Through a Looking Glass, Darkly

by Malteaser

AU: What if the White Rabbit had kidnapped Alice's entire family that 23rd of March? Or, the zany adventures of Suit!Alice.

5. Nine of Swords

NINE OF SWORDS

Upright - Deception, premonitions and bad dreams, suffering and depression, cruelty, disappointment violence, loss and scandal. All of these may be overcome through faith and calculated inaction. This is the card of the martyr and with it comes new life out of suffering.

Reversed - Distrust and suspicion, despair, misery and malice. Total isolation away from comfort and help. Institutionalisation, suicide, imprisonment and isolation.

When Alice was eighteen years old, she realized that she needed to start watching herself.

It had been one of those days that had started out bad, rapidly declined to wrongwards, and ended up plunging straight through rock bottom. Her hand had been in charge of the Queen's protection detail as she visited the city for her unbirthday celebration. One of the Resistance, a woman in a veil who had given herself away by running out immediately, had managed to get in a lucky shot that had shattered the Queen's crystal goblet. Jelly had run after her immediately, losing her when she took a flying leap off one of the plank bridges onto a ledgeway that she'd been loath to copy. Then she'd returned to the site of the shooting, absolutely frumious, and been informed by Uthar that Claude had not taken kindly to her disappearance; contrariwise, he thought it must be part of a larger pattern of insubordination. The upshot was that her Ten had given orders that she report to the Casino for a full debriefing.

"I was going after the shooter," Jelly hissed.

"And I believe you," Uthar placated over the top of his omnipresent clipboard. "But you don't have to convince me, you have to convince the Tweedles."

"But-"

"I already had to talk him out recommending you for execution," Uthar told her. "Don't make this worse on yourself. Report to the Casino."

Jelly turned her gaze to where Othello was pretending to be engrossed with guarding a few terrified civilians. He turned so she couldn't see his face; Jelly grimaced, not entirely sure why she expected any different. Othello had his own life to look after, and contradicting Claude in this situation wouldn't do anything to extend it.

"Six," Uthar said, a note of warning in his voice.

"I'm going, Eight," Jelly replied, and left for the Scarab dock.

Okay, Jelly, she told herself later, as she watched the Casino loom ever closer. This isn't going to be pleasant. But if you couldn't handle not pleasant, you wouldn't be alive right now. Just stick to what happened, and you'll come out the other end.

Later still, things seemed a lot less simple.

"She should have jumped," one brother observed, his tone calm and even. She shouldn't have been able to hear it, as he was standing on one end of the plank bridge she was in the middle of, and the wind was howling, threatening to push her off into the lacuna below, but she did.

"Should have, could have," the other brother replied from the opposite end of the bridge. "But why not would have?"

The wind howled, and Jelly crouched down, clutching onto either side of the board with white-knuckled hands. "Because I didn't want to die!" she yelled.

The Doctors paid her no heed, but the wind picked up, and the plank bridge shook, and flipped over. Jelly screamed, and clung on tightly, trying to scramble back on top of board. Then one of the Tweedles kicked his side of the board off the ledgeway, and she fell, wind whistling through her ears and limbs flailing uselessly until-

She was standing still and upright, the walls of the Truth Room completely white and empty. She seemed to be alone, and for a moment the only sound was her heavy breathing.

"Do you know what you did wrong?" One of the Doctors was suddenly standing right in front of her. She leapt back, and he continued. "Are you wrinkle-free?"

"What?" she replied.

"That would take a very hot iron," his brother answered for her, appearing at his side. There was a hiss and the smell of burning meat; Jelly flinched, but no pain came.

"But she'll do," the first Doctor concluded. The door to the Truth Room opened, and Jelly ran for it before he could give her permission to go. She slammed the door shut closed behind her, and leaned back against it, panting.

It's over she thought. It's over, it's over, it's over, it's-

Snick.

Mad March was in the hallway with her, his switchblade open and glinted under the fluorescent light. His yellow hair was even more wild than usual, and his eyes were bloodshot.

There was an awful lot of speculation about why the assassins rarely associated with the other Suits. People would say that they were snobs who considered themselves above the rest of them, or that they suffered from crippling social anxiety, or were under orders to avoid interacting with Suits. These people were very rarely Spades. Once you had to work with assassins on a semi-regular basis, you quickly learned that the assassins the Queen hired need to kill the same way everyone else needed to sleep. Avoiding people meant not killing the ones they weren't supposed to touch, and killing the ones they weren't supposed to touch meant execution. Mad March was the Queen's favorite because in all his years of service, he hadn't slipped up once.

Jelly wondered if he would slip up today. Then her brain kicked itself back into gear, and she straightened. March would do whatever it was March planned on doing, but she shouldn't be showing any vulnerability to a homicidally deprived maniac.

"You've come a bit too late to join in," she told him.

Snack. His switchblade went back into its sheath.

"Eh, I'll catch the next one," he said.

"I thought they would have sent you after the Queen's almost-killer," Jelly said, moving past him.

His switchblade went snicker-snack as he just barely managed to restrain himself. "They did. She pitched herself off a bridge before I could reach her."

"Shame," Jelly replied with mock sympathy, while a petty, vindictive part of her cheered Good.

"You're boyfriend's looking for you, by the way," March said.

Jelly rolled her eyes. March had a habit of referring to every man she regularly associated with as her boyfriend. It was one of those things about being the highest-ranking woman in the Spades that was more irritating than terrifying. "And which boyfriend would that be?"

"The prince," March said. "Though I can't see why he's not enjoying the first party he's gotten the Head Bitch to sign off on instead of looking for you."

"I'll be sure to pass along your concerns," Jelly said dryly. She turned the corner and broke into a sprint, not stopping until she'd reached the Royal Wing.

She could hear the music thumping loudly now, played on full blast since no one was trying to keep up the pretense that there was no party. As she stood there in the corridor, a couple of partygoers spilled out of the ballroom, limbs entangled, drunk, steeped, and completely oblivious to anything that wasn't them.

This must be for Grace, she realized suddenly. She was due to finish being ennobled tomorrow. Or was it today? Yesterday?

How long had she been in the Truth Room anyway?

"Jelly!" Jack called, the fakest smile she'd seen on him to date plastered on his face. "I've been looking for you."

"So I heard," Jelly replied, stepping carefully over the undulating couple. "What's the problem?"

"Problem?" Jack repeated, nodding his head towards a niche in the wall where a statue of Vilnius stood. Someone had gone through the trouble of lacing it up in a corset, Jelly noticed. She'd thought Jack's parties had a tendency to get out of hand before, but this was something else entirely.

Jack ducked his head beneath Vilnius' sword arm, and leaned against the wall, as Jelly settled herself opposite him. "Have you seen Duchess yet?"

"Have I?" Jelly asked, confused.

"Grace," Jack corrected himself. "They made her into a Duchess. Have you seen it yet?"

"I just got here," Jelly admitted. There was an obscene moan from one of the couple on the floor. "Though if she's in the same state as the rest of the party I'm pretty sure that-"

"Jack!"

Jack blinked and craned his head around the edge of the niche. A fine-boned arm curved around his shoulder and dragged him all the way out. Jelly followed, to find that the arm was attached to a curvy sort of woman in a slinky golden gown, her blonde curls piled high on her head. It took her a moment to realize that it was Grace; she supposed that was because she couldn't remember the last time she'd seen her without her Club's uniform on.

As she watched, Grace all but plastered herself over Jack. "The two of you are going to be even worse now, aren't you?" Jelly realized.

Jack coughed, placed his hands on her hips, forcing her off him. Grace molded herself to his side instead, which Jelly took to mean yes.

"Grace," she greeted. "You look fantastic."

Grace smiled, as fake as Jack's had been and twice as sharp. "Oh, it's Duchess now."

"Well, you look fantastic, Duchess."

"Thank you, Six," she said. It sounded like a dismissal. Grace turned back to Jack, cupping his face in her hands. "Your parents are worried about you, Jack. Why did you leave the party?"

There was something off here. Jack went through most of his life looking like he had a stick up his ass, true, but he was never this tense with Grace. And as for Grace, she normally tried her hardest to put some distance between Jack and his parents, if only metaphorically. She was certainly never this… clingy.

Maybe by 'worried about you' she meant 'murderous and about to send the guards after you'? Or maybe Jelly hadn't actually left the Truth Room. That would explain why everything seemed distorted.

"Well, let's not keep them waiting," Jack said, not really answering her question. He took a hold of Jelly and dragged her with them back into the ballroom. No sooner had she entered, though, then Othello threw himself more or less on top of her, laughing uproariously.

"Jelly! Jellybean!" he said. "The Tweedles didn't turn you to mush! I was worried!"

