Chester Cheshire grinwild's Arc

Chapter 5 of 15

The raven hopped off the desk and dragged one wing across the floor. It hobbled to the warped birdcage in the corner, climbed inside, and yanked the bent door shut with its beak. The hinge groaned. The bird turned its back on Chester and tucked its head down. "You know I can still see you, right?" Chester said. He waited. The raven squawked once through the bars and said nothing else. Chester tapped the desk. He stared at the cage. He stared at the quill lying in its puddle of purple ink. Then he picked it up. "Rapunzel," he muttered. "Tower. Hair. Lizards." He wrote it fast this time. The ink bubbled before he finished the page. The book shuddered, sprouted two ragged purple wings, and lifted off the desk. Chester grabbed for it. Missed. He dipped the quill again. He wrote another. That one tore its own cover open and flapped to the rafters. He wrote a third. A fourth. A stack of split, broken books rose around his boots, pages cracked like shells, and still he kept writing. One bad book sat slumped on the floor in a heap of white shards where a teacup-shaped summoning had collapsed in on itself before it could fly. The winged books circled his study. They beat against the round window until the glass burst. The flock poured out into the purple leaves and climbed. Through the broken pane, Chester saw them gather above Wonderland in a brown and purple swarm, wings flashing, more joining every second from the hatch above him. He dropped the quill. "No," he said. "No, no, wait." He ran for the door. He stumbled down through the leaves to the cobblestone square. The flock had already found the long winding table. They dove. Chester threw up his paws. "Not the table," he shouted. "Anything but the table." The books swerved at the last second. They banked hard and slammed into the tall stack of cups Harrietta had been building beside her seat. China exploded. Saucers spun across the stones. Harrietta stood very still in the middle of it, ears flat, one cracked handle by her foot. Chester lowered his paws and looked at his own setup. Untouched. Every teapot in place. He let out a breath before he could stop himself. Harrietta turned her head. She had heard the breath. "You did this," she said. Above them the flock wheeled and climbed higher, too many to count now, scattering into the purple sky. Chester opened his mouth and closed it. The quill was upstairs in a cage with a bird who would not touch it again. The princess was still lost in the leaves. And now there was an army of his mistakes loose over Wonderland, and the only friend he had at his table was counting broken cups and deciding what he was.