Mad About the Hatter (13 page)

Hatter gently pushed Rabbit’s watch away. “I am not late. I did not kill Time. I’ve barely even poked it a little. I’ve been very busy securing the presence of Henry, also known as Boy Alice, and going to great and quite exhausting lengths keeping him out of harm’s way while escorting him to the Red Castle. Quite a grueling and vexing project, for which I may not expect recompense, might I add.”

Henry frowned at him, but Hatter pretended not to notice, keeping his attention on Rabbit. He’d deal with Henry’s dented feelings later.

Rabbit’s eyes opened wide. “Heavens, is this really Boy Alice?” He stepped up and peered closely into Henry’s face, whiskers twitching. “Why, yes, I can see the family resemblance now. Well, if he’s anything like his sister, that explains why you’re late, Hatter.”

“I am nothing like Alice!” Henry glared at Rabbit, his lip curling over his teeth.

Hatter took a step to the left, effectively stepping between Henry and Rabbit. “You see? There are extenuating circumstances. He is most disagreeable. Tiresomely so. I didn’t kill Time. If anything, I saved it by making him hurry despite his argumentative nature.”

“Hey! Whose side are you on? I am not argumentative!” Henry put in.

Hatter smirked at Henry from over his shoulder. “Thank you for proving my point.”

Rabbit waved a dismissive hand at both of them. “Doesn’t matter. You know how it is with the Queen. She never changes her verdicts.”

Hatter scowled. “Rubbish. This is just her way of getting out of her promise to me, that’s all.”

Henry pulled on his shoulder. “What promise? You didn’t say anything about a promise from the Queen, Hatter.”

Hatter cursed himself silently for slipping up. “Er, it’s nothing. Never mind. You heard Rabbit! We’re late! Let’s go. Come on, double time.”

“You just said we’re not late!” Henry shouted, his cheeks growing very red.

“I lied.” Hatter turned away, not wishing to see the hurt and anger in Henry’s eyes. Lying about lying about lying. It was a new low, even for him. He tried not to slouch from the weight of the guilt pressing down on his shoulders as he followed Rabbit through the woods toward the Red Queen’s castle.

Henry grabbed his arm and pulled him to a stop. They watched Rabbit hop into the distance, never slowing, obviously convinced the two of them would hurry behind him now that he’d proven how very late they were. “What did you mean when you said you lied? What did you lie about?”

“It’s really nothing. Look, plans have changed. We can’t go to the Queen’s castle.”

Gaping at Hatter, Henry’s jaw dropped. “What are you talking about? Of course we do. You said she was the only one who might be able to send me home!”

“Yeah, about that… that would be the part I lied about.”

Henry folded his arms across his chest. The look on his face was positively murderous. It was obvious to Hatter that Henry wasn’t taking a step until he got an explanation.

Gods, how Hatter hated the truth. It was almost never pleasant, and usually quite painful, which is why he usually liked to bend and twist it into more palatable shapes. He sighed. “The Queen believes you’re here to execute a coup against her regime. When Alice became Queen, even though it was only for a few short hours, the Red Queen nearly lost her mind if not her head. She won’t let that happen again. She aims to question you, then lop off your head as a warning to other interlopers.”

“Lop off… you mean….” Henry’s hand went to his neck as if to protect his tender throat. “I intend nothing of the sort! I’m here by accident. I’ll just explain things to her, and—”

“Explain? To the Red Queen?” Hatter couldn’t help a sardonic laugh from escaping his lips. “No one explains anything to the Queen. She’s built of nothing but maliciousness and stubbornness held together by a few threads of narcissism and a nice big helping of conceit. She’d cut off your head if you tried to talk her out of cutting off your head.”

Pale as milk, Henry began to pace, his hands clamped to the sides of his head as if to keep his brains from leaking out of his ears. “Why? Why did you lie to me?”

“I didn’t. Not really. If you remember, I said the Queen wanted me to bring you to the castle, and that was the truth. I merely omitted the part about losing your head.” Hatter felt hollow inside. He sounded like a jerk even to himself. Then again, he never expected to have feelings for Henry, other than gratitude for providing a way to keep his own head attached to his shoulders. The new charges against him for killing Time were false; the Queen was trying to make sure Hatter—and in turn, Henry—would be delivered to her by Rabbit. He wasn’t worried about them, but he was worried about Henry. “Listen to me. The Queen is not a good sport, but we don’t need to see her to get you home.”

