Many Happy Years Ago…

Tarrant's eye twitched as he hurriedly made his way from Hightopp manor to Witzend.

I let this happen- I wasn't thinking, I should have brought a spare with me but I wasn't thinking! The craft, the craft- the Spade will have his order on time, it will be perfect!

Beside him, and skipping lightly down the trail, was Lian. The youngest of his clan- his sister, after a fashion. The girl wore one of his earliest works of the season, a knit cap in her favorite color, bright teal. A gift for her birthday that he'd presented after the tea was slurped and the cake was served. This particular cap had a row of decorative yellow buttons sewn along the side.

"Why are we going into town, Tarrant?" The girl asked. She always had so many questions; she wasn't like him, made mad either by birth or by trade. She was, at times, too irritatingly logical to bear for more than a few minutes at a stretch.

Tarrant sighed. Baby-sitting was a burden he could not carry while in the middle of such an important project- this fedora was his first work for the Court of Marmoreal and if anything went wrong, his career would be in jeopardy. To be parted from Mirana...he couldn't face that possibility.

"It's for the Spade Knight's fedora. I've almost finished it but my spool is empty- there is more thread at the palace, but it must be finished now!"

"Why now?" Lian pressed.

"It is a matter of professional integrity- I told the Knight it would be ready first thing in the morning, and I can't break my promise." Tarrant stepped over a fallen log. Nothing must get in his way!

Lian took up a stick and dragged it behind her. "Will you teach me the hatting trade the way Mortan taught you?"

"I will teach you all I know, Lian."

"Well...I like flowers more than I like hats." She confided.

Tarrant glanced down at her and gave the girl a smile. He was anxious to complete his errand and return to work, but he would not be unkind. "Then they will call you Gardener when the time comes for you to begin your work at the Marmoreal Court."

Lian smiled back at him. "We're getting close to the village- will you buy me a flower, brother?"

He looked ahead and his sharp eyes took in the many shops and stores of the village. "Yes, yes. Anything you want. I'll find you once I find my thread."

The forest opened to reveal the crossing blocks of Witzend and Tarrant released his hold on Lian's small hand.

"Goodbye, Tarrant. I know once you find your thread you'll make the Spade Knight very happy!"

He waved and watched for a moment as the girl headed to the flower shop, the one place she always insisted on visiting when he took her into town.

Mad as he was, Tarrant found his sister to be strange. The girl liked flowers more than tea, more than hats, more than candy, even! While there was a certain family resemblance in her coloring, she wasn't like him or his father; Lian wasn't mad at all.

Tarrant thought a moment. Perhaps he should teach her the trade so that she would become mad, and then make a more fitting companion for him.

But the thread.

Tarrant blinked and started to make his way toward the center of Witzend Square, passing the butcher and blacksmith on his way. He had heard the news of a dress shop that had opened on the far side of the square- surely a seamstress would have a spare spool of midnight black thread!

And it had to be midnight black- no other shade of thread could be used on the hat now. Any other color would be a crime.

Tarrant paused outside of the shop. The storefront read Issa's Day Dresses & Gowns.

Ah, this is the place- they must have the thread!

He stepped into the shop and for a moment he could only stare, the plea for midnight black dying in his throat.

The man's world stopped as his eyes feasted on the colors flooding his vision. Wire mannequins were placed about the floor of the shop, modelling the most delicate, beautiful gowns that he had ever seen. Empire waists, jeweled straps, backless gowns- all in a riot of colors so exquisite and so unique that Tarrant felt a pit form in the bottom of his stomach. The seamstress who had crafted these living artworks must be a master, and here he was, a young hatter anxious over his first commission to the court.

Somehow, an unfinished fedora seemed a very small thing when placed beside the gowns of this shop.

Not even the dresses worn by the young princess are so...I must meet this Issa!

