Welcome to Wonderland

Prologue

    The trees were tall and sturdy, barely moving an inch when the strong winds blew. The grass, however, swayed violently in the breeze, whipping about beneath the moonlight. Two young girls and a tall woman huddled by the castle to keep warm, sitting in the Western Courtyard of the castle in the kingdom of Kirana.

    “Amara, can't we go inside?” one of the young girls whined, tugging on the woman's sleeve.

    “Not now, Summer. Not now,” the woman whispered. “We have to wait for your parents to invite us in, remember? Just because you are the princess does not mean you get to do whatever you want.”

    “But Mama and Papa are in a meeting right now, and it's so cold outside!” the young girl complained. Her sister stared at the moon, feeling that underneath such a beautiful silver disc, nothing could possibly go wrong.

    “Amara, let us inside,” the younger sister continued, now tugging on her caretaker's skirt. Amara looked down at her and smiled.

    “I already told you, we cannot.” She joined the older sibling in staring at the moon. Summer muttered to herself and took her seat.

    “The moon is really beautiful,” the older sibling muttered.

    “It is,” Amara agreed. “Don't you think, Summer?”

    Summer looked away, into the Eastern Courtyard, purely to avoid answering the question (she was mad at Amara right now, after all). But it was while she stared into the Eastern Courtyard that she saw him; a man dressed in a large cloak and a dark mask, holding what seemed to be a gun of some kind. Curious, Summer placed her hand on her sister's shoulder.

    “Alice, look.”

    Her sister blinked and looked over at her. Summer pointed into the courtyard.

    “Who's that guy?” she asked, glancing up at Amara. “Amara, Alice, look.”

    Amara and Alice looked out into the Eastern Courtyard. They watched, as the mysterious man shot something out of his gun that exploded on contact with the castle, setting the whole east wing of Kirana Castle ablaze. Summer and Amara screamed. Alice gasped.

    And then, as quickly as he'd come, the mysterious man vanished. Summer started to cry. Alice stared at the flaming hallway worriedly.

    “What on earth just happened...?!” Amara cried.

    “Our parents are in that wing!” Summer sobbed, burying her face in Alice's shoulder. Alice stared blankly at the dancing inferno.

    “It's not spreading,” she noted.

    Amara nodded slowly and knelt down, pulling both the children against her and backing into the northwestern-most corner in the Western Courtyard, huddling against the bleak grey stone of the walls and the castle entrance. “Stay here with me until someone is alerted and puts out the fire. If it spreads, we'll flee the courtyard. For now, we are safe.”

    Alice nodded and took Summer's hand. The three huddled together for at least two hours until a group of knights finally charged over to the raging fire (which, amazingly, still hadn't spread, and had also, miraculously, managed to set stone ablaze) and dumped buckets of water on it until it had been successfully put out. The knights went into the Western Courtyard to check with Amara and the two princesses. Amara assured the men that everyone was safe, then slowly rose with the children. The knights waited with them outside until a messenger came and informed them that the king and queen had invited them inside.

    Amara, Summer, and Alice walked with the knights into the throne room in the eastern wing of Kirana Castle. Summer spotted their parents alive at the end of the room and ran over to embrace them, her gleaming silver pigtails flying out behind her. The king and queen hugged their daughter tightly at the front of the room while Alice and Amara spoke about the strange occurrences outside.

    “What on earth did that man use that was able to set the stone on fire? Not to mention that the fire didn't spread, meaning it probably wasn't magic,” Amara muttered to herself.

    Alice started fiddling with one of her long, blonde pigtails absently. She was the only member of her family with blonde hair—the rest had hair that was silver like the moon. Silver hair was treasured in Kirana, a kingdom that nearly worshiped the moon. In fact, almost all members of Kirana had that treasured hair, aside from Alice herself and a man who worked at the baker's shop in the village. Still, even the baker had hair that was a pure, shining white, and he was treated no different. Alice knew that when it came down to it, her silver-haired younger sister would inherit the throne before her. The thought bothered her just a bit.

    “Alice! Are you listening to me?”

    “Huh?” Alice looked away from her hair and turned to face Amara. Amara's deep brown eyes narrowed and she frowned at the princess.

    “I was asking you your opinion of this strange occurrence. What do you suppose it is? Why would someone light only the eastern wing, and how?”

    “I'm only fifteen,” Alice stated. “I don't know any more than you do. But, I just thought of something...”

    “You did?”

    “That man. His hair was black, wasn't it?”

    It was true, though no member of the trio had thought of it until just now. The assaulter didn't possess Kirana's famous silver hair, which meant he was a citizen of another kingdom. Alice had to wonder how he seemed to know his way around the palace so well, if that were true.

    “Odd,” Amara muttered. “Members of Minorea are magic-users, right? They all have black hair. It would explain why the man was able to vanish without a trace like that...”

    “Minoreans are sword-users. Yoancalens are magic-users. Yoancalens are blonde, like me.”

    “What? But that doesn't make any sense...” Amara groaned. “Alice, do you remember anything else about the man?”

    “He used a gun. We're the gunsmiths, aren't we?”

    “A gun from Kirana, hair from Minorea, and the magic of Yoancale. What kind of a superhuman was this man...?”

    Summer bounded over to them and sat beside Amara. Alice and Amara moved over in their pew to give her a bit more room.

    “What are you two talking about?” the thirteen-year-old princess asked.

    “That man that attacked us,” Amara answered. “He's awfully multi-cultural, don't you think? A Kirani gun, Minorean hair, and Yoancalen magic.”

    “His cloak was really fancy, not something any of those kingdoms could have made. The last kingdom, Rigalad, makes the best clothes. So his cloak was probably from there.”

    “Why target us, though?” Alice wondered aloud.

    “Who knows?” Summer shrugged. “Well, whatever he was, he meant business—”

    “Indeed I did, Princess.”

    Summer gasped and squealed. The trio looked around the room, searching for the source of the voice. It was nowhere to be found, though, and it seemed that no one else had even heard it.

    “Don't bother looking for me. You won't find me.”

    “Does anyone else hear that?” Summer called loudly. Amara and Alice nodded beside her.

    “Hear what?” the queen responded from the front.

    “Dear princesses, you're the only ones that can hear me. You, and your friend.”

    “Why?” Alice whispered.

    “Because you saw me, obviously. And now that you have, I'm afraid I have to kill you.”

    “What...?!”

    A large, swirling vortex suddenly appeared from out of nowhere only a few feet away from the edge of the trio's pew. Summer screamed as she was pulled away into the vortex. Amara cried out her name and nearly dove after her. Alice clung tightly to her seat, but this didn't stop her from being yanked into the mysterious vortex. No one else even seemed to notice that they were gone...as if Amara,

Alice, and Summer had never even existed.