visiting with the Hatter. Sometimes they arrive in time for teatime. Sometimes, that time belongs to just her and Tarrant.

The first month passes peacefully. Wonderfully. Alice thinks that if this is her new life, she could get used to it. Easily.

If only the research were going as well as everything else.

“Where is that volume on the Jabberwocky anatomy?” Alice asks one day. “I’d like to take a look at it again.”

The queen shows her the way to the Royal Library of Alchemy and locates the correct volume. “I was sure you’d memorized this already, Alice.”

“I’m sure I have. I just want to test my memory...” The lie is almost too easy to say.

She’d had to wait another four days before, finally, the friend she’d been needing to talk to had passed her in the hall.

“Hello, again, Alice. How odd to see you out and about before brillig. Have you misplaced your Tarrant?”

Alice valiantly fights the blush Chessur’s suggestive tone provokes.

“No, I’ve not misplaced him. He’s fine. I thought I’d have a word with you on the way to tea.”

“A word, you say? Or a whole sentence?”

Alice smiles. “A conversation.”

He pauses and hovers in the air. “And what would you wish to converse without your Tarrant knowing?”

Ignoring the personal comments, Alice waves Chessur into the alchemy library. “This,” she says, pointing to a diagram of the Jabberwocky, “is what I’d like to discuss with you.”

“Ah, yes. The Trial of Threes. It arrives in twenty-eight days, doesn’t it?”

“Exactly. And... I’ve only fought the Jabberwocky the one time, so I was wondering if, you know, you could... with your abilities, I mean...”

“Hmm...” Chessur purrs thoughtfully, regarding the drawings from an upside-down position in the air. “An interesting challenge. I’ve never tried to learn a shape this way.”

Which reminds Alice... “How did you learn the Hatter’s?”

Chessur’s grin is very, very wicked. “Perhaps on Tarrant’s birthday, when it’s perfectly acceptable to embarrass him as much as possible, I shall explain the process to you in complete, unabridged, crystal-clear detail.”

Alice chokes. “I... think I can guess now...”

“I’m sure you’ve several ideas regarding the process running through your mind, but tell me, why must this be kept a secret from your Tarrant? Wouldn’t he be pleased to know you’ll be prepared?”

“Well, it’s not that I don’t think he’d approve, I’d just thought it would be a bit much to know there’s a copy of the Jabberwocky out there... I mean, after it...”

“Yes, a perfectly horrid Horvendush Day.”

Alice nods. “Before I leave, I was thinking I might tell him I’ve practiced with the Bandersnatch, but he doesn’t need to see this.”

“Your attempts to protect him are unfailingly valiant, Alice. I shall do my best to replicate the beast. I may not get it exactly right... especially the voice, but...”

“Anything you can manage would be appreciated.”

Chessur grins. “It will be my pleasure, Alice. Now, if you’re ready to put away your protective tendencies...”

“Done. Let’s go to tea.”

Chessur smirks. “Indeed, let’s not keep your Tarrant waiting...”

 

*~*~*~*

 

Two weeks later, Alice is sitting the Royal Library – again – with a dusty tome lying open across her lap – again – staring at the entry explaining the Trial of Threes – again – but this time she’s seriously considering asking the Bandersnatch to be her Jabberwocky stand-in. She hasn’t heard anything from Chessur and she’s starting to become concerned. Yes, she’ll take the Vorpal Sword with her to face the rebirth of the Jabberwocky, and yes, the sword already knows what it wants, and yes, Alice need only hold onto the blasted thing, but...

But the Jabberwocky will remember her. And it won’t have forgotten her amateurish fumbling with the sword, either. And then there’s the fact that nearly every time the Jabberwocky has faced the Vorpal Sword, the bearer has been different. Insignificant, the creature had called her. Alice supposes she was. And still is. After all, she doesn’t know how to fight something like the Jabberwocky. It’s this ignorance she desperately needs to address. Fighting the Bandersnatch wouldn’t be the same, but at least he’d be a closer approximation. Closer than a rook, a knight, and a bishop.

Alice leans her chin in her palm and regards her left hand over the brittle pages of the book. Frustrated with the Trial of Threes, Alice adds to her compilation of unknowns by contemplating the odd, faint, bluish band circling her ring finger. She can’t remember exactly when she’d noticed it: at dinner sometime after the first and before the final duel. She wonders if this is something she ought to be worried about. Don’t some poisons change the color of one’s skin? But why would it show up as such a uniform line and only in this one place?

Another mystery. And not important when compared to her confrontation with the Jabberwocky only a fortnight away.

“Ah, what an interesting mark you have there!”

Alice twists in her chair and sighs at the Cheshire Cat’s grin. “Chess! Have you managed it?”

He arcs his brows. “How abrupt! No ‘Hello, handsome cat. How have you been?’”

“Hello, handsome cat. How have you been? And have you managed it?”

Chessur sighs. “You Uplanders have deplorable manners.”

“Most of the time,” Alice admits. “Sorry.”

The cat twists through the air suddenly, rustling the pages of the Chronicle of Rites on her lap. “Interesting reading. I don’t suppose you’ve indulged yourself in any entries other than the Trial of Threes? Many of Underland’s most sacred rites are en-tome’d here...”

Alice glances down and reads the title of the next rite in the text: Thrice a-Vow. With an impatient snort, she closes the book and sets it aside.

“Out with it, Chess.”

“Are you sure? This is a library, not a battlefield.”

For a moment, Alice stares at him. And then a wide grin curves her lips. “You did it? I mean, you can do it?”

He grins. “Did you truly doubt I could?”

Wisely, Alice doesn’t answer. Feeling hope for the first time in weeks, Alice suggests, “This evening, after dinner, let’s find someplace... large and isolated.”

“I’ll meet you at the castle gates,” he promises, and with a twirl and flick of his tail, disappears.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant Hightopp knows what today is. Today is the day before the Trial of Threes. No one has mentioned it in over a week. He doesn’t know what the queen and Alice think they’re gaining by ignoring it. Or perhaps they aren’t. Perhaps they simply do not speak of it in front of him.

He’s concerned, of course. Alice must go alone to that broken battlefield and wait beside the headless corpse for its new body to emerge. A grisly task, at best. Terrifying to contemplate without the aid of her friends.

He regards Alice across the small table. He’d invited her to his rooms for dinner. It had seemed the only way to acknowledge what she must do on the morrow. He hates – loathes, despises – the fact that his Alice must negotiate a peace treaty with that monster. He hates – abhors, detests – the fact that he cannot – must not – stand with her.

Dinner had seemed like an inspired idea: let her know he knows without having to say the words! But as the evening drags on with only awkward – flat, hopeless, arbitrary – comments about the food, which neither of them are particularly interested in consuming, Tarrant begins to consider that he’s made a mistake.

He searches for something to say. He should have something to say to his Alice! He can feel the words swirling like a storm in his mind, but every utterance he considers is too trite, too depressing, too desperate. His Alice deserves better than paltry comments, poorly-timed riddles, and non sequiturs.

Conceding defeat, Tarrant pushes away his plate with a clatter. Alice looks up and watches as he rises and picks up his chair and sets it down at her side. Retaking his seat, he reaches for her hand – and, by chance, it’s the left one! – and encloses it in both his own.

“Tarrant...”

“Aye,” he says. “I d’nae want ye teh go on th’morrow, but I ken ye must.”

She stares at his hands, curled around hers, and nods.

“Promise teh fight as hard as ye must teh win.”

“I promise.”

Tarrant pulls her hand to his chest. Her body follows and the smell of her almost distracts him. “Promise ye’ll return.”

At this, she looks up, finally. She studies his eyes for a moment and he wonders which of his emotions they reflect now. His fear or his passion?

“And what will happen to you if I break that promise?” she whispers.

His hands tighten but she doesn’t try to withdraw from his desperate grip. “I cannae say. Promise me, Alice. Please.”

Tarrant would do anything to take that pain from her face, but he is only a hatter. And he’s never mended a woman’s spirit before. The moment stretches until Alice stands and matter-of-factly seats herself across Tarrant’s lap.

He’s too startled – amazed, enraptured, exhilarated! – to focus on her words at first, but after a moment, they filter through the haze of wildness:

“I’ll win and then I’ll come back. I promise.”

Tarrant frames her face with both hands. “Alice...”

Her expression is fierce, intent. He shudders helplessly.

He feels her hands on his jacket. “Here,” she says, her stare expectant.

Tarrant looks down at the fabric pin she’s holding up to him. He thinks he recognizes it as one of the half dozen he keeps concealed in his left lapel for emergencies.

“Take it,” she says.

He does. And then he stares when she offers him her left hand, palm raised, fingertips turned toward him.

He shivers. The second exchange...

You shoul’nae!

He knows. But Alice... does she know? He shouldn’t do it if she doesn’t know. He should ask. He should tell her what it will mean if they do this...

His apprehension and desire swirl, froth, and churn inside him. Oh, how he wants this!

Ask her if she understands!

He intends to. He honestly does. But the look in her eyes is mesmerizing and her hand stays there, steady and sure, and he can see the shadow of her own promise-ring on the underside of her finger and he...

“Alice...?”

“Yes.”

It’s enough. He reaches for her hand, cradles it in his own, and applies the pin to her heart-line finger. Tarrant can hear his own heart pounding. His pulse rushes, overwhelming his ears. He leans forward and slides the pad of her finger between his lips. Again, the taste of her blood makes its acquaintance with his tongue. He notices the salt, of course, but something else. Something rich and metallic... He keeps his eyes closed even after he releases her.

When he feels her smaller hand around his own, Tarrant opens his eyes and watches as she presses the same pin against his fingertip. He stares, watching the blood dew. He’ll have another small, blue mark there on the morrow...

His fingertip disappears between her lips and he stiffens, gasping. He watches, but part of him still cannot believe this is happening. Alice, his Alice, is more his now than ever before. More his than not his.

She gently laves the pinprick with her tongue and he hears a breathy groan. Belatedly, he realizes he must have been the one to make it as Alice’s mouth is quite busy at the moment.

Watching him intently, she pulls his hand away, leans forward, and covers his lips with hers. Tarrant is defeated by the touch. His arms rise, pulling her closer, closer, closer still...

Her hands frame his face. Her tongue laps at the seam of his mouth. He denies her nothing. He thinks of nothing except the miracle of her here, in his arms, his. He strokes her tongue with his own, welcoming it in his mouth, then chases hers as it retreats. His fingers bury themselves in her hair and slide between her vest and shirt to rest against her back. And she holds onto him!

Tarrant savors her acceptance and this second kiss continues on. He knows he must stop.

Stop now! Nae more must be taken! Not yet!

No, no, he can’t have her. Not yet. This is only the second exchange, but he’s not sure if he can stop.

Alice...

His hands clench.

Help me...

He knows he could be hurting her; he’s pushing her back against the table. In another instant, he’ll have her laid out on it and then...

STOP!

Alice tears her mouth away and gasps. Tarrant lowers his forehead to her neck and pants helplessly against her collar. He can see the vague outline of her breasts as they rise and fall with her wild breaths. He closes his eyes.

“Violet, again,” she murmurs.

He manages a tiny nod.

“I think I know what that means now.”

He giggles. She’s still seated across his lap. There’s no doubt she can feel him as easily as he can feel her pressing just there... Alice laughs with him and Tarrant lets the rest of his tension fall away from him. He leans back in his chair and collects Alice’s hands in his again.