The gowns were crafted with such precision, such skill. He knew next to nothing of dress-making, but he knew what he liked; Tarrant was sure that he had never before encountered such a talent. Drawn in, he reached forward to brush his fingertips along the skirt of the nearest gown. The material...it was like draping liquid, a sensual cascade of deep jade silk. Helpless, his eyes slipped closed with the pleasure of it.

"Are you just going to browse all day?"

The question brought Tarrant's mind back to the present. Who spoke to me? I was certain I heard someone.

He looked about the shop but he could see no one.

Frowning now, he moved to the counter at the back of the shop. He had to pass several more display gowns to do so, but with his returned clarity came renewed focus. The thread. His hat could not be finished without the thread.

He frowned. There was no seamstress tending at the counter, as he might have expected, only a cat; a large striped cat was simply lounging on the counter, displaying a terrible work ethic as it licked its left paw.

"Where is the owner of this shop, cat? I am in dire need of a spool of midnight black thread."

"Why are you asking him? He's only a cat."

It was a second voice, a woman. Tarrant turned around to find a young woman standing directly behind him. He started, both from surprise and a...feeling that he could not name. A kind of startled feeling that put him on his guard. For a moment, he could only stare.

This young woman- she was unlike any of the other women he'd seen in Witzend and looking at her, oh...

"Only a cat, she says. If you keep this up, Issa, I won't allow you to scratch my back every night before bed."

Tarrant blinked. This woman was the talent behind the gowns fit for a queen? She was so young and so...

His pulse quickened. "I- Issa? Is that your name?"

The young woman smiled at him with her eyes. Such unique, exotic eyes. "Yes, I am Issa. And you…you were looking for midnight black thread, yes?"

Tarrant reached to shake her hand. "Yes. I'm a hatter by trade."

Issa held onto his hand and turned it, examining his skin. "I thought as much from the stains on your fingertips. Forgive my forwardness, you see I'm new to Witzend. Do you have your own shop?"

He took his hand back. His skin felt strange where she'd touched him. "No, no. I…I have a place in the palace."

Issa moved around him and went behind the counter. "Tarrant…would you believe that you're the first man I've met since opening the doors of my shop?"

He felt strange inside of himself- he could not stop looking at Issa, but the longer he stared, the stranger he felt. Was it his madness?

"I'm the first?"

The cat swirled through the air in lazy circles above them. "Ah, the hatter's not only mad, but deaf as well. You're two of a kind."

Issa shook her head. "Ignore the cat, he becomes jealous so easily."

Tarrant's eyes widened at her. "You're mad?"

Issa smiled lightly and leaned in close to whisper, "Oh, yes. Mad as a hatter, perhaps. But I am much happier this way."

The man could only stare at her, stunned. She was so...so...

Issa slipped a spool of the desired thread into his hand. "No charge for that thread, Tarrant, so long as I see you again soon."

She's wonderfully mad!

Tarrant smiled and nodded. "Yes, I'll return. I'll come back tomorrow."

Issa's unique eyes watched after him as he backed out of the shop. "And I'll be counting the minutes."

The cat only shook his head.

They had not left the upstairs workshop. Alice sat on the floor, her legs folded under her in the same spot where she'd been standing only minutes ago. The heat had died in her just as quickly as it had flared with the Hatter's touch on her skin.

Several tears had coursed down her cheeks, leaving salted tracks in their wake. Hatter had moved away from her, needing space for himself. Space to breathe without catching Alice's scent. Space to think without his mind becoming clouded.

Alice ventured forth a question. "Will you tell me more about your family?"

She did not want to hurt the Hatter with her curiosity, but she felt that speaking of these people who meant the world to him, letting out his pain, voicing his regrets- she felt it was helping him.

Hatter sat on the floor, leaning against the wall and resting his elbows over his bent knees. He looked up at her, and Alice was relieved to see that his face was still a palette of color, rather than the ashen gray it became with his self-imposed restraint over his own madness.

He was being himself now, and entrusting his truth to her. Alice would not abuse his trust. No, never that.

