Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
Alice
“Alice.” The voice was sharp. Urgent. “Wake up.”
My eyes snapped open. Darius stood over me, already wearing the hat.
“Get up. We need to move.”
Sleep still clung to me. “What—”
“We’ve been betrayed.” His silver eyes were hard. “Carpenter sold us out to Ari.”
The name pierced my racing heart.
I jumped up from the couch too fast, my hands shaking, black dots swimming across my eyes. “He’s coming here now?”
“Any minute.” My dress had rumpled up around my thighs. Darius stepped closer and helped pull the fabric down. His fingers brushed over my skin and I shivered.
I looked around frantically. Two bedrooms. No balcony. No fire escape. We were trapped. “How are we going to get out of here?”
My chest tightened. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think.
Another memory surfaced. Marsha’s vines. Phantom thorns dragged across my arms, my legs, my ribs, wrapping around me, squeezing tighter and tighter until I couldn’t breathe.
My hands shook. My legs went weak. The room started to spin.
“Alice.” Darius gripped my shoulders. “Look at me.”
I couldn’t. All I could see was the dungeon. The vines. The blood.
“Vines,” I gasped. “The cathedral. They were everywhere—wrapped around the building, then around me.” A shudder ripped through me. “They almost killed me.”
“Alice.” He lowered his head and brushed his lips over mine. The memory faded. The fear dissolved. All that mattered was his kiss—warm, steady, grounding me.
He pulled back slowly, his forehead resting against mine. “Breathe. I’m not going to let them take you.”
I forced air into my lungs. In. Out. In. Out.
His breath mingled with mine. He smelled like pine and something darker. Something that made me want to lean in instead of pull away.
“I can’t end up in that dungeon,” I whispered as I wrapped my fingers in his shirt. Joy survived because of her shadows. She could fight back. But me? My magic would probably kill me before the queen ever got the chance.
“You won’t.” His silver eyes locked onto mine. “I promise.”
Stay calm. Stay calm. Stay calm.
I forced myself to breathe. To think. And when I looked at him again, I caught something unexpected—a glint of mischief behind the silver.
“You have a plan, don’t you?” I narrowed my eyes. “How are we getting out of here?”
He released me and crossed to the window, throwing it open. Cold night air rushed in.
I peered over the ledge. At least four floors below. We’d break our necks. Or least I would. “What are you doing?”
He winked. “We’re going to fly.”
“Fly? But I can’t—”
He rolled his shoulders. And then—
Wings.
Golden wings unfurled from his back, catching the moonlight like burnished metal. They stretched wide, magnificent and terrifying, filling the small room.
I stumbled backward, my breath caught in my throat.
A golden demon. The Mad Hatter was a golden demon.
“But Ari can fly,” I stammered.
Darius smiled—a dangerous, reckless smile. “Ari’s fast. But I’m a Runner. In the air or on the ground, nothing in this dimension can catch me.”
He held out his hand.
“Do you trust me?”
I froze.
Did I trust him? Maybe. Did I trust him not to drop me? That was a different question entirely.
But heavy footsteps thundered up the stairs. Voices shouting. Getting closer.
I grabbed his hand. He pulled me against his chest, one arm wrapping tight around my waist.
“Hold on.”
Darius scooped me up, one arm under my knees, the other locked around my back. I wrapped my arms around his neck and held on for my life. Then we launched through the open window.
Cold air slammed into my face. Wind tore at my hair. Behind us, I heard the door crash open—too late.
We were already in the sky.
Below us, Maddenvale shrank to a cluster of flickering lights.
He flew so fast it felt like being strapped to a 747—if a 747 could dodge between clouds and make my stomach drop every few seconds.
I tried to look over his shoulder, but we were moving so fast everything was a blur. Trees, hills, sky—all smeared together like paint.
Angelo Santi could fly—I’d watched him tear across the New Orleans sky like a shadow with wings. He’d been terrifying. Untouchable.
Darius would have left him in the dust.
Cradled against his chest, I could feel Darius’ heartbeat. Steady. Calm. As if this was a leisurely flight and not a desperate escape. Mine was the one that was racing around my ribs.
Darius slowed. We dipped toward the treetops, branches reaching up like grasping fingers.
I looked up at him. “Why are we slowing down? Are you all right?”
“Campfire below.” His eyes narrowed. “Caterpillar is there.”
Cold fingers walked up my spine. “I thought they were taking him to the queen’s castle.”
“So did I.”
He circled lower, his wings barely making a sound. Through the leaves, I caught a flicker of orange light.
Fire coiled in my chest. Fire. It looked like fire.
