Ascending From Madness Read online

  “You can take on gremlins, but a furry fox is what freaks you out?” Scrooge smiled over his shoulder, completely undoing me. Did he know every time he looked at me, he unraveled and disarmed me a bit more? It was a steady and slow descent, but this was the moment I knew I was falling for him. In a cave on Mount Crumpit, in a world I didn’t belong in.

  Yet, I did.

  This moment was when something clicked, even though I hadn’t known it at the time. This quiet beat we shared, just the two of us, in the middle of the night, when I knew I was right where I was supposed to be. With him.

  My story being written.

  In my gut I knew I belonged. That I was her…

  Is this why my dream had taken me back here? So much was still foggy and unclear, but he was real and so were my feelings for him. My anchor. As if he were holding me to this realm I was sleeping in, he pushed me to keep going to find strength.

  “This happened before,” I whispered to him, his eyes going back and forth between mine, studying me. “I remember now. This place is real. You are real.”

  “Most likely. A place is real if you believe it to be.”

  “You sound like Frosty.”

  “Now you’re just insulting me,” he rumbled, moving in closer, the smirk on his face dropping away. Exactly as I had before, I became aware of our proximity, his skin warm under my fingers, and his mouth only inches from mine.

  “Ms. Liddell.” His breath wisped over my lips. “Al-ice. This is a bad idea.”

  “Maybe,” I replied. “But let me tell you a secret… all the best plans are.”

  The side of his mouth hooked up. My gut craved him; the need to kiss him was painful.

  His mouth inched toward mine, but instead of feeling his lips, his words shoved into my ear.

  “Time to wake up, Alice… before it’s too late for us.”

  Then the man disappeared in front of my eyes and a piercing scream stabbed through my ear to my heart.

  Scrooge!

  I jolted, my lids popping open with a start, my lungs gasping for air, my gaze moving over the sterile room. What happened to me in this space rushed back to me in a sharp blow. Still strapped to the chair, the dried blood trailing down from my eye to my chin cracked as I wrinkled up my face in revulsion.

  They did it; the sick fucks gave me a lobotomy…

  Wait.

  I paused, sending all my attention into my brain where they poked a hole, searching and prodding to assess any differences.

  Nothing.

  If anything, I felt stronger.

  I should have been either docile or a vegetable. I was neither. Power and energy buzzed in my veins; a warmth moved around the areas the ice pick had stabbed through, as if it were being healed.

  Inject me. The syringe with the scroll lettering was no longer on the tray, but I was certain it had been. It had protected or healed me. Whatever it did, it had saved my life. And I had no doubt this hadn’t been the first time my “sugarplum fairies” had saved my butt.

  I felt more alert, more alive and conscious than I had since coming home, like the cobwebs had been mostly cleared away.

  Since coming home.

  Turtle doves…

  My chest pattered in quick huffs. It was all true. I wasn’t crazy. All my memories weren’t back, the pieces not fully connecting. But I had been in another realm where Matt was Scrooge and Jessica… I could picture her on steps, people bowing to her. Mass of grays and blacks; faces that were ordinary, but they were no longer strangers to me. Everly Green. Pepper Mint. Dr. Cane. Even the secretary at her other office. I could see each one in the crowd, their face twisted up with disgust and hate, chanting for my death. For their queen to take my head.

  She called herself the Blood-Red Queen of Winterland.

  “Holy Keebler elf.” My mouth parted. “She’s really a queen of a magical land. In a galaxy far, far away.” I shook my head in utter disbelief, my own words ringing in my ears like ramblings of a madwoman. “Damn, I really do sound crazy.”

  It didn’t matter; it was true. Winterland was real. I just needed to figure out how it all connected, and I sensed Matt was a huge part of putting the pieces together, my dream tugging on the back of my mind.

  Erupting like a dormant volcano, a bellow echoed through the hallway, familiar and filled with agony. It was what woke me up, tearing through my dream and bringing me back to consciousness. A deep bone-chilling roar echoed and tumbled over me, freezing up my chest.

  Scrooge.

