Hare and Hatter
The following is the first scene I planned when I began writing this story… gosh, almost four years ago now. This was the big scene, the beginning of the reveal I've been building up to for over 60,000 words, I hope all of you enjoy it and thank each one of you for your support!
Just a warning, a lot of miscellaneous people are getting their heads chopped off in this chapter.
Part Three
Chapter Forty-eight
The smile that cut across Lord Vincent's face was all sweetness and light and the head of the nearest noblewoman fell off.
There was absolute silence as the body listed sideways, voluminous skirts almost keeping it upright for a moment. Then it seemed to pass a tipping point and the meaty noise the body made hitting the ground seemed to break some sort of spell over the room. Someone screamed and nobles began scattering in all directions.
And in the center of all the chaos stood Lord Vincent, smiling serenely, with the Dormouse hovering around his shoulders.
"I don't understand," Mister Gregory said, eyes wide, "The Dormouse can't do something like that! It does sleep, not…" He swallowed thickly.
"It's not the Dormouse doing that," Liam said grimly.
Mister Gregory frowned at him, momentarily ignoring the chaos in front of them, "What do you mean?"
"He has two Chains." Liam said, without his glasses he could easily see the other Chain curled up inside Lord Vincent, all bones and viciousness. "And the second… it's not as benign as the Dormouse."
It turned out to be a good thing that the party guests were scattering, as Lord Vincent chose that moment to summon his second Chain, which sliced the nearest three nobles in half on it's appearance. Bones turned out to be what this Chain was mostly made of, looked like a larger than life skeleton of a goat with some of it's bones twisted into strange configurations. The smile on it's skull almost matched the one cutting across Lord Vincent's face.
Break strode across the floor toward him, Hatter flaring up behind him. "Well, well, Sewer Rat, couldn't keep yourself hidden forever, could you?"
"I don't need to part of Pandora anymore." Lord Vincent's hand pressed against the front of his coat, where Liam remembered him tucking the papers into, "So I won't be. All the rest of this," He aimed his smile at the retreating nobles, "It's just my last little flourish."
"Then it's going to be a a brief one." Break snapped, "Not because you betrayed us but because he-" He stabbed a finger in Liam's direction, "He you should have known better than to to hurt. Because now I have to kill you." He unsheathed his swordcane and lunged at Lord Vincent.
The other man smirked and made a slight gesture that had the bone Chain moving forward to intercept the blow. Break's sword sparked black flame and he went flying, landing in a skid that had him struggling to get his balance back. The bone Chain moved in on him and Break apparently gave the command to his own Chain because Hatter glided forward to meet it.
"Don't use Hatter!" Miss Sharon, who hadn't run the other nobles and now stood in solitary splendor in the middle of the ballroom floor. "Break, you'll hurt yourself more- you can't afford to waste power on someone like him!"
"He can't afford not to," Liam murmured. "That Chain is too strong to fight with only part of Hatter's power." Gregory glanced at him and in doing so accidentally shifted him so that his shoulder wound burned with pain.
The flinch that he couldn't stop made his knees go out with pain, Gregory was caught by surprise and wasn't able to take the sudden weight. They both crumpled to the ground and he must have made a pain noise because Miss Sharon's head snapped in his direction. She edged along the wall skirting around the fighting Chains. Reaching them she knelt and put a supporting hand around his shoulders, avoiding his wounded one, probably staining her white gloves blotchy red.
In front of them there was a roar that made them all look up, the bone Chain had lashed out again and the Mad Hatter was reeling back, dark ichor and power fragmenting off from the brim of his hat. Lord Vincent laughed bitterly and waved his Chain onward. Break staggered as Hatter took another blow, one that made the eye lurking under the cape snap shut, peppering the floor with more ichor as a slice appeared across the lid.
"I thought you were going to teach me a lesson." Lord Vincent sneered, "So far all I've learned is that you're afraid to use your Chain properly. Are you worried I'll still be stronger than you?"
"I'm worried that I'd beat you," Break said, giving a smile that had the hardness brought on by pain, the hand that wasn't holding his sword held his chest. "And that it really wouldn't be worth the effort. I don't want to break a sweat over you."
Lord Vincent threw back his head and laughed, his Chain pulling back a little. "Am I not worth killing yourself to defeat me? I think I might be offended if I wasn't-"
"Vince?" The voice made the blond lord freeze, apparently the noise had carried into the back room where a lot of the more important nobles had probably gone to do the ceremony with Lord Oz. Of course the first among the ones to come back would be Gilbert.
Behind him Lord Barma stood, watching the scene with a frown.
"Well," Lord Vincent said, "It looks like I don't have time for a proper fight, Hatter. I'm afraid I'm going to have to wrap this up before my brother decides to intervene." He looked up at his Chain, "Let's finish this, Demios."
The Chain flew forward and slammed into Hatter, pinning the other Chain to the floor in a billow of dark cloak and colored hat ribbons. Without giving Hatter time to recover the Chain started slashing at him, sending ichor spattering across the floor. Break staggered, made a choked noise, and dropped to his knees. He clapped a hand over his mouth and coughed, red staining his glove.
