Chapter Text
Why Is a Raven Like a Writing Desk?
For Andy,
you helped me so much, I miss you, my friend.
It was around four o’clock in the morning. The woods that surrounded the Academy were dark and silent. A single hooded figure was marching towards a Tumtum tree and rested their head against its trunk.
When they lowered the dark blue hood, she revealed shiny raven hair damp with sweat. The woman was panting, clutching her left hand against her stomach. Thick, dark blood was pouring trough her fingers from what seemed to be a rather deep wound.
A bleat shook the tree, and she jumped in surprise. She thought the beast was wounded and kept busy as well.
A heavy thud shook the air when something landed a few feet away from her.
A dragon-like monster was breathing heavily, sniffing the air. It was about 9 feet tall, its massive figure contrasting the tiny figure of the woman, stood 5 feet tall. Its bat wings were clearly damaged – one was bent in a funny way, the other looked wonky. It couldn’t fly.
It roared again and the woman, hiding behind the tree, took a better look at its shape. Its long writhing tail was shaking with fear; its eyes – big and round – were petrified with terror. Another warbling sound. A call for its master.
It had three long fur-covered fingers as claws and they were covered in blood, its head looked like the head of a fish with two big upper teeth and two smaller but still sharp teeth on the bottom.
“Stupid chicken! You’re drawing attention on us…” muttered the woman though gritted teeth, trying to ignore her own pain.
She inhaled deeply and looked down at her free hand.
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
She didn’t want it to come to this. It was hard to concentrate with the piercing pain in her stomach and the dizziness due to the blood loss.
A shiny silver dagger appeared in her hand, it had an intricate engraving on the blade and it was extremely sharp.
She was about to leave her hiding spot when another beast rushed towards the dragon and attacked it. It was so fast she couldn’t even see it properly. Just a flash of claws and enormous eyes.
The dragon bleated and with her heart pounding in her chest, the woman jumped out, running towards the two fighting monsters, holding the dagger above her head.
“Don’t you dare hurt my Jabberwock, you foul creature!” she stabbed the monster in the back, but it was too strong. In a second it left the dragon on the ground and was on her, ready to bite her head off. The Jabberwock protected her, attacking the monster and successfully hurting it enough to force it to flee.
The woman sighed, tired. The blade disappeared from her hands and when she dropped to the ground, unconscious, the Jabberwock disappeared too, in an explosion of blue butterflies.
Principal Larissa Weems found the unconscious lady during her daily morning walk around the school grounds. At first, she thought the woman was dead, but when she hit her shoulder with the tip of her pointy shoe, a strangled whine came out of the stranger’s mouth. With a surprised and sharp intake of breath, the Principal promptly took her phone out to call for help, her blue eyes now scanning the tiny figure by her feet trying to identify any signs of attack.
The ambulance took them both to the Jericho hospital; Larissa was constantly checking her phone just in case something happened at the school. She texted a colleague about her unforeseen event, and that she would be running late for her meetings.
“Are you a relative?” A doctor asked, and she was pulled down to earth from the million thoughts running around in her head. She didn’t like hospitals and waiting rooms were uncomfortable. The seats were too small, the air was too clean.
“No,” she replied. “I was the one who found her. Is she alive?”
“Yes, she was lucky,” the doctor sighed. “She was attacked by some rabid animal. She has a deep wound on her chest, and she almost bleed and froze to death. She didn’t have any ID on her but she’s stable now, she’s just woken up…”
“Can I see her?”
The moment Larissa entered the hospital room, she was transfixed by the enormous eyes that belonged to the tiny woman in the hospital bed.
They were grey, somehow glassy. Too big for her head. She was staring right into her soul, Larissa felt extremely uncomfortable.
“Are you another doctor? I’ve already told the other one I don’t remember anything”.
Her voice was a sweet sounding, but the tone was sharp, quick. She had a weird accent, a mixture of British and American.
“I’m not a doctor,” Larissa explained, approaching the bed with caution. “I’ve found you in the woods, near my school. You were unconscious, I called an ambulance”.
Something seemed to click inside the mind of the woman in front of her, because Larissa could see the change in her eyes.
“You’re Larissa Weems” it wasn’t a question, “You’re the Principal of the Nevermore Academy” another statement.
“And you are—” eyeing her from top to bottom, she could see the signs of the attack. Baggy eyes, scratches on her pale face, a few bandages that she hadn’t notice before.
The edges of the other woman’s lips curled ever so slightly. “Curiosity killed the cat, Larissa”.
“I’d prefer if you called me Principal Weems”.
“I don’t like titles. I like names. Kings and queens, hatters and principals… they’re all going to lose their heads. Larissa might keep her head on her shoulders”.
She tried to stretch her arms and legs, but her limbs were still too sore from the battle.
“And yet, I still don’t have a name to call you by” Larissa pointed out, she was trying to keep calm. This stranger could be anyone. A threat to the school, a danger to—
“You’ll find a form on your desk where I’m filed as ‘Winifred Donkin’. That’s not my name but I was going to explain the whole situation to you during our meeting, which was scheduled for nine o’clock this morning, I guess… what time is it?” she spoke so composed, almost stoic, Larissa was intrigued.
The Principal looked at her phone.
“It’s almost ten o’clock, I guess you’re the one who applied to be my ‘secretary’…” she emphasised the last word with caution.
