Bargain price

CHAPTER 7

Q UEEN GENEVIEVE slipped away to her private rooms for a moment’s rest, leaving the guests to occupy themselves. Without a word, Hatter Madigan followed and stood guard in the hall.

The queen’s quarters consisted of three interconnected salons. One of these was filled with overstuffed couches and giant pillows to swaddle Her Highness in lazy comfort; another was a dressing room, storehouse for the queen’s many royal outfits; and the third was a bathroom, outfitted with tasseled curtains made of a fabric more voluptuous than any found outside the queendom.

Genevieve studied her reflection in the bathroom looking glass. Her daughter’s birthday always made her feel old. It wasn’t very long ago that she herself had begun her training to become queen. She saw lines at the corners of her eyes and on both sides of her mouth that hadn’t been there a year earlier. It was a shame that imagination had its limits, that it could affect the physical realm only so far and she couldn’t imagine herself young again.

What was that smell? A familiar, spicy-sweet aroma. She saw a plume of blue smoke and followed it into the sitting room, where she found the blue caterpillar coiled dreamily around his hookah and puffing

away. Ordinarily, Genevieve would have been angry to discover anyone, let alone a giant larva, in her private sanctuary without having been invited. But the caterpillar was no ordinary giant larva. There were eight caterpillars in Wonderland, each a different color. They were the great oracles of the region, already old at the dawn of the queendom. They served the Heart Crystal and didn’t much care who occupied the throne so long as the crystal remained safe. It was said that they could see the future because they

refused to judge it, but lately more and more members of the suit families were shrugging off the caterpillars’ prophecies, claiming a reliance on them was nothing more than silly superstition, a remnant from more barbaric times. The caterpillars didn’t actively interfere in the workings of the government or in the rivalries among the suit families, but they weren’t above letting Genevieve glimpse the future if it concerned the safety of the Heart Crystal, so that she might take action to protect it.

“Thank you for coming today, Caterpillar,” she said. “It’s an honor to play host to one so wise. We are all humbly grateful-especially Alyss.”

“Ahem hum hum,” grumbled the caterpillar, exhaling a cloud of smoke.

The smoke formed the shape of a butterfly with extended wings, then metamorphosed into a confusion of scenes. Genevieve saw a large cat grooming itself. She saw what looked like a lightning bolt. She saw Redd’s face. Then the smoke again formed the shape of a butterfly. The butterfly folded its wings and Genevieve awoke on a couch with the smell of stale tobacco in her nostrils. The caterpillar was gone. Hatter Madigan and a walrus in a tuxedo jacket two sizes too small were standing over her.

“You must have fainted, madam,” said the walrus-butler. “I will get you some water, madam.” The walrus hurried out of the room. The queen remained silent for several moments, then- “The blue caterpillar was here.”

Hatter Madigan frowned and put a hand to the brim of his top hat. His eyes scanned the room. “I’m not quite sure what he showed me,” Genevieve said.

“I will inform General Doppelganger and the rest of the Millinery. We will prepare a defense for whatever’s coming.”

Just once, Queen Genevieve would have liked to relax the watchful vigilance she was forced to maintain every hour of every day to ensure Wonderland’s safety. The caterpillars’ prophecies were always so

vague. Sometimes their visions reflected only possibilities, the dark wishes of those who never planned to carry them out. But she couldn’t take a chance, not when it concerned Redd.

“Make sure not to alarm our guests,” she said. “Of course.” Hatter bowed and left the room.

Genevieve was lucky to have such a bodyguard. Hatter Madigan could swing a blade (or several at once) faster and more accurately than anyone alive. He was nimble, acrobatic. He could flip and tumble through the air without getting hit by a single cannonball spider in an onslaught of cannonball spiders. But even with all of his skills, he could not protect the queen forever. How could he have known that the precautionary measures he was about to take would prove useless, that it was already too late?