A Tale That Could Not Be
Chapter 25: Ghost in the Cell

The fairy dust tumbled over her head and immediately filled her with a sense of emptiness and lightness, as if she had lost all weight. Selvina looked down at her body, her arms and hands, her feet, and everywhere else. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary. For better or for worse, she was still very much alive and in no pain.

“Seems to me like you were swindled,” Alice said with a raised eyebrow. “The dust barely even sparkled.”

Selvina stood up and leapt into the air, thinking maybe the dust could make her fly, but immediately landed back on the ground, albeit very lightly. She sighed. “Other than feeling as light as a feather, I don’t think it did anything.”

“Sorry, Selvina,” Alice said sincerely. “I was kind of rooting for you.”

Selvina sighed again and leaned her forehead against the bars of her cell door.

Except that it went straight through, catching Selvina off balance and making her stumble right through the closed cell door. Standing in the hall, her eyes with shock and confusion, Selvina glanced back at her empty cell and then at the hall. She felt herself all over and once again felt no pain or discomfort, just a constant weightlessness.

“This just gets curiouser and curiouser,” Alice said, her own eyes wide with amazement. “You just walked right through those bars as if they weren’t there.”

“I did, didn’t I?” Selvina asked, still in disbelief. She glanced back at the pouch of fairy dust sitting the cell’s floor. No wonder the fairies didn’t want Pan to get his hands on it, Selvina thought. Were he able to fly through walls he would literally be unstoppable. She leaned her arm through the bars, still in awe at how it simply passed right through them, and grabbed the pouch. How she was able to grab the pouch in her hand and lift it through the bars she had no idea but she didn’t bother working out the science. She instead hurried to Alice’s cell, walked right through it, and knelt before the chained girl.

“Do you want to get out of here?” Selvina asked, reaching inside the pouch.

Alice frowned in determination as a smirk spread across her face. “Do I really need to answer?”

Selvina grinned wickedly and pulled out a pinch of the fairy dust, squinting from the light. She lifted it over Alice’s head but before she dropped it she said, “We get my friends first. That’s the deal. We find Wendy and Goldilocks and get them out of here. I know you probably want some revenge on the queen but we can’t do that until my friends are safe.”

Alice nodded. “I agree.”

“Good,” Selvina said before she opened her fingers and dropped the fairy dust.

Alice immediately stood up and the shackles that had once been around her wrists and ankles fell away. She rubbed her raw wrists, wincing as she did so, and breathed deeply. She then stretched her arms and legs, and twisted her spine.

Selvina grimaced as it cracked loudly and repeatedly. “I’m guessing you didn’t get too much exercise.”

“Once or twice a week I was able to run around my cell under heavy guard but only for a few minutes at a time. The queen was smart enough to know that if I was unhealthy her supply of blonde hair would dwindle so she wasn’t as cruel to me as much she would have wished to be.”

“I’m surprised you lasted this long,” Selvina said. “I don’t know if I’m that strong.”

Alice placed a hand on Selvina’s shoulder and gave it a light squeeze. “You came here on your own, Selvina, with the sole purpose of rescuing your friends. If that’s not strength then I don’t know what it is.”

Selvina smiled. “Thank you… I hear what you say but sometimes think my bravery is just stupidity.”

“There’s a fine line, but in the end, if your friends are better off for it, does it matter?”

“I guess not…”

“Exactly, now let’s go before the guards find out we’re gone.”

Selvina nodded to that and then the two girls hurried down the hall toward the staircase that would lead to the higher levels. Guards stood at its entrance but they were half asleep and as Selvina hid inside one of the walls, under Alice’s orders, she watched the other girl approach them. She disappeared into a wall and then appeared beside one of the guards. In his sleepiness he did not immediately see her and she was able to grab his spear and sweep it at his legs, tripping him over. The other guard came to attention but Alice dropped the spear and leapt into another wall. The guard stood, dumbfounded, as Alice appeared behind him and unsheathed the guard’s sword. Selvina watched intently, wondering if Alice was actually going to shed blood.

