I swallowed hard, shook my head.
“Oh, yes. I had my hands on your mind, and I was ready to do it at the order of my sister. I was going to extract everything, put all your memories into a heartlock—but then I felt it.”Her smile.“The love you carried in you was breathtaking—for your sister, for the Hands—especially for the Heart boy. It was everywhere inside you, woven through every memory, every moment, so deeply I couldn’t find a single thread in you that exists without that feeling.”
My eyes burned and burned, but the tears remained unshed. I was smiling now, too.
“It’s the reason I couldn’t do it,” she whispered. “I couldn’t erase something sowhole,so pure. So powerful. The way you love gave me hope, even if I didn’t realize it at the time.” She laughed, and it was short but straight from the heart. My eyes closed and finally the tears slid down—happy tears. So, so happy… “I told myself I was simply being practical, that a veil was faster, cleaner than an extraction,” said the queen. “But it was just the love. What it reminded me of.” Again, her hand went to her chest. “I was a girl with a full heart once, too. Maybe I can become one again.”
“Hear that, Ora?” Silas was grinning ear to ear, looking at me like he wasproud.So much prouder than he’d been for his own self. “You saved all of us.Again.”
I laughed. “That would actually beyou,but I’ll take it.”
“It was all of us,” he said, and both the queen and I nodded. It was indeed. We all saved one another, and in turn, made an actual change.
With the help of a certain Cheshire Cat, of course, who’d told me exactly where to find the records the first time I asked, but I never even realized it.The room beyond the kitchen.
I wondered, would I see him again when I went back to the Labyrinth?
Just the idea made goose bumps rise on my arms. A talking, grinning cat. What a strange, strange world I lived in—and I loved every second of it. Maybe even more than I had ever realized, if the Red Queen was to be believed.
“What about you? What about…after?” I asked her with half a heart.
I knew she was going to be present in the trials the councils would hold for her, to punish her for her crimes. There would be an investigation—she’d initiated it herself, haddemanded that the courts plan the trial, and they’d agreed because, I suspected, the people were terrified. Nobody knew what to do without queens in charge. So, whatever the Red Queen had demanded, I was sure they’d do it.
And I knew, as she did, that it was the end for her, an end sheneeded.
“After my punishment, if the council and the new queens allow, I’ll live out the rest of my unnatural life on my own. That will be my happy ending.”
Except to bealonewasn’t a happy ending at all, I didn’t think.
At that, the Red Queen stood up.
My heart jumped. “We can surely visit sometime,” I said before I could stop myself.
“Absolutely,” she said. “I’m well aware that I have no right to ask for anything, but I would very much like to be considered a friend.”
My smile was instant and mirrored hers.
“A friend.” With the Red Queen. TheformerRed Queen.
“I would be honored to be friends with people who are far braver than I could ever be.”
“You were brave in the end,” Silas said. “That’s what counts.”
“Untrue,” said the queen. “But a kind thing to say, nonetheless.” She nodded her head deeply. Silas and I remained seated, half glad, half sad, half…unsure. Of everything, really. “Well then, I’d best get to it. I have quite a lot of things to pack, it turns out.” She glanced around the balcony, at the palace behind her, at the towers and the marble and the gold. “Fifty years’ worth, to be precise.”
Her smile remained in the center of my mind long after she was gone, her bare feet silent on the marble floors. She disappeared inside the palace, and we could no longer see her, but we remained sitting there in themorning sun for a few more minutes, almost as if we expected her to come back. Almost as if we expected something to change.
It felt like closure, yes, but it was also…sad.
Eventually, Silas put his empty cup on the table. “What a story.”
The laughter came suddenly and slipped out of me before I could catch it. “What a story, indeed. Forward and backward and all the way to the end that also feels like a beginning.”
“Well, backward steps are part of the dance, too, aren’t they?” he said, and I couldn’t agree more. “My curse worked even better than I could have expected.”
“What was it exactly? Andhowdid you manage it?” If even the Red Queen had been impressed…
“Didn’t you hear?” He flashed a grin. “I havetalent.” I rolled my eyes, but I knew he was teasing. And I did believe what the Red Queen said—hedidhave a lot of talent for magic. “I planned to force the queens to speak the truth publicly and to never be able to lie again. I’d have no regrets if it weren’t for our Helen.”
