I wave back, feeling shyer than I’d like.
They all turn their attention to Dad as he shrugs into a chain mail mantle. He takes the sword offered him and walks into the middle of the pit with his brother. They bow; then, in a blink, they’re fencing. Ash flies up around them with each lunge and parry.
Dad seems out of his element, his movements jerky and imbalanced. He gets tripped and pinned to the ground by Bernard’s sword a few times. But soon, it’s like a switch flips on. His thrusts with the sword become fluid and natural. His fingers, wrists, body, and arms settle into a cadence as graceful as a waltz. The clang of swords rings in the air. It’s a good thing he’s stayed in shape via racquetball and jogging, or he’d never have the stamina for this.
The epiphanies and events of the past twenty-four hours start to spin around me. I stumble toward the empty table Dad pointed out and slide into my seat. The netherling customers I saw earlier still haven’t noticed me.
One is a reptilian creature. The other is monkey-faced and woolly. The lizard looks like a floating head and hands. Queen Red’s memory of Bill the Lizard resurfaces—the details emotionless and distant. The lizard’s body seemed to disappear when his clothes took on the color of leaves around him. It was like his suit was the chameleon instead of him.
Is this Bill? If so, my kingdom is in more danger than I imagined. Grenadine, Red’s amnesiac stepsister and my temporary standin as queen, doesn’t have the royal blood or crown-magic pulsing through her that I do. She’ll be hopelessly lost if the lizard isn’t showering her with ribbon reminders. By getting Bill stuck here, I’ve made things even worse.
“It’s an optical delusion, just so you know.”
My attention snaps up to a white, egg-shaped creature standing over me. Parts of his oblong body are studded with colored beads and shimmering ribbon glued in place. He looks like a giant Fabergé egg that escaped from a museum.
He sets down a glass of water, plops a basket of steaming rolls on the middle of the table, then slides a menu toward me. “My customer you keep gaping at. His suit is hooded and made of simulacrum silk. Comes from enchanted telepathic silkworms. It’s transparent when pulled over other clothes. It connects with the wearer’s mind and reflects their surroundings. Observers are deluded into seeing only the body parts that are bared. Tricky, aye? Comes in handier than you’d think.”
His yolk-yellow eyes, red nose and wide mouth remind me so much of the egg-man I met in Wonderland, I can’t help but blurt the name. “Humphrey?”
“Hardly,” comes the sour answer. “Name’s Hubert. Didn’t anyone ever teach you how to make a proper acquaintance?”
Wow. He even sounds like Humphrey. I squint. “Uhhh . . .”
“Well, are you going to sit there with your brain idling, or are you going to order some fare?” One praying-mantis arm straightens the collar beneath his chin, while the other balances a tray with a pad and pen as he awaits my answer.
“You’re his brother, aren’t you?” I ask, pushing aside the menu. The yeasty bread smells too good to resist so I grab a roll and sink my teeth in.
Hubert’s cheeks burn red. “Oh, I see. Since we’re all the same shape and color, we must all be related, right? An egg by any other name and all that rot.”
“Well, no. Since you work here, and the place is named after him.” I take another bite of my yeasty roll. “Figured it was a family thing.”
“Firstly,” he snorts, “I’d ask that you not speak with your mouth so full of bread. And secondly, if you’ll take a look at the menu, the inn is called ‘Humphrey’s and Hubert’s.’ Centuries of lazy-tongued patrons shortened it. But it’s right there in print, so see that you don’t.”
“So you’re business partners.”
“That would be a were.”
I wince. “Right. I’m sorry, I just thought—”
“Psssh. I know all about you and your dastardly thoughts.” He waves his buglike arm. “You’re the one who plugged up the rabbit hole.”
My own cheeks grow warm as the latest bite of bread forms a doughy lump, almost too big to swallow. “Th-th-that was an accident.”
“An accident.” The flush of Hubert’s cheeks bleeds into his whole face and body. I worry he might explode, sending his beaded embellishments ricocheting off the cushioned walls and floors like bullets. “An accident like the one that broke Humphrey’s shell and caused him to be exiled to the garden of souls? An accident like that?”
Thumping the prongs of my fork against the breadbasket, I frown. “Well, yeah. He fell off a wall. And later he tripped over Chessie’s head.”
“Pushed. He was pushed off that wall. By your great-great-great-grandmother. All so Humphrey would crack atop Rabid White. All so his innards could coddle that little fellow’s flesh. Eat it away so Queen Red could ‘save’ him.”