Deciding that she'd been avoiding it long enough Elphaba made her way to the rooms that Shell had told her their father occupied. Her sister had explained to her that morning over breakfast that Frex had practically locked himself away with his books, scrolls, and Ozma theories. Stepping up to the door to her father's suites, Elphaba took a deep breath. "He's gone mad, Elphaba, be careful." She'd been warned.
"Who is it?" Yelled out a gruff voice. "I said I didn't want to eat! I'm busy!"
Elphaba swallowed. "It's me Papa, it's Elphaba."
There was a shuffle of sounds behind the door before she heard it being unlocked. When it swung open a grizzled old man who looked older then he was peered up at her. He looked her over for a long time before reaching up to touch her cheek. "Fabala? My little Fabala?"
Elphaba was shocked to say the least. Her father hardly ever touched her. "Yes Papa, it's me."
Frex smiled and then took his daughter's hand. "Oh my Fabala you've come home at last." He pulled her into his sitting room and then let go of her. He walked, with a bit of a limp she noticed, to a large table covered in papers. "Come Fabala, come see what I've discovered."
He wasn't the same man she'd left behind for Shiz. There was an almost wildness in his aged, haunted eyes. Elphaba walked over to him as he'd asked and stood beside him. "What is all this, Papa?"
"The truth." Frex replied. There were scrolls and open books, hand written notes in Frex's handwriting, and letters on official Ozian letterheads.
Elphaba looked over it all expecting it to be old sermons and unionist scriptures. She hadn't really believed Morrible when she'd told her and Nessarose that their father had begun a quest for find the Ozma Tippetarius. But there it was, all laid out for her. Everything on the desk was about the line of Ozma. There were even things about Lurline spread out on the table. This made Elphaba blink. Her father was a Unionist, a believer in the Unnamed God, he wouldn't believe in the pagan goddess Lurline.
"Don't look so surprised." Frex said. "You know the line of Ozma is interwoven with the myth of Lurline. Doesn't mean I believe in fairy queens any more then I do the Kumbric Witch."
Elphaba decided not to mention what she'd read about the Kumbric Witch, but smiled at the thought of her father reading martial about her and Lurline. "What have you leaned Papa?"
"I think I'm on the brink of finding a line." Frex replied.
"A line?" Elphaba repeated, her brows scrunched in a questioning way.
Frex nodded. "A family line tied to the Ozma line. If the Ozma Tippetarius can't be found, then the rule of Oz would go to the female head of this line."
This actually stirred something within Elphaba. A legitimate and rightful heir to the throne, someone to challenge the Wizard's power? It seemed an almost to perfect dream. Then again, depending on who it could end up being, a horrible nightmare, but anyone was better then the Wizard right? Well, Elphaba thought, anyone but Morrible.
After spending the afternoon with her father listening to his theories, Elphaba felt as if her head were going to pop like an over filled balloon. She decided to go for a walk in the garden, which is where Shell found her.
"I hear you're here looking for help." Shell said as he fell into step with her.
Elphaba looked at her brother. She didn't know him and was a little uneasy around him.
He gave her a dashing smile and then grabbed her hand. "Come on then."
She was again taken aback by the touch of a member of her family. It was strange, she didn't see the same emotions in Shell's eyes that she did in her father's or Nessarose's. There was no pity, loathing, or embarrassment.
Shell led her back into the house, down to the cellar, and to a door near the wine cellar. He opened the door with a key and then led his sister down a cramped and winding stair. At the bottom he opened another door with another key. Stepping inside he lit candles and lamps to give them light.
In the center of the room was the oddest contraption she'd ever seen. Elphaba walked over to it and then around it.
"It's a printing press." Shell told her. He then walked over to a small desk and picked up several pieces of paper, which he handed to her.
Taking the papers Elphaba read over them in shock. There were articles on Animal Rights, anti-Wizard sentiments, and even illustrations of Animals and other citizens of Oz being mistreated. She read over one of the articles and then looked up slowly. "Shell, this says that a man from Gillikin was beaten by the Gale Force for speaking against the Wizard's yellow brink tax."
Shell nodded sadly.
