Page 60 of Wondrous

“And how has that worked out for you?” I snapped. “You haven’t caught a single mock dragon. We’ve caught two, which means we’re the ones saving Wonderland. You’ve just been stomping around the Tulgey Wood with a fancy sword.”

Alicia turned back to me. “At least my sword is—”

“All of you, stop arguing!” Maria said, banging her hand against the table. “Don’t you hear that?”

“Hear what?” Alicia said rudely. We shushed her.

I didn’t hear anything at first. But then, abruptly, I could hear nothing else. It was a snorting, snuffling sound that grew slowly louder and louder, coupled with the smell of metal and smoke.

The third mock dragon had joined our party.

Chapter 30

The mock dragon didn’t come from the forest. He came from the sky, falling toward the clearing with the deadly speed of a hawk and landing with a thunderous crash upon our makeshift table. Cups shattered or bounced onto the grass, hedgehogs squeaked in terror, and my poor folding table groaned and sagged beneath the mock dragon’s weight.

Alex and I shrieked uselessly, while Jack and Maria leapt back. Maria reached for her net, and Jack shifted into his jabberwock form. Alicia, seated in the empty chair beside the mock dragon, sat frozen as the creature’s wing brushed the top of her head.

“Oh,” I whispered as the mock dragon’s gaze fixed upon me, the person directly opposite him. Whatever Jack and Maria were planning, there wasn’t time for it. The mock dragon was barely a yard from me, and his mouth was open, a great ball of fire rising in his throat. I must have sat there gazing into the dragon’s throat for a mere second or two, but time had elongated, and a great many thoughts filled the space, all of them panicked and useless.

I’m about to be burnt alive was the one that rose to the surface. I wondered if this would turn me into a hollow, or if the hollow would surround me and I would tumble into it, the same way I had tumbled down the rabbit hole all those years ago.

The words, when I finally found them, felt as if they were torn out of me. “I have an answer to your riddle!”

The mock dragon paused. He cocked his head at me, and for a moment there was only silence in the glade, apart from the crackle of flames at the back of his throat.

The mock dragon closed his mouth, and then, almost delicately, swallowed. The flame sank back into his chest, and he gave a loud snort through his nostrils, releasing a cloud of smoke that sent my hair billowing back.

“Very well, then,” he said in that voice I remembered, quieter than you would expect from a beast that size, a hoarse near-whisper. He lowered his haunches onto the ground and leaned his elbows on the table. “Let me hear it. If I like it, I just might spare your life—for now.”

Chapter 31

“Mmf” was all I could say in response. I felt as if I’d used up every ounce of courage I possessed in getting that one sentence out.

Focus, I told myself. You’ve faced two mock dragons already. Is this one any more terrible?

This was the wrong question. Because, yes—now that I could actually focus on him and not just his fire, this mock dragon was undeniably terrible. His appearance wasn’t mismatched and jarring, like the first mock dragon, or hideous like the second. The third mock dragon was beautiful, but it was a twisted and uncanny beauty. During our first meeting, I had assumed he was enormous, but that was because I couldn’t tell where his voice was coming from. In fact, he was only a little larger than a bull, perhaps, but with the frame of a lion, all muscle and grace. His head was that of a raven, and this was what he most resembled, for his body was covered in dense black feathers. Most terrible of all was his beak, which was too long and ended in a lethal point and concealed countless sharp teeth.

“Well?” the mock dragon said. He seemed almost cheerful. That was perhaps the most disturbing thing about him. He had nearly incinerated me, not out of vengefulness, it seemed, but because he had thought it would be fun, just as he clearly thought watching me struggle with his riddle would be fun. It was the sort of innocent cruelty I associated with small children who didn’t know any better—and cats, of course.

“You asked me before,” I managed at last, “ ‘Why is a teacup like a river?’ Well, they both hold water.”

There was a silence, into which my words seemed to sink like a pebble tossed in a weedy pond—with a half-hearted splat.

The mock dragon cleared his throat wetly. “That’s dreadful.”

“It’s correct!” I protested.

“Yes, yes,” the mock dragon said with a snort. “But correct is not the same as interesting. There are a great many things in the world which are correct, but I certainly wouldn’t bring them up in polite society.”

“Right,” I said, trying to suppress a hysterical laugh. “Well, that was just my first try. I can—”

“No,” the mock dragon said in that same chipper tone. “You seem like a dull little girl. Dull people are only good for one thing: eating.”

He opened his beak, flame brewing at the back of his tongue.

“May I give an answer?” Maria said in a strangled voice. She sat down beside me again, giving Jack and Alex a sharp look. They reseated themselves, Jack shifting rapidly from monster to boy and to monster again, then back to boy, as if in agitation. I put a hand on his arm and for a moment felt soft feathers against my skin.

To my immense relief, the mock dragon closed his mouth and inclined his head toward her. “Very well,” he said. “Since you asked politely.”