“Rumors…” She searched her memory. “You mean, about Mr. Caterpillar moving to a smaller storefront?”
Cheshire’s head spun upside down. “How slow you are tonight. I was speaking of the rumors surrounding the new court joker.”
She perked up. “No. I haven’t heard anything about him.”
“Neither have I.”
She furrowed her brow. “Cheshire, that is the opposite of a rumor.”
“Contrariwise. I haven’t the faintest idea who he is or where he came from. It’s all very odd.” Cheshire licked his paw and cleaned behind his ear, which struck Catherine as impolite, being so close to the table. “They say he walked right up to the palace gates three days past, already dressed in fool’s motley, and asked for an audience with the King. He performed a magic trick or two—something about shuffling the Diamond courtiers and asking His Majesty to pick one card out of the set … I couldn’t follow the details. In the end, he was given the job.”
Catherine pictured the Joker lounging on that suspended silver hoop, almost as if he expected the King’s guests to entertain him, not the other way around. He had been so poised. Though she hadn’t questioned it before, Cheshire’s curiosity piqued hers. Hearts was a small kingdom. Where had he come from?
“Have you heard the other rumors?” continued Cheshire.
“I’m not sure. What other rumors?”
Cheshire rolled onto his stomach and cupped his face in his furry paws. “His Congenial Kingness has chosen a bride.”
Her eyes widened. “No! Who is it?” She glanced around the room. Certainly not Margaret. Perhaps Lady Adela from Lingerfoote or Lady Willow from Lister Hill or—
Or …
Her breath hiccupped.
A wash of goose bumps spread down her limbs.
Her mother’s enthusiasm.
The first quadrille.
The King’s flustered grin.
She whipped her head back toward Cheshire. His enormous grin struck her as extra mocking.
“You can’t mean it.”
“Can’t I?” He peered up at the chandeliers. “I thought for sure I was capable of that, at the least.”
“Cheshire, this isn’t amusing. The King can’t—he wouldn’t—”
A trumpet blared, echoing off the pink quartz walls.
Catherine’s head spun. “Oh no.”
“Oh yes.”
“Cheshire! Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Ladies and gentlemen,” cried the White Rabbit, his pitchy voice insignificant after the horn. “His Royal Majesty has prepared a special announcement for this evening.”
“Shall I congratulate you now?” Cheshire asked. “Or do you suppose premature well-wishes could bring bad luck? I can never recall the proper etiquette in these situations.”
A curtain of heat embraced her, from brow to toes. She could have sworn someone was pulling on the staylace of her corset as her breaths grew shorter.
“I can’t. Oh, Cheshire, I can’t.”
“You may want to practice a different response before you go up there.”
The crowd applauded. The King stepped onto the stage at the far end of the ballroom. Catherine cast her eyes around, searching for her parents, and when she found her mother beaming and brushing a tear from her lashes, the reality settled around her.
The King of Hearts was about to propose to her.
But—but he couldn’t. He’d never done anything more than compliment her baking and ask her to dance. They hadn’t courted … but, did kings have to court? She didn’t know. She knew only that her stomach had tied itself into triple knots and the idea of marrying him was preposterous. She had never once considered that the silly man could want anything from her but sweets and pastries. Certainly not a bride, and … oh heavens, children.
A bead of sweat dripped down the back of her neck.
“Cheshire, what do I do?”
“Say yes, I suppose. Or say no. It matters not to me. Are you sure orange is my color?” He was inspecting his tail again.
Desperation clawed at Catherine’s throat.
The King. The simpleminded, ridiculous, happy, happy King.
Her husband? Her one and only? Her partner through life’s trials and joys?
She would be queen, and queens … queens did not open bakeries with their best friends. Queens did not gossip with half-invisible cats. Queens did not have dreams of yellow-eyed boys and wake up with lemon trees over their beds.
She tried to swallow, but her mouth had dried up like stale cake.
The King cleared his throat. “Fair evening, loyal subjects! I hope you have all enjoyed tonight’s delights!”