“What do we do?”
“I need to get you somewhere safe first.” His arm tightened around me. “Then I’ll come back.”
As we drifted closer, the scene below came into focus. At least eight soldiers surrounded Caterpillar. He sat slumped near the fire, smoke still curling lazily from his skin.
“But you could get hurt.” Panic edged into my voice. “There’s too many of them.”
“I’m not going to let anything happen to you or Caterpillar. But I won’t risk you walking into a trap.”
I couldn't even dress myself without my magic going haywire. What made me think I could help in a fight? But I couldn't just hide in the trees while Darius risked his life.
“I’m not completely helpless, Darius.” I squirmed in his hold. “I could help with my magic.”
His arms tightened around my waist. “But it’s unstable.”
“That’s just it. I could do a distraction.”
“No.” The word came out hard. Final. “If something goes wrong—if you lost control—we’re captured. Or worse, dead.”
I winced. His doubt cut deep—deeper than it should have.
I thought he would drop me onto the ground, but he stopped on a thick branch instead. “You’ll be safe here.”
I looked down, and my stomach dropped. It was at least ten stories high. “Are you serious?” I clutched a branch. “This is where you’re leaving me?”
“I can’t have you following me. You’ll slow me down.” The corner of his mouth twitched—almost a smirk.
“Arrogant much?”
“Truthful.” He released me onto the branch and stepped off into nothing, his golden wings catching the air.
And just like that, he was gone.
I gripped the bark, my heart pounding. He was so sure that I would screw this up. Just like everyone else. Just like every witch who’d ever looked at me like I was broken.
My eyes burned. I blinked hard.
Darius landed just beyond the firelight, his wings tucking silently against his back. From up here, I had an unobstructed view of the clearing below—the soldiers circling Caterpillar, the flickering campfire, the glint of armor.
Something whizzed past me, and my mouth dropped. Black wings flapped overhead. Harpies—two of them.
My blood went cold.
I’d seen harpies before. Keir Rankin, the Unseelie mafia king, had kept a pair, tamed by one of his men—Nyx Grimshaw—who’d earned their loyalty through years of patience and trust. Those harpies had been deadly, yes, but there’d been something almost noble in the way they’d moved—proud creatures who chose to serve.
These were nothing like that.
They circled above the camp with lazy menace, their human faces scanning the ground below. Hunting. Whatever leash the queen held them with, it wasn’t love or loyalty. Just cruelty recognizing its master.
And Darius was down there. Wings tucked. Exposed.
Could he get Caterpillar and take off before the soldiers spotted him? Before the harpies dove? For all I knew, their talons could be enchanted. Poisoned. One strike and he’d never get airborne again.
Neither the harpies nor the men appeared to have noticed him. Yet.
What was his plan? Just fly in and snag Caterpillar? Against a dozen soldiers and two deadly harpies?
My chest tightened. He was fast, but he wasn’t invincible.
Something moved below me. I squinted through the branches.
More soldiers. Another ten at least—and these carried bows.
Archers.
I had to warn him. But how?
Think, damn it. Think.
I had to help him or he was going to die.
Darius sped toward Caterpillar.
Soldiers shouted. Swords scraped from scabbards. They charged toward him from all sides.
Then the archers released.
A dozen arrows cut through the air.
“No!” The scream tore from my throat.
Someone cried out below. A man’s voice. Pain.
Darius. Oh god, Darius.
Something cracked open inside me. Not my unstable magic—something deeper. Something ancient. Power surged through my veins like molten fire, burning through every nerve, every cell.
I didn’t think. I just reached out, my palm stretched toward the sky.
Stop. Please stop.
And everything... stopped.
The harpies hung in the sky like dark paintings, wings mid-beat. Arrows floated motionless in the air. The soldiers stood frozen mid-stride, swords raised, mouths open in silent battle cries.
Even the flames of the campfire had stilled—but it didn’t hurt the way my magic usually did.
It felt… right.
I didn’t do this. I couldn’t have done this. Someone else in the Elder Dimension must have done it.
But the power still hummed beneath my skin, warm and waiting, as if it had been there all along.
I glanced down at my wrist and went still.
The bracelet. My bracelet—the one I’d worn since I was three, the one that had never come off, never changed, never done anything—now held two golden strands instead of one. They wound around each other in a delicate spiral, catching the frozen firelight.
I touched it with shaking fingers. The metal was warm. Alive.
How? Why now, after all these years?
It had to be this place. The Elder Dimension. Something here had triggered the bracelet, the same way something here had frozen time. It couldn’t have been me.
It couldn’t have been me.