Bibwit leaned closer and spoke soothingly, sincerely. “Your recent displays of affection have been admirably subtle, my dear, but no longer hiding your feelings from yourselves, it’s impossible that you could hide them from the rest of us-or, at least, from me. I congratulate you on your engagement to Dodge.”
“Well, technically, I’m not sure we’re-”
“Technicalities are for engineers, Alyss. I approve your choice of Dodge for a husband, even if, technically, it isn’t my place to do so. But humor a wise, ancient albino, will you, and don’t chastise me for my approval.”
After some time, Alyss said, “Thank you.” Her thoughts had led her back to Hatter, to the possible reasons for his troubling behavior in Boarderland.
It has everything to do with Arch, I know it does.
Throughout their trial, the Lord and Lady of Diamonds had asserted their innocence, claiming that they had been set up by Boarderland’s king. The evidence said otherwise: So damning was it that even the Diamonds’ connections in court hadn’t saved them from being sentenced to the Crystal Mines for twenty lunar years.
“I doubt Lord and Lady Diamond were as innocent as they claimed,” Alyss said, “and yet…”
“You think there may be some truth in what they alleged of Arch?” asked Bibwit. “That it had been his idea to give Molly the mysterious weapon?”
“Yes.”
“We’ve discussed this, Alyss. As helpless as it makes you feel, when it comes to King Arch, nothing can be done. It wouldn’t be wise to accuse him of aggression against Wonderland, especially when we have only the Diamonds’ accusations to support the claim.”
“I know.”
Bibwit smiled-one of those sad smiles suggestive of a lifetime of accumulated knowledge, not all of it heartwarming. “But what you know and what you feel are two different things?”
She nodded.
“It’s a hard lesson,” said the tutor, “one of the hardest, to learn that with all of your imaginative powers, there are times when you can do nothing.”
CHAPTER 30
A RCH HAD long ago found that his best defense against enemies was to guard against what he would do if he were his own adversary. Putting himself in Hatter’s place-shockingly reunited with Weaver, his daughter held prisoner-Arch would have made the same choice the Milliner had made; he too would have joined the tribe. But, the king reminded himself, Hatter’s joining the tribe should not be mistaken for genuine allegiance. If he were Hatter, he would use it as a means of gaining time to learn what he could of Molly’s whereabouts, and to get reacquainted with Weaver. He would do all he was told until such time as he could effect Molly’s rescue. Convicting Hatter of his own counterplots, Arch did not allow the Milliner to go anywhere unobserved. Hatter took his meals with Ripkins and Blister and was given a cot in their tent. On the occasions he was granted leave to visit with Weaver, an intel minister was always close by, watching, listening. Was it reckless to let the Milliner converse with Weaver? Arch didn’t think so. If anything, the care he himself had shown to Weaver, and the “friendship” that had formed as a
result, might confuse Hatter, chip away at his steadfast loyalty to the Heart clan until, for the security of
his own family, he became more accepting of Arch as his king. Hatter might go from feigning allegiance to sincerely embodying it.
“Do you know what this is?” Arch asked.
He held the silken thread aloft, stretched taught between his hands. The thread glinted in the light. If the
Milliner knew what it was, he didn’t say.
“It is silk produced by one of Wonderland’s six caterpillar-oracles,” Arch explained. “This one, I believe-it’s hard to see in this light-is orange. I know you’re familiar with the power of caterpillar silk, Hatter, so there’s no use pretending.”
“My hat is, in part, made of them.”
“Yes. Your hat contains threads from the blue and purple caterpillars and it is these that account for the hat’s remarkable characteristics as a weapon. You see that I know things you would not expect me to know. The spinster who taught Milliners to manufacture their hats in just such a way, what was her name?”
“Miss Hado.”
“Miss Hado, that’s right. Poor Miss Hado. Once Redd took control of Wonderland, she didn’t survive much longer than Queen Genevieve. But as determined as Redd was to eliminate Milliners from existence, she was somewhat lax in the disposal of their headgear. Had you managed to avoid Redd’s Glass Eyes after her coup, Hatter, you could have gone around to Wonderland’s many purveyors of contraband and bought up the headgear of your assassinated Millinery colleagues. You would’ve had to be quick about it, though, as you wouldn’t have been alone. The supply of Milliner hats, never abundant, became more and more limited as Wonderlanders unraveled them, trying to discover how the caterpillar threads worked. No one succeeded in this, I assume, or we would’ve known it by now.”
“You must have succeeded, Your Majesty,” Hatter said, “or I wouldn’t be here.”
Arch toyed with his caterpillar thread, coiling and uncoiling it around a finger. “You will not provoke me into telling more than I wish. I unspool this information to you a small amount at a time, much as one of your caterpillars spools silk out its spinneret. You will be told as little as is necessary for you to perform the task I require of you. Now let’s see, what else do I know that might surprise you?”
In trying to surmise the details of Arch’s plan, Hatter had concluded that it had been an accident. Arch could not have lured Weaver to Boarderland as part of his present scheme. To do that, the king would’ve had to know about his and Weaver’s relationship before she left the Everlasting Forest’s Alyssian headquarters for Talon’s Point. The king would have either had to induce Weaver to abandon Molly at the headquarters and risk a journey to Talon’s Point, or he would’ve had to know, not only that she would do such a thing, but when she was going to do it. And as clever as Arch was, none of these was possible. Ripkins had stumbled upon Weaver at Talon’s Point and Arch, learning who she was, had cultivated a relationship with her in case it might one day prove useful. Which it obviously had.
“I know,” Arch resumed, “that when using caterpillar silk to make a Milliner’s hat, the mix of colors and the amount of each color used have everything to do with the powers produced. I know that the stitch in which the threads are bound are equally important. I suppose what I’m saying is that different combinations of caterpillar silk produce different weapons. For example, were you to take a bit of green thread and a pebble-sized wad of yellow thread and weave them together in a butterfly stitch, you’d better be sure to have a zincon-lined container to put them in, because you’ll have produced something not unlike what recently upset Wonderland’s Crystal Continuum. I also know that each of you Milliners was taught to manufacture your own hat, as it was believed you should give birth, so to speak, to the weapon that would become an extension of yourself.”
“Your knowledge befits your authority, Your Majesty,” Hatter said.
“And every Milliner’s hat contained no more than a couple shreds of caterpillar thread. Often they contained no more than one color. Isn’t that right?”
“As far as I know. I only have experience with making my own hat.”
“Hatter, what if I told you that I had enough silk from all six of Wonderland’s caterpillar-oracles to produce many generations’ worth of Millinery hats?”
Hatter said nothing, hoping Arch would answer his own question. It couldn’t be that he wanted the foremost Milliner of the age to sit around manufacturing top hats for Boarderland forces, could it? “Are you sure they’re not counterfeit, Your Majesty?” Hatter asked.