Chapter 25.
A/N Thank you for the reviews. It's awesome to have people take the time to leave a word. Please keep it up :)
It was white.
White light.
Such a cliche.
He remembered such cliches from long-forgotten poetry in dusty classrooms back at Shiz. From novels he'd never read and stories he'd heard tell. He'd never thought his life to be a cliche until he met Elphaba and knew differently. He was a prince but never a promising one. A rebel but not a true one. She...was a true original, as much by default as by choice. Unfamiliar and surprising in every aspect, yet utterly believable. Anything but a cliche.
His most original and defining quality, he knew, was being able to see her for who she was, where the rest of the world was blind to everything but her color. It was an affliction he was grateful for and one that made every life choice for him from the moment he'd decided to help her save that Lion cub.
Now, loving her was an integral part of him; he hated libraries (silence always got to him for some reason) and avocados (pretty much the only green he couldn't bring himself to like), liked dancing and cotton candy and loved Elphaba Thropp. Fiyero Tiggular in a nutshell.
So the decision to swing in on that rope, an entrance he couldn't help but be quite proud of, had been an easy one. It was either him or her and the latter wasn't an option.
When he'd thrown down his rifle at Glinda's feet, because of course he was never going to hurt her, and been dragged off by what remained of his Gale Force, he'd known what was to come.
So he wasn't sure what was happening now, but he did know it was not what he had expected of death.
The picture of his former girlfriend and the men he'd called friends faded. Elphaba, her arms held back by the men he would never call friends again, blurring along the lines until it was nothing more than a vague memory somewhere in the distance.
Fiyero, how in Oz...
But she'd never finished her sentence because he'd interrupted her question with an order.
I said, let her go!
And he'd pointed his gun at a woman he'd believed he could love, a long time ago.
A time before a girl had entered his life that had turned it upside down without so much as an apology.
A girl that had changed him completely without being aware of it. Even he hadn't been aware of what she'd done, what she truly meant, until she'd left never to come back.
The girl he was seeing now.
Only he wasn't merely seeing her.
A tiny green girl, skinny legs and straight black hair that ran down her back. A small face with big brown eyes. He could see her, sitting on a bed with a blanket pulled over her legs, up to her chin.
But he felt her too.
She was cold and scared, huddling beneath the tattered blanket without wanting to admit her fear. Half hidden, and half raised up to face whatever it was she feared.
Little green fingers on the ledge of a windowsill as a coffin was carried over the grass. Confusion and grief and chaos in her mind. Her mother's funeral?
He never got to see what it was because the next moment, he saw her running down a gravel road, fast, so fast, past trees and bushes, hurried and out of breath. Scared again but not of the unknown this time. She looked, he looked, behind to see other children follow. It took him a second to realize that she was running from them, they were chasing her. She was fast, but not fast enough. He could see, feel, as they caught up with her enough to throw a rock that hit her in the shoulder. She didn't fall but she stumbled and it slowed her down enough for a boy to catch up with her. He pushed her, Fiyero could feel his hands grabbing at her arms and then push her against a tree. What color do you bruise, little frog? Is it green when you bleed? Fiyero felt anger at that but she didn't. She fought back and ran and the next thing he knew he was in a bathroom, where she sat on the edge of the bathtub and bit her lip as she cleaned a wound on her arm (had that boy given it to her or was this a different time, a different bully?) It hurt, he could feel it, but she didn't cry. She didn't make a sound, but he could taste the coppery blood as pushed her teeth into her bottom lip and cleaned up the mess.
He whirled past another picture, her father talking to Nessa. Elphaba, as still and silent as she could, sitting at the same table, a piece of paper of some kind in front of her. This was a clear moment. He could tell it was important somehow; the colors were more vibrant and he could almost feel her heartbeat. A rapport card, that's what it was. All A's. It didn't surprise him. She wanted to show her father, he would have been able to tell that even if he hadn't felt the anxiety. But Frex didn't pay his daughter any attention. He was focused on his youngest and her rapport card. Fiyero wanted to say something but knew he wouldn't be able to. These were memories, Elphaba's memories, and he didn't know how but he was along for the ride. He watched as she took the card of the table, put it away and picked up her fork.
He wondered about the how and why of it all but before he could come to a conclusion, he was dragged along by the next flash of memory, another piece of her life.
A leap in time, as he saw her in front of Shiz. Her father coming up behind her, pushing Nessa. He yelled at her about something, but she barely took notice. Excitement and apprehension fought a battle inside her but excitement shone the brightest.
