by Frank Beddor
CHAPTER 45
ON A suburban street where Wonderland children frequently played, outnumbered and outgunned card soldiers were saved from a bombardment of razor-cards by a shield that repelled the projectiles back upon the Glass Eyes who fired them…
In an Outerwilderbeastia safari park where families often vacationed, a platoon of pawns was able to defend itself against several Boarderland tribes with the help of orb cannons that automatically reloaded and launched generators…
Along hiking trails in the Everlasting Forest, Fel Creel warriors on the verge of routing two full hands of card soldiers suddenly found themselves being routed by the ground upon which they stood, as it crumbled beneath their feet and sucked them down into unknown depths…
Supporting her troops from the crystal chamber, Alyss had been able to hold Redd’s forces in their current positions for more than a quarter of a lunar hour. But she could feel fatigue overtaking her, even with the Heart Crystal so close. Redd’s invasion of Wondertropolis seemed as inevitable as the seasons.
Can’t keep this up. Can’t be at all places at once.
“The Pool of Tears, Alyss!” Bibwit shouted.
She turned her imaginative gaze upon the pool: Two and three at a time, figures were splashing from its surface.
Are those…skeletons?
They were. Innumerable skeletons swimming to shore along with Master Sacrenoir and others of flesh and no good intent. They scrabbled onto dry land and attacked any card soldiers and chessmen within sight: yet another battle, an ambush upon Alyss’ senses and strength.
Pointing her scepter at the Heart Crystal, she surrounded the Earth mercenaries with a barrier exactly like the one that had so recently separated the queendom from Boarderland—the pylons, the sound waves that could fry a trespasser’s internal organs. But as she did, the scorpspitters that had cornered Catabrac warriors in a dark quadrant of the Chessboard Desert disintegrated into nonexistence. The warriors blasted their way through a spread of Five Cards and advanced toward the capital city.
Redd, informed of Sacrenoir’s arrival and rolling toward Wondertropolis in her three-wheeled vehicle, guffawed when she remote-viewed the barrier meant to contain Sacrenoir and the others. The closer she got to the Heart Crystal, the more she felt her powers increase. She stopped up the barrier’s pylon vents; the sound waves flickered and went out. Alyss conjured another barrier, but Redd stopped up its vents just as quickly. Alyss conjured a third barrier, but this time, sensing Alyss’ gaze upon her and wanting a distraction, Her Imperial Viciousness said aloud, “Let’s see how my guardsman friend is doing.” She then directed her energies to a particular Wonderland farm, where Dodge, having commandeered a spirit-dane, was speeding through a gobbygrape arbor to the Everlasting Forest, it having been reported to him that The Cat was last seen there, decimating card soldiers with tremendous swings of his paws.
Since the fighting began, Alyss had taken comfort in the fact that Dodge and The Cat were nowhere near each other. But Redd’s ploy worked. Alyss let herself be distracted, focused her imaginative sight on Dodge, who had climbed off his spirit-dane and was unsheathing his father’s sword, stalking toward—
“Bibwit,” Alyss yelled, “tell Dodge The Cat he sees isn’t real! It’s a construct!”
The tutor repeated the message several times into his desk’s audio intake, but Dodge didn’t respond. If The Cat were a construct, he would find out for himself. The Cat grinned and stood his ground as Dodge ran toward him with a sword aimed at his throat and—
Bonk!
A pail flew up and hit the guardsman in the shoulder, and before he could recover, another came at him from his opposite side. Clonk! Off balance, he swung his sword to defend himself against a hoe that had been thrown at him by some unseen hand.
Redd.
Alyss conjured pails and farming tools of her own to smash against her aunt’s. But more than a few of Redd’s conjurings made it through, hitting Dodge in the head, arms, legs and stomach, frustrating him, angering him, all while The Cat stood untouched and laughed. And in trying to protect Dodge, Alyss lost sight of what she’d been doing, imaginationwise, on other fronts. Sacrenoir and the rest of Redd’s Earth army passed between her barrier’s gobbedup pylons with ease. Elsewhere throughout the queendom, Redd’s hordes punished Alyss’ forces and closed in on Wondertropolis.
Alyss realized her mistake. But it was then, as she was beginning to think Redd unstoppable, that she truly understood Blue’s message.
Court loss or lose. Invite loss.
