Chapter 41
“Your presence is requested in the rose garden,” the maiden who escorted Alice from Queen Gayelette’s quarters said.
Did every palace in Oz have a rose garden?
It seemed so. “If you’ll follow me.” The girl smiled politely and draped Alice in a deep purple suede cloak.
Alice, fighting the swell of feelings Gayelette had stirred, found the maiden amusing, at least enough to briefly distract her from the idea that she was a witch.
What would happen if she didn’t want to go to the rose garden?
Would the maiden still walk there? She hadn’t really asked Alice, just informed her and dressed her in outerwear.
Alice smirked at her own thoughts and followed.
In the garden, Alice saw Blinkem waiting in a stone gazebo, his back to her.
Lush, tightly-petaled roses climbed the columns surrounding him.
Faintly she heard the same sort of whispering that she had in the crystal greenhouse of Roseland.
She could only assume these roses came from the land of Ev.
“Shall I wait?” the maiden asked her, standing at the trellis arch marking the entrance to the garden.
“Oh, no, thank you so much,” Alice said, amazed that a chaperone was not required.
She looked into the garden, and Blinkem, who had heard them approach, now faced her.
His hair slicked back, he wore a tailed jacket in the now-familiar royal purples of the Ruby Queen, his shirt top-buttoned high with a neck bow.
His aristocratic look was almost intimidating, given his tight-jawed, serious expression.
As Alice approached, she felt nervous as Blinkem’s eyes gleamed, taking in her hair. She felt foolish and feared that he might find her new hair frivolous, and indeed it was the first thing he noticed.
“The queen has offered a gift, I see,” he said.
“Remarkably so!” Alice touched the soft hair that fell over her shoulders. “Do you think it’s too much?” Alice didn’t want to ask, but she’d rather know than wonder.
“Not at all. You look…like yourself.” He stood with his hands behind his back, like a guard.
She found herself taken aback. She wished to ask him how he would know she looked like herself.
What self did he have to compare this one to?
She did not ask—perhaps knowing too much would spoil the moment—and he simply looked at her as she allowed him to do so.
“Did she give all of the guests gifts?” Alice asked after a moment, as she found herself wondering if there was anything different about him.
“Likely so. She is generous.”
“And intimidating,” Alice scoffed.
Blinkem slipped into a laugh, his large white teeth and smile completely changing his face. Alice laughed, as some of her tension eased at seeing his jovial side.
“You seem to know many queens,” Alice said, with a playful squint. “It makes sense, given that you are a prince.” Oh, how bizarre that sounded coming out of her mouth.
“I know a few, yes. I have the trust of Tattypoo, so queens tend to respect the work I do.” Blinkem glanced away.
“Are all queens witches?” Alice asked, feeling ridiculous even saying it. Blinkem grinned and thought for a moment.
“My mother was not,” he said, then looked around at the roses that clung to the masonry. “But every other queen I know is.”
“Queen Gayelette certainly is.” Alice smiled and touched her hair. “And she believes I am a witch, though that seems impossible,” Alice said, unable to shake the thought. Was it that she didn’t believe it, or was it that she wished for it not to be true?
“I’m sure it’s possible. You are quite good at impossible things.” The words settled and disarmed her. He held her eyes a moment longer, then looked away just as her cheeks flushed.
“Blinkem,” Alice said.
“Yes, Alice.” He looked squarely at her. She began to laugh, to steady her nerves.
“You speak in very brief, partial phrases. I enjoy riddles, but I do not enjoy having to pry. What I certainly do not enjoy is not having information, especially when it feels intentionally hidden.” Alice waited for him to respond, perhaps roll his eyes or confess. He did not.
“All right, then.” She exhaled, hoping it would cue him to speak, but, yet again—nothing. “Can you tell me of the day I saw you in Kensington Gardens?”
Blinkem took a breath and began to walk, and Alice followed in lockstep down the promenade under the rose arches.
“That was the day I had been transformed,” he murmured, and her heart sped up as he began to tell the story.
“Tattypoo was delayed from returning from retrieving the Munchkins, and a witch attacked me.”
Seven-year-old Blinkem stared down into the newly constructed well. A bucket dangled from a wooden canopy. Around the well were piles of stone, lumber, and various supplies, ready for the Munchkins to begin constructing their homes upon arrival.
