A/N: Here we are, ladies and gentlemen, the latest chapter. It's been a joy to write, and I can only hope that you have as much fun reading it as much as I did writing it. In the meantime, I've been reading your reviews, and I must say, they've all been very encouraging.
I'm glad you think the story's epic, Town, and truth to be told, I'm just grateful that I've managed to rack up at least thirty-eight reviews.
GoodWitchesOfOz, I appreciate your honesty, and I'm glad you've enjoyed the story so far. Hopefully, this chapter- without the chainsawing that the previous one was subjected to- will be up to standards.
I hope you enjoy Elphaba's reaction, Wile E Coyote.
And to Anna Marie Raven... I was so tempted to have Elphaba get snarky about exactly that issue. But then, I've never been good at those kinds of jokes, and I couldn't figure out a way of working one into the conversation without it seeming out of place.
So, without further ado, read, review and enjoy!
Disclaimer: I own nothing of Wicked, the Wizard of Oz, Return to Oz, or anything of the Oz franchise that happens to influence me.
For a moment, Elphaba sat, frozen with disbelief at the sight of the Ruby Slippers glittering ominously on the ends of the Nome King's monolithic feet.
Then, she lunged.
Flinging herself at the King with all her might- and what little magical power she could draw on- she leapt towards the Ruby Slippers. She wasn't sure how she was going to actually get them off the King's feet, or what she was intending to do with the Slippers once she had them, or even if either attempt would work; in that moment, her mind was empty except for a seething miasma of rage, not just because this blood-drooling megalomaniac was currently wearing the very shoes that had been stolen from her sister's corpse, but because of every other atrocity that had preceded this moment: the kidnapping of Glinda and Fiyero, the destruction of Oz, the murder of Curter and Rasp, the revelation that he'd been spying on her from childhood into adulthood, and now this- a personal insult on top of a long string of injustices. All she could think of in that mind-incinerating instant was of taking the Ruby Slippers back and hammering the King into gravel.
And she flew: for a split second at the most, gravity forgot all about her as she launched herself across the room and over the Nome King's desk. In that moment, the Ruby Slippers were within arm's reach; she actually felt her fingernails glance off their bejewelled surface- and then an ethereal hand rocketed out of nowhere and swatted her away. Astonishingly, she landed right back in her seat, enraged, but otherwise unharmed.
"There's really no need for that, Elphaba," the King admonished gently, lowering the Slippers out of sight.
"You THIEF!" Elphaba screamed. "You avaricious, genocidal, grave-robbing bastard!"
"I stole nothing; I merely recovered what Dorothy Gale lost."
"Oh, and that somehow makes everything better, does it? You'd have gladly stolen them if you'd had the chance!" She let out a snarl of barely-restrained fury. "And I case I actually need to make this any clearer to you," she hissed, "I've spent the last year wondering what became of those Slippers, hating myself for allowing the only existing memento of my sister to slip through my fingers … when all along, you've been hoarding them!"
"Were they really the only existing memento?" the King asked; his voice sounded genuinely curious. "You spent almost every waking hour caring for Nessarose before you went to Shiz; you knew of almost everything she treasured, and you knew where it would have been stored in the family home- you might have even been able to find something that brought back fond memories of your beloved sister. Instead, you chose the Ruby Slippers, a gift she never thanked you for and never really appreciated- in fact, the very representative of the last time you ever spoke to one another: an argument. So tell me, do you want to remember your sister, or do you want to remember your own misery?"
Thanks to the sound of blood rushing through every single vein in her head at an intensity more commonly associated with horseraces, Elphaba couldn't hear what she said next: what little she could discern involved a long string of expletives and threats roared into the Nome King's face at almost point-blank range; it was all just meaningless noise to her ears, except for the rather welcome sound of her calling the King a "pathetic, flailing guesswork artist" and making bloodcurdling references to castration and molten lava. The fact that the King's expression didn't change throughout any of this explosive rant only made her angrier; at one point, she even tried to break the spells preventing her from using magic, to no avail. Eventually, though, she ran out of breath and insults, and collapsed back into her chair, growling furiously until her sense of hearing finally returned.
"For what it's worth," said the King, gravely, "I am sorry… but I couldn't just give them back to you, especially not after I unearthed their true power."
It took a little while for Elphaba to voice a coherent response, as she'd just about screamed her throat raw. After a few seconds, though, she managed to whisper, "That has to be about the flimsiest excuse I've ever heard in my entire life. And while we're about it, what true power? I enchanted those Slippers to let Nessarose walk; nothing more, nothing less."
"On the contrary, I think you gave them a great deal more than you intended: after all, I remember that these shoes were once plated with silver. Rather strange that a spell designed to let a cripple walk would turn silver into rubies."
"So? The spells of the Grimmerie aren't the most reliable in the world; maybe I garbled the incantation a little bit-"
"The spell had nothing to do with it. The power that these Slippers now contain was yours and yours alone."
"But that's impossible! I couldn't have-"
Elphaba's rationalizations were drowned out by the King's laughter. "Oh, you poor, self-doubting child," he said, pityingly. "You truly have no idea just how powerful you are."
