Heartless

by Marissa Meyer

  The jury scribbled on their tablets.

  Peter took a step forward. “These people—the maid, the Joker, and you.” He snarled at Catherine. “They trespassed onto my property. I’d asked none of them to come there. Nosy wretches they were, coming to see the ‘monster,’ the ‘beast.’” He spat. “But she was my wife! And you killed her. Right in front of me, you killed her. You’re the monsters. Not me. Not her!”

  “She was the Jabberwock!” Cath screamed.

  A gasp rose from the crowd.

  “That’s what he isn’t telling you. The wife he was protecting was the Jabberwock. Mary Ann was to be the creature’s next meal.”

  “She should not have come to my patch. Trespassers! Murderers!”

  “You are the murderer!”

  “As are you, and a thief besides! You stole that pumpkin from me, I know you did. She was getting better. The curse was going away, but then she saw that cake and had to have it and when she turned again … she wouldn’t … she couldn’t turn back again and it’s your fault!”

  The King pounded his gavel—each thud like a hammer on Cath’s temple.

  “Now, now,” said the King, who was sweating profusely. “I think perhaps the jury would appreciate one little clarification…” He cleared his throat and adjusted his powdered wig. “Sir Peter, you claim that the Jabberwock was your wife?”

  The audience rustled and Cath heard more than one member of the jury mention that Peter Peter’s wife had been at the black-and-white ball. Sickly thing. Not at all monstrous.

  “She was poisoned,” said Peter. “Poisoned by bad pumpkin. I saw her eat them—she couldn’t stop. Then she started to get sick. I thought it was just from the overeatin’ but … then she started to change.” A deep wrinkle cut between his eyebrows. “It happened the first time after we left your ball, after those courtiers talked to us like we hadn’t earned being there. After you”—he pointed at Cath—“looked at us like scum on your shoe. I watched her turn into the Jabberwock. Saw it with my own eyes.” He balled his fists. “Even when she was herself again, the cravings were too much for her. She’d eat anything orange, anything she thought could satiate her. But nothing did.”

  Cath’s jaw ached from clenching her teeth. They said the Jabberwock had gone after Cheshire and Margaret that first night—after Cheshire’s fur had been tinted orange and he probably still smelled of pumpkin pasties.

  And in the meadow, she had taken the Lion, with his golden-orange mane. But the monster had probably been there looking for Hatta, the messenger who had brought that first pumpkin from Chess.

  And in the theater, the beast had come after her. Wanting more of her pumpkin cake.

  “After she turned a second time,” Peter growled, his eyes cast in shadows, “I made the pumpkins pay.”

  “If I recall,” drawled Mr. Caterpillar, “the Jabberwock was a nuisance. I say, good riddance.”

  “I tried to stop her,” said Peter Peter. “I swear it. Built a cage even, but I couldn’t keep her.” His expression turned fierce. “It wasn’t her fault though. It was the pumpkins what did it!”

  Cath squeezed the rail until her fingers ached. “This is not a defense. You killed Jest. You cut off his head, right in front of me.”

  “You killed my wife!”

  “You were going to feed Mary Ann to her!”

  “She shouldn’a been on my land in the first place!”

  THUD.

  THUD.

  THUD.

  The sound of the King’s gavel interrupted their argument and Cath sank her head in between her tense shoulders.

  “Th-thank you, Sir Peter, for your—er, statement.” The King’s voice was shaking. “We have now heard the defendant’s testimony. Jury, what is your verdict?”

  The jury huddled down with their slate tablets and whispers. Catherine heard none of their discussion. Her ears were humming, her brain clouded with visions of Jest in the mud, the ax swinging at his throat, her own heart splitting down the middle.

  “We have reached a verdict, Your Majesty.” It was a toad who spoke, standing up with a slate in his webbed fingers. On it he had drawn a picture of Peter Peter standing on top of an enormous pumpkin and grinning. “We the jury find Peter Peter not guilty!”

