Hey guys, sorry for the delay. School stuff has to take precedence, no matter how I really feel. :) Here is the next chapter. I'm not really happy with it, but what author ever is. The chapter introduces a new concept (you may or may not like it), so tell me what you think. I had to give a bit of history because there is a three month jump here, let me know how that transition went. And a Ozian History lesson without getting lectury. Anyway, please review after you read and I will love you forever. Thanks to all of my usual reviewers, and let me know what you think!
Disclaimer: I do not own anything dealing with Wicked/The Wizard of OZ, blah, blah, blah. Just don't sue me :)
Chapter 7: Angels and Goodness Knows
Glinda found herself back at Shiz, acclimated back into the world of fine learning. She had not been given a chance to grieve much for the loss of her dearest friend because of all of the new and extraordinary things that seemed to be happening. After "the incident" everyone had been shocked to find out that Elphaba, their green colored classmate, was actually a great force of evil. Glinda was having difficulties with the issue at hand, she knew that Elphaba wasn't a wicked person, but the more people talked about it the more frustrated she became with the whole thing. As always, when something frustrated her she ignored it. However, the rumors that flew began to eat at her confidence level, and she began to wonder if the rumors were really true. People seemed to forget her association with Elphaba, and were utterly excited to find out the news of her position.
Madame Morrible had returned to Shiz as well, the Wizard, she said, had sent her to oversee Glinda's training and act as her private mentor. Another was found to take her place has head of the school. Cornelius Vicardian, who had previously taught Glinda's Exuberance Methodology class in the Political Department, was selected. In Glinda's opinion, this was done because of his loyalty to OZ and the Wizard; he was an easy pawn to play, after all exuberance was empty when no brain was there to back it up.
Fiyero seemed distraught when Glinda had come home without Elphaba. Glinda decided to take it as he was as shocked as she was to find the Elphaba had chosen to abandon everyone who mattered to her. She clung to Fiyero tighter. The further he tried to push her away, the further she would go to impress him, he seemed to finally come to the realization that he could not win, which made Glinda all the happier for it.
Nessarose was nearly inconsolable, her father fell sick shortly after Elphaba's disappearance, but as far as Glinda had been informed, was recovering from the shame nicely.
Glinda found that she had a new sense of control in all other aspects of her life. Where ever she went people seemed to respond in a new manner. It wasn't until about three months after her trip to the City that she picked up the paper and found a picture of herself on the front page top of the fold. She was astonished, but began to read the article. And it explained why she was being treated so differently.
The Wizard of OZ Finds a Source of Good
Speech Given by Press Secretary Madame Morrible
The incident of three months ago is a marring scar on the face of the Emerald City; however, the citizens of OZ should feel a sense of comfort. It is with great pleasure and distinction that from the incident, something Good has arisen. Lady Glinda Arduenna arrived in the Emerald City, it is speculated, around the same time as the "Wicked Witch", the Wizard had heard of Glinda's legendary beauty and goodness through philanthropy exhibited throughout the state of Gillikin and called for a meeting with her immediately. Lady Glinda not only has beauty beyond compare but some of the best sorcery skills seen in OZ since the Ozmaian Witches of Old. It is the Wizard's great hope that Lady Glinda, will bring a sense of peace to all of OZ. It has also been decreed by the Wizard that should he find it necessary, she will be his second in command. It is because of this honor to Lady Glinda, that the Wicked Witch came forth in all of her wretched and wicked glory, the curse meant for Lady Glinda missed, hitting the poor and innocent orphan monkeys that the Wizard had taken in after the natural disaster that struck the Gillikin forest. The Witch then proceeded to take Glinda to the top of the Western tower and try to push her off. If Glinda had not used her power to stop the Witch from destroying the Wizard's Palace, it would have spelled disaster for OZ…
Glinda looked up in shock she couldn't even bring herself to read the rest of the article. They had truly spun the story to such a degree to make her out to be the hero. She was thrilled and appalled all at the same time. She wanted to know why it had come to this. She looked at the clock tower and saw that she was nearly late for her Sorcery Class, while she had become relatively proficient now that Morrible actually paid close attention to her; she was no "sorceress of legendary power". She walked briskly to the door of Morrible's compartment and knocked. The door opened on its own, as usual.
"Good evening Lady Glinda, lets get down to business dearie, shall we? Did you study the spell I gave you yesterday?"
"Yes, I've studied it. Though I wish that you would tell me what it's for. All you said was to not say it out loud."
Morrible had a hungry look on her face.
"It is just something that the Wizard thought that you should do, if you are to be his advisor and all. He wants you to truly be a force of good in this world. I procured this spell from the Ozma line royal archives. Now Glinda, if you would, please invoke the spell."
