Quite Contrary (4 page)

“Will he follow me?” I asked, trying to keep the resentment out of my voice. I wasn’t going to let a rat be a better friend than me. The rat was scoring pretty low right now, but I’d been scoring lower.

“Yes,” Rat-In-Boots answered. It was immediate. No doubt in his voice, and plenty of fear. “It might be a while, but the story has started. It has to find its end, and that means he will find you.”

“He won’t find me soon. I’m going to get good and lost,” I grumped.

“You’re heading in the right direction for that, Miss,” Rat-In-Boots promised.

certainly wasn’t meant to go this way. This forest became a thick, choking jumble a few steps off the path. The trees crowded close enough that their branches tangled overhead, and between the trunks lurked dry, withered bushes. It was a world of dead leaves and stiff, scratchy twigs.

I forced my way through it anyway. I missed my shoes and stockings, but four layers of skirts were armor down to my knees. I was heading in a direction the Wolf hadn’t thought of, so scratched shins? Completely worth it.

But what was this direction?

“You’re my guide. Where are we going?” I asked my rat.

“That’s a dangerous question to ask, and there’s no answer,” he squeaked from my shoulder.

“You take this being lost thing seriously, Rat,” I accused.

“There are ways to get around,” he admitted reluctantly, “Gates, signs that you can go from one place to another. I knew a way into fairy tales when I saw one. I was born here.”

“I’m really stuck in fairy tales now? A bunch of dwarves are gathered around a glass casket over the next hill?” I prodded.

“Not that one. Maybe. I don’t think so. The Red Riding Hood story is alive, but Snow White has already been told.” He kept rearing up and casting his nose around, staring into the darkness and sniffing the faint night breeze. Was he trying to avoid looking at me? He gave in quickly and confessed, “I took us here automatically. I didn’t think about it. Fairy tales are deep, but we’re easy to get to, and I know how it all works here.”

Ah, I got it. He blamed himself. He might be right. Eh. I’d gotten locked in a crawlspace by myself. But it meant a lot to him, because his voice was full of high pitched awe as he went on, “I didn’t think you’d get out of that alive, Miss Mary. I’ve seen people get lost before. They need someone to take care of them, or a Wolf gets them. You played him like you were just waiting for a story of your own. You didn’t break down at all. You’re amazing.”

Oh, hell. He had to come out and say it. He had to call me brave.

I stopped. The tree next to me stood especially tall, and had a little space around it not completely filled with bushes. “If I’m going to keep doing this, I’ll need food, Rat. You can do that for me, right?”

“Here?” he asked in surprise, “I think so. There will be something.”

“Now, Rat,” I ordered him, my voice as hard as I could force it.

“I’m sorry, Miss Mary. I didn’t think,” he apologized as he slid down my dress. “I’ll find you food and be back in a blink.” He hit the ground and scrambled off into the darkness.

The world spun as the dizziness hit. I was so fucked. I couldn’t see any way out of this. I was lost, and not in the pretty way, Rat-In-Boots meant it. There was no way home, no way back to anything I even recognized. I hadn’t had much, but I’d lost it all now. And what had I gotten? A rat and a wolf. Not even a wolf, a monster psychopath of hair, muscle, and teeth. All those pretty words meant ‘I’m going to enjoy killing you’, and the rat said it would happen, guaranteed.
Mary Guisse Stuart, you are so stupid. If someone pointed a gun at your head, you’d stick it up your nose and dare them to pull the trigger.
I was going to die.

I heard my breathing rasp, and forced myself not to snuffle and whimper. I couldn’t stop the tears that burned the edges of my eyes and rolled down my cheeks, but I could put my hands over my face to hide them.

My body was going numb. I fell back until my shoulder hit the big tree, and slid down to sit on one of its roots. I didn’t want to feel anything.
Stop thinking, Mary. Just let yourself be afraid and it’ll be over sooner.

Eventually, I swear the tree started talking. In the voice of a sleepy old woman it told me, “Once upon a time, a boy sat next to me, right where you are. He cried, like you’re crying. Every tree has one wish, and I gave mine to him. He wished for boots that would take him far, far away. I granted that wish. He’s gone, and so is my wish, but I can give you his old shoes. He buried them right next to you.”

I rubbed my nose, looking like an idiot I’m sure, and peered up suspiciously at the old tree. It stood there, like trees are supposed to stand there. “Shoes? You’re giving me shoes,” I snarked. What do you say to something like that? Then I remembered I must look like a mess, and rubbed my face on the inside of my cape. It would make a smeary mess out of my Halloween makeup, but I wouldn’t look like I was crying when Rat-In-Boots got back.

Rat-In-Boots got back. The tree hadn’t said anything. He came back dragging a bag, and inside the bag was a ham. Seriously, a ham. A cooked ham. “Where did you get this?” I asked him. I bit in sharply. A honey glazed baked ham.

“A traveler in the woods hung it up from a branch to protect it from bears. He should have hung himself up the same way,” Rat-In-Boots explained. Solemn, but no big deal. That must happen all the time in fairy tales.

You know, like wolves swearing to kill you.

Or trees offering you shoes.

I put the ham down. My stomach was too twisted up from crying, but I could distract Rat from noticing that. “If a tree offers me a pair of shoes and then shuts up again, do I trust it?” I asked.

“Yes!” he squeaked immediately, “It means you’re a heroine, not a victim. Magic is drawn to you. Where are these shoes?”

