24. Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Three
Alice
C rossing through the portal felt like falling through shattered glass that never cut—each fragment a different moment in time that brushed against my consciousness before dissolving into the next.
I stumbled forward, gasping as solid ground materialized beneath my feet.
The air tasted ancient, like dust and starlight and forgotten dreams.
"Welcome to the Forgotten Lands," Varik said quietly beside me, his wild green eyes scanning our surroundings with wary familiarity.
I blinked, trying to make sense of the landscape.
We stood in what might have been a forest, but unlike any I'd seen before.
The trees grew in impossible configurations—some upside down with roots reaching toward a sky that shifted between twilight and dawn in rhythmic pulses.
Others spiraled in helical patterns, their branches weaving through different planes of existence.
The ground beneath our feet seemed solid enough, covered in moss that glowed with faint luminescents.
"It's beautiful," I whispered, watching as flowers bloomed and withered in accelerated cycles before returning to bud again. "And terrifying."
Chi materialized beside me, his form more translucent than usual, as if the Forgotten Lands were calling to his liminal nature. "Time moves differently here," he warned, his voice carrying strange echoes. "Minutes might pass as hours in the outside world, or decades might compress into heartbeats."
Heart emerged from the portal behind us, his ruby eyes wide with wonder and apprehension. Through our connection, I felt his disorientation—the Heart Stone's magic struggling to maintain coherence in a place where causality flowed like water.
"The resistance fighters?" I asked, worry flashing through me.
"Made it through," Heart replied, though his voice carried strain.
"Though they're as disoriented as we are.
" He gestured behind us where the portal was slowly sealing itself.
Through the diminishing opening, I caught glimpses of his people stumbling into this timeless realm—some looking younger than they had moments before, others bearing silver threads in hair that had been solid brown or black.
"The Forgotten Lands age differently," Varik explained, noticing my stare.
"Some visitors grow younger, others older.
The realm responds to inner time rather than chronological age.
" He shouldered one of his impossible packs. "We need to find shelter for the night. We don’t have enough time to make it to the castle before it gets dark.”
"Castle?" I asked, following Varik as he began picking his way through the twisted landscape. The moss beneath our feet pulsed with each step,creating ripples of bioluminescent light spreading outward like dropped stones in still water.
"The Sanctuary of Hours," Varik replied, his voice carrying a note of old pain. "It exists at the center of the Forgotten Lands, where all timelines converge. If we can reach it, we'll have protection from temporal displacement—and from anyone foolish enough to follow us here."
Chi's form flickered as we walked, sometimes solid, sometimes transparent, as if the realm couldn't decide which version of him belonged. "The Red Queen won't pursue us here," he said, though uncertainty colored his words. "Even she isn't mad enough to risk the temporal storms."
Through the Heart Stone, I felt a pulse of disagreement from Heart.
"Don't underestimate my mother's madness," Heart said aloud, falling into step beside me. "She's risked worse for less."
I glanced around at our strange surroundings, watching as a nearby flower aged from bud to bloom to decay in the space of seconds, only to reverse the process moments later. "How far is this Sanctuary?"
"A day's journey," Varik replied, adjusting his hat as we navigated between trees that seemed to shift positions when I wasn't looking directly at them. "Though 'day' has little meaning here. We'll need to follow the moss-light rather than the sun."
As if responding to his words, the bioluminescent path beneath our feet brightened, creating a winding trail through the impossible forest. Heart's fighters gathered behind us, their expressions ranging from wonder to terror as they witnessed the realm's temporal anomalies firsthand.
"The moss remembers the way," Chi murmured, his form solidifying slightly as he floated alongside me. "It's one of the few constants in this realm—a living map that exists across all timelines simultaneously."
I felt the silver patterns beneath my skin responding to our surroundings, pulsing in rhythm with the moss-light's gentle glow. The ward's consciousness, now merged with my own, seemed curious about this strange place where time flowed in all directions at once.
"We should move quickly," Heart advised, his ruby eyes scanning the shifting forest with military precision. "The longer we remain exposed, the greater the risk of temporal displacement."
As if to emphasize his point, one of his fighters—a young man with a jagged scar across his jaw—suddenly staggered, clutching his chest. Before our eyes, his appearance flickered between youth and age, his hair cycling from black to gray to white and back again.
His face aged decades in seconds before snapping back to its original form, leaving him gasping and disoriented.
"Temporal flux," Varik said grimly, moving to steady the man.
"It happens when someone fights against the realm's flow instead of accepting it.
" He looked meaningfully at the rest of Heart's fighters.
"Don't resist the changes you feel. Let the Forgotten Lands decide what version of yourselves belongs here. "
The scarred fighter—Martha, I remembered—helped her companion steady himself. "How do we avoid fighting it?" she asked, her weathered face tight with concern.
"Think of yourselves as water," Chi advised, his form rippling like liquid mercury. "Water doesn't fight the shape of its container—it simply flows to fill the space available."
I watched Heart's fighters exchange uncertain glances, clearly struggling with the concept of surrendering control to an alien realm. Through the Heart Stone, I felt Heart's own unease—his tactical mind rebelling against the idea of accepting unpredictable changes.
"It's easier than it sounds," I said, surprising myself with the words. The silver patterns beneath my skin seemed to pulse with understanding, as if they recognized something familiar in this timeless place. "I can feel it—the realm isn't hostile. It's just... curious."
As we continued along the glowing moss path, I noticed the ward consciousness within me growing more active.
It reached out tentatively toward the temporal currents flowing around us, not to resist them but to learn from them.
Through that connection, I began to sense the deeper rhythms of the Forgotten Lands—layers of time stacked like pages in an infinite book, each one containing different versions of possibility.