"Oh for crying out loud," Jelly said, pulling herself free of Jack so she could try and stand Othello upright. Jack disappeared into the crowd, pulled along by the Duchess. "How much Mirth did you have?" she demanded.

"Lots," Othello said cheerfully, before picking her up and beginning to swing her around, ignoring her squawk of indignation. "Lots and lots and lots and lo-"

He crashed down onto the floor, bringing her with him.

"Okay big guy, let's find a place for you to sleep this off," Jelly groaned, helping him to his feet. They staggered into the corridor, passed the frotting couple and the statue of Vilnius (which was now sporting a pair of men's underpants on his sword) and stumbled into the elevator. Jelly pushed the button for the level of her quarters, and leaned Othello against the wall. He giggled, swaying with the motion of the elevator until the doors dinged open, and then they were off to her room.

"Sit," Jelly said, pushing him inside. Othello sat, if only from a lack of other options. "I'm going to get you some water. Stay here."

When she returned, glass in hand, Othello was drooling into her pillow. She rolled her eyes, left the water on her chest, and locked the door behind her.

She should have checked in with her father ages ago anyway.

The apartment was dark, and far away enough from the party to be silent as well. The door clicked loudly shut, followed shortly by the sound of crinkling bed sheets. Dad appeared in his bedroom doorway.

"Hey," she said.

"Oh thank God," Dad said, hurriedly crossing the room and pulling her into his arms. "You're alive. Thank God."

Jelly stood there for a moment, clutching him tightly and letting herself relax. Then she asked "How long was I in there?"

It had been just over two days since she'd been ordered to debrief, apparently. Dad gave her all the details as he made them hot chocolate; Uthar had informed him after his shift had ended, as per protocol, and he'd gone to the King immediately to try and get her released. He'd promised to look into it, but when Dad came back the next day she'd still been with the Tweedles, and he'd refused to do anymore work until she was released.

"They let me out of the cell not too long after dinner was packed away," Dad concluded. "Cricket walked me back here, and said that you'd be along shortly."

"I got a little caught up in Jack's party," Jelly explained, "For Grace. It seems to be a lot louder than usual."

"Ah?" Dad said, suddenly absorbed in watching his drink.

Jelly thought, staring absently down into her mug, watching the little marshmallows dissolve with unfocused eyes. They'd put Dad in a cell for refusing to make Tea. It wasn't surprising, really, but I did drive home certain facts.

Firstly, the Crown still needed her Dad to be their Carpenter. Secondly, Dad was no more willing to be their Carpenter now then he was when they first kidnapped him. And lastly, with her mother dead she was their only source of control over him.

It should have been a comforting thought, at least somewhat. They were necessary, and that would protect them. But, somehow, it wasn't very comforting at all.

What it boiled down to, she supposed, was that needed was not the same thing as invulnerable. There had been other Carpenters before her father, she knew. They'd mostly died of old age, lab accidents, or suicide, but at least one of them had been executed when he'd proven to be too much trouble. There was no reason to expect that her father was in a much safer position, especially if her actions were being counted as a part of the trouble he caused.

Jelly didn't think that she had 'a pattern of insubordination'; she rather thought she had a tendency to follow orders even when she really wanted to just go home already. Then again, it didn't really matter what she thought, it mattered what others thought of her. If she appeared to be too much trouble, on top of the fact that her father was barely forcing himself to work as it was, then they would both be on the executioner's docket before too long.

She couldn't let that happen.

The Queen hated her, of course. The Queen hated everyone, women doubly so. Claude didn't like her, but he recognized her competence enough to give the nod to her promotions even after she and Othello were no longer formally partnered. Mercutio approved of her methods as long as they had the desired results, which was a lot more often than not these days. Harlan hated her, for the way she disrupted normal proceedings and for the fact that she'd nearly gotten him executed when she reported that he was drinking Calm while on duty. One out of four superiors was… kind of bad. She hadn't even gotten to her immediate superiors yet.

That needed to change.

"Are you going to be okay, Jellybean?" Dad asked.

Jelly started, and looked up. Dad sent her a concerned look.

"I'm fine," Jelly told him, and then took an overly-large gulp of hot chocolate as though to prove it. "I'll be fine," she confirmed, after she managed to swallow.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Dad asked.

"No," Jelly replied reflexively. "Absolutely not, no."

"Okay," Dad replied, spreading his hands out in a calming gesture. "But maybe you should think about taking tomorrow off."

"No," Jelly said again. "No, I need to be at work tomorrow. I've been gone long enough; if I wait rumors will only start spreading that I've been damaged."

"Are you sure?" Dad pressed. "I can talk to the King. I'm probably not his favorite person right now, but he'll still hear me out."

"No, I'm sure," Jelly replied. Though, talking to the King didn't seem like such a bad idea. Dad would go to him when he needed something done swiftly; Claude did much the same. She'd never have the Queen on her side, but maybe, if she went and apologized on behalf of her father, and kept him in the loop as far as things in the City went, she could have the King. That would certainly be a start.

Dad stood up and squeezed her shoulder. "Are you going to finish that?" he asked, pointing with his free hand at her neglected mug.

"Yeah," Jelly replied, wrapping her hand around it. Dad leaned down and kissed the top of her head. "Don't worry about me, Dad. I'm fine, really."

Five years later, Jelly shifted the logs in the fire with the end of her stick. The fire crackled and spat out a shower of sparks in response; next to her, Hatter made an abortive move towards taking her stick away. Across the fire sat Jack, picking bits of meat off his borogrove bone, and just beyond that was Charlie, moving around in the half-dark that wasn't quite beyond the fire's glow."

"Anyone care for some more borogrove?" the Knight offered.

"No thanks," Jelly replied.

"I'll have some," Jack said, at the same time. Charlie handed over another rib, and Jack began to tear into it as the elderly man sent both her and Hatter disapproving looks.

"It's delicious," Jelly explained. "But I'm really full."

Hatter nodded along with her, looking innocent enough to conjure a halo around his hat until Charlie moved away, muttering about finding more wood for the fire. Then the smile slid from his face. Jelly poked the fire again.

What it all came down to was that she was pretty sure her father hadn't been moved from the Casino before she rescued Jack. And, as she'd been stupid enough to leave White alive, the Crown would know that she'd rescued him. There were quite a lot of things she could get away with in her allotted week; she doubted attacking the White Rabbit and then absconding with the prodigal heir and a double agent was one of them.

She poked the fire again. Hatter sent her a warning look.

Well, she might be able to get away with it if she went back to the Casino with said double agent and prodigal heir in tow. But neither of them would come willingly, she knew, and she'd be left in an even worse situation than she started out in. Her father would still need to get out of Wonderland. The Crown might be willing to not disbelieve her, but they would be suspicious of her actions for some time. The Resistance would be closed to her forever.

She used the end of her stick to roll one log off another, sending little glowing embers afloat in the air as she did.

Jack would never forgive her either, most likely, assuming they still had a relationship where forgiveness might be warranted. And Hatter would be humiliated, tortured, and executed. She didn't like that idea. She didn't like that idea at all.

She made to jab the fire again, when Hatter reached out and held the stick still. "If you keep doing that you're going to light my hat on fire," he said sternly.

"Sorry," Jelly apologized, more for her thoughts of turning him in than anything else.

It was strange. She felt more badly about the thought of betraying Hatter than she did about betraying Othello, who was probably having a time of it now that it turned out he was the second of a Resistance sympathizer. Then again, she needed Hatter more than she'd ever needed Othello. The fact that he was pitched in with the side she agreed with more than not might have something to do with it too.

She almost poked the fire again, before she caught herself, and snapped her stick in half. She threw both halves into the fire, and then cast about for a more constructive train of thought to board.

"So, New York?" she asked.

Jack finished picking his borogrove rib clean before tossing it in the dinner scrap pile and replying "Yes. The city New York, I mean, not just the state."

"The Oysters really named two different things the same name?" Hatter asked.

The city so nice they named it twice, Jelly nearly recited. Instead, Jack answered "Yeah, there's city of New York, and then the state of New York that the New York city is in."

"So did they name the country after the capital or did they-"

"Oh no, New York's not the capital," Jack told him. "And 'state' is how they subdivide their country."

Hatter looked confused for a minute. "Are you sure you don't mean 'county'?"

"No, I'm sure," Jack said. "Actually, if I recall correctly, New York the city has more than one county in it."

"What?" Hatter asked.

"Did you do the tourist thing?" Jelly asked, amused, and very certain that there was no way to explain New York to anyone who hadn't been there.

"Not really," Jack said, indicating his hair. "I was trying to blend in more than anything else."