"Some. Ask me questions, not riddles."

She licked her lips before asking him a question to which she already knew the answer. She only wanted to hear him say it. "Who did my room belong to?"

Hatter shifted slightly, took a deep breath. "It was hers. Issa's, in the time before she came to share mine."

"She lived here with your family before you were married?"

"Yes. It was my doing, it was the only way I could have her close. She had a dress shop in Witzend, it is where I first noticed her. I learned that she had been sleeping in the back room of her shop until she could earn enough to buy her own house. She had no family, no clan- there was a rumor that she had come from…somewhere else."

Hatter tapped his shoes together three times.

"Somewhere else, like me?"

He giggled then, a sharp sound piercing the somber air of the room. "No one is sure! Not even me, Issa made a game of it, always trying to make me guess. I cleared the room for her and invited her to stay. We were of like mind, Alice. She wanted to be here as much as I did."

Alice frowned. His heartache pierced her. "Hatter, why did you give me her old room?"

He took a breath and stood up. He reached down to her, offering his hand.

Alice took his hand and Hatter pulled her to stand. He turned around to let her replace her dress.

"I…I think, if Issa was here, she would have happily given you her room. She would have given you anything. And...she doesn't need it, where she is now. Issa will never return to this house, there is nothing left for her here."

The Hatter opened the door of her bedroom and simply stood to the side as Alice stepped over the threshold.

Alice paused a few steps into the room and turned back to face him. If this was to be the end of them tonight, Alice felt that she had to say something- what the man had shared with her warranted further words of kindness. "Hatter?"

He had been turning to leave, but he looked up to meet her eyes. "Alice."

She took a deep breath. "I'm sorry that all of this has happened. You didn't deserve this, no one does. I wish I could change things for you."

Hatter shifted his weight as he stood in the hallway. He shook his head. "Do not be sorry, please. I can't take another soul being sorry for me. They think I can't see it, but I do. The looks and the whispering. They're all sorry for me, and they're all afraid of me."

"What? Who is?"

"The Court of Marmoreal." He stated plainly. "When I went back to the palace to Mirana after the terrible day- she could see it in me, Alice."

The Hatter was telling her a story now, one with no plot or direction. Alice took a step toward him. "See what, Hatter? What could Mirana see?"

"The darkness!" He yelled, startling her. When he spoke again his voice was far gentler. "That monster tore out my heart and filled it with this- this blackness I'd never known before. Mirana knew. I went to her after I found what was left of my clan- nothing but trifles. She was my friend for so long, and after the end of clan Hightopp, it was the young queen who knew me best. And Mirana could see it. She could see I was…fading. I was fading away and changing into something else. The dark thing. The thing that would make me a killer, and I wanted to kill, Alice. I wanted the Knave. That dark thing in me wanted his blood more than I wanted my family."

Inside, Alice's heart was singing. Hatter's confessions were painful for her to bear, but the truths rising from the man were proof of the trust he'd placed in her. This was what Alice wanted; a true friend, not a childish playmate. In placing his trust in Alice, the Hatter was becoming the friend Alice had always secretly longed for in London.

Yes, Hatter was her true friend...and perhaps more, now...

Alice took another step closer, her attempt at bridging the gap between them. "You might have killed the Knave on Frabjous Day."

His eyes were wide and wet at his confession, his voice growing thick. "I was close. I wanted him terrified, Alice, I wanted him twisting and bleeding and screaming…but I didn't kill him. I couldn't. That dark thing in me was ready to- but I couldn't do it."

"Why not?"

He blinked at her. "I...I stopped when I saw that you'd slain the Jabberwocky, and you hadn't killed that beast because you hated it, or because hurting a living thing gave you any pleasure. You slayed the monster because you had to- because the Oraculum decreed that only Alice could slay the Jabberwocky. You killed the beast to save all of Underland, not because you had a dark thing living inside of you screaming for revenge, as I had for so long."