“There we are!” Tattypoo said as she came from the flower grove at the edge of the site.
“Blinkem, dear, now listen, there’s a wild grove of poppies.
No wandering while I’m off!” He nodded, and she handed him the basket with moss and violet flowers that she had potted.
“Will you do us the honor?” she asked him.
He took the basket that he had helped string a rope to and, standing on the well’s ledge, hung the decoration as Tattypoo held his waist.
“Right then,” she said, helping him down.
“I should be back before half past.” She removed her cherished pocket watch from within her waist pouch, and, with its long chain double clasped, arranged it so he could wear it as a necklace on account of how small he was.
“You know what to do. If anything other than me or the Munchkins comes through that portal…”
“I run as fast as I can to the nearest place between worlds…”
“Right. And where are you to go?” Tattypoo asked.
“I’m to wait for you on the south bank at Kensington Gardens.”
“My smart boy!” She gave him a little chin squeeze before straightening up. He, as he always did, flipped open the clover faceplate to admire the clock’s golden face. His finger hovered over the fourth knob that controlled the picture dials with the suns and moons.
“Blinkem!” Tattypoo said sternly, and he flipped the watch closed.
“I know. Never touch the fourth knob,” he said, hanging his head.
“Never ever. Now, as the Munchkins come through, you are to welcome them on behalf of all of Oz.” She fluffed the silk bow at his neck before brushing his white linen suit jacket and waistcoat. “Such a handsome prince,” she said. “Off we go, then.”
Blinkem stood back with a smirk as Tattypoo turned her back to him. “Now, let’s see.” She began to pat her skirt and turned to him before scrunching her nose. Then, she looked into her sleeves like a magician looks for scarves. “Either my wand has run off, or a little prince has fooled me.”
Blinkem’s grin couldn’t be contained as he withdrew the wand he had hidden inside his jacket. She held out her palm to him, in which he placed the wonderous tool. She shooed him back, held her hands high, and drew a large circle from as high as she could reach to the ground.
The wand sparked, and, as though it were cutting the very air in which it glided, another world appeared as if behind glass within the sparkling outline she drew.
The world was dark with heavy smoke. Tattypoo turned and winked, then stepped through, and as her feet landed in the dark field beyond the portal, it sparked vibrantly and then, with a flash of light, closed abruptly.
Blinkem hopped up on top of the well and sat staring off into the woods as he waited for the portal to reopen so that he could welcome his new people to the Land of Oz.
Blinkem waited for the spark to return, but as the sun began to set over the valley and the long hand was due south, he began to worry.
He was sure that Tattypoo would find her way back, but he worried about how he would return to the palace if she did not.
He did not know the woods well enough to navigate.
He squinted and, in the distance, through the rows of trees that surrounded the field, he saw a cloaked figure had appeared. The figure moved quickly over mounds of wild grass. Its path was leading directly to Blinkem.
Blinkem tucked the watch into his pocket and hopped down and stood nervously as the figure strode closer.
“I don’t expect a prince to be standing in these woods unguarded,” said the woman in the cloak as she reached the edge of the newly laid dirt and rubble road.
She removed her hood. She was an older woman with hard features.
“I am not unaccompanied.” Blinkem straightened his posture again and pulled at the sleeves that poked from beneath the linen jacket. “And your name, ma’am.”
“I am Mombi,” she said. “Do tell, where is my sister, Tattypoo?” Blinkem shifted nervously, looking around. He didn’t feel he should disclose that Tattypoo was sneaking new citizens to Oz from another land. That was their secret.
“Tell me, how, though, does one witch seem to discover wells of such magnitude?” Mombi walked around Blinkem and tapped the flower basket, sending it to sway back and forth.
Blinkem turned his head, afraid Tatty’s welcome basket would fall.
If this woman did not know how Tattypoo did things, could she really be her sister?
“Goddess Waters seem to manifest for her, do they not? Every time she finds a new gaggle of poor souls, land and water are ready at her beck and call.” The woman turned on her heel, the gravel crunching as she did.
“It’s almost as though she knows something we all do not!
Do you?” She pointed directly at him, her crooked fingertip very close to his nose.
He backed away, turning over his shoulder to watch her as she continued to circle.