"Is the jean and dress shirt combination really in style?" Jelly asked.

"I got the warning that I'd been found after I'd gone to bed. I just went with whatever was closest," Jack protested.

"Including the necktie?" Hatter observed.

Jack sent them a withering look, and moved the topic of conversation back off of himself. "I did get a chance to see the Empire State Building. Jenny took me out one afternoon."

"…Jenny?" Jelly asked.

"Yes, Jenny," Jack confirmed. "She's a martial arts instructor, very pretty."

Jelly stared at him, wondering if that was what it sounded like as anger began to run through her.

"You'd probably hate her," Jack added.

Yeah, probably. "Jack," Jelly said, keeping her voice very even. "You're engaged, remember?"

"It's an arrangement," Jack said. "Simply because it would be impolitic to-"

"Arrangement?" Jelly demanded, standing up suddenly enough to startle Hatter into getting up as well. "Do you have any idea what she went through in order to be able to marry you?"

"No," Jack bit out, rising to his feet as well, "Do you?"

"I don't need to," Jelly shot back. "I see how she reacts when the Tweedles are in the room with her. Jack, you humungous prick!"

Jack clasped his hands behind his back and met her glare evenly over the fire. Jelly suppressed the urge to leap over it and wring his neck.

"I'm surprised you care that much," Jack retorted icily, "Given the number of times I asked for your help and you refused."

"Don't you dare try to pin this on me," Jelly hissed. "There is nothing I can do. You- all you have to do is not cheat on her-"

"What exactly do you think I've been doing these past five years?" Jack asked tartly.

"Having parties and stealing flamingos for illicit flights into the city," Jelly answered.

"I've been looking for a way to undo whatever it is they did to her!" Jack yelled. "How do you think I became this deeply involved with the Resistance?"

"I think you'd do anything to piss your parents off," Jelly snapped back. "I think, for all that they wouldn't give two shits about you otherwise, as long as you're their only heir you're untouchable and you want to push that as far as it will go!"

"What's all this now?" Charlie asked, clanking back into the circle of light. For a moment, no one said anything.

"You're vastly overestimating my parent's tolerance," Jack said at last. "For all that it reluctantly extends to a few ruined flamingos and rowdy partygoers, it doesn't stretch nearly far enough to cover this. If my parents knew that I worked for the Resistance- that I was actively trying to overthrow them- their preference for a blood heir would evaporate. They'd kill me, and adopt someone more suitable for their needs."

"Uh," Charlie said, looking between her and Jack with wary eyes, unprepared for how wrongward the conversation had gone. Jelly did feel a little bad, on his behalf and Hatter's, but her anger at Jack far outweighed her guilt.

"Yeah, and that sucks," Jelly shot back. "What makes you think that gives you free reign to cheat on Grace?"

"The fact that I haven't so much as seen Grace in five years!" Jack protested.

"What?" Jelly cried incredulously.

"Whatever they did to her made her into an entirely different person!" Jack yelled. "Duchess doesn't talk like Grace, or act like her or believe the things she did. She doesn't even like the same food! Don't pretend you haven't noticed!" Jack's hand flew out, nearly into the fire. He snatched it back before any damage could be done, and repeated. "I've been looking for a way to undo the damage for five years. At this point, it looks like there isn't one. I'm not convinced she's even in there anymore. There's just something my parents created prowling around in her skin, and I do not owe any loyalty to it."

They stared at each other over the fire for a moment, before Charlie interrupted again with "I'm going to go on patrol. It's a very dark night and there may be beasts who-"

"I'll go," Jelly said, turning away from the fire and heading for the forest. If she didn't get out of here now, she would do something she would regret later.

"But you don't know the paths," Charlie protested. "Or the dangers. I've lived in these woods for-"

Jelly unholstered her gun and held it up so the men could see. "I'm armed, I'm angry, and I'm a Spade. I'll be fine."

Strangely enough, Charlie had nothing to say to that. But before she could safely leave the clearing that had once been the throne room, Jack's voice rang out "Fine. Walk away. But before you go, answer me this: have you seen Grace recently?"

"As a matter of fact I have." Jelly turned around just enough so that she could see Jack's face, and told him "She came to see me just before I left the Casino and asked me to look after you."

She stomped into the Wabe before he could collect himself enough to respond.

It really was very dark in the forest. She was used to the more gentle grayness of the city at night, where even if there wasn't a streetlamp on your corner, there were plenty glowing above it. Here the only source was the moon that grinned maliciously down at her, and the stars that twinkled just a bit too brightly.

Jelly tore through the woods, navigating her way by the contrast between the harder dark of the trees and the softer dark of the space between. It wasn't too long before she realized that she was being followed. The footsteps were too quiet to be Charlie's, and too sure to be Jacks; she wasted a few moments trying to evade him, before she remembered that Hatter was better at it than she was.

"I don't know how I could make this any clearer," Jelly said loudly. "But I'm not very good company right now."

"Well, you could write it out," Hatter said from his position a good twenty cubits behind her. "The glowing kind of ink would probably be best for this light."

Jelly turned around so that it would be possible for him to figure out that she was staring at him.

"There's always musical theater," Hatter added, taking a tentative step towards her. "You could write a play about how poor your company is."

"And then I suppose you'd come along and make it that much richer?" Jelly asked, holstering her gun.

"Of course," Hatter said, as though he were surprised she thought things could have gone any differently. "And then we'll have a dance number."

Jelly giggled. "Yeah, and Charlie and- and Jack will-" She leaned against the tree, shaking. "Will dress up the skeletons-" She gasped, tears welling up in her eyes and making it even more difficult to see. "-and we'll-"

Hatter placed a hand on her shoulder, and Jelly let out a proper sob.

"Right," he said, steering her off the tree and over to where a large stump was standing at about knee height. "Let's sit down a minute. I'm a bit knackered from chasing after you anyway."

"Smooth," Jelly said thickly as she sat down.

"I don't know why you're assuming I'm lying," Hatter said, mock affronted. "I mean, really, think back on the day I just had. First I get word that the bloody Ten of Spades wants to defect to me, and then she avoids me like I've got the nephelokokkygian plague. Then she pulls a gun on my boss…"

Jelly buried her face in her hands and let him speak, his arm around her shoulders the entire time. He'd moved onto talking about the first time he'd been in the Forest of Wabe before she had herself under enough control to straighten. She scrubbed the tears from her face with the back of her hand and he wound his commentary down.

"Sorry," she said. "It's been a long day for me too."

"I remember," Hatter informed her. His hand was still on her shoulder, and for all that she was no longer in danger of crying, she wasn't quite ready to shrug it off.

"I should probably apologize to Jack," she said, after a moment's pause. "He's still a giant dick, but that was-"

"Hitting below the belt so hard his whirligigs are now above it?" Hatter offered, after a moment of watching her struggle to find the words to complete her sentence.

Jelly glared a little, before giving up on glaring as a bad job. She was spent. "Yeah, something like that."

They were silent for a moment more, before Hatter said. "You know, I kind of wish my father had hung on a bit longer."

"Oh?" Jelly asked, not sure where this was going.

"Yeah," Hatter said. "You and he probably would have had a lot to talk about."

"How so?" Jelly asked.

Hatter pulled his arm away from her. "It's like this," he said, getting up. "My mother was Resistance, a pamphleteer. No, that's not right. She was the pamphleteer. It's been almost twenty years since she died and still half the stuff in circulation is her work."

"She got caught," Jelly guessed.

"Yeah, she got caught," Hatter confirmed. "The Suits came in one night, roughed her up a bit, and whisked her away to the Casino. Dad went to collect her body a day or so later, and came back with the license required to sell the Queen's Teas in the shop."

"When my mother was executed," Jelly began. Hatter jerked in surprise, so she elaborated "She was caught helping people fight their addiction to Tea. That's kind of a big deal. It wasn't long after that when I started thinking about what sort of Suit I was going to be when I grew up."

"And that's what I don't get," Hatter cried. "Weren't you angry? Didn't you want it to stop? Why would you help keep it going?"

"Because I can't stop it. I can't pardon everyone on the executioner's docket, I can't even pardon my own Suits when they end up there, and I've barely been able to stop my father from ending up there or worse," Jelly explained, anger rising again.

"But you're only making it go," Hatter said.

"Not always," Jelly pointed out. "I wouldn't be here if I hadn't let Bruno go, and he wasn't the first. And another thing," she stood as well, agitation jerking her arms about, "You're not exactly an innocent here yourself. You sell Tea. It might get you contacts, free information, and a healthy supply of bribing material, but that doesn't erase the fact that the Queen's reign is built on Tea, and you support that."

