Not wasting another minute idling about, Marchy headed for the throne room. Hatter would likely be there with his wife, visiting her sister, the Red Queen. That was a lengthy and complicated story he tried to forget because, well, he didn't care. He still had no idea how long he was expected to be a guest in the Red Kingdom before he returned home. When Melody wanted to visit her sister, Hatter followed. Which meant Marchy followed. The White Queen had tasked him with looking out for Hatter back when they were young, and he didn't quite trust Melody to do that on her own. She was a findling, after all, and still ignorant to this world, despite being here for a few years.
When the previous Red Queen had lived in the castle, the throne room had been devoid of much decoration. The black stones had been dark and imposing with a few items in red to give it color. Now, as he entered the massive space, he passed potted red roses along the walls, statues, and many more banners, the largest one displaying the new royal couple's coat of arms featuring a grinning Boojum, a tiny borogove, and fierce gryphon.
"Ah, Marchy, so nice of you to finally join us." The new queen had been standing next to her sister in the middle of the room, with both their husbands at their sides. She had a borogove on her shoulder, twitching its turquoise feathered tail. The little creature wore his favorite bicorn hat, sash and sword belt, and hopped to the ground toward him.
Hawthorn poked his head out of Marchy's pocket and chittered, running down his leg to join the other creature before they both took off under the nearest table. Probably plotting something. Those two were as thick as thieves whenever they got together, and it often boded ill for Devrel.
Speaking of…
"Where is that accursed feline today?" The Boojum looked like a cat with a grin, but he could be a nuisance of the utmost degree. A trickster through and through.
"Devrel is back at the cottage with Sunny and the kittens," Melody stated. "You're safe from him today but can't say for certain he won't pop in tomorrow during the festivities."
A masquerade ball was held every year to mark the anniversary of Queen Cadence and King Gareth's marriage. Devrel wouldn't miss it, being Gareth's closest of friends. Which meant he needed to keep an eye on Hawthorn and that feathery-arsed instigator before a war of trickery broke out between both parties. Some days, Marchy missed when Hawthorn had avoided Devrel completely. Simpler times, those.
Dreading the question he felt obligated to ask, he said, "Is there anything you need me to do to help prepare for the ball?"
Gareth grinned, and Marchy could only assume the man knew, whatever the answer, it would be met with disdain.
"I'm so glad you asked," Cadence said in an all-too-sweet tone of faux innocence. "Hatter was going to help, but he's modifying a few of my ladies' gowns for the ball. Would you mind assisting Gareth in clearing out some of Matilda's storage chambers? She was a bit of a hoarder, I'm afraid, and I'm sending things back to Adelaide to see if she wants them, or if they can cheer her up since she's been rather withdrawn lately. Or mayhap we can donate or have a royal auction. If you see anything there you want, let me know. If it's not for Adelaide, it's yours as payment."
He glared at Gareth who shrugged. "Of course, Your Majesty," Marchy drawled, "I would absolutely love to clean your clutter."
Cadence snorted and waved him off. "You're always so grumpy for someone who's not as sneaky with his conquests as he thinks he is. One day you'll actually be in a good mood after a tumble."
Though he'd gotten used to Cadence's forwardness, it never failed to surprise him. He checked over his shoulder to see if the five of them were alone.
Cadence laughed out loud. "Your secret is safe with me, Marchy. I won't force marriage on you if you really don't want it. No good comes from that."
"Well," he said and straightened his jacket in jerky movements as the skin on the back of his neck warmed considerably. "I thank you for your discretion." He turned to the king and added, "Shall we?"
Gareth nodded and the two of them headed off together to encounter whatever mess Matilda had left for them to find that Cadence couldn't be bothered to sort through in five years.
Chapter 2
April hesitated on the sidewalk outside the antique shop. She'd gotten very little sleep, thanks to thinking about her boss and the creepy mirror. Did the woman really believe she was from Wonderland? Had she finally reached the point in which her mind stopped coping with reality? Ms. Scarlet didn't look a day over thirty-five, but that didn't mean she wasn't older. The right beauty products and even plastic surgery could fool anyone.