  They were torturing him. I could feel his pain in the air. It was palpable, coating my soul in grief and anxiety. Yanking against my binds, my instincts kicked in, needing to get to him.

  Fire zapped at my skin, reverberating down into my bones as I tugged and heaved against the restraints, a cry baying from my mouth. Thrashing, I tried to wiggle free, fresh blood leaking from wounds on my wrists.

  He went silent, and my ears perked up to listen for any noise. He was close, on this side of the sanatorium, but from there I didn’t know.

  Shoes clicked down the hallway. My frame stilled as I listened to them move closer and closer. My heart thumped in my chest as the handle of the door clicked, and panic they were coming back for me soared through my chest wanting to burst out. Lying back, I slammed my eyes shut, trying to relax my body so I appeared to still be unconscious.

  The person stayed silent, but the heavy steps and the short puffs of breath from exertion led me to believe it was Cane.

  His presence loomed over one side of my body. Hot sticky fingers came down on my neck. “Your pulse is high.” He hmphed through his nose, his hands sliding down my neck sensually to my arm.

  Trying to slow down my frantic heartbeat into a slumbering state was a lot harder than it seemed; my body reacted on its own to his foul touch.

  “You really are so pretty. And this way, you will be even better. Silent and beautiful, dazzling as a star on top of a tree,” he muttered. A deep inhale fluttered at my neck, making my stomach twist. “You smell like vanilla. I miss vanilla. At least I can sneak sweets when she’s not looking, but everything tastes different here. Smells different. Like chemicals,” he babbled, his nonsense becoming background when I felt his fingers work at the straps around my wrists. My heart leaped up to my throat, and it took everything I had to not react, to wait patiently.

  He didn’t even question if the lobotomy worked; he must assume I was no threat to him in any way, even if I woke up. And it would have been true if not for the serum. If I didn’t believe in magic before, I certainly did now. I thought my wish went unanswered. It couldn’t stop him from hurting me, but it had protected me where it could.

  My teeth ground together. Cane’s hands wandered down my legs, taking his time to go over my curves, air puffing out quicker in excitement.

  “This will be our little secret, won’t it, Alice?” He cupped my inner thigh, trailing his hand down to my ankle, undoing my ankle strap. One side was free, and the desire to kick him in the head raged in my blood, but I kept still, letting his fat fingers wander as he unlatched my other side.

  “I can’t help myself. You are so beautiful. Tight little body, but still so soft.” His hands unharnessed my right ankle, skimming up my pants leg, a hiss coming from him. He liked me like this. A silent victim. He’d probably enjoy it even more if I was awake but no longer able to fight or even speak up for myself. A prisoner in my body who could never call out his wrongs or stop him from doing it again. “She wants me to put you in the hole, but what’s the hurry, right?”

  Screaming and jumping around inside, I waited for him to unclasp the last cuff. As usual, I had no plan except to escape. My lashes parted a sliver, peering over at the tray. All the instruments were still there.

  “Oh, elf pudding… you feel so good.” The restraint fell from my wrist, his hands sliding over, curling around the side of my breast. “You shouldn’t be so temptingly sweet, Alice. I want to nibble and lick you everywhere.”

  “And
I want to skewer you like the fucking pig you are,” I growled, my elbow ramming into his throat as I scrambled in the opposite direction. Catching him off guard, he stumbled back, his hand going to his neck, choking, his eyes open wide in shock.

  “Yeah, I’m not the drooling, compliant girl you thought you’d find, huh?” I leaped out of the seat, facing him, glaring, the hatred and disgust I felt looping around my spine.

  “How? I felt it go into your brain.” His small eyes narrowed even more. “This is not possible.”

  “Didn’t you know?” I lowered my head, pinning him with my gaze. “I have extra muchness.”

  He inhaled, understanding I now remembered the truth. He didn’t need to know I was still uncertain of the picture and how I fit in, but I recalled Winterland.

  I knew in my gut I was her…

  I took a step, my hip hitting the tray, my peripheral drawing down, eyeing the items on it.

