My eyelids drooped but I tried my hardest to fight it. In between my slow blinking, I saw them, flowers rocking back and forth. Daffodils, roses, tiger lilies. They were all singing, they were the ones trying to make us fall asleep. Why we didn’t just bypass them, I didn’t know. Maybe there was no way around them, I didn’t know. My mind couldn’t think in a straight line, but I knew I had to try my best to stay alert, just in case.
The sound slowly died away as we moved further and further into the forest. My strength started to come back to me at last, and I felt strong enough to be able to walk. None of the others seemed to be phased by the flowers, which made me feel a bit weak in contrast. I wasn’t used to this place, though, it wasn’t like there was anything in the real world that I could have any practice with. I slapped Kenny on the side of the shoulder to let him know I was awake and ready to be let down. He set me down on the ground.
“What they hell was that?” I asked as I stretched. Energy was slowly coming back and it felt great.
“The Garden of Live Flowers,” Malcolm answered.
“Which means what?”
“Which means,” Chase said. “That they are living beings that feed off anything that they find. They get their victims to lay on the ground and fall asleep, then they wrap their roots around you and suck the life out of your body. Your blood becomes their juice and everything else their food in a sense. Most of them have been destroyed in Wonderland, except in the Dark Forest. No one wants to deal with the things here so most people try and avoid the area. They must have been real hungry because they weren’t trying to hide the fact that they were there.”
They sounded grotesque. I couldn’t imagine a plant doing such things. They were supposed to be such lovely things, not creatures that killed for food. Well, except for the Venus flytrap, but that was different. Well, it wasn’t, it was just like that but at a bigger scale.
“Why didn’t we just go around them?”
“Because there isn’t a way around them. They are essentially the wall that keeps people out of the Dark Forest. They are just the beginning of all the horrible things this forest contains. They don’t let anything in, but neither do they let anything out,” Malcolm explained. “That is, unless you are used to their lullaby.”
I didn’t want to think of what worse things there could be in this forest. The more we strode further into the forest, the more I wondered if the Circus was indeed safer.
“So does that mean you all are used to the song? How is that?” I asked.
No one answered, but each of them glanced at Malcolm. Bill was the only who smiled. “Simple for me, really, I used to listen to their song for fun when I was exiled out here, hoping for a good night’s sleep. Even uprooted one and planted it in my room, didn’t I Malcolm? Those were the good ol’ days when we didn’t have to worry about any rules or nothin’. But I guess it’s better this way, having a sane mind and all.”
“You are everything but sane, Knave,” Chase commented. “And the Mad Hatter here has never lost his name.”
Malcolm shot Chase a look and before they began their never-ending argument, I decided to intervene. “How do we know Bill won’t follow us?”
“Because, this place is too dangerous, even for him,” Melvin explained.
“But what about the portal? Why didn’t they just use that?”
“It would have been very tricky for him to open a portal in midair where if he messed up, he would crash into the ocean below,” Malcolm explained. “We actually planned it out, instead of just going on a whim and getting captured.” Malcolm eyed Chase. I had forgotten, Chase was the one who grabbed me and put me up in the tree where Bill had found me. I didn’t blame Chase, there was no way Bill should have been able to find the right portal, yet somehow he did.
“It wasn’t my fault,” Chase argued.
Malcolm stopped and turned around to face Chase. “What do you mean it wasn’t your fault? We had a plan and you didn’t stick to it!”
“If we stuck to the plan, we would have all been dead and Alice would have still been captured!” Chase retaliated.
Malcolm jabbed at Chase’s collarbone. “If you didn’t bring Alice to the Circus in the first place, we wouldn’t have needed a plan! Because of you and your big mouth, Howard is dead!”
Kenny held out his hand. “Malcolm, calm down. It isn’t that bad. Just calm down.”
“I would be calm if this cat didn’t always screw things up for us.”
Chase frowned and the two boys glared at each other for a moment.
Chase shook his head and turned away from Malcolm. “Fine, I can tell that I’m not wanted. You don’t need me anyway, this is your turf, not mine, Mad Hatter.”
He turned and started into the forest, running away from the group. I watched in horror, as he would be all alone in the Dark Forest, a place where horrors simply awaited us all. I knew Chase was mad, but it was an idiotic reason to split from the group.
I glanced to Malcolm. “You can’t let him just run off like that.”
“I can’t?” he sarcastically replied.
I shook my head. “No, because friends don’t leave other friends behind.” I started after him.
“No, Alice, wait!” Malcolm called after but it was too late. I was already out of sight from them,
