Behind Sanity

Chapter Seventeen

                                                                     Behind Sanity 

                                                                Chapter Seventeen 

                                                                                1 

               The heat rose around Alice as she headed down into the rocky crater.  The rabbit was nowhere to be seen by this time, as she had expected, knowing she had spent too much time conversing with the Cheshire.  She slid down from a rock and wiped her forehead of the sweat and ash that had collected there.  It truly was scorching down here!  She wasn’t sure exactly why.  Was this a volcano perhaps?  She saw no lava.  Baffled or not, she would just have to put up with it, she supposed.

                She climbed past the rocks and walked along the narrow paths until she veered about halfway down, where a cold blast of air hit her.  Her sweating was done in an instant and she was chilled.  What?  If this was a volcano, wouldn’t it only get hotter the further down she went?  She shook her head as she remembered what the cat had said: things here aren’t always what they seem.  He was right.

                 So, how was she to get this getting-small potion?  She busied herself with wondering this on the way down.  Would she have to work for it?  Would she have to find it?  Would she have to make it herself?  She shook her head.  As terrible as it may have sounded, she’d rather just hurt whoever had it and take it from them.  That would save her much time in getting her answers.  

                She stopped in her thoughts then, immediately disgusted with herself.  How could she have had such a thought?  As if the notion of hurting someone else for her cause was quite alright!  What sort of horrible monster was she becoming?  Or, what sort had she always been?

                 It was strange that all she cared about now were her answers, but it was true.  She wanted to know why she was here and what to do to stop coming back here.  What about Morgan?  What about Victor and the other man?  What about the other people?  Alice shook these thoughts away from her.  The path was becoming narrower and she needed all her concentration to stay balanced.

                 She approached the entrance to the fortress – at least, what seemed to her to be the entrance.  Two great doors of wood, cracked and weathered, rested at what appeared to be the bottom level of the fortress.  There was a tall platform in the distance with no foreseeable method to reach it, upon which stood two card guards.  Only the doors were visible behind them, and beyond that, who knew?  She would just have to find out.

                 From her position, she could see the guards clearly, pacing back and forth.  Back and forth.  It was almost hypnotic.  Didn’t they ever grow tired?  Alice wondered exactly how many decks of cards the Queen had control over.  What other races and creatures did she have up her sleeve?

                 Alice drew back the knife carefully between her fingers as she thought, and timed the pacing of the guards.  Which would be first?  The Three of Diamonds or the Nine of Spades?  Which would it be?  

                 Eeni, Meenie, Minee…

                 She threw the knife with every intent of striking the Nine right in the back, but instead she hit the Three across his shoulder.