Blood of Wonderland. Colleen Oakes

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      Since they had fled the stables, Morte was actually gaining weight on Wonderland’s bountiful grasses and plant life. His inky coat glistened in the sun, his muscles hard and ready. He looked healthy and strong, even with his healing wounds. Dinah was not faring as well. As she ripped into her bird meat and bread every morning, she was painfully aware that she was starving, and that each meal meant that her provisions were dwindling. What would she do when the food ran out? She had been diligent about plucking any available fruit from the trees—a Julla Tree, with its sharp and fuzzy black melons, a pink peach tree, a handful of berries. Dinah would shovel them into her mouth, her lips dark with their ripe juices. Stepping over plants and overturned logs, she walked amid countless trees stretching on forever. At night, when she settled into a thick nest of leaves or particularly soft dirt, she would set out to eat only a half loaf of her bread and always ended up eating the entire thing.

      This raw hunger was something she had never experienced. She thought of all the tarts she had thrown out, of the banquets and balls where trays had been piled high above her head; lavish displays of exotic bird breasts, creatively carved pies, bubbling wineglasses, and rich fruits. All that food, wasted; all the food she had taken for granted. This was what she thought about when she walked, when the hunger pains became so intense that she gasped out loud. Her boots, once a deep, regal red but now covered to the tip with brown mud, crunched over dead tree branches, thick foliage, and exotic orchids.

      Since the bear attack, Dinah had been more aware of how much noise she made. Hammering the tree with her sword in a moment of frenzy had no doubt attracted him. Her breathing was silent, and she tried to step softly, even when her legs felt as if they were made of iron. She tried to heighten her senses, to pay sharp attention to the wood around her. She had come within an inch of her life because she hadn’t been paying attention. It wouldn’t happen again.

      Still, it was hard not to be distracted by the beauty around her. The deeper they descended into the Twisted Wood, the more breathtaking the forest became. The soft colors of the plains gave way to deep mossy greens, their fuzzy fingers reaching ever upward on towering majesties of trunks and branches. One day, as she absently had watched a red-striped otter flit in and out of a stream, she had come very close to walking off a cliff. Behind her, Morte had given a loud snort and Dinah had stopped, the tip of her boots sending a scatter of pebbles off the cliff and down into a clear river far below. Even that had fascinated her; she had never seen such translucent water or such richly colored minerals that graced the river floor. Silver layers of rock converged upon each other, giving the entire river a rippling effect, though the water’s flow was quite mild.

      Morte had allowed her to ride him a few times in the last few days, but only when she had grown so exhausted from walking that she found herself leaning against each passing tree to keep her balance. With an annoyed snort, he would saunter beside her and lift his leg. Dinah would climb up with a grateful sigh and feel the wave of relief that came with settling onto the already warmed bear pelt, her legs draped over Morte’s neck.

      One day, lulled to sleep by his easy rhythm, she was jerked awake by the feeling of a cool shadow passing over her. Dinah looked up before letting out a small gasp. The trees had converged in a thick canopy of flowering branches, interweaving with each other to create a solid tunnel of flowers. The ground beneath, deprived of sunlight, had a soft and somewhat muddy texture and was covered by a thick maroon moss. The flowers looped down through the tunnel—pinks, purples, and glossy greens, swallowing the sky. Strange white insects buzzed within the tunnel—completely rotund, they fluttered by on petite wings that barely seemed to hold them, nesting on the dewy orchid petals, waiting for their mate. Once the mate arrived, the two little creatures somehow hooked themselves together and created a warm light that glowed from both of them. Together they would float drunkenly through the tunnel.

      Dinah was watching them in wonder when Morte gave a rough lurch under her—she was almost sent sprawling past his hindquarters, and would have been if she hadn’t had her hand wrapped in his mane. Without warning, he was running—that pure gallop she had only experienced when she was fleeing for her life. Did he sense something? Her body tensed, hunching down, but he wasn’t being chased—his steps had a lightness to them that she hadn’t felt before. He was running because he could; from his mouth erupted happy whinnies. His body flowed like water beneath her, his speed unmatched by anything Dinah had ever seen. This time she was able to enjoy it—the world flying past, the greens and purples of the tunnel blending together as they raced through. His hooves barely graced the ground. Dinah felt her black hair flying behind her, her gray cloak flapping in the wind. For the first time since she had been awakened that night by the stranger’s hand, Dinah allowed herself to smile, a smile that stretched into a laugh as Morte plunged farther and faster through the tunnel. I’m flying! she thought.

      Daring to reach one hand above her head, she let her fingers trail the heads of thousands of fuchsia orchids, their swollen tongues dripping down around her. The glowing lovebugs guided their way with subtle iridescent light, bouncing off branches and flowers, occasionally whapping Dinah across her cheeks and brow. She didn’t mind. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the swift wind on her face as Morte’s speed intensified. The tunnel ended abruptly, with two tree trunks lying squarely in the middle of their path. Morte easily leaped over them and then began to canter at a normal speed. The air was frigid on her face, which Dinah was surprised to find soaked with tears.

      Morte let her ride a bit longer that day. The more Dinah observed him, the more she understood why he had not heeded the king that day as her father had bellowed out Morte’s name in a blind rage. Morte wasn’t anything like a normal steed. He didn’t come when called, and he wasn’t to be coddled and loved, as he wouldn’t give it back. Sure, Dinah gave him any apples that she ran across, but only from a distance—tossed in the air. When her father rode him into battle, he had made the mistake of thinking Morte was fighting for him—he never understood that Morte wanted to fight for himself, that he had no loyalty to the man.

      Morte slept the nights away without a care, and Dinah watched him enviously as he slipped into the depths of slumber. At night, her thoughts wandered into dark places or even darker memories. Charles’s body, lying broken on a stone slab. His beloved servants, Lucy and Quintrell, their throats open and bloody. The sound of the trumpets blaring from the castle and the Cards who had swarmed out of it, so ready to kill their princess. The stranger, his black figure silhouetted in front of her balcony, the way his hand had wrapped around her mouth, truly the most terrifying moment of her life. She thought about Wardley and his brown curls. Wardley, who had saved her. Wardley, who was probably in the Black Towers, black roots twisting into his body, into his brain, hollowing him from the inside out.

      When she finally did fall asleep, she drifted from one bizarre nightmare to another. The night before, Dinah dreamed that she had awakened to the sound of someone crying softly. Curiosity propelled her forward, and she came to a large clearing in the trees, where one of the Heart Cards she had killed sat on a log, softly playing a lute, a cat lounging lazily on his shoulder. Dinah had sat at his feet and listened to his weeping song as blood flowed down his chest, a crimson river creeping closer and closer to her white nightgown. She woke up screaming, covered in a cold sweat, and was unable to fall asleep until dawn began its slow rise.

      Dinah’s days, however, in the untamable wood were consumed with thoughts about her mother. Dinah had always tried her best not to think on Davianna. Her father had forbidden her to speak Davianna’s name in his presence. In a way she was grateful to him for the excuse—it was easier than facing the raw grief, the gray wave of nothingness that would roll over her if she lingered on her feelings for just a moment. But here, she was at the mercy of her memories during endless hours of walking. The good thing about Morte was that he didn’t care if Dinah wept as she walked, or if she spent an hour staring off into the hazy wood. Remembering Davianna was a gift that Dinah gave herself—she needed to feel close to someone out here in the wilderness.

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