“Thank you, Alice.”

She smiles and combs his hair with her fingers, smoothing it down. Tarrant has a vague memory of her hands clenching in it and struggles to keep his mind in the present only.

“I’ll keep this promise,” she tells him. “I’ve sworn an oath in blood, and sealed it with a kiss. There’ll be no breaking it now.”

The words reverberate in him, making him shiver. How odd of her to describe the second exchange like that. Almost as if...

“I’ll go tomorrow and I’ll fight as hard as I must. And I’ll come back.”

Tarrant manages a smile, but the confusion he feels... the confusion manages him. A short while later, he escorts Alice to her room but never once does he find the words to ask her why she’d called the second exchange a blood oath. Perhaps it’s an Uplandian custom, he surmises. Although, the thought doesn’t help him get any rest. All night, he chases sleep and all night, it eludes him.

 

*~*~*~*

 

At dawn, Mirana meets Alice at the castle gate. For a moment, she simply watches as Alice pats the Bendersnatch and scratches behind his ears.

“Alice...” she begins.

With a final pat, her Champion turns. “Your Majesty?”

Mirana opens her mouth to give the order to offer an alliance, or, at the very least, a truce. The words don’t come. “I trust you to do what you believe is best for those you love,” the queen whispers.

A triumphant light shines in Alice’s dark eyes. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

The queen watches as Alice mounts the Bandersnatch. She can see the Vorpal Sword as well as a bag of provisions slung across the young woman’s back. Frowning, she puts out a hand to stop the Bandersnatch from taking off.

“Where’s Tarrant? Wouldn’t he want to... see you off?”

“Don’t worry. There’s no need for good-byes. I promised him.”

With that, Alice’s leg nudges the Bandersnatch and, with a great huff, he gallops off into the murky morning.

The queen watches her go, hand still raised.

What have I done? she wonders. If Alice kills the Jabberwocky again, all hope is lost for the next Trial of Threes... The Jabberwocky’s grudge is not a meek or mild thing.

But how could she have denied the Hatter what little peace she can offer him? How can she betray one so loyal? Mirana hopes Alice will try, nonetheless, to broker peace. She hopes, but she knows it’s too much to expect success.

Sighing, she turns back to the castle. She has quite a bit of correspondence and other business to attend to today, despite the date. That ridiculous Wooing Rite has put her woefully behind schedule. Sometimes she wonders why, exactly, she’d wanted to be queen. Certainly, she’d had more time to spend in her laboratory when her sister had been in power. Of course, leaving Iracebeth in power would have been beyond cruel and inhumane... to everyone in Underland.

The morning seems to be galumphing backwards for Mirana. The stack of papers on her desk seems to be growing taller despite the fact that no new ones have been delivered. She almost wishes she could be up in her rooms with Pondish and Algernon, sorting through the hats and hatboxes to be returned to Tarrant for refitting, reconfiguring, or recycling. After all, as queen, she is not permitted to wear the same creation twice. A pity, really. She’s quite fond of some of them.

When lunch arrives via Lakerton, the queen considers taking it down to the hat workshop to see how Tarrant is doing.

Just as she opens her mouth to request that very thing, a very harried Hatter crashes into her office. Startled, Mirana leans back in her chair as he storms across the room in wordless fury. She’s never seen his eyes that particular color of rage before.

“Tarrant?”

He says nothing. Behind his shoulder, the Cheshire Cat hovers with a worried scowl. Mirana jumps when he slams something on the tabletop between them and Mirana gapes at what could only be the Oraculum – the Oraculum that she’d hidden in a hatbox in the back of her closet for spring nightgowns.

She spares a brief thought to having a word with Pondish and Algernon about sorting through her unmentionables without permission, but focuses when Tarrant wordlessly jabs a finger at the illustration for today.

Mirana leans over the document and gasps.

“But this...!”

“Is not possible, I know,” Chessur says. “She’s been training for the last two weeks to avoid that very fate.”

Tarrant pivots and focuses his burning orange-red eyes on the cat. “Trainin’ how?”

“Well, that is, I...” He looks from Tarrant’s intimidating stare to the queen’s befuddled expression. “She presented me with Your Majesty’s copy of Jabberwocky Anatomae and I... learned its shape. We’ve been meeting after dinner for the last fortnight...”

Mirana gapes. “You learned the Jabberwocky’s shape?”

“Yes, for Alice.”

She blinks and looks down at the scroll. Her eyes tear as she watches the Jabberwocky lean over Alice’s prostrate figure at the battlefield. The Vorpal Sword and the shield have been tossed aside.

“There’s more, I’m afraid,” Chessur continues.

Frantically, Mirana unrolls the scroll a bit more and stares at the image of Mamoreal... or what had once been Mamoreal. She sinks into her chair, struggling for air.

“I’ve destroyed us all,” she says.

“Or just her!” Tarrant screams. “Why di’ye have teh demand th’ truce? Don’ ye see it’ll kill her afore she even –”

Bracing her arms against the edge of her desk, Mirana finds the strength to stand and shouts back, “I did not order Alice to negotiate! I told her to protect the ones she loves!”

The silence is somehow worse than the noise, she notes.

Tarrant stares at her, frozen. And then:

“Call her back!” he orders.

Mirana stares at him. “I... can’t. She took the Bandersnatch at sunrise. She’ll be there by now and the third and a third hour is approaching...” She consults the clock. “There’s no time, Tarrant. We must evacuate the castle –”

Tarrant slams his hands against her desk. “D’nae tell me there’snae TIME!”

“YOU!” he roars, turning on Chessur, shaking with fury. “Does the Jabberwocky fly or nae?”

“Er, yes. Yes, it flies.”

“Then you’re takin’ me teh the battlefield.”

Tarrant storms from the room. To retrieve his broadsword, the queen imagines. She shares a shell-shocked look with the Cheshire Cat.

He gulps. “Tarrant thinks I’m going to fly him to the battlefield as the Jabberwocky?”

“It would appear so.” Overhead, Mirana hears a door slam and heavy footsteps cross the room. “And if I were you, I’d be ready to go by the time he gets done up there.”

Chessur doesn’t need to hear any more. In an instant, he’s disappeared.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Alice takes in the desolate, stone checkerboard and the dark, skeletal shape at the base of the ruined tower in the distance. She draws in a deep breath and gathers her courage. Bringing her leg over the Bandersnatch’s neck, Alice carefully slides to the ground, trying not to get any of his fur caught in her armor.

She takes a minute to stand next to him, her hand against his furry jaw. He’ll be the last friendly face she’ll see until her task has been completed. She’s in no hurry to send him away.

“Grrrb?” he asks.

Alice pats him. “Yes, yes, it’s fine.” She sighs. There’s no point in putting it off. “Go on now,” she tells him.

His great, jaundiced eyes roll in her direction, expressing his doubt.

“I’ll see you later, Bandy.”

With a huff, he turns and gallops off into the forest. Alice hopes he won’t go too far as she might really want a ride back to Mamoreal when this is all over with. Who knows how long she’ll have to run, dodge and hack away before she prevails?

She takes another deep breath and heads for the Jabberwocky carcass across the battlefield. Judging from the position of the sun in the sky, it’s just gone lunch.

Doing her best not to think of what Tarrant must be doing, who he might be having tea with, which hats he’s currently working on, Alice picks her way over the ruins and finds a series of fallen pillars and chunks of stone that provide the best protection in the area. She pulls her satchel over her head and, stomach churning, sets the bread and fruit it contains aside untouched. She fights better on an empty stomach anyway.

Alice sits down on the cold, weathered stone and, with her shield at her side and the Vorpal Sword in her hands, waits for the Jabberwocky to awaken.


 

Chapter Eight: The Jabberwocky

The very worst moment in Tarrant Hightopp’s past is the instant he’d stood in the center of his clan’s modest village, right where the maypole should have been, right where the children should have been playing, right where his family should have been celebrating on that beautiful day. The very worst moment in his past had been standing there in the burnt brown landscape and seeing... nothing.

(He’d lost days after that. In fact, he suspects that’s when he’d so offended Time and his pocket watch had been at last cursed to show only six o’clock forevermore.)

The very worst moment in Tarrant Hightopp’s future had unrolled right in front of him. Chessur had been complaining about the scones – “Too dry. Again! Who makes these things? I thought you said Thackery hopped off last week. Has he reemployed himself here already?” – and Tarrant had been sorting through the stack of hatboxes that had just been delivered.

It had been excellent timing; he’d needed something to distract himself from the fact that Alice wouldn’t be coming to lunch today. He’d needed something to distract himself from the reason she wouldn’t be there. Every time he’d thought of the Trial of Threes, he’d felt a stab of despair incomparable to anything he’d ever experienced.

You were supposed to help her find a way around it!

“There must be another option. We’ll find it,” she’d said the day she’d told him of her decision to be the Queen’s Champion on a permanent basis.

Another option... True, there must be one. But Tarrant hadn’t found it for her despite the weeks of thought he’d put into it. He’d looked up at the clock – this clock belongs to the queen and Time would never deny her – and had known that at this moment, Alice was on her way to the battlefield to negotiate with that... creature that had destroyed his people.

Why are you here?! You should be with HER!

On this day, Alice – his Alice! – will be offering that vile creature amnesty in reward for killing and burning and DESTROYING! And there is nothing to be done about it. As Queen’s Champion, Alice cannot disobey the queen’s orders even if she wants to. Not without breaking her promise, and the breaking of a promise of that sort – the Royal Decree sort – would be very bad.

The knowing that things would have to be this way had been torturing him unrelentingly. First, in subtle silence during the final days leading up to the Trail of Threes. But then, on this day – the day of the confrontation – he’d been desperate to do anything to avoid those wild, despairing, infuriating thoughts. Sorting through the queen’s old hatboxes and ignoring Chessur hadn’t been his first choice, but then, he’d never really had much of one when it came to this particular cog in Fate’s machine.

Tarrant had just set aside a red sunhat and had moved on to the next box when, upon lifting the lid, he’d been surprised to discover a hat that had very closely resembled the Oraculum. Which had been quite odd, because Tarrant cannot recall making such a hat. Although he can’t be sure that he’s never made a hat like this one, he had thought it odd to find it in a hatbox he remembers delivering to the queen himself. And at the time, it had most definitely not contained an Oraculum Hat.

He’d lifted out the scroll – perhaps it’s not a hat after all? – and had turned around.

“Oh, I say. Is that the...?” Chessur had choked around a scone he’d just announced wasn’t worthy of being used as a bathing sponge.

“Does it look like the Oraculum to you as well?” Tarrant had asked, mildly in spite of his growing unease. And then he’d opened it and the worst, the very worst moment of his future had been laid out before him in vivid detail.

Given the fact that no one had deigned to inform him differently, it had been only natural for him to assume that the queen’s orders would be Alice’s downfall.

That bloody truce, he’d thought as he’d charged up to the Royal Office. It had been his last coherent thought until the queen had admitted defeat.

“I’ve destroyed us all...”

“I told her to protect the ones she loves!”

Tarrant Hightopp understands now. He remembers Alice’s vow:

“I will not let you be hurt.”

He remembers her promise:

“I’ll win and then I’ll come back.”