"But-"
"You always overdo things when you're under stress: you sprang to the defence of a single lion cub- and put a whole classroom into a frenzy; you were anxious to please the Wizard, so you gave Chistery wings- and extended the spell to an entire flock of his brothers, who you didn't even know about at the time. Is it really so surprising that your attempt to help your darling sister resulted in some of the most powerful artefacts in recorded history? In the end, you were so desperate to give Nessa the chance to walk that, as you spoke the words of the spell, you accidentally infused the slippers with a fragment of your own intrinsic power."
And against all expectations, Elphaba realised that this made a disturbing amount of sense: thinking back to that tumultuous day, she remembered how just how tired she'd felt after casting the spell. In fact, by the time she'd left the house, she'd been seeing double; at one point, she'd almost blacked out in mid-air and had to stop for half an hour while she recovered. With no trustworthy doctors in reach, she'd been forced to soldier on until the fatigue passed, and in the chaos that had followed her visit to the palace, she'd forgotten all about it… until now. And that wasn't the only evidence in the King's favour, was there?
She found herself thinking back to just a few short days ago, when she and the refugees had sought shelter in the ruins of the family mansion: there, in the very study where the Ruby Slippers had been created and Boq had become the Tin Man, they'd found that massive hole in the wall, a crater that had clearly been there since before the place had been condemned. Both Rasp and Gnoll had believed it was a sign that Nessa had possessed magical powers, and after all her attempts at denying it, she now knew that they'd been right all along! She didn't even need to guess at how she'd made the hole: she'd been angry, guilt-ridden, and almost half-insane with loneliness and obsession, she'd just been abandoned by the man she loved and by her own sister, and if the magic of the Slippers really had been Elphaba's, all would have needed was one outburst- one scream of grief… and after seeing that power in action, what might she have done after that? Would she have tried to master it? What would she have planned to do with it? Would she have tried to make amends in some way? Would she have tried to hunt down Boq?
Or- if she'd survived the events of the next day- would she have become even worse than the Wizard?
Elphaba's subconsciousness, which had long since stopped responding to her desperate howls for mercy, immediately conjured up a vision of Oz conquered by Nessarose, a wasteland of ruined cities and endless deserts where the pitiful remnants of civilization lived in fear of the dreaded Wicked Witch of the East, the all-powerful itinerant madwoman who'd laid waste the country in her fruitless search for the Tin Man, even going so far as to kill her own evil sister in-
Oh merciful gods and demiurges, I'm actually buying into the rumours they said about me and her. I've only been in the King's presence for a few hours and the bastard's already driven me half insane. Someone please kill me before it gets any worse.
Back in the present, the Nome King was still explaining himself:
"I was only intending to use them to restore my lost powers- at first. But then I saw how the Slippers replenished themselves: for every mouthful of magic I consumed, a dozen more grew to replace it. And it didn't stop at regeneration either, for the energy you bestowed upon them was so potent that, now that it was unfettered by the frailties of a human body, it was actively growing in strength every day- and every hour, with the augmentations I performed. I expected to exhaust the Ruby Slippers' reserves by imprisoning the Wizard outside of our dimension; after all, it was something that I'd only done once, in my prime, and even then it had almost killed me. But no, there was always more, always more energy flowing through my body. Slowly, I began augmenting them further, conserving the energy, allowing it to build and purify until even the greatest sorcerers paled in comparison; we magicians can briefly defeat reality in our own small ways, but these artefacts can utterly dominate it."
"You mean-"
"Yes: the magic you infused the Slippers with is now so powerful, so concentrated, that reality itself now bends to the will of the wearer. Less than a few days after you created them, these humble shoes sent Dorothy Gale all the way home with a click of her heels. Can you imagine the power they can exert after a year of conservation and enhancement?" The King laughed almost hysterically, and then calmed almost as suddenly. "But there's a sting in the tail," he announced soberly. "I can't access their full potential, not as I am now; all of my experiments confirmed that, thanks to the rather messy collision of the original design and your enchantments, the Ruby Slippers work best for human wearers."
Another piece of the jigsaw puzzle gently slid into place. "The Nome hybrids," Elphaba whispered. "You were trying to make them human enough to use the Slippers."
The King nodded solemnly. "Lord Eldrect and his household were more than willing to sacrifice their lives; they'd been my allies since before my descent into solipsism. Unfortunately, even with the thimbleful of sheer power I'd managed to attain with the aid of the Ruby Slippers, the delicate transition from the inorganic to the organic was beyond me. The hybrids that resulted were sickly, barely-living creatures, too malformed in body and mind to even wear the Slippers, let alone wield them. For a time, I despaired, knowing that the power of effortless transformation was beyond my reach… but then, I remembered the Grimmerie; the incantations were undoubtedly complex, but the transformations that resulted were more than stable enough for my purpose. So, I convinced the War Council to invade Oz, promising them enough resources and riches to keep them occupied while I dealt with the Grimmerie; after all, with only a quarter of the Ruby Slippers' power unlocked, I'd be no match for all of them at once."
