Unhinged (Splintered, #2)(49)
She opens her mouth to respond, but I plow ahead before she can.
“All this time you’ve been riding me about my clothes and my makeup … it wasn’t because I looked too wild or immodest. It was because I looked too much like a netherling. It reminded you of everything you lost. Right?”
She sniffles but doesn’t answer.
“You hammered into my head how you don’t want me to make the same mistakes as you … to fall in love too young and lose my shot at being an artist. I couldn’t understand why you didn’t try to start over again now that you’re out, to have the career you’ve always wanted. But it was never about your photography. Dad kept you from becoming queen. And now I have the crown. You must really resent us.”
“No, Allie …”
I’m deaf to her. I can’t hear past the lies. “How can you hold a grudge against someone as amazing as Dad? He was faithful for eleven years. He stayed true to you and waited for you to get well. All those nights he sat alone in the living room … pining for his wife … staring at those stupid daisies that hid all of your secrets. He deserved the truth, Mom.” Another sob escapes my throat. “We both did!”
Tears race down her face in the dim light.
She went to the asylum to protect me when I was a child—those memories threaten to soften my anger. But how can I truly know why she did what she did? Maybe she just didn’t want me to become queen instead of her, and that’s why she tried to sever my connection to Wonderland. Maybe it’s her in the mosaic. She’s the one in the shadows, watching and waiting to get her chance to steal the crown.
The blossoming mistrust smothers any last traces of compassion, and I hurl the cruelest insult I can think of. “I don’t know who you are anymore. But I do know one thing. You’re a bigger liar than Morpheus ever was.”
I can’t face Mom’s devastated expression, so I brush her aside, gather up my dress’s train, then make a beeline to the back hall.
She stays behind, her soft sobs ringing louder than any scream … louder than the train that almost crushed me earlier today. Maybe it would’ve been better if I had been crushed. That pain would’ve been instantaneous and then gone. It wouldn’t linger and eat away at me like what I’m feeling now.
Poor Dad. I can’t believe how dishonest she’s been with him—the man she vowed to love and stay with forever. And I’m becoming just like her, lying to the guy I love. Which is something I never wanted to do again …
Mom’s footsteps drag heavily across the living room; then the back door slams. Instead of coming after me, she went to her garden to commiserate with her chatty plants. It’s fitting. They know her better than I ever did.
I sag against the wall outside my bedroom, willing myself to stop trembling before I face Morpheus. Chest tight and eyes stinging, I peek through the door.
There are a few puddles around the aquarium’s base. The eels seem okay, gliding through bubbles as if nothing happened.
On my bed, Rabid White is wrapped in a bath towel. The only part of the bunny-size netherling that shows is his bald head: pink doelike eyes set within wrinkled, albino skin. Fuzzy white antlers rise behind his humanoid ears.
He’s so out of place here. He needs to go back. Problem is, with my cheval broken, I don’t have a mirror big enough to send him into London and through the rabbit hole. The netherling world once again has me under its thumb with all of its one-way tickets. The portals from the Red and White kingdoms only lead out of Wonderland. The rabbit hole only leads in. I just wish there was some way around the rules.
I also wish I could be as carefree as Morpheus.
He sits Indian style in front of Rabid in an oddly endearing scene, like one friend comforting another. He’s tucked a pair of earbuds into Rabid’s humanoid ears. The creature’s ancient face fills with wonder as he bobs in time with the music.
A wave of affection washes over me, for Rabid and Chessie, and all the netherlings in Wonderland—followed quickly by anger at Morpheus. He let me believe he used my mom’s mind to approach me so young because he was desperate to be free of his own curse. I made peace with that, empathized on some level. One of the things he and I have in common is our fear of being constricted or imprisoned in any way—mind, body, or spirit.
Now I suspect he wanted revenge on Mom for backing out of their deal. That’s something I can’t forgive.
Morpheus offers Rabid something shiny and silver to play with. It’s Jen’s thimble. She must’ve missed it in her hurry to pack and leave. Rabid tries to eat it, but Morpheus stops him.
“Warm it with your eyes,” he instructs.
Rabid sharpens his glowing irises until they radiate red heat. Under his concentration, the thimble turns a soft orange.
Morpheus places the tiny inverted cup on one of the four prongs of Rabid’s left antler. The orange glow seeps down his fuzzy horn and evaporates every drop of water in its path, as if the heat is traveling through him.
“Now, we only need seven more to warm and dry you,” Morpheus says, then laughs as Rabid clacks his bony hands together in applause.
I don’t know what to think, seeing my dark tormentor caring for one of his own—gentle and teasing. He’s like that with me sometimes, too.
I fight the tears building at the inner line of my lashes. I’m utterly alone and confused, but a queen doesn’t let her vulnerabilities show.