He curls his fingers tighter around the scrap of leather he’d thrown around Chessur’s neck for a harness and knows exactly what he’d see if he looked down at his left hand. He’d see the darkening band of red across his finger with its first tendrils beginning to show. He’d see the weaving of her blood into his heart line. He’d see his future. Lost before he’d barely grasped it.

“A little—tight—Hatter!”

Tarrant growls at Chessur’s complaint but forces his grip to relax. The ungainly body of the Jabberwocky lurches through the air. Obviously, this is not something Chessur had taken the time to explore very thoroughly during his nighttime duels with Alice.

He bites back his complaints; after all, flying is faster than running or even racing on horseback. Tarrant grits his teeth as another awkward flap of the Jabberwocky’s wings makes his stomach lurch.

“Ye can a’least belch purple flame, cannae ye?” he hollers.

“Flame?” Chessur nearly meows in affront. It’s a strange sound to be sure, coming from a pitch-black, scaly nightmare of a flying lizard. “I learned this form from anatomy drawings! How exactly do you think I was supposed to pick up how to manufacture flame?”

“So, ye’re goin’ teh be completely useless,” he yells over the wind.

“Lower your voice. I can see the battlefield just beyond those trees.”

As the checkered battlefield unfurls beneath them, Tarrant Hightopp finds himself in a quandary. Here, in this moment, he must make a choice. (A rather inconvenient time to be making choices, but there’s no avoiding it!) As he sees the long, knobby, undulating body of the true Jabberwocky rise up in the air, Tarrant finds himself torn between avenging the worst moment of his past and preventing the worst moment of his future. On this day, there is only room for one or the other.

A flash of silver gleams in the air then arcs far and wide, clattering against the stones. The Vorpal Sword now lies a hopelessly great distance from its bearer. The Jabberwocky opens its jaws and spews that hateful purple flame. The force of it pushes the Champion back and knocks the shield from her arm. As they draw closer, Tarrant watches her struggle to her feet and dive behind a nearby pillar. The Jabberwocky moves to pursue.

Too late! Too late!

Tarrant grits his teeth and makes his choice. The choice he’d already made. The only choice he could have made.

He chooses Alice.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Panting, Alice crouches behind the pillar and struggles to catch her breath. Had the Jabberwocky been that fast when she’d fought it three and a third years ago? Had the force of its blast of fire been so strong? Like throbbing, lavender lightning? She doesn’t think so.

She knows she’s delaying the inevitable. She will die here, on this battlefield, defeated in the rematch she had sought. She’d come here, she’d made a choice between the Jabberwocky and Tarrant, and somehow, it’s all gone horribly, terribly wrong.

“Hide all you like, pathetic bearer. It will not save you!”

Alice doesn’t disagree.

She can feel the ground tremble with every step the creature takes. Closer, closer, closer still...

I can’t survive this.

Alice closes her eyes with the sudden knowledge that she will break this promise – the most important one she’s made thus far. She will not fight as hard as she must. She cannot fight at all. Her hands clench into fists. She knows these hands will accomplish nothing against the Jabberwocky. This fight is finished. And Alice will lose.

I can’t keep my promise, she thinks. Regret clogs her throat, hardens within her chest.

There’s only one choice left to be made: to hide behind bits of rock or face the consequences of her actions.

She stands. Legs shaking, she moves away from the dubious shelter of the fallen pillar.

“Ah, there you are.”

Alice lifts her chin until she meets the Jabberwocky’s eyes.

Its tongue flicks out. Its stare is triumphant. “You shouldn’t have kept me waiting. It’s rude.”

The Jabberwocky pauses, drawing out the moment. Alice feels shame push tears out of her eyes and down her face. This is her death and yet she can think of nothing to say. No way to acknowledge it. There are no words that will help her part with her life. Besides, whatever she would say, she would not give to this creature. Her last words would be for Tarrant, if she’d had the power to speak them.

It’s at this moment, as Alice feels her eyes start to close, as the Jabberwocky takes a deep breath, readying itself for one last blast of flame, that a shadow passes over them, knocks her down and crashes into the Jabberwocky, all at the same time.

Alice once again finds herself gulping air. She hears a dreadful crash: a large body slamming into the ruins. And her name... she hears someone calling her name over and over again. There’s a hand in her hair. The overcast, glowing sky fills her line of sight and her eyes water again.

“Alice!”

The shadow passes between her and the too-bright sky. Somewhere off to the side, a hideous screech rents the air and the mindless roar of flame erupts again. She’s too tired to even flinch.

“ALICE!”

She coughs, blinks, and focuses.

Tarrant’s face, tense and paler than ever, his irises nearly translucent with fear... Tarrant’s face is the shadow, she realizes. The force that had knocked her down. She raises her arms to his shoulders and loops them around his neck. In the next moment, she’s sitting upright and wrapped up in his arms. She can feel the pounding of his pulse where her fingertips rest against his throat.

You’re real, she thinks.

Another earth-shaking boom startles her. Her eyes widen and the haze of confusion vanishes.

“No!” she shouts, pulling back, pushing him away. “What are you doing here?!”

His eyes narrow and their hue darkens. “I’m releasing ye from yer promise – d’nae fight the Jabberwocky. Don’kill it.”

“What?”

“Trust me!”

Tarrant pulls her to her feet and Alice finally sees two Jabberwockies in a snarling knot, claws slashing, teeth gnashing. She stares.

And then she understands: “Chessur!”

The true Jabberwocky twists, pinning the shape-shifter to the ground, rears back, opens its jaws...

...and snaps at the air.

It roars in frustration, turning as Chessur reforms just over its shoulder and swipes at it with his claws. The Jabberwocky bellows its horrible flame, but Chessur has already disappeared again.

This time, the Jabberwocky takes nothing for granted. Twisting its neck, alert and coiled for the next attack, Alice knows this cannot go on indefinitely.

The sword!

She turns toward it. If she runs while the Jabberwocky is distracted, she might make it!

“No!”

Alice is forced to look into Tarrant’s furious expression as he shakes her.

“Di’ye nae hear me? D’nae fight th’Jabberwocky!”

“But Chessur...!”

Tarrant’s eyes narrow.

Behind them, the Jabberwocky howls again as his strike whistles through his foe; Chessur had evaporated yet again. “What is this mockery?!” it bellows.

Alice watches as Tarrant’s entire being changes, transforms, and suddenly, there’s a green-eyed mad hatter standing in his place. Turning, Tarrant announces, “A cat!” And then, with a stern glance, he orders, “Stand down, Chessur.”

Chessur reappears some distance from the Jabberwocky but between it and his friends, as if ready to defend them at a moment’s notice.

The Jabberwocky rattles its scales, flicks its forked tongue, and hisses, “What did you say, Outlander?”

“A cat,” Tarrant repeats, “with evaporating skills.”

“I also borrow shapes,” Chessur seems compelled to add. “But that’s neither here nor there.”

The Jabberwocky’s eyes narrow. “Indeed. For you – Cat – and you – Outlander – stand between me and my enemy. You will stand aside or you will perish. It makes no difference to me!”

The monster takes a step toward her. Tarrant leaps in the way, his arms wide. Alice stares at his broadsword, still slung across his back, sheathed. Chessur moves to intercept the Jabberwocky again and suddenly, Alice knows what she has to do.

After all, this is her fight!

“STOP!” She ducks under Tarrant’s arm and takes four steps in the creature’s direction. “It ought to matter who you kill! You ought to care! You’ve killed this man’s entire clan!” Alice doesn’t take her eyes off of her foe as she gestures wildly in Tarrant’s direction. “For WHAT?! What did the Red Queen promise you on that Horvendush Day that would justify a massacre?!”

“A massacre?” The Jabberwocky pauses, flicks its tongue, and shifts its volatile gaze to Tarrant. “A Hightopp, are you?” it rumbles.

Tarrant, now standing beside Alice, nods.

The Jabberwocky leans back slightly. “I see. That... was not my finest hour.”

The admission shocks Alice into silence. Even Tarrant and Chessur say nothing. When her voice finds her again, Alice asks, “But why?”

Tongue flicking, the Jabberwocky coils its tail around its legs and tells her, “For the Vorpal Sword, of course.”

“Of course?” Alice parrots. “But what is so special about a sword? Why are you enemies?”

The Jabberwocky seems startled. It blinks and a look of... sadness comes over it. Its leathery wings rustle. Its snake-like whiskers droop. “You mean, you do not know?”

Alice shakes her head. “No.”

“In the hands of another, the Vorpal must be my enemy. But...” With reluctance, the Jabberwocky continues, “In my possession, it is my salvation.” The creature glances in the direction of the fallen weapon and Alice is surprised to see a wistful look about it. “The Vorpal is my heart and soul. Taken from me by one I trusted. Used against me to gift fame and glory to its wielder.” The Jabberwocky returns its gaze to Alice. “Of course I would kill for it. I am incomplete without it.”

Alice’s thoughts race. Could it be this simple? Could this be the answer to all the calamities and misery?

There’s only one way to find out...

Turning on her heel, she marches across the stones and tufts of weeds and picks up the sword. She carefully holds it in front of her, as she had the day she’d presented it to the White Queen. She walks past Tarrant and Chessur and, standing before the Jabberwocky, holds it out to him.

“Then take it,” she invites.

Alice cannot mistake the look of longing the Jabberwocky directs at the blade. “I cannot take it, bearer. It must be returned to me by a hand not my own. For that was the manner in which it was taken.”

She hesitates, for truly, here is a situation worth hesitating over. She wonders if the Jabberwocky is telling the truth. Yes, the first hour of its new life has not ended yet, and, as the texts and the queen herself had assured her, the Jabberwocky is more... vulnerable now than at any other time. But to trust it?! To trust this beast that had happily tried to kill her not once, but twice?!

This is the reason why the Jabberwocky and the sword remain enemies, why they cannot escape this unending cycle.

Alice sees the truth now: who, in their right mind, would be willing to trust such a nightmarish creature? Who would be willing to give away the one implement that has the power to control it? Who would be willing to risk their own life to right a wrong? A wrong that no record remains of... A wrong that may, very well, be pure fabrication and nothing more than a means to killing the sword’s bearer?

Who in their right mind would dare to trust the Jabberwocky?

Perhaps she’s not in her right mind, but Alice knows she has to try. The cycle cannot continue.

The battlefield is completely silent except for the sound of her footsteps. The Jabberwocky straightens as she approaches, its eyes wary, its body tense and twitching. Still Alice does not grasp the sword by the hilt.

When she is but two small steps away from the creature, when she can smell its odd, alien scent, she stops. She offers the sword and says simply, “Show me where to place it.”

The Jabberwocky’s tail curls and uncurls as it seems to deliberate. Finally, it leans back, exposing a long, slender break in the scales covering its chest. It watches her and she can feel disbelief radiating from it. It has no reason to trust her. She has no reason to trust it.

“The Vorpal Sword is yours again,” she whispers and gently lays it against the Jabberwocky’s torso, pressing it into the slender space.

In that moment, the tiny seed of hope that Alice is clutching with all her determination resonates with the same emotion in the Jabberwocky. The sword, nestled in its chest, glows, and in the next instant, a pulse of light – a shockwave – sends Alice flying backward through the air.

She curls her arms around her head and the breath is smashed out of her again when she lands on the stones. She hears nothing over the pounding of her heart and her frantic gasps for air, but there are hands on her face and the shadow covers up the sky again. For long moments, that’s all she can comprehend: the hands, the shadow, the pain in her chest and the bruises on her body.

