I haven't written anything with precious baby Liir in a while, so here is this. If you've read any of my other Wicked fics, you know I love me some alive and well Fiyero, but this stays pretty true to book!verse and is set in some of the early months of Elphaba and Liir being at Kiamo Ko. Liir's about eight/going on nine here.
Enjoy some conflicted and uncertain Elphaba!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
Elphaba wandered the corridors of Kiamo Ko, trying to memorize the routes instead of focusing on her own thoughts. It was no use, naturally. She found herself wondering how many times Fiyero may have walked the same path or how long it had taken him to map out every nook and cranny. Maybe he meandered to get away from Sarima and her sisters. Or maybe he wasn't the type to explore halls. Perhaps he had found a corner to stow away in until the late hours of the night when his wife and inherited family were sound asleep. Elphaba liked to think she knew him better than that, though. He would have spent time outside, she thought when she passed a window, walking the battlements or hiding among the commoners in the village at the base of the Kiamo Ko fortress.
Fiyero was a hunter. Drawn to the outdoors and everything nature had to offer. She couldn't even count how many times he reminisced about the seemingly vast expanse of the Thousand Year Grasslands while he was stuck in the confines of the Emerald City. Part of her regretted not indulging his thoughts more. She should have asked him where his favorite place in the Vinkus was, growing up and then. Or where she should visit if she ever took the opportunity to travel outside of the Emerald City. She should have asked him to tell her more about his people and his culture. Elphaba rolled her eyes when something in her tightened uncomfortably. She should have done a lot of things while she could have, but it was no use speculating now.
When Elphaba took the stairs down to the first floor, she could hear Sarima's youngest sister talking to that horrible child. Manek. A terrible, brute of a spawn who wouldn't do the world a twig of good. It hardly helped that his mother and aunts doted on him like he was a gift to the household. Whatever he did was something a proper man would do. They were building up a cult of virility around an eleven year old, and Elphaba could only imagine what condoning his actions would lead to in another ten years—or even when he turned Irji's age in another two. A horrible child with terrible upbringing. And shame on the women of this damned castle for comparing him to Fiyero.
They didn't know Fiyero, Elphaba reminded herself as she waited for the terrible child and his indulgent aunt to leave the area. These women had an image of Fiyero in their head that would never equal the real thing. Fiyero was kind. Kind and gentle. Manek was everything Fiyero would have balked at. If anyone resembled Fiyero's mannerisms, she supposed it was the girl, Nor. Curious, warm, and never where you expected her to be. But Elphaba assumed Sarima and her sisters would hold Nor's gender against her.
Manek and the youngest sister cleared out quick enough, and Elphaba continued her walk. She could take Killjoy into the village. Most of the people down there didn't bother either of them, and the butcher always gave the dog some scraps of meat when they passed by. If it was a good day, the baker sent Elphaba back up to Kiamo Ko with stale biscuits for the children. (She always gave them to her animals, but the baker didn't need to know that.)
She found the dog outside in the garden shed with Liir, her charge. Liir was pressed into one of the corners, his knees folded up to his chest and pale arms wrapped tightly around his legs. Killjoy laid curled up at the boy's feet. Elphaba's brow furrowed at the sight of them. Her mind immediately jumped to Manek. Had the imp done something to Liir?
"It's cold out here," she commented.
Liir was absolutely pathetic as he looked up at her. It almost brought a laugh out of her, reminding her of the looks Shell used to give their father when he was told to do something he didn't want to.
"It's nice," Liir replied, though the goosebumps on his arms betrayed him.
"Killjoy and I are going to the village," Elphaba told him, motioning for the dog to follow. He popped up, his tail wagging happily from side to side. Liir, on the other hand, scowled, looking even more sullen than before. Elphaba sighed and added, "Well, come along if you must."
Liir's joints creaked as he unfolded, and Elphaba wondered how long he had been in that position. Especially when he stumbled upon standing. Without thinking, she held out an arm to steady him. The action threw him off, and Liir sent Elphaba a guarded and inquisitive look. She tried covering it up by reaching for a nearby fabric for him to use as a cloak, but that was hardly an alternative. Liir took the fabric from her, muttering a quick thank you before ducking out of the shed.
"The others would turn to pestering me if he was bedridden or dead," she defended herself to the dog, who didn't seem buy it.