"No, it doesn't, and I don't forget that," Hatter snapped. "I couldn't, between Dormie and Dodo. It's part of why I take jobs like this. I'd have been much safer just leaving you with Dodo, you know."

"No, you'd probably have died, because I would have shot you if you tried that," Jelly told him.

"I wear body armor, and that's not the point," Hatter said. "The point is I know how much harm I'm doing. And I know how much good I'm doing. And I make sure I keep the second column at a higher value than the first."

"And you can quantify that?" Jelly asked snidely, folding her arms and leaning back against a tree.

"You're the one who's getting by with making the occasional exception," Hatter shot back, mimicking her posture. "As far as I can tell pretty much everyone in the Suits is getting by with either doing that or steeping themselves." Jelly snorted, but Hatter continued "I don't get why you keep at it."

"What would you like me to do?" Jelly demanded. "I mean, hypothetically speaking in some universe where I haven't already defected, what is there to do? If I started talking about overthrowing the Queen, the mostly likely thing that would happen would be that Darrel would tell the King, and then he'd have me taken down. Then he'd do to my father what he did to Grace. The only thing that would change would be that there would be a Carpenter who liked his job, and Othello would spend his first few months as Ten trying to separate himself from me by striking out the policy changes- and those are to your benefit, you know. Our focus shifted from Resistance activities to violent crimes after I took over as Ten, and believe me, I'm not stupid enough to think we got even a fraction of you after the food riots."

"Oh, I never took you for stupid," Hatter protested.

"Then what do you take me for?" Jelly asked.

"You're-" Hatter's answer was cut off by a roar from somewhere deeper in the forest.

"I think we should head back to camp," Jelly suggested.

"There, see? You're not stupid at all," Hatter said, and they went back the way they came.

Jelly thought about trying to explain things to Hatter as they went, but decided that it was no use with a non-Suit. They didn't get it; civilians thought of the Queen as a person mad with power, and as executions the extensions of her whims. Suits knew that there wasn't that much thought behind it, that her whims often didn't extend down as far as the level of individuals. They were just a pack of cards to her, faceless and interchangeable; the Queen needed someone to blame when things went wrong, and unless they came up with better targets, they were it. Executions weren't personal any more than Mt. Asclepius' eruptions were.

Except it wasn't a perfect metaphor, she realized. There were certainly ways to avoid the Queen's wrath without leaving the Casino altogether. You didn't speak up, especially if you were a woman. You became quietly necessary. You gained the favor of the King, or a Trump, or the Club Suits. She had done as much.

She thought some more. You would live longer if you didn't have children, longer still if you were single, longest of all if you couldn't be a wife and mother in the first place, she reasoned. How many of the people she worked with were orphans? How many men did she work with who were single fathers? Hell, she'd been more or less raised by a single father. She remembered what Fletcher had told her about women in the Spades. She thought about how quick the King was to tamp down on anything that would upset his wife.

Maybe the civilians were more right than she'd believed. The thought didn't sit very well in her stomach.

They were nearly back in the throne room before something else occurred to Jelly. "What happened to your father?"

"He killed himself," Hatter replied. Jelly stared at him. "He left me a shop, and a note asking me to do something good with it. So I have."

The fire had died down a bit, and Jelly took a look around as Hatter tried to coax it back up. She could see a lump on the bed just inside the derelict to the left of the fire, which was probably Jack. She would have to apologize later, then. She turned as she heard the sound of a stick cracking in the wood, and then let out a small scream as Charlie appeared directly in front of her and she reflexively kicked him in the shins.

The kick didn't seem to register, because Charlie's reaction to this was to squint, and place his pointer finger directly over her heart.

"Uh," she said, pulling the finger off of her. "Hi?"

"Are you really a Suit?" Charlie demanded.

"A Spade," Jelly clarified, "And yes, I have been my whole adult life."

"You don't look like a Spade," Charlie said, eyeing her suspiciously.

"I'm out of uniform," Jelly replied, shifting so that she had Hatter at her back rather than the forest.

"That's not what I meant," Charlie said. "You aren't sharp enough."

"Excuse me?" Jelly said.

Charlie weaved back and forth, still squinting at her. "You're at all the wrong angles for a Spade."

Jelly shot a look over her shoulder back at Hatter, who shrugged.

"Uh," Jelly said, turning back to Charlie, who moved forwards a few steps and began to feel at the air around her body. "I'm not a Spade any more. Maybe that's the problem?"

"No, it's not," Charlie said decisively. "You wouldn't be nearly this poufy if that were the case."

"Poufy?" She'd been called a lot of things in her time. Poufy was not one of them.

"Yes. You're puffier than a midsummer's raincloud, and twice as lightning-y." He stopped waving his hands around and looked her directly in the eye. "Would you permit me to do a toenail reading?"

"No, thanks," Jelly said, hoping she didn't look as weirded out as she felt. "I'll pass."

Charlie's face fell, but he shuffled away without protest. "This is all wrong. You're too poufy to be a Spade. He's too stringy to be a Heart." He wheeled suddenly on Hatter, who had been busy smirking and thrust a finger into his face. "And I don't know what you are beneath all that rabble, but I don't like it."

"Fair enough," Hatter replied. "I have no idea what you are either."

"I'm a Knight!" Charlie reminded him, and brought his fist down on the top of Hatter's head. Hatter yelped, and whisked his hat off his head. Charlie wandered off to the where there was a hammock strung between both trees, muttering something unflattering about the younger man's tailor.

Jelly went over to stand next to Hatter, the better to stare at the old man as he arranged himself on the hammock, and snuggled up close to a teddy bear.

"So," Hatter said, a bit too cheerfully, as he turned to face her. "I'll take the first watch-"

"There's no need for that!" Charlie yelled, not even opening his eyes. "I have an early warning system all set up! Just be ready to run if the raven caws!"

Hatter turned and stared at him. "Is that a metaphor or-"

"No," Charlie said derisively. "It's the signal for the perimeter breach, you huggermugger."

"What did he just call me?" Hatter asked her.

"A huggermugger," Jelly told him, before adding, deadpan. "I can't believe it. You accost people in alleyways for hugs. You monster."

Hatter ignored her, and continued to stare at the Knight. "I'm tempted to go over there and shake him until he makes sense."

"I don't think it works like that," Jelly told him.

Charlie snored, and Hatter visibly tore himself away from whatever line of thought he'd been following. "So, as I was saying, I'll take the first watch-"

"Oh, there's no need for that," Jelly interrupted. "I had a nap today, I'll take it."

They looked at each other for a moment before Hatter said "First one to fall asleep makes breakfast?"

"Works for me," Jelly agreed.

They talked about inconsequential things, gossip about their mutual acquaintances and the like, as they sat by the fire. It got progressively colder as the night wore on, and it wasn't long before Jelly had buttoned up her jacket, popped the collar, dug her numb fingers deep into her pockets and was still shivering.

"You could come and sit by me?" Hatter suggested, watching her lean towards the flames.

"Is it warmer over there?" she asked.

"Of course it is," Hatter said. "I'll have you know I'm an excellent source of heat."

To prove his point, he moved beside her, sweeping his arm and a good portion of his jacket around her back as he sat down.

"Well, you certainly have excellent taste in jackets," Jelly admitted.

"Well, you knew that already," he pointed out.

Jelly hummed, and tried to rub the feeling back into her fingers.

Jelly woke up some time later, still tucked under Hatter's arm and leaning back against the log that had served as their bench last night. Dawn had broken and Hatter's beard was tickling her ear; for a moment, Jelly thought it was that which had woke her up. Then she heard the sound of a stick snapping, and realized that that wasn't it at all.

"Hatter," she hissed. "Hatter!"

Hatter jerked awake; Jelly pressed a finger to his lips and stood as quietly as she could.

"What it- what is it?" Hatter whispered sleepily, as he got to his feet and her eyes darted about.

"I don't-" Jelly began, before she realized what was wrong: Jack was gone.

"Fuck a duck!" she yelled, stalking towards his empty bed. Charlie tumbled out of his hammock with a surprised shout.

"Okay," Hatter said, straightening his hat and coming up behind her as she looked out from the bedside. "Is he going home, or-"

"No, he'll head for the city," Jelly said, looking out. A metallic glint caught her eye, and recalling Jack's wristwatch, she went after it.

Jack was trying to move discreetly rather than swiftly, and was still unsure of his footing; Jelly had years of experience chasing deviants through a not-always-level city. It wasn't long before she caught sight of him fully.

"Jack!" she yelled.

Jack audibly smacked his palm to his face, before dashing off of the path.

"Oh no you don't," Jelly growled, and took off after him.

Jack was leaning against a tree when she caught up with him, as though to say I'm letting you catch me.