More applause, at which the King clasped his own hands together and bobbed up and down a few times.
“I wish to make an announcement. A good announcement, nothing to be worried about.” He giggled at what might have been a joke. “It has come time for me to choose for myself a wife, and for my subjects … a most adored Queen of Hearts! And”—the King kept giggling—“with any luck, bring our kingdom an heir, as well.”
Catherine stepped back from the feasting table. She couldn’t feel her toes.
“Cheshire…?”
“Lady Catherine?”
“It is my honor,” continued the King, “to call up the lady I have chosen for my life’s companion.”
“Please,” said Catherine, “cause a distraction. Anything!”
Cheshire’s tail twitched, and he vanished. Only his voice lingered, murmuring, “With pleasure, Lady Catherine.”
The King spread his arms. “Would the ever lovely, delightful, and stupendous Lady Cathe—”
“Aaaagghh!”
As one, the crowd turned. Margaret Mearle kept screaming, swatting at the orange-striped cat who had appeared on top of her head, curled up beneath her fur headdress.
Catherine alone turned the other way.
She fled out to the balcony, running as fast as her heeled boots and strangling corset would allow. The cool night air sent a chill racing across her enflamed skin, but every breath remained a struggle.
She lifted her skirts and slipped down the steps into the rose gardens. She heard a splinter of glass and startled cries behind her and wondered what chaos Cheshire must be causing now, but she dared not look back, not even as she reached the gardens.
The world tilted. She paused at a wrought-iron gate, gripping one of the decorative finials for support. Catching her breath, she stumbled on. Down the clover-filled path between rose arbors and trickling fountains, passing topiaries and statues and a pond of water lilies. She reached for the back of her dress, desperate to loosen the stays. To breathe. But she couldn’t reach. She was suffocating.
She was going to be sick.
She was going to faint.
A shadow reared up in front of her, backlit from the blazing castle lights so that the silhouette stretched over the croquet lawns. Catherine cried out and stumbled to a halt, damp hair matted to her neck.
The shadow of a hooded man engulfed her. As Catherine stared, the silhouette lifted an enormous ax, the curved blade arching across the grass.
Trembling, Catherine spun around. A dark shape dropped toward her out of the sky. She screamed and threw her arms up in defense.
The raven cawed, so close she could feel his wing beats as he flew past.
“Are you all right?”
She gasped and withdrew her arms. Her heart was thundering as she peered up into the boughs of a white rose tree.
It took a moment to find him in the dark. The Joker was lounging on a low-hanging branch, a silver flute in his hands, though if he’d been playing it before, she’d been too distracted to notice.
Her lashes fluttered. Half of her hair had fallen from its chignon and draped over her shoulder. Her skin was burning hot. The world was spinning wildly—swirling with lemon tarts and invisible cats and curved axes and …
The Joker tensed, his brow creasing. “My lady?”
&nb
sp; The world tilted severely and turned black.
CHAPTER 7
“LADY HATH STUMBLED on this midnight dreary, with a pallor frightfully pale and weary.” A somber, melodic voice floated through the encompassing darkness.
“Duly noted, my feathered friend,” came a second voice, lighter and quick. “Are you sure we haven’t some sal-volatile in there?”
“I know nothing of your hoped-for salt, though with your plan I find a fault. To keep her from awaking groggy, ’twould be most prudent to make her soggy.”
Something hard thumped on the ground by Cath’s elbow, followed by a quiet slosh of water.
“No, Raven, we are not throwing a bucket of water on her. Keep looking. Haven’t we a ham sandwich? Or some hay? That always worked on the King.”
Rustling, fumbling, clanks and clatters.
A sigh. “You know what? Never mind. We’ll use this.”
The rustle of foliage followed by the snap of a branch. Something soft tickled the tip of Cath’s nose.
She squirmed, turning her head away, and caught the faint perfume of roses.
“Aha, it’s working.”
She wrinkled her nose. Her eyelids squinted open. Darkness and shadows swirled in her vision. Her head felt heavy, her thoughts disoriented.
