Something was wrong. Something was horribly wrong.
The Writer frantically scratched his quill across the page, jotting down precise orders that could not be ignored. And yet, they were not followed. What was worse, whatever he wrote vanished away within seconds. Controlling the actions of any being by writing into their Life Story also sapped him of energy and spirit but he didn't feel any weaker.
"I've written into this book enough to kill me," he muttered to himself, his eyes darting all over and his mind struggling to come up with a conclusion. "Why do I yet live and why does the writing disappear?"
The Writer took a step back from the open book resting on his desk and pondered deeply. His subject, the Black Knight, was not obeying him. Yet, how could he when the orders could not be given? Something was preventing his ink from remaining on the page. He had tried writing on other pages within the book but they all yielded the same results. It was not the book banishing his ink.
Gazing down at the pages, The Writer read the book's final entry.
So strong. I run from them, all those beasts and creatures watching me struggle. Curse them all. Kill them all. I must find Selvina. The magic is ever so strong. I can barely move. I enter the skull. I see the lid. I can sense the portal below. I can sense Selvina's presence. I must find Selvina. She was here. She may yet still be. I must find her. I must find Selvina.
I crack the lid apart with my sword. It crumbles easily. I must find Selvina. The magic is so strong. I feel it seeping through my armour. It holds me. It wants me. I must find Selvina. Blue light. It leads far below. I cannot see the bottom. I feel strange. The magic is clinging, grabbing, stabbing, piercing, clawing. I leap. I must find Selvina.
"That must be it, then," The Writer said, his lips pursing tightly and his eyes narrowing. "Wonderland. I should have known."
In ages past, Wonderland had been created by the gods as a land of experiments and trials. When the elemental gods had been young they practiced their gifts of creation in a land set apart from the rest. If something went wrong, the rest of their precious world would be unaffected. In the end, when they felt skilled enough to create what would become Faeryum and the rest of the world, they buried their spare world beneath the real one. The world of mistakes, abominations, chaos, and utter nonsense was left behind to fend for itself. Over time, a measure of control was established, though it continued to be a pale shadow of the real world, something forever foreign, exotic, and dream-like. Wonderland beings had no books in The Writer's halls, their Life Stories hidden elsewhere in their own world. The world within a world was closed off to The Writer, beyond his control and safe, at least from him.
But now the Black Knight was there.
The Writer was mostly displeased with the news but all was not lost. Once the Black Knight reduced Wonderland to ash, it would return. Once it did, its orders could be given.
The Writer grinned, walking out of his study and down the passages to the Hall of Life, where his innumerable bookshelves held the Life Story of each and every sentient being in all of Faeryum. Even for him it was impossible to glance at them all, let alone read them. Many lives would begin and end without him ever knowing they had ever existed. The Writer, powerful as he was, was no god, though he was certain even they would have difficulty reading everyone's lives. No being could be so omnipotent, could they?
He walked a path he had walked often and stopped before a favorite book of his, gazing down at the pages. His smile widened. There she was. After all this searching, he had finally found her.
Selvina.
Not of this world, Selvina had no Life Story in his hall and thus hers could not be read. The Writer could only read about how her life affected those of others. He had read a mention of her in the bounty hunter Artemian's Life Story. He had then read several other mentions of her in others. Knowing that he could not search every book in the hall, he focused on the stories of Faeryum's most influential figures. King Midas had seen her but at the time The Writer had not been searching for her. King Charming or Sultan Ali Baba had seen nothing. He had not chosen to read King Arthur's Life Story for Selvina had taken a ship west from Midae, taking her away from Avalon, and thus making her chances of seeing him nonexistent.
Of course, had he known then that eventually they would meet, he'd have followed King Arthur's life much more closely.
The Writer had been busy with another leader, anyhow. Faeryum's most influential figure, of course, was Empress Rhiannon, and as he read her Life Story, he was overjoyed by how it was developing. In her midst was Selvina, alive and well. As quickly as he had discovered Selvina's location he had rushed to his study to redirect the Black Knight.
Unfortunately, it had descended into Wonderland before he had a chance to tell it anything.
Selvina, however, did not seem to be in any rush to leave the empress. It appeared that she would be staying in Corbeau for the winter, much to his delight. This gave the Black Knight enough time to realize that she was not in Wonderland, after he had destroyed it, and return to Faeryum, where he could then head directly to Corbeau.
