A Blade So Black

by L. L. McKinney

  The clock on the microwave read just after noon. Church would let out soon, if Pastor wasn’t on a roll or the Holy Ghost didn’t take over the service. Visits with Grandma Kingston usually lasted for a few hours, sometimes more. If Alice was back by three, four at the latest, she should be fine.

  “I’m really gonna do this.” She shook the jitters from her hands. Slayer of fear itself, and she was worried about crossing her mom. With damn good reason, but still. “Gut up, Kingston.”

  Before she lost her nerve she rushed out the back and over the fence, hoping to avoid the nosy eyes of her across-the-street neighbor. Mrs. Hughes used to go to church with Alice’s family and babysat Alice when she was younger. Now she was Mom’s watchdog, keeping an eye on things from the rocker on her porch. Thankfully, the backyard wasn’t in her line of sight.

  The train ride across town seemed longer than usual. Normally, she spent the time texting back and forth with Courtney and Chess, but neither of them had messaged her since last night. Instead she burned through her lives on Candy Crush, jumping every time a notification dropped onto her screen, afraid it was her mom, but it was from Court’s and Chess’s feeds. They were full of Snaps and Instagram pics from the party. The hollow ache in her chest returned. It looked like they had a blast without her.

  It didn’t take long to reach the pub. She pushed through the door and nearly tripped down the stairs when she spotted Hatta doubled over on his knees, his arms wrapped around himself. Papers lay scattered around him. Harsh coughs rattled his body as he choked on his efforts to take in air.

  “Hatta!” She flung her bag aside and dropped beside him. “What’s wrong?”

  He pushed her off, shaking his head. “Go.”

  It took a moment for her to realize what he meant. “No, I’m not leaving you.” She shifted on her knees to get a better grip on him.

  He shuddered. The feel of it traveled up her arms. He tried to pull away. “N-no … get…”

  “I’m staying here, Addison,” she barked.

  “Get.” His head snapped up as he clutched at his chest.

  Alice nearly recoiled when their eyes met. The multi-colored quality of his irises blended, melding into a burning orange like embers in a fire. The whites turned black and stuck out sharply against his sickly pale skin.

  “Oh god,” Alice whispered, her hand at her mouth.

  “Get … Maddi,” he gasped, gesturing shakily at the hallway.

  “Maddi?” Alice repeated with a glance over her shoulder. “Maddi. M-Maddi!” she shouted, tightening her hold on Hatta as he sank toward the ground.

  Alice screamed for the girl again, her fingers fisted in Hatta’s shirt as he sprawled across the floor, still, lifeless. She smoothed his hair from his face as she leaned in to make sure he was breathing. It escaped him in static pants, ragged and labored.

  “Okay, okay—okay.” She didn’t want to leave him, but she had to. She was on her feet and at the hallway in an instant. “Maddi!”

  The bartender nearly slammed into her, stumbling to a stop with a flail of limbs. “Ruckus jumps the way?” she asked, normally drowsy eyes alert.

  “Help him!” Alice raced to Hatta’s side. She hit the floor next to him, her knees punished even through her jeans.

  Maddi’s shoulders hitched. “Oh … oh no! Okay, one bird is not two.” She raced behind the bar. “I know, I know, I know.” Bottles clacked and glasses clinked as she rummaged around. Something hit the floor with a smash, and she cursed.

  Alice shifted so Hatta’s head rested on her lap. She brushed fingers through his hair and over his forehead. He was hot to the touch, but the whole of him shivered violently. She shushed him when he groaned. “It’s okay, you’re okay. You’ll be fine, I’ve got you…”

  He had to be. Thoughts of anything else tore a hole inside her.

  Maddi scrambled over, clutching what looked like an old, black iron jewelry box. She sat it down with a scrape and reached to snatch a thin gold chain from Hatta’s neck. A sliver of a key dangled at the end. Maddi shoved it into the top of the box and twisted. The lid creaked open.

  Alice clutched Hatta as the other girl lifted small vials filled with various colored liquids up to the light, shaking them one by one before replacing them. When Maddi finally found whatever she was looking for, she tore the cork free with her teeth.