She stood before the Heart Crystal, her scepter held loosely in her hand, doing nothing.
“Alyss!” Bibwit shouted. “A-lyss!”
I must invite loss to prevent Redd’s victory.
Above her, above the city center, the web of caterpillar thread was more intricate. She rushed to the control desk, sent a dispatch to the generals.
“Let Redd advance,” she ordered. “But be sure the soldiers make a show of resistance. If they don’t, she’ll be suspicious.”
“Let Redd advance?” General Doppel’s voice croaked.
“All due respect, Your Majesty,” said General Gänger, “but that’s crazy talk!”
“Just do it!”
With Bibwit fidgeting at her side, and still defending Dodge—who had yet to land a blow on The Cat construct—against Redd’s bruisings, she watched the control desk’s viewing screens. On the outer streets of Wondertropolis, the first of her retreating card soldiers appeared, fighting weakly and rushing for cover whenever it presented itself. Redd’s army came from every direction at once. Redd herself followed along behind the warriors who’d fought their way through the Everlasting Forest, riding tall in her three-wheeler with Arch and her tutor as companions.
Beep, beep beep beep. Hatter’s voice pumped through the control desk’s speakers: “Queen Alyss, I’ve woven the green thread, as you requested. The pattern is all but complete.”
“Hold, Hatter, and wait until I give the order to complete it.”
Redd’s forces were quickly surrounding the palace, smashing shop windows, exploding transports, scarring building fronts with crystal shot and razor-cards.
“Are you sure this is wise, Alyss Heart?” Bibwit said, but he seemed to be talking to himself and Alyss didn’t answer.
“Closer,” she was murmuring as Redd advanced. “Closer.”
Another few blocks and the palace itself would be overrun. Redd’s army was already storming down Heart Boulevard toward the palace gate. But still Alyss waited. Redd appeared on the boulevard. Three blocks away, two blocks, one block—
“Now, Hatter!”
On Talon’s Point, the Milliner tied the last segment of loose caterpillar thread in place according to the diagram Arch had given him, and—
WUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMP!!!
WUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMP!!!
WUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMP!!!
WUUUUUUUUMMMP!!!
WUUUMP!!!
It didn’t matter who or what they were—queen, tutor, guardsman, general, evil ex-princess, conniving former king, chessman, soldier, mercenary, or civilian. To WILMA, all were equal, all equally vulnerable to the upside-down mushroom cloud of energy she’d birthed, and for a time, the length of which would be forever unknown in the annals of Wonderland, it was as if life in the capital city had been wiped out.
CHAPTER 46
SHE WASbeautiful. She was powerful. WILMA was everything a despot could want in a weapon. If, in terms of destruction and body count, the annihilation she caused was not as massive as it might have been, the loss could still prove inconceivable…
Redd was among the first to revive. She found her scepter, which had been knocked loose from her grip, and stared groggily about. Her three-wheeler was nowhere to be seen. Her army—her niece’s too—lay scattered before her in various attitudes of unconsciousness.
A quarter of a block away, Arch and The Cat were gradually waking. Arch recognized the effects of WILMA but did
not understand what had happened. The effects were not as drastic as they would have been if Hatter had activated WILMA per his instructions. Still, the weapon could not have failed to operate upon the imaginatively gifted. Wasn’t Redd’s three-wheeler gone? Every one of her conjurings would have vanished. But precisely to what extent Redd had been affected, and for how long she would remain so, Arch didn’t know. He would have to bide his time, to watch and learn. He hadn’t become Boarderland’s king by being reckless. He would not ruin his chances to be king again by acting too hastily.
Approaching Redd, he said, “Alyss must have harnessed more power from the crystal.”
Redd snorted, dismissive. But a power that could flatten entire armies in one go? She sought Alyss in her imagination’s eye, but it was as if she’d been blinded and she saw only darkness. She had been feeling somewhat less tingly since she’d awakened…
She tried to conjure a transport, unable to summon so much as a wheel into existence. She tried for something smaller, simpler: a rose vine. No vine formed. She tried to conjure what even a talented child would have considered child’s play: a tarty tart. Again, she met with failure.
She was powerless. She had no imagination.
How could she face her niece without imagination? She would kill Alyss for doing this to her. A slow death. A torturous death. But not now. No, she first had to regain her former strength, again suffuse herself with power, and then…
Arch was watching her. She grimaced to hide her panic.
