The presence of Aruc very nearly spoiled Elphaba's evening, but with Fiyero's intervention, he managed to keep a tolerable distance. She walked with Nessarose, admiring the beautiful gardens all framed by the majestic mountains and clear sky.
"Are you staying until the wedding, then?"
In the stillness disrupted only by the crunch of gravel beneath her feet, she couldn't help but eavesdrop on the men's conversation.
"Much of it, yes. I have some local business to attend to, what with my long absence, but you'll have plenty of time to be bothered by me, no worry." Aruc shot her wink, and she scowled.
"Master Aruc is quite handsome," Nessa whispered, and Elphaba blinked down at her. "I mean, so is Prince Fiyero, but…perhaps you hadn't be so thorny."
"Are you playing matchmaker, sister?"
"If you married him, we could live near each other after all."
"Isn't it awful enough that you're being married off without planning my incarceration as well?" Elphaba wrinkled her nose. "Imagine me, married. And to that obnoxiously rude boor no less." She fought a shudder.
"Planning our lives together already, cupcake?" Aruc dropped an arm around her shoulders. "How sweet. Will we have many children?" He eyed her lewdly. "Best to get started soon, I think."
Elphaba whirled on him, gripping his arm and twisting it behind him. "Touch me again, and I'll break it."
"What did I say, Fiyero? Feisty."
She snarled, "Cretin."
Fiyero stilled her wrist with a firm hand. "Elphaba, please." She flung the arm away as if leprous and stormed ahead a good twenty paces. "Aruc, you have to stop pestering her."
"Why?"
"It's ill-mannered. And she wouldn't hesitate to really break it. Then where would we be?"
"Oh, she only caught me off guard. It's not as if she's too strong to fight off." The prince lifted an eyebrow, and Aruc colored even as his chin jutted forward. "Why, Fiyero, don't tell me you're frightened of a woman."
Elphaba spun on her heels, fire in her eyes, prepared to show him exactly why he should be frightened of her when Fiyero caught her around the waist. He pulled her back, a hand clamped over her mouth.
"Aruc, why don't you show Nessarose the west wall? It should be nearing sunset, and we'll meet you there momentarily." He paused to glare back at his friend. "That is, if you can manage to be polite to my fiancée, at least."
Aruc looked genuinely apologetic. "Of course. I didn't…"
Fiyero sighed and nodded, pulling Elphaba off in the opposite direction. The other pair was long out of sight before he relented. "Can I let go, or will you go running back to murder him?"
Her shrug was sharp.
"Didn't I warn you not to react? He's just goading you. He doesn't mean it."
"Then he shouldn't say it," Elphaba hissed. "And you shouldn't be sending him off alone with my sister."
"She's fine, Elphaba." He caught her before she could shove past him. "He's not really so bad, and she's not nearly so offendable."
"Are you saying this is my fault?"
"No." He ran a hand through his hair. "I'm saying I need you both to stop, and to do that, you're going to have to calm down."
"Why don't you make him stop?"
"He will." Fiyero clasped her hand and towed her farther through the rows of poppies as if distance would soothe her. "Trust me, I know him. He's all talk and teasing, but he means well. He just wants to rile you, not actually upset you."
She snorted.
"I do apologize for his behavior."
"And Aruc?"
"Will apologize to you also." The determined tone in Fiyero's voice mollified Elphaba enough to stop dragging in the opposite direction. "Alright?"
"We'll see."
"For what it's worth, Aruc only annoys people he likes. As much as he's annoyed you, I think he may be hopelessly infatuated already."
"Ugh. I'd sooner marry swine than him."
Fiyero laughed. "Would you? That would make for some interesting children."
"Oh, shut up." But her rebuke lacked bite.
"So other than Aruc, how do you mind the evening?"
"It's alright." She let him redirect her, calming as she observed the vibrant fauna. "Your gardens are very beautiful."
He tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow. "I'm pleased you like them."
"You don't have to babysit me, you know."
"You're not a chore, Elphaba." He set his other hand atop hers. "I enjoy your company."
"Nessa must be missing you."
"Doubtful. Certainly not more than she is you." Elphaba couldn't argue, and she said nothing as Fiyero chuckled. "Besides, Aruc is probably charming her as we speak."
She frowned. "Then you should hurry."
"Why? Do you think I have something to fear from him?"
"Not in the slightest," Elphaba replied before she caught the trap. She slapped his arm lightly. "You cad! You should be ashamed."
"Should I?"
"That was a dirty trick. I didn't mean to compliment you."
He leaned down. "With such miserly praise, one must take what he can get."
"Men," she sighed heavily and shook her head. "Are you all so vain and insecure?"