"And because you didn't have time to learn its spells on your own before they returned, you captured Glinda and then me."
"I hadn't originally intended to so in Glinda's case: up until I saw her in action, I was only going to use her as bait to draw you in. She put up quite a struggle when my forces attacked the Emerald City, even managed to use an Animation Spell on the fly, so I made her a deal and incorporated her into my plan-"
"- In case I refused to take part," Elphaba finished. "Thank you very much for clearing that up. In that case, all that remains to be seen is just how long you're planning on torturing me until you give up, kill me, and settle for the Witch you've already fooled into working for you."
The King opened his mouth as if to speak. Then, he realised what Elphaba had just said. "I'm sorry, what?" he asked blankly.
"Well, if you've spent the last decade keeping an eye on me, and if you've questioned the Wizard, you'll know that I've learned my lesson: I do not make bargains with the enemy; I have ethics, standards, and maybe even a few badly-traumatized handfuls of pride. Furthermore, I've been subjected to enough attempts at temptation to know that you have absolutely no way of giving me what I want, either because you're a born liar or because you're so convinced that the Ruby Slippers can give you everything you ever wanted that you've lost interest in the facts. See, I know that there'd have been no way that the Wizard could have possibly made me into a hero after so many years of demonizing me, just as I know that you can't just use the Ruby Slippers to grant wishes. So, you'll fall back on torture, and because you don't have the time to break me, you'll eventually give up, kill me, and settle for Glinda. End of story."
"Good grief, with your cynicism, I wonder how you can even get out of bed in the morning."
"With your attitude, I wonder how you can sleep at night," Elphaba shot back.
"Very funny. But in all seriousness, why do you think that I wouldn't be able to grant your wishes? What makes you think that these miraculous artefacts wouldn't be able to make your dreams come true?"
"Because you're clearly a starry-eyed fantasist too busy daydreaming of utopia to even think about the real world; assuming that I did turn those Slippers into self-sustaining magical generators, their power wouldn't be enough to transform an entire species, and it certainly wouldn't be enough to control reality itself. You know how I know that? Because, as you said, it's an offshoot of my magic, and I know for a fact that I am not that powerful: even after all this time and all the purification you've supposedly put it through, my magic wouldn't be that powerful, nor would it be able to accumulate to the degree you're suggesting. I am not a demigod, I am not some kind of messiah- I'm just a fallible, limited human being; the only things that set me apart from the rest of Oz are my skin and a few intrinsic powers."
"The key word in this speech being "limited," I assume?" The King shook his head in disgust. "It was bad enough hearing this self-despising monologue repeated by the spies I stationed at Kiamo Ko; hearing it from you in person is just depressing. I mean, once you'd escaped from Oz and found the time to recover from having your spirit broken, did it ever occur to you that you might actually be more powerful than you think?"
"Just what I needed; assertiveness training from a megalomaniacal dictator," sneered Elphaba. "I mean, first the Wizard, now you- why does this keep happening to me? First of all, I'm not listening to you: this is just the prelude to you offering me the world. Secondly, after all the time spent pushing myself to the limit in fighting the Wizard- or you- I know for a fact that I've reached the uppermost pinnacle of my abilities, and it's not all that impressive."
This time, the King looked downright affronted. "You are nowhere near the pinnacle- you're not even at the foothills!" he exploded. "I mean, Madame Morrible herself summoned a tornado that inhaled a house from another world, and she was decades past her prime when she did so! You outdid her several times over the course of your illustrious career!" He took a deep breath, and thought for a moment. "Just supposing," he said, "Just for the sake of argument- that when I gained full control of the Ruby Slippers, I really could give you everything you'd ever wanted. Isn't that worth at least discussing? I mean, it's not as if there's anything left to fight for, is there? Oz is dead; its cities have been destroyed and buried by the new growth; its people have been scattered from one end of the country to the other."
"Thanks in no small part to you. You're not giving me much of a reason to accept this: I mean, if I was trying to convince a witch of just how trustworthy I was, I wouldn't mention just how many innocents I murdered, or how many people I dispossessed-"
"You can kindly stop suggesting what you'd be doing in my shoes." The dismissiveness in the King's voice was palpable. "And you can also drop the moral posturing, thank you very much: had you not been shot down by Curter, you wouldn't have given a damn about the people of Oz; you left exile to rescue Glinda and Fiyero, and that was all you were concerned with, because you knew that the Animals would have been able to survive in the new wilderness. Even when you befriended the refugees, your heart wasn't really in it- do you remember that tantrum yesterday afternoon?"
"That doesn't mean anything! Just because I lost my temper doesn't mean-"
"Then why didn't you advise the refugees to gather more supporters? There would have been hundreds of Ozians roaming the forests that evening: you could have given the starving masses new purpose and bolstered the ranks of the freedom fighters; working in tandem, you and Curter might have found a way to arm all of them, and had you so chosen, hundreds of loyal freedom fighters could have soared into battle this morning! They might have crippled me, even killed me outright if there'd been enough of them- but no: you didn't want to expand the group beyond the few Ozian humans you had come to respect; accepting anymore would open you up to the hatred of the ignorant masses. And besides, you didn't have the time to mollycoddle Ozian fools: you wanted to rescue Glinda and Fiyero."
