Free The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor Page B

rest assured.‖
    The knight gathered his bishops and their pawns. ―Spread out through the capital city,‖ he ordered. ―Find anyone willing to fight for White Imagination and tell them where we‘re camped.
    They must make their own, careful way to us. But be sure they‘re sincere in their wish to join our cause or you will give us away and we‘ll be doomed.‖
    Among the soldiers gathering in the forest sat one who wasn‘t a soldier at all—just an inconsolable boy, slumped against the base of a tree, crying in fits and jags and not caring if Redd herself heard him. The generals would have known better how to subdue a raging jabberwock than a mourning child.
    ―You should never have brought me here,‖ Dodge moaned. ―I shouldn‘t have left them.‖
    ―There was nothing you could do, son,‖ General Doppel said.
    ―You would have been killed,‖ said General Gänger.
    ―At least I would have died alongside my father! I could have protected Alyss!‖
    ―If Hatter couldn‘t—‖
    ―Then no one could have provided protection enough, I‘m afraid.‖
    Dodge wiped his nose.
    ―We are sorry,‖ generals Doppel and Gänger said as one.
    ―I‘ve lost my father and…and Alyss!‖
    The Generals lowered their heads, took a moment to speak.
    ―We have all lost Princess Alyss—‖
    ―And feel your suffering on that score.‖
    Dodge doubted it. They couldn‘t possibly know how he felt—the pain, the sudden wretched loneliness. They might have lost their princess, but Alyss was so much more than that to him.
    Would he never more see lively, sweet-smelling Alyss Heart? Never again confide to her his dreams of soldier-fame? What good were dreams now? And then his father…he could hardly take it all in. He would never see his father again. Where the two greatest loves of his life had been, he was faced with nothing, blankness.
    ―We are sorry,‖ the generals said again. But they had what remained of their army to comfort; they left him and strode among their soldiers, dispensing words of consolation to the wounded and commendations of bravery to all.
    Dodge didn‘t remember falling asleep, wasn‘t aware that he‘d even been sleeping until he woke the next morning with a sudden start, an idea blazing in his brain and the resolve to carry it through already firm. When the generals came upon him, he was ripping the fleur-de-lis badge off his guardsman coat, and they watched as he put his coat on inside out and rubbed handfuls of dirt over himself until it became virtually impossible to tell that he wore a guardsman‘s uniform.
    ―What are you up to?‖ General Doppel asked.
    ―If it‘s too late to do anything for Alyss, there‘s at least something I can still do for my father.‖
    The generals exchanged a worried glance.
    ―I‘m going to get his body,‖ Dodge said. ―The leader of the palace guard deserves a burial proper to his station and I‘m going to give it to him.‖
    ―You can‘t go back there,‖ General Gänger said.
    ―Why not?‖
    ―Well,‖ said General Doppel, ―who‘s to say that Sir Justice‘s body is even still there, and—‖
    ―And Redd‘s soldiers are everywhere,‖ General Gänger finished. ―You‘ll never make it.‖
    ―I‘m going.‖
    ―But we forbid it!‖
    Dodge Anders had always shown respect for chains of command, for the discipline required of military men, but he suddenly barked, ―Who are you to forbid it? Do you have Anders blood in your veins?‖
    ―I‘ll go with him if it‘ll make you feel better, Generals.‖
    The white rook. Dodge felt his heart thumping in his throat. He was breathing short and fast. The chessman came and stood next to him. It was all right. Dodge didn‘t know the rook well, but it was all right. It would be good to have company.
    The generals shook their heads, couldn‘t help being impressed by the boy‘s character despite the foolishness of the proposed errand. In silent agreement, they removed the exact same crystal and