The Looking Glass Wars (5 page)

The queen‘s quarters consisted of three interconnected salons. One of these was filled with overstuffed couches and giant pillows to swaddle Her Highness in lazy comfort; another was a dressing room, storehouse for the queen‘s many royal outfits; and the third was a bathroom, outfitted with tasseled curtains made of a fabric more voluptuous than any found outside the queendom.

Genevieve studied her reflection in the bathroom looking glass. Her daughter‘s birthday always made her feel old. It wasn‘t very long ago that she herself had begun her training to become queen. She saw lines at the corners of her eyes and on both sides of her mouth that hadn‘t been there a year earlier. It was a shame that imagination had its limits, that it could affect the physical realm only so far and she couldn‘t imagine herself young again.

What was that smell? A familiar, spicy-sweet aroma. She saw a plume of blue smoke and followed it into the sitting room, where she found the blue caterpillar coiled dreamily around his hookah and puffing away. Ordinarily, Genevieve would have been angry to discover anyone, let alone a giant larva, in her private sanctuary without having been invited. But the caterpillar was no ordinary giant larva. There were eight caterpillars in Wonderland, each a different color. They were the great oracles of the region, already old at the dawn of the queendom. They served the Heart Crystal and didn‘t much care who occupied the throne so long as the crystal remained safe.

It was said that they could see the future because they refused to judge it, but lately more and more members of the suit families were shrugging off the caterpillars‘ prophecies, claiming a reliance on them was nothing more than silly superstition, a remnant from more barbaric times.

The caterpillars didn‘t actively interfere in the workings of the government or in the rivalries among the suit families, but they weren‘t above letting Genevieve glimpse the future if it concerned the safety of the Heart Crystal, so that she might take action to protect it.

―Thank you for coming today, Caterpillar,‖ she said. ―It‘s an honor to play host to one so wise.

We are all humbly grateful—especially Alyss.‖

―Ahem hum hum,‖ grumbled the caterpillar, exhaling a cloud of smoke.

The smoke formed the shape of a butterfly with extended wings, then metamorphosed into a confusion of scenes. Genevieve saw a large cat grooming itself. She saw what looked like a lightning bolt. She saw Redd‘s face. Then the smoke again formed the shape of a butterfly. The butterfly folded its wings and Genevieve awoke on a couch with the smell of stale tobacco in her nostrils. The caterpillar was gone. Hatter Madigan and a walrus in a tuxedo jacket two sizes too small were standing over her.

―You must have fainted, madam,‖ said the walrus-butler. ―I will get you some water, madam.‖

The walrus hurried out of the room. The queen remained silent for several moments, then—

―The blue caterpillar was here.‖

Hatter Madigan frowned and put a hand to the brim of his top hat. His eyes scanned the room.

―I‘m not quite sure what he showed me,‖ Genevieve said.

―I will inform General Doppelgänger and the rest of the Millinery. We will prepare a defense for whatever‘s coming.‖

Just once, Queen Genevieve would have liked to relax the watchful vigilance she was forced to maintain every hour of every day to ensure Wonderland‘s safety. The caterpillars‘ prophecies were always so vague. Sometimes their visions reflected only possibilities, the dark wishes of those who never planned to carry them out. But she couldn‘t take a chance, not when it concerned Redd.

―Make sure not to alarm our guests,‖ she said.

―Of course.‖ Hatter bowed and left the room.

Genevieve was lucky to have such a bodyguard. Hatter Madigan could swing a blade (or several at once) faster and more accurately than anyone alive. He was nimble, acrobatic. He could flip and tumble through the air without getting hit by a single cannonball spider in an onslaught of cannonball spiders. But even with all of his skills, he could not protect the queen forever. How could he have known that the precautionary measures he was about to take would prove useless, that it was already too late?

CHAPTER 8

T HE PARTY had moved to the South Dining Room for tea and most of the guests had returned home. The walrus made his way around the long table, at which sat Queen Genevieve and the suit families.

―Lump of sugar for your tea, madam? A drop of honey for your tea, sir?‖

Genevieve smiled politely, not paying much attention to the goings-on. Because of the caterpillar‘s warning, because King Nolan should have returned hours ago and yet she had received no word from him, she couldn‘t concentrate. Ah, but here were Alyss and Dodge. What misadventures they‘d been getting up to only the spirit of Issa knew.