The man paused to take a deep breath. When he went on, his voice carried a vivid tone of hope. "But on the Frabjous Day, I learned that I am not that thing, Alice. It is a part of me, but only a part. A small, horrible part of me. For years, I have been afraid of it overwhelming me. I had the Knave, but I couldn't do it. It is as you said. Issa…none of my clan would have wanted me to become a killer, a dark thing. To kill the Knave would see everything I was to them and to you, all of me would be unmade. If had killed the Knave, I would no longer be myself. I chose to allow Mirana, our White Queen, to mete out justice."

Alice felt tears well in her eyes for him. For his pain, for his courage. She stepped to him and took his hands into hers. "I- Hatter, I think if they were here, your family would be so proud of you. I've met soldiers before, in London. Sometimes my father would invite them to the house to discuss the security of his business. I would overhear them, bragging over their kills in combat. It is a weak man who brags over killing, Hatter. You're not like them and you are nothing like the Knave. You're not a killer and you are not cruel. You have some darkness in you now, but that dark part of you will not win."

Hatter looked away from her for a moment. "You said I hurt you on the balcony."

Alice swallowed. "It's nothing."

He looked back to her and tightened his grip on her hands. "Let me see, please."

She tried to pull away from him but he did not release her. "I don't think that's-"

"Alice, did I hurt you in the White palace?"

"Oh, it- it's not that bad, Hatter. Honest, the bruises aren't even-"

"Bruises? I bruised you?"

Alice looked away from his searching eyes. "Just some, on my arms from where you were holding me. It's nothing."

Without warning, Hatter pulled her forward into his embrace. "I'm sorry. It was me, but that darkness, the rage- I become another man. I hate him, I want to send him away forever. Alice, may I see what I did to you?"

Alice looked up at him. "You're sure that you want to see my bruises?"

Hatter released her from his embrace and knelt down before her, a position of his plea for forgiveness. "Yes. I've never hurt anyone before, not even in my anger. Let me see what I've done to you so that I might never do such a thing again. Please."

Alice hesitated a moment, but the earnest expression over the Hatter's face convinced her. Her dress sleeves were too thick for her to simply push them up to her shoulders to reveal the skin he sought. There was only one way to show him.

"Turn your eyes, Hatter."

The man did as he was asked, and respectfully turned his back to her for modesty's sake.

Alice moved quickly, sure that she had gone mad somewhere within the past few minutes. This was something she'd never dreamed of doing, but it seemed that her muchness was running right over her reason.

I could never do this in London, never! I would be ruined...but I am not in London. The rules of home are a world away...

Her reaction to the Hatter's careful hands in the workshop had been a frightening, thrilling experience. Alice wondered if she was becoming a wicked creature, offering herself to Hatter in this way. But, she wasn't offering herself, was she? No. No, surely not.

Alice wasn't sure what she felt any longer. It was as if her thoughts were no longer her own.

But she was wasting time, and the Hatter was not a patient character; he might turn at any moment and see her exposed breasts.

What would happen if he did?

Alice slipped out of the top of her dress and shift, and then brought her bedsheet up to cover her chest. She sat on the edge of her bed and cleared her throat, signalling to him that she was ready.

From behind her, Alice could hear the Hatter gasp. Whether from the sight of the dark bruises circling the top of her arms or the sight of her naked back, Alice did not know.

The man came forward to sit on the bed behind her, his eyes taking in the bruises banding around the tops of her arms. He couldn't help himself; he reached forward and curled his hands lightly over the bruises, holding her from behind. Hatter dipped his head, pressing his forehead into the soft heat at the nape of her neck.

"Alice, I…it was me. I did this."

She clutched the sheet more tightly to her chest and turned to him. "No, Hatter. You mustn't think that."

"I hurt you, I did this, a great bad thing."

"Stop that. I don't blame you, and so you can't blame yourself for what happened. That's in the past. Things have changed. You can feel that, can't you?" Alice reached a hand forward to lay over his heart.

