Splintered (20 page)

The famous Lewis Carroll scene passes through my mind—the card guards painting the roses red in the garden to keep from being beheaded. How ironic, that in
this
Wonderland, someone could
lose
their head forever by painting the roses upon this box.
“So Morpheus wasn’t completely honest,” I say. “There’s another way to free her and open the portal. It’s not just up to the person who put her there.” Jeb is standing behind my reflection, his expression smug. I can almost hear the “I told you so” emanating through his eyes.
“It isn’t such an easy decision,” Gossamer scolds, then lifts off my shoulder, wings buzzing. “Once the trade is made, no one can ever free the replacement soul. The blood makes the seal permanent, eternally.
One trade of souls will shut the door, and blood shall seal it, evermore
.”
“So, what you’re saying”—Jeb steps up—“is that it has to be an unselfish love. Which Morpheus is incapable of giving. He lacks that kind of courage.”
Gossamer flaps her wings in midair, arms crossed over her chest. “My master has a great capacity for courage. He saved my life once.” She glances at the hall’s entrance and back again. “No one knows what he or she is capable of until things are at their darkest. That is why the key to opening the box is the essence of the heart. Therein lies the world’s most potent power.” Her cryptic words hang in the air.
She ducks beneath the table and drags out my dad’s army knife, leaving it by Jeb’s foot. He tucks the weapon into his pocket. I want to ask what the sprite means about a heart’s essence, about the dark. I want to ask how Morpheus and the solitary netherlings are faring downstairs. But my tongue is tied up in the jabberlock poem and Jeb’s reaction to my questions.
Gossamer has us face one of the mirrors, and she touches the glass with a fingertip. The moth spirits vanish from the in-between plane, flying into other mirrors along the walls.
Palm splayed over the reflective surface, the sprite initiates that same splintering effect I saw in the cheval glass in my bedroom. A long table filled with pastries and teacups appears in the mirror, sitting under a tree in front of a country cottage that’s shaped like a rabbit’s head—complete with chimneys for ears and a fur-thatched roof. It looks as if the sun has overpowered the moon this time, because daylight shimmers on the surroundings. With a key almost the size of her forearm, Gossamer unlocks the portal, smoothing the glass.
Pounding footsteps echo from the adjoining hall. The fight has made its way here.
“Just go!” Gossamer prompts.
Jeb won’t even look at me as he lifts the backpack onto his shoulder, his complexion almost as green as Gossamer’s. I leap through the mirror, more desperate to escape my hurt and confusion than anything Rabid White and the Red army could unleash.

Before I can explore the table I’m standing upon, something crashes into me from behind. I trip face-first into a pie filled with succulent purple berries.

“Al . . . I’m sorry.” Jeb lifts me by my elbows, pulling my shoulder blades into his chest. “You okay?”
I refuse to answer on the grounds that he didn’t specify physically or emotionally. With his help, I regain my footing between a plate of buttered bread and a bowl of candied violets. Some of the pie filling coats my mouth.
I lick it from my lips, then flap my fingertips, trying to get the sticky stuff off.
From our end of the table, the landscape we saw refracted in the mirror is in full view. The bunny-shaped cottage sits on a hill—a green and lush oasis smack in the midst of a desert. Sand dunes in the distance look like a chessboard—squares of black and white like the ones I’m always tripping over in my nightmare. I yearn for a canvas and raw materials so I can capture the warped vista forever.
A temperate breeze sways my braids, birds twitter in a mulberry tree overhead, and sunlight warms my shoulders. It reminds me so much of Pleasance that a wave of homesickness crashes over me. I wish I could talk to Dad; even more, I wish I could hug him.
It’s Saturday. At least I think it is. If I were home, Dad would be grilling steaks. I’d fix a fruit salad, because it’s my job to see that he eats well-balanced meals.
What if I can’t pull this off and get back home? Alison will blame herself forever and plunge into the deep end for real. Shock treatments will make her worse. Then Dad will be sitting alone in the kitchen eating cold cereal with nothing but his grief to keep him company. And then there’s Jeb’s mom and Jenara. His job at Underland helps pay the monthly bills. They rely on him. What will they do without him?
