Chapter 70
Chapter Seventy
ALICE
No. Freaking. Way.
The Bandersnatch sniffs at my hand—short, sharp sniffs—cautious, like a dog trying to decide if I’m something to be wary of or just another part of the scenery.
The others flank its sides, their glowing eyes locked on me, watching. Waiting.
Behind me, Hook is so still he might as well be carved from stone. But I feel him—coiled tight, every muscle wound like a spring ready to snap. He’s waiting too. Because we both know—one wrong move, and we’re completely and utterly screwed.
“Alice…”
I freeze.
Not that I was moving before, but now… now everything stops. The world locks into place, like something vast and unseen just took a breath and held it. My own breath catches, and beside me, Hook goes rigid.
It spoke.
The Bandersnatch lifts its head, rising—not just in size, but in presence. The smoke coiling around its body shifts, pulling in and out like breath, making a low, wheezing sound that sends a ripple of cold across my skin.
It grows taller with every exhale, stretching impossibly high until I have to crane my neck just to keep eye contact. But I don’t back down. I don’t step back.
"You speak."
My voice barely sounds like my own. My pulse pounds in my throat, and I can’t tell if it’s from fear or something else—something deeper, something older.
The Bandersnatch’s golden eyes don’t leave mine. They blink—slow, deliberate, assessing—and something inside them shifts. Before, it looked like an animal. Instinctive. Dangerous. Unknowable.
Now…
I suck in a breath.
The Bandersnatch tilts its head.
"You stand at the gates of the Sacred Hall of Memories. You stand at the threshold, child of two worlds. You do not know it yet, but you are remembered here."
A pause. A moment for the words to settle, to wrap around me, to pull at something inside me I don’t understand. I don’t know what they mean. But they mean something.
"Wonderland has always known you. It has waited for you, through the unravelling of time, through the decay of its bones. It bends, it shifts, it twists upon itself—but you? You remain. The girl who left. The girl who forgot. The girl who was never meant to be forgotten."
A breath, slow and deliberate, those golden eyes pinning me in place.
"I came here by accident," I manage. "When I was a child, I—"
"You do not remember the old ways, the first paths, the doors that were sealed long before your birth. But they remember you."
The Bandersnatch’s voice rumbles through me like thunder, deep and knowing.
"It was not an accident. They whisper your name in the dark, in the roots of the earth, in the veins of this land that writhes under the Queen’s hand."
I shake my head, my heart hammering so hard it might break through my ribs.
"You are more than what you believe. More than flesh. More than memory. You are the hinge upon which Wonderland turns, and yet, you do not see it."
I swallow hard.
"You are Alice."
A pause.
"And you have come home."
The words slam into me like a wave, dragging me under, tumbling me in a riptide of something I don’t want to feel. My pulse races with every syllable, every meaning behind them. "This is not my world," I say, but the words feel weak. Hollow. Like I don’t even believe them myself.
"When I was a child, I—"
The ground lurches beneath me.
The whole world tilts.
I gasp, grabbing the railing as my stomach flips. Hook curses beside me, bracing himself against the shifting ground. But there’s nothing to react to—just the land itself, moving.
"Tell it to stop," it commands.
I blink at it, heart still slamming against my ribs. "What?"
"Tell it to stop." Its voice is deeper now, edged with something sharp, something expectant. "You have the power. The land listens to you."
"I—" The path bucks, twisting underfoot, and I grip the railing like a lifeline. "I can’t. I don’t—"
"Learn," the Bandersnatch snarls.
My breath hitches. The path shudders, lurching sideways, and I dig my heels in, fighting to stay upright.
"I don’t know how."
The Bandersnatch steps closer, its golden eyes burning.
"You do know. You always know."
The world jerks violently. The tremor beneath us is like a heartbeat out of rhythm, chaotic and wrong. I squeeze my eyes shut against the dizzying motion.
"You stand in a land that bends to your very existence, and you are losing to it. You refuse who you are. That is your weakness. You let doubt sink into your bones, let it rot you from the inside. Wonderland knows you, and yet you deny it. That is why you fail. You cower like a frightened child."
My eyes snap open.
"I am not afraid."
That has never been it. I was not afraid as a child. Never. And I am not afraid now.
Hook moves beside me. "Alice—"
The Bandersnatch snarls at him. "Now is not your time."
The world shakes again, and when I look at the Bandersnatch, twin yellow eyes bore into mine. They flare. I am standing before them all—the Bandersnatches, but not just them. Hook, too.
"If the path moves, you fail."
I swallow hard, rip my hand from the railing, and throw it into the air, into the chaos, into the power pressing in on all sides.
I feel it.
I feel it from the place above, from the creatures in front of me, from everything around me. It hums. It sings. Something low and rumbling.
But I don’t know what I’m doing.
I don’t know how to do what they need.
But I do it anyway.
I try.
The Bandersnatch nods, and all I can do is breathe—feel the vibrations in the air.
The air shifts.
Something answers.
The tremors falter—just for a fraction of a second—like the path itself is waiting.
"Enough," I say. My voice shakes, but it’s strong.
Nothing happens.
Hook is there. He steps into me. So close. So god damn close, and I ...
"Say it like you mean it."
I grit my teeth, fingers curling into fists.
Something unfurls inside me, hot and alive. It rushes up my spine, blooming outward, twisting through my chest like the vines we just cut away.
I stare down at the shifting path, at the cracks forming in the dirt, at the way the world sways like something caught in an unseen tide.
Not this time.
"Enough," I say again, and this time, it’s not a plea.
It’s a command.
The moment stretches—silent, waiting—then slams into place.
My body hums, every nerve singing, my skin burning with a power I don’t understand.
"Wonderland is listening," the Bandersnatch murmurs.
"Stop."
The path stills.
And just like that—my knees give out.