The walk to the village took a good thirty minutes, but they passed with relative ease. Killjoy took turns between trotting at her side and chasing, and being chased by, Liir. A few times Elphaba even heard the boy giggle, but he always stifled it quickly as if he thought Elphaba wouldn't stand for merriment. She let him go on thinking that. It wasn't the worst thing in the world if the children thought she was no-nonsense. A stark difference from the other adults in the castle who were nothing but frivolity and nonsense.
Elphaba watched Liir while he and Killjoy jumped around as the steep cliff petered out and gave way to the moorland. He had lost a lot of weight since they arrived at Kiamo Ko. There were no longer elderly maunts to give him biscuits, and the diet at Kiamo Ko was simpler and blander than what the cloister had supplied. Elphaba imagined Liir was also experiencing some stress and anxiety, too. He didn't seem any less or more nimble because of his weight loss, though. She had spied him playing with Killjoy on the way to Kiamo Ko. Liir moved quickly and effortlessly, climbed up and down with boulders with ease, and stalked around Killjoy's blind spots like a hunter.
Bitterly, she blamed Sarima for their situation. If that infernal woman would just hear her out, they could leave. If she had just let her say what she wanted to say that first week, she wouldn't be confined to the western tower for peace. Liir would probably still be a broody little child, but at least he wouldn't have been a broody and bullied child. Elphaba imagined them in Quadling Country where she had spent time in her own childhood. She thought they would have been happier than they were at Kiamo Ko. If not Quadling Country, somewhere in the Vinkus's southwest. She remembered Fiyero saying how beautiful the southern Grasslands were during the spring and summer months.
The closer they came to the village, the closer Liir kept to Elphaba's side until he was nearly glued to her skirt at the gate. She drew the hood of her cloak as they entered the village, and Liir wrapped himself firmly in the fabric. He took social cues from her, she knew, but he didn't understand most of what he was doing.
"How goes it, lass?" the butcher asked when Elphaba approached her with Killjoy and Liir in her wake.
"I'm alive, at least," Elphaba responded, struggling not to turn her nose up at the carcasses behind the butcher. Rudeness did not get Killjoy scraps.
The butcher nodded to Liir, who was sulking behind Elphaba with his head bowed forward. "Ye got a shadow this time?"
"Liir," she replied simply despite the butcher's expectant look.
Although the butcher continued to drop looks at Liir throughout her conversation with Elphaba, she never pressed. After they discussed the news coming out of the Emerald City, the butcher gave Killjoy a bone with some meat still on it, and, without Elphaba's consent, gave Liir a handful of lemon drops and toffees.
Elphaba normally milled about longer with the baker. He didn't mind her green skin, and he was sharply intelligent. She often wondered why someone so smart was baking bread for ungrateful mouths, but he seemed happy enough. Besides, if he wasn't running the bakery, her luck would have given her someone incorrigible. This time, however, Elphaba was quick to see him and leave: she introduced Liir to the baker upon greeting, and the man remarked how similar Liir looked to some of the Arjikis through the late Baxiana. Elphaba steered the boy out of the room quickly. She wasn't sure why it unnerved her so much, and she didn't want to stay any long to worry about it.
"They have a little library," she told Liir. "It's not much. Not like…" Elphaba trailed off, thinking about the Emerald City. Thinking about her brief life there. "I've gathered many of the Arjiki are illiterate."
She wondered if that came off insensitive. Conventionally illiterate is what she meant. They bright people, but there seemed to be a reason why Fiyero had been the only Vinkun at Shiz. Elphaba bit the inside of her cheek.
"It's just a shelf in their soap shop, but it's nice and smells like…" she trailed off again.
Liir saved her from having to overcome any awkward silence.
"Kiamo Ko's library smells like soap."
"It does, yes," Elphaba replied thinly. Kiamo Ko's library and Fiyero. "Killjoy scares the owners, so they let me take him in. We'll stop in and peruse."
The owners, a husband and wife, started when Killjoy padded in, and Elphaba was close enough behind him to witness it. She got a sick joy of the momentary terror people experienced upon seeing one of her pets. The reactions the bees got were the best. There were a handful of people who were frightened of the crows, but her bees really elicited the screams and jumps that defied gravity for seconds. The owners of the soap shop usually dropped whatever tool they were holding when they saw Killjoy. They didn't drop anything this time, but the start was good enough for Elphaba.
