War of the Cards

From there, Dinah could even see the outline of the Royal Apartments, spiraling red-and-white stones that seemed to reach into the heavens. She could just make out the tall iron wall that encircled the castle, the gates that her men would hopefully break open in a day. The palace pulsed with a warm light cast from its thousands of red stained-glass windows. From this balcony, she could even make out the largest heart window, the one that poured its light into the Great Hall. The Great Hall, where the King of Hearts gathered his generals, no doubt preparing to launch his massive defense of the palace. Where he drunkenly laughed at the idea of defeat at the hands of his weak daughter and the Yurkei chief.

“Do you think—”

She didn’t get a chance to finish her question. A shadow rose out of the barren village, moving quickly and flying toward them. She opened her mouth to yell, but it was too late. An arrow grazed her cheek and buried itself deep into the mill behind her. When she turned, she could see a red glass heart quivering in its nock.

Dinah leaped back and Ki-ershan shoved past, pushing his torso in front of her and pressing her against the wall behind him. He turned to shield her beneath his arm. Cheshire ducked just as another arrow whistled past his head. His black eyes were wide with fear as he screamed at them both. Two more arrows thunked into the wood above their heads.

“Get the queen inside! Where is that coming from? Ki-ershan? Can you see it?” Ki-ershan, still crouched like a protective animal over Dinah, raised his head.

“There!” He pointed. A small, lone figure was running away from the mill, a bow at his side. Ki-ershan screamed something in Yurkei, and Dinah saw Yur-Jee sprinting after the figure. Dinah’s voice was caught in her throat as she watched Yur-Jee quickly gaining on the shadow. Suddenly the Yurkei stopped running, took a deep breath, and raised his bow, a pale arrow nocked on the bowstring.

“Stop!” Dinah cried, but it was too late. In a flash, Yur-Jee released the arrow and it buried itself deep in the figure’s back. The small figure pitched forward into the dirt. Ki-ershan grabbed Dinah’s arm and yanked her to her feet, pulling her down the rickety stairs. Cheshire, breathing loudly, followed, a dagger clutched to his chest. They ran toward Yur-Jee, who had propped the figure up, his knife at the man’s throat. As Dinah approached, her heart sank. It wasn’t a man. It was a tall boy, no more than thirteen, pale and wild-eyed. He drew labored breaths that Dinah knew would be his last. A black stain spread rapidly on the front of his shirt. Yur-Jee stepped away and the boy crumpled to the ground.

“Don’t go near him,” Cheshire warned as they approached. “He’s an assassin.”

“He’s a boy,” snapped Dinah. She knelt beside the boy, taking him gently in her arms. He was almost the same age as Charles, but with curly red hair and a generous dotting of freckles. Flecks of blood covered his mouth, and the point of the arrow protruding from his small chest rose and fell with each breath. Dinah laid her hand over the wound and pulled the boy close. His eyes opened and shut at random as he stared at her face. He coughed up blood as he tried to speak.

“Are you the Queen of Hearts?”

Dinah nodded and touched his hair gently. “Why did you do this? Where is your family?” The boy’s eyes were fluttering now, and Dinah gave him a soft shake. “Look at me. It’s going to be all right. Why did you try to kill me?”

“The king … the king … he took my family, and he said that if I didn’t kill you, he would kill my parents.” His unfocused eyes lingered on Dinah’s face. “I’m sorry. Please don’t …” His mouth gave a final tremble, and he pulled himself up to Dinah’s ear before resting against her neck. “There is one of us in each village.” His body gave a convulsive shake and a raspy rattle passed through his mouth, his sour breath washing over Dinah’s cheek.

She looked into his eyes. “I’ll protect your family when I am queen. I promise.”

A small smile dashed across his face before his cloudy eyes stared out at nothing. His chest stopped heaving. He was gone.

Dinah slowly laid his body down on the ground and used her sleeve to wipe the blood from his mouth. He looked so much like Charles. The same eyes, the same determined mouth. This wasn’t an accident. Images of her brother’s fractured limbs flooded her mind, of his eyes staring motionless at the stars. She thought of Lucy and Quintrell in a bloody pile, of the dark spot underneath Charles’s head, of the crown he made that she would never wear.