Glinda stood in the center of the room and took her training wand out of her purse; she had mastered the shrinking enchantment that allowed her to enchant her bags to fit almost anything in them.
"I Summon fire, wind and rain, with this spell I call forth to gain, Powers which are yet to be mine. Powers to create a force divine. With this ancient magic I summon thee, to set the angel of goodness free."
As of late bubbles did not erupt from Glinda's wand, Morrible said that this was showing that her powers as a sorceress were growing; however Glinda's jewelry did glow very brightly. As she evoked the elements they became corporeal and began to fly around her, Morrible was standing just outside of the circle that had been created, she seemed to be laughing. Glinda thought about stopping the spell in the middle, she was rather frightened, however she recalled something that Morrible had said in their previous lessons. Once you summon an element you must command it dearie, or else it will be set free to do what it wishes, and that usually spells ruin for the conjurer. As the spell reached its conclusion the elements seemed to combine to form a bright light in front of Glinda, when the light faded a wand was floating there. It was silver and had bright blue sapphires and diamonds studded into a star-like shape, Glinda looked at it, the colors in the jewels of the wand seemed to mimic what she was wearing. Morrible walked over and tried to touch it however it seemed to emit an aura that wouldn't allow her anywhere near it.
"Well go on dearie, take it. It's yours."
Glinda reached out for the strange object that was hanging magically in front of her. As her perfectly manicured hand grasped the cool metal she felt a rush of excitement. Suddenly she felt whole.
"Well dearie, how do you feel?"
"I feel wonderful. But Madame, what is it?"
"It is the legendary wand of the Angel of Goodness. Long ago, before the official creation of OZ there were other deities, other than the Unnamed God, or Lurline, or the Kumbric Witch, or whichever. Now whether you are a Unionist or a Pleasure Faither, or any other religion, these deities made a huge impact on the formation of the world. This spell was found in an ancient text, the Wizard sent it to me shortly after his arrival, and he knew that I was an academic of lingification with a bit of skills in the magic department. Every time that anyone has ever tried to invoke the spell, they have failed miserably; even Elphaba was unable to produce the results seen here. But where she has sheer power, you possess a form rarely seen in a magic user, but enough of this history dabbling, you…"
There was a brutal knock on the door. Madame Morrible escorted Glinda to the back entrance to the Office hidden behind a bookcase.
"Ah, my next appointment has arrived, be a dear won't you and leave the back way. You now possess a powerful tool in your Sorcery arsenal. You will begin to feel the changes soon enough. But beware of using the wand too much until our next meeting."
Glinda was utterly shocked. This silly looking wand was obviously something of great power, and something that Madame Morrible had been pursuing for a long time. She was utterly too excited to even question Morrible as she was excused. She took her jacket and placed it over the wand to hide it as she walked out of the office.
As Glinda walked into her newly private suite, she looked into the mirror hanging on the wall near the door. She was surprised to see that she didn't look as tired as she felt, in fact, she looked better than she had in quite a while. The stress of trying to graduate early and the Elphie ordeal had changed her looks dramatically over the course of the last few months, however all that stressed seemed to be erased from her face now. She walked closer to the mirror and noticed that she had a subtle aura surrounding her head, very much like a halo. She looked at the wand and was surprised to see it twinkle even in the dim lighting of the room.
She came to the conclusion that she had earned this. She had been through quite the ordeal and this was fate's way of paying her back, so she began to try and experiment with the wand. She took out one of Elphaba's simple frocks that she had taken from her roommate's closet before the custodians came through and took everything away, she had also managed to spirit away several of Elphie's books, as well as her green bottle. All of these things sat in the bottom of her closet in one of Glinda's trunks, over the course of the last few months, Glinda found herself taking the things out and sitting with them for a little while. It was some comfort to know that she had a little piece of her good friend, wherever she was in the small world. She placed the frock on the edge of her bed. She wondered if it would work. She squared off and waved the wand in a brief, and what she thought, majestic manner. She even threw in a sing-songy voice.
"Ballgown!"
Even before Glinda's eyes the simple frock transformed into a magnificent ballgown. It was just as pretty as anything that she had ever seen in the specialty shops in Gillikin: it was bubble gum pink with jeweled accents everywhere; the skirt was huge and looked as light as air. She squealed and rushed over to it, it was nearly thirty pounds when she picked it up. Suddenly a wave of dizziness hit her and she fell forward onto her bed, and knew no more.
She didn't even feel when someone entered her room and watched her sleep. With a smirk and a flick of the wrist dark tendrils of smoke, almost like mini-storm clouds, appeared, they were held off by the strange aura that surround Glinda's sleeping form and with a flurry of fabric the presence vanished.
