“Just walked off, did they?” I wasn’t quite sure that Sir Blanc wasn’t making fun of me.
“The Queen had been waiting for just such an occasion,” said Sir Blanc, his pleasant face darkening. “She swooped on them and took them away, and I’ve not seen them since.”
I thought about this for far too long, until it occurred to me to ask: “Hang on, if the Queen has them, why are you looking for them here?”
“I know not,” said Sir Blanc, even more sadly. “Forsooth, I’ve lost my wits! Alas the day! Once such a bright light in the rebellion!”
My eyes flew to his face. “What rebellion? The Queen came to the tea-party one day and– oh! Hatter and Hare! What rebellion, Sir Blanc?”
“It is gone with my wits,” said Sir Blanc simply. “Until I regain my wits, I wander the Chessboard Woods and serenade the trees with my sad ditties.”
“If the Queen has your wits, you won’t find them by wandering the woods,” I reminded him; but Sir Blanc wasn’t listening. He was warbling something mournful to the greenery around us, his moustaches drooping disconsolately. “Where are Hatter and Hare?” I asked, by way of trying to stop the wavering noise. “Can you take me to them?”
“I fear not, Mistress Mabel. My wits, having fled, have taken with them all useful knowledge of my former associates and occupations.”
“Maybe that’s why the Queen took them,” I said slowly. “When did your wits first go missing?”
“Five years ago,” he said. “Five long, weary years!”
A fizz of excitement went through me. “That’s when I came to Underland last! And the Queen was threatening Hatter and Hare. Maybe that’s how she knew about them. Sir Blanc, if I help you get your wits back, will you take me to Hatter and Hare?”
“It would be my pleasure, madam.”
“All right, then!” I said, pleased with myself. “Do you know how to get to the Queen’s Castle?”
“Every man knows the path to the Castle of Hearts. That he may escape again from thence is another matter.”
“Well, we will,” I said stoutly. I couldn’t see the red points of the Heart Castle from here in the woods, but the pall of it was still palpably felt. I had no intention of being trapped in it.
It took us a day and a half to get to the Heart Castle. We probably would have been faster walking, but Sir Blanc insisted on us riding his horse, which was so old and mournful that it seemed to take one step backwards for every two it took forwards, in a sort of a sad strathspey. I tried not to be irritated, because neither of them could really help it. Really, I could have made it to the Castle myself: it was immediately noticeable on the horizon when we got out of the Chessboard Woods. Unfortunately, Sir Blanc was too honourable to let me go by myself; particularly since I was helping him. I tried not to be irritated at that, too, but it was a bit harder: Sir Blanc may have been brave and kind, but he had no idea of how to be inconspicuous. It was partly his armour, which clanked and rattled more loudly than I’d thought possible; but he also had a habit of talking at the top of his lungs– or worse, when the dismals fell on him, softly wailing sad songs.
When we got to the Castle of Hearts, however, it became obvious that it would take a lot more than being inconspicuous to get in. Sir Blanc and I made it into the servants courtyard without anyone batting an eyelid, but once there it was clear that the only thing getting past the guards and into the Castle itself were recognised servants and a series of heavily weighed and loudly creaking metal carts. Each of them was guarded by a red knight who stood to attention on a metal footboard at the back of the carts, and each of them was pulled by a stocky little mechanical horse. I wondered at the mechanical horses until it occurred to me that real horses needed drivers, and there was no room on the carts for a driver. They seemed to be very precise in their movements, and no less precise in their timing: an outgoing cart met an incoming cart on the hour, every hour. I counted the minutes on my watch, which interested Sir Blanc greatly, looking around at the courtyard while we waited. It had been made into a storage ground for various stockpiles of supplies, from barrels of wine to crates of apples, and a lunch spot for a lot of very small, very grimy children. Sir Blanc and I lingered close to the apples and tried to think of a way past the guards. At least, I tried to think of a way past the guards while Sir Blanc became enthralled by my watch, which I had given him to distract him from his very loud determination to challenge the red knights to combat. When he was enthralled enough to have forgotten about the other knights, I stole one of the apples from the crates and sidled up to one of the kids.