  “Wide the door,” Maddi cooed as she tipped the vial against Hatta’s lips. When it was empty, Maddi leaned in and pressed her ear to Hatta’s chest. Everything fell deathly still, quiet, as they waited. For what, Alice wasn’t sure.

  Her fingers tapped Hatta’s shoulders. Her body jostled his as her knees bounced.

  “Still,” Maddi snapped.

  Alice froze, throat working in a thick swallow.

  Pleasepleaseplease …

  “Too much of nothing.” Maddi straightened and went through the selection process again, pouring another vial down his throat, then listening at his chest. “Come on, come on.” Her hands shook as she searched a third time.

  Hatta’s breath sputtered and choked, like an engine on the verge of giving out.

  Alice squeezed his hand. “You will live,” she whispered, her fingers wound around his. “You’ll be okay. A-are you listening?” Shivers wracked her body. Tears blurred her vision. She shook her head then bent forward, her brow pressed to his. “Come back to me.”

  Eleven

  CONTAGIOUS

  The clinking of vials, like the distant ringing of bells, sung a sorrowful melody. Maddi poured another potion down Hatta’s throat. The fifth or sixth, Alice had lost count.

  As Maddi administered the potions, she chanted Verses of various lengths, the words lost beneath her breath. Another elixir tipped from her fingers before she leaned in to listen to Hatta’s chest again. “Hear me, Addison…”

  Alice couldn’t manage words, try as she might. Instead she focused on breathing, which had become increasingly difficult.

  Hatta jolted with a harsh gasp, startling both Alice and Maddi, who jerked back. His eyes flew open, rolling in his head before fixing on a point overhead. The black in his eyes lightened to gray, and the fiery glow of his irises dulled.

  “By the Breaking.” Maddi heaved a relieved sigh and leaned back on one hand while the other pressed to her face.

  A short laugh escaped Alice as she wiped her cheeks and nose with her shirtsleeve.

  Maddi checked Hatta’s vitals, holding his eyes open with her fingers to examine them, feeling for his pulse along his wrist. He didn’t seem to notice, his gaze unfocused, cloudy. At least his breathing eased and the shivering lessened, but he was still burning up. Alice brushed damp hair from his face, pausing as she noticed a change. Green strands had lightened to blue. She toyed with them while she watched Maddi work.

  “What’s going on?” Alice asked.

  “I’m … not sailing high.” Maddi gathered the empty vials scattered across the floor. She placed them in the box and snapped it shut. Alice noticed only one vial had anything left in it. Maddi locked the box, then slipped the key into her pocket.

  That wasn’t comforting. Alice continued to toy with Hatta’s hair.

  “I have…” Maddi seemed to consider her words, pausing in action as her gaze swept the room. “I have seen a sickness. Two in one. Curse and sorrow.” She held up two fingers, then tapped them together in a scissoring motion. “Two in one.”

  Alice didn’t understand. But with Maddi, she hardly ever understood. “Curse and sorrow?”

  Maddi sat back, wrapping her arms around her lifted knees. “Of brisk wings and battles.” She glanced away, her face scrunched. “Her darkness. Poisonous.”

  Her darkness. Alice had heard that phrase before, when the Black Knight first attacked her. She had a good idea who Maddi meant. “The Black Queen.”

  Maddi’s head bobbed. “Verse, powerful. A cursed, poisoned body. A winged mind.” Her shoulders hunched, and she sank behind her knees even more. “Bad crows, over and over. In here.”
She tapped the side of her head. “It’s called the Madness.”

  Alice frowned. “It … what?”

  “Dreams are not in Wonderland.” Maddi’s voice was so soft, Alice barely heard the words. “The hungry dark.” Maddi swallowed. “Everything gone to near away.”

  With each word, the fist around Alice’s heart tightened its grip, until she felt she might break. She had no idea what was going on. “I don’t … I don’t understand. What’s wrong with Addison?”

  Maddi pushed to her feet, disappeared behind the bar with the box, and emerged empty-handed a moment later, glass crunching under her feet. “Maybe is a word.”

  What the hell does that even mean? “Whatever it is, can you cure it?”

  Maddi shrugged, her lips trapped between her teeth. “Can’t say, no how. No way, knowing not a least.”

