((I can't believe I hadn't added this till now. I'm such a dummy. You'll know what it is soon enough, so I'll just let you get on with the story. ))



She walked past the first trees, her fingertips brushing the leaves to the side of her. Dew clung to her hands as she passed, dripping from her fingers. She stepped carefully around the flowers at her feet, lilies wet with dew, tiger lilies dipping their heads toward the ground, roses closed against the cold. Everything was cold here. Silent...it was never silent...she passed nine morning glories, their heads closed against the night, and found herself near a pebble path.

Lifting her foot she toed the pebbles, poking them around to see if they moved. Satisfied that they were solidly in place she moved onto the path. At that moment rows of fluorescent blue mushrooms to the left and right of the path lit up, showing the path going into the distance at either end, disappearing into the dark. She walked along the path, not caring about where she was going, watching the mushrooms as she passed them, their glow seemed to be dimming the longer she watched, as if the mushrooms were going back to sleep.

She then noticed she seemed to be standing on cobblestones, and looked up. There before her was a little pink gate, swinging slowly open. She stepped through the gate into a dimly lit backyard, Chinese lanterns strung about seemed to have candles lit, but with very little wick left. She walked to the center of the garden where there was set the most gaudy looking pink table she had ever seen. Lace and ribbons hung at the corners, three tablecloths were spread over it's massive surface; Purple, gold, and green, all laying on the table as if they were just flung there. Cups, teapots, saucers, and every kind of tea cookie were piled over the tablecloths, a different kind of chair at each place setting. Nothing matched. It was exactly as she remembered it.

She picked up a teacup she remembered; bone china with delicate antique roses painted around it's belly. She turned it over in her hands and found a chip, rubbed smooth with hours and hours of straight use. Rubbing it with her thumb she found it perfectly smooth, stained with black tea. She put it carefully back where she had found it, walking quietly to the next place setting with the memory of a clear and gleeful shout sounding in her mind. She grinned to herself, but continued out of the yard, a sad smile on her lips and she shakes her head.

She walked but a short ways and found herself at the edge of a babbling brook, and walked along it for a while listening to the gossip, and odd rambling as the clear water fell over smooth river rocks. Suddenly she was next to a stand of dead trees, their bark peeling and dry. She thought it looked similar to the garden she first walked through, but there were no flowers here. She walked between the trees, touching bark here, ducking under a dead branch there. All at once she was face to face with that sinister cat. Always where you don't want him, never where you do. Into everything, and helping with nothing. Damned cat.

He grinned wide, his fangs shinning in the moonlight, and did a back flip straight into a tree, his body phasing straight through it, leaving only his grin and gleaming eyes. They seemed stuck to the tree, then they too faded. She walked to the tree, and put a palm against the bark, which was oddly smooth. She curled her fingers a little, tips pressing into the tree. Suddenly she was falling, wind whipping through her hair inside the tree, colors streaming by, swirling and tickling her skin. She righted herself, pointing her toes down, or what she thought was down....she wasn't quite sure how far she'd fallen now...ten feet, twenty feet...two? She imagined perhaps she were just being blown around by a gust of wind who decided to take a rest inside the tree. That sort of thing happened here, you know...

All at once she was back in the moonlight, the colors fading from her vision as she collided with the ground. She landed flat on her bottom in front of a large blade of grass. Somehow during the trip she had become smaller, which wasn't really a surprise to her. Nothing surprised her anymore...She stood and straightened her skirts; Not quite as full as last time, but still a proper length.

She brushed a few stray crumbs of dirt off her bottom, and looked around. She saw the castle looming in the distance, it's white surface gleaming in the moonlight, seemingly pulling all the light for itself, leaving the rest of the cold land in shadow. She needed to get to the castle, but decided to walk in the opposite direction. One tended to get where they wanted to go by trying not to get there in this place. This thought came to her as easily and welcomed as one knows that rain comes down, not up.

So she continued on, staring at her toes, moving at a swift pace away from the castle. In no time she stood at the gates, the dimmest part of the castle to be sure. She reached out to touch their decaying and darkened surface when a loud groan sounded from them, and they began swinging inward, opening for her as she came forward. She wondered as she passed whether the gates too had a mind of their own, and a will to decide as they sluggishly opened, as cold as the rest of the land. Did they ever want to just rest, and refuse to open? Did they ever get tired of letting people in or out, protecting the castle? She patted the doors as she passed them, as if to thank them for this last service.

She was now in the courtyard, surrounded by hundreds...no, hundreds of thousands of red roses, every breed, every height and build, bushes, climbing, stemmed, but red. Always the bloodiest of reds. As she walked the garden path she mused to herself that the moonlight and the dew made them look like they were bleeding out fresh, like little bundled wounds. She stopped before two large stone platforms, black and solid. Along the top of each flat stone were rows of wooden blocks, shackles embedded in them. The entire surface of each, other than a few clear sides was rusty, and grimy. Blood caked nearly the entire surface of the stones, the grass around them flaky with it.