Munching on my apple, I jerked my chin at the latest cart and said: “What’s that?”
“An ice cart.”
“Why’s it getting into the castle? They’re not letting anyone else in.”
“It’s for them ice vents in the castle: they keep the halls cool in the summer. The ice goes in the ice chamber and a bunch of vents splits off from there and runs through the castle so it all stays cool.”
“Oh, that’s clever,” I said, thinking of the air conditioning systems back in Australia. They were probably better at keeping places cool, but it wasn’t very likely that you could sneak in through the air conditioning. I was very much hoping that it would be possible to sneak through the ice vents. The only question was to get into the ice chamber itself. I was quite certain that wandering into the ice chamber with a knight would be even harder than sneaking into the castle with one. Unless...unless I didn’t try to sneak in with a white knight. Unless I tried to sneak in with a red knight.
Sir Blanc, for all his clanking and vagueness, proved to be very handy when it came to waylaying one of the carts and its attendant knight. Maybe the loss of his wits made him more prone to violence. We attacked it a street before it turned into the courtyard, and while Sir Blanc did most of the hard work, I was proud of the fact that it was I who unseated the red knight from his position with my school tie. Once he was on the cobbles in a stunned heap, it was Sir Blanc who removed his helmet and hit him once, very effectively, in the head. He also proved to be very good with knots, and had the red knight trussed and out of sight in an alley before the cart had a chance to turn into the courtyard.
While Sir Blanc settled himself on the moving cart, wrapped in the red knight’s cloak and wearing his helmet, I scrambled into the back, where I was simultaneously almost crushed and almost frozen by the massive block of ice it contained. From there it was simply a matter of listening anxiously to Sir Blanc’s short interaction with the castle guards, and excitedly to the sound of our progress echoing against the passage walls as we drove into the bowels of the castle.
We drove for a lot longer than I expected, making a curved descent that seemed to be never-ending and increasingly claustrophobic until, all at once, the noise of the cart again echoed loudly. Shortly after, the mechanical horse stopped, though the sound of its clopping remained while Sir Blanc descended from his perch and lifted me out of the cart.
“We’re in!” I said. I couldn’t quite believe it myself. I looked around us while the mechanical horse waited patiently for its load to be uncrated. The ice chamber was enormous, cold reflecting off the domed metallic surface. To my joy, the vents that dimpled it at regular intervals were large enough not only to fit my skinny body, but Sir Blanc’s much larger one. There were even ladders leading to the higher vents. Well, air vents must have to be cleaned and repaired occasionally, I supposed. The chill that surrounded us from the massive blocks of ice already unloaded was something fierce.
“Very well,” said Sir Blanc. “Where shall we begin, madam? I am entirely at your disposal.”
“The royal chambers, I suppose,” I said. “Where are they?”
“We must traverse two levels of underlings and utility chambers before we attain to the galleries and royal chambers.”
“All right,” I said, throwing another look around. “The higher vents, then.”
It hadn’t really occurred to me how horribly noisy
Sir Blanc would be when confined to a metallic vent. If he was noisy out in the open air, he was actually shattering in the metal vent system. It wasn’t easy getting him in the vent, either. And when I tried to warn him about the amount of noise, he looked reproachfully at me and said: “A knight and a nobleman does not creep into a fortress like a sneak-thief, Mistress Mabel. My honour much misgives me.”
“Your honour is helping a damsel in distress,” I told him crossly, and kept crawling. It was half true. “And my name is Mabel. Not mistress or madam.”
“Certainly, my dear child,” responded Sir Blanc, once more conveniently oblivious. Redirecting his thoughts wasn’t hard, but it was a little wearisome having to do it so often. “Shall we arrive soon, do you think?”
“Don’t know,” I panted. “Hold on, Sir Blanc: boost me up to this grating. I think I can see a grand hall.”