If I screw this up, I screw it up for everybody.
Jeb—still behind me—offers a napkin. I wipe my face and mumble, “Why didn’t you land at the other end of the table?”
“It was occupied.” Jeb turns me around.
I nearly choke at the sight of the tea party guests—Herman Hattington, March Hairless, and Door Mouse—all seated at the far corner and frozen solid beneath thick, glittering sheets of bluish gray ice.
“Mothra has a twisted definition of
asleep
,” Jeb says.
Morpheus has a twisted definition of everything
. Shaking my head, I start toward them. As I step over the teapot’s spout, steam licks my calf, dampening my leggings. Hattington and his crew are suspended like glaciers, but the food looks fresh and the tea’s still hot.
“Where’s that pepper?” I hold out my hand. It’s awkward playing at teamwork. My family’s been in upheaval mode since I can remember, but at least over the last few years, I’ve had Jeb’s friendship to count on. Now it’s hanging by some weird emotional thread; I don’t know whether to believe him or Morpheus. It was easier to be mad up in the real world, when I knew for sure that he’d chosen Taelor.
Jeb digs the bag from his pocket. I loosen the ribbon while breathing through my mouth. I won’t chance inhaling any of it. Just the faded scent of the pepper on the fans and gloves was enough to make me almost sneeze.
Sneeze
. . .
That must be what Morpheus intended with this little bag of spice.
“You’re not going to waste it on trying to make the hat guy sneeze, are you?” Jeb asks. “He’s an ice sculpture. There’s not even an opening where his nostrils should be. And there’s only enough pepper for one dose. We have to be sure.”
It’s uncanny how well he reads me at times, yet is so oblivious at others.
Tying the bag shut, I hand it back. He’s right. We’ll never be able to wake Hattington with pepper. He doesn’t even
have
a nose. I edge closer. He’s holding up a cup of steaming tea, as if he was in the middle of punctuating a point with it.
“Jeb, something’s not right with his face. It’s just a blank space of nothing.” The glittery, bluish gray void reflects my likeness, more unsettling than a stranger’s frozen snarl would be.
“Maybe the ice is so thick, it covers his features,” Jeb tries to reason.
“I don’t know. But check out that hat.” It could be a medieval torture device—part top hat/part cage—made of metal pins with a hinged flap at the crown that’s open like a lid. On second glance, the metal’s actually growing out of his head like bones. The cage pokes through holes in his flesh, just like the chess piece in Morpheus’s room.
“A conformateur,” Jeb says, his voice tense. “He’s got a conformateur sprouting out of his head.”
Most people wouldn’t know about a nineteenth-century tool used for customizing hats to fit specific head shapes, but Jenara has one in her room. Persephone ran across it at an estate sale once and, knowing Jen’s love for anything fashion related, bid low on it and just happened to win because no one there knew the value of the artifact.
The ribbed metal frame molds around a customer’s head where a hat brim would sit, and the pins conform to the ridges and bumps of the skull. An oval of cardboard is inserted into the hinged lid and pressed into place at the crown, causing the pins to punch holes in the shape of the head. It forms a pattern the hatmaker can use to custom-fit a hat to that individual.
Why this one is physically attached to Herman’s skull is beyond me, and I don’t even want to imagine how he uses it in his craft.
I force my attention from his reflective face and turn to the “hare,” who is twelve kinds of hideous. Mostly because he seems to be turned inside out—no fur, only gaunt flesh. It’s like looking at a skinned rabbit. But at least he has a face. His expression is demented, with a wild glint in his white eyes. A teacup balances atop a pastry on his plate. His paw is tucked into the cup from his wrist down, as if he’s dunking something.
Of the three guests, the mouse is the only one that looks normal. If a mouse wearing a doorman’s jacket could be considered normal.
“I don’t know how to solve this,” I say. “They’re all frozen, so how do we make them all sneeze with one dash of pepper?”