“Oh? Why should I ever believe a word you say again?”

“There is no reason. You’re right to doubt me. I behaved abominably, and for that I’m truly sorry.” Hatter swallowed his guilt like a bitter pill, and stood tall. “But I’m not lying now. If you go to the Red Castle, you will lose your head.”

Henry stopped pacing and faced Hatter. “Then what am I supposed to do? Stay here forever? I have a life back home! Friends. Family.” He picked at his shirt and pants, which were filthy from their slog through the Neverglades and Confection Mountain climb. “Clean clothes!”

“Family? I thought you hated Alice.”

“I do not! She’s my sister, and besides, I owe her an apology. I was wrong. She was telling the truth all those years. I have other family besides Alice, you know. There’s my father…. He drinks, but he’s still my dad. Plus, there’s my mother’s brother, Leonard, who showed up a few years ago. People depend on me. I have to go back!”

“Well, as I said—if you were listening, which you obviously have not been—there is another way. I know where the magic looking glass is, the one Alice used the last time she came to Wonderland.” Hatter allowed himself a small triumphant smile. “It stands to reason that if she used it to get here, then you can use it to get home.” His smile slipped, and he whispered, almost under his breath. “Unless it’s one-way magic, like the door to Caterpillar’s Lair.”

“What’s that? I didn’t hear you.”

“Nothing, nothing. The mirror is located in the White Queen’s castle.”

Henry cocked his head, and narrowed his eyes. “Didn’t you tell me the White Queen was dead?”

“Oh, quite dead, yes.” Hatter nodded. “Lost her head on the chessboard, and it is very rare that anyone survives that! However, her castle remains. Empty, of course, and some say haunted, but there nonetheless. And somewhere within it is the mirror.”

Clasping his hands behind his back and tucking his chin down, Henry resumed pacing. It was obvious to Hatter he was thinking things over. “I suppose if the mirror isn’t there, then I’m no worse off than I am now. I can always come back to the Red Castle, right?”

“Well, yes, although the result will be the same, I assure you. Beheadings are the Red Queen’s favorite pastime.”

Hatter watched Henry’s Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed hard. “Okay. Lead on to the White Castle, but I warn you, Hatter… don’t lie to me again.”

“You have my word.” Hatter solemnly crossed his heart, wondering how much his word was actually worth on the open market these days. Not enough to buy the holes in Swiss cheese, he figured, but again, Henry didn’t need to know that. He had heard that the glass was in the White Castle; he hadn’t lied. Whether it would work or not was up for debate. For the moment, though, making sure Henry’s handsome head remained where it belonged was quite enough for Hatter. That and keeping his own firmly attached as well.

He looked off into the distance, where Rabbit was no more than a spot on the horizon, then turned to the northwest. His voice sounded far more chipper than he felt. “This way! Come on, let’s step lively. We’ve got miles to go before nightfall. Miles to go.” He set off at a brisk pace, with Henry at his side.

They walked in silence for several miles, each lost in their own thoughts. Then Henry finally broke the silence with a question.

“Did you say Alice was Queen of Wonderland? How could that be? For that matter, if Wonderland is all one country, how could there be a Red Queen and a White Queen?”

“Alice was Queen, once. Didn’t she tell you?” Hatter sighed, and began walking. As he suspected, Henry kept pace with him. “It was years ago, at the end of Alice’s last visit here. Of course, there are those who believe it true, others who insist it was nothing more than a dream of the Red King, and others who believe Alice was the one dreaming, but since they’ve both been gone for years, there’s no way to verify it either which way. I’m not even entirely sure how it happened, since it’s singularly unusual for anyone not born to the crown to wear it. All I know is that it supposedly involved a chess game, a White Knight, and some sort of cake.”

“Cake? What flavor?”

“Do you know, I’m not sure.” Hatter tapped his chin with a finger. “Certainly nothing as ordinary as plain vanilla cake. Perhaps it was something of the upside-down variety, since it certainly turned the monarchy on its ear for a time. Of course, then Alice disappeared again, and things went back to normal, or for what passes as normal here on most days, so I suppose it really doesn’t matter.”