There was a questioning silence.
"I don't condemn you for wanting that, Elphaba: I know how much you love them. There's no shame in wanting to save those you love, just as there's no shame in accepting a bargain when there's literally no other option."
"Alright then," Elphaba sighed. The sooner she got this nonsense over and done with, the better. "What could you possibly offer me?"
"Everything you've ever wanted, my dear. For example, I know you've been interested in starting a family, though of course Fiyero's- ahem- inorganic nature makes this impossible. Making your darling husband-to-be a human being again? Not a challenge to my new powers."
"Your Highness, if you think I'm going to compromise my principles for the chance to get a bun in the oven, you can go to hell."
The infuriating smirk once again blossomed. "I'm just getting warmed up, Elphaba. What would you think of a chance to live happily? Even after you left Oz, you never really attained true happiness: you had to worry about Fiyero being damaged or destroyed by wolves, by fire, by falling onto sharp rocks- his immortality makes him fragile; you had to worry about finding food, about keeping the villagers in the nearby towns from asking too many questions, and of course, about how Glinda was faring. If you so desired, I could allow you to live in a settlement of my own construction, inhabited by the resistance movement you befriended: Fiyero would be human again, you'd be given a comfortable home, and you'd be accepted by the community…"
Elphaba considered this, if only in an attempt to gauge the King's sanity: most of the proposal had actually sounded possible; returning Fiyero to normality was a bit of a stretch, but the rest of it wasn't entirely outside the realms of what was possible. Building a settlement would be easy for someone with a reasonable grasp of the earthly magicks, and providing for the neighbours would be relatively easy as well. Maybe, with access to the Grimmerie, Fiyero could be transformed back into a human; after all, Elphaba might been able to do that herself had she not decided to hand the Grimmerie over to Glinda.
"…And, if you so wished," the King added, "Glinda would be there."
Alright, he's insane. Nevermind.
"And what would I say to her, exactly?" Elphaba snapped. "What would I say to her after all this time? "Oh, hi there, I'm sorry for faking my death and putting you through a hellish mixture of Ozian politics and Nomish prisons, but as you can see, it was totally worth it!" What would I say to Fiyero? What would I say to the rebels? I don't think any of them could forget the fact that I ended up leading them into total failure!"
"Memory is infinitely mutable; they'll remember only as much as you wish them to. If you wish, I could have Glinda's memories adjusted so that your faked death never happened; if you want, I could have the resistance believing that they succeeded in killing me, and they're living somewhere in rebuilt Munchkinland. And if your conscience gets the better of you, well, I think Curter would forgive you regardless."
"Curter's dead, in case you've forgotten."
"Death is no obstacle to the power of the Ruby Slippers."
"And I can honestly say that you are the first and only person in recorded history to say those words with a straight face."
"I'm being serious: if you so desire, I can easily resurrect the dead and restore them to full vitality without any negative symptoms. Madame Morrible, Doctor Dillamond, Nessarose, your parents- just say the word, and they'll back in the world of the living before you can blink."
Elphaba very briefly hid her face behind her right hand in the universal gesture of exasperation, and asked, "Where are all the normal propositions? Usually around this time, I'd be offered fame, fortune, luxury, endless supplies of chocolate- that sort of thing."
"In other words, everything the Wizard promised you, and everything you refused. I'd like to try a little originality, if you don't mind."
"Just indulge me."
"Fine: converting base metals into gold should be easy enough to provide fortune, providing you don't mind crashing an economy or two; endless supplies of chocolate likewise; as for luxury, what's your poison? Sun-parched shores, palm trees and beachside mansions of gleaming white marble? Golden palaces, sinfully decadent furniture, fine wine and armies of handpicked slaves ready to fulfil your every whim? Or just a basement full of drugs and a mattress? Different people have different ideas of luxury."
"For someone who isn't even human, you've got a very firm grasp of human vices. And you still haven't mentioned fame."
"You're already notorious, so I presume you want something more positive. If you like, I could engineer a situation in which you save the entire population of Oz, and you're accepted as their saviour, the foundation of a new and better society that would worship you for millennia after your death- and that's assuming you don't want immortality as well. Of course, if Ozian adulation doesn't appeal, I could create a society from scratch and program them to worship you as a goddess. I could go on, though I must admit, the other options all involve a lot of time travel."
Somewhere deep inside Elphaba's mind, cynicism pressed an override button; out loud, she snapped, "Okay, that's enough: you might have fooled Glinda into thinking that you can turn back time, but you're not going to fool me: I don't care how much power you think those Slippers have stored in them by now; they don't have the power to send you through time. Simple as that."
