Part 13 (1/2)
Shoved into the wall of the ”well” were short wooden struts just wide enough for a foot. If they were very careful, they might be able to make it to the top without falling to a painful death.
All the wild confidence she'd felt in her Wonderlandian Grove fizzled out of Lizzie. All marchiness chilled out of her feet.
But she whispered, ”Off with its head.”
Maddie nodded.
Lizzie shakily ascended the stairs. They were wet and soft, like slushy snow, so she had to lean against the slime-coated wall for support. Even the shush, shush, shush of their feet seemed too loud. The Jabberwock could be anywhere.
At last, Lizzie climbed out of the well and into the light of a carpeted s.p.a.ce that was refres.h.i.+ngly hallway-shaped. It almost seemed like the normal school, but as they crept along, wrongness was everywhere. Slides instead of steps, curves instead of corners, the floor making soft ribbits with every press of her feet. So much had transformed that Lizzie stared at an innocent lamp, waiting for it to sprout legs and dance a jig.
Fear neither lamps nor jigs, Lizzie, she told herself. Just find the library.
Lizzie had spent hours in the library, reading the Wonderlandian books, gazing at the ill.u.s.trations. In the quiet grandeur of the library, she had let herself yearn for home, the way cheese yearns for cloth, the way bees yearn for b.u.mble. So she knew the exact location of every Wonderland-related book: which corner, which wall, which shelf, and even which hidden chests in the back of custodial closets.
”That's good,” Maddie whispered.
”Hmph.” Lizzie did not approve of Maddie's nosing around her royal and private thoughts, but at the moment she was occupied with the larger worry of actually finding the library in a Jabberwocked school.
”That's bad,” whispered Maddie.
Lizzie parted some drapes, trying to let in more light, only to find that the drapes covered blank stone walls and were themselves dripping with b.u.t.ter and grape jelly.
Everything Lizzie saw was twisted, neither Ever After nor Wonderland. Brushrooms grew out of the floor, wiggling their bristles at them. Treacle tapestries dripped on the wall, their s.h.i.+ny-sweet images ever-changing. A pot of flowers seemed to smile at her. That was delightfully Wonderlandis.h.!.+ Except that the smile was a little too intense. And when they opened their mouths, instead of singing, they lectured on mathematics.
Lizzie took her safety scissors out of her pocket to cut off their heads but thought better of it. What if those flowers had been Dexter or Darling or someone?
The hallway seemed to go on forever, far and away into the distance, until it flickered and abruptly ended.
Lizzie and Maddie shrank back as large chunks of the walls fell away and resolved themselves into further hallways. A gigantic caterpillar, each segment of its body a fringed throw pillow with ta.s.sel legs, stampeded across their path from the right hall to the left.
”That's odd,” Maddie said.
”No doubt,” Lizzie said. ”At the very least, things should be moving left to right. It's as if the very rules of civil behavior are being ignored.”
A gang of cards chased after the caterpillar, paper flapping obscenely as they ran. These were not respectable cards, to Lizzie's mind-that is, they were not playing cards. These were greeting cards, if what each of them was shouting was any clue.
”Get well soon!” yelled the first to cross their path.
”Happy birthday,” cheered the second. The third wetly spluttered, ”I'm so sorry.”
The last card in the group noticed them, stopped, and pointed its long, thin arm threateningly.
”Happy anniversary?” it asked.
”Happy anniversary,” Maddie said.
The card nodded its front flap and ran to catch up with its pack.
”That was close,” said Lizzie. ”I was about to say aCondolences' and may have gotten us smooshed inside the card like pressed wildflowers.”
They arrived in an open room that might have once been the Castleteria. All the tables, chairs, and benches were huddled against one wall, s.h.i.+vering. The s.p.a.ce left by their absence was empty, except for several upside-down bowls on the floor and a huge, lumpy gray ball in the center of the room under the chandelier. The gray ball sounded like it was giggling.
”Maybe we should go a different way,” Maddie whispered. ”This seems way too creepy to be safe.”
”Laughing things are never dangerous,” Lizzie said, marching forward.
The ball stopped laughing.
”You,” Lizzie announced. ”Giggling Thing! We need directions!”
The lumpy ball spun around, exposing raisin eyes and a wide-open mouth. Whatever it was, it looked needy. It plopped forward, its huge belly slapping the floor, its flat, walrus-like tail smearing porridge behind it.
”Hugs?” it lisped.
”No hugs,” Lizzie said, more certain than ever that she was not a hugger.
”I know that smell,” Maddie whispered. ”That used to be the peas porridge in the pot nine days old. No way I'm eating it now.”
”No way I was eating it then,” said Lizzie.
”Hugs!” it said.
”Hugs?” other voices whispered. The bowls lifted up like half of an oyster sh.e.l.l.
The Porridge Thing kept advancing, its eyes wider, its mouth wetter, and its laugh louder. The girls backed into a wall.
”Do something!” Lizzie shouted to Maddie. ”Narrate us out of this!”
”That's not how it works!” Maddie shouted back.
The Porridge began to whimper. ”Hugs...”
”Poor thing,” Maddie said.
From beneath the clacking bowls, lumps of raisin-studded porridge rolled out, sprouted muddy legs, and began to run. The Porridge squealed with delight and took chase.
”Can't catch me, can't catch me!” the lumps chanted in little gurgles.
The girls edged toward the door through which they had come. Several lumps careened off the ceiling they had been running on and fell splat at their feet.
”Whee!” roared the Porridge Thing, slamming into the door and nearly crus.h.i.+ng Maddie in the process. The lumps skittered over Lizzie's foot and the Porridge chased on.
Lizzie reached for the door only to find it had shrunk, the walls puckering around it like a mouth after eating something sour.
”Shrinking potion!” Lizzie shouted. ”Give me one now, Maddie!”
Maddie pulled off her hat, rummaging through the contents.
”I don't-” she started, but Lizzie yanked her out of the way of a careening lump. Maddie's hat fell from her hand and rolled away.