―Well, well, if it isn‘t the girl of the hour,‖ she said. ―And where have you two been?‖

―Nowhere.‖

Doing her best to look innocent, Alyss took her seat. She flashed Dodge a warning glance—say nothing—and he manned his guardsman‘s post as composedly as he could, across the room from his father. Jack of Diamonds, with tarty tart crumbs on his cheeks, down the front of his waistcoat, and in his wig, glowered at them. He opened his mouth to announce Dodge‘s punishment just as Bibwit entered, caked in mud and spotted with feathers.

―Bibwit!‖ gasped Queen Genevieve. ―What happened to you?‖

―Why, nothing ever so much, I‘d say. My robe took on certain—how shall I put it?—birdish properties and I found myself floating in the air. Happily, I soon fell into some mud, from which it took a bit of ingenuity to free myself.‖

Queen Genevieve blinked a moment. ―Alyss!‖

―I didn‘t mean to,‖ Alyss said. ―Things just started happening—‖

Jack of Diamonds leaped up on his chair and pointed a stubby finger at Dodge. ―He dared strike my royal person and he kidnapped Princess Alyss, and you can see by the dirt on their shoes that they left the palace! I demand that the commoner be deported to the Crystal Mines!‖

The suit families all started talking at once, grumbling their displeasure, guffawing in disbelief.

―Everyone, please calm down,‖ said Queen Genevieve. ―Bibwit, is this true?‖

―Not precisely,‖ answered Bibwit. ―But I‘m afraid the children did leave palace grounds momentarily.‖

―Dodge Anders!‖ bellowed Sir Justice. ―You get over here right this minute!‖

―Yes, sir.‖

―The Crystal Mines!‖ Jack insisted, biting into a tarty tart and spewing a mouthful of crumbs into the Lady of Spades‘ hair.

The Lord of Diamonds stood up, as if making an announcement in court. ―Good and kind Queen, I expect an increase in lands and tithes as a result of this unfortunate occurrence. My family‘s name has been tarnished beyond recognition by my son‘s treatment at the hands of this…this…boy!‖ He gestured at Dodge.

The Lady of Clubs whispered into her husband‘s ear, ―His family‘s name‘s suffered more harm from his own boy than any other.‖

The Lord of Clubs snorted with laughter.

―Hear, hear!‖ demanded the Lord of Spades, rising from his chair. ―If the Diamonds receive more land and money, so do we!‖

Queen Genevieve was getting a headache. ―There will be no increase in lands or tithes for anybody.‖

The families protested, their voices rising in heated debate. Alyss‘ kitten trotted into the room.

―My cat!‖ Alyss cried.

The room went quiet.

―Your—?‖ Queen Genevieve said, but that was all she got out before a deep rumbling shook the palace, goblets and chandeliers trembled, and the kitten began a gruesome transformation, its limbs stretching and expanding until it stood on two muscled legs, its forelegs having become two lean and powerful arms and its front paws thick, with claws as sharp and long and wide as butcher‘s knives. Its face remained catlike, with a flat pink nose, whiskers, and slobbery fangs.

This was no adorable little kitten. This was The Cat—Redd‘s top assassin, part human, part feline.

Before General Doppelgänger or Sir Justice Anders had time to act, before even Hatter Madigan could tumble into blade-spinning action, there came shouts and an explosion from outside the dining room. The heavy double doors blew apart, a wall crumbled, and a horde of Redd‘s card soldiers charged through the blasted opening with swords raised.

Standing amid the crumbled stone and splinters of wood was a nightmare version of Genevieve, a woman Alyss had never seen before.

―Off with their heads!‖ the woman screamed. ―Off with their stinking, boring heads!‖

CHAPTER 9

T RAINING THE soldiers had taken time, effort. It disgusted Redd how many fools claimed to be practitioners of Black Imagination but didn‘t realize the amount of work needed to become halfway decent at it. Or they lacked the ambition, the spurs of vengeance and fuming hatred, that helped Black Imagination flower within them. But these had never been the most disciplined members of the queendom. Not only had Redd been banished from Wonderland years ago, forced to live in a grubby fortress on Mount Isolation in the middle of the Chessboard Desert—

acres of icy snow alternating with acres of tar and black rock, forming what looked from the air like a giant chessboard—not only this, but she‘d had to piece together a military force out of deserters, mercenaries, cutthroats. A good many of these had been Twos and Threes in the Wonderland Deck, card soldiers who were little more than bodies to be thrown in front of incoming cannonball spiders and generator orbs, doomed to die. Luckily, Redd also had Fours, Fives, and Sixes at her disposal, and a ragtag group of ex-Wonderlanders who‘d never been part of the Deck at all but who hadn‘t felt at home living in bright, happy Wonderland.

