The castle was a large pair of glass towers at the center of town. Some sections were filled with alternating green and blue glass bottles. They gave the vague impression of stained glass. The sun shone through the bottles, lighting the ground below blue and green. The two towers were joined by two sections of wall and a gate between them.

Adrian reached for the door and stopped. He pointed at a sign printed in large bold letters:

Coco read the sign aloud and looked at Rudy, who was awake but still nestled in the pink shoulder of her frock. “You may have to wait out here.”

“I’ll just hide in your sleeve. Maybe your hair. They’ll never know I am here. I won’t make a sound,” Rudy pled.

Coco looked at Adrian like a little girl begging for a puppy.

“The Queen won’t like it. She won’t tolerate it.” He shook his head.

“But if she doesn’t know…”

Adrian took a deep breath. He released the air slowly, like a human tire that had sprung a leak. “Fine. But! If she should discover him, I knew nothing of it.”

He pulled the door open and the smell of roasting meat hit Coco square in the face. For a moment, her mind drifted to the Oracle and her bag of meaty fortunes, but her hunger took over and her stomach began to growl. She stepped inside and Adrian shut the door behind her.

The Queen’s servants were sharing their evening meal in a large courtyard. Long planks of wood held up by barrels were covered in plate after plate of roasted meat. Servants sat on boxes, old broken chairs with wobbly, lopsided legs, and stacks of old phone books.

Adrian pulled out a gray-white, cracked plastic patio chair mostly comprised of duct tape. “You can have my seat, I’ll go and find another.” He smiled at Coco, but once he looked up at the other servants of the court his face went back to stone. All business. He marched off through a door to retrieve another chair for himself.

The servants in the courtyard appeared to be knights like Adrian. They all wore similar rubber armor, and greeted Coco with warm smiles. She took Adrian’s seat happily and the knight to her left handed her a plate. Coco reached out and grabbed three slabs of meat from the platter in front of her. Two of them she slapped down on her plate, and the third she bit into directly.

The other knights had no silverware so she was not all too concerned with proper table etiquette. She dug into the meat like a rabid animal, letting the juices dribble down her chin and onto the front of her dress. After several bites, she noticed a few of the knights staring at her. She put the slab of meat down and wiped her mouth with her dress. Then she tore small pieces from the roasted meat and placed them in her mouth, which she kept closed while she chewed.

Adrian returned with a wooden crate and squeezed beside her. He grabbed a few slices of meat.

The man beside him held up a slab, tore it into strips and let juice run down his arms. He looked over at Coco, who had her mouth rather full. “Have you ever tasted feline so tender?” he asked.

Coco stopped mid-chew. She managed to yell through her mouthful, “Excuse me?!”

“The cat,” the knight said. He held up a strip of roasted meat and waved it around. “It’s extra delicious this evening. It seems you showed up on the right night!” He grinned at Coco, with pieces of shredded cat wedged between his yellow teeth.

Coco leaned forward and spit the wad of meat onto her plate. The others watched her, stunned.

Adrian raised an eyebrow “Is there something wrong?”

“You’re damned right there’s something wrong! I’m eating CAT?! Why the fuck are you people eating cats?!” She spat onto her plate in an attempt to get any and all particles of cat meat out of her mouth.

“What do you mean—” Adrian started to ask. But he was cut off by a lofty, inquisitive voice from down the table.

“Is there a problem?”

Coco looked along the rows of knights toward the voice, ready to fire off comments about how wrong and barbaric it was to eat cute fuzzy kittens, but when she saw who spoke, she quickly rethought her strategy. “No. No problem. I’m just full.”

The Queen said, “I see. And just who might YOU be?”

Coco needn’t ask who was inquiring. The Queen wore an elaborate barbed wire crown encrusted with shiny bits of broken costume jewelry. Her dress flowed with layers of old bed sheets and curtains—solids, florals, plaids. But it was her face that drew the most attention.

Half her face was that of any pale, middle-aged woman’s. There were some wrinkles around her mouth, crow’s feet, and three deep lines that cracked through her forehead from furrowing her brow. The other half of her face was fitted with a piece of metal mesh, molded to form the structure of a human head. Instead of a left eye, she had a forty-watt light bulb. It blinked off and on when she spoke. She wore her hair in an elaborate orange and white twist that sat atop her head like a delicious pastry. Coco found this very distracting.

Adrian answered for Coco and himself while she stared. He stood at his place at the table and spoke with diligent respect and clarity, “Your highness, this woman is a traveler and she—”

The Queen interrupted him. “Adrian,” she said breathily, “since when do we take in strays? Except to eat them.” Her smile stretched wide, her teeth sharp, metallic points, and she laughed haughtily.

The other servants joined in laughing.

It wasn’t until the boom of laughter around her that Coco realized that everyone at the table was male, save herself and the Queen.

“Continue!” the Queen barked once the din of laughter had faded.

Adrian gathered himself and explained that Coco had woken up not far from the kingdom and needed help getting home. He started confidently, but under the scrutiny of the Queen, he wavered. Coco watched him struggle to gain composure.

“So,” the Queen sighed heavily, “You’ve brought an outsider to my kingdom?” She crossed her arms over her chest and squinted disapproval at Adrian.

He opened his mouth to argue. Coco could see that he obviously did not want to displease the Queen. He looked to Coco, and then back down the table with wanting eyes. Then he bowed his head in submission and uttered a simple, “Yes, your Majesty.”

“I see,” the Queen said. “I would ask you why…” Adrian looked up with a faint glimmer of hope in his eyes. The monarch continued, “but I know quite well that the answer is stupidity. Now take your seat. I’ll deal with you after dinner.”