.Walk.- This chapter is dedicated to you, to heal the cut. :]
nutnut- I am delighted that you like my Elphie. To know that even one person believes I have written a character well makes my day, as characterization is one of my most favorite aspects of any story.
CurlyHairedGirl- It seems you enjoy the interaction between Elphie and Galinda the most in this story. There isn't much (if any) interaction between the two in this chapter, however, next chapter will hopefully make up for that. After all, I believe a ball is mentioned at the beginning of this chapter…? :]
nirky- Thank you for the compliment, it made me smile. I'm glad you are enjoying the plot. A couple of other people have commented on my particular development of Elphaba, perhaps this chapter will help explain that, to some extent at least.
Everyone- Sorry for the wait, hopefully this chapter is worth it. I just couldn't quite get everything to come across as well as I wished. Let me know what you think. Enjoy. -Ms.
Chapter 10: Variations on the Concept of Green
"Are you ready?" Asked her assistant, as though it really mattered whether she was ready or not.
"Does it make a difference?" The woman asked as she glanced at herself in the full length mirror attached to the wall.
This one was smart. She would do well for herself. The assistant smiled at the woman who she guessed would become a decent friend, at least as far as that was allowed to go. "No, your Highness, it doesn't. But I suppose you already knew that?" It wasn't really a question.
There was a knock at the door, and the woman before her sighed in resignation.
The assistant looked up from where she had been adding some last minute touches to the lay of the woman's gown. "Its time, your Highness. Take a deep breath and pardon me for saying, but kick some ass."
The woman turned back to her just as the doors to the stage opened, the grey smoke meant to add a bit of flair to her entrance boiling and writhing around her, and let out a full throated laugh. Her mock bow to the assistant was majestic and teasing all in one. "If you insist," she replied. She turned on her heel and disappeared into the smoke, the silver mass swirling and twirling to mark her passage as it lapped at the train of her dress. There was silence.
Then, just before the doors slammed shut behind her, the booming roar of applause and cheers assaulted the ears of the assistant who stood in awe, for the first time, of a person she had been hired to serve. By the sounds of the crowd, she was doing just as the assistant had suggested, though perhaps all it had taken was her apparently inherent ability for commanding the attention of those surrounding her. Never the less, the assistant smiled. She knew her advice was unnecessary but still felt some pride, as she knew her charge was currently kicking some ass with the force of her presence alone.
Galinda awoke to the sound of knocking on her dorm room's door and excited squeals coming from the girls responsible. She wiped the drool from her chin and brushed her hair out of her eyes. A glance to the other side of the room confirmed what she already knew to be true; Elphaba had spent the night out, once again. She had neglected to come back to their dorm room after Galinda's attempt at seducing her. Galinda sighed and put on her happy face to greet the bundles of high pitched giggles and flurries of motion that were Pfanee and Milla, both obviously too worked up to tell her what all the commotion and the early morning wake-up call were all about.
It made no difference though, as Galinda was fully aware. They would spill their guts before too much longer. She walked over to her vanity and began to comb out the tangles in the mass of blonde curls laying down her back and waited patiently for Milla and Pfannee to settle themselves on her bed.
When they had finally calmed down enough to speak, Pfannee took the lead. "Miss Galinda, we have all been excused from classes today!" A long squeal was added on to the end of this sentence for good measure. Galinda, who was, for some reason, not feeling her usual perky self today, was growing quickly annoyed with the sound.
"How wonderful!" She exclaimed. "To what do we owe this unexpected holiday, ladies?"
Milla took a deep breath and responded, her words running together with the speed of her speech. " Madame Morrible came into the dining hall today and announced to everyone present that..that…that… THE WIZARD HAS INVITED EVERYONE WHO MATTERS TO A BALL THIS AFTERNOON!"
Pfannee took over. "All of the students and staff at Shiz have been included as an extension of Madame Morrible's invitation! Apparently the Wizard has some great matter he would like to announce. But what do we care? A BALL, GALINDA! AT THE EMERALD PALACE!"
In an unconscious attempt to redirect her unusually sour mood, Galinda realized she was slightly intrigued. Despite all her family's wealth and notoriety, they had only been invited to the Emerald Palace one time, when the Wizard took power, and Galinda had been too young to recall the event. Her parents still spoke of it as if it had been yesterday. They spoke of the people, the architecture, the art, and the money. But mostly, they spoke of the almost ethereal power of the man who had become their new leader. Her mother and father had described it all so frequently that Galinda felt as if she could remember it as well, though they professed that even their grandiose descriptions did no justice to the truth.