More moments at Shiz then. Fellow students that called her names, being roomed with Galinda, who refused to speak to her. The library, quiet and solitary. Protective and safe.
No one had wanted to talk to her, he remembered, but now he realized that she had never expected anything else. She seemed quite happy, as he got a glimpse of Dr Dillamond as he praised her work. In fact, she was happier than ever because her brain was finally being challenged and she was rewarded for who she was, with good grades and attention from Professor Dillamond.
One moment followed right after the other, barely seconds long but a whirlwind of emotion that felt much longer.
His own face then, as she dropped her books and he stared at her anger in laughter.
Maybe the driver saw green and thought it meant go.
The hat she'd worn at his welcoming party. The cut of shame and sadness at the Ozdust, when she realized it had all been a sham, a prank to make a fool of her. The anger at herself because she'd fallen for it, dared to hope.
Her fear as the classroom went crazy. He remembered that day as if it was yesterday and he knew the expression on her face because it had been what had propelled him into action and he'd seen that face so many times, in dreams and nightmares alike. She was scared, genuinely afraid, of what she'd done and what would happen. She felt lonely, in that moment, and he felt it as if it was him (and it was, now, in a way) but then he had run forward, his eyes trained on hers and the shock that pulsed through her at his action silenced him. He knew that she'd been surprised at his help but he'd never known how shell-shocked she'd been. Had no one ever done anything for her?
The shock of his hand against hers, when she'd grabbed onto his to make him stay. No one touched her out of their own free will, until Galinda had come along. Except for Nessa, maybe. No man certainly had ever so much as touched her.
The pain of seeing him with Galinda, and the acceptance that followed right after. There was no fight in her when it came to things like this. Only resignation.
The Wizard and the moment she realized the truth. The fight in her, the pain (but no sense of surprise) of Galinda saying no to joining her in her defiance.
The absolute thrill of her first flight.
Flashes of being cold, hurt, wet, hungry. The longing for warmth, in every sense of the word. The taunting memories of him and Galinda. The memories of not being truly alone.
Flashes of his face, of the poppies he'd given her at the train station. Poppies, whenever she saw them, reminded her of him.
His face kept popping up now. It startled him. He'd spent so much time thinking about her, searching for her, that he'd never stopped to consider that maybe she'd thought about him nearly as often.
You shouldn't have to be, should you?
Do you understand why I'm here with you?
The victories of what she did. The Animals that were saved, that were grateful. The joy of doing something good.
The loneliness. The knowledge that she could never have made another choice, but the desperate wish that she'd never have had to.
The absolute, terrifying shock at seeing him in that rundown building where he'd gone to find her. The fierce love she felt, and the surprise at the feeling. Astonishment at her first kiss. Bliss then, as she let herself give in for a second.
The disbelief at his words, at his declaration of love. She didn't believe him. She wasn't worthy of him and never would be.
Her pain and the shattering of the last smidgens of hope as Nessa refused to listen, to help, to believe.
Hurt and denial at Glinda's accusations and harsh words. Guilt at the truth in those words. Love too, though, for her best friend.
The utter fear and complete horror as she watched him swing into that field to save her. Her heart, his heart, felt as if it was being torn from her chest, literally being ripped to pieces, as the soldiers hauled him off.
The desperation to save him. To do nothing else but save him. Her willingness to die for that. For him. She'd give everything, for him.
He felt it all.
He saw it all.
It flashed before his eyes, in his mind, around his heart, faster than a heartbeat, but he saw her whole life.
Oz, this girl...
He didn't feel himself waking up, couldn't tell the difference anymore between dead or alive, awake and asleep. Questions of where he was, and who with, what had happened and what would happen next, made their way to the front of his brain as he struggled his way to consciousness.
"Fiyero?"
He knew that voice but couldn't place it.
"Fiyero?"
A warm hand clasped around his. He knew that touch.
That voice.
Of course. His mother.
"Mom?"
"Oh, Thank Oz."
He blinked to get the foggy remains of sleep out of his eyes.
"Mom?"
He tried to move but soft and steady hands pushed him back into the mattress.
"Yes. I'm here. Your father too. I..."
He was glad to see them, to hear the voices he knew so well. But he was missing one voice. One face.
"Elphaba..."
His father's face filled his line of vision.
"She's...she's not awake yet, son. Don't worry now. Rest first. She's just in the next room so no need to panic."
He must have slept a while. His head was heavy and filled with clouds. And he didn't hurt. Or not as much as he should be hurting, at least.
"What happened?"