Glinda woke up cuddled up with the ballgown and the wand. Sequins and jewels pressed against her face. She sat up relatively confused by the recent set of events. She wondered what had woken her up, when it all came together. There was a knock on the door.
"MISS GLINDA!"
"Coming, coming. It is extremely rude for people to come banging my door down with such a force that even the Princess Ozma couldn't sleep through it."
She opened the door to find Boq standing there. He looked at her strangely. She realized that she must look terrible.
"Miss Glinda, you look very nice."
She was very confusifyed by his comment.
"Boq, whatever is the commotion all about."
"Miss Glinda, where have you been? You haven't been in class for nearly a week."
"Why, that's… that's impossible. I was just in Morrible's office last night."
"No. Glinda, listen, you haven't been around all week. The last time any of the other students saw you was just before dinner a week ago tomorrow."
"Well how is that even possible? Excuse me I need to go and talk to Morrible."
"No, Glinda don't you understand? Morrible has told everyone that you were off on some mission for the Wizard, promoting peace and goodness in some far off land."
"Really? Well that is utterly too strange. Well thank you for informing me of this. I truly appreciate it. Now I must get ready for the day."
She shut the door.
"DON'T FORGET OUR PRESENTATION IS TODAY IN HISTORY!"
Glinda walked over to her vanity, without looking in the mirror she picked up a make-up brush and began to apply her usual routine to her face, she looked up and her jaw dropped. The aura that had been present before seemed more pronounced, and on top of that, her face was utterly flawless, she needn't even think about make-up. She stood rather quickly and knocked most of her make-up to the floor.
"Oh my goodness. How clumsy of me."
She took a moment and placed her hands on her hips surveying the room, she then stooped down to pick the things off the floor. Suddenly there was another knock on the door.
"Just a moment!"
She grabbed the makeup and threw it back on the vanity, rushing to the door chastising herself. She opened the door to reveal Madame Morrible.
"Madame Morrible? What are you doing here?"
"You used the wand didn't you?"
She pushed through to Glinda's room. Glinda turned and quietly shut the door. Morrible walked to the wand but again was rebuffed by it which seemed to aggravate her further.
"I specifically told you not to use your new wand, and what do I find? You are incapacitated for the day after I release the news of your arrival in the City. And then I have to pull all sorts of string dearie to ensure that no one gets suspicious when you don't show up at your lessons."
"I do apologize Madame, if you had only told me the repercussions of using it I would have avoided this entire scandal."
"A scandal it is not dearie, thanks to my cleverly woven stories, mixed with various this and various that. I would have talked further with you, but other matters demanded my immediate attention. The Wizard sent a messenger to tell me that the Captain of the Royal Guard was killed in a tragic accident, something to do with a magician bringing a tool shed down on him. Squashed him and three of his lieutenants flat. "
"How terrible, how absolutely terrible. Someone should make a pronouncement or something."
"Oh, how good of you to think of such a splendid idea. That is why you are the Wizard's soon to be closest advisor."
She grandly exited the door, and Glinda quickly closed it behind her. She turned and nearly screamed, but then she didn't know what she would be screaming about. She felt frustrated and tied down and yet free and exhilarated. She walked to her closet and pulled out a lovely ensemble of a knee-length honey colored pencil skirt and a crisp white blouse with a lovely sequin embossed baby blue jacket, she thought she looked rather professional.
She entered her class a moment later and sat in her usual spot. The room got quiet as she entered. Everyone seemed to be in some sort of trance. Glinda tilted her head in an interested fashion and took out her pen a paper. The professor, who had also stopped talking upon the arrival of Glinda cleared his throat.
"I apologize Lady Glinda for starting without you, Madame Morrible and Headmaster Vicardian said that you would be out on some peace negotiation until next week."
"Oh no professor… I… got back early, it was a rather successful trip."
Some of the students turned to look at her.
"Glinda, it is too bad that you were not in the city when the Wicked Witch dropped that building on the captain of the guard."
"Well it was only a tool shed…"
"I heard that it was an entire house!"
"I head that it was an office building!"
"Well my father works in the City and he told me that it was a ten story mansion!"
"Class, class! Settle down please, I'm sure that Lady Glinda tires of hearing the frivolous details of which she already knows. Now, Glinda, Boq requested that we wait for your project until you got back, would be willing to present today?"
Glinda smiled and stood, walking forward to the front of the room, she took our her training wand and gave it a little flick. Her notes for the presentation appeared.
"Your goodness, what will your and Boq's presentation be covering."
"The title of our presentation is Will the Lies We All Believe Outlive the Truth."
"Splendid. Well you may begin."
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