“Bring the doggerels!”
From her caravan of attendants, the dazed doggerel-keeper shuffled up with three packs of the dazed creatures.
“Heads ache, not quite awake,” the animals chanted, “let us alone and give us bones.”
“Shut up!” Redd said. “You are to sniff out Vollrath, Sacrenoir, Alistaire, Siren, and whoever is still alive among the tribal leaders. Tell them we’re returning to Boarderland. They are to consider today a practice run for the genuine attack we’ll soon make on this, my queendom. Now get.”
Their collars clicked open and the sixty doggerels trotted lazily off in various directions. Redd stomped over to a spirit-dane struggling to its feet. Not yet recovered from WILMA’s impact, the beast nearly buckled when Redd climbed onto its back.
The Cat transformed himself into a kitten and jumped up to sit in his mistress’ lap.
“Arch!” Redd aimed her scepter at him as if to strike a blow with her imagination.
Amused, Arch said, “Coming, Your Imperial Viciousness,” and hopped into the saddle behind her.
Spurred on, the spirit-dane loped toward Boarderland, carrying Redd and Arch into a future that could never accommodate both of them.
CHAPTER 47
THE REPORTS were identical to the ones received after the Crystal Continuum had been rendered useless. Conjurers were unable to conjure, writers unable to write, inventors unable to invent, musicians unable to play their instruments or compose. The sole difference between WILMA and Arch’s prototype lay in degree, scope. WILMA had left imaginationists throughout Wonderland without their abilities.
“If I myself hadn’t seen the Heart Crystal as dim as a volcanic rock,” Bibwit said, “I wouldn’t have thought it possible. Whatever else has happened, the universal imagination has been scrambled, and I pray this is merely a temporary problem, as it was in the continuum crisis. But I do grow paler than usual when I consider what might have occurred if Hatter had done Arch’s bidding and sewn the caterpillar thread over the city’s center.”
They were in Heart Palace’s war room—Bibwit, Alyss, General Doppelgänger, and Dodge. Waking from WILMA’s shock in the gobbygrape arbor, Dodge had found no evidence of The Cat. With Redd’s forces retreating, and with coaxing from Alyss, he had reluctantly come back to the palace.
“We’re lucky Redd thinks you still have imagination,” Bibwit said.
“Does she?” Alyss asked, watching Dodge.
“There’s no other reason for her to retreat.”
The general cleared his throat. “How long are Hatter Madigan and Homburg Molly to remain at Talon’s Point?”
“Long enough to grieve,” said Bibwit.
The force of WILMA had knocked Hatter off the mountain’s peak, but he had slowed his fall to the mouth of the cave by raking his crowbars down the rock. Inside the cave, he’d found Molly woozy but uninjured. He had climbed back to the summit and cut as many of the caterpillar threads as he could reach. The loose ends flapped and furled and the entire web had crackled into dust and been carried every which way by the wind. Weaver would be given a proper funeral. Hatter would mourn her death a second time, but at least now he would do it with his daughter.
In the war room, General Doppelgänger said, “Hatter has always exemplified devoted service, but Queen Alyss, he did disobey you. I can’t help wondering if he should not be subjected to the same tribunal that a Two Card would be.”
“Hatter expects punishment,” Alyss said. “He welcomes it. But the fact is, General, that if he hadn’t gone to Boarderland when I told him not to, Redd might at this moment be wearing Wonderland’s crown.”
The general bowed his head, satisfied, and consulted his crystal communicator. “Redd’s army isn’t retreating quietly,” he announced. “We’re still receiving reports of intermittent skirmishes. The good news is that we’ve captured enough Boarderland tribespeople to fill a smail-transport.”
Alyss nodded. She wanted to be alone with Dodge, to whisper in his ear, How strangely free I feel without my imagination. She’d been left with the chance to explore who she might be, unburdened by such a great gift. I want you to feel what I feel, Dodge. The Freedom.
Perhaps later they would discuss it. Yes, she’d confide in him as she would for the rest of her days. But right now, as if she still had the power of remote viewing, she looked off in the direction of Boarderland, to where she knew Redd was already plotting another attack, and she longed for a single, unified imagination, neither Black nor White.
