Chapter 131: Ch129. The war that was
The world around them shuddered, moved and warped.
Alice did not move, but the Spire did. The space between them bent, cracked, and unfurled like the pages of a forgotten book, a story buried beneath layers and layers of time.
The Hatter-Miles felt it all at once. A pull, a shift, and then a sudden, terrible weight that pressed down on his soul, like stepping into a place where history had been burned into the ground.
***
The air smelled of ink and roses. Of spilled tea and war drums. The Hatter-Miles was not in the Spire anymore.
He staggered as his boots touched soft, dewy grass. He blinked, his breath unsteady as he took in his surroundings. The sky above was painted in a twilight hue, bleeding shades of violet and deep blue, and in the distance, he could see the towering shape of a castle – her castle – looming over the heart of Wonderland.
His Wonderland.
And he was standing in his own parlor.
The great, endless tea table stretched before him, a beautiful mess of porcelain cups, silver cutlery, and plates stacked to the sky. Lanterns swung lazily from invisible strings, glowing like captured fireflies. The wind hummed a song through the trees, rustling the leaves in a rhythm that had once been familiar. But this was not the present.
The air felt wrong, something dark curled at the edges of this memory, and then a voice.
Frantic. Breathless.