Page 27 of Wondrous

There was something odd about that voice, now that it was closer, and free of the echoes of the pit. It was—

A hand reached over the edge of the pit. A pale human hand, the nails caked with mud.

I screamed and released the rope, and the jabberwock went sailing downward again to land with a wet thud.

It took another quarter hour to get the jabberwock out. One of the blankets had torn, and then when I tried to lift him, one of the knots came loose. Then he realized halfway up that he forgot the teacup, and I had to lower him down again. By this point we were sniping at each other constantly.

“That’s three times you’ve shoved me off a cliff,” he said. “You’re lucky I’ve not cracked my head open. I hope the mock dragons roast you slowly.”

“Twice,” I snapped. I was sweaty and exhausted, and my hems were caked in mud. “The second time was your own stupid fault.”

“Technically, everything about this situation is your fault. Do you think I wanted to have anything to do with some idiot on a quest?”

“Oh, right—you tripped and fell on my tent,” I snapped. He had just passed the halfway point, I thought, but kept slipping down the side every few feet, and my strength was almost spent. “Just admit that you were going to eat me.”

“I absolutely was not,” he said, and it didn’t seem like he was faking the disgust in his voice. “Most jabberwocks don’t like to eat people. We generally just scare them away, if they stumble into the Jabberwoods. We eat snails, moths, and fish.”

This was a lot to process. I was relieved—and somewhat disbelieving—to hear that jabberwocks didn’t eat people, because if I’d known he’d eaten someone, I wouldn’t have been able to stop thinking about it, or wondering if he was thinking about it every time he caught a glimpse of my tender skin.

But also—moths?

“Yuck,” I said, adjusting my hold on the rope. “Wait a minute—you don’t like to eat people? Most of you? There are a few too many words in that sentence.”

He made a sound like a shrug. “I haven’t eaten anyone. But we’re predators. What do you expect to happen if some fool of a girl comes wandering into our woods, waving a sword around?”

“I suppose that makes sense,” I said, and then the insult registered. “And I don’t have a sword. All I have are my teacups.”

“And look what they did to me. I almost wish you’d chopped my head off.”

“I don’t—” I froze, because he had reached the edge of the pit and was pulling himself out.

“If you push me in again, I promise to land on your horrible teacup,” he said.

He removed the cup from a pocket in his clothing and placed it on the ground—it was muddy and the handle had a small chip, but it was otherwise intact. The jabberwock pushed himself upright and drew his legs out of the pit, wincing. He made no move to stand, and I made no move to help him. I felt as if I’d been trapped in amber.

“Please, go ahead and stare all you like,” he snapped, visibly blushing. “You might as well admire your handiwork.”

“I’m—I’m sorry,” I said, feeling as if I’d been slapped across the face—or, as the Hatter was fond of saying when in dire need of tea, flattened by a herd of walruses chasing a runaway oyster. “I just—how did this happen?”

Because the jabberwock wasn’t a jabberwock anymore—he was a boy.

A human boy. One who looked around my age, with dark hair against pale skin that had just the faintest tinge of gray in it. That was the only evidence of his former form that I could see. I thought he would be tall when standing, and his hands were graceful, the fingers perhaps a tad overlong and flexible but in a way that was only vaguely reminiscent of clawed dragon feet, and only if you were thinking about it.

He was also, I couldn’t help noting, indescribably handsome. Impossibly handsome, particularly given what he’d been before. His black hair was wavy and fluffy as a cat’s, as well as mussed and woven with leaves from the forest floor, which only added to his perfection. His purple eyes, which had been more red than blue in his jabberwock form, had darkened to a rich plum and somehow reminded me of falling stars.

“Wonderful,” he muttered, looking away from me. He seemed uncomfortable beneath my scrutiny, and I tried not to stare, but it was very hard. “So you don’t even know how you did this to me.”

“Technically I do,” I said faintly. “The teacup made you less dangerous, but it’s never worked—er, quite like this before. Wait, what on earth are you wearing?”

His clothing was as strange and unexpected as the rest of him. I couldn’t quite describe it—the fabric was dark and diaphanous, like smoke, which would have cut an impressive picture if the garment hadn’t had the rough shape of a potato sack. The sleeves were long and bunchy, so long they trailed on the ground. He’d shoved his hands through holes that must have torn open when he fell.

“Were you wearing clothes before?” I said, trying to remember.

“Of course I was wearing clothes.” He wrinkled his brow at me. “You think jabberwocks wander around naked?”

“I—I suppose I never gave it much thought,” I said. “Well, those are clearly too big for you now. We’ll go to Peddler’s Path tomorrow and see if we can’t find someone who will sell you some clothes.”

He gave me an outraged look. “I’m not wearing human clothes.”