“She is lucky, I suppose,” he said.
“Lucky, indeed! Though with the wealth of the crown behind her, does she need luck?” The woman’s tone taunted, and she was walking purposefully so that he had to keep turning. He stopped, for she was making him dizzy. She studied him closely as she came back around to stand before him.
“Tattypoo will be back shortly. You may ask her then,” he said, hoping this was true, as he squeezed Tatty’s watch within his pocket.
“I’m not so sure of that.” The woman began to grin.
Blinkem tried not to look at her. Instead, he looked around her at the field where Tattypoo was to return.
But the feeling of the woman’s eyes was so unnerving that he kept having to look back, trying to figure out why she stared.
She smiled wider each time he turned his eyes toward her.
“I would so enjoy such luck. Are you her lucky charm, little prince?” Mombi took a step toward him, blocking his view of the field. There was nowhere to look but up into her dark eyes.
“What do you mean?” he asked, as the question was very silly.
“Perhaps you are where she draws such chance at these miraculous moments of happenstance?” The woman was using a sweet voice, but it didn’t seem sweet at all to Blinkem. It felt like when someone lies but thinks you are too daft to realize it.
“I could not be a charm of luck. I am a prince,” Blinkem said, raising his chin. She should be treating him as such, after all.
“No, you are correct,” Mombi said, her boot crunching as she stepped forward. Blinkem swiftly stepped back, and Mombi stopped and stood just looking at him for what seemed to be a long while, long enough for him to wonder if Tattypoo would arrive just then. But she did not.
“Has my sister told you of the animals that communicate directly with the Goddess Lurline?”
Blinkem had always asked Tatty for stories of her goddess, but she never seemed to have them straight. “Really? Many animals?” he asked sheepishly.
“She is terrible at remembering details, isn’t she?
” Mombi said, and Blinkem nodded as a small smile came across his face.
Perhaps this woman was indeed Tattypoo’s sister, for this fact was certainly true.
“Oh yes, all types: the unicorns, the lions, and even rabbits are said to have the ability.” The woman was smirking as she said rabbits.
All he could think of was how silly it would be to have rabbits talking to a goddess.
“Rabbits?” he asked.
“And…” She leaned forward, towering over him. “There was a time, long before now, when witches would sever the foot of a rabbit and wear it as an amulet so that they could speak to Gods.”
“Did it work? Could they communicate with her?” Blinkem reminded himself to ask Tatty if she had a rabbit foot.
“I should like to find out, wouldn’t you?” the woman said, stepping closer to Blinkem.
“Yes,” he said and took a step backward.
Then, the woman opened the cloak and pushed it back over her shoulder. She drew a wand from a darted pleat in her skirt and raised it slowly, pointing it directly at Blinkem.
Then, in a blink, it was no longer the witch Mombi who stood before him, but Tattypoo.
He blinked again. She was a mimic! “You are doing the forbidden! And you are not to point a wand directly at a person!” Blinkem said, raising his hand over his face, reminded of the many times Tatty had scolded him when he played with her wand.
“What about pointing it at a rabbit?” The woman who now looked like Tattypoo did not retract the wand, and it began to spark.
“I beg your pardon?” Blinkem asked. Then, as though someone had split his skull with an axe, he dropped in agonizing pain.
The color drained from his vision as he fell to the ground.
His hands broke. Every bone in them broke before his eyes, and he began to shrink, feeling as though he were crushed in a vise.
His hands grew smaller and smaller and contorted as the timepiece and chain grew larger and larger.
White fur sprouted from his skin, and in a pile of his own clothes he sat far below the witch.
She bent to grab the watch, and the startlingly loud sound of her movement alone would have been enough to frighten him.
He took off running, and it wasn’t the run of a boy, but that of a rabbit—a frightened white rabbit.
With the watch tangled around his mid-section and bounding legs, he sprinted.
Find the place between worlds, he remembered as he ran.
Then he remembered he must think of the bank of Kensington Gardens, or else run the risk of winding up wherever the place between worlds decided he should go.
Kensington Gardens, he chanted over and over in his mind, with the witch in pursuit, howling in frustration that she had changed him into a creature she could not catch.
Kensington Gardens, he chanted once more and fled into the hole beneath the tree to the place between worlds.