Seeing Redd Read Free Page B

this is for me, having to share a room with you.” Then, as he did every night, he suddenly cried, “There’s been a mistake! I’m Jack of Diamonds and I don’t belong here!”
    Tonight, however, hardly had he uttered these words when—
    eeeeeEEEEEEEBOOOOOSSSHHHK!
    He was knocked to the floor. Chunks of stone flew every which way. The air became heavy with dust.
    A glowing orb generator had blasted a craggy hole in the wall.
    Jack scurried underneath his bunk, squeezing as far back as he could to keep from sight. Peeking out, he saw guards exchanging fire with a shadowy enemy, the razor-cards of their AD52s (automatic dealers capable of shooting a deck’s worth with a single pull of the trigger) zipping past, searing through the night sky.
    A figure stepped through the blasted hole into the dorm. “Jack of Diamonds?”
    Jack hustled out from under his bunk and approached the figure with open arms, as if welcoming a guest to his drawing room. “What took you so long, my good man?”
    â€œWe have to be quick,” the figure said.
    Jack bowed to his dorm mates, who lay in various degrees of dishevelment and shock from the blast. “Gentlemen, I bid you farewell. My parents’ emissary has arrived to take me home!”
    And with that, Jack of Diamonds escaped the Crystal Mines.

C HAPTER 3
    T HE BRIEFING room hadn’t yet been used in its official capacity: thrice-daily meetings during which Bibwit, Dodge, General Doppelgänger, and Alyss’ other advisers would apprise the queen of pressing Wonderland business, be it financial, political, or militaristic.
    â€œWhat’s this I hear about you refusing to come to my party?” Alyss teased, forcing a professional smile onto her face as she glided into the room—hexagonal in shape, with holographic viewing screens lining the walls and, at its center, a thick, heavy conference table carved from a single slab of soapstone.
    King Arch was not one for teasing. He turned from his intel ministers, with whom he’d been conferring in a lowered voice. “Queen Alyss,” he said, “I make no secret of my prejudices. I don’t believe the turmoil Wonderland has recently endured would have happened were it a kingdom instead of a queendom. But I have come to pay what respects I can to you, for between you and your aunt Redd, I much prefer having you as a neighbor.”
    â€œThank you, I think,” said Alyss. “Shall we sit?”
    The holo-screens were displaying real-time scenes from Wondertropolis’ major thoroughfares and intersections. Arch lowered himself into a chair before the screen showing the newly-named Genevieve Square. The intel ministers removed themselves to a corner of the room and remained standing while two fellows with faces as inscrutable as masks took up positions on either side of their king.
    â€œI feel safe when I travel with them,” Arch said, noticing Alyss’ interest in his bodyguards. “Their names are Ripkins and Blister, and their combat skills, I think, would rival those of even the famed Hatter Madigan, though I’ve been informed that he has taken a sabbatical.”
    Alyss nodded. “He needed some time to attend to personal matters. But he’s available to us if we need him.”
    The truth was, neither she nor anyone else knew where Hatter had gone or when he’d return. On several occasions, she had stood next to the Heart Crystal to maximize her remote viewing ability, searching for him with her imagination’s eye. The Everlasting Forest, the Chessboard Desert, the Valley of Mushrooms, Outerwilderbeastia, even the Volcanic Plains: No matter where she looked, she failed to locate him. He seemed to have vanished from Wonderland altogether.
    From out in the passage came a skiffling sound; Homburg Molly ran into the room and took up position at Alyss’ right flank.
    â€œKing Arch,” she said, “I’d like you to