Unhinged

by A. G. Howard

  Jeb’s deadweight arms are awkward and difficult to thread through the jacket’s long sleeves. It’s unsettling to see him immobile. He has such a strong, active body and is a master at everything he uses it for—riding his Honda, skateboarding, painting, rock climbing, or even making me feel … amazing. Seeing him so vulnerable reminds me of the danger he faced in Wonderland last summer, and what lies ahead for both of us now that I’ve brought him into this again.

  I try to move fast. He’s broader through the shoulders than Morpheus, but the wing openings allow enough give that I can still button the jacket just below his sternum. I skim my fingers through the hair on his chest, wishing I could talk to him.

  “If only you could hear me,” I whisper, more to myself than Jeb. “If I could make you understand how sorry I am.”

  Morpheus taps a foot beside my thigh. “I suppose now might be the time to tell you I could arrange for him to be awake in a dream state that would keep his conscious pain at bay.”

  My jaw drops and I look up at him. “What? He could’ve been awake this whole time and not been miserable? What’s wrong with you?”

  Morpheus purses his lips. “Hmm. Have Jebediah mooning over you in a half-awake dream state, or have him unconscious and drooling. What do they call that here? A no-brainer.”

  I clench my teeth. “Morpheus! I swear, you are the biggest—”

  “Tut.” He rolls up the cuffs on his black dress shirt. “Don’t say anything I’ll make you sorry for. In all honesty, I’ve rather had my fill of your nagging for a bit. I could use a distraction.”

  “The feeling is beyond mutual.” I scowl at him.

  Smug, Morpheus waves glowing blue fingers across Jeb’s forehead. “Dreamer awake, but stay undone; your thoughts are but shadows eclipsed by the sun.”

  Jeb grumbles but doesn’t wake.

  “It will take a few minutes to kick in,” Morpheus says, then wanders off to examine Persephone’s personal shrine to the 1990s movie The Crow. He stares into the eyes of the life-size cutout of Brandon Lee as if staring in the mirror.

  “Let me find something to wear, and we’ll go,” I call over to him.

  “You should hurry. Once Jebediah wakes, his dream state will be temporary. Reality will start seeping into his psyche, so we’re on borrowed time.”

  “Okay,” I answer.

  Morpheus returns to his appraisal of Brandon Lee. “Not bad. If he only had wings.”

  I shake my head dismissively, then make my way to the racks filled with funky and gothic clothes waiting to be wheeled out to the main floor. Persephone’s collection of window-dressing props adds a creepy air: a skeleton with only one leg occupies a busted antique chair, bony arms crossed over its chest like it’s a crypt-keeper; a roll of canvas for backdrops; a trunk filled with shattered masquerade masks and threadbare costumes; Styrofoam wig heads sporting an assortment of wig colors and styles; and some electrical items including more strings of lights and a miniature smoke machine.

  I stop at a rack of damaged merchandise. Not my first choice for a trip to London, but since Persephone will be throwing most of them away after writing them off on her taxes, it’s the best choice, so I don’t feel like I’m stealing.

  I find a three-quarter-sleeve minidress of stretchy purple velvet, with fitted bodice and flared skirt. Turquoise lace trims the cuffs and hem. It hits at my thighs, the perfect size for a tunic to go over my ripped jeans. There’s a tear in the left shoulder seam. I unravel it further until the slit will accommodate my wing and then tear the other shoulder on the right side to match.

  After tossing a quick look at Jeb, I duck into the tiny bathroom off to the left, close the door, and set my backpack on the floor. I loosen my belt, and the drop cloth slips away, so I’m standing there in only my bra, jeans, and boots. Cold air rushes over me from a vent above the sink. The tiny fluorescent light barely illuminates the room and wreaks havoc with my reflection.

  I skim my fingers through my tangles, shocked at how wild I look.

  I’m every bit a netherling: eye patches, unruly, wavy hair that appears to move as if alive, and a sheen of glitter on my skin.

  Most awe-inspiring of all is how my wings rise behind me, shimmery and frosted—a haze of jewels and gossamer.

  Last year, I stood here, terrified of becoming who I thought my mom was—a crazed woman, bound in a straitjacket and occupying a padded cell. Now here I am, a completely different person than I was: half netherling, half human, but still wholly confused.