"How?" She asked simply.
"No one ever notices when I take off for a few weeks. I talk to people, follow the Force troops, we have people on the inside, Fabala, we're working towards the same thing you are, or at least I think you are." He waved his hand around to show the room as a whole. "I come back here and print those, then take them back to be passed out."
Her head was spinning again. Was she being told that her brother worked on some underground set up to unseat the Wizard? "But I've never seen anything like these before, not even at Shiz."
"Then you weren't looking close enough." Shell told her with a smirk. "So, I know I'm not some sorcerer or even college educated or anything, but will I do?"
"Do for what?" Elphaba asked.
"The help you came here looking for." Shell replied.
Elphaba looked at him carefully for a moment. "Why?"
"Because we hold the same belief, the Wizard's killing Oz," He paused and then took her hand again. "And because I'm your brother and you need help and maybe a little family to stand beside you."
There was never a time where Elphaba had wanted Glinda to talk to, to be with, more then she wanted her love there with her now to help explain all this to her. She never was any good at matters of family and friends until Glinda.
Oh Elphie, Glinda thought as the large pink bubble she'd just spelled started to lift from the ground. It had taken her weeks just to get the silly thing big enough to go all the way around her and give her room inside, and sturdy enough to hold her weight and not pop under her heels. With those goals accomplished, it was time for the hard ones. Getting the thing in the air and controlling it. How am I supposed to steer this thing once it's in the air? She asked herself as she looked down. The bubble was three feet off the ground and rising. Oh Elphie I wish you were here to help me.
She'd gotten the bubble to move around a bit and was trying to get it higher when she heard people calling out her name. The tone in her classmates' voices caused Glinda to lose concentration and the bubbled popped causing Glinda to land on her behind with a soft thud in the grass.
"Are you alright Miss Galinda?" Averic asked as he helped her up.
Glinda pulled her hand out of his and smiled politely. "Yes Master Averic, I'm fine, thank you, and it's Glinda now."
Pfannee and Shen Shen both looked impressed that Averic had shown Glinda some attention. Then they remembered why they'd coming looking for the blonde. Reaching into her bag Shen Shen pulled out a piece of paper and held it out to Glinda. "Glinda! Look! We've seen these all over campus. Morrible's having a royal Ozian fit."
Glinda took the paper, which turned out to be a pamphlet of some sort, and began to read it. It was full of anti-Wizard articles, including one about what had really happened between him and Elphaba. It was written so eloquently and with so much detail that she knew who had to have written it.
"Can you believe it?" Pfannee said with a huff. "The lies that green girl's telling people about our Wonderful Wizard."
It took a lot for Glinda not to react or say something.
"Madam said everything she's saying is a lie." Shen Shen added. "That she's merely trying to get back at the Wizard for seeing through her."
"Seeing through her?" Glinda asked when she finally looked up.
Shen Shen nodded. "He saw she was wicked, especially after she cast that awful spell that turned all those cute little monkeys into evil winged creatures."
Pfannee put her arm around Glinda. "You should go to Madam." She advised. "To make sure that wicked green girl didn't bewitch you."
Fighting the urge to push the other girl off her, Glinda settled for stepping away from her. "I'm sure I'm perfectly fine." She said with bouncy perk. "Madam and the school physician checked me over when I got back."
Both girls beamed at Glinda as Averic offered his arm to walk her back to the girl's college.
"See, our Glinda's too good to be bewitched by that nasty wicked witch." Averic said.
Something inside Glinda exploded with pain at the sound of that name. Wicked Witch, if they only knew the truth. They will, she told herself, they'll know and then they'll see how awful it feels when they feel the way they made my Elphie feel.
Once she was alone in her now private dorm room, Glinda sat on her bed looking over the pamphlet a little more carefully. She'd nearly given up but then something small caught her eye. At the bottom of the back page in the left corner near the fold was a tiny design. When she looked at it more carefully she could make out an entwined P and G wrapped around the handle of a broom. Pink and green go good together, she thought as she hugged the paper to her chest. Then she smiled as she wiped a tear from her cheek. But I think I prefer my bubble to that broom.