She was pleading with him, but for what, Alice could not put into words.

"I can."

The longer the Hatter watched her, the stronger Alice felt the return of that thrilling, terrifying sensation she'd felt when he'd had his hands on her, guiding the cool slickness of his measuring tape over her skin. It wasn't natural, this feeling; Alice was torn between the need to run from him and to do something…wicked.

Is Underland changing me into one of the nymphs? This isn't me!

The air in the room seemed to change as their silence stretched forward. Hatter looked away from her then. "I'm going to start on your first dress. If I work through the night I can have it finished by the morning."

"You don't have to do that for me."

"Of course I do. I made a promise."

Hatter stood from her bed and started toward the door. Had she been clothed, Alice would have followed him. She stopped him with her voice instead.

"You never wrote down my measurements."

Hatter turned back and smiled, tapping on his left temple, "They're all right up here. Believe me, I'm better with measurements than I am with my memories."

Alice closed the door behind Hatter and waited, listening to his retreating footsteps. She shut her eyes and pressed her forehead against the cool wood of the door.

What happened to me? It was Hatter- his hands on me...touching me all over...

The hour had grown late, somehow, though Alice felt sure that she and the Hatter had returned from Witzend only a moment or two before. Time was different in Underland. It must be, for Alice's confusion.

But then, the man's confessions were lengthy- and the emotional toll weighed heavily on her mind. As did the heat Alice had felt with the Hatter in the workshop.

What am I becoming?

Alice shivered, recalling the scene: she in nothing but her shift, standing still as the Hatter circled her, grazing his hands and his tape all over her. He couldn't have known of her feelings, Alice was sure, for, while she had gained her first glimpse of what passion may be, her poor Hatter had fallen into a living memory of intimacy with his wife.

Issa. I'm so sorry that Hatter was left alone in the world- I think, given the choice, he would still rather be with you and the rest of Hightopp clan. But you all died that horrible day. I want Hatter to be happy, and I know if you still lived that you want happiness for him as well. Issa, I will help him. Somehow, I will help him.

Alice lifted her head from the door and fanned herself with her hand. She felt hot, near feverish from all that had happened in the day. So much. Too much.

She moved to her bed and removed her dress, leaving her in her shift once more. She felt better, cooler, but somehow bereft. There was no Hatter to guide her movements, no exciting drag of cool tape against her skin.

Alice was alone in the dark of a bedroom that had once housed her friend's long dead wife.

Sleep could not come soon enough.

Alice had only just begun to drift off into a dreamscape when something brushed across her face. She started awake, her eyes trying to adjust to the dark. She felt it. There was another presence in the room with her.

"Hatter? Is that you?"

"I'm sorry to disappoint you." Replied a deep, and rather bored voice.

A large, bright pair of eyes opened from nothing in the air before her, and Alice could see a small weight settle down on the corner of her bed. The body of the cat came into view, until he was solid enough that Alice could no longer see the footboard through his form.

"Chessur!" Alice smiled and sat up to speak with the cat.

"Who else?"

"What are you doing here?"

The cat's body rolled onto its back, stretching languidly, even as his head remained facing forward. As unnerving as the sight should have made her, Alice found herself smiling at him.

"I just came for a visit. The palace isn't as peaceful as it once was."

"What do you mean? Is everyone all right?"

Chessur flicked his tail. "Oh, yes, every last one of Bayard and Bielle's pups have full run of the castle- there isn't a corner I can evaporate to without them finding me, but I dare them to try finding me here."

Relieved, Alice laughed. "And here I thought you might have come just because you missed us."

"Only you, love. I've had to watch my step around Tarrant for so long that I hardly know how to speak with him."

"You're afraid of Hatter?" She asked.

"There's nothing to fear when I can evaporate away from him, but all the same I'd rather not hear him curse me in Outlandish."

Alice thought back to the Hare's tea party. "At the table, when I first met with him, why did he yell at you that way?"

