After dinner, they went back to the study to fix the last remains of their plan. Somehow, the knowledge of having lost one of the most important pieces of divine power in the middle of an unfindable dimension, gave urgency to attempt any way to go back. Alice began worrying. If the effects had begun to happen, they would increment exponentially in the following weeks.
“Only one grey hair?” Alice asked when they hunched over the desk.
"As far as she could tell, yes. Trust me, she looked."
"Alright then. Maps…of...Wonderland, down, please."
She twirled her finger in the air. A small set of rolls from the top of the bookshelf came floating down onto the desk. Crude drawings made by an eight year-old showed the most important points in the not-so-fictional land.
"I'm sure I lost it between the coast of the Sea of Tears, and the Rabbit's house." She pointed in the map to those places. "But since it's been three years, it could be anywhere."
"I would began our search there, and then move spiralling outwards until we reach…"
His finger hovered over the drawing of a croquet field and the outline of a castle.
Alice shivered.
"No. I'm not going back there", she barked.
Edgar looked at her. Alice, even in her most outlandish, still carried the composure of the Athenidas with her. This time, her eyes had bulged and her entire body tensed at the thought of going to the castle. Through clenched teeth she explained her last visit to the Court of Hearts hadn't gone nowhere near to normal.
"Even for Wonderland standards, that thing was messed up." She looked away, before continuing. "Anyway, I don't think the cup would be there even if moved. Probably among the ones on the Hatter's table if so."
Then, the door opened and the mirror from her bedroom came through. Since the only time Alice had gone anywhere close to Wonderland by her own volition was through a mirror -and into the Looking Glass territories- maybe they could enchant it to work in the same way.
After an hour of casting spells to the surface, and having it bounce them back to them, Edgar came up with the thought of doing it to the frame. In an instant, the entire mirror began glowing and bubbling.
"After me, and watch where you step", Alice commanded.
Crossing the almost-liquid reflection, and walking a few metres, they found themselves in a carbon-copy of the study. Except, everything was backwards, including the letters in books and the maps. Alice barely payed attention to them, since she had seen the trick before, but Edgar became fascinated by it.
Things changed when they came out of the study. The rest of Featherhill simply wasn't there. through the door they began walking on stones covered in moss and surrounded by overgrown plants. No flowers this time. No colourful plants to call her ugly, or a weed. Good. Unlike the eight year-old Alice, the current one knew a mowing spell and had no patience for insanity.
Edgar had taken out a small knife, and began digging in places where the dirt seemed untouched but still in the path.
"What are you doing?", Alice asked.
"Look at this, my mother taught me."
He sprinkled dirt on a notepad he made appear in his hand. On pale, golden clouds of dust, a figure began to form and walked out of the pages and through the path in front of them. A small figure, but undefined.
A figure turned out to be Alice, though a small, child, Alice. The one which came through the original mirror, and had an entire chess game in front of her. A game in which she would win, and became queen. She had forgotten about that.
"No sense following her. I wasn't here the last time."
"So, where then?"
Alice turned to the ocean. A vast and irascible mass of frothy waves and infinite blue. A sea of tears, made out of desperation and the confusion of a young girl who tried to understand the rules of a world which had none.
"Through there, if we can make a boat", she said, looking at the tall weeds. "Help me with these."
They pulled them out of the ground. Roots came with them, and Alice used them to harness an improvised barge, out of the weeds and twigs. Edgar tried to help, at first, but she made clear soon enough that she didn't need any help. Alice, after living under the guise of her parents didn't require help to work.
She needed an audience.
The barge, as far as Edgar could tell, could barely hold one of them before beginning to sink. Most of structures built by Athenidas had a fatal flaw. He remembered Icarus, their brother, and the stories of him plummeting to his death by a mixture of a demented king and poor craftsmanship. He could almost see themselves hurling into the depths of the ocean, due to the thing not holding their weight. Worry he immediately told Alice about.
"Oh, this thing? No, you're right, it could never carry us without buckling and bending." She pulled a jar out of her dress. "Not like this, anyway. Walk back a couple steps..."
He did. Alice moved her finger and the lid of the jar opened. Moved it again, and a brown paste came out of it and, without touching a thing, splashed against the barge. Cracking and stretching, and the barge began to grow. In a matter of seconds, the contraption grew twice it size. Now, could easily hold both of them.
"Are you waiting for an invitation? Hop on!" She said, lifting her skirt to go up the side of the barge.
For what seemed hours, the barge moved through the choppy waves in an infinite blue. Soon, the shore vanished on the horizon, while nothing appeared on the other side. Edgar feared they'd become castaways, but Alice didn't seemed to mind. Her whole body pushed the thing forwards, and wind followed her movement, as if it came from within her.
"I just hope I'm right", she muttered, mostly to herself, while looking away.
"You don't know!?" Edgar panicked.
"I've done this exactly once in my life. Once. And inside a bottle". She began to lose patience, and her hands glowed with a blue tint."If I have to explain myself at every step, we'll get nowhere."
"Excuse me for worrying. One would think that the woman who inspired a book with her name on it, would have -at least- some idea of the layout and geography of the place she named!"
"I had, in 1859, when I came here. Need to remind you I was EIGHT! Were you a damned cartographer on Year 3!? I'm making this up as I go, and I appreciate your help. However, this line of questioning is not very productive, since I can't make us go back from here!"
The moment she yelled that last word, to be heard above the whistling of the wind and the crash of the waves. The moment not just her hands, but her entire arms glowed with a blue tint. The moment her eyes seemed to pierce Edgar in the chest.
That was the moment when the storm hit.
If the sea had behaved irrational before, as any good sea would do, this was nothing when compared to the now unstable and threatening Sea of Tears. As Alice lose what little composure she had, the barge swung from side to side, rocking as the waves pushed them in all directions at the same time. The flimsy grass creaked and twisted under their weight and the force, but didn't budge. One last wave lifted them up in the air, tens of metres, and propelled them away.
CRASH!
Comments (0)
See all