Page 25 of Wondrous

“Then we go our separate ways,” I said with as much confidence as I could muster. There would be nothing to stop the jabberwock from eating me after he had taken the antidote, except perhaps his sense of honor. Did jabberwocks have honor?

Perhaps the jabberwock was thinking the same thing, because he didn’t argue any more. I heard him fidgeting at the bottom of the pit, the shush-shush of the water. I accept, he said. I’ll lead you to the dragons. Just get me out.

I sprang into action, stoking up the fire again and setting the kettle on to boil. “Do you like tea?” I asked. “No, silly question—why would a jabberwock like tea? I just have so many varieties, and—”

I like tea. The jabberwock sounded slightly offended. Not sweet, though.

“Ah,” I said. “I have a delightful smoky oolong—it tastes like buttered toast. Coming right up!”

I made the tea with shaking hands, but a part of me was also strangely excited. Well, I had never served tea to a jabberwock before. It would give me an interesting perspective on my skills as a tea maker—maybe not a relevant one, as jabberwocks no doubt had unique palates, but interesting nonetheless.

When I was finished, I picked up the tea tray (I couldn’t resist adding a cinnamon swirl, which went so well with oolong) and stood a bit back from the pit.

“I’m going to set this down,” I said in a warning voice. “You’ve given your word that you’ll help me. You’d better not try anything.”

I won’t. He sounded weary. His voice in my head was also louder, somehow, as if he was closer. I just want to get out of here. I’m cold and wet.

Nervously, I stepped to the edge of the pit. But no tail reached out to drag me into the darkness, so I crouched and placed the tea tray right at the edge. As I did, I happened to lean slightly over the pit, and my gaze drifted naturally downward.

A gaping mouth filled with teeth—some as long as my index finger—yawned open an arm’s length from my face. Somehow the jabberwock had crept up the side of the pit without my noticing and was now almost at the very top. Most of his body was still in shadow, and I absorbed only the barest impressions of him—a head large and wolflike, with violet eyes set wide apart like an owl’s. All my attention was caught by that enormous jagged mouth as the jabberwock hauled himself up another inch.

My scream was so loud it could have split the darkness in two. I leapt backward just as his tail slashed toward me, but before it could get close, the jabberwock lost his hold on the wall of the pit. With a sharp birdlike cry, he tumbled back into the shadows, tail grabbing uselessly at the walls and sending earth raining down on him.

I stood, panting, several body lengths from the pit until the echoes of the jabberwock’s fall had faded away.

“You were planning to attack me!” I said between gasping breaths. “And after you promised to help.”

Of course, he said. His exhaustion might have been false before, but it seemed unaffected now. I only care about getting out of this pit. And my way of doing it, by dragging you down here and making a ladder of your bones, is much less complicated than yours.

“Oh,” I murmured. I was shaking so hard now that I didn’t know if I would ever stop. “Making a ladder of your bones” had lodged inside me like a spear of ice, and suddenly I had gone past wondering why I had come up with this plan and on to wondering how far I could get from this forest before I was forced to stop, if I started running now.

I broke my back, the jabberwock said, a sulky note in his voice. Before. When I fell into your trap. That’s why I can’t fly out.

“Oh!” I was overcome by an unexpected wave of pity, which I tried to keep out of my voice. I didn’t want the jabberwock to think I was soft, and pitying a creature who had, in all likelihood, been trying to kill me was definitely soft. Possibly to the point of stupidity.

“I didn’t know jabberwocks could fly,” I said. “Well, that’s—you deserved it,” I added sternly. “Ah—does it hurt?”

We heal fast, the jabberwock said, sounding puzzled by my question. If we eat. If we don’t, we can’t heal at all.

“So you’re really stuck,” I murmured. “You’ll die if I don’t help you.”

Just like my mother. Murdered by a hero. I should have just stayed away from you. She would have been so disappointed in me.

I heard a soft sound, less resonant than the terrible burbling I had heard before, and wetter.

“Are you crying?” I said, astonished.

The jabberwock didn’t reply, but the wet growling grew louder.

“I’m—” I stopped, wondering if I should keep trying to sound bold and hard-hearted, like a true hero facing a monster, but I couldn’t bear to when he was sobbing like that. “I’m sorry about your mother. Even though she probably wasn’t any less wicked than you, it isn’t right that you lost her when you were so young.”

Stop, he said.

“Stop what?”

Stop with your tricks. You must think I’m a fool. You don’t care about my mother.

“I’m not trying to trick you!” I protested. “Look, I know you hate me, but I’m doing this for your own good, too. If somebody doesn’t catch these mock dragons, Wonderland will fall into ruin. That’s what the prophecy says. So you should want to help me, because I’m helping the jabberwocks, too, in addition to everybody else who lives here. Have you heard the White Queen’s prophecy?”