CHAPTER EIGHT

WHAT?

Six. Seven. Eight. Nine.

I took a long gulp of air, like a man rescued from drowning, and staggered against the wall. My claws dug into rough stone. In the distance, the last echoes of clock chimes died away.

It was nine o’clock again. And, once more, I was alive. I was in a dank and foul-smelling prison cell bedded with moldy straw, and there was a faint ache in my belly, but I was most definitely alive.

The fact that I’d just died and resurrected didn’t matter very much to me at that moment. There was only one thing on my mind—the sight of my brother’s face, years older than it should have been.

“Crispin!” I threw myself against the bars. Torches burned along the passageway outside my cell. “Where are you?”

“Right here,” said a voice from behind me. “Kanin’s” voice, but with Crispin’s Talesend accent this time. “You don’t need to shout.”

I whirled around to face him. He was sitting in the corner of the cell with his back to the wall. The rabbit mask dangled from his neck on a strap, and his white costume was spattered with dirt.

“Well?” he asked, after a few seconds. “Are you going to stare at me until the loop starts over again, or are you going to say something?”

“Crispin,” I breathed.

“Yeah, that’s my name. Don’t wear it out.” He stretched and yawned. “And I’m finally in the dungeons. I knew I’d end up here eventually, but I did hope I’d have a bit more time. Relatively speaking.”

“You’re…old.”

“Excuse me?”

“I mean…you’re older.”

“I’m sure I appear ancient to a little puppy like you, but I’m only forty-four.” He ran a hand over his grizzled face. “If my hair hadn’t turned prematurely white, I’d look quite youthful for my age.”

I sank to a crouching posture on the bed of straw and lapsed into silence again. My mind was still struggling to process all of this.

“They’ve taken Cordelia to another cell,” he said. “That hag Beatrice arranged for us to be alone so we could ‘catch up on old times,’ as she put it.”

A legion of questions swarmed through my mind. I couldn’t settle on which one I wanted to ask first. For some reason, the one I finally blurted out was, “Why a rabbit?”

“What?”

“Why’d you disguise yourself as a rabbit, for pity’s sake?”

“It’s—”

“Don’t be Alan and say it’s a long story. Regardless of how long it is, tell it.”

He drummed his fingers on his knee. “All right. Fine. Like Cordelia said, ‘rabbit-hole’ is the popular term for magical portals. And for some reason, as my ability to create those portals grew stronger…I found that the only form I could shapeshift into was a rabbit. Either an ordinary one, or that human-ish version you saw earlier. I don’t know if it was a psychological thing, or if there was some other cause.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why?”

“Well, I mean…rabbits are a little…you know…cute.”

“Hey.” He poked a piece of straw in my direction. “Don’t knock rabbits. Rabbits are amazing now, thanks to me. I have re-defined rabbits.”

“Okay, okay.” I got up and started pacing.

“Don’t pace. That’s one thing I haven’t missed. Why can’t you think while sitting still?”

I turned on him. “Crispin, what happened?”

He gave me a wry smile. “What didn’t happen, more like.”

“That’s not an answer!” I started pacing again.

“You’re—”

“Yes, I’m doing it again! Deal with it!” I padded back and forth across the straw on all fours. “Forty-four years old.”

“Give or take. You know I’ve always been a little arbitrary about my exact age.” Crispin didn’t actually know what day of the year he’d been born on.

I made a quick calculation in my head. “Twenty-one years! It’s been twenty-one years since Cordelia and I got dropped into this place?”

“Not counting whatever time I’ve spent in here. When I left to come here, it was 1943. I don’t know how long it was before I started remembering, and I’m not sure how many cycles there were after that.”

I tried to sort out a timeline of events in my head—a difficult task, under the circumstances. “So you came in, and Cordelia and I were already part of the loop, arriving at the ball over and over again, thinking we’d just left you—”

“Yeah. Basically.”

“Why didn’t you tell me who you were?”

“I did, a few times. You didn’t take it well, and I got tired of seeing you go through that pain over and over again—once I started remembering past cycles myself, of course. You weren’t remembering yet when I arrived, and I started retaining my memories before you did.” He shrugged. “Like I said, the process is different for everyone in here.”

“So you kept it hidden from me. All that time.”