  The cheer was deafening. All around her, the people of Hearts embraced one another, hollered ecstatically. Even the King giggled with relief.

  The Kingdom of Hearts had never seen such a ghastly trial, and everyone was thrilled that it was over. The man was not guilty. They could all go on with their silly, pointless lives.

  Except Catherine. From the corner of her eyes she saw Raven puff his feathers.

  She snatched the gavel from her husband. “SILENCE!” she screamed, pounding on the railing so hard a crack formed in the polished wood.

  The ballyhoo stopped.

  A courtroom of faces turned to gape at their Queen. Her reddened face, her livid eyes. A turtle ducked into his shell. An opossum rolled into a ball. An ostrich tried, but failed, to bury its head in the polished quartz floor.

  “I reject the jury’s verdict,” she seethed. “As the Queen of Hearts, I declare this man guilty. Guilty of murder. Guilty of thievery and kidnapping and all the rest, and for his sentence—I call for his head. To be carried out immediately!”

  Her words echoed through the courtroom, casting a cloud over the stricken faces. No one dared to breathe.

  Catherine had eyes only for Sir Peter, whose face was furious beneath streaks of dirt, whose teeth were bared.

  The numbness began to settle over her again.

  “You deserve no mercy,” she said.

  Peter spat again. “I want nothin’ from you.”

  “B-b-but, darling,” said the King. Soft, patient, terrified. His fingers brushed against her arm, but she ripped it away. “We … we have never … In Hearts, we don’t … Why, sweetness, we don’t even have an executioner.”

  The corner of her mouth twitched. Her gaze shifted to Raven. “Yes, we do.”

  Raven lifted his head.

  “You were the White Queen’s executioner,” she said, “and now you will be mine. Serve me dutifully and we shall both have our vengeance.”

  He remained silent for a long while, still as a statue. Then he spread his wings and stepped off the rail. Like an ink splatter on stone he transformed into the hooded figure. His face cast in shadow, his gloved hands gripping the handle of the glinting ax. Now, in the light of the courtroom, Cath could see that his hooded cloak was made from raven feathers.

  The guards drew back, leaving Peter Peter alone in the center of the room. Though he held fast to his defiance, Cath could see him beginning to shake.

  Raven’s shadow lengthened across the floor, dwarfing the murderer. He hefted the ax onto his shoulder.

  “For the murder of Jest, the court joker of Hearts, I sentence this man to death.” She spoke without feeling, unburdened by love or dreams or the pain of a broken heart. It was a new day in Hearts, and she was the Queen.

  “Off with his head.”

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  OR, WHY IS A RAVEN LIKE A WRITING-DESK?

  IT’S COMMONLY BELIEVED that when the Hatter posed his unanswered riddle in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland—“Why is a raven like a writing-desk?”—Lewis Carroll did not have an answer in mind. However, after years of being pestered, Carroll finally gave in with a response, recorded in the preface he wrote to the 1896 edition of Alice: “Because it can produce a few notes, tho they are very flat; and it is nevar put with the wrong end in front.” (Note that the misspelled nevar is raven backward. Unfortunately, the misspelling would soon be caught and “corrected” by some industrious editor and Carroll’s clever wordplay would be lost in future editions.)

  All of that is to say that Carroll’s “official” answer to the riddle was the inspiration for Jest’s debut performance at the black-and-white ball in Chapter Four.

  Over the years, countless fans and readers have added their own
interpretations of the riddle. The answer that Hatta gives in Chapter Eighteen (“Because they both have quills dipped in ink”), was one that I was quite proud of myself for coming up with, but soon learned that I was not the only one to think it. This answer was credited to David B. Jodrey, Jr., in The Annotated Alice1, along with dozens of other brilliant and amusing answers recorded over time. (My personal favorite comes from Tony Weston, one of the winners of a contest posed by The Spectator in 1991: “Because a writing-desk is a rest for pens and a raven is a pest for wrens.” I imagine that Carroll, with his love of wordplay, would approve.)