The cat regarded her for a moment before blinking and licking his lips. "It's a long story. I'll tell you if you scratch behind my ears."

His request came so easily that Alice couldn't help laughing. "You really are a cat, aren't you? It's hard to remember that sometimes."

"A cat is my natural shape, what makes it hard to remember?" He asked as he moved toward her.

To Alice's surprise, Chessur curled into her lap in the same way a favored pet might; it was a testament to his true nature.

"It's just that the cats can't talk in my world, that's all."

"They must be terribly boring, then." Chessur yawned. "My ears now, if you please."

Shrugging, Alice began to scratch his head, just behind his ears as he'd asked. "Is that all right?"

"Yes, don't stop." He purred. "You've had some practice with this."

"I have a cat in London. Dinah. My father gave her to me a few years ago as a birthday gift."

"Mmm. Is she pretty?"

Alice thought on that. What would appear attractive to a cat? Or to Hatter, for that matter? "I think she is. She's a small cat, mostly gray with white socks and a flame on her face."

"And her eyes?"

"A sort of pale yellow. I suppose she would seem very plain when compared to the other cats like you. There are others like you, aren't there, Chessur?"

His head turned around to face her, "Yes, a few."

"Do you have a family?"

"Everyone is born from another, yes, I have family but I don't know where they are. Cats are not notoriously social, Alice. Not like dogs or humans."

Alice nodded. "Then you are a little like the cats in my world. They like to be left alone too."

"As they should- dogs are obnoxious in every world." Chessur yawned again and purred as Alice focused on that one spot just behind his left ear...

Alice smiled wryly, thinking how strange it was to be cuddling an animal with such a talent for evaporating, as he called it. "Chessur, will you tell me?"

"Hmm? Oh, yes, your hands are perfection, Alice."

"I meant about the Hatter, Chessur."

The car twisted in her lap, presenting his stomach. Alice obliged and continued to scratch him. "Right. It is no great tale, just that Tarrant blames me for not saving his wife. He doesn't understand. I was there, Alice. For all my evaporating skill when I'm calm, I can't do it in fear. I couldn't save Issa, it was a miracle I saved myself."

The cat's calm explanation was to be expected, but Alice didn't like to think long on the Hatter holding such anger toward his friend for so many years.

"If the Hatter knows that then why does he blame you?"

"He never knew such pain before that day. None of us did. He's hated me all this time because when he looks at me, he sees her."

"Her?" Alice pressed.

"Issa." The cat clarified, stretching in her lap, so enjoying the drag of her nails over his belly.

"And why is that?"

"Because when I first met Tarrant, I was Issa's."

Alice stopped scratching him. "Wait- you were Issa's pet?"

The cat frowned at her. "No! I've never been anyone's pet. But, Issa was a lovely and kind woman. I came upon her on the road to Queast when I was barely more than a kitten. She'd told me that she was on her way to Witzend, intent to open a shop of her own. She had a talent for making dresses, though I can't say if her work was any good. Clothes are the humans' worry. She gave me a bit of her lunch and invited me to go with her. Well, it was go with her to Witzend or it was to continue floating about Underland by myself, looking for amusement. I chose her, just as she chose me."

"And what did you do once you arrived in Witzend?" Alice asked.

The cat turned and bumped his head under her hand, making his want known to her. Alice obliged and began to scratch him once more. The cat purred loudly, his body vibrating against Alice's thigh. "Ah...well, Issa worked in a fabric shop owned by a friend of hers. Soon she'd saved just enough to open her own shop in town. It was a nice shop, and Issa would allow me to sit near the window. I used to spend hours just staring at the people passing by. Ah, yes, to the right please."

"I had no idea of all this, Chessur." Alice was surprised at the cat's revelations to say the least.

With the cat filling in pieces of Hatter's history, the full story was becoming clearer to her...and...in the strangest way, Alice felt that she was growing fond of Issa, this talented, determined woman who had once held the heart of her friend.

