Prologue: Beyond the Rabbit Hole
With a twitch of its whiskers, the white rabbit looked around, and then dove down into the rabbit hole.
Some distance away, the young woman who was watching cursed to herself as she lowered her crossbow with a scowl. Well, there went getting dinner in a fast manner. Shifting her weight slightly to get more comfortable, she checked the arrow in her bow before settling down to wait. She could wait. She was patient. And right now, she was a bit hungry.
Sure enough, after a few minutes, the rabbit emerged again, ears moving in every direction as it poked its pink nose out cautiously. Inch by inch it emerged, and the woman waited, barely daring to breathe, let alone move. Finally freeing itself from the underground lair, it began to hop away from her, across the wide meadow.
Getting up carefully, the woman waited until it had gotten a bit of distance between her before she began to follow, waiting for the right opportunity. The sun was getting low in the sky, a corner of her mind noted. She must have really come far from the home she shared with her father, nestled in the isolated footlands of the White kingdom. Pushing the thought aside, she turned her mind back to the rabbit, and to dinner.
With a flick of its ears, something made the rabbit startle, and she quickly took aim, but a ripple in the very air itself made her pause and look up. So close she could touch it if she walked a few paces, stone emerged out of the air-- a stone wall that seemed to extend on and up, the rock crumbling and badly decayed in some places. She looked up, and up, and the rabbit was forgotten as she took in the sight.
It was a castle. There was nothing else it could have been. The structure was massive, with multiple towers spiraling off into the sky, the overall architecture seeming to fit together and yet have little sections that differed from each other, as if each part had been designed by a different person, with all of them sharing the same sense of style. It was also in terrible shape, pieces of wall fallen down and apart, the entire structure covered in dirt and the filth of ages of neglect.
What the...? Castles didn't just appear from thin air. Taking a few steps toward the castle, she reached out to touch it, to assure herself it was real, and as her fingers brushed against it, a jolt went up her arm, straight to her spine and then to her brain, her eyes; it was like they had just opened a bit wider. She sucked in a breath of air, jerking her hand back. The castle remained, silent and unmoving, as if it had always been there. Feeling a bit unnerved, she took several steps back, and as she did, the castle vanished, as if a curtain had been cast over it.
The rabbit was certainly gone by now. Feeling too shaken to be irritated at the loss of dinner, she turned toward home.
Her name was Ameko Satoka.
The first thing Akito noticed when his daughter returned was her silence, her introspective expression. It struck him as unusual because she was usually buoyed by a natural confidence, not letting events shake her deeply. "Did something happen?" he asked as she put her crossbow up. "I hope you didn't try to follow a rabbit down its hole again."
She scowled at him. "You're never going to let that go, are you? I was six."
The older man smiled, giving her a pat on the shoulder as he moved to seal the door shut. "It was a joke. Still, losing a rabbit usually doesn't make you have an expression like that. Is something wrong, Ameko?"
The scowl faded into an expression of unsureness. "I went really far out today."
"Oh? Where did you go? Did you cross the forest?"
"Yes, but only briefly. I found a new stream, it takes you to the other side of the kingdom, I think," she explained, checking on the fire burning in the hearth. "There was a big valley, and there's...something strange out there."
"Something strange?"
"Are you going to repeat everything I say?" she asked with a frown before taking a seat. "Something that isn't supposed to be there. Something like that."
"Are you going to beat around the bush until I ask you directly?" the older man countered. "What was it?"
"I think...I think it was a castle. It just appeared out of nowhere, and...." She trailed off as she saw her father's expression. Akito's face had turned serious as she spoke, the other man taking a seat as well, lost for a moment in his own thoughts. "Father? Do you know what it is?"
"There aren't many that wouldn't know," he told her, voice gone quiet. "There's only one castle in the White kingdom, particularly one that would be hidden under a cloak of time."
"You don't mean...the castle? The White Rook?" Ameko asked with a frown. "But why there? Why would it appear now? That castle's been gone for decades, right?" She crossed her arms as she tried to recall what she knew of the castle.
Akito was silent for a long moment. At last, he answered, "Because it needs to."
"Why?" She scrutinized his face. "You know something about this, don't you? What is it about that place."