  Great. The last thing Alice needed right now was more nonsense talk. More than usual, anyway. She looked back to Hatta, resting peacefully. The idea that this darkness was turning him inside out sent her stomach roiling. “What now?”

  “Away, away, fly to roost.”

  “I … I don’t … what?”

  Maddi made a frustrated sound before pointing at Hatta. “Rest.”

  “Oh.” Alice carefully finagled from beneath Hatta, gently laying his head against the ground. “You take that side, I’ll take this one. On three.” She shifted her hold to grip Hatta under his arm. When Maddi did the same, she started the count. “One, two, three.”

  The girls heaved. Alice nearly toppled from the momentum, surprised at how light he was. The two girls got him up, his arms over their shoulders.

  Thankfully, he stirred enough to get his feet under himself and help them propel him along the hall. Maddi called out directions, right turn, left turn. The back of the pub always seemed to grow larger and larger, expanding like some sort of mystical labyrinth.

  The three of them wound up in a room Alice had never seen before. The girls maneuvered him onto the bed, where he sank against the sheets with a faint murmur, then didn’t move again save for the steady rise and fall of his chest. Every now and then he’d twitch with a cough.

  “Sleep now, starshine.” Maddi made her way to the door.

  “That’s it?” Alice didn’t want to leave him like this. “We leave him here to suffer?”

  “Only fish flip-flop.” Maddi leveled a look at her, swallowed, breathed in slow, then pushed more words out. “There … is … nothing else. Done.” She disappeared through the door.

  Alice hesitated, glancing at Hatta. He looked relatively at peace, his color still way off, but it enhanced the otherworldly appeal he always exuded. It made him seem that much more … ethereal.

  You sound like a lovesick puppy. She forced her eyes away from him and to the rest of the room. It was similar to the one she’d been treated in, though larger, the walls darker, more rust colored than plain tan. A large portrait hung directly across from the bed, the gold frame a twisting flow of gleaming metal. The picture itself poured across the canvas in a mix of color and light. A golden castle set amid a sea of green seemed to twinkle against the painted sky of pinks and blues. Flowers and trees danced in an invisible wind.

  Impossible. Alice blinked, and the brushstrokes settled into stillness. It had to be a trick of the light, she told herself, and turned her gaze elsewhere. A few articles of clothing littered the floor, a haphazard trail she followed to a long, dark-stained dresser. A massive thing, the drawers scuffed and worn with use, knickknacks dotting the scratched surface. She plucked up one of several rings, stole a glance at the sleeping Hatta, and slid it onto her index finger. A simple band of silver, it fit perfectly. The metal warmed instantly.

  She ran her fingers across the dresser, her eyes trailing the other items: a snow globe on a stack of old books, a Ziploc bag filled with all sorts of buttons, a half-empty bottle of cologne she barely resisted the urge to smell, a set of Figment Blade daggers still in the sheaths, scattered spools of thread of different colors—all strewn among various mugs and teacups of all shapes, sizes, and materials, stacked or alone. She went to remove the ring, planning to place it back in the pile of jewelry, but she hesitated. Glancing at the sleeping Hatta, she left it on, hoping he wouldn’t mind, if he even noticed it was gone. It was some small piece of him she could keep with her and return when he recovered from … whatever this was. Grandma Kingston used to pray over little trinkets from friends and family; said it made it easier for the angels to know who she wanted them to look after.

  Shoving her hand into her back pocket, she moved for the door but paused. She peered out into the hall, then hurried over to the bed, leaned in, and brushed a kiss to his brow. “You’ll be okay.”

  “Mmm.” He barely stirred.

  Heat flushed her face and she hurried out, closing the door behind her.

  In the bar, she found Maddi sweeping up the sea of shards on the floor. The pub was gonna run out of glasses at this rate.

  “Tick-tock?” Maddi glanced up from her task.

  Alice avoided making eye contact. “Went to the bathroom, splashed some water on my face.”

  “Mmhm.” It didn’t sound like Maddi believed her.

  “What’s the plan?” Alice slid onto a stool. “Or, idea.”

  Maddi kept sweeping. “Twinkle, twinkle. Not too far. Ideas, ideas.” She paused, frowned at the floor, and then continued sweeping again. “Twinkle, twinkle, where you are.” Dustpans full of glass went into the bin. “Twinkle.”