“Hello,” spoke one of the bleary shadows, sharpening into the court joker. He lifted the soft-petaled rose away from her face. “Are you all right?”
“Nevermore,” said his Raven, who was perched on the edge of a metal bucket.
The Joker cut him a glare. “Don’t be rude.”
“’Tisn’t rude to rebuke an arbitrary greeting, a nonsense question upon first meeting. To be all right implies an impossible phase. We hope for mostly right on the best of our days.”
“Exactly,” said the Joker. “Rude.”
The Raven made an unhappy noise. Spreading his massive wings, he leaped up into the air and settled on a high branch of the rose tree instead.
The Joker returned his attention to Catherine. He had removed the three-pointed hat and his wavy black hair was matted to his head in places and sticking out in others. The light from a nearby garden torch flickered gold in his eyes, still thickly rimmed in kohl. He smiled at her, and it was the friendly sort of smile that reached to every corner of his face, drawing dimples into his cheeks, crinkling the corners of his eyes. Cath’s heart tumbled. During his performance, she had been hypnotized by his magic, amused by his tomfoolery—but she had not realized that he was also quite handsome.
“I’m glad the rose worked,” he said, twirling it in his fingers. “I suspect this would be a different sort of meeting had we been forced to use the water bucket.”
She blinked, unable to smile back as the shadows shifted across his face. It wasn’t just the firelight. His eyes really were the color of gold. The color of sunflowers and butterscotch and lemons hanging heavy on their boughs.
Her own eyes widened. “You.”
“Me,” he agreed. He cocked his head to the side, frowning again. “In all seriousness, my lady, are you…” A hesitation. “… mostly right?”
She felt it again, that internal tug she’d had during the dream, telling her that he had something that belonged to her, and she had to catch him if she were ever to get it back.
“My lady?” Setting the rose aside, he touched the back of his hand to her brow. “Can you hear me? You’re very warm.”
The world spun again, but this time in a delicious, time-stopping way.
“Perhaps I should call for a Sturgeon…”
“No, I’m fine. I’m all right.” Her words were sticky and her fingers fumbling, but she managed to grasp his hand before he pulled away. He froze, dubious. “Though I can’t feel my legs,” she confessed.
His lips twisted to one side. “Mostly right, after all. Let’s not tell Raven he was correct, or he’ll be insufferable the rest of the night.” He glanced down. “I can almost guarantee that your legs are still attached, though there is an awful lot of fabric disguising them. I’ll go searching for them now if you’d like me to.”
His expression was innocent, his tone sincere.
Catherine laughed. “That’s quite generous, but I’ll go searching for them myself, thank you. Can you help me sit?”
Still holding her hand, the Joker scooped his free arm beneath her shoulders and lifted her upward. She spotted his hat lying upside down not far away, and scattered around it an odd assortment of junk. Glass marbles, a wind-up monkey, handkerchiefs, an empty inkwell, mismatched buttons, a two-wheeled velocipede, the silver flute.
With a quick pat, Cath confirmed that her legs were indeed still present. Her toes began to tingle.
“Your hands are like icicles.” The Joker draped her fingers across his palm and started to massage them—working from her knuckles, across the pad of her thumb, along her wrist. “You’ll feel better when your blood is flowing again.”
Cath inspected the Joker, his messy curls, the point of his nose. He was sitting cross-legged on the grass, hunkered over her hand. His touch was shockingly intimate compared to the touches she was used to—those brief, civilized encounters during a waltz or quadrille.
“Are you a doctor?” she asked.
He looked up at her and smiled that disarming smile again. “I’m a joker, my lady, which is even better.”
“How is that better than a doctor?”
“Haven’t you ever heard that laughter is the best medicine?”
She shook her head. “If that’s so, shouldn’t you be telling me a joke?”
“As the lady pleases. How did the joker warm up some hands?”
She shut one eye and considered, but was quick to give up. “I don’t know. How?”
“By being a warm, handsome joker, indeed.”