Needing a paycheck, April decided to suck it up and go clock in for her shift. As she approached the door, her already present frown deepened. The sign in the window hadn't been flipped around to say the store was open. Advertising as being closed could have been turning customers away for the first hour of business. Ms. Scarlet would never close on a Sunday and lose the flow of tourists heading home after their weekend getaways.
She pulled on the handle, but the door didn't budge. With a frustrated huff, she dug her key out of her tattered, faux leather bag, yet before she could insert it into the lock, Ms. Scarlet appeared at the door. When she saw who it was, the woman's glower turned into a smile. Sugary sweet, and it creeped April out.
I should have called in sick.
The door opened, and April was gestured inside. "About time you decided to come to work." Ms. Scarlet locked the door behind them. The lights were off, except for those in the show room the mirror hung in, but not from the overhead fixtures. Candles lit both sides of the display. Red roses were scattered across the floor, with petals chaotically arranged like spilled blood.
"Um…" What could she possibly say about the sight before her other than it unnerved her more than it probably should?
Ms. Scarlet wore a long, red gown with flowing, draping sleeves that belonged in a medieval period piece. Her hair was down from her ponytail today, in sleek, raven waves. Her hair was straight normally. It looked nice this way, but if possible, the change made this even crazier.
"Well?" Ms. Scarlet's dark eyes twinkled with…anticipation?
"Well, what?" she asked.
Sighing dramatically, Ms. Scarlet grabbed her by the arm and led her to the back room. Letting her go, finally, so she could set her bag down and clock in. "You're lucky I brought cosmetics with me."
"Excuse me?" April whirled around and faced her. Where did this woman get off?
Ms. Scarlet held up a hand to silence her. "It's not an insult, but you'll want to look your best."
Her best for what? It dawned on her suddenly—that damned mirror again. "I never agreed to anything." Besides, it was all a bunch of crap. "I went home and researched the information you told me yesterday."
Smiling, Ms. Scarlet nodded. "I would be surprised if you hadn't. Noticed some inconsistencies, did you?" She turned on her heel and headed across the room to what looked like a candy-apple red cosmetic case, the caliber of which professional makeup artists used. It was three and a half feet tall and on wheels like luggage.
Jesus, does she think I need that much work? "As a matter of fact, I did," April replied. Ms. Scarlet had gone on later about Alice's age when she'd fallen through the rabbit hole and looking glass, and they didn't match the age that history documented her as being when the books were published. That was, of course, assuming that fictional Alice and the Alice the books were supposedly written for were in fact the same person, which was utter poppycock.
The other woman shrugged and opened the case, rummaging through various compartments and picking out a few things. She looked up and pointed at a stool. Well, if her boss wanted to pay her and give her a free makeover, she didn't see a huge problem with it, even though she wasn't sure why she needed one. Truthfully, she was still a little insulted by it.
"Well," April urged. "Don't you have an excuse for that?"
Ms. Scarlet chuckled. "Why would I need one? The girl acted like a spoiled brat who thought she was entitled to a que
enship just for being clever enough to return a second time. Nothing pleased me more than the day Wonderland expelled her for good. I threw a celebration that lasted months."
All April could do was gawk. "That was during the nineteenth century."
"Time in Wonderland moves differently." She waved a hand dismissively. "Sometimes slower, sometimes faster, sometimes backward, sometimes forward, and sometimes…just sometimes…sideways, but that's rare. There's no way to truly know when you will be tossed into it. It's been nine years since I was…displaced." The expression that crossed her features for a moment was pure rage, but then she smiled, and her face softened to the familiar one. The one of a woman who had welcomed her in and had been so kind to her through the years. This weirdness was something new, and that's why it was so alarming. "It could be a year later than I left, it could be a hundred. I don't think it will be that extreme, but Alice's return wasn't too far off in her age versus the rest of us at the time."
Even if that was true, which it couldn't be, the information was still contradictory. "How could there be record of the first book being written before she told him the story of what happened to her?"