  His eyes slid to the door and back to me, gauging if he could make a run for it or hoping to see Jessica and a herd of guards walk in. He was no match for me untethered and capable, and he knew it.

  There was a pause; a beat of time when everything vibrated with electricity, vivid with life. It was just a blink, and we both moved. I whirled around, my fingers clasping onto the object, and hurled myself over the end of the chair at him as he hobbled for the exit. Leaping on him, he swung, his fist clumsily striking out as he squealed, bashing right into the eye he had just stuffed a pick into. A scream seized my throat, my figure falling onto him, the pain bursting behind my eyes, throbbed angrily, zapping the nerves trying to heal.

  His head smacked against the tile, his body buffering me from the floor. The hammer in my hand skated across the room. Shit!

  “No! Help,” he screamed. “Someone help!

  Dread sank into my belly. I couldn’t have anyone hear him. If Jessica or a nurse found us? Game over. Scrambling off the ground, I lurched for the tray, my fingers folding around another item.

  “Help! Help! Help,” he screeched, scuttling for the door.

  If he stepped outside, my life was over. Springing for him, my arm wrapped around his neck, constricting his airways like a boa.

  His nails clawed at my arms, his hard-soled shoes kicking back into my shins in a painful blow, loosening my hold on him.

  Using his weight, he yanked me forward, his hand grabbing the handle, pulling it down.

  “No!” Completely on autopilot and survival instinct, I reacted, and with all my might, my arm thrust the orbitoclast into his temple.

  Slurping and crunching, the sound of spearing skin, tissue, and nerves resounded in my ears, drowning out the guttural scream piercing the air. Hot red liquid ran over my hand, dripping on the floor.

  I twisted the pick. His body went rigid, his scream dying in his throat. Another one of those pauses captured the room, a thump of his heartbeat, a fluttering of his lungs. Life. Then his body dropped, a lump on the floor at my feet, twitching and wiggling as it let go.

  Oxygen puttered in and out of my lungs as I stared down at him in shock. The end of the instrument stuck out the side of his head, blood trailing out of his mouth, eyes, and temple onto the floor.

  I had first planned to knock him out. I had never thought myself capable of killing someone outside of my imagination. My ex? Yeah, I envisioned that all the time, but not for real, never even contemplated anything past the dark fantasy.

  Well… the Alice before Winterland didn’t.

  This Alice?

  This Alice had a lot more muchness.

  Chapter 20

  My fingers wrapped around the end of the orbitoclast, pulling it from his temple. The sickening squelch of brain matter and tissue churned my stomach, my throat constricting.

  “How’s that for a lobotomy?” Using his jacket, I wiped off the rod, the blood smearing and soaking into the fabric. “Who’s the vegetable now?” My lip rose in a snarl. If things had gone a different way, the Sliding Doors effect, my life would have taken the course they set out for me with years of torment and abuse I would have suffered at the hand of him and Jessica. Hers I could almost stomach; she was straight forward in her torture. His would have broken every last piece of my soul.

  If I saved another person from this man, then I didn’t regret for one second my hand in his death.

  Time to move, Alice.

  Stepping over him, I pressed my ear to the door, listening for movement or voices. Besides the buzzing of the lights overhead and the heater pumping in warm air, there was only silence. Taking in a breath, I cracked open the door, peering out into the dark hallway, the light from the main lobby area pooling down the corridor. The hushed chatter from the nurses was just muffled inflections. They were still in night mode, which meant I had only been asleep for a little while. Night mode had fewer people on duty and most lights were off in unused areas, but I had no doubt this place was extra jumpy after what happened, putting the nurses and guards on hyper-watch.

  Creeping out, I kept my eyes locked on the entrance of the hallway. There were at least a dozen rooms on this side of the wing, and only two of them I knew he was not in: Jessica’s office and the room I had been in, which were the last two on the end. All the rest of the closed doors could be possibilities. And I had no idea if he was alone now.

  Scurrying like a mouse, I quietly went to the next door, listening for sounds before trying the door. I was risking everything. I understood that, but no way was I leaving without him. He came here for me, and now it was my turn to rescue him. And with my luck, there was a good chance it would go terribly wrong.