Jelly glared at him, unimpressed. "What the hell are you doing?"

"I'm going to the city," he replied. "As you might imagine, after years of escaping to there, I have a few friends I can stay with."

"And you're so sure that these are friends your parents know nothing about?" Jelly asked.

"Are they?" Jack asked back. "You're the one held responsible for breaches in city security. You're the one who catches me and brings me back every time I escape. You tell me."

She couldn't help but get the impression that Jack was still a little sore from the night before. "Look, Jack," she began.

Jack raised an eyebrow, waiting.

"Okay, so you knew Gryphon," she said, pushing her apology to the side in favor of perhaps getting somewhere useful today. "Who else in the Resistance do you know?"

"Caterpillar," Jack replied, pushing away from the tree and heading back towards the path.

"What?" Jelly cried. "Are you serious?"

"He recruited me into the Resistance, he helped me look for a cure for Grace, he got me through the Looking Glass," Jack yelled back. "Yes, I'm serious."

"Who are we talking about now?" Hatter asked as he walked up from the path.

Jack went back into stiff mode, and didn't reply.

So Jelly did for him. "He knows Caterpillar."

"What?" Hatter said, indignant. "Why didn't you tell us that yesterday?"

"That's what I want to know!" Jelly said.

Before Jack could explain himself, there was the distant sound of Charlie yelling.

"Oh, what now?" Hatter muttered, grabbing Jack by the arm and dragging him back up to the throne room, Jelly following close behind.

What now apparently consisted of a raven cawing the early warning in its cage as Charlie yelled out the names of different musical instruments.

"Drum!" he shouted, brandishing a frying pan. "Fife! Piccolo!"

"Charlie!" Jelly yelled, grabbing him by the shoulder, and then ducking as he nearly brained her. "Charlie! Sir Charles!"

Charlie stopped mid-swing and stared at her."Yes?"

"How far away is the perimeter?" she asked.

"Three stadia," he replied.

"Okay," Jelly said. "We have time then; they're going to be on foot. Can we borrow your horses?"

"Yes," Charlie said softly. Then, much more loudly, "Yes! To the horses!"

He ran off, and the three of them followed him.

There were enough horses for each of them, and more, which she supposed was only right. Whichever of the Knight's warhorses survived would have had one hundred and fifty years to breed in, after all.

"Okay," Jelly said. "Here's the plan."

"We have a plan?" Hatter asked.

"I'm making one up right now," she told.

"Okay, continue," he replied.

"Hopefully, we'll be able to avoid the posse altogether," Jelly did continue. "Equally hopefully, it'll rain mince pies and lemonade this afternoon. We can buy ourselves some time by sticking along this ridge. The trees will provide us with some cover, and the elevation will give us a vantage point. When March spots us, we'll know. Then, I'll break cover. I shot his ear off, I'm pretty sure he's angry at me; that means he'll follow me. The three of you fall back into the forest and double back towards the Casino a bit. If I make it, we'll meet up by the hedges. If not, take the Stone to Caterpillar."

"That's a terrible plan," Jack opined, buckling his saddle onto his mare.

"I don't like it either," Hatter added.

"Okay," Jelly said. "What's wrong with it?"

"The consequences of being captured are greater for you than they are for anyone else here," Jack said.

"Uh, Jack?" Jelly replied, pretty sure she should be offended. "There are two people here who belong to an army, and the one who isn't me is old enough to remember your grandmother's reign. I have the greatest chance of fighting them off, and come to it, the greatest chance of resisting an interrogation."

"Bravo," Jack shot back, stepping up into his saddle. "Well done, you are correct. But there's something you're forgetting."

"What?" Jelly asked, annoyed.

"The Stone has been away from the Looking Glass for long enough that they'll have had to have shut it down. That means that there are no more Oysters coming into Wonderland. As much as my mother would dearly love to see your head roll, my father's far too practical to allow it. He's going to ensure that every Oyster is drained dry, including you."

Jelly froze in the act of mounting her horse, surprised less by the words and more by the way he said them, like it wasn't a terrible secret and there weren't people around to hear it.

"What?" Hatter yelled, loud enough to spook his horse a little.

"I knew it!" Charlie crowed. "I knew you weren't a Spade! Aha ha!"

There were many ways Jelly could respond to this. She could deny it. She could call Jack out on what was obviously an immature attempt at revenge for her remarks last night. She could pull out her gun and shoot him in the face. But, as tempting as those ideas were, there was only one good way to respond.

"Jack," Jelly said, slipping into her saddle so that they were at more or less eye level. "Think about it for a moment. Is my being drained really worse than Charlie being paraded around the Casino as a trophy, or Hatter being tortured, or your own parents killing you? Is it worse than the Crown getting the Stone of Wonderland? My feelings and I aren't on speaking terms anyway!"

"But you're an Oyster?" Hatter asked.

"Only from the minute I was born," Jelly replied.

Hatter looked like there was more he wanted to say, so Jelly cut him off. "And we need to leave quickly, so unless one of you has a better idea why don't we stick with my plan?"

"I could drive them away with my skills in the Black Arts," Charlie offered, his tone growing more theatrical as the sentence reached its end.

"We'll hold that idea in reserve," Jelly replied. "Let's go."

They made their way through the Forest of Wabe in silence, Charlie's inclination to sing having been unanimously vetoed by everyone else. They skirted the edge of the cliff face, keeping watch over the valley below with keen eyes. They were nearly in the Fungiferous Foothills before Jelly caught sight of a Spade.

"They're here," she said. There was a flash of white, and March's bunny face turned up towards them. They'd been spotted. "And they know we are too."

Charlie groaned.

Jelly thought. The posse was Darrel, March, and a set of twelve Spades. She had twenty nine bullets, three knives, and, for the moment, the high ground with the sun rising behind her, and a horse. She didn't like those odds, but they were workable.

"This is the part where you slip away," she reminded the men. They ignored her.

"By my psychic to the mysterious sinews that bind mankind to the out realm," Charlie moaned, touching his fingertips to his temples and closing his eyes. "Galadoon De Booshe!"

"Charlie," Jelly said.

Charlie opened his eyes a sliver. "Hm?"

"Get the hell out of here. All of you," Jelly said. "The Stone needs to get to Caterpillar. More importantly, they can't get a hold of it."

At that, Jack urged his mare around and deeper into the Wabe, followed reluctantly by Charlie.

"Do me a favor? Don't forget to ask about my father," she said pointedly. Hatter nodded, and followed the other men.

She watched as the foliage closed around them before urging her mount into motion. She steered her horse back where the slope had been gentler; they would climb there. Well, the Suits would climb there; it wouldn't surprise her to learn that March was planning on leaping up out of the valley onto her horse. She clutched at the reigns, and waited on the cusp of the slope for the Suits to come into view. Once she was sure that they knew where she was, she take off, and they'd follow.

Kill or be killed situations were surprisingly uncommon in the City. The sort of people who would rather be killed than taken in to face the executioner's axe were few in number and, for the most part, as inclined towards suicide as they were to going out in a blaze of glory. When she had climbed the ranks, she'd encouraged those under her command to take prisoners, if only so that they could fill the spaces in the executioner's docket that might otherwise be occupied with their own numbers. There had been times when it was unavoidable, and during the food riots things had almost escalated to open civil war, but even then, the Spades worked under a strategy of having the numerical advantage whenever possible, and they always had body armor, the best weapons, medical assistance on standby and three square meals a day. She was used to having her opponents at a disadvantage. She was used to being able to force them to surrender. She was used to have at least Othello at her back, but more often a set, or a hand, or a play, if not the entire deck.

That wasn't going to happen here. She was outnumbered. She was outgunned. She was a traitor. And she didn't even know if she'd managed to accomplish anything.

She didn't have to wait very long. The first Suit- and she forced herself not to identify them- was in her sights before her muscles had time to begin to cramp. She was just about the kick her horse into action when he fired off a shot. The sound of the gun going off panicked her horse, which reared back unexpectedly, throwing her to the forest ground. Pain flare anew through her wounded arm and she was momentarily bereft of breath. She took it back quickly though, and snatched the gun up from the ground.

Thankfully, the Suits kept aiming for the horse after it bolted, rather than her, and she managed to make two clean kills in three shots before they realized that they'd been shooting in the wrong direction. Jelly felt their return fire thud into the tree she'd taken cover behind, before popping off three shots of her own. None of them hit anything that was after her, as far as she could tell, but that hadn't been the point. As they took cover she fled deeper into the Wabe, running until she found a hollow tree in which to hide.