At that point, she should have left; she should have turned on her heel and walked out the door. But instead, she stood there and waited for the King to lose his temper again; and worse still, he didn't. He smirked and Elphaba could only listen in mute horror as the fateful words "Perhaps a demonstration is in order?" drifted across the room.
"No, it's not in order at all!" she shouted, flinging herself to the floor in a vain attempt to dodge the mountain-levelling explosion that would result from this starry-eyed twit's failed attempt at time travelling. "Do not try anything! Do not try anything! Do not-"
There was an eye-searing flash of red light, and the King vanished.
Eight long seconds passed before Elphaba finally worked up the nerve to stand up and investigate the vacant space where the King had once sat. Whatever he'd done, it obviously hadn't involved teleportation and judging by the faint traces of magic around the desk, he hadn't set off a flashbang and retreated back into the earth.
What if, against all known magical theory, the King had somehow managed to move through time?
If so, how was he going to demonstrate this newfound power? Was he going to bring back something from the past or the future? Or was he going to change something?
And then, just as Elphaba was beginning to feel apprehensive, a white-hot needle of pain slammed into the base of her spine and rippled out across her skin, growing worse and worse with every inch it travelled. By the time the sensation had reached the tips of her fingers, she felt as though her skin was on fire; she couldn't be certain, for her eyelids had been forced shut by the burning that now coursed across her face. All she knew for sure was that every single nerve in her skin was practically alight with searing pain, and the sensation wasn't showing any sign of fading.
Through the seemingly endless haze of pain, she realised that whatever the pain was, it clearly had nothing to do with fire at all: she couldn't feel any kind of heat around her, and her clothes obviously hadn't burned away. Then, as she wondered what else could cause this, a new sensation arrived amidst the pain, and she let out a gasp of horror as she felt her skin begin to change: across her entire body, her very flesh was beginning to bubble and flow like liquid; unrecognizable shapesrose and fell from her now-molten skin as Elphaba's body underwent its own private metamorphosis.
What had the King done to her? What changes had he wrought upon history?
Forty agonised seconds later, the pain finally faded, leaving her half-collapsed on the floor, still alive… but undeniably different. Now, her skin felt inexplicably itchy and uncomfortable; more disturbingly, Elphaba had the distinct impression that it was actually loose in places.
Looking down at her hands, she found that, to her amazement, the very texture of her skin had changed: where it had once been smooth and relatively unblemished, now it was covered with tiny reptilian scales. And it didn't stop at her hands either; a cursory examination revealed that her entire body was covered in the delicate snakeskin. And all of it itched; it rasped and itched and tickled at every nerve until all Elphaba wanted to do was scratch.
There was another flash of ruby-coloured light, and suddenly the King was sitting behind his desk once again, looking very smug indeed.
"What did you do to me?" Elphaba demanded, trying not to let the fear and irritation in her voice show. The itching was almost unbearable now; indeed, the only thing stopping her from taking a fingernail to it was the irrational fear that her entire skin might just slough off if she tried.
"I bestowed a few reptilian traits on you," the King explained. "It's a comparatively minor change, historically speaking."
"But why am I…. itching?"
"A side-effect of your new attributes: you're on the verge of moulting."
"I'm what?" Inside Elphaba's head, some long-forgotten rumourmonger whispered "I hear she can shed her skin as easily as a snake!"
"Moulting- it's a very common habit of snakes, lizards and other-"
"I KNOW WHAT MOULTING IS!" Elphaba roared, scratching furiously at her left arm. "I've read enough books on the subject to know about skin shedding, but how am I supposed to go about it? I need to do it now or I'm going to go insane!"
"I wouldn't recommend rubbing your head against a stone; use your fingernails."
"How the hell do you know that's going to work?"
"Because it always has for you," said the King, voice brimming with confidence. "In the meantime, shall I allow you some privacy? This isn't something you can do fully-clothed."
Elphaba was too discomforted to be angry, so she just nodded. Immediately, four opaque wooden panels materialised around her, shielding her from view. As an afterthought, a mirror was added to the ensemble, presumably so she could admire her new self. Elphaba barely even looked at it. As soon as she was certain that absolutely no-one could see her through the walls of the improvised changing room, she shed first her clothes and then her skin: it took ten humiliating minutes of scratching and tearing and worrying at the masses of dead scales, and by the end of it, her fingernails felt as though they were about to drop off, and she was blushing so furiously she thought she might spontaneously combust.
But, at long last, the last patch of dead skin fell away, and she breathed a sigh of relief as the itching finally stopped. Her new skin was tauter and more colourful than the old, and the scales seemed to glisten in the pale lighting of the office; it was at once disturbing and eerily fascinating, to the point that Elphaba almost considered admiring herself in the mirror. But in the end, she didn't: she put her clothes back on, still fuming with embarrassment, finishing by kicking the nearest panel to the ground and sitting back down in her chair in a huff.
"That," she snarled, as the changing room disintegrated behind her, "was just plain immature."
"Don't look at me; I just added a few extra ingredients to the Green Elixir. Besides, you've had more than enough time to get used to moulting."
"What the hell are you talking about? I've never moulted before in my life."