The answer didn't come immediately, but the face primer, foundation and concealer did. A lot of concealer. Something that didn't do wonders for her self-confidence in the least.
"Charles Dodgson, eh…Lewis Carroll, was a writer, April. He wrote stories, and poetry, and enjoyed making up nonsense words and riddles. He already had material with no plot. Have you read the Alice books, dear? The first one especially had a lot of random scenes, though the second one had a more cohesive plot where Alice, the little twerp, is trying to become queen, mocks and disrespects the Red and White Queens—" She sniffed haughtily and squeezed a makeup sponge in her hand so hard her nails ripped into it. "I'd like to shake her until she turned into a bewildered kitten like that book said she did to me, that little ingrate."
Oooooookay. Someone clearly had some issues with the end of Through the Looking Glass, and it probably didn't help that she thought she was the actual Red Queen.
"Anyway," Ms. Scarlet said, pulling out an eyeshadow brush and dipping it in a silvery pigment. "He'd already had some nonsensical scenes written and was so taken by the fantastical stories that he revised and connected them together. Wonderland is magical, oftentimes dangerous or odd, and it is vastly different from this world, that is true, but if you go there expecting total nonsense and buffoonery, you will be sorely disappointed. Lewis Carroll's Wonderland is a story, a fairytale of his making, based on the ramblings of a child he had an inappropriate fascination with. The real place," she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply as though she was smelling the air in this imaginary world. "There's nowhere else like it."
The rest of the makeup was applied in total silence. When Ms. Scarlet was done, she held up a hand mirror to show off her work. April took the offering and gawked. Her boss was secretly a master at cosmetology. Aside from the darker than usual eye makeup and red lipstick that brought out the copper in her mahogany-colored hair, she looked pretty much like herself still and not like a complete stranger.
"Are you sure you don't want to change clothes? I have an extra dress."
Makeup was one thing. Playing dress-up at work was another. "I hate dresses."
Ms. Scarlet threw back her head and laughed. "How I wish I could see the Hatter's face when you insult his talents. I knew I chose the perfect findling."
April set the mirror down in a slow, calculated movement so she didn't clench her fists. "What did you call me?" What did that even mean? Findling? Like…she picked her up off the street all finders-keepers or something?
"Nothing bad, if that is what you're thinking." She stood. "Your hair looks decent enough. You should wear it down more often. It has such pretty waves." Yeah, and she should probably smile more too, right?
"Um, thanks? But I'm not going to Wonderland." The idea had her fighting a laugh. Would her boss smash her into the mirror? What happened when April didn't disappear into it?
Ms. Scarlet put her hands on her hips and arched a brow. She looked regal when she did that. It was unsettling how much she looked like a fabled Red Queen. "And why not?"
"I gave up on fantasies and fairytales when I spent years in an orphanage before a foster family was kind enough to take me in." And they were rewarded for it by getting hit by a drunk semitruck driver and dying instantly in the crash. They had been on their way to sign the adoption papers to surprise her. The sadness had never left her. They had been decent people, and they had wanted her to be their daughter. Something her real parents hadn't wanted. She'd never known them.
"And that is why you are the perfect findling."
There was that word again.
"Come on, April. Live a little. If I am full of shit, you can laugh about it and still get paid for the trouble. But if I'm not…" Ms. Scarlet clutched her by the shoulders and shook her. "If I'm not, you could have adventure, romance, whatever you dream!"
"I suppose…" Romance though, really? With whom, the Mad Hatter?
She allowed her boss to drag her into the display room with the candles and roses. April saw herself and her made-up face, hair cascading over her shoulders, ripped jeans, dingy sneakers, and a charcoal gray T-shirt that had been washed perhaps one too many times. Truth be told, she'd always felt a little out of place, and not because of all the misfortune and the loner vibe she put off. Once upon a time, she'd longed for adventure, romance, and fantasy. But those days were over when the only good thing to happen to her was taken away from her in an instant.
"Don't you dare cry and smudge my hard work." Ms. Scarlet smacked her on the arm. It stung. "I don't want you to be alarmed, but this will require a teeny tiny blood exchange."