Hurriedly, she reholstered her gun in the small of her back, and took out the one from her shoulder holster, which had more bullets in it. After a moment's thought, she placed it back inside, and pulled the knife out of her right pocket. She was outnumbered, but for the moment, no one knew exactly where she was. They would spread out and search for her. The less noise she made, the easier it would be to evade them, and pick them off. The EPs would let Darrel know which of his men had died, and with that information, direct them towards her position anyway: that would lend itself well enough to her purpose. There was no need to be stupid about this.

Before long came the sound of footsteps, crunching against the leaves and mulch that coated the forest floor. They belonged to a pair of Spades, Jelly guessed. She clutched her knife and waited; the pair paused not too far from her position, checking the shrubbery across the path. As she watched, one of them turned from keeping watch on the forest to confirm something for his partner, leaving both of their backs exposed.

She leaped at them from behind, bringing her left foot down on one Spade's instep as her right hand smashed into the back of his head. The other Spade brought his gun up to bear; she grabbed his arm with her free left hand and forced his aim down and away, at the prone Suit's body rather than hers. Then she brought her knife up and slashed it across his throat. Blood gushed from the wounds, coating her hand; his body shook in his death throes, causing him to fire his gun before falling to the ground. The bullet went in through his partner's neck, putting an end to his struggle to get back onto his feet.

Jelly threw herself behind a nearby tree as another pair of Spades, drawn by the fire, rushed through the forest. She switched dropped the knife back into her pocket and withdrew her gun. The pair drove for cover when they saw the bodies, but one wasn't quite quick enough to avoid her opening shot. His body flopped into the bushes, but a chunk of his head spilled out onto the path. His partner shot at her, and she pressed herself more fully behind the tree for a moment, before darting out to return it. They exchanged fire for a few moments, until her gun jammed. She swore, dodging fully behind the tree again. The Spade clipped the side of the tree trunk with his next shot, sending splinters flying through the air, several of which embedded themselves in the side of her face, just narrowly missing her eye. She yelled in pain, and heard the Spade ease out of his cover when she failed to return fire.

She had two thoughts, as she eased the gun out from behind her back. The first was fuck that hurts. The second was that guy must think his shot hit me, rather than the tree.

Then she whirled around the tree and shot at the Spade. He bellowed in pain, and Jelly shot again, this time making sure the bullet hit his head, not his chest.

She listened. Nobody seemed to be coming, so she picked up the guns from the fallen Suits, taking one to replace her jammed weapon, and collecting the other's cartridges. Then she wiped her knife and hands down on the pants legs of one of the Spades as best she could. Her arm still hurt and the side of her face was throbbing, but they were debilitating injuries. She had thirty-eight bullets and three knives against six Spades, Darrel, and Mad March. She might just live after all. Though, the fact that no one had come to investigate the prolonged exchange of gunfire by now was worrying her just a little.

She moved the way the last pair of Spades had come, listening for any sound of approaching Suits and trying to keep her own tread as light as possible. Then suddenly, there was the sound of shots being exchanged.

A portion of her was unsurprised to find Hatter, on foot and being shot at by a pair of Spades. Most of her was too busy being furious with him to be unsurprised. Then Hatter went flying back as one of them shot him in the chest.

Jelly stepped out from behind her tree and shot them both, one through the head, the other through the neck. Then she slid down the small hill that separated her from their bodies, and went to get Hatter.

He'd already picked himself up and set his hat to rights when she came into full sight of him.

"What happened to you?" he asked, as he took in her appearance. "You were on your own for what-"

"My plan happened," Jelly hissed. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm making sure you see your father again," Hatter replied.

Jelly stared at him for a moment. "Okay," she said finally. "How many did you incapacitate?"

"It doesn't matter," Hatter replied.

"Hatter-"

"No, you're not listening," Hatter said. "It doesn't matter. They've already called for back-up. Do you know how many Suits can fit into a Scarab?"

"Two hands worth," Jelly replied with a groan.

"Well, yes of course you do," Hatter muttered. "As far as I can tell, the plan was to have the posse drive us towards them." He glanced back to where the bodies were. "But if they're all dead, they're going to abandon that plan pretty quick."

"They aren't all dead," Jelly told him. "There are still at least four Spades, Darrel, and March: though, if I were Darrel that would be enough casualties to make me scrap the plan. What about Charlie and Jack?"

"Riding back to the City of the Knights at breakneck speed when I last saw them," Hatter said. "The Suits will be looking for two men and a woman, not just two men, and certainly not a Knight. With a little luck they'll be passed over."

"By what?" Jelly asked. As though in answer, there was the unmistakable whirr of flamingos flying overheard. "Oh, motherfucker…"

"Yeah," Hatter said, pressing them both flat against the tree. They waited, barely breathing, until the sound of airborne Suits faded.

"Do they have a plan after that?" she asked. "The City of the Knights is probably big enough to hide in, but it's also big enough that the Suits will find it sooner or later."

"If we're not back by nightfall, they're going to head for the boat," Hatter said. "Come on."

"The boat that March will have found and Darrel will have told his back-up about?" Jelly asked as she followed him along the path. It was narrow enough to provide ample cover to hide behind, while being clear enough not to trip them up.

"There's a distinct lack of other options here, you know. The way between the Casino and here is blocked, and the way between the city and here is a whole lot of open ground we could very easily be spotted on," Hatter replied. "Besides, the boat's docked right near a hot-spot for smugglers. As soon as word gets around to Tortoise's lot, they'll come kick them out. I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't happening already."

"What makes you say that?" Jelly asked.

"Because I know the food smuggling business like I know the Tea business," Hatter told her. "I know what the demand is and I know what people can get out of their government rations and what's grown in the city. And let me tell you, there is one hell of a gap. Shipments will have been intercepted, and no competent Resistance leader- which Tortoise seems to be- is going to let their source of political sway wane. With a little luck, we could slip out in the confusion."

"I try not to rely on luck too much," Jelly said. "It always seems to duck out at the worse possible moment."

"Well, do you have a better idea?" Hatter asked.

She opened her mouth to respond, but heard the sound of an approaching pair. She wondered, distantly, if they knew they were being that loud as she gestured for Hatter to hide and crouched behind a bush.

A few moments later the pair blundered by, visibly steeped on one of the less relaxing Teas. Jelly waited for them to stagger by- the game had changed now, and the less attention she drew to herself, the better.

Naturally, that was the moment in which she lost her footing, slid, and crunched into the shrubbery. No amount of Lust, or Passion, or Desire was going to obscure the noise, and the pair doubled back to investigate.

They were nearly upon her when there was a whistle, and Hatter punched one of them in the face. Jelly rose, bringing the butt of her pistol up into the back of the other's skull. The one Hatter had taken care of flopped back and was still; hers collapsed forwards and attempted to rise until she gave him a sharp kick in the head.

"What's the deal with your right arm?" she asked, bending to retrieve their weapons.

"It's my right arm," Hatter replied, holding out his hand, his eyes not on her but on the forest. She handed over one of the fallen Spade's guns, and he checked the cartridge and the safety before depositing it in his breast pocket.

"Yeah," Jelly drawled. "But you seem to be able to hit harder with it than most people." She ejected the other gun's cartridge, and tossed the gun itself into a nearby hummock. Assuming they found it at all when they regained consciousness, it would need a thorough cleaning before it worked again. She held out the cartridge. "Free bullets?"

"Thank you," Hatter said, taking them and ignoring her earlier comment. The headed off again, forgoing talking in favor of listening for the approach of more Suits.

There were many more Suits: the pairs came closer and closer together and thrice they heard flamingos overhead, but they managed to avoid most of the Spades, incapacitate the ones they couldn't, and if the flyers spotted them, there was no indication of it. Eventually, the patrols thinned, and she began to shift her focus, bit by bit, off of immediate survival and onto what they were going to do when they caught up with Charlie and Jack. Providing they did catch up with them; the alternative was that they'd been captured, and she wasn't really prepared to face that possibility. She wasn't a very big fan of the whole 'escape in the merely probable confusion of a firefight between the Resistance and whatever Spades were guarding their drop point': she'd played with more wildly fluxuating odds, yes, but generally with some way of seeing where they were just before she acted, and with a back-up plan firmly in place.

Before she could come with one, however, there came the sound of marching feet; there was only one set, but at the pace it went, there was no mistaking who it was.

She turned to Hatter, who jerked his head towards a tree with low-laying branches. She swung herself up into it, and had climbed several cubits up before she realized that Hatter wasn't following.

"Hatter!" she hissed, trying to project her voice and not have it carry at the same time. The marching grew closer as Hatter turned around and pointed skywards. Climb.

Jelly gesticulated wildly with one arm, the other clutching tightly to the branch she was seated on. She forced herself not to grimace as the way her face tried to contort drove the splinters deeper into her skin. What the hell are you doing?