"Yes, you have; don't you remember?"
Elphaba was about to answer "of course not!" when a veritable avalanche of memories swept into her brain, flooding her consciousness with information: hundreds upon thousands of scenes were slowly incorporated into her personal history, all of them detailing the impact that her reptilian traits had had on her life. Immediately, she understood why the King had called the alteration "minor": after all, her green skin had already branded her as a freak and an outcast- the addition of scales would have barely made the slightest bit of difference, except in making that long-forgotten rumour come true. However, from all the years of moulting that had been added to her memory, a few inexplicably stuck out: some were childhood recollections of being yelled at by her father for leaving shed scales around the house, others were more recent ones of frantically worrying about having to burn the skin so the witch-hunters couldn't use it to pick up her trail; by far the strangest (and most embarrassing) of the new memories was from her days at Shiz, when Glinda had quite unexpectedly burst into their dormitory just as Elphaba had finished moulting. Much blushing and promises never to speak of the incident again had followed.
Back in the present, the King chuckled, "I take it that your scepticism has been well and truly dispelled."
She sighed; it was obvious that, whatever the King had done to her, it didn't involve transmogrification or any deliberate memory alteration. And if this did mean that the Ruby Slippers were as powerful as suggested, then the Nome King was an even bigger threat than she'd heretofore suspected.
"Fair enough," she grumbled. "You've convinced me. But can you get rid of the scales, now? As interesting as this is, I'd rather not spend the rest of my life sloughing off my skin twice a month."
"As you wish." With another flash of red light, the King disappeared back into the murky realms of the past, leaving Elphaba to suffer the pain of her own history being completely reformed for the second time that day.
Once she was able to open her eyes again, she found that her skin had returned to its usual texture (making this probably the only time in her entire life she'd ever been happy with her natural appearance), and the cast-off husk of her old snakeskin had vanished, having presumably ceased to have ever existed. Eventually, the memories of her "other self" vanished, too- thank goodness. By the time the Nome King reappeared, Elphaba was well and truly back to normal.
"So, now that you no longer doubt these marvellous artefacts, tell me, now that you have nothing to lose and everything to gain… what do you want?"
"Nothing," she said flatly.
"And I can tell you're lying, by the way."
"I'm not interested in anything you have to offer."
"Another lie."
Elphaba bit her lip; the King, infuriatingly enough, was absolutely right: she was interested in his proposition- who wouldn't be interested? But she couldn't accept the bargain: it would mean sacrificing her principles, her dignity, and the lives of every surviving human being in Oz; after all, the King was still out for Ozian blood, and while Elphaba still resented the citizens for accepting the Wizard's propaganda so blithely, she wasn't prepared to see them dead in exchange for her own happiness.
Or are you?
She hastily swept the molecule of temptation aside; she couldn't start thinking like this, not now- she had to keep her composure.
"Do you know what I promised Glinda?" The King's voice was a silken purr, now. "More than anything else in the world, she wanted to go back to the day you first began your rebellion against the Wizard; she believed that all the hardships you suffered were due to her refusal to join you that day, you see. But what if you could share in her reward? Wouldn't you relish the chance to battle the Wizard again- but alongside your dearest friend, both of you equipped with all the magical knowledge you now possess?"
"And how do I know you'll honour your end of the bargain? For all I know, the moment you've achieved ultimate power, you'll just stab me and Glinda in the back, or imprison us in the palace for all eternity!"
"What would be the point of either? Killing the two of you would be a pointless waste, and as for imprisoning you… well, no offence intended, but I will actually have more important things to do than keep the two of you hanging around."
"Then why would you send us back in time when we'd be in the perfect position to stop you from invading Oz in the first place?"
"Control over reality extends to control over time, remember? Once I have the full power of these artefacts under my control, I'll be beyond the very reaches of history itself- as will anything else I desire. But it's nice to know you're considering what I have to say."
"I'm not considering anything!"
"I suppose not: you're too busy lying to consider much at all. And the thing is, Elphaba, you're a very bad liar, especially when your intended target is yourself. So, I'll ask you again: what… do… you… want?"
"For the last time," Elphaba all but shouted, "I don't want anything from you! I told you- I've learned my lesson: no reward would be worth the price I'd have to pay!"
There are very few expressions that honestly seem to say more than the owner possibly could; at that very moment, the Nome King was wearing a very faint half-smile that seemed to shout "I was just waiting for you to do that, and you didn't disappoint. Well done. Would you like your ignominious defeat served with triumphant gloating or with despair-inducing silence?"
Out loud, the King said, "Allow me to show you exactly what you'd be sacrificing by accepting this bargain..."
And before she could stop him, there was another eye-searing flash of crimson light as he once again disappeared back into the past.
A nerve-wracking silence followed; in the absence of anything better to do, Elphaba wondered what the King was going to change about her this time- assuming that was what he intended to do, anyway. What had he meant, exactly? How was he going to show her what she'd be sacrificing? What did he think she'd sacrifice, anyway?