Empress be damned, Selvina was going to die.
****
Meanwhile, Wonderland burned.
The forest in which Selvina and Rapunzel had worked together in finding their way, after a heated dispute, roared with another type of heat. The fiery inferno consumed every tree, every bush, every flower, and every blade of grass. Black and violet flames reached for the sky as glowing embers rose up for miles before falling back to the ground in a snowfall of ash. Panicked creatures of all sorts fled when they could, though most were unlucky. The fires spread quickly, as if having a mind of their own and fulfilling a goal.
Their goal, to all onlookers, seemed to be the utter destruction of all of Wonderland.
The Black Knight marched onward, a great castle in its sights, while chaos rampaged about all around it. Its blade burned with the same fire that consumed the world around it. Its ruby eyes flared with intensity, firmly fixed on the fortress ahead, beyond the trees.
Selvina would be there. Selvina had to be there.
It came to a small clearing then, where a long table sat, surrounded by chairs and covered in teacups, tea kettles, saucers, plates, and bowls. Pastries and fruit sat unattended, ready to eat.
The Black Knight cleaved the table in two and pressed on.
Nothing was an obstacle. All was cut into pieces. Its blade could not be stopped and its progress could not be slowed. Fallen trees, claimed by fire or blade, lay on the ash-covered ground like the bodies of dead sentinels, their watches ended.
A white light peeked through the trees, glowing brighter than the fire around it. Moments later, the ground dipped slightly and ahead was a pool, surrounded by strangely beautiful structures as tall as he was. Darting out of these structures were tiny lights buzzing away with all haste.
The Black Knight gave it little pause, walking forward without slowing in the slightest. Moments later, some of the buzzing lights flew at it, buzzing around its face and blasting tiny explosions of light in every direction.
The Black Knight blinked. A second later, tendrils of dark energy seeped out of the cracks in its armour and writhed about, reaching and stretching outward, grasping the tiny lights and burning them in black fire. The Black Knight watched as the lights dimmed, revealing thumb-sized, winged bodies dropping to the ground.
Fairies.
I must find Selvina, the Black Knight reminded itself. There was no time to inspect the dead fairies. They were dead. They were the past and best left behind.
When it became apparent that the fairies could do nothing to stop it, they all fled the area, joining the glowing mass far ahead.
The fairy city and its marvelous castle were only paces away now. No more lights fled from it; it was completely abandoned. A sparkling pool of water lay within the fairy city, reflecting the flames burning around it. Specks of ash were dropping onto its surface, staining its crystalline waters.
The Black Knight walked through the castle, crumbling it to dust underfoot. It then stepped into the pool, dipping its sword into the water and making it thrash and boil, killing everything below the surface. After it had passed, a burning tree cracked and fell, dropping into the pool with a great splash, covering it completely. The last fairy kingdom was destroyed within seconds and all that remained of Celustaria from then on was rubble and ash.
****
The dark fire spread onward, creeping every steadily toward the castle.
Standing on the battlements, Queen Alice and her greatest of friends watched on, speechless and afraid.
The White Rabbit fussed and muttered worriedly, pulling his ears and thumping his feet. "Oh dear, oh dear, this is so terrible! So terrible!"
Beside him, the Mad Hatter gulped. "This is the mostest of terrible. The mostest of the mostest of them all."
Alice, her face pale, didn't know what to do. She had her castle guards, her friends, and her own self who would could fight well in their own way but this...this was something else. This was no mad queen, cruel knave, or wild bandersnatch. This was a creature of nightmare, a monster, a demon in purest form. Fire followed its every step and nothing in its path could stop it.
She looked up at the sky, dark with smoke and glowing an ominous, violet light. The smoke had spread over her castle, a grim herald of the approaching doom. Ash and embers fell all around her like snow. It seemed, or perhaps was, that the end had come.
The March Hair, standing to her left and carrying his massive spoon, frowned and stomped one large foot. "If the General orders it, I'll fight the beast. I'll even skip tea time if I must. Send me into battle, great General, and let me die with honour."
"Do no such thing, Hare," Alice said, her eyes on the black figure in the distance. "You'll have your chance to fight soon enough. Let us be there with you in the end..."