But how many times in the past fistful of years had she toured her training camps in the hope of witnessing the glory of a budding war machine with ranks of well-trained soldiers eager for bloodshed? 347. And how many times had she been disappointed, seeing only misfits engaged in sloppy, inefficient military maneuvers? 346. She once came upon a Six Card, a lieutenant, yelling at some idiot Two who was cradling a cute, fuzzy guinea pig.

―I tell you to think black thoughts and you come up with that!?‖ the lieutenant had screamed. ―Is a guinea pig bad? Do you consider a guinea pig the representation of all that‘s evil?‖

―Maybe…if it‘s an evil guinea pig?‖

The lieutenant and Two Card had eyed the animal, which sat in the soldier‘s folded arm, twitching its nose, oblivious.

―That is not an evil guinea pig!‖ the lieutenant had shouted.

Even though she needed every able body she could get, Redd ordered the lieutenant to kill the soldier.

By the force of her vindictive will, as much as by the training the soldiers endured for ten hours of every lunar cycle, her army was at last ready. She decided upon Alyss‘ seventh birthday as the occasion of attack. Wonderland would be celebrating its future queen. What better time to wrench back what was hers? She would give Wonderland its future queen all right, but it wouldn‘t be the one citizens were expecting.

She sent out seekers—deadly creatures with vulture bodies and fly heads—for aerial reconnaissance. She had bred and trained them herself. Her troops suited up, sharpened blades, loaded crystal shooters and orbs. Redd stood before them on the jagged promontory of Mount Isolation. She spread out her arms as if to embrace all that was bad and threw her voice into the wind.

―Years ago I was told to leave the comforts of home by my own family. I was removed from the power to which I‘d been born. All of you have had to leave your homes for one reason or another, and together we have suffered through our lives in this barren land. But all that‘s over now. Today we will return to our birthplace and remake it in our image—which is to say, my image. Today we will make history. But…‖ And here she scowled down at her troops massed before her at the foot of the mountain. ―If there be any doubters among you, any who are unsure of their willingness to die for my cause, let them step forward now. They will be excused from this day‘s battle until they are ready to fight, and they can enjoy a nice cup of tea.‖

Redd then did an extraordinary thing: She smiled. But her facial muscles weren‘t accustomed to being used in this way, and the soldiers thought they had never seen her look more fierce. They knew better than to step forward.

―To victory then!‖ Redd shouted.

She had to give her rogue soldiers credit: They might not have been the most imaginative, they might have been novices in Black Imagination, but every single one of them had learned well how to kill. Equally good with swords, knives, spiked clubs, spears, orbs, crystal shooters, they had little trouble getting past the guards that patrolled the edges of the Chessboard Desert, meant to contain her and her kind. And Redd herself made sure that no warning dispatch made it to the palace, rerouting it to oblivion by the power of her imagination. They had little trouble butchering the interior guards. They marched into Wondertropolis, hardly the worse for wear, trailing bloodred clouds and howling winds. At the sight of them, Wonderlanders, who had been celebrating only moments before, abandoned their games and ran off to what security their homes afforded. Every Wonderlander over the age of twelve remembered the devastation of the civil war between Redd and Genevieve. They knew why Redd had come.

The palace appeared in view, the Heart Crystal the only bright light in the gloom Redd had brought with her. She ordered her troops to surround the place. In her imagination‘s eye she saw her most formidable henchman, in the form of a kitten, padding silently along heart-shaped halls, past watch-posts where guardsmen said, ―Hey, look at the cute cat,‖ and, ―Here, kitty, kitty.‖ But the kitty was on a mission and didn‘t stop. He approached the Security Oversight Room and transformed himself from feline to assassin. The Cat smashed through the locked door, surprising the five guards lounging by the controls and monitoring crystals. With a few swings of his powerful arms, he flung them down like so many rag dolls, leaving them slumped and bleeding on the floor. He ripped the master key from the waistband of the highest-ranking guard and inserted it into the security console. He turned the key and flipped release switch after release switch; all over Heart Palace, bolts unlocked, doors and gates swung open, and Redd‘s troops stormed in. The Cat turned back into a kitten and bounded toward the South Dining Room, where the Hearts and their guests still had no idea what was happening.