Okay, calm down, Elphaba; you already know that he's at least mildly unhinged as well as impossibly powerful, so there's no real point in worrying when you know that he's absolutely guaranteed to do something horrible. You just have to wait and hope that whatever he has in mind isn't too debilitating.
Fourteen seconds went by, and nothing happened.
Elphaba's mind, deprived of anything sane to focus on, began thinking of all the horrors that the Nome King could be committing upon her past; after all, she'd refused every single offer he'd made so far- maybe he was going to try and torture her into working for him. And maybe, just maybe he'd decided that the best way to go about this was by incorporating only the most distorting teratogens into the formula of the Green Elixir, reducing Elphaba's body to a tumorous jumble of distended limbs and withered features, a creature without eyes and incapable of speech thanks to the lipless mouth and flesh-rending teeth… but the torture wouldn't be from the sight of these deformities, or even from the pain that they'd no doubt infuse her body with; no, the true torture would arrive when the memories of her new self arrived in her brain: after all, would this version of herself have ever met Glinda or Fiyero? Of course not! She wouldn't have even been allowed to associate with Nessa! This version of Elphaba would have been locked in the attic for most of her childhood, subsisting on rats and lichen until her first magical outburst smashed the house into matchsticks, and sent her rampaging across the countryside, a monster to rival anything conjured up by the Wizard's propaganda department.
Calm down, calm down- it might not be exactly like that; he might just be seeing if he can-
This time, Elphaba couldn't hold back a scream. If anything, the pain was even worse: the feeling of being burned alive had been replaced by the awful tearing and wrenching of being flayed and dismembered. Worse still, it wasn't followed by any sensations of her body changing or mutating; for the next minute, all she felt was a profound and agonising sense of loss.
Much later, she learned that the pain she felt was essentially an echo of whatever changes the King was making to her personal history, the logical consequences of having her body and almost three decades of her life restructured. At the time, though, all she knew- indeed, the only coherent thought she could form at that moment- was that she was closer to dying now than at any point in her life. Somehow, this had managed to outdo literally every other brush with death that she'd experienced in her life; all the bullets she'd intercepted (about five, thanks to Ozian snipers), all the knife wounds she'd managed to withstand, all the times she'd nearly fallen from her boom- this was the very brink of death. If she were to black out now, there'd be no waking up again.
So she clung to her consciousness like a shipwrecked mariner might cling to a piece of flotsam, until the pain finally faded, leaving her collapsed on the floor, exhausted and aching, but somehow still alive. For what felt like centuries, she lay there, dead to the world; then, the Nome King reappeared, smiling triumphantly down at her. And why wouldn't he be smiling? After all, his handiwork was on display, now.
She was about to ask what he'd changed about her this time, when she realised that she couldn't feel the presence of any crippling mutations; no mismatched limbs, no patchwork skin, no secondary mouths. She didn't feel different, and her body certainly didn't look different from what little she could see of it. What had the King changed?
Groaning in exhaustion, she slowly clambered to her feet; but as she tottered upright, she instinctively reached out to grab the back of the chair so as to steady herself- and in that moment, she realised what had been done to her, for she had a clear view of her right hand:
It was no longer green-skinned.
Somehow, she'd...
She'd…
The King's smile grew. Without saying a word, he idly waved a hand through the air, producing a large mirror so brilliantly polished it looked more like a sheet of platinum from a distance, and with another gesture, he sent it floating towards Elphaba.
By now, she knew what to expect, but that didn't stop her heart from skipping a beat when she looked into the depths of the mirror, and saw a face bereft of green.
Once upon a time, every single fantasy she'd ever had would end with her being made normal and accepted by others; once, she'd toiled and slaved throughout her college days just for the chance to meet someone who could "degreenify" her, as she'd called it; she'd even searched the pages of the Grimmerie itself for a spell that could cleanse her unnatural skin colour. Of course, the dreams never came to pass, the Wizard turned out to be a fraud, and her attempts at enchanting her skin were invariable too dangerous to properly implement. In the end, Elphaba accepted the fact that the miracle she'd been hoping for would never happen, and got on with her life and the rebellion that had occupied it.
But somehow, after all the heartbreak, disillusionment and resignation... she was finally normal.
The face that gazed back at her from the mirror was as pale and smooth as carved ivory; high, delicate-looking cheekbones and a somewhat pointed chin; a long, slender nose; large dark eyes, wide with amazement and fear; a thin-lipped mouth open in an astonished gape... to Elphaba's eyes, her face almost looked pretty.
No, more than that.
"Why, Miss Elphaba," Glinda had said, "Look at you: you're beautiful."
"Not such a terrible sacrifice at all, is it?" the King said quietly. "When all's said and done, the only thing you'd have to give up is your own unhappiness."
"I…" Elphaba swallowed hard, and tried to force her voice to work again; she had to say no to this bargain, she had to keep to her principles; she had to think of all the people who'd have died for nothing if she accepted- and of all the people who would die. But it was so hard to even remember why she was fighting this uphill battle when one of her oldest and most heartfelt wishes was staring her in the face.