Galinda smiled. "Well, ladies…" She paused and took in the hound-like stares of dogs to master she was receiving from the two girls. "It seems as if we have a ball to prepare for." Milla and Pfannee squealed again, this time in perfect unison, and jumped off her bed to wrap her in an exuberant group hug. Galinda took it all with the proper dignity befitting a leader, as her parents had taught her, and as she so obviously was.
Although they spent several hours preparing, and the time passed quickly, the carriage ride from Shiz to the Emerald city, while it only took half as long, seemed to take twice that. Galinda sat staring out the carriage window, occasionally joining in the banter of her classmates, and fanning herself half-heartedly against the unusual fall heat. Her forest green dress, while strapless, was long and heavy. Combined with the excruciatingly tight corset she had bought specifically for the dress, the several layers of bustles beneath her skirt, and the glaring sunlight, her fanning brought little relief.
While she had been preparing herself for the ball, the porter had arrived at her door with a message from Fiyero. Pleasantly surprised, Galinda had opened the letter, hoping to find an invitation to attend the ball with her prince. She had been only slightly disappointed.
My Dearest Galinda, the letter began.
As you well know, being Prince of the Vinkus, I must attend to certain duties on occasion. The matter which the Wizard will be speaking on prior to the ball requires my attendance during the ceremonies. I wish I could have informed you earlier, but as I only just found out myself early this morning, I must leave for the Emerald City without delay. Though I will not be available to escort you to the ball, I hope to see you there, and sincerely wish for the opportunity to make it up to you with the honor of being your dance partner for the evening.
All my love,
Your Prince, Fiyero
Galinda tried to sigh. Her corset laughed at her and foiled the attempt spectacularly. This day was not going nearly as well as she would have liked. Another useless attempt at a deep breath, and she gave up. Shallow and unsatisfying breaths they would be then. 'Just like you,' said a voice in her head. And she realized, without much surprise, that it was right.
They arrived at the Emerald Palace only a quarter of an hour before the Wizard was to deliver whatever grand announcement he had in store for them, and so Galinda had little time to take everything in as she would have wished. The one thing that stood out the most about the Emerald City was most assuredly the color. Or rather color-S.
Galinda realized that she had never fully understood the broad range of tone and shade that the color green could possess. Everywhere she looked, it seemed that a different variation was waiting to meet her hungry eyes. Every sign and streetlamp, every swirl of lettering across frosted sea foam storefront glass, every flamboyant street trolley, all of them possessed their own ode to the sometimes sensitive, sometimes ferocious, sometimes mysterious hues of emerald for which the city was named.
Galinda walked through the streets in silent awe of the mind behind such powerful beauty. The entire city was a masterpiece of design and structure, painted across the land of Oz like a single green brushstroke in the center of a collage of color. Only, if the Emerald City were the brushstroke of an artist, the artist had spent years sweating over perfecting each miniscule drop of paint to his liking, each shade and shadow, and the placement of each strand of the brush as it left its mark on the canvas. If the Emerald City were the brushstroke of an artist, he had been a genius to whom few could compare.
Lost in her scrutiny of the city, Galinda walked on, unaware of anything else until what would have been her hipbones (minus the obnoxious bustle of her dress) slammed into something hard and unyielding. She was snapped out of her daze immediately, and though she tried to conceal it, her face bloomed a vibrant shade of red when she saw the guard rail with which she had just collided. Instead of looking to see who had observed her embarrassing scuffle with the guard rail, Galinda took some time to examine the structure behind it. The stage where the Wizard would be appearing in a matter of minutes was a huge thing. From end to end, it spanned nearly one hundred feet in length. Though the guard rail was in place before the stage, there had been erected another one, quite similar in design and appearance, at the edge of the platform. Guards stood at strict attention every ten feet the length of the rail between the stage and the crowd. Though they gave off the impression of statues in their royal garb, stiff and silent, their eyes never stayed in one place for longer than a second, weighing, judging, and dismissing each member of the crowd in the space of a glance.
Suddenly, the blare of trumpets sounded directly ahead of her, and Galinda's eyes snapped back to the stage. The royal fanfare announcing the arrival of the Great and Powerful Wizard came to an abrupt halt as the man himself appeared from the double doors set into the back wall of the stage and Galinda was afforded her first glance of the man whom so many feared and just as many loved. Dressed in robes of deep emerald, the man who appeared before the suddenly silent crowd looked every inch the ruler of the most powerful nation in the world. He was incredibly tall and even through the thick fabric of his robes, his powerful chest and arms were apparent. His once coal black hair and goatee were streaked with the silver of his years, but only added to the sense of majesty he exuded. Dark brown eyes, set in an utterly masculine face possessing a squared muscular jaw and large, strong nose, scanned the crowd before him before coming to rest on Galinda who was standing just in front of him. A thoughtful look passed over his face before he glanced away and finally, he began to speak.