Without a word, she stood up and began walking back to camp.

“Your Majesty …,” Cheshire called after her.

“Bury him!” she barked in reply.

Cheshire followed her. “He tried to kill you.”

Dinah whirled on him. “Only because the king threatened his family! He was innocent, and we buried an arrow in his back.” Her shoulders shuddered. “We shot a child.”

Cheshire was insistent.

“Yur-Jee could not tell that he was a child. He saw an assassin, one who almost put an arrow through your neck. It is the essence of war, painted in shades of gray that no philosopher could sort out. He tried to kill the queen. We could not let that stand. What if he got away? Made it back to the palace? What if he had been spying on us the entire time?”

Dinah nodded. “I understand your point, Cheshire, but you need to hear mine. I’ll not have my army killing children, whatever the circumstances. In the future, anyone who does will answer to me. You and Yur-Jee will bury the child. With your hands.”

Cheshire’s eyes darkened. “Watch your tone, daughter, lest you forget who you fight. In two days, we will march on the palace, and there will be no mercy for any of us. Remind yourself why you lead this army and steel your dark heart. There is more blood ahead than you could imagine.”

Cheshire turned, but Dinah grabbed his arm. “My dark heart beats just fine,” she snapped before letting go. “And it’s big enough to sustain my rage and my mercy.”

Cheshire stared at her for a long moment before dropping his head. “If you say so. If it is your wish, I will help bury the child.”

Dinah held his gaze. “Good.”

She was left alone, huddled in the dark, as the men worked nearby to bury the ginger-haired boy. Her hands and neck were covered with slick blood that she frantically tried to wipe on the dried grass at her feet. It wouldn’t come off. Dinah raised her hands to the moonlight, illuminating her wet palms. A queen’s hands, she told herself.

Hands trembling, she pushed herself to her feet and raised her weary head. I am the queen, she told herself over and over again until she felt it thrumming through her body, hoping it would stiffen her resolve. Behind her, she could hear the sounds of earth showering down onto the boy’s body, the child resting forever in the cool ground. She stared in the direction of the palace. Her tears dried on her cheeks. She let Cheshire’s advice wash over her.

She would let the fury define her, not the mercy. It was too painful.

“I am coming for you,” she whispered to the night air, to the King of Hearts, a man who made a habit of killing children. She rested her hand on her sword as she let her rage writhe through her veins. There were no stars that night, for even they trembled at what lay before them.

Dawn came early on the morning of battle, marked by a light rain that gently peppered the ground. The weather seemed to agree that this forlorn day had finally arrived. The rain fell lightly on her tent, making a lulling sound. Dinah lay still and concentrated on not opening her eyes. She knew that once she opened them, it would begin. By nightfall, her fate would be determined—either she would sit proud and triumphant upon the Heart throne, or she would be buried in the wet Wonderland earth, forever scorned as a traitor to her people.

Every day since she had left the palace, Dinah opened her eyes with the expectation that she might die. Still, today was different. Today death was not an unknown figure whispering between the trees. Today she would challenge death to a duel, a game in which the odds lay against her in spades. A hysterical laughter bubbled out of her, a mad laugh that made her sound just like Charles. In Spades. Her calloused hands trembled under her thin blanket.

It was the image of his broken body that finally forced open her black eyes, awash in tears. She stared at the roof of the tent, listening to the sounds of her army outside. Finally, Dinah rose slowly and washed her face in a basin of ice-cold water. A tray of hearty food had been left out for her—by Wardley, probably. Her stomach was knotted so tightly that it hurt to breathe. She forced herself to shove down a few eggs and a crust of bread. It would have to do.

For a few moments, she sat silently on the edge of her cot, staring through a small hole in her tent at the naked plains of Wonderland, dotted with black Spades and painted Yurkei horses.

“I am the queen,” she whispered to herself. She tried repeating the phrase over and over again, but her words faltered, tangled up inside her throat, caught in a knot of fear. She was staring at herself in the looking glass when Sir Gorrann poked his head through the tent flap.