  Who am I, really? Powerful but broken, like my mother? Or am I something more? A queen destined to rule Wonderland with the most enigmatic and frustrating of all netherlings at my side, to have a son who will in some warped way be a gift to that mad world?

  I can’t. Not yet. I snap my gaze to my boots. No more staring in the mirror. No more conjecturing. It’s overwhelming, even terrifying, to know my life has already changed so much. I can’t imagine it changing so drastically again.

  I need to be reminded of what’s normal. What’s safe. And Jeb represents all of that. I need to fix him, to get back to real life. A life with no more secrets between us.

  Dressing myself with wings proves a challenge, but the stretchy fabric helps. When I finally step again into the storeroom, Jeb’s standing against the wall wearing a confused expression, though he doesn’t appear afraid or in pain.

  My heart gives a little jump to see him awake and alert, even if it’s in a dream state.

  Morpheus is missing, and The Crow display looks different. I try to place what’s changed, but a shuffling sound in the shop’s main room distracts me. I assume that’s where Morpheus went, probably to check out the mirrors on the walls. I should make sure he isn’t seen by any passersby through the front windows, but I’m so thrilled to finally have a chance to talk to Jeb, I can’t bring myself to leave yet. It was yesterday afternoon when we last had a lucid conversation, but it seems like forever ago.

  “Jeb.”

  He jerks to attention as he notices me. The black blazer fits him even better when he’s standing, pulling open across the front to display more of his chest. The fabric glides down the thighs of his jeans. He pushes off the wall, studying me like I’m a painting. I shiver under his appraisal—not sure how to react after our earlier encounter. I know he won’t hurt me, but …

  He walks over, cautious, as if I’m a shy animal that might spook easily. Or maybe it’s him that could be spooked.

  I stand my ground. I’ll have to camouflage my wings and eye patches somehow before we go to London, but I don’t want to hide them from Jeb. Not anymore.

  I flinch as he reaches toward my neck.

  “Al?”

  I melt. There’s nothing but the gentleness and love I’ve come to expect in his voice. No murderous intent or crazed edge to his gaze. I tackle-hug him, just like I wanted to the instant he showed up at the cottage.

  He stumbles backward two steps, but his sturdiness prevails. He steadies me and returns the embrace, hands searching for a place on my back that isn’t blocked by my wings.

  “This is different,” he whispers, yet he doesn’t sound disturbed or freaked out. “Of all the times I’ve had this dream, we were never in the storeroom.”

  I draw back and study him, smiling. Morpheus wasn’t kidding when he said he’d be in a dreamlike state.

  He returns my smile, and his labret sparkles. Even in the dimness, I can see the red welts on his chin from the rabbit’s claws.

  “I’m so sorry.” I stroke the raised lines with a fingertip, though I’m talking about so much more than his physical condition. “Does it hurt?”

  He lets me fuss over him all of a nanosecond before pulling the macho act. “Nothing ever hurts when I’m with my fairy skater girl.” His gaze doesn’t leave mine as he grabs my hips and drags me close so there’s no space between us. “You know I love you like this.” He skims my eye patches with a fingertip, his breath hot on my face.

  The confession is beautifu
l, but I wonder if he’ll feel the same when he’s no longer in a trance.

  “I’m ready,” he says. There’s a sweet insistence in the words that makes my throat dry. He’s a toned-down version of the starving artist I faced before, and I’m once again the center of his world.

  “Ready for what?” I ask.

  “For you to wrap me in your wings,” he answers, voice gruff. “And for me to show you how to fly without ever leaving the ground.”

  He nuzzles my neck, and a blush heats my skin. A quiver of pleasure surges through me, from my toes to my wing tips, but I push him to arm’s length, hands wrapped in his lapels. Morpheus said this dream state is temporary. We have to hurry.

  “Listen, Jeb. This dream is different. There’s about to be a lot of weirdness.” I inch backward toward the entrance to the main floor where Morpheus is so we can go.

  Jeb follows me, head cocked, a provocative intensity in his eyes. “Bet I can handle anything you throw at me.”