We walked in relative silence for what felt like hours, following the luminescent trail through landscapes that defied comprehension.
I passed a grove where the same tree existed in multiple seasons simultaneously—spring blossoms on one side, autumn leaves on another, winter bare branches reaching toward summer's full canopy.
The contradictions should have been jarring, but somehow they felt natural here, as if this was how time was supposed to flow when freed from linear constraints.
"Alice," Heart said quietly, falling into step beside me as the path widened. Through our connection, I felt his curiosity mixing with concern. "Your magic—it's responding differently to this place. The patterns beneath your skin are brighter than I've seen them."
I glanced down at my hands, noticing he was right. The silver traceries had spread further up my arms, creating intricate spirals that pulsed with each heartbeat. More unsettling, they seemed to be moving of their own accord, shifting and rearranging themselves like living tattoos.
"The Forgotten Lands recognize the First Queen's pattern," Varik said without turning around, his voice carrying across the strange acoustics of the timeless forest. "This realm existed before the division—it remembers what Wonderland was like when magic flowed freely."
Chi's form flickered with what might have been envy or concern. "Careful, Alice. The realm's recognition could be as dangerous as its rejection.”
"Dangerous how?" I asked, watching the patterns shimmer beneath my skin.
"The Forgotten Lands might try to... keep you," Chi explained, his form solidifying as he moved closer. "Places with consciousness tend to collect what they find valuable."
I shuddered at the thought, but the ward within me seemed unconcerned—almost welcoming of the realm's attention. Through our connection, I sensed no malice in the timeless forest, only ancient recognition and something like relief.
"It feels like it knows me," I admitted, trailing my fingers along a tree trunk that aged and renewed itself beneath my touch. Where my skin made contact, the temporal fluctuations stabilized, as if my presence anchored that small piece of reality.
"Because it does," Varik said, pausing to study a fork in the moss-light path.
"Or rather, it knows what you carry." His wild green eyes held mine with uncomfortable intensity.
"The First Queen spent considerable time in these lands before she unified Wonderland.
Some say she learned to transcend linear existence here, which is how she eventually merged with the realm itself. "
Heart's grip tightened on his sword hilt, ruby eyes scanning the shifting forest with new wariness. "You're suggesting this place taught her how to... ascend?"
"Not taught," Chi corrected, his form rippling as temporal currents brushed against him.
"Prepared. The Forgotten Lands don't instruct—they simply reveal what already exists within a person.
" His teal eyes found mine. "What they're revealing in Alice is the same potential that once transformed a simple dreamer into Wonderland's living consciousness
The revelation hung in the air between us, heavy with implications I wasn't ready to face.
I turned away from their watchful eyes, focusing instead on the strangely beautiful chaos of our surroundings.
A butterfly with wings like stained glass fluttered past, its lifecycle visible as it aged and renewed with each wingbeat.
"So this place might... accelerate whatever's happening to me?" I asked, trying to keep my voice steady despite the fear coiling in my stomach.
Varik nodded, his expression grave beneath the brim of his hat. "The temporal currents here respond to potential. They'll amplify what's already developing within you."
Through the Heart Stone, I felt a surge of protective concern from Heart. He moved closer, his ruby eyes tracking the increasingly complex patterns spreading across my exposed skin.
"We should rest soon," he said, his voice carrying an authority that made his fighters snap to attention.
"There," Varik pointed ahead where the moss-light path curved around a cluster of ancient stones that hummed with their own inner rhythm. "Those standing stones create a temporal eddy—time moves more slowly within their circle. We can rest there safely until the path reveals our next destination."
As we approached the stone circle, I noticed each monolith was carved with symbols that seemed to shift and change when I looked at them directly. The air within the circle felt thicker, more substantial, as if we were moving through honey instead of atmosphere.
"Much better," Chi sighed as we crossed the threshold, his form immediately stabilizing into solid flesh. "The stones anchor reality—I haven't felt this corporeal in centuries."
Heart's fighters spread out around the perimeter, their movements becoming more coordinated as the temporal stability eased their disorientation.
Martha checked on the scarred young man, who seemed to have settled into a consistent age somewhere in his mid-twenties, the flickering between youth and elderhood finally stilled.
"Better?" Martha asked, her weathered hands gentle as she checked his pulse.
"Much," he replied, his voice stronger now. "It felt like I was being pulled apart and put back together over and over." He glanced around the stone circle with newfound respect. "This place... it's alive, isn't it?"
"Everything in the Forgotten Lands has some degree of consciousness," Varik confirmed, settling onto a moss-covered boulder that obligingly shaped itself into a more comfortable seat.
"The stones, the trees, even the path we're following—they all remember what Wonderland was like before the division. "
I sank down beside one of the carved monoliths, immediately feeling the silver patterns beneath my skin respond to its proximity.
The symbols etched into the stone began to glow faintly, resonating with the magic flowing through me.
As I watched, they rearranged themselves into configurations that looked almost like written language—though in no script I recognized.
"They're trying to communicate," I whispered, pressing my palm flat against the stone's surface. The moment my skin made contact, images flooded my mind—visions of Wonderland as it had been before the courts divided it into warring territories.
I saw vast libraries where knowledge flowed freely between realms. Gardens where impossible flowers bloomed in harmonious chaos.
Cities built from crystallized dreams where beings from all corners of reality lived in peaceful coexistence.
And at the center of it all, a figure with silver-touched hair who moved through the landscape.
I didn’t know I was in a trance, or even hear my name being called as more and more images were shown to me.
Things that happened, things that could happen…
and things happening now. All shown to me so quickly I felt myself almost disconnect with my body as I let myself fall deeper and deeper into the visons being shown.