Free Red Queen by Christina Henry Page B

to sleep while perched on the branch and now she would pay for it. She could still hear the screaming from her dream, an echo that followed her into wakefulness.
    The wind whistled in her ears. Her back arced toward the ground as her limbs curved upward, grasping for the sky. She had only a moment to brace herself for the hard crash of ground beneath her, for the blossoming of pain as her bones shattered.
    But that did not happen. Instead she hit something leathery and tough and very,
very
smelly, like a sulfurous swamp. She had a glimpse of an enormous face—bulbous green eyes, hairy nostrils under a giant potato nose—and then everything went darkas fingers closed over her and a rumbling voice shouted in triumph, “Got you!”
    Her body was breaking now, though not the way she’d expected it to when she was falling. The creature’s grip was crushing her, but more than that she couldn’t breathe. The hideous stink of its skin was overwhelming. She was choking, gagging, and in a moment the hand that held her would snap her ribs and the splintered pieces would pierce her heart and she would be dead.
    Hatcher.
    It was a thought or a wish or possibly a cry, and she was certain it would be her last.
    Then she was able to breathe again, the unbearable pressure gone, but it was hardly reassuring as the monster had opened its hand, grasped her by the ankle, and lifted her to its eye level. Her pack knocked against the back of her head as all the blood rushed from the bottom of her body to the top.
    The giant’s eyes narrowed slightly as it observed her. “Well, you are hardly more than a mouthful,” he said. “But you’ll do until I can find your friend.”
    The creature’s maw opened, revealing cracked yellow teeth and a large grey tongue. An astonishingly foul odor emitted from its throat, like the inside of the creature’s body was populated with dead things.
    This is the last thing I will see in this life,
Alice thought, and reflected that death by Jabberwocky would have at least been less disgusting than this.
    The bottle with that monster (
butterfly
) was still in her pack,so at least it would also be digested and Alice could go to her death with a clear heart. She closed her eyes, not wanting to see the inside of the monster’s throat as she slid down, not wanting to know anything else. She hoped it would be quick. She hoped it wouldn’t hurt.
    Then, yet again, something unexpected happened, as it always seemed to do to Alice.
    As the giant released her and she fell toward its wet grey mouth, she was snatched from her fall by another enormous hand.
    â€œCod, no!” shouted the second giant, who held Alice by her ankle and shook his hand as he spoke. “You know the rules. You know her law. They’ve done no harm and we are to do no harm in return.”
    The giant’s gesticulating made Alice feel that all her organs would soon shake loose and fall out of her mouth, and then where would she be?
    Dead,
she thought sourly, whether by the will of one giant or the accident of another.
    â€œI’m huuuungry, Pen,” whined the first giant, whom the second giant had called “Cod.” He sounded exactly like a child begging for a lemon ice at the zoo. “It’s been ever so long since we’ve had any human flesh. Not since
he
started burning everything out of spite. That one and her friend were the only two to pass through in ages. No one wants to cross the plains anymore.”
    â€œNo one left to cross the plains anymore,” said the second fellow, who appeared to be called “Pen.”
    What curious names these giants have,
Alice thought. It was something to think about besides the fact that she was upside down and rocking to and fro with every motion of Pen’s hand.
    â€œBut that don’t give you the right to break her laws. She said she’d punish us and you know right well she can and will,” Pen