When, at last, she manages a breath that is not cautiously shallow or too painful, she blinks her eyes and croaks, “Tarrant?”

“Aye, ye’re fine. Ye’re fine.”

Her hands reach for him, fluttering weakly. Again, he pulls her into his arms. Alice leans against him and turns toward the Jabberwocky. Her eyes widen at the sight of it now. No longer is a black, skeletal, hideous dragon twitching and glowering beside the ruins on the battlefield. The Jabberwocky’s body is still now. Calm. Its eyes are closed and its expression peaceful. Alice watches as its body fills out and its wings unfurl. And the colors! Deep blue, shimmering green, and radiant orange blossom across its scales. Its whiskers thicken and, on its skull, its crest rises like a plume atop the head of majestic bird. Finally, it opens its eyes and Alice stares again, for in each eye she sees the warm colors of dawn: yellow becomes peach and then rose.

The Jabberwocky regards her as well and then, in a soft voice, murmurs, “Thank you, former bearer.”

“Alice,” she manages. “Call me Alice... What’s your name?”

The Jabberwocky startles at her daring question.

“My name? I...” It seems to have to think about its answer. “Krystoval,” it says finally. “Yes, I remember it clearly now. I am called Krystoval.”

Krystoval, the Jabberwocky, turns to Tarrant and, expression grave, intones, “I am sorry for the loss of your clan, Outlander. I regret many things I have done over the course of my existence, but that day most of all.”

Alice grasps Tarrant’s hand when he merely nods tersely in acknowledgment. She wouldn’t have been able to find words, either, if she’d received an apology for the eradication of everything she’d held dear by the very creature that had taken it all away. And the fault of it cannot wholly lie with the Jabberwocky. No, Stayne and the Red Queen had used Krystoval, had treated this creature very poorly, had twisted and starved it with shadowy promises of freedom until the barest hint of relief had driven it to kill and destroy.

No longer.

“What will you do now, Krystoval?” Alice asks.

Its mouth stretches in a toothy smile that seems oddly gentle. “Live, Alice. I shall live now.”

“The White Queen,” Alice feels compelled to say, “offers you her hospitality. You’re welcome at Mamoreal.” She hesitates, suddenly ashamed. “If you can overlook the rash actions of her Champion, that is.”

“There is no shame in fighting,” the Jabberwocky says forcefully. “Only in doing so for the wrong reason.” It gazes at her intently, evaluating the embrace she hasn’t disengaged from. “I believe your reason for fighting, Alice, must have been quite worthy.”

“Well, all’s well that ends well!” Chessur chirps, still a starved-looking Jabberwocky.

“Indeed,” Krystoval agrees. It studies Chessur with a keen eye and an embarrassed expression. “Tell me, Cat-With-Evaporating-Skills, did I truly look that horrid?”

Chessur evaporates and reappears, once again, as a smiling cat. “More so, I believe,” he comments blithely. “After all, I’ve not got your skills at frightening the wits out of others.”

“Remarkable,” the Jabberwocky murmurs. Then, turning back to them, it says, “Fairfarren, Alice. Fairfarren, Hightopp and Cat-With-Evaporating-Skills.”

“Fairfarren, Krystoval,” Alice whispers and watches as the Jabberwocky spreads its wings and takes off across the sky.

 

*~*~*~*

Notes:

The part about Tarrant’s pocket watch showing only six o’ clock comes from Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland.  In the book, the Hatter offends time by singing "Twinkle, twinkle, little bat..." (the queen, who was in attendance, shouts, "He’s murdering the time!  Off with his head!") and after that, it’s always six o’clock for the Hatter.  However, I infer from his appearance in Through the Looking Glass that the Hatter’s issue with Time has been cleared up.  Unfortunately, in OPK, they are once again on the outs.
 

Chapter Nine: Outlandish Claims

Mirana cradles the Oraculum in her hands, marveling yet again at the illustration before her: The Jabberwocky allowing Alice to replace the Vorpal Sword in its breast.

And then: Alice and Tarrant and Chessur’s triumphant return to the still-standing castle at Mamoreal.

Yes, yes, she’d already heard the details from her returning warriors. Still, she marvels.

Only Chessur’s unique abilities could have delayed and distracted the enraged Jabberwocky. Only Tarrant’s non sequiturs could have calmed it. Only Alice’s odd Uplander logic could have worked out the puzzle of it all.

A puzzle, indeed. Mirana shakes her head and sighs with fondness. Only an Uplander would have thought it odd that a monster and the sword capable of defeating it have maintained a rivalry since the beginning of recorded history. Only an Uplander – Alice – could have saved both Underland and the Jabberwocky.

What odd logic those Uplanders employ, she thinks.

“Ahem...”

Mirana looks up and smiles at Chessur where he hovers just inside her office door.

“If I might make a brief request, Your Majesty?”

“Chessur, what do you need?” the queen asks, feeling magnanimous after such a fine conclusion to the trouble that had been looming over them all for months.

“I would like to borrow the Chronicle of Rites if I might... for Alice,” he states with a demure air.

The queen blinks. “Whatever for? The Trial of Threes has been completed. Permanently, it seems...”

“Yes, so it would, however...” Chessur clears his throat. “Did Your Majesty happen to notice Tarrant’s heart line earlier?”

Mirana searches her memory and finds herself recalling the moment Tarrant had slammed both of his hands down upon her desk in fury. Oh, yes, there had been something different about... Oh, goodness.

“They’ve completed the second exchange?” she asks.

“They have. How he got Alice to agree to it, I’ve no idea. I’ll eat my tail if she truly knows what’s happened.”

Oh, that’s not good at all!

Mirana bites her lip. “Do you really think now is the best time to... tell her?”

“Well,” Chessur holds up a paw and counts his pads. “She’s in bed at the moment so her weapons are all beyond reach. She’s too tired to kill Tarrant with her bare hands should she react... adversely. And, as I mentioned, she’s lying down so if she swoons, she won’t hurt herself.”

“All valid points,” Mirana praises. “If I might make a slight suggestion? Give the tome to Tarrant. Let him have one more chance to tell her himself.”

“If he can,” Chessur snorts. “How he thinks he’s going to explain this happening not once but twice...?!”

Mirana has a hard time thinking of a plausible excuse for that, as well. “Still, let’s give him the opportunity.”

Chessur turns, as if to evaporate, but pauses and, with a positively evil grin, inquires too innocently, “I don’t suppose Your Majesty would permit a cat to oversee the conversation. Just to be... safe?”

Mirana huffs, hiding a smile. “No overseeing. No overhearing, either, Chessur.”

“Oh, very well...”

“And Chessur?”

“Your Majesty?”

“I commend you. Your battle with the Jabberwocky was valiantly fought.”

The Cheshire Cat winces, but she thinks she sees a spark of reluctant pride in his green eyes. “Don’t remind me,” he grumbles and swirling once, disappears.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant slumps in the armchair beside Alice’s bed and holds onto her hand – the left one again! He’s tired enough to tumble into a bed, too, but he mustn’t do so in Alice’s. It would not do to lie down next to her, no matter how tired he is. After all, his exhaustion has its source in a sleepless night and a highly emotional afternoon. He isn’t the one who had been tossed about by the Jabberwock!

He glances at the jar of salve on the sideboard and feels not a little jealous that the queen had been the one to tend to Alice this time. Still, Tarrant could hardly have addressed the injuries on her shoulders or hips or... No, no, he couldn’t have done that. The second exchange had only been completed the day before and he’ll have to wait until the third before...

Clearing his throat, Tarrant elects to distract himself from the third exchange and what follows it.

Gently unfurling her fingers from the lightly-clasped fist she’d made in her sleep, Tarrant examines her heart line. Just like his, the band has darkened considerably. His is a bright crimson now and Alice’s a bright blue. Wispy tendrils break off from the band around their fingers, twining up toward the pinpricks on the fingertip and twining back, over the third knuckle and reaching further to the wrist.

All in all, it’s a perfectly normal betrothal ring. Over the next few weeks, the lines will darken and continue twisting up until they reach the space over the heart. Tarrant knows that only with the third and final exchange will Alice’s blood bind with his heart and his with hers.

He smiles and hums a bit under his breath. Alice remains unmoving against the pillows, but he doesn’t mind. She’s safe now. And she’s very nearly completely his!

“I thought I’d find you here.”

Tarrant turns and shares his smile with Chessur who, oddly enough, does not smile back. “Thank you for your assistance today, Chessur. It made all the difference in Underland.”

“It was the least I could do.”

“Well, no... You could have evaporated from the queen’s office and left Alice to die, me to madness, and the Jabberwock to rampage across all of Underland.”

“It was enlightened self-interest, I assure you.”

“Ah, sure you are,” Tarrant giggles.

Ignoring the pun, Chessur nods to the developing heart line on Tarrant’s left hand. “A strong connection. It’s developing rather fast.”

“It seems to be,” he admits happily.

“I’ll have to congratulate Alice on her impending nuptials when she awakens.”

That dries up Tarrant’s smile. “Oh, well, that is...”

“You still haven’t told her yet,” Chessur says in an accusatory but resigned tone.

“I thought she... That is the other night when she... and I asked if she was... and she said ‘Yes!’”

Chessur gives him a cool, evaluating look. “Humor me,” the cat orders, producing a brown, dusty book. Tarrant accepts it and stares at the faded words on the cover. “There’s an entry in there that will explain the process, but not your rationale. I have to admit I’m rather curious as to that, myself.” Chessur’s tail twitches back and forth in irritation. “Do not leave this room without telling her what the two of you have done.”

With that, Chessur evaporates slowly until only his glaring green eyes remain. But after a moment, even those are gone and Tarrant looks down at the book in his hand. He slumps back in his chair and, still holding Alice’s hand with his right, he opens the text with his left and begins leafing through the pages. In silence, Tarrant reads over the rite that has been a part of the Hightopp clan as far back as anyone could remember. But despite the familiarity of the passage, he feels completely and utterly alone.

What will he do if Alice refuses him, refuses this? He is not a prince or a lord or a viscount or a baron or even a promising merchant. He’s a craftsman. A milliner. An old, lonely, mad one at that. And Alice is so very young and lovely and...

Tarrant would give almost anything to stay in this moment, holding her hand while she sleeps. But, he imagines he would miss her voice eventually. And her attention. She can’t very well converse with him, sit with him, or return his grasp if she’s asleep. And because Tarrant wants those things, more than anything, he’ll wait until she wakes up and then... and then he’ll tell her what it is they’ve done.

Although things look bleak, there is hope: Alice has forgiven him before.

Perhaps she has the strength to do so once more.

“Oh, iambic pentameter,” he murmurs.

No doubt Alice would have liked it, had she heard it.

 

*~*~*~*

 

That bloody Jabberwocky is Alice’s first thought upon waking.

She winces with each ache and pain as she gingerly tests her limbs. When nothing seems to be hurting worse than it ought to be after being treated with Mirana’s special Pain Paste, Alice relaxes back and luxuriates in the familiar surroundings.

Very familiar! she thinks when she realizes someone is sitting in the armchair beside her bed. The very same one the Hatter had used the night after he’d pulled her through the looking glass. And now here it is, occupied again. But by a different man this time. No, the Hatter isn’t waiting for her to wake up. Tarrant Hightopp is.