Liir wandered around the shop while Elphaba and the dog settled into their corner. A small smile slowly spread across his face as he leaned down to smell some of the soaps. She watched him as he tried to hide his smile, but little slivers of it showed after various sniffs. Elphaba leveled the husband with a glare when he stepped forward to keep Liir from picking up a soap that smelled like blood oranges. For good measure, she glanced at Killjoy and back to the husband. He looked over at the wife who shook her head, so he gave Elphaba a small nod and retreated back to whatever he had been doing.
After a good fifteen minutes of smelling everything they had in the store, Liir sat across from Elphaba. She looked over at him when he reached for one of the books she had piled on the table. His little face contorted in confusion while he flipped through the pages. A serious one replaced his confused look, and Liir agitatedly exchanged the book for another and then, after several rough page turns, another.
"What did you think of Feldman's theory on the transition of traits in interspecies genetics?" Elphaba asked the boy, teasing.
He stared down at the book, running his finger up and down the crease of the book.
"Outdated," Liir mumbled.
Elphaba wasn't able to stop her smirk in time.
Liir shut the book and pushed it back onto the table. "It doesn't have pictures."
"Well, there are some very vague diagrams that are far too mature for you," she said and he sneered. Elphaba shifted and grabbed one of the children's books from the shelf. Liir stared at it when she offered him the book. "It's much more readable than natural sciences."
He grimaced at her.
"Ah," Elphaba said, putting the book down, "I see."
"It's not so bad," he told her. "Sarima's kids can read some, and her sisters make them read chapters from that one book to them during tea." It was a ridiculous romance novel of some sort.
"A shame," Elphaba commented, drumming her thumb against the top of the book she had been reading on Vinkun flora and fauna. "Well, how about you learn to read and keep it a secret?"
"A secret from the Tigelaars?" he asked skeptically.
"It's not unheard of," she said, thinking on their entire reason for being there.
"You'll teach me?"
"No, Killjoy is rather keen to."
Liir frowned at her.
"Well, come on," she beckoned for him to sit beside her. "We haven't that much longer before the rest realize we're gone."
Liir took a spot on the bench next to her, hesitantly adjusting his position as if he wasn't sure how close she would allow—or how close he could get without touching her. She made a comment that he wouldn't catch her green, and it earned her a small laugh from him. The sound made her uncomfortable. Well, the feelings it caused did, at least. A swelling warmness or happy tug in her chest. So she prattled on about the importance of being well-read when in the company of dolts like the remaining Tigelaars or backwater Munchkins. The more she talked, the easier it was to ignore the feeling in her chest.
He struggled with the first few words, of course. Just basic sentence starting words, but he was able to pick out proper nouns easily. Vinkus, Arjiki, Scrow, Kiamo Ko, Oz. Words he had seen over and over.
It was odd, Elphaba, thought, teaching a grown boy to read. When she helped Nanny teach Shell to read, there had been a sort of ease to it. Shell hadn't had the same exposure as Liir had, and they were essentially working with a blank slate. He had to learn the proper nouns, verbs, simple articles, and conjunctions. Everything. Liir had to jump back to square one, though, before he could pick back up where he was. And that frustrated the boy, she knew. She could hear it in his voice as he tried to sound out gatherers.
"I'm tired," he complained.
"You haven't even finished the page."
"It's too long."
"It's four sentences."
Elphaba rolled her eyes and nodded to the book when Liir scoffed. She wondered if she should bribe him with goodies or something. Did people bribe their children? Or whatever Liir was to her. If she offered him a fresh baked good for every page he successfully read, was that teaching him bad habits? Or just the way of their world?
"I'll offer you a favor for every chapter you complete," she said decidedly.
"A favor?" he parroted back skeptically.
"Yes, a favor. You know what a favor is, don't you?" Elphaba continued at the look he gave her, "There are five short chapters in here, and if you read through this all, I'll owe you five favors."
"What if I don't want anything from you?" he asked.
"Maybe not now, but we seem to be stuck with each other for the time being. What if that nasty little psychopath needs a good scare? You couldn't possibly scare him. So you could ask me to: no further strings attached." When Liir stared back at her blankly, she clarified, "Manek, Liir. I'm talking about Manek."
"What's a psychopath?"