April met her gaze in the mirror, her expression totally sincere. Spinning around, she glared at her, face to face. "Excuse me?" And that hadn't even been the craziest thing she'd said all day.
"I cut your palm and then mine, we clasp hands and then touch the mirror. Looking glasses don't work for anyone; otherwise, everyone would make it through, and the secret ability of this mirror wouldn't be so secret, now would it? Since I used to reside there, my blood combined with yours will tell it to take you there in order to test you."
There was a test now? No one told her there would be a test!
Wait… Why was she even stressing about it when it was completely bogus?
But April wasn't given a chance to argue. Ms. Scarlet picked up a sinister, golden dagger with rubies in the hilt she'd hidden under a hand towel, and then she grabbed April's hand. "If you struggle, it will cut deeper than intended," she said through gritted teeth, trying to keep a steady grip on both her hand and the dagger. She nicked her left palm, close to her thumb. Letting April go, she did the same to her own and tossed the dagger aside as though it was trash and not a priceless antique.
Cradling her wound in one hand she shook her head. "You've lost your mind."
Ms. Scarlet laughed, lacking humor. "Hardly. Give me your hand."
"No." She turned her body away as the woman grabbed at her.
"Now, girl!"
Something about the authoritative tone made her acquiesce. Cautiously, she offered the wounded hand. The cut had only been a small surface scratch, but throbbed as though it had been sliced to the bone. Blood flowed freely from it.
Her wound was pressed against Ms. Scarlet's, who apparently didn't care how unsanitary it was. April hoped her boss didn't harbor any diseases. Considering the situation, it wouldn't be surprising if she was sick mentally.
"Together, place our blooded hands unto the glass."
Nodding, April stepped up to the mirror with the woman and swallowed hard. The glass was misty, almost like smoke had risen behind the surface. Goosebumps broke out across her flesh. She placed her palm upon the glass at the same time as her boss.
The solid surface grew icy, so cold it burned, and then everything vanished. Poof. A smoky dark void opened beneat
h her palm, and before she could react, Ms. Scarlet shoved her into it.
Chapter 3
Marchy stared at the pile of things deposited in wooden crates and on tables, and turned toward Gareth. "Aren't you king? Can't you find someone to do this who's dying to please you?" Sure, he spent an absurd amount of time tidying up for Hatter, but that didn't mean he wanted to be the royal servant, cleaning up their lost rubbish. Hatter was like a brother to him, and he was paid for his work there.
"You're not dying to please me?" Gareth mocked and brushed a hand through his shoulder-length blond hair, regarding the scene with as much reluctance as Marchy felt. "I don't know. I'm pretty sure I can call that treason."
With a snort, Marchy ran a finger through a significantly thick layer of dust on top of a wooden box and sneered at the gray smudge that came off upon his fingertip. "Not treason. Just rebellion." He wiped the offending substance on his trouser leg.
"Rebellion oft leads to treason."
This topic was leading him to covet both. His patience only went so far these days, though he could cool down quick enough. If he could just pinpoint the source of his discontent. "Do shut up, won't you?"
Gareth laughed, the smile lighting up his golden features and silvery eyes. "Did you learn that phrase from Melody or Cadence?"
Marchy frowned. The last thing he needed to do was to pick up the phrases a couple of meddlesome findlings uttered consistently. Melody was always in his face, wanting to help him do his job, wanting to set him up with some woman she befriended at court, wanting to pet Hawthorn, who—speaking of traitors—liked her. The bright side of it was, with her position in the White Kingdom as the queen's advisor, she took a lot of trips away from home. So he did get some peace. Some.
"I miss things the way they were. Hatter and I didn't need anyone else." It was selfish of him to wish his friend's loneliness back on him. Melody eased the madness in a man who'd been quickly succumbing to bouts of rhyming and riddling. Sometimes he still did, but it happened far less often. The woman was a godsend, but that didn't mean Marchy had to like her. Appreciate her, aye. Like her, no.
The Enchanting Page 2
