Heart Knight

"No, that's the Jabberwocky," Russell corrected, then pointing at another painting. "That's the Cheshire Cat."

"Well, both creatures are equally ugly so it's suiting either way," I muttered.

The actual avatar of Envy's identity was a violet and pink striped fat cat twisting its torso, almost as if it was spiraling out of the brackens and leaves. The picture was nearly as identical, if not more authentic, as the cartoon one. They both sported the same creepiness: wide eyes, impossibly wide grins, waggling eyebrows. But what was the creepiest was the human-like face on an animal's body—it was creepy to the beyond beyond. Huh, no wonder that stupid puss was entitled to be the Cheshire Cat.

"The Cheshire Cat is supposedly impossible to take sight of, if not the chance may be non-existent," he said.

I blinked and looked at him, curious. "Why?"

"Well…" he exhaled, eyes turning to the ceiling, "since the beginning of Wonderland, there was a man and a woman who discovered a gem housing some sort of ultimate power, and with that power they became immortal lords—the Lord of Light and the Mistress of Dark..."

The abiding couple were worshipped by the people due to their indescribable power, and later they had seven children—the Deadly Sins—who were born with the similar power and immortality. However, one day, one of the Sins rebelled against his mother and fled elsewhere to establish his own kingdom. Another son abhorred his father for some reason and did the same thing as the other son in a different region.

The Mistress grew distraught (Russell said it wasn't about the rising kingdoms but something else—I wasn't too sure about that), and so she ordered her most obedient son to construct a castle in honor of her. Despite the glamorous palace made, she wasn't satisfied still and decided to have another one, this time by her slaves (in which, in my opinion, was weird).

Then an uprising was stirring, causing a war. The three kingdoms went head on, and the first kingdom crumbled because the Lord of Light disappeared mysteriously before the night of the attack, leaving his people with no leader. No one knew what happened to the Mistress of Dark or her children who were with her. The two empires stood, but as time passed on, the two castles evolved into kingdoms as well.

Millenniums went by and the independent Sins and the Sin who made a castle and the Mistress who made her slaves make her a castle ruled behind their fortresses. However, it was becoming a tedious task, and so they abandoned their thrones and selected human kings.

"The Deadly Sins who ruled were the only ones remembered for their monarchy: the Cheshire Cat, Griffin, and Jabberwocky," Russell explained. "But with them gone, nobody was able to find them; it was as if they vanished."

"Wow. Took you that long to answer me one question," I snorted. Not that I minded, anyway. Normally, I would find history to be boring, conversely, my interest reached its highest peak as Russell went on explaining Wonderland's olden times.

"I would have figured you would bombard me with questions." He shrugged.

I waved my hand dismissively. "Meh. It was nice to know, anyway. So, tell me, what's this gem containing power?"

"I don't know, not even Fletcher, and he's the historian's star pupil." It explained so much on the extent of his knowledge.

"Does his teacher know?" I asked.

"I'm not sure. Likely not," Russell said. "I heard that it was a complex research seeing how it came to be ages ago. They're working on a technique to revive the material, in hopes of solving the case."

I frowned. "Wouldn't they want the power themselves when they accomplish it?"

"I suspected as much, but Fletcher has complete trust in them, not to mention complete admiration." He rolled his eyes. "It's as if they were royalty themselves and he's there in person."

"Hmm." My eyes drifted to another painting. It was a girl with black hair and dark eyes and pale skin. It was relatively one of those pretty faced portraits, like the Mona Lisa, however, there was a peculiar trait about her: there were feathers. Black-red feathers grew on the ends of her hair, the edges of her face, and her arm undersides. I would have imagined that she had a tail to go with her image. "Who's this?"

He looked at where I was looking at. "Oh, that's just a knight who was accompanying a visiting prince from the Kingdom of Spade. We didn't meet personally; I just caught a glimpse of her and was intrigued of her appearance."

"I must say," I mused, "you have one heck of a memory. Or is it roughly estimated?"

"Both. There were distinct details that I recalled while the rest I drew freely."

Leaning closer, I made out the shades and colors put in to bring out a picture like this. And strangely, the more I look at her, the more familiar she appeared. I wonder why…

"Wait, Kingdom of Spade? Prince?" I straightened my back, turning back at him.

He nodded. "Sometimes heirs would visit to strengthen the alliance between kingdoms."

"That makes sense. What are the other kingdoms?"

"Well, there's the Spade, Clover, Diamond, and Heart. The Kingdom of Heart is where we are ruled under by."

That's where I needed to go.