And he’s very much sound asleep.

Alice smiles but doesn’t move to nudge his knee. The shadows under his eyes are dark and his skin is still so pale. He ought to be in bed, so of course he isn’t. She sighs. She doesn’t want to get up – the bed’s far too comfortable. She knows she should wake him up, though, and send him off to his own bed, but she doubts he’ll go. He’ll insist on tea and riddles and whatever else he’s waiting in her chair in order to talk to her about.

She decides to let him sleep.

For a while, she simply lies on her side and watches him. She notices he’d taken his hat off – it’s on the sideboard. As she can’t see the jar of healing paste, she imagines his hat must be sitting on top of it. She studies his cravat, loosened just the slightest bit. He’s still wearing his vest and jacket. It’s the same suit he always wears and now it’s seen one more amazing adventure. Leaning against the chair is his broadsword. She imagines him waiting outside her door while the queen had asked her about the battle as she’d applied the paste then helped her into her sleeping trousers and nightshirt. Perhaps he’d been pacing. Or maybe he’d been too tired to do more than lean against the wall. Perhaps there’s a broadsword-hilt-shaped dent in the plaster beside her door...

She regrets falling asleep so quickly for she’d missed his arrival and the chance to thank him now that they’ve returned safe and sound.

“You saved me again,” she whispers.

He doesn’t stir.

Well, watching him sleep is all well and good – romantic, even, she supposes and then wonders if those sorts of thoughts might be inappropriate. After all, the two times she’d kissed Tarrant the circumstances had been rather... unusual. Perhaps, to his mind, they’re friends only... And for all her brazenness, Alice never has been able to ask him about that. Strange.

Wishing for something to distract herself with, her gaze falls to the book lying open on Tarrant’s knee.

Well, as he’s not using it at the moment...

Gingerly, Alice reaches out for it but stops and stares at her hand.

How very... odd, she muses with a twinge of alarm. The simple, pale blue band around her third finger seems to have... changed. She turns her hand this way and that, examining both the darker band and the odd, curving lines that seem to be sprouting from it. They wrap up her finger, like vines, and twine across the back of her hand, halfway to her wrist.

She flexes it and is relieved that it doesn’t hurt.

Some sort of poisoning, she decides dispassionately. The queen will have something for it.

This time, when Alice reaches for the book – and a much-needed distraction – she doesn’t hesitate. Very, very gently, she lifts it from his knee and, turning it around, reads the title of the entry:

Thrice a-Vow

Frowning, Alice tries to remember why that seems so familiar. She studies the fine calligraphy of the title for a moment more, but the memory eludes her. Out of patience, she flips over the book’s cover. (Ah, now I recognize this book!)

She returns to the entry and skims it, unsure if she’d like to spend thirty minutes trying to grasp some horridly dull concept. However, when she finds several unsettling phrases repeated consistently in the text, she slows her perusal:

“One of the advantages of the Thrice a-Vow is derived from the sharing of blood. Aspects of each of the bonded’s character may be transmitted in such a way, ensuring that afflictions such as madness and paranoia are tempered. This vow has often been used in such cases as when one of the participants suffers from some variety of chronic mental fatigue or illness...”

Alice skims a bit more and sees a notation:

“Illustrations of the stages of the development of a successful heart line may be found on the following page.”

She turns the page.

After a moment – or two – of staring at the drawings, she manages to swallow. The sound of it is oddly loud in the room and Alice startles herself. She flips the page back to the entry:

“A drop of blood must be consumed directly from the tip of the to-be-bonded’s heart-line finger, each of the other’s, then followed by a kiss, with the exception of the third and final exchange which requires consummation for the full effect to be implemented.”

Alice gapes at the page.

“Consu...” she mutters a bit breathlessly. Hurriedly, she sifts through the various examples of complications:

“If the second exchange is not made within three months’ time, the vow will cease without harm to either party. Upon the completion of the second exchange, another three months may be passed before the third exchange. If the third exchange is not made by the end of the thirty-times-third day, the disintegration of the vow will be quite painful, the intensity of which will drive any remotely unstable individual into true madness and will also leave a permanent mark on any healthy mind.”

“Oh, bloody wonderful,” she growls, reading the rest of it.

As the bits she’d already covered had hinted, the Thrice a-Vow is, in fact, a type of Underland marriage rite. While deliberate erasure of the vow after the completion of the second exchange is strongly advised against, it is quite impossible after the third.

I am such a fool! Alice shoves the book away and stares up at the ceiling. She doesn’t dare look in the Hatter’s direction. She knows if she does, she’ll be staring at his left hand and she’s not ready to see what she thinks must be there.

And to think I’d thought it a harmless ritual – something we’d stumbled upon by accident!

Indeed, a harmless, friendly – although not all that friendly if the heat of those kisses are anything to go by! – innocent – again, perhaps not the best choice of word ­– little ritual. It had certainly seemed to soothe Tarrant the second time around, but, now that she thinks about it...

I suppose I would have passed out, too, if I’d known what the first exchange had signified...

Alice shifts uncomfortably, guiltily. Perhaps Tarrant hadn’t meant to make the first exchange at all. Perhaps that’s why he’d fainted. And then... oh, dear... Alice had more or less demanded he make the second. She’d told him to take the pin and had offered her hand and...

Had he been too much of a gentleman to refuse her?

Alice folds her arms over her chest and grasps her upper arms as another – an even more horrible – possibility occurs to her:

Had Tarrant even been aware of what they’d done at the time? Had he known they’d promised and then betrothed each to the other? Likely not, she realizes. He would have mentioned it. Perhaps that’s why he’d been reading this particular entry when he’d fallen asleep. Someone, probably the queen, had noticed the blood-betrothal-rings on their hands and had given him the book to read.

Alice squeezes her eyes shut. What must he think of me?

Tarrant, her closest, dearest friend, now must face a lifetime of unending madness – caused by the painful reversal of the first and second exchange – or marriage. To her.

Suddenly, it’s all too much. Much, much, much too much. Tarrant will be very disappointed with her lack of muchness when he wakes up, but Alice cannot stay in this room another minute!

She slides quietly from the bed, throws on her discarded vest, grabs her belt, sword, and knife out of habit, and flees the room.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Mirana can’t say she’s surprised to see her Champion standing barefoot and looking quite lost on her doorstep. She’d hoped for a far more satisfactory result to her learning of the Thrice a-Vow, of course, but that can’t be helped now.

“Come in, Alice.”

Alice moves woodenly toward the sofa then, inexplicably, stops and swerves toward an armchair. Alice says nothing as she stares into the dark hearth, not even commenting on Mirana’s night mask. And Mirana knows silence is never a good sign.

“The Thrice a-Vow?” Mirana prompts, sinking down into the adjacent chair.

Alice nods. The queen notices her left hand is curled into a fist.

“What will you do?” she asks gently.

Alice shakes her head. “No idea. Absolutely no idea.”

“That’s fine,” Mirana assures her. “Stay on the sofa again, if you like.”

“Thank you.”

Mirana reaches out and pats Alice’s short hair. “You’ve taken good care of me, Alice. As your friend, I shall do my best for you.” Rising, Mirana gathers up a pillow and some blankets then makes up a bed on the sofa. “Get some rest now. Things will look different in the morning.”

“Yes,” Alice agrees with a tiny smile. “For one thing, it won’t be so dark.”

“Exactly!”

When Mirana quietly sneaks out of her own bedroom just after dawn and passes by the parlor, she notes that Alice never did move to the sofa; she’d spent the night in the armchair. Mirana places a jar of salve for her beside the small pile of weapons on the neighboring chair, then, on a whisper of sound, leaves her rooms.

Floating down the stairs, Mirana thinks to try Tarrant’s apartment first, but when the keyhole informs her that he’s yet to return, she drifts in the direction of Alice’s room. With a soft knock, she opens the door and calls, “Tarrant?”

Receiving no objections to her entry, Mirana pushes open the door and scans the room – really, Alice ought accept an apartment! This is far too small for her to feel comfortable for very long!

And there, by the bed, Tarrant sits (with his elbows braced on his knees) in an armchair – one very similar to the one Alice had slept in, actually – and is staring at an open book on the bed covers. Approaching him, Mirana notices that the text in question is her reference book on Underlandian rites and that it’s not even turned in the correct direction for her Hatter to be reading it.

Stepping closer, she realizes he’s not reading it. He’s not even staring at it. His eyes are unfocused and she winces at that horrible muddy, murky gray-green. She’d hoped never to see that particular shade again.

“Tarrant?” Unsure of her reception, she gently pats his shoulder.

After a long moment, he asks quietly, “Where is she?”

“In my rooms.”

“She’s upset?”

“A bit.” The queen looks down at Tarrant’s hands as they dangle between his knees. She’s never seen his hands so... motionless, so weak, so lifeless. She winces again at the sight of the bright red betrothal ring on his left hand.

“’Twas a mistake,” he says. Looking down, he comments flatly, “I’ll have to start wearing gloves. Regularly.” There’s a slight pause, and then: “I hate gloves.”

The queen pats his shoulder again. “Maybe a pair with the fingersleeves cut off?”

“... maybe.”

She wants to ask if Tarrant had explained the situation thoroughly to Alice, but she dares not stir his pain any more than it already has been.

“In a few days... Give Alice some time,” she counsels him. “Even I was surprised when I’d first heard about it.” She doesn’t tell him who had told her. He knows. He’d been an apprentice to his Fa when Mirana – a princess, then! – had asked the man about the odd blue design scrolling up his left arm.

“’Tis the Thrice a-Vow. A blood rite. Keeps us hatters sane – well, mostly – an’ it keeps auwr spouses lively... sometimes a bit tae much!”

“Let her think about it for a few days. You’ve time yet...”

Tarrant stands. “I think... I’ll fetch those gloves now. Good day, Your Majesty.”

Helplessly, Mirana watches as he slouches from the room.

 

Chapter Ten: The Sixth Suitor [Rated M]

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

Chapter Eleven: Through the Looking Glass

 Tarrant Hightopp is the happiest hatter in all of Underland.

Not that he’s asked any other hatters to comment on their level of happiness, but he’s quite sure none could possibly be happier than he is!

“Whoops. Watch that ledge,” Alice says from under his arm.

“Troublesome feet,” he murmurs. “T’woul’be better were I a jar.”

Alice chuckles. “Yes, then you’d fly.”

“No feet,” he agrees with a delighted sigh. He follows the garden path back to the castle with Alice pressed against his side and her arm around his waist. Tarrant could not have asked for a better distraction from his discomfort. Couldn’t have imagined one, either. Even if he had sat down and given the subject a good, long pondering over a cup or three of Throeston Blend. Of course, things would be perfect if Alice were tucked snuggly against his side, her hip brushing his with every step, without the added botheration of painful injuries. (His head still throbs and things are a bit slippery, sliding like quicksilver in and out of focus in a way that would be quite worthy of lengthy study if not for the fact that the only thing he’d like to study at the moment - namely, Alice - he’d rather not have a distorted view of!)

As they step into the cool interior of the garden foyer, Tarrant notices the sound of clinking silverware and porcelain and wine glasses and idiotic chatter in the distance.

“Luncheon?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“With the queen?”