Instead, the short-haired blonde leapt on top of the guard’s back, removed his helm, and repeatedly bashed the sword’s pommel over his head until he eventually fell. The first guard was up by then but Alice dropped the sword, picked up the second guard’s spear, and smacked it across the other guard’s face. It sent him stumbling back in the wall, where Alice then flipped the spear around and thrust its butt end forward. The spear struck the guard in the forehead with a sickening thud and he too tumbled to the ground, much like the other.

With the guards disposed of, Selvina walked into the hall, her mouth agape with wonder. “Where did you learn to do that?”

Alice shrugged before wrapping the guards up with their own belts. “I was in a rebellion, remember? I didn’t go in without training. By the way, if you have the patience for it, the March Hare can teach you some amazing fighting techniques.” Alice then waved at Selvina to follow her up the stairs and she did so, but not without having another look at the unconscious guards.

Slipping through walls without needing to open doors saved Alice and Selvina many essential minutes during their search. Back on the main floor of the castle, they combed through many rooms extensively. When patrolling guards or castle servants appeared in the halls the two girls would slip in between the walls and wait for them to pass. For all the foreboding about using the fairy dust Selvina had received, she was grateful she had used it. It was proving to be most beneficial.

Alice eventually began remembering the castle’s layout and guided Selvina to where she remembered the kitchens had been. Alice stopped at one wall, signaled to Selvina to be the look-out and then poked her head through the wall. She soon pulled it out and tapped Selvina on the shoulder.

“The kitchens are right here,” she said with a great smile on her dirty face.

Selvina smiled back, overjoyed to finally be getting somewhere, and together they walked through the wall and into the kitchen. Selvina was immediately bombarded by numerous scents and aromas, mostly sweet ones. The kitchen was vast and had over a dozen tables assembled in rows with counters lining every wall. There were cupboards aplenty and six huge stoves. Cooks, bakers, assistances, and cleaners hurried about preparing what looked like a grand feast of desserts.

Most likely to celebrate my beheading, Selvina thought. She smirked and titled her chin upwards slightly. There would be no beheading, however. Not today, not tomorrow, and not ever.

Amidst the hustle and bustle of the frantic baking and cooking, the kitchen staff didn’t even notice Alice and Selvina. Selvina searched the faces of everyone, noticing that some weren’t even human. Several frogs leapt about the place, adding finishing touches to cakes, muffins, donuts, eclairs, and various other pastries. A large staff member who happened to be a bipedal walrus tested the icing by dipping his thick fingers into the bowl. Selvina spotted him tasting one of the icings more often than the others and wondered just how official his job really was. A woman eventually smacked his hand away and ordered him to go elsewhere. Large as he was, the walrus walked away, cradling his smacked hand as if it had been injured.

A fat, man-sized dodo bird in a fancy suit, wearing a monocle, and carrying a cane suddenly barged into the kitchen and barked, “Hurry it up, will you? The queen grows impatient! Her foot has already begun to tap! Do any of you want to—” The bird abruptly stopped talking and stared ahead, his eyes wide with amazement. He was gazing directly at Alice and she was smiling back at him. “Is…Is that you, Alice?”

Everyone stopped what they were doing and turned their heads toward Alice, their eyes as wide as the dodo’s. Alice glanced at everyone in turn and then settled her gaze on the dodo and nodded. “Hello again, Dodgson, it’s a pleasure to see you again.”

The dodo took a few moments to gather his emotions before responding. He removed his monocle and wiped what looked like a tear from his eye and then cleared his throat. “I thought you were dead, Alice. What brings you here now?”

Alice frowned and raised a fist. “I’m escaping and then bringing down the queen.”

At those words everyone that had paused in their work soon resumed it, reminded of who they worked for. The dodo walked across the kitchen toward Alice and then placed a feathered hand on her shoulder. “Alice, my dear, you already tried that. You’re a hero that will go down in legend for giving that foul woman one heck of a good show but she can’t be overthrown. We all fought in the rebellion, remember? The White Queen is gone—I saw the beheading myself—and there isn’t anyone left to defy her.”

“I will defy her!” Alice growled. “I won’t stand for this, Dodgson, and you know that.”

“I do, but I don’t think there’s anything you can do. You’ve finally got yourself some freedom. I suggest you leave this castle as soon as you can and never come back. Find somewhere far from here to live out your life in peace, Alice. You of all people deserve that.”