“It’s time, Yer Majesty.”

Dinah looked up at the Spade, brave and powerful in his shining black armor.

“Dinah?”

“I’m afraid,” she whispered.

He knelt before her, his armor clanking against the ground as he took her hands in his and laid his forehead against her palm. “Everyone is afraid before a battle. No one speaks of the fear, though. Yeh cannot give it a name, for when yeh do, it becomes real. The Spades, Cheshire, the Yurkei, Mundoo, all those Cards that line the iron gates, all the people inside the palace grounds, and even the king himself—each one woke up today with the fear, deep inside of here.” He gently laid his hand over Dinah’s heart. “Even so, yeh will lead us into battle today, as a symbol of change. Yeh stand before Wonderland’s gates today as the rightful queen, an heir to yer mother’s line. And lastly, yeh stand before the King of Hearts today as a symbol of vengeance and justice, for the murder of yer brother, for Faina Baker, for my family, for the thousands of Yurkei, and for the innocent people of Wonderland he has murdered or imprisoned. We all must stand eventually, even if our knees shake.”

Dinah bent forward and kissed him on the forehead. “Thank you,” she whispered. “For everything.”

He left her alone, but just seconds later her tent flap opened once again, this time revealing a couple of Yurkei warriors who had come to dress her. Dinah stood with her arms outstretched as the Yurkei silently applied white stripes of paint to her arms and legs before wrapping them in a fine cloth dipped in Iu-Hora’s medicine to ward off infections. Over that, she was dressed in a simple white tunic and black wool pants before her armor was fastened around her. First came the breastplate, bright white with a broken red heart painted across it. It hit her at the hip, its edge sharp with tiny red hearts. The Yurkei gingerly lifted her legs as she stepped into her heart-covered, black leather leg guards that rose up the thigh. Red leather straps were added to protect her hips and shoulders. When they finished draping her body with the heavy armor, the warriors left the tent abruptly, without warning. She flexed her legs. The armor was heavy, but she was able to move fairly smoothly.

She heard quiet, purposeful steps, and Dinah looked up as Cheshire walked into the tent carrying her cape. He carefully draped it on her and then gently latched it at her neck. The white crane feathers, each appearing as if they had been dipped in blood, circled her, the cape’s weight brushing the floor while at the same time stretching out behind her like wings.

Cheshire stepped back and sighed, his eyes filling with tears. “Oh, my fierce warrior. For once, I am speechless. Look at yourself.”

She turned to the mirror. Dinah’s eyes widened in surprise as she barely recognized herself. A grown woman, proud and strong, stared at her, her eyes simmering like two burning coals, her pitch-black hair falling just below her chin. Cheshire reached for her crown.

“No,” said Dinah. “I’ll do it.” Watching herself in the mirror, she lifted the thin ruby crown and pushed it down onto her head. It sat snugly, a perfect fit. She looked at herself. This woman does not need fear, she thought. She is a queen.

“I’m ready.”

“You are a terrifying vision of glory,” Cheshire noted, with a sly smile. “Let’s hope the King of Hearts thinks so.” Just before she stepped outside, Cheshire spun her to face him. “Dinah, do not forget the plan. Even if you see the king, do not pursue him. There will be a time for your justice, and Charles’s justice, but now is a time for battle. If you go galloping off after the king on the north side, everything will descend into chaos …”

Dinah nodded. “I won’t. I’ll follow the plan.”

His dark eyes bore into hers. “The plan is perfect. All you have to do now is fight. Let that anger rise. We are all behind you.” He bowed his head. “Your army awaits.”

With a deep breath, Dinah straightened her shoulders and stepped outside the tent. She heard a collective gasp and then found herself too moved to speak. At the bottom of the hill, Spade and Yurkei stood together for the first time. They lined the walkway from her tent to Morte, who waited for her at the end of a long column of men, his reins held gently by Sir Gorrann. Wardley, devastatingly handsome in his silver armor, stepped up beside her and raised his hands to cup his mouth. The crowd fell silent.

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