Hovering over her head was the Cheshire Cat, his normally smiling face now sombre. "Is there nothing we can do, dear Alice? Is there no one or no thing that can stop this?"
"I haven't the slightest clue, Chesh. I wish I knew. How much I wish I knew..."
Below and behind them, hiding within the keep, were all survivors of the forest fire and any and all castle attendants. The fairies had recently arrived as well and two of them came buzzing toward the watchers, their glowing bodies like faint beacons of hope.
Alice turned her head and watched them come, daring to wish that they'd have a plan.
The two fairies, none other than King Oberon and Queen Titania, flew on either side of Alice's face and hovered there, watching the apocalyptic scene unfold before them. For a while, no one spoke.
King Oberon eventually broke the silence, his small face frowning. "And here we thought all would be well after Pan's death. It seems we've traded one terror for another and this one far worse."
Queen Titania bowed her head, her soft features etched in sadness. "We must not lose hope, Oberon. Celustaria is destroyed but our people yet live."
"Not for much longer, I fear..."
Alice, glancing from one fairy to the other, piped in. "Do you have no plan? Can we do nothing against this...thing?"
"It is a demon of tremendous power, human," said King Oberon. "We fairies are too few in number to fight it. Too few and too weak..."
"Can't we evacuate? Selvina and her friends left Wonderland. Can we not do the same?"
"You are not born of Wonderland, dear," said Queen Titania. "If you wish to leave, you can. We, however, cannot. If we were to leave Wonderland, we would perish. We are of this world and thus forever bound to it. What happens to Wonderland, happens to us."
"So that's it?" Alice asked incredulously. "You're just going to sit back and let your people die? Just like Selvina said you were doing with Peter Pan?"
"We had a hope then," growled King Oberon. "Selvina saved us all. Pan was defeated and killed. Our people were given freedom. This demon that approaches us now is sent by something or someone else. I know not who, but it is a far greater threat than Pan ever was. Given the choice, I'd rather see Peter Pan alive again than watch another second of this demon's destruction!"
Alice fought to control her rising panic. She was a queen now. She had to act like one. Her people looked up to her. They looked to her for answers. They needed saving and she was responsible for giving them what they needed. The only choice, however, seemed to fight this terrible foe and yet she already knew that it would only end in failure.
"Someone must know how to stop this thing!" she cried. She turned to the White Rabbit. "White Rabbit, run into the castle and ask everyone if anyone knows how to kill a demon. Now!"
"Yes, queen, right away!" the rabbit said before speeding off, his paws thumping rapidly.
Alice turned to the March Hare. "Same goes for you, Hare. Go and search the armoury for any weapon you think can stop this creature. If you can't find one, try and make one!"
The March Hare saluted with his spoon, smacking his head rather hard and nearly knocking himself senseless in the process. His eyes rattling about, he nodded, "Aye, General, with all haste it shall be done!"
"Hatter," Alice called, turning to the wild-haired man. "Race into the castle and fashion me any trap you think can work on this monster. I don't care if it only slows it down. I want anything and everything you can make and I want it now!"
The Hatter straightened himself and nodded frantically, his patched top hat nearly falling off his head. "I will make the greatest trap that ever did trap, my Alice queen!" With that he was gone, a hand on his hat and another pulling a steaming cup of tea from his inside pocket before taking a sip while most of it splashed out as he ran.
Breathing hard and fighting to steady her racing mind, Alice gazed ahead at the burning world beyond. She hoped she had done enough. With any luck, preferably a vast amount of it, a solution would be found. Someone might know a way to kill an armoured demons or perhaps a weapon could be found or made to slay it, or maybe a trap could stop it indefinitely, though definitely would be best.
"How am I doing, Chesh?" she asked, wide-eyed, knowing the cat still floated overhead. "Did I do enough?"
"My dear Alice," the cat said in his calm, wispy smooth voice, "how much is enough? Does anyone really know? You did what you did and what you could. Only time will show if it was enough."
"Yeah, I wish I had more of that right now..."
"I believe there is a shop for time down by the western sea but it's closed on Laisidays, which, unfortunately, is today."
Alice sniffed, flashing the briefest of smiles. "Pity."
The Cheshire cat nodded, sighing sadly. "Indeed."