“Wait a minute.” Henry put his hand on Hatter’s arm. He could feel the heat soaking in right through his coat sleeve. “If my sister was Queen, what does that make me? Am I a prince?”

Hatter frowned, thinking. He hadn’t thought of that before. “I don’t rightly know. Alice wasn’t born to royalty—she was a commoner who won the crown. Still, she held it for a time, even if it was only a matter of hours, and disappeared having never formally renounced it. You’re of her blood, but quite frankly, I don’t know what that makes you.”

Silence descended for another few minutes before Henry spoke again. “Alice and her dodgy queenhood aside, what about my other question? How can there be two Queens in one land?”

“That’s another story.”

“Well, we’ve got time, right? I don’t see the White Castle anywhere around here.”

Hatter blew a stray hair out of his eyes. “Years and years ago, twin sisters were born to the ruling Queen. One was pure and sweet, and kind to everyone. Never a sharp word passed her lips. She was beloved by all who met her. The other twin was as crude and cruel as her sister was good. She had a crooked smile and a twisted soul.”

“Let me guess. The good one was the White Queen, and the bad one was the Red Queen.”

“Hmph.” Hatter stopped and folded his arms across his chest, annoyed. “Have you heard this story before?”

“Um, no.”

“Then kindly allow me to tell it.”

“By all means, please do,” Henry said, with only the slightest hint of sarcasm.

Hatter, somewhat appeased, continued both the story and their walk. “The current King and Queen decided the sweet twin would inherit the crown. This, of course, did not sit well with the other twin. She threw a tantrum so foul that it dropped birds from the sky and withered every flower for miles around.

“When her parents refused to change their minds, she plotted her revenge carefully. First, she took a husband, a nice fellow, who really ought to have known better. Within weeks of the wedding, and before they could officially declare her sister Successor to the Throne, her parents died under suspicious circumstances—they choked to death on crow pie, a dish neither was known to relish eating.

The newly married girl, being the elder twin by mere moments, claimed the throne for herself under the Wonderland Rules for Royal Progression, which allows for the eldest child to inherit the crown unless otherwise decreed in formal proclamation by the current King and Queen. Her first order was to banish her sister to the other side of Wonderland, forbidden from ever entering the Red Castle again.

When her sister declared herself the White Queen in defiance of the Red Queen’s rule, the Red Queen seethed and simmered with rage, until she finally got her revenge on the chessboard.”

“So that’s why she wants my head? Because Alice became Queen?”

“That’s it in a nutshell.” Hatter removed his hat and fanned himself with it.

“Why does she hate you so much?”

“Me? Because Time cursed me.” Hatter replaced his hat on his head and tamped it down. “Time, you know, is the Red Queen’s only real enemy. Nothing escapes the ravages of Time. Except me. Because Time cursed me, I haven’t aged, and she’s consumed by jealousy. My very existence reminds her that she grows old while I remain the same. As I said before, it isn’t a blessing—it’s horrible having everyone you knew and loved die while you go on—but she doesn’t see it that way. She couldn’t care less if everyone she knows turned toes up, as long as she goes on just as she is.”

“Wow. She’s a total bitch.”

“Really, calling her that insults female dogs everywhere.”

Silence descended once more as they continued their trek to the White Castle. The sun breached the sky and was far along its path to the horizon again when they finally spied four gleaming towers in the distance.

Henry shouted and pointed. “Is that it? Is that the White Castle?”

Hatter nodded, not feeling the same jubilation. “That’s it. We’ll be there before dark.”

Before night fell he’d find out if he could send Henry home through the looking glass, or if Henry was stuck here in Wonderland. Neither option made Hatter very happy. If Henry went home, Hatter felt he’d miss something wonderful before he even got a chance to appreciate it. If Henry stayed, they’d both live on the run from the Red Queen, or worse, lose their lives to her spiteful wrath. His was, as the old Wonderland saying went, a lose-lose situation.

Sighing deeply, he hurried his step to keep up with Henry.

L
USH
MEADOWS
spread out before them. They were home to uncountable species of flowers, all of which produced blooms of white, from the giant, blindingly white Sunblockers, whose shade rivaled that of the largest oak trees, to the tiny Miniaturia, whose delicate ivory petals were no bigger than an exclamation point, and every size and shape of flower in between. Seen from afar, the meadows looked like softly rippling mounds of snow stretching out in all directions.