Here is another update, lovely readers! As always, Vanilla212 has done a fantastic job betaing this story. If there were a pirate crew of fearsome beta readers, she would be their fearless captain, sailing the seas in search of bad grammar and awkward phrasing to correct.

Hatter cursed the cadre of midgets jumping on his head — the ones causing the pounding in his temples, the high-pitched noise in his ears, and the general misery he felt. "Go away ya rotten little bastards," he muttered, and his splitting headache made the words echo loudly in his head. He groaned and opened his eyes.

There were no midgets. The noise in his ears slowly subsided.

He was sprawled awkwardly in the middle of his office floor, and not, he noted sourly, on the rather more comfy sofa. What a pity. His aching back would have much preferred the sofa.

Holding one hand to his head, he slowly clambered to his feet. Why the hell had he spent the night on the floor? A quick glance at the open wall of his office showed a late afternoon sun falling lazily toward the horizon, with a few puffy white clouds drifting serenely in the distance. Apparently it had been a beautiful day, though he'd already missed most of it.

Must've have had a lot of tea, he thought groggily, as he surveyed the various drinking paraphernalia strewn across his desk. He picked up a glass that still had a drop of bright green liquid in it and gave it a perfunctory sniff. The overpowering smell turned his stomach, and the lingering fumes made his head buzz. Strong stuff, this, and apparently he'd had a lot of it.

A sharp pang of guilt cut through the fog of his hangover. He dropped the glass on the desk, wishing he could forget where it came from.

Hatter had the nagging sense that he was forgetting something.

He sighed. Nothing to do but get the day started, now that it's almost over.

The first order of business would be to fire Dormie. He was eager to be free of his irksome employee, and there was no point in wasting time now that he'd made up his mind. He wondered if either Dormie or Alice had bothered to open the shop while he was out of commission. Alice likely wouldn't want to face a crowd of customers on her own, and Dormie was undoubtedly too narcoleptic to bother. It was just as well, since it wouldn't do for a customer to wander back and see the shop's proprietor passed out on his own product like some stuck tea-head. He had his reputation to consider, after all.

Wait.

Alice.

An image of her bright blue eyes flashed across his mind, and with a sudden flood of remorse, he remembered everything from the night before.

Shit.

She'd run away.

(the night before)

Alice didn't stop to think.

She ran into the night with no plan in mind, except to get as far away from Hatter and tea shop as possible. Without slowing down, she shoved a hand into her pocket as she ran, to make sure that Jack's gift was still there.

Earlier that day, after she'd fled the tense conversation in Hatter's office, Jack had followed her out and asked her to see him to the door. Curious in spite of her anger, she'd walked him to the shop entrance.

After carefully scanning the room for watching eyes, he'd discreetly produced a small wooden cylinder. He'd shown her how to manipulate the intricately carved patterns, releasing a hidden catch, and she had to stifle a gasp when the cylinder slid open to reveal a magnificent ring.

She'd seen very little jewelry in her life, and certainly never anything as impressive as this. The delicate gold band was accentuated with small diamonds, and a large gemstone she couldn't name was set in the center of a curling pattern of green stone. It looked ancient, and very valuable.

Jack had given her a very serious look, and said in a low voice, "Will you keep this safe for me, Alice?"

Confused, she'd reached out to touch it, carefully accepting it from him to get a better look. Why would he give something like this away, when it was likely to be safer with him? "What is it?"

Jack smiled. "There's a custom in your world, where betrothed couples share rings."

Alice had felt a wave of heat flush her face, and she'd refused to meet his eyes. Surely he didn't mean?...

"However, we're not in your world," Jack had continued, "so please accept this as my way of saying I care about you. I promise, Alice, that when I'm king, I'll make sure you're safe."

And then he'd left.

And now here she was, alone in an unfamiliar part of the city, with no friends to turn to. She wanted to believe Jack really could keep her safe, but that didn't do her any good if she couldn't get to him.

Alice slowed down to a walk, trying to get her bearings and force her racing thoughts into something cohesive. What next?

She could only think of three options: The first was to somehow make her way to the palace, to Jack. The second was to beg Chez to take her in, and the last was to somehow find the resistance group Jack was a part of, the one led by the Dodo.

She immediately struck the third option from the list. As far as she could tell, not everyone in the resistance was oyster-friendly. She didn't like the thought of getting involved without Jack there to intercede for her.

Her remaining two choices seemed equally dangerous. She hadn't the faintest idea how to get to the palace without being arrested and found out, much less get a private meeting with Jack. Anyway, what could he do for her? He wasn't king yet. The best he could do would be to squirrel her away with the rebels. No doubt Hatter would come looking for her sooner or later, and Alice didn't like the thought of that.

Asking Chez to take her in seemed like a dodgy proposition at best, especially if she showed up without her final delivery of illicit tea. Besides, Hatter knew to look for her there, too, and would no doubt stop by as soon as he sobered up. But Chez did have a boat. Maybe he could take her out of the city, somewhere safe. Maybe she could find work on a farm somewhere, and pretend to be mute. If she made sure that nobody ever saw her Glow, she might stand a chance of surviving, away from the tea trade and tea politics and Suits and everything else.

Suddenly, unexpected noises made her freeze in place. Her heart raced wildly as she heard distant shouts, followed by the ominous crack of what she thought must be a pistol. Somewhere off in the opposite direction, a boat with a loud motor raced through one of the upper canals. It was gang activity, she guessed. Hatter would've had a much better idea of what was going on than she did, and he would have found the safest paths. He always kept me safe...

She banished that notion as soon as it crossed her mind. Hatter was stuck on the tea, and he could stay that way. At least until I get away, she thought angrily. She set her jaw and kept moving...

...and stubbed her toe on a grotesque planter with a misshapen tree inside of it. She immediately wished she'd brought a light of some kind, but she wasn't about to go back for one. Besides, it was better not to be seen on a night like this. Scared or not, she would just have to find her way down to the docks in the dark.