Her laugh was unexpected, punctuated by the unladylike snort that Mary Ann often teased her about. She tore her hand away from him to cover her nose, embarrassed.
The Joker’s entire face lit up. “Can it be! A real-life lady with a laugh like that! I believed you were naught but mythological creatures. Please, do it again.”
“I will not!” she squealed, her face reddening. “Stop it. The joke wasn’t even funny, and now I’m all poked up.”
He schooled his face, though his eyes still danced. “I meant no offense. A laugh like that is richer than gold to a man of my position. I’ll make it my life’s work to hear the sound again. Every day, if it pleases you. No—twice a day, and at least once before breakfast. A royal joker must set the highest of expectations.”
Her pulse skittered. Twice a day? Once before breakfast?
A new sort of blush blossomed across her cheeks.
Noticing the look, the Joker released her hand, almost sheepish. “That is … you are the one, aren’t you?”
She stared at him, and in his eyes she saw the lemon tree that had grown in her bedroom overnight, its branches twisted around her bed’s canopy, heavy with sun-ripened fruit. “The one?”
“The future Queen of Hearts?”
The giddy euphoria left her in a single, painful breath. “I beg your pardon?”
“Oh, you needn’t beg.” Doubt crept across his brow. “Shall I apologize? I didn’t mean to be forward. It’s just that the King intended to ask for a lady’s hand in marriage during tonight’s ball, and … with your gown, I suppose I’d assumed…”
She looked down. Her skirt was a bright red nightmare engulfing her. “Did he say which girl he intended to ask?”
“No, my lady. I only know it was to be a daughter of a lord, though that hardly narrows down the list.” He leaned back on his hands. “What were you running from before?”
“Running from?” She forced a withering smile. “I was only wanting some fresh air. The ballroom can get so warm on nights like this.”
His eyes pinned her to the grass, growing concerned. “The King hadn’t yet made his announcement when you left?”
“I’ve heard nothing of it.”
&nbs
p; She shivered, not quite guilty at the lie. What was happening inside the ballroom? Had the King called her up? Were they looking for her?
She glanced back toward the castle, surprised to see how far she’d run. The gardens seemed to stretch for miles and the ballroom windows glowed in the distance. She wondered about the crash she had heard and hoped Cheshire wasn’t in trouble.
The Joker rubbed the back of his neck. “Maybe it is you, then. Perhaps I should escort you back…”
“No! No. Um.” She laughed uncomfortably. “I’m sure he meant to ask someone else. His Majesty has never shown me any particular interest.”
“I find that difficult to imagine.”
“It’s the truth.” She cleared her throat. “This might be a peculiar question, Mr.… er, Joker…”
“Jest. My name is Jest. My lady.”
“Ah—I’m Catherine Pinkerton.”
“It’s been a rightmost pleasure, Lady Pinkerton. What was your question?”
Cath fluffed the voluminous red fabric around her legs to give her fingers something to do while they went on feeling tingly and wanton. “Have you and I met before?”
“Before tonight?” He cupped his chin in his hand. “It seems unlikely.”
“I thought so as well.”
“Do I seem familiar?” His dimples made an appearance again.
“In a way. Most peculiarly, I do believe I dreamed about you.”
His eyebrows lifted. “About me?”
“It is strange, isn’t it?”
“Quite.” The word was subtle, surprised. He looked briefly unnerved, like when he had first spotted her and her red dress amid the sea of black and white. The self-assured visage slipped, just momentarily. “Perhaps we know each other in the future and you’re only remembering backward.”
She pondered this.
“So?” he prodded.
She blinked. “So what?”
“Was it a good dream?”
“Oh.” Her lips puckered in thought, but then she realized he was teasing her. She scowled. “To be frank, I found it rather dull.”
“Ah, but you can’t be Frank. You’ve already told me that your name is Catherine.”
“I’ve changed it.”
His laugh was unoffended. “At least the memory of this dream has brought some color back to your cheeks. You were white as a dove when you fainted. I’m sorry if Raven frightened you.”