I smile as she looks up at me, shocked. “I’ve been practicing. Want to try again? I have an entire sea of carpet to play with. And the way I remember it, your spirit withered under my command, just like now.”
Morpheus’s fingers tighten through mine—a squeeze of encouragement or of warning, I’m not sure. Either way, I ignore him and engage in a stare-down with her poisonous eyes.
“Oh, but I’ve taken measures to assure that won’t happen again. Haven’t you noticed yet?” Red lifts Hart’s inanimate hand and points it at my chest, triggering the tearing pain anew.
My concentration wavers. The vine I captured escapes the shrinking filaments of carpet.
In the same moment, Red topples, flung to the floor by Hart’s resurgence in their shared body. They roll around, looking like a mutated mental patient, scratching and tearing at their ever-changing hair with fingers and snarls of ivy.
I leap to my feet, ready to liberate my dress’s razor edges and rip her to shreds while I have some leverage.
Morpheus tugs me back into his lap and whispers in my ear, “You would only damage the shell and turn both spirits to ash.” It’s amazing how he reads my mind without any magic at all. “We need Red to fix Wonderland. Bide your time, luv. Bide. Your. Time.”
Always the voice of reason, even when madness drives his every action. Red holds all the cards, along with my heart. She admitted she’s tainted me, confirmed my suspicion that I need her not only to fix Wonderland but to fix my insides.
There’s a loud thud as the queen’s spinning body busts into the table’s legs and spills the milk. Red manages to get the upper hand again. She stands, entwines the queen’s arms, and smooths her crimson hair with a shaky vine. “Get your betrothed in hand, or the bargain is off,” she says to Morpheus. “And you know what that will mean for your precious home.”
I start to offer a nasty retort, but Morpheus tightens his hold around my waist—an unspoken plea.
Red’s attention shifts to me. “Today, you will welcome my spirit within your body. We will wed Morpheus, leave AnyElsewhere, and take our rightful place on the Red throne. Your betrothed has voiced a particular eagerness to begin your honeymoon.” She rustles to the door in a flowing cascade of netting, satin, and tentacle-like vines. “Prepare for the ceremony. I’ll return before the hour is out.”
She leaves Morpheus and me behind the closed door with nothing but the pounding of a hundred hearts—those that are disembodied and rocking the room, and the two wrestling within our own chests.
I leap off his lap and face him. “Eagerness to begin our honeymoon? Really?”
“Oh, don’t be so coy, my blossom,” he purrs, his flawless face the embodiment of temptation beneath the chandelier’s throbbing glow. “You know we can hardly keep our hands off one another.”
The netherling inside me fidgets, tantalized by his teasing. “What I know is that you always kiss and tell.”
Instead of the pompous grin or snide comeback I’m expecting, he shushes me with a finger to his lips and mimes: “The walls have ears.”
I don’t dare assume he’s being figurative. Standing slowly, he keeps a wary eye on our surroundings. He takes off his hat and gloves, then places them in the chair.
I bide my time as he lifts a cloth napkin from the table and runs his fingers across the burgundy wall tiles. He’s on the last quarter of the room when he scoops something into his hand and beckons me close. Five pea-size creatures scuttle over the lines of his palm. They resemble tiny human ears with crab legs and wings that seem too small to lift them.
Wrapping them in the napkin, Morpheus squashes them and shoves the wadded cloth under the door. “Ear mites. They would’ve recorded anything we said and reported it to the queen.” He leads me to the center of the room. “Now we can talk freely.”
I remind myself not to overreact . . . to give him a chance to explain. “So, this is a wedding dress?”
The smug smirk I expected earlier makes a belated appearance. “Perhaps not what I originally intended you to wear for our union, but it will do in a pinch. Aren’t you glad you had the foresight to put it on?”
I take down the bun at the back of my nape, giving my hands something to do other than punch him. “You made it clear I should wear it,” I say, weaving my red streak back into the rest of my platinum waves.
Morpheus watches my every move, momentarily distracted as I pin up my hair again, piece by piece.
“I thought the dress was meant to be a weapon.” I slip the last bobby pin into place.
“Oh, with the way it fits you, it very well is,” Morpheus says, his voice gruff. The spilled milk on the table has started an annoying drip-drip-drip onto the carpet. He backs me up to a chaise lounge out of the way of the mess.
I sit on the edge of the center cushion, my wings strewn behind me. “Tell me what’s going on, and this had better be good.”
He shakes out a cloth napkin. “Still don’t trust me, aye?”