“Trust me, Nick, it was better for you. And I already had the mask and the costume, so hiding my identity was easy.”

I gave him an incredulous look. “You infiltrated a magical ghost castle dressed as a rabbit?”

“I lead a very complicated life, Nick. Don’t judge.”

I wanted to delve further into this, but first I asked a more important question. “Where’s Molly?”

His gaze went to the floor. “I don’t want to talk about her.”

“Too bad. I want you to talk about her. I want you to talk about everything.”

Crispin’s teeth clicked together. “Nick, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not your little brother anymore.”

I sprang at him and snarled directly in his face. “Look, you. I don’t care how old or grumpy you get, or what kind of stupid costume you wear. You will always be my little brother. Is that clear?”

He didn’t flinch. His expression softened. “Yeah. It’s clear.”

I sank back onto my haunches in the straw and closed my eyes. “Now. I want you to tell me everything. Start at the beginning, and don’t leave anything out.”

“I’ll do my best, but we are talking about a couple of decades here. I may have to give you the abridged version.”

“Not too abridged,” I warned.

“We all got captured. Molly and I were sent to Warrengate, which was a lot more…austere without Malcolm in charge.” He fidgeted with his mask. “We didn’t hear anything about you for months. When I finally got an audience with Levesque, she told me you and Cordelia were dead. That you’d been executed.”

I felt a rush of sorrow and anger. “Please tell me Levesque is dead now.”

“Yeah, she is. I’m not quite sure how it happened. Apparently she was strangled by something with tentacles.”

“Perfect.”

“But before she went missing, she decided to make me and Molly her pet projects. Somehow, she’d found out about my restoring Molly’s voice by warping time. She wanted to explore the effects of that event on both of us.”

I tensed. “What do you mean, effects?”

Crispin started pulling apart a piece of straw. “This is going to sound like I’m bragging. Trust me, I’m not. But as it turns out, I’m an extremely powerful Charmblood. Possibly one of the most powerful ones who’s ever lived. It’s terrifying, and I hate it, but that’s the way it is. Apparently there hasn’t been anyone like me since Merlin. And Levesque wanted to exploit that.”

“How?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer, but I had to ask.

“You know how Cordelia sometimes talks about what her father put her through when he trained her? Let’s just say that I have a pretty good idea of what she went through now.”

I dug my claws so deep in the straw that they probably left grooves in the stone underneath. “I’m going to kill her.”

“You can’t; not now.”

“I don’t mean I’m going to kill her now. I mean I’m going to find a way to go back to my time and kill her before all this happened.”

“I wouldn’t advise that. Trust me, I’ve thought of travelling back and changing things. But time is so broken now that it’s no longer possible. Too much pressure on the fabric of reality, and it may unravel completely.”

I fought to put aside my fury at Levesque and focus on Crispin’s story. “So she…trained you. What happened next?”

“My powers over reality started to get stronger. I began breaking the rules of magic, pushing beyond the all the limits. Levesque was thrilled. She was going to use me as her own personal weapon.”

“A weapon against what?”

“You remember when we were on the Nautilus, and we saw that map Kiran had of all the continents across the sea?”

“Yeah. What about it?”

“Remember a country on one of them called The United States of Neverica?”

I furrowed my brow in thought. “Maybe. I remember seeing the name ‘Neverica,’ at least.”

“Levesque wanted to invade it. Apparently the Nevericans declared independence from the Council a long time ago and beat them in a war. Levesque intended to teach them a lesson. That’s why she sent Whitlock after the Clawthorn Rose in the first place. She was stockpiling magical weapons—and creatures, and people.”

This didn’t surprise me. “What about Molly? How did she factor in?”

Crispin hung his head. “I made a terrible mistake, Nick. I shouldn’t have gotten her voice back.”

The fur on the back of my neck stood up as I recalled what the Beast had said in my dream. “The Unqueen.”

“Yes.” He swallowed hard. “When I interfered with time…I opened the door for her to return. At first it was just her powers that manifested. Molly could do things with her voice that no Undine had ever been capable of—not since the Unqueen, anyway. She tried to hold back, but Levesque kept pushing her to do more, to go further.”

He stopped, and I waited patiently for him to go on. I hated to make him relive this, but I had to know the truth.