"Most certainly." He plucked a poppy and held it to her. "And women are so immune to flattery?"
She wrinkled her nose. "Careful, or I shall have to break your arm as well."
"I've offended you?"
"No." She smiled. "Not yet, at least."
"That's higher praise than the other, I think." He tucked the neglected poppy in her hand. "You didn't answer my other question, though that's becoming quite the norm for us, isn't it?"
"I shan't answer that, either. If I say no, I'm a liar, and if I say yes, I'm contradictory."
"You, my dear, are always contradictory." The gentle affection in his endearment brought a strong rush of guilt as she remembered her resolution. She pulled away and crossed her arms in front of her, the poppy fluttering to the ground. He frowned. "Now I have offended."
"No."
He stepped in front of her and caught her chin. "You lie terribly, Miss Elphaba."
"Perhaps you have a guilty conscience." But she avoided his eyes. "Is there something you need to confess?"
"You tell me."
"How should I know what you ought to confess?"
"Then tell me what offended."
"I said it already - nothing." She shifted away from him, but he caught her arm to hold her still. His hand on her chin tilted her face back toward his.
"Elphaba, why won't you look at me?"
Her eyes darted to his and back away. "I don't know what you mean."
He sighed in frustration and dropped his hands. She felt a strum of remorse at his hurt, but she held steady. The silence drew long. He bent and reclaimed the poppy from the ground, twirling the stem. She eyed the spinning petals, and he dipped to catch her gaze with a soft, searching expression.
"I'm sorry," she whispered before she caught herself, and she rushed a half-sincere, "About Aruc. I shouldn't have hurt his arm."
"More likely his pride." Fiyero held out his hand, and she took it reluctantly. With a gentle squeeze, he said, "And are you proud?"
She tilted her head at his non sequitur.
"Did I do alright with your sister, or am I still hopeless?"
"Oh, certainly hopeless." She smiled at him. "But less so."
"Will you help me again tomorrow? I'm sure, slave driver that you are, there's more for you to drill in me."
She nodded and walked ahead, but he tugged her back.
"Thank you. For helping." He brushed his fingertips lightly over her cheek and tucked the poppy behind her ear. She blushed as he beamed at her. "It's very becoming on you."
"Then it's the last thing I need with that lecher around." She reached to remove it, but he stilled her hand.
"Aruc? He's not so bad."
She eyed him suspiciously. "For a prince, you have astonishingly terrible judgment at times, did you know that?"
He grinned. "Shall we rejoin them?" He nodded toward the reddening sun. "I shouldn't steal you for the entire sunset."
"Oz knows if Nessa's even still alive left that long with him. Hopefully he didn't topple her down the mountain."
"We're already at the bottom."
"Technicalities."
She pulled him forward, and he laughed at her. "Eager, are we? Careful, or you might give Aruc hope."
"You bite your tongue."
Elphaba felt oddly carefree, racing through the rows of flowers and towing Fiyero behind her. She chanced a twirl, and he caught her halfway. "Forward, you. No more escape today."
"As if I needed to escape." But she slowed to a walk, less intent on their arrival as she imagined more time with that oaf.
"True. I have to admit, I'm impressed. Aruc's not normally so easily disarmed." He adopted a teasing look. "Particularly by a helpless girl."
"Oh, helpless girl, eh?" She spun on him, and in a matter of seconds had his hands pinned them behind his back. "And what does that make you?"
"Willingly caught?" He stared down at her, grinning. "Do you really believe I would be so unchivalrous as to fight a girl?"
She narrowed her eyes. "So you'll manhandle me, but not fight me?"
"Precisely." He slipped his hands from her grip and spun her back toward the castle. "But you're stalling, and the sunset is not."
They turned the corner, and Elphaba gasped. "Oz."
If she'd thought the day and the night glorious, this spectacular union shattered her conceptions. The dying sun streaked the sky with colors so vivid, her lungs literally could not conduct oxygen. She froze, and Fiyero set his hands atop her shoulders, understanding her awe-filled paralysis.
Her vision could not contain the beauty that drenched the landscape. It felt too magnanimous, too ubiquitous, and yet still so close that its power seemed to radiate through her. If ever she'd contemplated the existence of a deity, this moment nearly convinced her.
"How do you live here?" she breathed. "How do you see this every day? Or doesn't it affect you after this long?"
Fiyero sighed to her hair. "True beauty is eternal, Elphaba. Like love – unfading and unrelenting. As powerful in each moment as the one of its realization."
She scoffed. "Love is a myth."
"It's not," he whispered. "Any more than beauty. Look at that and tell me it's impossible."
She blinked and shook her head. "Myth," she repeated with such lackluster she couldn't even have fully convinced herself. Fiyero smiled, but didn't argue.