  Alice sat and waited while Maddi worked the broom furiously and muttered to herself. No use asking questions with the other girl wound up like this. Interrupting her while she was in the zone could make her lose whatever idea she was concocting. After putting the broom away, Maddi went back behind the bar. The way she scurried around, scooping up ice, selecting strawberries from a bowl, reminded Alice of a mouse.

  “Black Queen.” Maddi said the name like it tasted rotten in her mouth. “Her darkness. The Madness.”

  The whir of the blender filled the bar. Alice sat, her thoughts a jumbled mess, much like what was once fruit, ice, and juice. She doubted the outcome of her racing mind would be as tasty. The Black Knight had to have something to do with this. None of this shit started until he showed up.

  Maddi clacked a glass on the bar.

  “Thanks,” Alice muttered as she lifted the drink to her lips.

  Maddi poured a glass for herself.

  The cool of the frozen strawberries did little to quell the unexpected burn of alcohol. She coughed, glanced at her glass and then at Maddi.

  “Eat your veggies.” Maddi shrugged as she drank her un-virgin daiquiri without flinching.

  Alice swallowed and took another sip. It didn’t sting as much this time. “He came to my house.”

  Maddi stopped fluttering about, mopping the counter, and looked at her.

  “The Black Knight. He was in my room.”

  “It cannot cast its own shadow,” she whispered, and started wiping again. “All gone.”

  Alice tugged at her hair, then wiped the excess cream against her thigh. “I really wish you’d…” She trailed off, looking at her now-clean hand. The roiling in her insides returned. “H-how did the Black Queen spread her darkness, again?”

  Maddi didn’t say anything for a moment, cleaning and reorganizing things behind the counter. She drew out a teal potion, then downed it. Groaning, she clutched at her throat, turning away to cough into a fist. For a second Alice was afraid she was choking, until she straightened and cleared her throat. “She used the Heart. It and the Eye were the source of her power.”

  Alice blinked rapidly, her head jerking back and forth. What the— She pointed at Maddi, staring. “So that’s how you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “Talk!”

  The bartender made a face. “Couldn’t I?”

  “No, I mean—you sound not riddle-y.”

  Maddi lifted the empty vial. “Helps me straighten out words fo
r human understanding. Hurts, though, so I don’t use it unless it’s important.”

  Something twisted in Alice chest. So this was how she turned into Serious Maddi. “This definitely counts. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” Maddi flapped a hand. “As I was saying, the Black Queen’s artifacts of power, born from the core of Wonderland, passed down from ruler to ruler. The Eye let her see things about people, places, things. Deep into them. Not like read their minds but, she could see them, and whatever ailed them.

  “The Heart let her connect with her people and the land, able to draw on their essence to shape and influence both. That was before she corrupted the Heart and used it for the bad things.” She went still. “She used it like a weapon. A scepter that pulled the darkness out of the ground. She sliced open her victims and poisoned them with it.”

  The whole time Maddi spoke, Alice couldn’t move. She couldn’t talk, she couldn’t think, all she could do was listen to how absolutely screwed they were. Because of her.

  No. Nonono. Gripping the edge of the counter with one hand, her eyes fixed on the other, she forced the words free. “Could … could the Black Knight do this? Infect people with this darkness, this Madness?” He shared her other powers.

  “Yes and no. Using her artifacts to command the Nox, the Black Queen forged the Vorpal Blade for her knight. He could infect others, but his power still paled in comparison to hers.” Maddi turned a curious eye in Alice’s direction. “Why?”

  The trembling had intensified to full-blown shakes now. Hatta had said she was a conduit for a powerful Verse, meant to pass it on to an intended target. “I did it,” she whispered. “It’s my fault. H-he cut my hand! He put it in me! I gave it to Addison!” She shouted now, clutching her hand against her chest as it threatened to cave in on itself with each rattling breath. “I poisoned him!”

  Twelve

  THE PUZZLE

  Alice gazed at Hatta, stretched across the bed. His chest rose and fell with erratic breaths, and his eyes rolled beneath his lids. His lips trembled as he spoke in his sleep, too quick and too quiet for her to make anything out. He jolted and twisted, as if caught in a nightmare.