Hatter pointed up again, and then hurried away, moving around the edge of a medium-sized hill and out of sight. Jelly had several strongly-worded things to say about this development, but no way of communicating them, because at that moment March came into view.

He stomped his way up to the tree; Jelly inched her free hand to the gun under her arm, wondering if she'd left any of the shadows he tracked by, or if he'd spotted her already. He was almost directly below her; she could see the top of his head, where the ear she'd shot off had left some wiring and metal exposed. Then March's head jerked, suddenly, unnaturally, tilting his face in the direction Hatter had just gone.

"Hatter," he sing-sang in a mechanized voice. "Come out, come out wherever you are."

He pounded towards the edge of the hill, and then stopped abruptly. "You know I'm better at hide and seek than you are," he said, moving his head from left to right. "Why are you dragging this out?"

Jelly wrapped her fingers around the handle of her gun, and tried to ease it out of its holster as quietly as she could, painfully aware of the dried blood on her hand itching and flaking off as she did so. She wasn't quite sure if she believed that he didn't notice her, but if he was going to be stupid enough to give her a shot at him, she was going to take it.

March's head jerked, suddenly, to a cluster of bushes several cubits away from the hill. "You're only making this worse for yourself, Hatter," he continued, striding towards them. "I could make this quick. But you know how I get when I'm angry."

There was the sound of gunfire then. March jerked his entire body in that direction, and appeared to consider it for a moment before heading off. Jelly wondered for a moment if she should try for the shot, no matter how awkward the angle, but she didn't want to risk giving their position away if the assassin was leaving anyway, and very shortly he disappeared out of sight.

She stayed in place for a moment, then reholstered her weapon, and eased her way down. Hatter was standing by the tree trunk when she touched the ground, making it easier for her to spin around and say (quietly, of course) "What the fuck was that?"

"You're very foul-mouthed today, you know," Hatter observed, heading back off in the direction of the City of the Knights as though they'd merely dodged another patrol. Thankfully, the firefight seemed to be happening in the other direction. She'd be worried, but neither Jack nor Charlie had a gun to return fire with, so it didn't seem worth the energy.

"I haven't had breakfast," Jelly muttered, before finding that once they'd started the words were impossible to stop. "We're being followed by two hands worth of my co-workers. I've had to kill eight of them so far. There's only a limited amount of time to get back to Charlie and Jack before they attempt something suicidally stupid. My father is either in the process of being brainwashed or held on collateral for me managing to get Jack to safety. And you're trying very hard to distance yourself from March, but I've got to tell you, Hatter, it's not your best work. So I repeat: what the fuck was that?"

Hatter glared at her. "Fine, I know Mad March. Knew. And Jack is chummy with Caterpillar and you're a bloody Oyster. We're just having that sort of day." He moved past her, hurrying ahead.

"Knew how?" Jelly hissed as she caught up with him.

"I knew him," Hatter replied. "I might go as far as to say I knew him before he went mad, but then again he tried to electrocute me when I was nine, so I might not."

The hum of a flamingo filled the woods over the sound of distant gunfire, and they both dove for the relative cover of a nearby tree.

"Does this have anything to do with your right arm?" Jelly whispered on a whim.

"He cut the original one off," Hatter said. The words weren't matter of fact, like they'd been when he'd told her about his father. They were blunt, meant to scare her off. "So I had it replaced with something more durable."

The flamingo had passed, so Jelly unpeeled herself from the tree and started up again. "And, what? You survived once, so baiting him is good idea?"

"Would you rather his focus was on you? Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't even have that much," Hatter retorted.

"I've known him for thirteen years and he hasn't tried to kill me yet."

"I'm glad to hear it. But it's not exactly a mark in your favor."

"And surviving once isn't an excuse to be that reckless."

"Have you looked in the mirror lately?" Hatter asked. "I'm not the one with half a tree in my face."

"I'm a Spade," she said, exasperated. Hatter shot her a disbelieving look, so she amended "I was a Spade. I've been a Spade my whole life. This is normal for me. I know what I'm doing."

"So do I," Hatter told her. "I might go out of the way to avoid this sort of thing, but I'm Resistance. Sooner or later I was going to dance too close to the fire, and it was going to come down to this. Time's finally caught up with me, and I'm not going to run."

For a moment, it seemed they were at an impasse; then Hatter smirked, and said "Though, I'd like you to know that I'm deeply touched by your fretting."

"I'm not fretting," Jelly said with a roll of her eyes, relieved to be given the chance to retreat behind their normal banter. "I'm trying to come up with a good reason not to shoot you."

"Well, I could point out that it sounds like misplaced fretting, but I'm not," Hatter said, holding out a hand to help her down a somewhat-steep slope. "That's a reason."

"I don't think that counts," Jelly replied. "Actually, as this is my book I'm keeping here, I'm going to go with that definitely doesn't count."

"Well then," Hatter said. "What about my outrageous sense of humor? Or my cutting wit? There's also my overwhelming charm, and my devilishly handsome good looks."

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask him why he left out his sense of humility, but instead she went with "You are cute, I'll give you that much."

Hatter smiled, before seeming to catch himself and affecting an insulted tone. "Cute? Cute? Do you think that little of me?"

Jelly suppressed the urge to smirk. "Of course not. I could never think you little."

"You've walked into so many terrible jokes I don't know which one to say first," Hatter said.

"You could try list-"

There was the sound of a stick breaking underfoot. Jelly and Hatter went for the bushes, but they suddenly rustled, revealing a young man with a pistol. Before Jelly could try disarming him, the path came alive. They were trapped.

"Are you Hatter and Jellybean?" asked one of the gunmen.

"Ah, no," Hatter told them, holding up his arms in surrender. "Robinson and Duckworth. I'm Robinson, she's Duckworth." Jelly nodded once, mimicking his posture for the moment. "We're on our honeymoon. It got a bit trampled by Suits. If you could point us in the direction of the lake-"

"It's them," said a woman's voice. "Well, it's him, at least."

"Oh," Hatter said, dropping his hands quickly. "Hi, Sylvie."

Jelly lowered her hands and gave him a questioning look.

"I'm Bruno's sister," Sylvie said. "I'm also in charge of the farmers' block while Tortoise is getting up to shenanigans in the city. We've got your friends; they're safe. Well give you fresh horses, and then you can be on your way while we're keeping the Suits busy."

"Thank you," Jelly said.

"Now we're even," Sylvie replied.

The gunmen melted away into the trees, far more stealthy than the Suits had been to date. Benefits of being on their own territory, Jelly figured, as Sylvie turned with the obvious intention to have them follow her.

"Tortoise is in the city, you say?" Hatter asked.

"Yes," Sylvie said. "She got news that Carpenter defected, and decided that a meeting was in store."

Jelly slipped, and fell face first into a tree before Hatter could catch her.

"Ow!" she yelled, as the bark scraped against the splinters.

"You should really have that looked at," Sylvie commented, before stepping into a fern and disappearing from view.

Hatter leaned over the fern. "Huh," he said, bracing his arm against a nearby rock before dropping himself into the hole the fern had concealed. Jelly listened to the thump that signified his safe landing. It was almost immediate: she gave him a few moments before following.

Her knees bent as she landed on the dirt floor. Hatter helped her straighten and they made their way down the narrow tunnel, which was lit with the glow of phosphorescent mushrooms which grew in the walls.

"What is this place?" she asked.

"I'm not sure," Hatter replied. "I know Sylvie because I staked out one of the drop points. Tortoise's group generally use little dug-outs, but they're nothing this-" he cut himself off as the tunnel broadened to reveal a causeway across a large pit. Looking down, Jelly could see a space that rivaled the Great Library in terms of size and population, but instead of books, there was food. Food everywhere: ears of corn, barrels of apples, boxes of mangoes, bushels of broccoli, piles of cabbages. She had never seen so much food in one place in her life, and as a trainee she'd had to patrol the inventories in the Casino.

"But nothing this elaborate," Hatter finished. "Wow."

"Yeah," Jelly agreed.

"Harbingers!"

Charlie raced towards them, and caught them both in a hug. Jelly patted him on the back, until he drew the hug out past the point of awkwardness.

"Okay, that's enough," she muttered.

"We were just about to go back up and look for you," Charlie said happily. His face fell, though, when he got a good look at hers. "Oh my."

"Do you know where I could wash up?" Jelly asked.

"There's a water closet this way," Jack replied from behind the Knight. He was looking slightly overwhelmed, probably from being alone with Charlie for however long, but otherwise okay.

"Hold on a moment, I'll be right back," Charlie said, dashing away. She exchanged looks with Hatter, before turning back to Jack.

