Elayra rolled her eyes at Ghent’s confused reaction to Drust’s statement.
	“Your father.” Drust glanced toward Ghent when the boy moved to better place both him and Elayra in his view. “Hatter.”
	He sighed heavily at Ghent’s further questions, his brows raising as the boy posed the last.
	“He’s one of the Forsaken,” Elayra answered curtly, “if that’s what you want to know.” She looked to him, anger at the suggestion flashing in her eyes. “But that [i]doesn’t[/i] make him or any of the others affected crazy. They’re just—”
	Drust raised a hand for her to be silent as he stopped a couple feet from where the path ended.
	Her attention turned to him, her words cutting off. She stopped beside him as he angled himself so he could face both his charges.
	“Crazy, as in mad,” he explained irritably. “I believe he’s referring to the fictitious Mad Hatter.” He looked to Ghent, his eyes narrowing. “Your father’s not that old, boy. It’s an unfortunate coincidence, but a coincidence nonetheless. He was a bit eccentric, but not insane. ‘Hatter’ is what’s not his real name.” He glanced to the woods awaiting them, and his lips twitched downward.
	[i]He’s delaying,[/i] Elayra realized. He was trying to hide it, but she knew him too well for that. It would seem he was as eager to enter Hollow Forest as she was.
	 “Simply,” Drust continued, “he had a hat his father—who [i]was[/i] a hatter—made for him. He was never seen without it. Holeland Tweedle, one of the White King’s—” he glanced to Elayra, “your grandfather’s—advisers decided it would make for a fun nickname.”
	Elayra’s shoulders stiffened when Drust brought in her family. Her hard gaze shifted to the woods waiting beyond the opening in the tree barricade. The impossibly rich brown of the trunks seeped crimson sap as if pained by the vines winding their way up them and snaking about the forest floor.
	“I believe he said he was eleven at the time,” Drust went on, his gaze unintentionally following Elayra’s. “It was cute at first, but, to his regret, it stuck. By the time he decided on an official alias, his fate was already sealed as Hatter. He came to terms with it, though, and occasionally added ‘Mad’ to it to mock Carroll once he read the story. ‘Featherhead,’ on the other hand, would be a much more dismal alias to be stuck with.
	“Due to the magic nature of your vinifcium blood,” Drust looked back to Ghent, his expression unreadable, “it’s necessary for you to have an alias. For the likes of you and your father, true names have power. Until you decide on an assumed name, it’s best to not give your real name to anyone else here. Understood?”
	Elayra looked to Ghent with a mischievous smile. “Don't worry. You’ll [i]always[/i] be ‘Featherhead’ to me, Featherhead.”