Two people had been killed and Larissa suspected that the cause of death might be supernatural. After a few calls, she started to fear that the creature behind the murders was a Hyde. The only logical thing to do was trying to contact someone who considered themselves an expert. She had found a so called ‘Hyde-hunter’. They had only spoken via e-mail, and they had agreed to set up a plan that wouldn’t unnecessarily alarm the school staff, the students and most importantly, the city of Jericho.
The plan consisted in hiring the Hyde-hunter as her personal secretary, so that nobody would suspect a thing. Meanwhile the hunter would be free to survey the school ground.
Larissa simply didn’t expect to meet said hunter half dead on the day they were supposed to meet.
“I understand” she said, joining her hands in her lap. “So? What’s your professional opinion?”
The woman scoffed, sounding bitter. “It’s definitely a Hyde. When I receive a call it’s usually a bear, a werewolf or a troll… but this one almost killed me on the spot. It’s a powerful one, you must keep your eyes open. They’re never alone, the master is always one step behind them”.
Larissa nodded; her suspicions were corrected. Her students were in danger… the whole outcast community was in danger.
“I understand you have a weapon to fight the Hyde?” she asked, tilting her head.
The other woman shook her head. “I am the weapon. But we’ll discuss this when I’m out of this hospital. Can you get me out? I’m fine”.
“You’ve been severely wounded, and you’ve lost a lot of blood. I think you should rest…”
Before the other woman could answer, the doctor came in with a syringe and the woman practically jumped out of the bed, eyes filled with fear.
“No… no, no needles!” she was hiding behind the statuary figure of Larissa and it was almost comical. “I’m fine! Look, I can walk!”
The doctor smiled sympathetically, but he asked the woman to go back to bed anyway.
She insisted that she was perfectly okay, still hiding behind Larissa that was starting to find the situation a bit annoying.
“It’s just a needle…”
“You don’t know! I once drank from a bottle that said ‘drink me’ on the tag and it almost killed me! Who put poison in a bottle and then writes ‘drink me’ on it?” she seemed upset; she was shaking and her bottom lip was trembling. Tears were pooling in the corners of her eyes. Larissa was definitely taken aback from the sudden change in her mood.
“Help me… please…” she whispered and Larissa’s heart skipped a beat as those enormous grey eyes were trying and succeeding to convince her to do as she was being told. Was she a mermaid, perhaps?
“Miss… I assure you, this is just a bland sedative. You really need it” the doctor tried to calm her, but the younger woman snapped again.
“You don’t know what I need!” she was angry now, her eyes went darker, gloomier, her voice deeper.
A dirty hare appeared from nowhere and hopped from behind her, grabbed the stethoscope that was placed next to her bed and tried to examine it.
“What is it? Is it dangerous? Is it deadly?” he asked in a quirky voice.
Larissa stepped back, eyes fixed on the animal and lips slightly ajar; the doctor was definitely scared.
The young woman was staring at the doctor with her gloomy eyes, she didn’t even blink. “That’s a stethoscope. It’s not dangerous but you could use it to strangle someone in case of extreme danger”.
The hare sniffed the object, curious. “Stethoscope” he repeated, then he threw it across the room and it hit the doctor right in the face.
The doctor yelped, covering his face in pain and taking a few steps back.
“Not like this…” the woman complained, turning her back to Larissa and the doctor and eyeing the hare who was now jumping around.
“Did I help you, Alice? Was I a good hare? Do I have to do something else?”
He was now causing havoc in the hospital room, throwing everything upside down.
Larissa gasped in surprise; she had no idea what was going on.
“Sorry— he’s a little… Jim! No!” she grabbed the hare by his ears and while he was still wriggling her lips became a thin line.
“You’ve done enough for today”.
The hare disappeared into an explosion of blue butterflies.
She wanted to summon the Rabbit, he could have helped her escape… but it was clear now that she was indeed too weak. The simplest task was impossible.
There was no way she could summon the Jabberwock now, let alone control it.
The doctor was still under shock, Larissa seemed on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
“Can we go to the Academy, please?” Alice asked, pleadingly. “I’ll explain everything. I swear… just get me out of here. I hate hospitals and needles. They make me nervous and when I’m nervous I can’t control my peculiarity…”
Larissa nodded, what she said made sense. She was still hurt but they did have an infirmary. The hospital clearly wasn’t a safe space for her.
”I’ll sign her release papers, doctor… If the mayor or the sheriff have something to say, they know how to find me. Miss Donkin will stay at the Academy”.
Once they were both inside the car and Larissa started the engine, she finally asked the question that was running around her mind since she had seen that strange hare.
“So… Alice?”
“Alice Dodgson” she replied, resting her head against the car window.
“And that hare?” Larissa kept her eyes on the road, but she was nervously biting her red lips. The name was infamous. She doubted it was all a coincidence.
“That would be Jim. My Hare… he helps me sometimes, but he’s unpredictable, I wanted to summon the Rabbit, but my mind is still too fuzzy… I think I need to rest a little more before I can use my powers properly”.
”You’ll have everything you need at the Nevermore Academy”.
Alice forced out a bitter laugh. ”That’s funny, because twenty-one years ago you declined my application”.
Larissa eyed the woman beside her, she tried to sound casual when she asked: “Did the council gave you an explanation?”
Alice nodded, closing her eyes. She was exhausted, her voice was almost a whisper when she spoke, already half asleep, lulled by the motion of the car.
“Too many Hydes in my family”.