"Manek." Elphaba waved a hand somewhat dismissively, mostly because she wasn't sure how to have this discussion with a child. "Someone whose brain doesn't quite function like the rest of ours. Utterly fascinating, naturally, but dangerously so."
"The cook calls him a sociopath."
"Well there's an interesting debate."
They made it through two chapters and a half before the owners started washing up utensils, which told Elphaba they were preparing to close up. Liir didn't seem to be an especially bright child. He stumbled over his words, got unnecessarily frustrated with himself, and murmured berating comments under his breath. Elphaba attributed his quick fuse to the bullying—he couldn't have had much self-esteem with Sarima's children's constant jabs. Or perhaps if the maunts had spent as much time helping Liir as they did gossiping, he would have learned some basic reading skills. Though, she imagined they would have just sent him to her.
Killjoy growled lowly when the husband stepped toward them. Elphaba glanced up at him and then back down at where Liir's forefinger was tracing and retracing community. The husband held up a hand to remind Elphaba only one book could be borrowed at a time.
"Let's leave it there," she told Liir, gently taking the book from him. He looked disappointed, but Elphaba wasn't sure if it was with the situation, himself, or her. "The usual one, if you don't mind," Elphaba said to the owner.
Liir took Killjoy outside to wait for Elphaba as she filled out a small form the owners always requested even though she was the only one who borrowed the book. In was a thick tome, published not too long ago, about the rise of Arijiki ruling families and pondered what was next for the Tigelaar clan. It had pictures.
Elphaba looked over her shoulder at Liir who sat in the threshold, folded in on himself, with his head in his hands. She licked her lips then let out a huff.
"Will you sell the children's book?" she asked the owners quietly.
"This is a library," the wife replied flatly.
"This is a soap shop," Elphaba snapped. "Please," she added lightly.
The wife acquiesced after a few moments. "Just stop bringing the dog," she requested.
"Thank you." Elphaba tucked the book in her skirt and passed the other form to the husband along with some coin. She drew her hood as she headed toward the door. Liir popped up quickly and readily. "Come on then. They'll storm us with questions if they find out we've been visiting the village."
"What book did you get?" Liir asked. She had a feeling she was being put on the spot.
"Something well-above your level."
It was cold, and she knew it. But she didn't apologize or attempt a word of comfort. Instead, Elphaba kept a brisk walk as they trekked back up to Kiamo Ko. Liir's little legs struggled to keep up, but he did better than she expected. She only slowed down for a stretch when Killjoy seemed to glare at her from his trot beside her. The dog was right, she supposed. She wasn't trying to kill the boy. It wasn't his fault he was there. She hadn't needed to bring him down to the village with her. Why did she even bring him? Elphaba clutched the book she borrowed closer to her chest. She must have been coming down with an illness.
The sun was beginning to set when the finally neared the castle. Her crows were perched just across the bridge and on the bannister of the stone steps that lead down to the southern courtyard. Elphaba lowered her hood, and one of them started calling for her.
"Go tell the cook to give Killjoy a bowl of the good water," Elphaba ordered Liir while heading toward her beautiful crows.
Elphaba held her hands behind her back as she watched Liir and Killjoy disappear into the castle. The large doors shut heavily behind them, and Elphaba let out a rush of breath while the crows quietly watched her. Her hands shook lightly as she opened the borrowed book and blindly walked in the direction of the shed she found Liir in. She flipped toward the end of the book and ran her fingers over the pictures on the pages there. A few more pages until she landed on a full page photograph she knew well.
"Help me," she whispered angrily, though about nothing in particular.
She scanned a few more pages prior, ones with Baxiana's relatives prominently displayed in traditional Vinkun garb, overseeing ceremonies, attending hunts, and dancing at banquets. Elphaba quirked her lips to the side and snapped the book shut.
"Meet me in the tower in fifteen minutes, please," she told the crows who had followed her.
Elphaba propped the children's book up against the corner Liir had been tucked into. She glanced back at the entrance of the small shed and wondered how often the other children wandered in. Then, letting her gaze rake over the rest of the structure, how often anyone used it. For her own peace of mind, she worked up a small spell to keep it hidden from everyone but herself and Liir. But she stood with her hands across her chest, frowning down at the little book even after she witnessed the spell set.
Elphaba snatched the book back up and stalked off toward her tower.
She would give it to him some other time.
Ehhhhh?
(I swear I'll get to my other Wicked fics in good time.)