"I'd like to apologize for my behavior this morning," the prince said stiffly.

Jelly wondered for a moment if Charlie had spoken with him, before deciding that it didn't really matter. "I'm sorry for how I acted last night. Truce?"

"That would seem to be for the best," Jack agreed. "I'm not sure I want to know what your rejoinder would be otherwise."

"It would have involved punching out all your blood," Jelly informed him.

Jack shot an involuntary look at her right hand, which was still coated with blood and grime."The water closet's this way," he repeated, and took off down the ledgeway.

Charlie intercepted just outside the door. "Here!" he said, thrusting a sack into her hands.

"Uh, thank you?" Jelly said, opening it. A rubber ducky grinned out at her. She held it up and presented it to Charlie with a questioning air.

"It's bathing supplies," Charlie said scathingly, as though she should have known better. She probably would have, had anyone but him given her a sack outside a water closet.

"Thank you," she repeated, and went inside to clean up.

Charlie's sack did indeed contain a great many useful items. There was a bottle of mineral oil and a rough cloth she used to give her knife a better cleaning. There was a small mirror and a pair of tweezers she used to remove the tree bits from her face. But what it was lacking was a way to get the blood out from under her fingernails.

She'd gotten it off her hand proper easily enough. But she could still feel it coagulated in her cuticles, and no amount of scrubbing, picking or rinsing was doing a good enough job. Maybe it was the water pressure. There was no faucet, just a trickle of water from a spring coming from the wall and splashing into the basin. Maybe it was the temperature. It was a very cold spring, and hot water was better for this sort of thing, wasn't it? But she couldn't get the blood out and it was driving her-

Okay Jelly, calm down, she told herself sternly. You nearly ripped your own fingernails off the last time you did this. There's nothing there. You know there's nothing there.

It felt like there was. Eight people in one day was a lot, even for a Spade.

There was a knock on the door. "Are you okay?" Hatter called.

Jelly was trying to muster up the effort for a convincing yes when the door opened.

"Don't ask me that," she said, as Hatter walked in. "Ask me anything else, but don't ask me that."

"Okay," Hatter said, then, after a beat. "Are you ready to go?"

"Yeah," Jelly said, flicking her now dry knife back into her pocket and collecting Charlie's things back in his sack. Leaving now before she had a chance to show her fingernail issues in front of Hatter would probably be a good idea.

"Are you going to be okay for the ride?" Hatter asked.

"I'm fine," Jelly replied.

"Is your name really Jellybean?"

It was then she realized that she had inadvertently given him carte blanche. She pinched the bridge of her nose, feeling a headache coming on.

"I'm just saying, that doesn't sound like an Oyster name," Hatter continued, with a peek into the toilet stall to ensure that they were alone.

"It's not the name my parents gave me, no. Well, not the one they gave me originally," Jelly closed the sack and went for the door. Hatter opened it for her. "What about you?" she asked.

"My parents named me Theophilus," he replied.

"And the mystery of why you're called Hatter is solved," she replied.

"There's nothing wrong with the name Theophilus," Hatter protested. "It just can't beat Hatter."

Jack and Charlie were nowhere to be seen, but Hatter appeared to know where to go, so Jelly fell into step, allowing him to steer their way. Hatter, for himself, seemed to have run out of questions.

"It's not exactly what you expected, huh?" Jelly asked.

"What's not?" Hatter replied, too quickly.

Jelly shot him an unamused look. "Please. I've read the propaganda. Hell, they keep coming to Dad to help write it."

Supposedly, Oysters didn't think like Wonderlanders did. Which might very well be true, her Dad was fond of pointing out, but that had a lot more to do with culture then it did with any biological or neurological differences between the two peoples, and it didn't even begin to cover the gap the Tea literature presented.

Well, his rant was a lot longer than that, but at this point she was pretty sure that was the gist of the matter.

"Well, it's not like I trust the propaganda," Hatter said, sounding a bit hurt. "And I've read your books, remember? They certainly don't fit with the party line. I guess I thought there would be more noticeable differences, that's all."

"Supposedly, most of the differences people know about are the result of the most blatantly artificial pseudoscience since the invention of phrenology," Jack interrupted. He was standing just inside a small tunnel entrance, and once he was sure he had their attention he began to walk down it.

"Oh God," Jelly said as she followed, recognizing her father's words and really not wanting to. "He doesn't actually say that in front of other people, does he?"

"Only when they give him permission to speak freely," Jack replied, levering himself up and out of a small hole in the ground very much like the one they had entered through.

"Really? In Court?" Jelly asked, as Hatter helped her follow suit.

"Well, it's not every time your father's in Court certainly," Jack said as Hatter clambered up. Jelly buried her face in the palm of her hand, as much from the embarrassment as the way the sudden sunlight was making her squint.

"Oh that's not so bad," Hatter assured her. "My mother used to go around asking people why ravens were like writing desks. It wasn't a pass code, it didn't have an answer, she just liked saying it."

Charlie clanked nearby, and Jelly forced her eyes to open and adjust to the light, focusing her attention on the darker of the two horses they had left. "Well, we should probably skip over the sort of things Jack's parents say."

"Definitely," Jack agreed. "Seeing as I haven't listened to them years."

"My Nan used to tell me that if I were the only eligible bachelor in the world, there wasn't a warthog or a wallflower that would polish my escutcheon, let alone a woman of good breeding," Charlie said.

"You win," Jelly said. "Here's your prize."

He looked excited for a moment, before he realized that she was handing him back his sack.

"Yes, well," Charlie said with a sniff. "Let's be off. We have a Stone to deliver!"

True to her word, Sylvie did keep the Suits off their back. The way into the City was clear and trouble free, and they had little trouble avoiding patrols as Jack took the lead, ring once more in its box and tucked inside his pocket. They climbed higher and higher, until they finally arrived at one of the least likely hot spots for Resistance activity.

"The Hospital of Dreams," Hatter said flatly. "Caterpillar's in the Hospital of Dreams."

"Yes," Jack replied. "What of it?"

Jelly smirked. "He's been pretending to be here in rehab while doing Resistance things."

"That's just bloody typical," Hatter said.

"Why would dreams need a hospital?" Charlie asked.

"Because they ended up in the wrong person," Jack replied walking up the steps. "Come on, we're nearly there."

The Hospital itself was a dark and dismal place; Jelly let Jack handle the creepy receptionist and her bugs and kept a look about for anything that might have been lurking in the shadows. It was how she spotted him before he spotted her; the dark velvet of her coat blended in with her surroundings, and he was still wearing his white lab gear.

"Dad!" Jelly yelled, running across the lobby to meet him.

"Oh, just follow the Carpenter," the receptionist snapped as they met in a hug, Dad's hands shifting when he inadvertently pressed one against her gun rather than her back.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"I'm fine," he said, frowning as he pulled back and scrutinizing the bloody mess where the splinters had been. "They got me out right away. What happened to your face?"

"I had a disagreement with a tree," Jelly replied.

"The tree won," Hatter elaborated.

Carpenter raised an eyebrow at her.

"Hatter, this is my father," Jelly introduced. "Dad, this is Hatter. He's been helping me keep ahead of the- everything."

"Aren't you a Tea Seller?" Dad demanded. "I'm pretty sure I've seen you at the conventions."

"Yeah, technically," Hatter admitted. "Of course, it's the not-technical bits that are why I'm here."

"Is Caterpillar-" Jack began.

"He was smoking hookah in the middle of a rowboat in the pool last I saw him," Dad said.

"…really?" Hatter asked, as Jack took off in the direction of the stairs.

"I think it might be better not to ask," Dad said. "Jellybean, there's something you need to see."

"I'll just go take Charlie and catch up with Jack," Hatter said, walking over to where Charlie was squinting at the wall as though he thought it might suddenly attack.

"…Charlie?" Dad asked.

"It's definitely better not to ask," Jelly said. "What's going on?"

"I-" Dad began walking down the hallway. "I didn't know. If I'd known, I'd have taken you and run years ago. I always thought it wasn't worth the risk of contacting the Resistance when they were likely to be pretty angry at me."

"Yeah, I thought that for a while there too," Jelly said, choosing not to tell him why she'd decided that it was worth the risk after all.

"Well, apparently, they're desperate enough for information on Tea that we probably could have gotten away with it," Dad said. "Even if-"

He stopped outside a door marked NO ENTRANCE BUT ENTRANCED, and gave a small, bitter sort of laugh. "There's no good way to break this news, so I'm just going to say it: Carol's alive. Your mother's alive, and she's here."

"What?" Jelly asked as he pushed open the door to reveal a middle aged woman, with graying auburn hair and an anxious expression. "Mom?"

"Hello Jellybean," she said.