He let out a sigh through his nose. "Put on the kettle for some tea, if you will, please, daughter. There is something I need to tell you. It concerns your mother."
"My mother?" Ameko frowned, but did as she was told, filling the kettle before taking a seat again, straddling her chair. "Okay, I'm listening. What does my mother have to do with the White Rook?"
Akito didn't respond for a long moment. "Ameko...before your mother died, before she gave birth to you, she was preparing to die. She told me things that I was to tell you when the time came. If the White Rook has reappeared again, it means that its heir has enough power to restore the kingdom."
"I don't think I like where this is heading," Ameko said, a tone of nerves evident in her voice.
That got a chuckle out of Akito. "You were always quite astute, Ameko. What you're probably surmising is correct. Your mother, Rain, was the daughter of the White Queen who was murdered some fifty years ago."
He was right, that had been what she had been surmising. But to hear it spoken aloud was another matter altogether. "You're not very funny," she managed at last. "The whole family was wiped out. That's what everyone says."
"Have I ever told you that?" he countered evenly. "Of course everyone would say that. It would be to the benefit of the royal line if they were trying to keep hidden, would it not? But from my understanding, if the royal line had truly been eliminated, the White kingdom would not be standing. Even less so than the sorry shape the Blue kingdom fell into after their royal line was truly eliminated. It would have dissolved into the rock and sands of Neverland again."
Unable to continue to sit, Ameko began to pace around the small living room, trying to put her thoughts in order. "Rain was the daughter of the White Queen. She somehow escaped and went into hiding. Why?" She looked at him. "Does that make you the White King?"
He shook his head. "She would never let me marry her for that reason. She didn't have enough power on her own to resurrect the kingdom, so she told me." The kettle began to whistle, and Akito stood, pulling down a pair of teacups and carefully straining the tea. "Your mother was a smart woman as well, Ameko. She realized what she needed to do for the survival of her child, and of the kingdom. I think she gave up on her life the night you were born, to that end."
She sat down again, letting him press a teacup into her hands. "She left me specific instructions," Akito continued, holding onto his own teacup as he waited for it to cool. "After you were born, I left the village where I had lived and sought out the help of a Cheshire from the forest to help keep you hidden. It's worked so far, but now that the castle has chosen to reappear, I'm sure it won't be long before Neverland finds out there's a heir to the White kingdom. You need to return to the castle, Ameko."
"What am I supposed to do there?"
"That I do not know. I am sure that you would be able to figure it out, though. The White Rook will guide you, as will the power inside you. The power of your mother's line." He took a sip, then set the cup down. "You must return there, and then I must leave here."
She paused with the cup halfway to her lips. "You're not coming with me, then."
"I have no power of my own, Ameko. What small power your mother was able to give to me has long since been used up. If Neverland were to learn of a relative to the heir, I would only be used against you."
She set the cup down, her appetite for the warm, bitter beverage gone. "So this is something I need to do alone."
"I didn't say that. There are people that will help you, I am sure of it. It is just a matter of finding them. If you need to, turn to the forest. The Cheshire helped me... I am sure she would help you as well." He looked over at her, and smiled slightly. "You're taking this quite well, you know. It's not every day such a task is set before someone."
She barked out a laugh at that. "If I didn't know what a terrible sense of humor you have, I'd think it was a joke. It just doesn't feel real. But..." She looked down at her hand, the one that had brushed against the wall of the castle. "Everything inside me agrees. I just...I feel the need to go back to that place, and I don't know why."
"That's the kingdom talking to you," Akito said with a nod. "Do you have any other questions of me?"
"Did you know? About Mother?"
"Not until I asked her to marry me, and she said no," Akito replied with another sip of his tea. "She never used her power. All I know about what she gave me was that it's connected to the stream of time."
"Time magic?" Ameko frowned.
He shrugged slightly. "That's really all I know about the White Rook and the royal family. I imagine there were a lot of things Rain didn't want to talk about, or didn't know."
She sighed. "When should I leave?"
"Tomorrow. I'll send as many supplies with you as I can." He leaned forward, touching his forehead to hers. "Good luck to you, Ameko. I know you and I believe you have not been given a task you cannot handle."
"Luck," she murmured to herself. "I think I'm going to need it."