It was a grand hall, like something out of a fairy tale book. Red knights lined a hall of marbled white and scarlet, and a grating opposite me in my line of sight told me that if we continued straight ahead we would be going in the wrong direction. As we travelled toward the castle through a giant chessboard of different shades of green, Sir Blanc had told me that the Queen kept all her exotic curios in a small room at the centre of the castle, close to the royal chambers. He had been beamingly surprised when I suggested that it was possible she kept his wits there, too.
“Which way to the Queen’s curio room from the grand hall?” I hissed down at him.
“Onward and upward!” said Sir Blanc, by far too loud. I thought one of the red knights might have moved at the noise, but I didn’t stay to be sure. Instead, Sir Blanc and I continued onward and upward, taking each passage that led us higher until we came to an exceedingly tiny grate on the inward-facing side of the passage. I’d noticed that the grates usually had a counterpart on the opposite side of whichever room we found ourselves, but this grate had none. It was also by far the smallest grate we had yet seen. I couldn’t see through it at all until I realised that it was double-grated: there was another grate further in, at least an arms-length away. When I pried out the grating on my side I could see the marble bricks that formed the rectangular hole; and through that, a small piece of a plush, velvety sort of room that seemed to be almost entirely red.
“I think we found it!” I said, in an excited whisper. What I could see of the room was lined with glass-covered shelves, behind which were myriad tiny knick-knacks and oddities. In one corner I could see the contours of curving red wood that I could imagine were heart-shaped doors.
“What a shame we can’t fit through this grate! It must be the right one: she wouldn’t leave anything up to chance. What do you think we should do?”
Sir Blanc carefully let me down, and stared at the hole for a long, thoughtful moment.
“We must find a troupe of tiny people!” he said at last, his eyes bright. “We shall enlist their good services by representing to them the iniquity of the Heart Queen’s reign of terror.”
He looked so pleased with himself that I didn’t like to bring him down to earth. Well, for all I knew, Underland might be home to a troupe of tiny people. They weren’t here, though, and I didn’t much like our chances of getting back into the Heart Castle once we were safely out again.
“That’s a good plan,” I said, smiling at him. “But supposing we can’t find a troupe of tiny people in time? Maybe we can find another grating that’s close enough to sneak into the room without anyone seeing us.”
Sir Blanc gave me a sad, sweet smile. “It was a terrible plan, wasn’t it? My regrets, dear child: I am of no use to you.”
“That’s not true! I wouldn’t have been able to get in here without you! Who knocked out the guard, and tied him up? Who boosted me up into all these vents?”
Sir Blanc, after thinking about it, said in a pleased sort of a way: “’Twas myself, forsooth!”
“That’s right,” I said, descending from rhetoric to particulars to avoid confusing him: “And you stopped the red knight from killing me, too. Look, if we crawl up the right-hand vent, we can probably skirt around the side of it and sneak into the halls.”
“A knight does not sneak,” said Sir Blanc.
“Well, I’ll sneak. You just try not to clank.”
Music filtered into the vents the further we crawled. We were getting close, I knew.
“What do you see, child?” hissed Sir Blanc. He was still too loud, but at least he wasn’t clanking so much now. We were quickly approaching another grating, just as I thought we would. When I finally wriggled up to it, I found that it looked out on a small antechamber. It was a cool room for tray upon tray of tiny finger food and beautifully coloured bottles of wine. Unfortunately, even such a tiny room wasn’t unoccupied. Leaning against the doorway was a tall, thin figure with razor-sharp creases in his trousers and shiny red shoes with pointy toes. He was holding a champagne glass with something red and bubbly in it, but he wasn’t drinking: it seemed to be more of an elegant accessory. I’d seen him so often in windows and reflections that I recognised him straight away, even from behind.
I whispered to Sir Blanc: “Hang on. I might be able to get us some help.”
We were certainly in the right place: the wide doorway Jack was leaning into had heart-shaped mouldings that opened out at about waist height, and beyond that I could see the curve of red heart-shaped doors. Much to my joy, there were no card sharks in sight. Unfortunately, the lack of card sharks was probably due to the fact that the room beyond the antechamber was full of laughing, drinking guests. No one could get into that room without being seen by at least a dozen people. I couldn’t shout, either, or the guests would hear me. Whispering, on the other hand, wouldn’t draw Jack’s attention over the babble of conversation and the wail of the violin.