“Undoubtedly. She’d never abandon her guests for any reason.” Alice’s tone seems to indicate that it would have been all right with her if the queen had canceled the festivities.

Personally, Tarrant can’t think of a better reason to celebrate than the long-waited – and anticipated! – death of Ilosovich Stayne. Tarrant is actually rather sorry he’d missed it.

Must ask Mally for an exposition of that!

Laughter echoes from down the hall where lunch is being served and another question occurs to Tarrant:

“Alice, why is the Champion here and not protecting the queen?”

Alice doesn’t break stride as she maneuvers him to the staircase – he’d feared she might, actually; upon being reminded of her duties, she might have sat him down on the steps and run off! – but she merely maneuvers him close to the railing and begins to climb.

She replies, “Chessur’s taking care of it. He can become a Jabberwocky now. That’s much more frightening than I could ever be.”

Tarrant mulls that over. “I... found you quite frightening when you were angry with me.”

She laughs. “Well, that’s something, I suppose.”

“And then after the Trial of Threes, when I’d woken up and you had just... left... That was very frightening.”

Alice pauses at the top of the stairs – thus causing Tarrant to pause with her, as her arm is still tight around his waist – and places her opposite hand against his cheek. He can’t help but notice that this motion brings her body into fuller, closer – better! – contact with his own. “I’m sorry,” she says and he has to struggle to recall what it is that she’s apologizing for.

Ah, yes. He remembers now!

Tarrant closes his eyes briefly, then makes himself look into her eyes – this is more important than how close she’s standing, lad! – as he asks, “Did it... frighten you? The Trice a-Vow?”

He watches the emotions – so many! – form and reform in her expressions.

“I... it’s complicated.”

“There are two more flights of stairs yet.  Let’s take it step-by-step.”

“All right,” Alice replies, guiding him down the hall to the next set. “At first, I couldn’t believe it was possible. I’d thought... I don’t know, that it must be some sort of cosmic joke. Somehow you and I had started this little ritual that was actually real!”

Tarrant giggles. “You ought to know Underland better than that by now. Everything is real here!”

“Even dreams,” she agrees. “The rest of it is just as I said yesterday. Either you’d known about the rite all along and that’s why the first exchange affected you so strongly –”

He tries his best not to look too embarrassed about that swoon.

“ – because you’d realized what we’d done and you hadn’t intended to – and then you’d agreed to do the second because it wouldn’t have been gentlemanly to refuse...”

“Or?” he prompts. His memories from the day before are a bit hazy and things are finally starting to make sense now. At least in an Alice way.

“Or you hadn’t known about it either and the queen had noticed our heart lines and had given you that book to read.”

A few more steps pass in silence as Tarrant struggles with his shame. “I knew.”

“I see that now.”

Thinking he hears a hint of reproach in her tone, he hastens to explain, “No, not... that is, the first exchange... perhaps I was... I didn’t realize until you’d exclaimed and, at the time, I’d thought it must have been a pin in my cuff – I sometimes keep pins in my cuff – and that providence was smiling on us and then I just... I opened my eyes and I was... your blood was... and it was too late to stop, but I never thought you would... I mean, there was no reason for you to reciprocate... but then you did... and I thought, ‘This stops now!’ but you smiled... you smiled, Alice, and suddenly I was... we were...”

Again, Alice stops them. She raises her fingers to his lips and then replaces them with her own. Eyes wide, Tarrant gapes as she brushes her mouth against his in a soft, chaste kiss. “Like that?” she asks, leaning back a bit.

“Not... Well, that’s not quite how I remember it...”

“What did I forget?”

Tarrant watches as his hand rises – again without his permission! – and slides into her hair. “Ye promised no’teh forget me.”

“And that includes the minute details of a kiss?”

And there! Alice gives him that secret, knowing smile that had precipitated their first kiss. It calls to him irresistibly.

“Aye...”

Tarrant lowers his mouth to hers for the softest of kisses and brushes his lips against hers. And then – Yes! Just like that! – her lips part and Tarrant savors this second chance at their first kiss. He doesn’t shake or shudder with uncertainty or madness this time. The tip of his tongue glides between her lips in a slow, shallow slide... and then he pulls away.

After a moment, she opens her eyes. Tarrant studies the faint flush on her cheeks and the glazed softness of her gaze. “Is that how you remember it?” she asks.

“Aye. You?”

“It’s... becoming clearer.”

“Perhaps you need another reminder?” he dares to inquire.

“One more,” she agrees. “At the very least.”

He obliges.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Alice hasn’t ever thought of herself as much of a flirt, but she must have some latent talent for it. How else can she explain receiving four very enjoyable reminders of that first kiss before they even arrive at Tarrant’s apartment? She can feel the heat in her face and knows she’s flushed. It also doesn’t help matters – “matters” meaning her own personal sense of equilibrium – that she’s more aware of the solid warmth of his body than ever before. If she’s honest with herself – Oh, why bother? – she’d have to admit that Tarrant is perfectly capable of making his way to his rooms unaided. But, as he hasn’t complained, she hasn’t let go of him.

Arriving at his door, she leans across to grasp the doorknob but Tarrant is faster. He gently collects her hand in his and Alice has a clear, unobstructed view of his heart line. She watches her thumb slide over it.

“Will it always stay this color?” It is a rather vivid red, after all...

“No. It’ll darken with the last exchange.”

“And after that?” she asks, lifting his cuff a bit and studying the lines as they trail and twist up and over his wrist.

“They will never change,” he replies in a soft whisper.

Her fingertips uncover one more inch of skin before a touch in her hair distracts her. Looking up – and into violet-hued eyes – Alice gives herself over to one more reminder... Just one more! Only, she quickly realizes, this one is not a reminder of their first kiss. It has far too much in common with their second, although, Alice concedes, perhaps now’s not the time to bother with such distinctions.

Tarrant’s mouth presses against hers in a way that makes her torn shirt and the vest Algernon had silently delivered to her under the cherry tree earlier seem both far too inadequate and far too cumbersome. His lips are insistent and warm. And when hers part for him in helpless reaction, his teeth scrape lightly over them. His left hand captures her arm and, curling around her clenched fist, presses it over his heart. Her fingers brush against his jacket collar and grasp it desperately, pins and all.

The kiss deepens and now he’s inside her mouth and she’s marveling at the taste of him: sweet, as before, but somehow so real... His arms tighten around her and the distance closes between them. (Had she moved or had he?) The hand on his lapel becomes an obstacle and she runs it up his chest and curls it around the back of his neck.

Where their second kiss had ended with her first gasp for breath, this one doesn’t. Tarrant laps at her lips while she drags air into her lungs and then covers her mouth with his again. Alice is peripherally aware of motion, of being moved, of the doorknob pressing against her hip...

“Oy! Move it to a room, if you don’t mind!”

Startled, Alice turns toward the voice and stares down at the frowning keyhole.

“About time you noticed!” it grumps. “I’ve been clearing my throat and begging your pardon for the last five minutes!”

“Oh...” Alice says and winces at her rather inadequate response. In the suddenly awkward silence, she glances at Tarrant from under her lashes just as he offers her a sheepish expression. She bites her lip to keep from laughing but ends up snorting instead. Tarrant giggles.

“Oh, bloody great,” the keyhole grouses. “Like that chortling is any better!”

Alice reaches down and twists the doorknob, stepping quickly into the room as it opens.

“Thank you!” the keyhole sighs a bit spitefully.

Tarrant doesn’t take his gaze – still violet! – off of Alice as he follows her across the threshold.

“Hatter! You missed everything!”

Alice blinks and turns at Mally’s cry of despair. She gapes at the sight of the Tweedles, Bayard and his family, Thackery, Nivens, and – of course – Mally all sitting around Tarrant’s dinner table with empty plates and teacups. With a glance at the teapot – which has steam issuing from its spout – Alice suppresses a groan. Tarrant’s fingertips gently touch her lower back as he guides her to an empty chair. His eyes are green, again, she notes, although he still looks a trifle sheepish.

“The next time Chessur feels it necessary to knock a tree into me, I’ll be sure to raise your objection,” Tarrant replies gamely and holds out Alice’s chair.

Bowing to the inevitability of afternoon tea, Alice sinks down into her seat and summons a smile for Bayelle.

“It’s nice to finally see you at tea,” Alice says quietly, serving her a slice of lemon cake.

At the center of the table, Mally begins reenacting the final moments of the duel, to which Tarrant gives his undivided attention.

Bayelle ignores the performance and, with a wise look, responds, “It’s nice to finally see you with Tarrant.”

“It’s nice to finally be with Tarrant.”

“Then all is as it should be,” the she-hound comments. “Pass the tea?”

Oh, iambic pentameter, Alice thinks and, smiling, reaches for the teapot.

 

*~*~*~*

 

The funeral for Ilosovich Stayne is not so much a ceremony as a necessity. Mirana attends to ensure that the man who had murdered her sister – thereby thwarting any attempt Iracebeth might have made at redemption or even reconciliation – will stay decently dead. Beside her, Alice – the woman who had killed him – stands in attendance and, beside her, Tarrant Hightopp – the man who had nearly killed Stayne three years ago and likely regrets not finishing the task – remains silent and pensive.

Mirana can understand her own motivation for being here, despite all the history – some pleasant but mostly not – with the deceased. She can understand Tarrant’s motivations as well, for although they are as varied as her own they are still quite evident: there, in his clenched fists, she reads the need to be sure that the man who had tried to take his Alice away from him will never again be a threat. And there, in his pale, unfocused eyes, she reads the memory of that Horvendush Day when Stayne had led the Jabberwocky to Hightopp Village and Tarrant’s time spent in the Red Queen’s jail just before Frabjous Day. It’s very clear that both the queen and Tarrant have come here to bury their pain. But Alice...

Mirana frowns. Over the last two days, she has never seen Alice or Tarrant so happy. Despite the misunderstandings and turmoil, they’ve managed to grasp the joy that has always danced just beyond their reach. But here, at this somber, sparse gathering of people, Mirana watches Alice stare at the scars on her hands – from the garrote she’d used to dispatch Stayne; unfortunately the cuts had been too deep for the Pain Paste to heal completely – and the queen wonders why her Champion has chosen to be here today.

Tarrant accepts Mirana’s offer of tea once the service has been completed. No one had spoken except the funeral director – a buzzard by the name of Cloughcloth – and that had seemed fitting: Stayne had loved no one in his life and it follows that, in his death, no one would mourn him.

Alice neither accepts nor declines the offer of tea, but seems to follow in Tarrant’s wake, her mind on other things. Mirana continues to puzzle over her Champion's behavior as Alice ignores her tea, stares at her cucumber sandwiches, and often gazes silently off into the distance. It’s not until Tarrant offers to escort her to the croquet field for her daily exercises with the guard that she seems aware of her surroundings at all.

After her guests have left, the queen considers her Champion’s odd silence. Still puzzled, Mirana moves around the table and takes Alice’s seat, hoping to gain some insight. She lifts her gaze and looks in the direction that had so mesmerized her Champion all afternoon and is startled to find her reflection staring back from a looking glass.

Odd, certainly, but not... worrying.

The day following the funeral, the queen glances out the window at the sounds of battle on the pitch, and frowns when Alice seems to be putting a bit too much effort into her training. More than once, the bishop finds itself on its back. And, on one particularly memorable occasion, Alice doesn’t halt her attack and the poor fellow only just manages to scramble out of the way at the last possible moment. Strange, certainly, but not a cause for concern.