"You don't remember?"
"I remember the Gale Force."
He sat up, despite the hands that tried to hold him back.
"I remember them dragging me off. I thought I was going to die. I thought I had died."
He paused there. Maybe...
"Wait. Did I die?"
"No. No. Fiyero. Calm down. You're not dead. Neither is Elphaba. Though they did almost...but they didn't so it doesn't matter right now."
He was wide awake, all of a sudden. Clear-headed.
"How did I end up here? Like this?"
"We're not sure. Elphaba brought you here. You were really hurt, Fiyero. She did a spell. I don't know for sure what she did exactly, but you got better. Your wounds just disappeared. Most of them anyway."
"What?"
"Yes. She had a spell. She said you'd be fine."
So...that had been real? His dream. Her dreams? What...how...maybe he wasn't awake enough, after all.
"Where is she?"
"She's in the next room. She's.."
"Is she okay?"
"Well...I...we don't really know. Like I said, she did a spell and you got better...but...well...she didn't."
She didn't say anything else and his father looked grim.
He got up.
He should have been surprised but wasn't to see Yackle in the next room.
"Well, I never thought I'd see you look this spry again, Master Tiggular."
"I never thought I'd see you again at all."
He didn't bother with pleasantries. He was grateful for all the woman had done for him, for Elphaba, for Keegan, but he'd be glad to never see her again.
"I know that's what you'd hoped for, but since you two can't seem to keep yourselves out of trouble..."
Had he said that out loud? He didn't care.
"What's wrong with her?"
"Nothing too serious, though it's hard to say. It's not an everyday occurrence, this spell."
"Yeah. My mother filled me in, sort of. Or at least she told me Elphaba did a spell to save me and it ended up with me better, and her worse."
"Yes. That's is the gist of it, I suppose."
That calm, almost flippant tone of voice drove him mad. These were people's lives. How could she be so indifferent?
"Why did you give her that spell?"
"You were very hurt, Master Tiggular. Had she not done what she did, you would not be with us today."
"Yeah, I sort of gathered that. I knew what I was doing."
Giving up his life so that she would live had been the whole point.
"No one who does anything out of desperation ever does."
He didn't argue with that because he didn't know how to.
"So neither did she then?"
"Of course not. The girl wouldn't listen to reason. All she was concerned about was getting a spell that would return you to this world."
He noted, though he couldn't say why, that she didn't say 'return to her'.
"So what exactly happened?"
She sighed, deeply. It pissed him off immensely.
"She did a spell that healed you. Isn't that enough?"
He didn't like this woman.
"No. Why did it hurt her?"
"Because magic, especially of the darker kind, the more powerful kind, always comes with a price. She wanted nothing short of bringing you back from the dead. As I told her, that's not possible, but you weren't dead. Just badly, severely, injured. To heal that means to alter the world, in a way. Turning back time is not an option because it would reverse everything else and you can't simply speak a few words and have your injuries melt away."
"So her being hurt was the price?"
"It sounds awfully trite, if you put it that way. You healed because she took away your pain, by accepting it herself."
That would explain it. Sort of.
"So we traded places?"
"Again, so trite. But yes, in a manner of speaking."
"But...I saw her. I could feel her. It was as if I was in her shoes, in her life. I could see her life. Memories, I think."
"Yes. I suspected you would. I warned her about that."
"So how did that happen? Is it because she changed places with me? Did she see me too then?"
"I would venture so, yes. In order for her to do what she did, her soul had to connect to yours."
It made sense, in the kind of way that didn't.
"So how does that work?"
"Well, the person to figure that out would make history, Master Tiggular. There are many theories."
"What's yours?"
She looked back at Elphaba, then at him and when she spoke her voice was gentler than he'd ever heard it.
"I believe that some things touch your life, in a deeper and more profound way than most. These things touch your soul, scar them if you will. And I don't mean that in a bad way. There are positive and negative experiences in a human life that change the way we live, who we are at the core. Those things alter you. I suppose meeting Elphaba has done that for you. She changed you and in doing so, she touched your soul. If someone were to take it, and hold it up against the light, they would see your parents, probably, other people that had a great influence, that changed the way you think, the way you view life and live yours."
He could almost understand what she meant. And he could agree with it too. At least where Elphaba was concerned.
"So that's a soul mate?"
She shook her head and smiled softly. It wasn't something he'd ever expected to see on her face and it made her seem young and old at the same time.