Jeb shakes his head. “Let’s look at the book.” He wades through place settings and steps from the table to an empty chair. Pushing aside a rickety, three-tiered tea wagon, he drops to the grass. “Come here,” he says, urging me to take his hand as he sits at the table and settles the backpack next to him.
I let him help me down but pull free the instant my feet hit the ground. Blotting the remaining berry juice off my face with a cloth napkin, I check my clothes to make sure they’re clean. “I’m hungry.” An understatement. I’m famished. And I can’t remember the last time I ate something.
“Well, we shouldn’t eat this stuff.” Jeb gestures to the tea party spread. “Who knows what it might do to us?” He finds an energy bar in the backpack and hands me half. He motions to an empty chair next his. Instead, I take another one two places down. He stares hard at me while we eat; the only sounds are the rattling wrapper, the birds, and the breeze.
Avoiding his gaze, I count the peach and gray stripes in my leggings. My legs are starting to remind me of peppermint sticks. Tasty, curvy peppermint sticks.
My mouth waters.
What’s wrong with me? I need to be helping Jeb figure things out, but all I can think of is food.
After I wolf down the last of my bar, the hunger still hasn’t abated. I remember how good that purple stuff tasted and wish I’d never fallen into that pie to begin with.
On the other hand, it must’ve been hilarious to watch. I picture myself tumbling into the pastry and snicker out loud.
“What’s so funny?” Jeb asks. He has the
Wonderland
novel open on his lap and drops the last of his snack into his mouth.
“Nothing.” Another bout of giggles tickles me. This wave is so strong, I bite my inner cheeks to keep from giving in.
Oblivious, Jeb flips a few pages. “It says in chapter seven that the Dormouse kept falling asleep at the party, and the Hatter poured hot tea on its nose to wake it. The passage is underlined, so maybe that’s a hint. What do you think?”
“I think the mouse must’ve had a nose for tea.” I slap a hand over my lips, embarrassed by the senseless reply.
“Okay. Enough pretending everything’s cool.” Jeb drops the book into the backpack along with the wrapper. He comes over and catches my chin, lifting my gaze to his. “You really think I faked wanting to kiss you?”
An odd sense of playfulness blossoms inside me, completely inappropriate for the seriousness of our situation. “Ah-ah-ah, elfin knight.” I peel out of his grasp and jump to my feet—flirty, giddy, and totally not myself. “You’re not to touch my precious booty, remember? Get thee behindeth me, Jebbeth.” I swivel my back to him.
He grasps my elbow. “Would you look at me, please?”
I yank free and skip around the tea wagon to the other side of the table so the place settings form a barricade between us. To my left sits the Door Mouse. He’s the size of a gerbil, but his thin tail is furry like a squirrel’s and covered in white frost. Pillows are piled high on his chair, boosting him so he can reach the table. His head rests next to a cup half-full of hot tea. He must’ve frozen while napping.
I lean close to his ears—silvery with ice and oblong. “I don’t blame you for sleeping your life away,” I whisper to him. Jeb’s gawking at me like I’m from Mars. “Wish I’d slept the last few hours of mine.”
Jeb’s expression falls, and I know I’ve hurt him. That wasn’t my intention. I feel anything but spiteful. Aside from being hungry, I’m whimsical, light-headed, and uninhibited. It’s very liberating.
“Al, c’mon. I don’t want things to be like this . . . not with us.” Jeb starts around the table and I’m about to bolt, thinking a good chase could be fun, when I hear a sniffle. It’s so soft, at first I think it’s the leaves rustling overhead. Then I see the mouse’s nose wriggle. It’s shiny, wet, and pink, like a teensy ball of strawberry icing. I’m about to pluck it off and eat it when Jeb steps up behind me.
The mouse sniffs again.
“What do you think, Jeb? Use the pepper to wake him up. He can be our sidekick. We’ll call him Skittles, like the candy.” The things coming out of my mouth are nonsense, but I can’t seem to stop them. Any more than I can stop the colossal stomach growl that follows.
Watching me with an uneasy frown, Jeb takes the seat next to me and drags out the bag. “Its nose must be defrosted from the tea.”