On the day following that, it rains and the queen floats past Alice’s door to see if she’s available for brunch. Only, Alice doesn’t hear her knock nor does she respond when Mirana cracks open the door and calls her name. Upon opening the door fully, Mirana finds Alice sitting with her legs folded on the rug in front of the standing mirror. Just... looking. Eventually, Mirana gets her attention and they have tea. But, again, Alice offers very little in the way of conversation.

The next day is cool and cloudy and the pitch is still soft and wet so there are no training exercises for the second day in a row. The sounds in the corridor indicate to Mirana (as she takes refuge from ennui in her laboratory) that Alice is sitting in the hat workshop several doors down. After all, Tarrant doesn’t normally talk to himself when he works...  And especially not about his childhood or family!  But, unless her ears are deceiving her (as they had under the cherry trees! A raven and a writing desk, indeed!) there’s no other way to interpret the bits and phrases she catches between the whirr and clatter of the sewing machine and the stacking and un-stacking of hatboxes.

It’s the day after that when Mirana looks up from her desk as Tarrant enters her office, and – before she can offer him tea – announces with frustrating brevity, “Alice.”

“How is Alice?”

“Barely.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“She’s barely Alice!”

“What’s happened?” Mirana demands, thinking her Champion must be ill. She begins to compile a list ointments and antidotes from memory. Would the acid from a Grobben plant affect Uplanders differently than...?

Tarrant twists his cuffs helplessly. “I asked her why a raven is like a writing desk...”

Mirana recognizes the riddle; it’s the very same one she’d convinced herself she’d misheard Alice tell him under the cherry trees just a week ago. The one Tarrant had once asked an imaginary Alice every Saturday at teatime during that Dark Year. “Yes?”

His shoulders twitch and his gaze is restless. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?”  Whether it’s Hatter Logic or Uplander Logic, it doesn’t seem to matter.  Perhaps she ought to look into hiring a Royal Translator...

He nods. “She didn’t ask me. She’s supposed to ask me and I’m supposed to tell her I haven’t the slightest idea, but she di'nae ask me.”

Despite not being able to grasp the significance of the riddle, Mirana does realize that this ritual – odd though it seems – is significant to Tarrant and Alice.

“It’s none of my business, of course, but... you haven’t quarreled, have you?”

“I don’t think so...”

Mirana can think of nothing helpful to say.

“Perhaps if I... Yes, an apology is called for in this instance...”

“An apology for what?” she asks, bemused.

Tarrant smiles. “I haven’t the faintest idea, but it’s always a good place to start!”

Mirana watches him go and continues staring at the closed door for a long moment. And then, unable to ignore her curiosity and concern, especially when they pair themselves together, she gets up and follows him upstairs to Alice’s room.

“... wanted to say that... What I mean is that... I apologize,” she hears Tarrant say very clearly. It seems odd that Alice’s door is open for this conversation, but with the castle once again empty of guests, there’s no reason for the Royal Hatter and the Queen’s Champion to not expect privacy. For an instant, Mirana feels guilty.

“You apologize,” Alice repeats woodenly. The tone alarms Mirana and overcomes her discomfort. “For what?”

“What I’ve done,” Tarrant replies still sounding confident.

“What have you done?”

“Something to upset you.”

“How have you upset me?”

“I... am not sure.” A note of uncertainty enters Tarrant’s tone. “Perhaps if you could remind me of my transgression?”

There’s a very long pause. Mirana actually holds her breath.

“You’ve done nothing that requires an apology.”

Another beat of silence pulses between them and Mirana can only imagine the flickering of Tarrant’s eyes and his ever-changing expressions as he processes that. “Has someone else done something that requires an apology?” he ventures.

Alice sighs. “I’m tired.” Mirana can hear her exhaustion and frustration and... something else in her voice. “Just go away. Please.”

Oh! Mirana covers her mouth with a hand to quiet her gasp. Alice has never behaved so wretchedly! At least, not with Tarrant Hightopp!

There’s a squeak of a floorboard and a rustle of fabric. “Alice, please...” Tarrant whispers. “Why is a raven like a writing desk?” Silence stretches out the door and down the hall. “Alice... please?”

He waits. Mirana feels the minutes pass but Alice doesn’t say anything else. Finally, when Tarrant emerges from the room, leaving the door open, he turns toward the queen. She thinks to offer some explanation for her presence, but he doesn’t seem the least bit bothered by her intrusion.

Tarrant walks over to her and speaks quietly, “She’s hurt. Somewhere. Alice has always let me fix her. Well... except after confronting the Jabberwocky, but with the... various locations of those injuries, I wouldn’t expect... Well... otherwise she always lets me fix her!” He gives Mirana a solemn, woeful look. “Why won’t Alice let me fix her now?”

Why, indeed. “Let me talk to her,” Mirana whispers back.

“Talk, aye. You can talk to her.” His expression hardens with frustration. “The thing I’ve yet to come by is an answer.”

Unfortunately, Tarrant is right. Mirana talks and talks and talks. And then she waits and waits and... waits a bit more, but Alice never looks away from the mirror.

“What fascination does the looking glass hold for you, Alice?” Mirana asks, wondering if this question will be ignored as the rest have been.

“My scars,” Alice whispers, reluctantly. “I’m always surprised to see them. Sometimes I don’t notice them if I look through the mirror.”

Mirana regards Alice’s hands. The scars are still pink and slightly raised. “Why would you dislike them? They’re a mark of honor, of victory, of –”

“Murder.”

The word is so softly and so briefly spoken, the queen almost misses it. “... murder?”

“Do you think I have the right to touch anyone with these hands? Especially Tarrant? He’s never killed anyone. He didn’t kill Stayne, even when he could have. I did that.”

In her lap, Alice’s hands fist. “Sometimes, it’s so easy for me to forget that all of this is real.” She laughs but she cries, too. At the same time. Mirana’s heart twists at the sight of it. “Alice Kingsleigh would never have killed anyone. She never would have picked up a sword or wrestled a hatter or made a blood vow...!” Alice lifts her left hand and touches the surface of the mirror with her fingertips. “On the other side, there’s a world where Alice Kingsleigh is still... good.” Alice’s gaze slides from the mirror and settles on her left hand, on the scars, on the heart line. “Do you think my mother and sister have had m—the funeral yet?”

Beginning to grasp the fever gripping her Champion’s mind, Mirana blinks back her own tears. This is her fault, the queen knows. She should not have pushed Alice, encouraged and invited her to take up the Champion’s duties again and again and again. Mirana wants to apologize, but bites back the words. An apology hadn’t gotten Tarrant very far, after all.

Clearing her throat, Mirana asks, “Would you like to see your mother, Alice?”

“I’m... not sure. Would she be able to see me?”

“Not if you stay on this side of the looking glass.”

Alice considers that. “Yes, I’d like to see her.”

“All right, then close your eyes,” Mirana begins. “Now, imagine a room in your mother’s home that has a looking glass. Do you see it?”

Eyes closed, Alice nods.

“Imagine where the mirror is... Now, become that mirror, Alice. Feel your skin become cool to the touch and smooth. Picture the light as it comes in through the windows of the room... See how it reflects just so off of the furniture? The knickknacks? The rugs and wallpaper?” Mirana watches as Alice breathes, calm. Even Alice’s spark of life has been pulled back, tucked in, hidden. Alice might as well be a piece of furniture in this room. In that moment, Mirana knows Alice is ready to open the looking glass.

“And now, pass your right hand between your eyes and the room beyond... Yes, just like that... Unveil the looking glass in the room Alice – look, now.”

She does. Mirana remains at Alice’s side and studies the room through the mirror. It’s luxurious and well-kept. A lady’s bedchamber.

“Your mother’s room?” Mirana asks.

“Yes.”

And there, at the vanity, an older woman, still slim and handsome, sits with perfect posture. A music box is open beside her elbow. A stack of letters sits inside the keepsake compartment. Mirana doesn’t have to struggle to identify the handwriting; she knows they’re Alice’s letters.

“How much time has passed... there?” Alice asks in a hushed whisper.

“I cannot say,” Mirana replies. “Time is different in each world.”

“Could I... step through?”

Mirana hesitates. “You could, but without someone to keep the looking glass open... You might spend a half an hour speaking with your mother in Upland, but days... weeks... could pass in Underland. Or, you might only be gone an instant. There’s no way to know.”

“How did Tarrant know my ship was sinking?”

Mirana blinks at the sudden return to an old issue. “I’d taken to leaving the looking glass open to your cabin, looking only when I was sure I wouldn’t be intruding. It was that very morning, when the storm seemed to start on your side, that I told Tarrant that I’d been... watching you for some time. He was there, watching you write your report, when the ship overturned. And he brought you through because, as I mentioned before, I’d already promised not to.”

“He could have released you from your promise.”

“Yes, he could have.”

“Why didn’t he?”

“You’ll have to ask him that yourself, Alice.”

There is no response to Mirana’s quiet challenge. They watch as the door opens and Alice’s mother turns. A maid speaks and moves aside to let Mrs. Kingsleigh pass. The door closes.

“I want to talk to her. Can I?” Alice says.

Mirana places her hand on Alice’s shoulder. “You can. But be careful, Alice. Perhaps she has not yet heard about your ship...”

“I could... touch her, couldn’t I?” Alice asks. “I could... go back.”

“Yes, you could,” Mirana replies, then, daringly, touches the scars on Alice’s hands and the heart line. “But your hands would look no different, Alice. You cannot erase all that has happened.”

“I could forget... there. I forgot before...”

Mirana is silent for a long moment. “Do you really believe you could?”

“I...” Alice swallows. “I want to believe... I’m not sure if I like what I’ve become...”

“And what have you become, Alice? You are a strong fighter, a protector, a Champion.”

For the first time since Mirana had entered her room, Alice looks at her. “If I’m those things, why did I kill Stayne even though I considered LETTING HIM LIVE?”

It’s not a shout, but the intensity of the emotion steals Mirana’s breath.

“I considered it. I thought, ‘Let him live. Let him be punished by the queen.’ ... And then I twisted the garrote. Because... because...” Alice closes her eyes. “I don’t know why I did it.”

Mirana can think of nothing to say.

“Can you imagine what that’s like? Not knowing why you’ve done something? Not knowing if, next time, you’ll even think of stopping? Not knowing if, next time, you won’t even feel regret?”

“No, Alice, I can’t imagine it,” Mirana replies with brutal honesty. “But I think Tarrant might. How often do you think his madness has taken him over completely? How often do you think he’s come back to himself and not known where he is, how he got there, or what he’d done in the meantime?” The queen pets her Champion’s hair with gentle motions. “I may be your friend, Alice, but Tarrant still knows you best. As you know him best. Sometimes,” Mirana concludes, “even though it seems as if we ought to know ourselves best of all, it’s those we love who truly understand us. Especially when we don’t understand ourselves.”

Alice’s eyes had remained closed throughout Mirana’s small speech and now she shudders. Moments pass and the clock ticks softly, regularly. The door to Alice’s room is still open and Mirana would wager her kingdom against a teaspoon of moldy snail slime that Tarrant hasn’t left his place against the wall beside the doorway.

“I...”

Mirana’s hand drops from Alice’s hair to her arm. “Yes?”