She looked up at the castle, hands resting on either stone slab to steady her as she gazed up and up. Rows and rows of darkened windows stared out of the castle, as if a monstrous beast were blind to the world. No personality here, where there used to be...nothing but deep emptiness. But there! One window was lit, candles were obviously lit, casting shadows around the open shutters. The only window with shutters....surely to block out the sun which no longer shines on this world.

She pushed open the large doors into the entryway. She hardly willed herself to pay attention, the castle yielding to her, feeling the only amount of life it had in a long time. She was shortly in the most made up area of the castle, red and lace everywhere. This was surely the Queen's quarters. She opened the door before her, light peeking out from under it.

Upon entering, she noted that everything was in it's place. Perhaps not in a proper place, but everything certainly had a place. The room was incredibly cluttered with what looked like the worst collection of horrible and macabre items the Queen could find. To the left there were dolls with maniacal smiles spread across their white white faces, hung from strings around their necks, grinning as if watching. To the right was a case full of blades of every style and size, their handles wrapped in red leather, rubbed down to the true brown underneath by dainty long fingered hands, and years and years of use. Nicks spread all across their gleaming surfaces. At the center of the room was a basin and a heart shaped bed. The bed was covered in a musty red bedspread, covered with the dead and broken bodies of long dead roses, disintegrating into dust across it's unused surface. The basin was filled with what once was sweet smelling water, but was now murky and filled with only God knew what...rose petals now turned into floating pads of slime...

There, at the wall opposite the door was the large looking window, and in front of it was a folding screen, candles throwing a silhouette of a petite and shapely figure against it. The Queen sat in a chair, sipping from a long stemmed glass. Alice went to that end of the room, rounding the screen at the Queen's back, going around in as wide a circle as possible, keeping well out of arm's reach, until her back was to the open window.

The Queen took one last sip from her glass of blood red wine, then set it on a little table between her and the window. "So, you've come back I see. " Alice took her skirts in hand and curtsyed. "Yes, your majesty." She kept her skirts in hand, ready for the next reply. "And you came back just for me, my dear?" Alice nodded "Yes, your majesty."

The Queen stood, straightening her dress like a lady, then smiled at alice, holding her hands out to the girl as if expecting a warm and motherly embrace to take place. "And you've come to be with me, to serve me?" To this alice stepped back, holding her skirts out even further to her sides. "No, your majesty." At this the Queen's sweet smile turned to a frown of disgust. Alice looked at her plainly, seeing how the Queen too looked just as cold and tired underneath her peach-soft skin as the rest of the world around her. "What of the King, your majesty?" To this the Queen grinned an odd sort of grin, her eyes unfocused as she spoke. "Aah, the king was a dunderhead, and so he lost his." She giggled. A noise not quite as innocent sounding coming from her cruel red lips. "And Mr. Rabbit? The Mad Hatter? The Duchess?" To this the Queen giggled yet again, "Buffoons, all! And now they know better." She said in a sort of sing-song voice, now swaying slowly left and right.

Suddenly the Queen looked back to alice, the light never coming back to her far away eyes. "But you're here. You'll do everything I say. Such a good girl you are." Alice shook her head. "No, your majesty." The Queen's smile turned to a snarl, and she lept at Alice. Alice waited till the last moment to step out of the way, leaving the Queen to sail out window just as to Alice's shinning hair floated out of the way, turning the horrifying scene to a lovely dance, the Queen sailing down toward the ground, high insane laughter passing through her parted lips. The laughter stopping abruptly as her wine glass hit the floor, spilling burgundy wine across the carpet.

Alice stooped and replaced the glass, setting the Queen's crown next to the spreading puddle of wine. "Now now, no lollygagging, misery won't be drinking in the darkness, child." the smooth voice of the cat floated in through the open door. Alice continued her motions, and made her way out of the castle. "Leaving us, are you?" the cat callled, strolling along beside her. She glanced down then back up. He had decided to go with invisible skin, and walking cat organs aren't appealing. "Us, you say, damned creature, but here I see only you." The cat nodded it's head in agreement. "Yes yes, only me. I am the only one you see."

Alice sighed deeply at this point. "You won't be staying here, damned cat. I've had voices for years, and your's burrows in like a worm." at this she pointed at her temple. "Warm and toasty cozy mind you have, think I'll stay, your offer is sweet."

Walking out of sight of everything on a faintly glowing path, she rocked her head left to right slowly, listening to a tune only she could here, a smooth voice singing it only for her ears.