"Of course you didn't. This isn't your world, how could you be expected to know anything?"

"You're right. Hatter has told me some things. I think in time he might heal and tell me the rest."

"That may take weeks. I was there, I could tell you everything now." The cat hinted.

Alice thought on his offer. It was tempting; if she knew more about the Hatter's past, then she would know how to approach her friend in confronting it. But Hatter clearly did not like it when others spoke to her about him, his madness or his family. He'd called his beloved Mirana a gossip, and as things with Hatter and Chessur were only recently reconciled, Alice thought it might be best to leave the Hatter's history alone for the night.

"Thank you, Chess. But I think I'll let Hatter tell me on his own. He's finally come to trust me enough to tell me part of his story. Things are changing."

The cat twisted in her lap again. "They always do. A little to the left now, please."

"Alice, come round, are you awake yet?"

Alice frowned and opened her eyes. The Hatter was knocking at her door, calling to her. She looked about the room for Chessur, but the cat must have disappeared during the night, perhaps intent to find someone else to scratch his back after Alice had fallen asleep with him in her lap.

"Only just, what time is it?"

On the other side of her bedroom door, Hatter smiled. "Time has stopped for a bit, I suppose he deserved a vacation after the lead up to the Frabjous Day. But you must ready yourself for the White Queen. A bird came by with her summons."

She moved out of the bed and went to the door, though she did not open it to see him. Alice was not trying to be rude, but she was only wearing her shift, and after everything she had realized in the workshop, she thought it would be better to face him when she was clothed.

"She wants to see me?"

"No, Lady Mirana has asked for me, and I don't have the heart to leave you alone here. Spiders make dreadful company, they're impossible to ignore. We must start out for the castle."

Alice frowned, "I haven't any clothes but what I slept in."

"There were no clothes in your parting bundle?"

In the bundle left for Alice, there had been many wonderful things- a green scarf, a pair of walking boots and night slippers, a pair of silver earrings and a necklace, a parcel of caramels and a hairpin- but no functional clothing.

"No, is there a place in the house where I can wash my dress before we leave for the palace?"

Never mind that Alice had no idea how to wash clothes as the servants of her family home in London had always attended to such things, and she didn't fancy the idea of having to wait in her shift, but it would be much better than wearing her dirty dress through another day.

She could hear rushed footsteps in the hallway, and then the creaking of her ceiling as he'd apparently run upstairs and then back down again. "Hatter?"

"Not to worry, Alice. I keep my promises, it's a matter of professional integrity."

Alice hurriedly stepped back as Hatter opened the bedroom door just wide enough to get his hand through, and he showed her a dress dangling from a hanger.

It was the pale yellow he'd promised, a soft, summery day dress the shade of a canary's tailfeather, with a skirt shorter than anything Alice had ever worn before. To her delight, there was a deep blue ribbon meant to cinch the waist. It was lovely, everything Hatter had promised her.

"I couldn't sleep a wink last night and so thought to make myself useful."

Alice lifted the hanger from his hand and he closed the door once more as she held the dress and marveled at the soft texture of the material, the daring length of the skirt- why, she would be exposed up to her knees, she'd never seen anything like it!

"Oh, Hatter, this is just beautiful..."

"I hope it fits. Issa once told me that whoever the dress is made for should try it on many times to be sure its a perfect match, but I did not wish to wake you."

Alice shook her head, feeling the sharp sting of tears welling in her eyes. She was grateful that he could not see her through the door that separated them.

He is so wonderful, how will I ever be able to leave Underland?

She cleared her throat, "I'm sure it'll be fine, Hatter, now that I'm the right-proper Alice size."

In the hallway, Hatter giggled, "That you are. Please, put on the dress, for we must leave soon."

Alice did as he asked and pulled the light garment over her head. "I never knew you to be so concerned with time."

"Not always, no. But even a mad man does not dawdle in the face of the royal summons."