  “Wouldn’t be so sure if I were ye, dream-boy.” A woman’s murmur comes from outside the door, dry and husky, like leaves scraping tombstones.

  There’s a whoosh behind me, and I spin at the threshold. All I can see is web.

  Sister Two.

  I nearly choke on the pulse battering at the base of my throat.

  Gossamer filaments shroud the entire main room—shadowy strands strung from ceiling to floor. It’s like looking inside an albino pumpkin before the membranes are scraped clean. The web coats clothes racks and the checkout desk, even the display window, cutting off the daylight. The result is an eerie, misty gray light, as if storm clouds have settled outside. I squint, unable to pinpoint where the spidery grave keeper’s voice originated.

  “Morpheus!” I shout.

  No answer.

  “Who are you yelling at?” Jeb comes up behind me and touches my wing. A tingling sensation pulses through me.

  I turn and shove him toward the bathroom. “You’re in danger. She can’t find you.” I push him inside. He stumbles over my backpack but regains his footing.

  Questions fill his eyes as I slam the door between us.

  “Hey! Let me out! Al!”

  I hold the knob tight and look around the room, and pausing on Persephone’s prop skeleton. Taking a breath to calm myself, I coax him to move as if he were a marionette who requires no strings.

  Creaking and rattling, he hops over on his one foot and sags beside me, awaiting my command.

  We trade places, his bony fingers holding the knob as I look around dumbly.

  “Don’t let him out or let anyone in but me,” I tell him over my shoulder, not even sure the bag-of-bones understands. I’m still getting used to this magic stuff.

  Jeb’s door pounding grows louder.

  I gulp down my fear and step again into the main room, stopping short of a drapery of webs.

  “Welcome to my parlor, said the spider to the fly.” The whisper smells of fresh-dug dirt and is cold against my ear. My soul shrinks.

  I look up. Sister Two hangs upside down overhead. She hisses, and I retreat, my breath rapid and uneven.

  She’s not even trying to hide her gruesome form under a dress. Her top half is a woman—lavender lips, translucent face all bloody and scarred, a curtain of silvery gray hair hanging almost to my nose. Her bottom half—a black widow’s abdomen the size of a beanbag chair that could seat six people—balances on a strand of web connecting the ceiling to her spinnerets. Eight shiny spider legs curl around it, strangely graceful, like some grotesque circus acrobat dangling from a rope.

  Snip, snip, snip. The sound is my only warning. I duck out of the way as her scissor hand slices the air inches from my face.

  I dive to the floor and crawl behind the checkout counter, staying low to avoid dangling webbing.

  “Morpheus!” Fear ices through me. “Where are you?”

  “He won’t be answering, little fly.” Sister Two scurries down the wall behind me, the clawed, pointed tips of her legs tapping like raindrops. “He left ye, like the coward he be. It’s jest the three of us, here to settle yer mother’s debt.”

  Her head tips toward the storeroom, where Jeb is still knocking and shouting.

  “You’re lying,” I say, trying to ground her attention on me again. “Morpheus wouldn’t leave me.”

  “I found him in the other room. He shrank to the moth, and I chased him here.” She lifts her normal hand, the one encased in a rubber glove, and waves it. “Then, poof. He doesn’t be here anymore, does he? He found a way out. Too bad for ye.”

  I scramble backward from behind the counter, gaze locked on her gray-blue eyes, daring her to follow. I have to get her as far from the storeroom as possible, have to keep her focused on me as her prey. That’s the only way she’ll forget Jeb.

  She scurries after me. I trip over the edge of a rack. While trying to right myself, one wing catches in a sticky web. I’m stuck. My heart thuds against my sternum.

  Sister Two grows taller, her jointed, sticklike legs stretching up in one smooth motion. She leans over until we’re nose to nose.

  I won’t let my panic get the best of me. If I’m going to keep Jeb alive, I have to stay the center of her attention.

  “Why are you here? What debt does my mom owe you?” I ask, remembering how the same question was sidestepped by Ivory and Morpheus at the studio. I’m ready for answers.