“Buried right here, I guess,” I answered him, standing up and prodding the ground with my toe. “They’re not magic. They’re just ordinary shoes. She gave the magic shoes to someone else.”

“That’s still how it’s supposed to work. Can I have the shoes, Miss Mary?” He pounced on the spot as eagerly as he’d pounced on the idea of me attracting magic. Little pink hands flung away dirt with impressive speed.

Still. “Not likely,” I corrected him. “If they fit, I think I’m a little more in need than you are.” I lifted one foot and wiggled my toes. The tiny white socks that had come with the Red Riding Hood costume were covered in dirt and ragged already.

The boots peeked out, and I crouched down and helped yank them free. Wow. Just wow. I’d just scored a pair of massive leather clodhoppers, worn and ugly but as tough as iron and an inch thick on the soles. And they actually looked the right size.

“Yes, of course. I’m sorry,” babbled Rat in a rush. He didn’t look at all surprised as I slid my feet into both shoes and found they fit perfectly, as snug as gloves. What were the odds?

In a fairy tale? Pretty high.

I laced the shoes up tight, and despite the bleakness of it all, I started to grin. Just a tiny bit, but the crying had left me washed out, and washed out pleasure was as easy to feel as washed out despair.

“These are shoes,” I conceded, lifting a foot. It was like wearing a brick, the boot was so heavy. “Thanks, tree. I think I’m in love with these shoes.”

The tree didn’t answer, but these leather battering rams on my feet were all the magic I could ask for.

I’d recovered enough to take charge of my life again. Yeah, right. Well, I could get moving.

“We’re still in fairy tale land?” I asked Rat-Not-In-These-Awesomely-Ugly-Boots.

“We’re in the woods, Miss,” he explained, “THE woods. The ancient, the original. When you step under the trees and you don’t know the name of the forest or how big it is or where you’re going, that’s where we are now. The woods used to surround Man on all sides. Now, they’re hard to find. This is the breeding ground of fairy tales.”

Great. My rat had a streak of poetry. Maybe we don’t get the rat we deserve after all. “My question is, where else can we go? Zombie horror might be worse than wolves, but I’ve got to have more options.”

He stood on a tree root and scratched behind his head. Crap, he was adorable. Why do other people not like rats? “In theory, everywhere, Miss Mary. Every kind of story or land of magic a little girl could wander off the path and end up in is available, if we can find it. That’s the difficult part. This is the part of the world outside of maps. If there’s somewhere you want to go, I could look for entrances.”

“I want to go somewhere that talking serial killer wolves aren’t welcome.”

Okay, he didn’t want to answer that. He looked off into the trees instead of at me, and he paused before answering. “I could take you home, or try to. Where you’re from, wolves aren’t allowed to talk. That’s the only place you’d be absolutely safe.”

“I’m not going back home.” He’d better not argue.

He didn’t. “Then if we keep moving, we’ll find somewhere,” he went on awkwardly. “It’s easy to get from fairy tales to lands where children are welcome and something as evil as the Wolf—”

“They don’t want me in Oz either, Rat,” I told him.

“It’s a darker place than you think, Miss Mary,” he answered sheepishly.

“It’s not fucking dark enough to want someone like me,” I growled, anger stirring bitterly inside me again. “I’m not the kind of girl who gets to visit Wonderland.”

He winced at the word ‘fucking’, and in a very carefully calm voice asked, “Miss Mary, could you please not swear? That kind of language can get you killed here.”

Bile churned inside me, hot fury that made me yell, “Who the fuck are you, my fucking mother? I’ll goddamn fucking talk however I want! I just told you I’m not some bullshit brain dead retard girl who skips when she walks and never fucking talks back, and I’m not going to fucking pretend that I fucking am!”

He shrank as I yelled, his loaf-shaped body becoming less long and more round, but his voice stayed the same, calm but also emphatic as he asked, “Please?”

That little bastard. My fists clenched. My shoulders and chest got so tight I felt like I’d rip apart from how much I wanted to hit him, or scream at him, or stomp away. “I don’t like to be led by the nose, Rat. You get one ‘please.’ Just one. You know that? You just wasted it asking me to watch my language. Is that what you want?” I had to force the words out, and I heard my voice rasp.

His tiny dark eyes stayed straight on mine. He meant this. He really meant it. “It’s worth it, Miss Mary, if it makes you safer. You don’t mind if you look like a bad little girl, but the people who do will kill you the moment they hear a word like that out of your mouth. Worse, they won’t chase you or make a story out of it. They’ll just kill you out of hand.”

“G—” I started, then ground my teeth and rephrased what I’d been about to say. “Don’t try this again,” I hissed at him.

“Thank you,” he replied. His voice sounded as quiet and humble as mine sounded strained, and if he wasn’t honestly thankful, I couldn’t tell.

F- RRRRG.
Don’t choke on this, Mary.

“We’re leaving, Rat. That Wolf was too smart not to figure out I’m not coming. We’re getting away from here. I know this much, the Wolf rules the woods. Absolutely anywhere we go is better than here, so we’re going.” I’d already started moving as I barked all of this. I had pretty long legs for my age. I let them swing, walking as fast as I could and making him scurry to catch up. I had one tiny comfort, at least. These shoes were just awesome. They crushed thorn bushes like origami, and I couldn’t feel a single sharp rock or jagged twig. Under these lead soles, the earth was stamped flat. It was great.