“Molly was starting to lose herself, in the end. She knew that if she went too far, she’d be gone completely, and the Unqueen would take over. Her own personality would be gone forever. Only the Unqueen would be left.” Sorrow filled his eyes. “But she also knew that if she used the Unqueen’s powers to break through the wards on Warrengate and call out to her own people for help, they could free us. I couldn’t break us out because she was using a dampening collar to keep my magic in check, but Molly’s Undine powers couldn’t be constrained that way.”

“She contacted Aegiris,” I guessed.

“Yes. And once they found out what Levesque was doing to a princess of their realm, they declared war on the Council of Scions. They attacked Warrengate immediately and set us free…” He swallowed, then continued. “But by then, it was too late for Molly. She sacrificed herself to save me.”

I felt like I’d been punched in the stomach. “You mean she’s dead?”

“Yes.” I noticed a slight pause before he spoke the word, but I felt too guilty for making him suffer through the story to press him for further details.

“Levesque was captured in the attack,” he continued, “and the Undine interrogated her. That was when she told us that you weren’t dead, but trapped in the Castle of Basile. I tried to find you, but the Castle had vanished by then, and I had no idea when it would reappear.”

“Where does it go when it disappears?”

“Who knows? Some timeless realm outside of normal reality, most likely. Wherever that was, I couldn’t find a way to get there. Plus, a lot of other things were happening at that point.”

“What things?”

“Queen Saoirse wanted revenge for what happened to Molly. She continued her war against the Council of Scions until they were overthrown.”

“Good.”

“Yes, except that a lot of very bad people stepped up to fill the power vacuum that the Council had left behind.” Crispin lifted his head. “Fortunately, around that time, a mysterious, masked hero with formidable magical powers emerged from the shadows to take up the cause of the oppressed.”

I looked at him. “Let me guess. A hero dressed as a rabbit?”

“The White Rabbit is a figure of legend and song, I’ll have you know.”

With great difficulty, I resisted the urge to burst into laughter. “I want to hear the songs.”

“We shall see. Anyway, after a while—by which I mean over a decade—the Castle of Basile popped up again, this time near Talesend. Not a surprise, given the state the city was in.”

“What’s the matter with Talesend?”

“The problems of the modern age aren’t confined to power struggles between enchanters. Magical phenomena in general have been spreading like wildfire over the years. Creatures everyone thought were extinct are showing up right and left, causing mayhem. The runes don’t always behave the way they’re supposed to, which leads to chaos when people try to cast spells. The Afterlands are turning into a great big patchwork quilt of magical anomalies—and Talesend seems to be the epicenter of it all.” He chuckled. “The Castle of Basile couldn’t stay away from a party like that.”

“We have to get out of here,” I said. “We need to find a way to undo what’s happened. If Cordelia and I can get back to our own time…”

“Nick, what have I been telling you?” Crispin’s tone was sharp. “There is no way back. This is the world we’re stuck with, like it or not.”

I stood up and folded my arms. “I refuse to believe that. Why are you being so defeatist? That’s not like you.”

“Well, it’s like me now. Like I keep saying, I’ve changed.”

“But don’t you even want to try? I mean, you’ve got powers that affect time, right? So obviously—”

“Nick, my powers are part of the problem here! Using them to try to fix everything will make matters worse!”

“We can’t leave things this way! It can’t end like this! You and I have lost so much time together, Molly is dead—”

“Do you think I need you to remind me of that?” Crispin shouted. “I already told you, I thought of going back, but it’s no use!”

“You thought of it. Why didn’t you do it? Why did you decide so quickly that it wasn’t worth the risk? You could have at least tried!”

Crispin opened his mouth to say something, then fell silent. Finally, in a calmer tone, he said, “We’re wasting time talking about fixing things outside this castle. We can’t even stop what’s going on in here. Beatrice’s magic is more powerful than mine. Even I can’t counteract this time-loop spell she’s cast.”

I gave the claw on my left thumb a thoughtful nibble. “I have…something.”

“What do you mean, you have something? A plan?”

“It’s sort of a plannish…something.”

He laughed bitterly. “Plannish something. Brilliant. We’re saved.”

“You don’t have to be so cynical.”

“Try spending twenty-one years battling your way through a magical apocalypse and see how bright and cheerful you end up.”

I forced down the rush of guilt inspired by this comment and went to the cell door. “Can you get us through this?” I gave the bars an experimental rattle.