Before I had the chance to speak, Russell interrupted by saying, "Which reminds me, I better get back to the castle tomorrow morning."

"Hey, do you think you can take me with you?" I asked.

"What? Why?" He then shook his head. "Oh never mind, I know what you're going to say."

I raised an eyebrow. "You do?"

"Yes I do. Being a foreigner, you can't help but be curious, can you?"

Well then… "How'd you ever guess?"

"A lot of brainstorming," he joked.

"Right. So can you take me?"

"I'm not sure, Ed. I mean, there's a possibility that I might get in trouble…"

"C'mon, please?"

After a ton of (forced) begging, he sighed and relented.

"Yes!" came my cheer.

When we came down, Fletcher had already prepared dinner. "Smells great, Fletcher," I commented, nearly salivating at the sight of food set out on the table.

There was a faint blush on his cheeks. "Thank you, Miss Edward."

"Fletcher, I told you that you don't have to be so formal with me."

"I-I'm sorry, but it's just that…that you're my very first foreigner. It's hard not to get excited," he chuckled, sounding nervous. Oh, he was excited alright. So excited that he tackled me with ridiculous inquiries here and there. Such as, 'Do males wear dresses and women pants in your world?' or 'Do you leash your dogs? Or do the dogs leash their owners?'

The brothers discovered that I was a foreigner not too long ago when I first met Russell. Initially, he was suspicious. And why wouldn't he? Being a knight (to put it modernly, a high standard officer) simply out doing his duties when all of a sudden he witnessed a girl being hightailed by the big and scary Tweedle Dum would bring ideas. I cleared the belief that I murdered someone and the scent of blood got on me, causing Gluttony to chase after me.

The explaining of me being a foreigner got them hooked. Apparently, foreigners really were a rarity, and Fletcher almost fainted on the spot. Weird though, everyone else was okay with me not being a resident.

On his behalf, Fletcher felt so embarrassed of his older brother's accusations that he made him take me to his room and give me a tour of his paintings. I admit, it was damn awkward at first, but thanks to the many interesting paintings I had questions running. It turned out that we were stuck in his room for three hours straight.

"So everything went well?" the little brother asked.

"Sure did. Never would I have thought a foreigner would be this curious about Wonderland," Russell chuckled before taking a sip of his water.

Those two weren't so bad once you get to know them. Well, Fletcher couldn't be considered to be anything but nice by default. It was just the suspicion from Russell that had me worried, but it's all over now. Besides, I haven't heard them say a word about me being short! About damn time.

/00/

The next morning, Fletcher gave me a shirt and overalls (ugh, I hate overalls) and was sheepish about that he couldn't provide me any female clothing. The dress that I wore before was bloody and ripped, basically nothing more than trash, so I told him to throw it away.

Russell came down wearing his knave uniform, and I got to admit that he sure looked spiffy in it. I mean, just saying.

"She's where she usually is," Fletcher said casually, as if what he said really wasn't necessary but it was too much of a habit to suppress.

"Who's 'she'?" I asked.

Russell sent me a grin. "I'll show you."

At the back of the house was a stable, and in the stable were a terrible smell and a horse. A big white horse that you would see princes would ride on them in fairy tales. As he threw on a saddle, he said, "She's a beaut, isn't she?"

"Oh yeah," I agreed, "really beautiful."

I held my hand up to her nose to see what the horse would do.

She chomped on my hand.

Ow.

"What the hell," I grumbled, wiping the slobber on the horse's mane when Russell wasn't looking.

"Is there a problem?" he asked.

"No, no."

"Alright." He pulled a strap. "I'm done."

He helped me up on the large animal, and then came on as well, sitting behind me. Coming out of the stable, the horse took us before the house where we could say our farewells to Fletcher.

"Does this horse have a name?" I asked the minute we started the journey.

"Jill. She was named by Fletcher."

Jill, Jill, Jill, Jill… "Why Jill?"

"He liked the name."

"Hn. Jill's not a bad name."

Jill neighed.

At that moment, I just recalled something. Before I died, I always wanted to find my knight-in-shining-armor, right? Well, it certainly is ironic, but here I sit on a horse with a knight, taking me away to a grand palace. Even though I have no romantic relationships with anyone, it's still nice to think about it.

Whatever. Onward to the Kingdom of Heart.

Smiles says: Yes, a bit delayed, ain't it? I'M SORRY! Well, whatever, onward with life. Have you guys read Silver Spoon? It's by the same artist who made Fullmetal Alchemist! It's SO funny. The main character always gets chomped by cows and horses!