  Speaking of the Raven, I was unable to limit myself to abusing the work of only one great author in this book, I had to meddle around with two. Most of Raven’s dialogue is inspired by (and sometimes blatant reworkings of) lines from the poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe. Though readers are free to interpret the character however they see fit, I rather like the idea of Raven being the same bird that tormented the heartbroken narrator in Poe’s classic work. As “The Raven” was first published in 1845, twenty years before Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the timeline was too perfect to pass up.

  Lastly, I’m sure it will surprise no reader, fan, or scholar that I have taken an abundance of liberties, not only with Carroll’s story and characters, but also with the societal rules and norms of Victorian England. I hope you’ll forgive any inaccuracies, or even chalk them up to creative license if you’re feeling generous, and I sincerely hope that the spirit of Lewis Carroll will find more amusement than offense in my attempts to expand on his crazy, kooky, quirky world.

  It is Wonderland, after all.

  1. Martin Gardner, ed., introduction and notes to The Annotated Alice: The Definitive Edition, by Lewis Carroll (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1999).

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I’D LIKE TO START by expressing my appreciation for Gregory Maguire, whose fantastic novels Wicked and Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister served as the inspiration behind this book. Years ago, I was out to lunch with my agenting team, discussing fairy tales and villains, when I told them, “I wish that Gregory Maguire would write the origin story for the Queen of Hearts.” To which my foreign rights agent, Cheryl Pientka, looked at me and said, “Marissa, why don’t you write it?” So I also owe a great amount of thanks to Cheryl for helping me see the obvious, along with the amazing Jill Grinberg and the whole gang at Jill Grinberg Literary Management for their constant encouragement, wisdom, and enthusiasm.

  I am enormously grateful to Jean Feiwel, Liz Szabla, and the many, many, many dedicated and talented people at Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group, for having faith in me and for taking such pride in the books you publish. It’s been an enormous joy for me to work with you all.

  A huge thanks to Lewis Carroll, who, one hundred and fifty years ago, gave us some of the most memorable characters in all of literature. I don’t know if I’ve done your world justice, but I have done my best.

  Thank you to my husband, Jesse, our beautiful girls, Sloane and Delaney, and all my friends and family, who fill my world with love, wonder, and Cheshire-like smiles.

  And finally, I have to thank my mom, who sparked my interest in Alice early on with her Queen of Hearts Halloween costume, Alice in Wonderland Christmas tree ornaments, and collection of Alice figurines, music boxes, and more. This book is for you.

  Follow us on Facebook or visit us online at mackids.com.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Marissa Meyer’s first book in the Lunar Chronicles, Cinder, debuted on the New York Times bestseller list. Marissa lives in Tacoma, Washington, with her husband and their three cats. You can sign up for email updates here.

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  A FEIWEL AND FRIENDS BOOK

  An Imprint of Macmillan

  HEARTLESS. Copyright © 2016 by Rampion Books. All rights reserved. For information, address Feiwel and Friends, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  Our books may be purchased in bulk for business or promotional use. Please contact your local bookseller or the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at (800) 221-7945 x5442 or by e-mail at MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Meyer, Marissa, author.

  Heartless / Marissa Meyer.

  First edition.|New York: Feiwel & Friends, 2016. | Summary: In this prequel to Alice in Wonderland, Cath would rather open a bakery and marry for love than accept a proposal from the King of Hearts, especially after meeting the handsome and mysterious court jester.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2015021393 | ISBN 9781250044655 (hardback) | ISBN9781250080271 (e-book)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Characters in literature—Fiction. | Love—Fiction. | Fantasy. | BISAC: JUVENILE FICTION / Fantasy & Magic. | JUVENILE FICTION / Love & Romance.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.M571737 He 2016 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015021393

  Feiwel and Friends logo designed by Filomena Tuosto

  First Edition—2016

  fiercereads.com

  e-ISBN 9781250080271