  The sound of a door handle clicking down the hall made me freeze like an animal caught in headlights. I hadn’t had time to open the door where I was without already being noticed. Fear gripped my muscles, strangling my lungs. I pressed myself against a door, trying to blend in the shadows, my heart jolting adrenaline into my ears.

  A door two down from mine swung open, pale light trailing out of the room. Heels clacked over the linoleum floor. The grip around my lungs tightened as Jessica’s profile appeared in the hallway. She peeled the surgical gown from her lean form, the fabric drenched with blood. A dagger twisted in my gut.

  The blood-red queen fit her to a T.

  A cry clogged my throat at the thought she might have done the same to him. What would I find in there? Was he past saving? A vegetable of her making?

  A curvy nurse bustled out with her, bobbing about her reminding me of a nervous chicken.

  “Let me take that, my liege.” Nurse Green turned, facing my way, grappling for the garment.

  Not a twitch of muscle nor a puff of breath left my lungs. All she had to do was look long enough in my direction to notice the lumpy shadow against the door. She was so tuned to the intimidating woman before her, her throat bobbed nervously.

  “Can I say what an honor it was to be in the room with you? To watch you. You are magnificent,” Nurse Green gushed, curtsying. “Truly brilliant, Majesty.

  “Yes.” Jessica dumped her gory gown in the nurse’s open arms, barely acknowledging her praise. “I want him awake when I get back. My knave will experience every second of pain for his treason. Defying or disappointing me does not go unpunished. Do you understand me?”

  “Ye-yes, Majesty.” She dipped her body low again, fright trembling her voice. Was it sick I found pleasure in that bitch’s fear? She was the person who got bullied, then turned around and terrorized someone even more to gain some power back. Something about that kind of person I hated more.

  “I am still furious she was able to escape. You all failed to watch one silly human girl. Don’t think you all won’t be reprimanded for your inadequacies.” She looked down at Green like a bug. “I swear, I keep thinking there couldn’t be any people more stupid than you, but then you amaze me again with your incompetence. Every door is to be guarded. Let’s try to not screw it up again, shall we?”

  “Yes, Majesty.” Green bowed, her voice trembling.

&n
bsp; Jessica took a step around Green and stopped, along with my heart. She tilted her head toward my direction as if she sensed something.

  Gulping, my fingers tightened around the pick in my hand, ready to act if I had to. Please. Don’t see me. I was too close to him to be caught now.

  Her gaze rolled down the dark hallway, my pulse pounding so loud, I was sure it would be the very thing to give me away.

  “My Queen?” Green inquired.

  “It’s nothing.” Jessica shook her head, pulling her gaze away from me. “I will be back in an hour. He’d better be awake.” She turned toward the front, gliding down the hallway, her strides powerful and certain. If she wasn’t such an evil, horrendous person, you almost had to admire her self-confidence. No man or outside power would ever tell her what to do or control her.

  “Yes, ma’am. I assure you he will be.” Green trailed after her, exiting the hallway.

  A whoosh of relief flooded my body; not that danger wasn’t at every turn, but for this moment, I was okay.

  And I knew where he was, and he was still alive.

  Tiptoeing to the entrance with a rose symbol marked on a plaque, I pulled the handle down. The door creaked open, and a harsh gasp sliced down my throat.

  This room was a little different from the one they put me in but just as horrible. It had no windows, and the room was so white it was painful to the eyes. Flogging whips and torture devices I didn’t even recognize were against the walls. Electric shock equipment was in the middle of the room next to a chair.

  “Oh god,” I whimpered, emotion blurring my eyes. Strapped to the wooden chair, bloody and broken, was Scrooge. His head dangled forward limply, the straps holding him upright. “Matt.” I slipped into the room, shutting the door and running for him. My knees crashed onto the hard surface, and I dropped the pick, reaching up to lift his puffy face. One eye was completely swollen shut, cuts and bruises were shading his skin in blues and purples. On either side of his head where two burn marks discoloring his temples. Electrical shock burns.