“I want the queen to answer for all the destruction and despair she’s caused. If I die doing that then that’s fine with me. I won’t live somewhere far away and pretend this isn’t happening.”

The dodo sighed and glanced at Selvina. “Who is your friend?”

“Selvina,” Alice replied. “She freed me, Dodgson, and she is here to stop the queen too.”

Wait, what? Selvina thought in alarm. “I…I just want to rescue my friends,” she said shyly.

“And the only way to do that is to stop the queen,” Alice said with a frown. “If you take them from her she will stop at nothing to get them back. You will never be free.”

Selvina groaned. “I’m not a fighter…”

“No, you’re not,” Alice started, “but you’re a survivor. You’re braver than most and stronger in more ways than you can imagine. I wasn’t a fighter either, Selvina, but Wonderland is my home now and I won’t let the queen ruin it any longer. Will you help me?”

Selvina glanced from Alice to the dodo and then back at Alice. She felt uncomfortably placed on the spot and though she had not intended on opposing the queen more than she needed to she understood Alice’s point. Tinkerbelle had left to find aid in defeating Pan but Pan didn’t have a castle and an army to defend it with. The queen had all those things as well as a vice-like grip of fear on everyone in Wonderland. She could subdue resistance before it could ever take place. How could Selvina compete with that?

Eventually, Selvina sighed and said, “Let’s just start with getting my friends and then we’ll work out a plan for the queen.”

Alice narrowed her eyes in suspicion but did nod. “Fair enough.” She turned to Dodgson and asked, “Have you seen a woman named Wendy in this kitchen?”

“Wendy?” Dodgson asked curiously. He tapped a feathered finger on his beak for a moment before nodding. “Yes, I know a Wendy. She was sent to feed her majesty’s bandersnatches nearly an hour ago. She should be returning soon.”

As if on cue, Wendy walked into the kitchen, her hair in a bun and her hands scratched and bloody. “Those damned things need a muzzle, the lot of them,” she said as she washed her hands in a large bowl of water.

Selvina couldn’t stop herself from running Wendy and wrapping her arms around her, hugging tightly. Wendy was caught off guard and roughly shoved Selvina away before realizing who she was. She then returned the hug tenfold in strength.

“How are you here, Selvina? Pan told us that you and Rapunzel were dead.”

“We simply lost our way,” Selvina replied before pulling away from the hug and wiping away a tear of joy. “Rapunzel was with the Hatter and the March Hare when they were attacked by a bandersnatch and I haven’t seen them since. I’m here to free you, Wendy, and Goldilocks too.”

Wendy’s face paled slightly. “Free me? Selvina, you do know whose castle this is, right? The Red Queen will not be pleased to find out that I’ve gone.”

Selvina furrowed her brow in confusion. “Wendy, I am here to take you away. Why don’t you want to go?”

“I DO want to go, Selvina. Do I ever want to leave this dreadful place but if I leave then the queen will take out her anger on everyone else here. I can’t do that to them. They’ve been nothing but kind to me.”

Selvina was at a loss. Here she was, standing in front of one of her friend, ready to take her away to safety, and yet she couldn’t. Standing in Wendy’s shoes, she realized that she’d probably do the same thing. She couldn’t rescue Wendy and then let innocent lives get hurt because of it. She’d never be able to live with herself knowing that those injuries, if not deaths, would be on her hands. What did it all mean, though? Was Wendy then trapped in the castle? Was she doomed to work in the kitchens until her dying day?

Selvina thought of the fairy dust but as much as she wanted to sprinkle it over everyone she didn’t have enough. If she wanted to free everyone in the kitchen she would have to free everyone in the castle and that just couldn’t be done. There were guards, soldiers, bandersnatches, Pan, and the queen herself to face if anything like that was attempted. Selvina only had herself, her fairy dust, and Alice. The odds were impossible.

“Seems like we’re in the same sinking boat,” Alice said to Selvina glumly. “What should we do?”

Across the kitchen, hiding in a corner, Selvina caught sight of something that gave her hope and courage. It gave her a wink, a wide, grotesque smile, and then vanished.

Selvina straightened her back, frowned in determination, curled her hands into fists, and then uttered two words.

“We fight.”

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