“It won’t do any good. We can’t get back up to the ballroom; the clockmen will stop us.”

“I don’t want to get back up to the ballroom.”

He sighed and got to his feet. “Well, that’s where all the magic is concentrated, so if you want to do anything about breaking the spell, I don’t see the point in going anywhere else.”

I put a hand on his arm. “Crispin, you may be the second Merlin or whatever, but you’re not a detective. You’ve allowed yourself to get caught up in Beatrice’s game. You need to think outside the box—or outside the ballroom, in this case.”

“Says the Beast who’s been pirouetting around inside the ballroom for decades!” Crispin shot back.

“Getting murdered is quite intellectually stimulating. It’s given me a helpful change of perspective. Now, can you get this cell door open?”

“Yes,” he said reluctantly.

“Excellent.”

“But it won’t—”

I pointed to the lock. “Shut up and be magical.”

He did something fiddly with runes, and seconds later, the cell door creaked open. I bounded outside and headed down the corridor.

“Wait!” Crispin hurried after me. “You’re going to run into one of those—”

I nearly collided with a single clockman. He threw back his hood and gave a rattling, metallic hiss.

I punched him in the throat and separated his head from his shoulders, then Crispin pitched in with his own powers, reducing the clockman to a pile of rust.

I smiled. “Good work, Merlin the Second.”

“Stop calling me that. Don’t you understand? There’s no point in fighting the clockmen! They’ll be back in the next cycle, and even if we defeated them all, it’s impossible to breach the barrier around the edge of the spell. Plus, even if we get through that, those other creatures—the lizard-men and the rat-horses and the pumpkins—are waiting to stop us outside.”

“My, you’re a great big bundle of optimism today, aren’t you?”

“I hate to keep rubbing it in, but…apocalypse. Alone. Twenty-one years. At least.”

I ignored the remark. “Keep the clockmen off me if they show up. I need to have a quick word.”

“With whom?”

“Everybody. But I’ll start with Cordelia.” I cupped my hands to my mouth and called out. “Halloo! Cordelia!”

“Nick!” I heard her shout. She sounded overjoyed.

I followed the sound of her voice to a cell nearly ten yards down the corridor. The other cells I passed along the way were all occupied. I didn’t get a chance to properly observe the people inside, but a cursory glance revealed that they were haggard and decrepit reflections of the dancers upstairs. Their fine clothes were torn and bedraggled, their eyes were sunken, their faces hollow. Some of them were mumbling nonsense to themselves, while others merely gazed at the wall. I realized that this was what ultimately became of the people who regained their memories in Beatrice’s nightmarish domain. They had all been driven insane.

Cordelia was being housed with Melody, who was decidedly unhappy with her new accommodations. Cordelia, on the other hand, didn’t seem to notice them. Her face lit up as she saw me.

“You’re alive.” She reached through the bars and took hold of my paw, as if making sure that I was real.

“Yeah. I’m quite pleased about that.”

“Crispin’s old.”

“Isn’t he?”

“Forty-four,” said Crispin. “I’m forty-four. Older. Not old.”

“And he’s dressed as a rabbit,” said Cordelia.

I nodded. “Weird, right?”

“I want to go home.”

“Me too.”

Crispin pulled us apart. “Could you two give me some room so I can unlock the cell door?”

“He’s a lot grouchier now, too,” I told Cordelia.

Melody raised her hand. “Excuse me, but why are you bothering to rescue us? Are you just having fun, or are you actually doing something that won’t get flipped backwards in three hours?”

“Possibly,” I said. “Cross your fingers.”

“That never helps, in my experience,” said Cordelia.

“Do it anyway. It’ll make you feel better.”

“Whatever your idea is,” said Melody, “I hope it works out better than your last one.”

“My last idea got me killed,” I pointed out. “Practically anything would be better than that.”

“Please tell me you’ve developed your ‘plannish something’ into an actual plan,” said Crispin.

“It’s more of a quest, really.”

Crispin rolled his eyes. “Oh, goody. A quest.”

“My thoughts exactly,” said Melody. “Sarcasm included.”

“It’ll be fun!” I insisted. “All we have to do is find someone.”

“Who?” asked Cordelia.

“Who do you think? Cinderella, of course.”