"Break!" Miss Sharon called out and she whipped her hand out, black fire hurtling toward the bone Chain, followed by Eques, his mane burning with black fire. "Go help him!" She commanded her Chain and he threw his head in challenge before charging for the bone Chain, horn down.
Like anything would when being charged down by horse with a large pointy horn on it's head the bone Chain -Demios, Liam had definitely heard that name before in Pandora records- sprung back into the air, out of the way of Eques. The dark unicorn pulled up short of Hatter, pawing the ground in front of the fallen Chain before moving around him to put himself between Demios and Hatter.
"Dispose of them both." Lord Vincent told his Chain and it lunged at Eques. The first few blows Eques managed to turn aside with his horn but another slipped under Eques' guard and sent the unicorn flying. He hit the floor and skidded, trailing hooves drawing sparks of dark fire from the marble.
The skid ended with the wall, where Eques fetched up and didn't rise. There was a wound gaping wide on the unicorn's side and Sharon clapped a hand over her mouth, sweat beading on her forehead as her Chain's pain rippled over into her. But Demios wasn't done, it advanced on the Mad Hatter who had managed to get half up from the floor, though Break was still down.
The Mad Hatter jerked what might have been his head under the hat forward in a sharp nod and a curtain of darkness flew from him, right into the advancing Demios. The Chain shrieked as the tips of the bones on the left side of it's ribcage disappeared into black dust and pain flickered across Lord Vincent's face.
"Demios!" Lord Vincent snapped, cleared frustrated with his Chain. "This is taking too long."
Demios lashed out twice, sending Hatter back to the floor, making Break start coughing blood into his hand again. Hatter didn't have time to rise before Demios slashed at him and then the Chain didn't make an effort to move. Only a few steps away Break dropped the hand that wasn't at his mouth to the floor to keep himself from sagging to it.
"Break!" Gilbert called from the doorway, stepping forward. But Lord Vincent had moved while Demios had taken Hatter down, as Gilbert held out a hand to call Raven his brother reached over and laid a bare hand on the side of Gilbert's neck. The Doormouse, which had stayed hovering by Lord Vincent's shoulder moved over Gilbert and a moment later then man's eyes were falling closed.
Carefully Lord Vincent eased him to the floor. He held out a hand to Lord Barma in a clear threat but the man stayed at a distance.
"Kill Hatter." Lord Vincent told Demios, who struck at Hatter again, making Break's shoulder's twitch as his Chain bled onto the floor. It kept striking, seemly unwilling to make one fatal blow to the Chain that had wounded it but the smaller blows were clearly taking their toll. Hatter wasn't making an attempt to get up, his one large eye was still closed, his ragged cape not even fluttering.
And that was when Liam realized that this was it. Break was going to die. When Hatter was destroyed, and very few Chains could take the make of damage Hatter had already taken and still survive so it wouldn't be long, it would backlash onto Break and he was far too weak to take that.
He couldn't let that happen. Break has his friend. Break was important. Break was… his. There was no way he could let Break be killed right in front of him, not when there was something he could do, no matter how futile it might have seemed.
After all, Liam had a Chain as well.
Reaching up he put a hand to his earring. They'd kept him from remembering what had been written about Hare before and… it was possible they'd done ofter things as well. Ever since he'd begun to wear them he hadn't called on Hare, what if… he couldn't think that, not if he wanted to do this.
It was an effort to force himself to his feet, visibly surprising Miss Sharon and Mister Gregory, but with a hand to his earring he couldn't feel his wounds. The left earring slipped easily from his ear, weighing more than it should have in his hand.
When he reached for the other earring a voice snapped out, "Wait."
The word wasn't loud, but the force it was said with made everyone freeze for just a moment, glancing toward the speaker. Lord Barma had taken a step, not toward Lord Vincent but toward the battle, toward Liam. He had an arm outstretched, as if he could reach across the ballroom and the frozen Chains.
"Trust me, Liam, when I say you don't want to do that." He said, in a very, very careful voice. "We will find another way."
Another way that would result in Break dying. Lord Barma wouldn't use Dodo to protect Break, only to fend off Demios.
But to Liam, whatever the price of this was of doing this, it was worth it.
It must have shown on his face because Lord Barma said, "Liam," and there was a hint of pleading in his voice, "You have been protected for your entire life from this moment, don't throw that away."
Liam shook his head, putting his hand on his right earring. It felt warm.
"Liam!" Lord Barma shouted, "As your master I order you not to take that earring off!" The others were looking between them with confusion, even Demios had continued to pause, it's skull inclined toward it's master, waiting for an order.
"Listen to me." Snapped Lord Barma and there it was, the tone that had always been right before a blow, the same tone that had made him wince a hundred times, waiting for pain.
Liam squared his shoulders and looked right at his master. "No." He said. "Not anymore."
He took his other earring out.
For one long moment nothing happened and Liam felt the bottom of his stomach drop out.
"Hare?" He whispered. "Are you… still there?"
Then there was the swirl of a tattered cloak and the March Hare appeared.
TBC