"Oh, I don't know about that term. I wouldn't dare to go as far as touch that subject or claim to hold valuable opinions on the matter. But the soul is a fascinating and endlessly mysterious thing. It is, I believe, who we are. and those that manage to touch it, to become a part of it, they change who you are forever."
Her voice grew softer, as if she was moving away from him. He'd been looking at Elphaba the whole time, lying too still and too small in a bed too huge. He'd half expected Yackle to be staring far off into the distance. When he sneaked a glance at her, however, he found her eyes focused on him.
"We are shaped and fashioned by what we love, aren't we, Mr Tiggular?"
He had the feeling there was a correct answer to that question somewhere, but he didn't have it.
"I guess."
She smiled again. Still soft but wider. She seemed satisfied.
"So do I. And that's the best we can do."
Nessa's funeral had been a sober one. Glinda had been the only one there. Somehow, she'd expected Boq to be there but he hadn't been. Nessa had died by Morrible's hands, Glinda was sure enough of that to bet her inheritance on it, and she hadn't deserved to die as a means to an end. She'd died so that Morrible would have a chance to kill her sister too. The irony of that, after trying so hard not to be associated with Elphaba ever again, was not entirely lost on Glinda.
She wished now that she'd visited more often. That she'd been a better friend. But then she reminded herself that she and Nessa had never really been friends in the first place. And when Elphaba had disappeared, and Nessa had done everything in her power not to be associated with her sister, Glinda had been too angry, too sad, too disappointed, to invest much time in the younger Thropp.
She'd still seen her at times; Social functions demanded patience and the ability to hide dislike behind affected smiles and Glinda had always been good at that. Fiyero desirably less so, it turned out. He didn't like Nessa, resented her for abandoning her sister and saying all she said about her, and had never bothered to hide it.
Glinda could never really blame him because, behind her smiles and attempts to care, she felt the same way.
Still. To have no one at your funeral...
Elphaba would have been there, had she been able to. Glinda knew that and she wasn't surprised not to see her. She also knew that if Elphaba had been there, then Fiyero would have been too, and she was secretly glad to find them missing. She wanted them to be happy and she would do anything in her limited power to ensure their safety. Anything she could do to help them stay out of the hands of Morrible and the Wizard, she would do. But to see them together, a couple, a unity. To see her former almost-fiance holding hands with her best friend...
She wasn't sure she could handle that yet. And she wanted to be good, she wanted to help them. But it was best, for all of them, that she did it from a safe distance. She couldn't trust herself yet, to not let her emotions run her. To see them together, to be faced with the undeniable truth of what had happened between the three of them...it was a test Glinda was not ready for.
But...but...as much as that would have hurt, she still thinks she would have preferred it. Because at least she'd see them in one piece. At least she'd know they were alive.
Now, she didn't know anything. They could be anywhere. They could be dead. She'd heard that Fiyero had been dragged off to the cornfields. The news that their former Captain had committed treason to help the Witch escape had made its way to the Ozians too quickly to stop it, and they had cheered as it reached them that he'd been arrested, been punished for his crime. The news that he was no longer where the Gale Force had left him to die, was even greater news.
She hoped it had been Elphie. She hoped he'd been saved, but she couldn't be sure.
And she had not the slightest clue as to what Morrible and the Wizard were up to. She only knew it wouldn't be anything good.
For the second time in less than a month, Fiyero sat by a bed and watched her, hoping she'd wake up soon, knowing that she would be fine, but wasn't right now.
His head still reeled from what he'd seen.
Yackle had explained to him what had happened, the spell Elphaba had done to save him. How it came to be that he'd seen so much of her. He'd understood about half of what she'd said and even that part he wasn't sure about.
His soul had connected to hers, she'd said, and that was why he'd seen what he'd seen.
He'd never really believed in soul-mates, and he wasn't sure he did now, but he figured that if it was a real thing, they were as close to it now as they'd ever be.
She did love him.
She'd told him so, of course, and she wouldn't lie about it. But now, he saw what that meant. For her. To her. She'd never learned to love, to be loved. She was still, without a single doubt, the strongest woman that he'd ever know, and there would always be something ethereal and other-worldly about her, but she'd always been a girl, as well. A hurt and deeply lonely girl.
No more.
He felt the determination of his resolution set in the back of his head, even he was only half awake.
No more. He would take care of her.
She was his girl now, after all. She wouldn't be lonely again.
Thanks for reading! Review? Please? Pretty please? A reward will appear in the form of a new chapter (either monday or tuesday).
("We are shaped and fashioned by what we love" is Goethe's wisdom, by the way. Not mine :P)
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