  “Aw, curious now, are ye?” Drawing back, she laughs—like a rusted screen door swinging on its hinges. Strands of hair hang over her eyes, and she brushes them aside with her garden-shear hand. Blood drizzles from a freshly made cut, but she doesn’t seem to notice.

  “I should’ve killed her when I had the chance, and then ye wouldn’t have been born to steal the smile or release Red’s sprit. Like mother, like daughter. Though her thievery was more egregious than yours. She took the boy with the dreams.”

  The boy with the dreams?

  Gossamer said something about dreams when explaining the wraiths and borogoves—that they balance each other.

  “The borogoves?” I ask. “You use them in the cemetery to soothe angry spirits.”

  “Aye. Dreams don’t be a renewable resource, mind. And as our kind can’t dream, we steal humanlings, those young enough to still have an imagination. They provide the protection for the rabbit hole, and peace for me garden.”

  My stomach drops. “You steal human children? You kidnap them?”

  Sister Two’s eyes narrow. “Is that disdain I smell on yer breath, child? Yer mother was so like ye, disrespected the way things had to be. Rules are there for a reason. For the survival of our world, some have to suffer in yers. And vice versa, aye?”

  I’m too stunned to respond. I want to love Wonderland with all my heart, but how can I love a place that takes children from their homes?

  “There have been other humanlings since that boy,” Sister Two continues, her bloody face euphoric. “But he was different. Even as he aged, his dreams were magnificent. The ten years he was mine, I had such tranquility among me wards.” She works off her glove, using her teeth. The rubber sheath pops off, exposing scorpion tails in place of fingers and stingers in place of nails.

  I suppress a gag.

  My mind races for some way to keep her talking. “Who was this boy?” Although, in some private, horrified corner of my soul, I’m starting to think I already know.

  Curling and uncurling her venomous fingertips, Sister Two bows over me. “What difference does a name make? He’s long gone now. Ye can die without that answer, just as I’ve lived without it. All ye need is the knowledge that I’ll take yer mortal knight to be our new dreamer. He has an artist’s mind. I’ve seen his work. He’ll give me spirits many years of peace and entertainment.”

  “No, please. Don’t hurt Jeb …” I try to break free of the web, but it only tightens around my wing. Cold panic sluices through my blood, making me shiver.

  “Aw. Don’t ye worry, little fly, he’ll never know he’s suffe
ring.” Sister Two’s palm rakes my face. I grip her wrist and wrestle her, but those eight legs give her a better center of gravity.

  “Back off!” I snarl through gritted teeth, mind shifting into netherling mode. I remember her blind spot and silently call my skeleton marionette in from the storeroom to attack her from behind. “I won’t let you have Jeb without a fight.” I wince as a stinger presses my cheek, about to break the skin. Poison wells from the tip and drizzles down my face.

  “I be counting on that, devil-bug,” Sister Two says. “I like me food to have some bite.”

  “You want bite?” Morpheus’s voice interrupts from somewhere on the other side of the room, breaking my concentration. Bones rattle in the storeroom as my skeletal puppet falls limp. “Take me in her stead.”

  My heart soars … only to seize again when I realize what he’s just offered. I can barely make out his silhouette through the webs, standing in front of the display window: his body, his wings.

  “Morpheusssss.” Sister Two shoves me backward, unintentionally freeing my wing of its trap. I swipe the poison from my face and regain my balance.

  Morpheus’s wings flap slowly and cautiously. “Right here, my lovely wretch. I was feeling neglected. You were aiming all that beautiful fury at the wrong insect. After all, I’m as responsible as Alison for stealing the boy. You must know that by now.”

  Hissing, she scuttles toward Morpheus.

  “Alyssa,” Morpheus says, unmoving from his position, “you have a trip to take. Everything you’ll need is in my jacket.”

  Wait … that was why he insisted I put the jacket on Jeb, so I'd have the tickets if we got separated. It had nothing to do with Jeb’s bloodstained shirt. He thinks I’m going on the train without him.

  “No,” I insist. “Not without you.”

  “Would you sacrifice the mortal you love for the netherling you hate?” he asks, and the conviction in his voice hurts as bad as a blow. I don’t know what’s more excruciating, the fact that I’ve told him I hate him enough times to make him believe it or that I’m starting to realize how far it is from the truth.