When he spoke, he spoke with ease and grace, his deep, baritone voice traveling on waves of magic to those even so far from the stage that he was but a speck in the distance to their eyes. Surprisingly, his speech was short and to the point, as if he was in a hurry to get it over with.
"Citizens of Oz, I wish to offer my most humble gratitude to those of you who have graciously accepted my invitation to this function. It is so very infrequent that we have the opportunity to experience something the magnitude of which I have called you here to see. I have someone with me today who I would like to introduce to you. This person, simply by being who they were born to be, and by the grace of Ozma herself of course, has today brought together the two most powerful lands in all of our world. I had intended on this day coming at a much later date, but events of which I will not bore you with the detail of have forced my hand it seems…" Here he paused as if to gauge his spellbound audience's knowledge of the aforementioned 'events.' Galinda had no idea what 'events' he was referring to, and by the continued silence of the crowd, she guessed no one else did either. Though obviously if it were something which would actually affect them, it would have been common knowledge by that point, so she, like the rest of the people in attendance gave it little thought.
Obviously satisfied with what he saw, the Wizard continued, his voice slightly louder than before, and Galinda felt the tingle of anticipation dancing in her stomach at the sound. "So, loyal citizens, you are the privileged few who will bear witness to the unveiling of the most wonderfully powerful human being our world has ever seen." In that moment, something occurred to Galinda which made her chest tighten almost painfully, but the thought was so ludicrous, so impossible, that she squashed it with every ounce of mental strength she could muster. Her thoughts whirled and twisted in her mind like the thick grey smoke that suddenly appeared behind the Wizard, boiling out of the double doors which were once again opened by the guards standing escort to either side of him.
A shadow, dark and tall was moving slowly though the smoke onto the stage. The effect was that of something terrible and powerful moving in the dark, like a beast from the wilds north of the city stalking its prey. The smoke clouded the doorway behind the Wizard so thoroughly, that even in the bright mid-afternoon sunlight, it was impossible yet to see what it was. Though she had convinced herself that what she was thinking couldn't possibly be true, Galinda's heart was pounding like a drum, deep and insistent, in her throat.
She was not the only one. Each and every member of the crowd, though they could not understand why, stood silently in the grip of a deep, paralyzing anticipation. Not even the sound of breathing punctuated the sudden stillness surrounding the stage. It was into this void of conscious thought that the Wizard finally spoke once more, his voice shattering the silence which had descended like a hammer to a delicate Gillikan vase. As he spoke, the shadow moved gracefully forward through the thick fog of smoke enveloping the far side of the stage.
"I would like to introduce, with the greatest of pleasure, Her Eminence, Elphaba Melanie Thropp…"
Galinda felt her jaw drop, as the shadow amongst the smoke materialized into the green woman herself, beyond radiant in a strapless black silk dress, the train of which trailed far behind her into the void beyond the smoke.
"…Empress of the Vinkus…"
Her heart continued to beat itself into a pulp against her trachea as Galinda stared in wonder at the woman who she had tried to overpower with a silly game of seduction less than a day earlier. The wizard reached behind him without looking back and Elphaba placed her hand imperiously over his arm, taking two steps forward to stand abreast of the most powerful man in the world. Her eyes were steel covered in lace as her gaze swept out over the awe struck masses before her. A light breeze swept over the crowd, teasing her waist-long midnight hair as Elphaba's eyes came to rest on Galinda herself. Their eyes locked as the Wizard added her final title.
"…and, my daughter, Princess of Oz."
The quiet which had stolen over the crowd at the appearance of the green woman sounded like a bull in a china shop compared to the silence which now reigned. Even the birds in the trees planted throughout the city ceased their singing as if conscious of the magnitude of the words that had just been spoken. Galinda stared into the honey-colored eyes of her roommate and felt a sudden calm.
All at once, without warning, applause erupted from the hundreds present, as if of a single mind, the sound of thunderous approval. It went on for several minutes, and all the while, the two women's eyes never left those of the other. It occurred to Galinda then what she had always seen dancing mysteriously in her roommate's eyes, like the ghost of a ghost, tangible, but just out of reach. It had been power. Long hidden, almost to the point of dormancy, the inherent power of the green woman now shown dangerously, like a razor's edge, in the eye's which held her own.