Page 23 of Wondrous

“Good,” I snapped, knitting my hands together in a vain attempt to stop them from trembling. “Now would you shut your mouth?”

“What mouth?”

The Cat turned to me, and I gave a muffled cry of horror. Where his mouth should have been was only a shadowy hollow, through which I could see the moss of the forest floor.

“That’s disgusting,” I said. “I’d rather a mouth without a cat than a cat without a mouth.”

The Cat grinned—somehow, he managed it mouthless, which was simultaneously disturbing and fascinating. But before he could say anything else, I heard a distinctive, grumbling sort of growl off to my right, a sound that went on and on, louder and louder, until it felt as if the forest floor were growling along with it.

“Cat,” I whispered. “Is that—is that burbling?”

The Cat didn’t answer. The burbling stopped, and something darted out from behind one tree and vanished behind another. Too fast and perfectly silent. I jumped, my shoulder striking the tree, and gave another choked cry. Instantly, I clapped my hand over my mouth.

“Did it hear me?” I whispered. “Cat? Cat?”

But the Cat was gone.

I squinted into the shadows, trying desperately to see. Had I imagined it? I didn’t think so. There it was again—an awful, vaguely serpentine shape. It walked on all fours and sometimes seemed to glide above the ground in a way that reminded me of a dragon. It had a tail at least twice the length of its body, which twined round the trees it glided through like a vine.

The ordinary forest noises had faded away. It was as if even the trees were holding their breath, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that the thing had heard me. The leaves rustled behind me, once and then twice. Where had the creature gone? Was the rustling moving closer?

I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. I pressed myself into the tree trunk as if I could sink into the bark.

Something lunged out of the shadows. Something that—to my overwhelming relief—had been lurking in the darkness on the other side of the tent. It seemed made of liquid shadow and was covered in gray-green feathers, which glistened in the dim light. That was all I was able to make out—it moved too quickly.

And then—

An unearthly scream, like that of some prehistoric bird, and both tent and monster vanished, as if a magician had waved their wand over them. The light went out a quarter second later but not before I saw that my plan had worked. The jabberwock had pounced on the tent, rending it with its claws, but the tent had been resting on air. I had stretched it over one of the pits that riddled this strange wet forest—only the pegs at its circumference were actually attached to the ground.

The tent wrapped itself around the creature and they tumbled down, and it was a full three seconds before I heard the sound of a wet thud that sent several stones and chunks of earth lining the pit tumbling after the tent. For a long moment, I sat frozen, barely daring to breathe. I hadn’t actually expected my plan to work—or, rather, I’d expected it only in a vague, hopeful sort of way, without thinking through the particulars. Now that it was done, I couldn’t comprehend that I’d managed it.

I had caught a jabberwock.

Chapter 14

“Good for you,” the Cat said. He appeared again by the edge of the pit, sniffing at the air. “I don’t think the older jabberwocks would have fallen for that trick. But this young fellow took the bait.”

“Good for me,” I repeated. “Good for me? What on earth have I done? You were right—I am mad!” I pressed my hands against my face. “Oh, no, no, no—there’s a jabberwock down there. I caught a jabberwock. Oh!”

“Calm down,” the Cat said. “Like I said, he’s a young one; they have fewer teeth at that age.”

When I only continued to chant “Oh no oh no oh no” under my breath, the Cat gave a huff of laughter. “Alice, have some of that foul drink you like so much. The kind that tastes like you scooped it off the bottom of a pond.”

“Tea!” I cried. “You want me to make tea?”

I paused, heart thundering in my ears and breath coming in ragged gasps. “Actually, that’s—that’s not a bad idea.”

And so, in a forest of monsters, with an enraged jabberwock only a few feet away, I made tea. It didn’t take long—the fire still had a few embers, and within minutes the kettle was whistling away over the crackling flames. It was an oddly cozy sound in that eerie, murky forest. I didn’t want to look toward the pit, but it was worse to look away from it, in case the jabberwock came creeping out like a spider escaping from beneath a glass.

I drank from the happy-memory cup and was much soothed by the memory of playing with Dinah. This made me look at the Cheshire Cat more fondly, remembering what good companions cats could be. I wasn’t completely alone.

I crept to the edge of the pit. All I could see down there was darkness; the lantern had been snuffed out when it fell. All I could hear was a steady trickle of water from where a puddle near the edge of the pit was slowly dripping down the side. I would have wondered if the jabberwock was unconscious if I hadn’t been so aware—distinctly and horribly—of being watched.

“J-Jabberwock?” I said. “I’m sorry about—this. I didn’t want to capture you, trust me. But I need your help.”

A long feathered tail sliced out of the pit, lashing at the earth only a foot from where I stood.

I screamed and leapt backward, tripping over a root and landing on my back. The tail lashed out again, and I got out of the way just in time. I scrabbled backward on my hands until I hit the trunk of a tree.