I can’t concentrate on anything but my body. My skin feels itchy, like I need to
do
something. I climb on top of my chair, then onto the table, kicking some dishes aside.
“Al, what the—?”
Music plays in my head . . . not Morpheus’s lullaby. Something with a sensual, addictive beat. I twist my hips back and forth. The rubies on my belt sparkle, and the rings jingle—belly-dancer style. I didn’t know I could move like this. Must be from all those years of hula-hooping with Jen.
Jeb’s eyes look like they might pop . . . so do the veins in his neck. He makes a sound—somewhere between a cough and a moan— mesmerized by my rocking hips. He stands. “Would you get down? You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“No. Come up here with me.” I raise my arms over my head and roll my pelvis seductively. “It’s a wake-up dance for Skittles. You know, like the Native Americans used to do to bring down rain.”
Jeb gawks. “I seriously doubt any Native Americans moved like that.”
Feeling the groove through every pulse of my body, I envision the chains on Jeb’s belt dancing to the music, imagine coils of energy running through the links, inducing movement. I beckon them toward me with a fingertip.
“Hey . . . hey, wait!” Jeb’s chains lurch, forcing him up onto the chair. He tries to grab the links with his hands, but they break free, tugging until he’s standing in front of me on the table.
I catch his hips, coaxing his body to sway with mine. Pressed against him, I nuzzle his neck, dropping kisses over his soft skin as I rake my fingers through his hair. His ponytail comes undone. “You taste good enough to eat,” I whisper.
The chains wind around his thigh, squeezing. Tensing all over, he grabs them. “H-how are you doing that?”
I laugh, running my palms across his biceps and chest. “Morpheus showed me I could animate objects. Isn’t it spectacular?”
I’m concentrating too hard on how good his muscles feel, and it breaks my connection with the metal links. The minute he’s free, Jeb climbs to the ground and lifts me down. I drop into my seat, giggling as he clasps both my hands crossways over my chest.
“You’re freaking me out, Al. Come on.”
“Come on where?” I break a hand loose and run a fingertip down his shirt, tracing the line of sheer black fabric over his yummy navel and stopping to clutch his waistband.
A muscle in his jaw jumps.
I purr. “Poor control-freak Jeb. Your world’s way off-kilter when little Alyssa’s not tripping over her chastity belt. Is that it, bad boy?” I tap the button at the top of his fly.
“Uhhh . . .”
“Why don’t you wake up Skittles, and then we’ll go home and have a real party?” I’m smiling so hard, it hurts my face—a provocative, teasing smile. For some reason, I can’t stop.
“You need to quit looking at me like that,” Jeb says, a husky rattle in his voice.
“Or else what?” My insides tickle with an unfamiliar power, knowing that he’s flustered. Knowing that I caused it.
Swallowing hard, he fishes out the bag of pepper again. “‘Home.’ Right. Maybe if we wake the mouse, the others will wake up, too.”
“Yeah! Let the tea party begin!”
Then I can finally eat something.
I play a drumroll on the table’s edge with my forefingers.
Jeb shoots another bewildered glance my way. It’s delicious being able to unbalance him. Like when his blood turned green over Morpheus earlier. I’ve never known any girl to be in control of Jebediah Holt. Sure would rock to be the first.
A tiny voice inside me tries to break through, tries to remind me this isn’t
me
. . . that I wouldn’t say these things, not to Jeb—that I wouldn’t take pleasure in his pain. Something’s wrong and I should tell him so he can help, or at least defend himself. But the hunger inside crushes my conscience. It’s more than just an ache for food. I’m starving for power, too. Power to bring the guy I want to his knees. To make him pay for not wanting me back.
With one eye on me and one on the bag of pepper, Jeb packs the mouse’s nostrils. The tiny creature inhales sharply. A sneeze gathers, then erupts on a hiccup. His icy shell shatters with the force of it. Clumps of frost slide from his brown fur and red jacket as he sits up to rub his nose.
The instant he sees us, he scrambles behind his teacup. Braving a peek, he blinks black dewdrop eyes our way. They look like chocolate chips. That fierce hunger rolls through me again.