I settled for a piercing hiss. “Oi! Jack!”
One golden brow arched as Jack’s head turned. His black-flecked eyes searched the space behind him, flickering over red and white marble until they came to rest on the decorative grating that I crouched behind. Perhaps he was going to ignore me—or perhaps he hadn’t really figured out where the noise was coming from—because he turned back to the music room, his eyes running lazily over the room. At length, however, he turned around again, his eyes lingering on the other room, and sauntered casually toward me. He gave the clasp a quick, sharp kick with the heel of his shiny red shoes, his eyes never leaving the other room and his back never losing its arch.
In fact, the only acknowledgement he gave of my presence as I crawled out of the ice vent was to say: “Don’t get mud on my shoes, Mab!”
“They’re too shiny anyway,” I said disapprovingly.
“What are you doing, exactly?”
“I need your help.”
“Well, hello, how are you, and good to see you too!”
That threw me enough off balance to silence me for a moment. Then I said cautiously: “Hello. How are you?”
“More than slightly bored,” said Jack, his eyes still roving the room. “Thank you for asking. Mother Dearest has been called away briefly, so I’m hosting the most boring party Underland has ever seen. No, stay down there: if you get up they’ll be able to see your head above the mouldings.”
I settled my backside down in the shaft again and hugged my knees.
“I see you’re still grubbing about under tables and in– what is that, exactly?”
“These are the ice vents,” I said, surprised. “It’s how this place stays so cool. Didn’t you know?”
“Obviously not,” said Jack, a little stiffly. “Are you still keeping bad company?”
“I don’t keep bad company,” I told him, with equal stiffness. Something sharp prodded my backside, prompting me to squeak and tumble out of the vent, and Sir Blanc exited behind me, pointy helmet foremost.
Jack, his eyes very narrow, only said: “So I see.”
“Salutations, Emissary of the Red Heart!” said Sir Blanc, far too loudly. Jack winced, and my o
wn eyes flew to the main room.
“Sir Blanc, shhhh!”
“Evil must never be confronted in silence, dear child,” Sir Blanc said, in gentle reproof.
Jack became very still, radiating offense from every sharp edge. “What are you doing here, Mab?”
“We’re stealing back Sir Blanc’s wits,” I told him, wondering if I should apologise. “The Queen took them, and he needs them back for, for, well, he needs them back.”
“I see. And what do you want with me?”
“See that door?” I pointed to where the heart-shaped door of the Queen’s curio room could be seen over the curve of the moulding. “We need you to make a distraction so that we can get in there.”
“In these clothes?” Jack touched a slender hand to the blood-red ruby in his perfectly arranged cravat, his pale brows arched in polite disbelief. “Certainly not! Make your own distraction. As a matter of fact, if you wander into that crowd in those filthy rags, you’ll make as big of a distraction as you could hope for.”
“How about I step on your fancy red shoes?” I said. “Will that cause a distraction?”
Jack gave me a cold look but Sir Blanc shuffled forward in a series of dull clanks and patted me kindly on the head.
“Rail not, sweet child. We do not require this varlet’s services.”
“Oh, it’s varlet now, is it?” said Jack, eyeing Sir Blanc in dislike. “I can see you’ve been endearing yourself, Mab. He seems to think you’re some sort of a dog. Ow! Mab!”
“Keep talking,” I said grimly. “See what happens!”
Jack threw a swift look around, and then crouched beside me. “One day, Mab–!”
I stared at him stonily. “One day what?”
“Well, for starters, one day we’re going to be married, and I won’t have you grubbing about in ice-vents dressed like an undermaid.”
“We’re not going to be married!”
Jack sighed. “I know I explained it to you, Mab. I was nine, you were a toddler...blood, bonding ceremony, Mother Dearest?”
Playing Hearts Page 4
