Page 40 of Wondrous

I staggered back a step and snapped “Jack!” but my indignation was mixed with laughter.

“Sorry,” he said, holding his hands up and giving me a wry look. “It’s hard to resist trying to scare you. It’s second nature to us. At least a dozen times today I had to stop myself from leaping out at you from behind a tree.”

“Hmm,” I said, and despite my still-thundering heart, I found this intriguing. “It’s like my politeness. I can’t stop having good manners with people, even if they deserve rudeness. It’s my nature, too, I suppose.”

“Oh, really?” he said with amused sarcasm. “I must have mistaken you for the person who trapped me in a big wet pit.”

“I said I can’t be rude to people who deserve it,” I said. “Perhaps you just aren’t frightening enough to deserve it.”

He laughed and settled himself by the fire with easy grace, one leg drawn up. “I suppose I’m not, to you. Anyway, I’m sorry. I’m going to try harder to resist my—nature.”

This was said with such unaffected honesty that I couldn’t think how to respond. In teasing him, I’d ventured onto unfamiliar ground, and now I didn’t know how to find my way back.

Fortunately, Jack didn’t seem to notice my awkwardness and chattered on about our day. Now that he’d decided he didn’t despise me, Jack had proven himself a surprisingly pleasant traveling companion, if a little flighty. He had such enthusiasm for new scenery that he sometimes reminded me of my uncle’s big yellow Labrador, and kept dragging me off course to look at a waterfall or vista. I wouldn’t have minded at all if we didn’t have two more mock dragons to catch, the thought of which made the knots in my stomach twist ever tighter as we drew nearer to Weirgrove. Earlier, we’d nearly stumbled across a trio of Alices, who fortunately had been making so much noise that Jack and I had been able to climb a tree before they passed us by. It was an unpleasant reminder that this was a competition—and one I could easily lose—not merely an adventure.

Yet Jack’s casual delight over our journey had been a welcome distraction, and even fortifying. He clearly wasn’t worrying over mock dragons, so why should I?

Grackle settled on Jack’s shoulder after we’d eaten, and he stroked the moth absently. The movement caused him to knock his teacup over, but he caught it—or something did. One of the ripples of air that he summoned sometimes.

“How do you do that?” I said.

“Oh—I’m a sorcerer,” he said in an offhand way, as if he were announcing that he liked to knit. “An apprentice one, anyway. I’m still in training. I’m terrible at it, so don’t worry about me trying to enchant you. But that’s why I could speak into your mind. Most jabberwocks can’t do that.”

“A sorcerer?” I repeated.

“Sorcery is one of only three respectable professions in the Jabberwoods,” he elaborated, seeming to mistake my astonishment for a lack of understanding. “Rat farming and thievery are the other two. It wouldn’t be too bad to be a thief—they steal anything they can get their hands on, whether that’s books or tools or jewels, and they get to leave the Jabberwoods, though they don’t go far. But my father would never let me. He’s too afraid of losing me.”

My attention had snagged on rat farming, and it took some effort to take in the rest of what he’d said. Half the time, I found Jack the easiest person in the world to talk to—something I still couldn’t wrap my head around—and the other half, it was like having a conversation with someone who kept flinging cold water in your face.

“But I was able to enchant you,” I said at last.

“Like I said, I’m not very good at sorcery,” Jack said. “Maybe a more powerful jabberwock sorcerer could have thrown off that teacup enchantment, but I can’t.”

I nodded, though I felt a prickle of anxiety. What would happen if Jack did free himself from the enchantment and resumed his true form? Yes, he didn’t hate me anymore, but I’d still trapped him and threatened him into helping me.

I sat on a low-hanging tree branch and drew my knees up, hugging them to my chest. I should have felt relief—after all, I’d defeated one of the mock dragons. Instead I was as full of self-doubt as ever. Was I going about this whole thing the wrong way?

“Jack,” I said quietly, “what if I’m not the Alice?”

“Who else would you be?” he said absently, adding another piece of wood to the fire.

I felt a shiver of déjà vu—the Hatter had said exactly the same thing. Occasionally, I’d had the sense that the creatures of Wonderland were connected somehow—though I’d always dismissed this as my fancy.

“It’s actually quite likely that I’m not her, statistically,” I pressed. “I don’t like to bring maths into anything, but there were easily fifty others in that throne room.”

Jack gave me a blank look. “You truly don’t realize that you’re the center of all this? Is that normal for heroes? I’ve never met one, so I can’t tell.” He went back to poking at the fire.

“I’m—of course I’m not,” I said, a little crossly. “I’m not even brave, and heroes—”

“You ran away to Wonderland,” he said. “Though your own world is a lot safer, by the sound of it. Not to mention that you went into the Jabberwoods. And captured a jabberwock.”

“Yes,” I said, “but I was only able to do that after drinking from the wisdom cup.”

“Who made that cup?”

“Well—” I stopped, nettled. “I did, but—it’s—well, the other Alices probably don’t need enchanted teacups,” I finished weakly.

“All right,” he said, not as if he were agreeing with me but as if he had decided I was some sort of enigma beyond his understanding.