What’s going on with him? Who is he, really? Having him cloth-battered, blood having dried on his bare skin in most places, makes him most vulnerable-looking now. This looks like a moment I can take advantage of. How many times do you get to have an upper hand over the infamous Carter Pillar?
“I am ready for anything,” I say. “If you don’t step onto the chessboard, I will assume you’ve been denied walking upon white tiles, just like you wouldn’t do it in the Vatican. Fabiola may have been right. You’re a devil in disguise,” I raise a hand. “But even so, I will never blame you for it, because whatever makes you see something good in me, whatever makes you want me to save people, there must be a redeeming quality about you.”
The Pillar says nothing. It’s evident to me that he is sucking in whatever truth he is about to spill, right into the belly of his soul.
“There is nothing to be ashamed about,” I continue. “I am like you. An evil girl. But I made a choice to be good and pay for my sins.”
“Did you?”
I shrug. “I’m trying. Believe me I am. I may not have remembered everything I’ve done in the past, but the basic principle is to try to be a better person in the now.”
“I like the sound of that,” he says, and steps further.
My heart races, watching his foot near the white tile. Is he really going to step on it? Knowing him, I’m sure he could come up with a last minute trick.
In slow motion, holding my breath, I watch The Pillar step onto the white tile.
I can’t believe it.
Even slower, he pulls his other leg up and now steps with both feet upon the tile.
I wait for something to happen. I wait for a trick. I wait for him to shiver and shudder in pain because he isn’t supposed to be stepping on white tiles.
But all my assumptions are futile. The Pillar does have the power to step on white tiles. His intentions are clear, unless I don’t truly believe in the chessboard’s verdict. But I do believe in it. My heart tells me so.
“How is that for good intentions?” The Pillar says.
“Then why didn’t you just do it?” I chortle, so happy. “Why did you play games with me? I get it. Fabiola wasn’t right. You can walk the white tiles. You just want to come across as mysterious, like you always do.”
“Maybe I have another reason.”
I raise my eyes to meet his — they’ve been fixed on his legs all this time. “What do you mean?”
“Are you ready for this, Alice?”
“Ready for what? Please stop doing that? You’re scaring me.”
“You wanted to know my intentions, whether I can step on the white tiles or not. You wanted to know why I haven’t stepped on the tiles in the Vatican, even when I can now step on white tiles. Scary or not, you asked for the truth.”
It puzzles me what he is about to show me. What could possibly shatter this beautiful moment, knowing his intentions are ‘white’?
“This is why, Alice,” he says, strolling over the corner of the white tile.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Showing you who I am,” He says, and lifts up his right leg, leaning more to the right, then he stretches over to the adjoining black tile.
And there he shows me. It’s confusing. Too confusing, in fact. But it’s the truth.
The Pillar’s right leg steps over the black tile. He simply can step on both.
I cup my shriek with both my hands, more bewildered than shocked, because I’m not quite sure what this implies, having both white and black intentions.
Suddenly, when I’m about to press him for an explanation, the whole life-sized chessboard hums in a low drone that I can feel in my feet.
The drone escalates to a rattle, which escalates to an earth shattering sound, as if an earthquake is about to take place.
Chapter 55
“What’s going on?”
“I have no idea,” The Pillar says, stretching out his arms for balance, the same as me. “Hang on tight, Alice.”
“This is ridiculous,” I say. “We’ve ended up here because of the clue in the Black Queen chess piece. Are we going to die?”
“Unless Fabiola and Lewis intended a horrible fate for those who looked for Carroll’s Knight, it couldn’t be,” The Pillar says. The whole chess city starts to shake all around us. “Why would Lewis want us to die if he’s scattered the pieces all over the world? He could have simply thrown them into the ocean for no one to find them.”
“But he didn’t.” It’s getting hard to keep balance. “He hid the pieces from the Chessmaster, but he wanted someone else to find it. Probably me.”
It’s this exact moment when I realize that the final chess game is definitely between me and the Chessmaster. Carroll’s Knight isn’t just something the Chessmaster needs, but also fears.
This is it!
This is the part I read in the notes, where it explains he is afraid of something. I think the Chessmaster is afraid of me. No, that’s not quite it. He is afraid of me finding Carroll’s Knight, but he also had no choice but having me look for it. Because whatever Carroll’s Knight is for, Lewis was smart enough to hide from him, and only have me find it.