“I’m...”

The queen waits.

Alice takes a shuddering breath. In silence, tears squeeze out from between her closed eyelids. In a small, choked voice, Alice says, “I’m ready for Tarrant to fix me now.”

That is – apparently – all he has to hear. In the next instant, Tarrant is in the room, helping the queen to her feet and then seating himself on the floor next to Alice and gathering her into his arms. He whispers against her hair in his thick brogue and Mirana distracts herself from trying to understand the words. This time, she doesn’t eavesdrop. But she does close the door on her way out.

 

*~*~*~*

 

Tarrant damns Ilosovich Stayne every minute of every hour of every day that Alice struggles with her conscience. Often, Time finds them on the same sofa or settee or terrace wall or even armchair, with Tarrant’s arms around her shoulders and her hands grasping his elbows or jacket lapels. In these moments, the silence is absolute, total, accepting, like being at peace, like feeling the blanket of the earth settle over one’s head, laying one to rest.

Yes, that’s what he and Alice are doing: resting.

After a while, she always says, “I had a choice.”

And he always answers, “Aye, ye did.”

“I killed him.”

“Aye.”

“If I’m ever not upset about that...”

“I’ll say, ‘Ye ought teh care who ye kill.’”

“Yes... I ought.”

Tarrant doesn’t tell her how guilty he feels about this. Alice does not need his remorse, too. Any offer to remove her pain might upset her balance and send her tumbling back through the looking glass... and that Tarrant suspects he would not be able to survive.

So he doesn’t tell her about that instant during her duel with Stayne when he’d known something had been about to happen. He doesn’t tell her about that moment of frustration when he’d tried so hard to remember something he ought to know...

Stayne had noticed the heart line...

Tarrant had heard it all – the entire interview from inside the alchemy cupboard – and although Alice had realized that knowledge would change Stayne’s plans, Tarrant hadn’t. If he had, he might have chosen to stand a bit further from that bloody tree. He might not have been knocked out when he’d been pushed down. He might have thrown a knife at Stayne’s hand, stopping him from choking Alice. He might have thrown a knife at Stayne’s throat and saved Alice this internal conflict.

Yes, if Tarrant had known then what he knows now, he would have intervened. Even if it had meant harming Alice. He flinches to think it, but he would have thrown one of his own knives at her to stay her hand.

But then, would she have always wondered... If he’d interrupted her, stopped her, would she have always wondered if she could have killed a man. If “a man” is, in fact, what Stayne had been. Tarrant isn’t so sure on that point.

“Stayne was a monster,” he’d told her once.

Alice had merely shaken her head and argued back, “The Jabberwocky was a monster and we see how that turned out.”

Aye, Alice had killed it and then tried to kill it a second time without considering any other options. Sometimes, Tarrant wants to shake some sense into her.

Perhaps when she’s feeling better.

He’s looking forward to doing a lot of things when she’s feeling better, actually. But for now, they rest. Tarrant is a little surprised by how soothing this time is for him, too. As the queen had told Alice as they’d sat in front of the mirror, there have been many times when Tarrant had come to his senses in a strange place and had wondered what he had done while in the grip of that madness, had wondered what he’d been capable of...

In a way, he’s relieved that Alice has already found the answer to her own version of that question: she knows what she’s capable of – she doesn’t like the answer, but she knows it. Tarrant may never know his own limits. He may never have the chance to face the monster within him, whatever form it takes or sins it enjoys.

Although, when he sees Alice sitting on the rug in front of her mirror, when his entire being freezes in terror – Is she going to leave?! – he thinks he glimpses that beast within him. He thinks he knows what lengths he would go to in order to keep her. He remembers the first exchange of blood; at the time, he’d been surprised by the fact that Alice’s heart-line finger had been pricked. But, Tarrant is ashamed to admit that he’d never asked her what had really happened. In the grip of madness, had he pressed the pin to her finger with deliberate intent? Had he done that? He’d like to think he hadn’t forced that upon her, no matter how simple it would have been to reverse. He’d like to think it very much.

So, he doesn’t ask.

And he doesn’t ask her if she wants to leave, if she wants to return to Upland. They both know that would be impossible now.

But after the third exchange...

Tarrant buries his face in her hair and closes his eyes.

After the third exchange, she could leave, and ye wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it, lad.

His mind would be safe... or as safe as it has ever been, as would hers. For as long as they both live. (Tarrant refuses to think of the state of his heart; yes, he has realized exactly what that odd center-of-his-chest stomachache had actually been. In fact, it had taken quite a lot of effort to lie to himself about it as long as he had.) But the vow will not force them to remain together. Alice could go back... marry someone else... forget about Underland entirely, forget Tarrant... He wouldn’t be able to stop her.

A bit more Time, he pleads silently with the entity that has turned its back on him. He needs just a little longer to open her eyes to what she could be here in Underland... what they could be... together.

Tarrant damns Ilosovich Stayne for the dire straights he finds himself in now. He wishes for his previous ignorance: only a fortnight ago, Tarrant had been sure that having Alice would be the same as keeping her.

Now, he knows differently.

 

*~*~*~*

 

“Are you sure you wish to do this?” the queen asks.

Alice nods, smoothing the long, blue jacket over her hips. The last time she’d worn these clothes, she’d been trapped in her cabin aboard a sinking ship. She remembers those moments with difficulty. Some things she can’t recall at all – the level of the water, the temperature of it, if she’d been wearing shoes or not. And yet other things she recalls with such vivid clarity that she feels it – Tarrant’s blazing orange eyes, his mercury-stained, battered fingers reaching for her, the scent of the seawater-saturated wood, the rush of the air as it had been churned with the incoming deluge.

With difficulty, she keeps her body from shivering. “Thank you for the boots,” she says.

“Of course,” the queen says. “You never ask for anything, Alice. The least I can do is provide you with footwear you’re familiar with.”

Alice models the boots. They don’t look very much like the ones she’d worn at sea, but she doesn’t think anyone will notice. With no task left to do, no reason left to delay any longer, Alice turns around and regards the full-length mirror in her room. Mirana stands to the side.

“Thank you for helping me,” Alice tells her friend, her queen.

“Again, it’s the least I can do.”

Again, Alice nods. Words seem so out of place considering what she’s about to do. “If you see Tarrant, tell him...”

“I shall.”

With a tense smile, Alice focuses on the looking glass, on the shadowy room in the world beyond, and steps through.

Stepping through a looking glass is an odd sensation, she thinks, feeling the cool glass warm against her skin... warm and then relent to her intrusion and she has to shove with her toes to make it through what feels like a solid wall of air. Emerging, she gasps. The scent of her mother’s perfume hits her first and Alice feels the tears she’d been denying burst forth.

Despite the ache in her heart, Alice grasps the sides of the mirror frame and pulls herself the rest of the way through. Her boots touch the carpet – she’d forgotten how soft it is! Not at all like the thin rugs at Mamoreal! – and Alice gives herself a moment to wipe her tears away and absorb the sights and scents that ought to be as familiar as her own skin, but, strangely enough, aren’t.  But then, these last few months, even Alice’s skin has changed, hasn’t it?  Suddenly nervous, Alice checks to make sure her heart line is still completely concealed under her glove and jacket sleeve.

With a deep breath, she gives her mother’s sleeping figure a long glance before moving to the vanity. Alice had given a lot of thought to this meeting and she wants to be sure... Yes, there on the vanity is the missive with the official seal of Her Majesty’s Royal Navy. Opening the letter Alice hadn’t been able to read through the looking glass, she sees it’s the one she’d expected: everyone believes her dead now. Lost at sea with the crew and Lord Ascot’s steam clipper.

Alice puts the letter down and turns. On the bed, her mother’s face looks haggard and exhausted. From grief.

It’s time to do something about that...

Alice moves quietly to the bedside and gently sits on the edge. Taking her mother’s hand in one of her own, Alice raises the other and gently tucks a few stray gray hairs back under the white night cap. After a few moments of this, her mother’s mouth twitches and her eyelashes flutter.

“Mother...?”

Helen Kingsleigh’s eyes open slowly, still clouded with sleep. “Alice?”

Alice hides a wince at the utter lostness in her mother’s tone, the frailty and pain. “Yes, it’s me.”

“Alice!” The older woman struggles to sit up in bed. Gently, Alice holds her back against the pillows.

“Everything’s all right, Mother. You’re dreaming.”

“I’m...? But you...” Thin, warm hands grasp Alice’s arms. “You feel so real!”

“Everything feels real in dreams,” Alice reminds her. “Remember the odd one I used to have? Again and again?”

“Oh... yes. But, Alice... Your... What...?”

“The ship sank; it’s true. I’m afraid that really happened,” Alice says softly. “I was in my cabin. It was over quickly.”

Tears glisten in the dim light. It’s a full moon tonight, Alice realizes, and it’s hovering just beyond the window on the far wall. Gently, she wipes her mother’s cheeks with a borrowed handkerchief: it’s one of Tarrant’s.

“I wanted to tell you that I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m in a wonderful place, Mother, and there are so many friends there... Friends I never even knew I had. And there’s someone who loves me very much...”

Alice is quietly startled when she realizes that this is very true. Tarrant does love her. Perhaps a bit desperately sometimes, but no more than... Oh! Alice blinks as she realizes that she loves him a bit desperately in return as well.

She says none of this aloud. In a subdued tone, she assures her mother, “Where I am now, I have someone I can hold onto when I need to. Someone who holds onto me, too. I’m not alone.”

Helen Kingsleigh sobs quietly and Alice fights to keep her expression peaceful. “Don’t be sad, Mother. Everything is fine.”

“I... don’t know what I shall do without you, Alice.”

“I know... I know... It all seems so impossible now, but you’ll be all right, and I know this because I am.” And, suddenly, Alice knows that she really, truly is all right.

Alice blinks back her own tears as her mother raises her hands to touch her daughter’s face. “Your hair’s so short, darling...”

“A concession to life at sea,” Alice lies easily.

“Oh...”

“I don’t know if you’ll remember this when you wake up, but... I love you, Mother.”

“Oh, Alice! I love you!”

Alice lets her mother pull her down into an embrace. After a long moment, after conquering the writhing mass of words and platitudes and promises lodged in her throat, Alice whispers, “Give my love to Margaret?”

 She nods. “Just... don’t go. Not yet, Alice, don’t go...”

“It’s all right. Everything’s fine. This is just a dream. And I’m in a good place now. I’m happy. I’m safe. There, there...” Alice croons, petting her mother’s wet cheeks. “I have to go back soon – everyone’s waiting for me – and you need to sleep...”

“... Alice...”

She watches as her mother closes her eyes and, gradually, relaxes against the pillows. She lingers until she’s sure her departure won’t disturb the woman who might not have always understood her, but had loved her nevertheless.

A part of Alice doesn’t want to leave, but she knows she must. She must go back through the looking glass and the life that’s waiting for her there. This Alice Kingsleigh is no more. This life is over. Now she will face the next one: the one she has chosen.  The one she'll build with a mad hatter named Tarrant Hightopp.

Carefully, she stands and, with a determined breath, steps up to the looking glass and then into it.

 

*~*~*~*

Follow this link for Chapter Twelve, the non-explicit version.
To access the original [NC-17] version, please follow the Next link at the bottom of this entry. 
 

Chapter Twelve: Promises Kept [Rated NC-17]

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