"I… I… I'm not going to give in just because you've made me look normal," she managed to say. "If you think all I need to make me happy is a new face, you've-"
"Of course I don't. If I wanted to drain the pigmentation from your skin, I wouldn't need to waste time changing the past; no, your new form isn't the only gift I have to offer- and you know it. Now remember, if you will, the life you've always wanted…"
And before she could even think of stopping it, before she could try and brace herself for the impact, another lifetime of memories flooded her unprepared mind. But unlike the memories of her reptilian self, they didn't merge seamlessly with her old recollections; instead, all the old memories were unceremoniously shoved aside, allowing the new to assume their place. And over the course of the next few minutes, Elphaba found herself sporadically forgetting: for moment at time that seemed to last infinity, she'd forget everything that she'd once been: the last few days among the rebels, the Invasion of Oz, faking her death, falling in love with Fiyero, her time as the Wicked Witch of the West, that first visit to the Emerald City, befriending Glinda, attending Shiz, even the fact that she'd once had green skin- all of it was wiped from existence, and replaced with the history of her new self.
For the rest of those times, when her original identity remained intact, she could only watch as choice visions of her rebuilt life played out before her mind's eye.
There were no painful childhood memories here, no recollections of being locked in her bedroom or slapped across the face for trying to leave the house, of being yelled at by her father while mother sat in silence, apathetic and withdrawn; in her past, the house never seemed dark or oppressive, and nobody ever shouted at her for trying to speak to them. In fact, the very first memory she recalled was one of being hugged, and her mother's voice echoing soothingly overhead. The happy memories didn't stop there, either: she saw her father smiling proudly as he watched her, seated on the library floor, lost in one of the largest books in the room; she saw family outings, celebration after celebration, and seemingly endless praise from both her mother and father… There were even visions of going to school and being accepted, if not adored: after all, not everyone wanted to be friends with the governor's daughter.
And the happy memories continued spiralling into her brain, every single one a thousand times as joyous and treasured as the last; even the birth of Nessarose didn't seem to tarnish the joy of this Elphaba's past, nor did being entrusted with Nessa's safety when she left the house or on her first day at school. After all, that was the day she manifested her powers- first in finding the brat who'd stolen Nessa's schoolbag, tracking him down with the kind of intuition that only magic could offer; then, when the roof of the decrepit main hall collapsed, sheltering the crowd below with a blast instinctual magic. Elphaba remembered the aftermath of that day, of being hugged by Nessarose and being told, again and again, "You saved me!" She remembered the odd mixture of fear and pride and relief that her parents had displayed; neither of them were sure what to make of their eldest child's mysterious powers, but for the most, they were just happy that the two had returned unharmed. Most of all, Elphaba remembered the exhilaration she'd felt; she couldn't tell if it was an aftereffect of her first magical outburst, or just happiness at having saved Nessa's life. And frankly, she didn't care.
The memories raced onwards: year after year of being privately tutored in magic, of learning and of triumph as her powers and her knowledge grew to eclipse those of her teacher, as she grew to love the sense of accomplishment that magical research and experimentation granted. Her parents, once unnerved by magic, now began to praise her achievements, boasting to the world of their eldest daughter's power. Her tutor- a spindly little character who'd once numbered among Madame Morrible's chosen few- suggested job opportunities, all of them grander than the last. And when she finally graduated from both high school and from private tuition, she was once again given a place at Shiz- not just as a student, but as an assistant. "It's a stepping stone to greater things," she was told. "Horrible Morrible might not look it, but she's got the ear of the Wizard; impress her, and the sky's the limit…"
So, she accepted. Four years of university followed; four years of teaching and toil, of one triumph being followed by yet another; of weird and eccentric friendships with all manner of people, from the resident occult scholar, "Lofty" Trapdamask, to the infamously ditzy Galinda Upland. Somehow, she managed to take the gaggle of misfits that had come to populate the magic class and transform them into qualified magicians. At the end of her final year, a letter arrived from the Wizard, requesting her presence and that of her five best students- her apprentices in service to His Ozness's Government, as the letter put it. Elphaba, flushed with excitement, briefly interpreted this as her entrance into thaumaturgical research and development.
Somewhat unsurprisingly, all her hopes in this direction came tumbling down once she found herself actually standing before the Wizard, watching in disbelief as he stepped out from behind the Face and started outlining her new duties, which consisted of protecting the government from suspected "terrorist threats," ensuring that people retained their trust in Oz, and that was it.
Once again, instead of feeling awe and reverence, all she felt was disgust.
This is who I've slaved and toiled over the last few years to work for, she thought bitterly, a con artist and a fraud without the slightest thimbleful of magical power. And we're supposed to just lie down and accept that everything we do is in the name of the public good… when Ozian schools are training magicians just so this clapped-out old bastard can take credit for what THEY do! Everything I've done in my life has been leading up to a life of servitude to this bastard; no individual research, no invention- just mercenary work for HIM! And what about all those rumours I've been hearing? What about the disappearances among the Animal populace? The cages? The talk of a secret police? Are they real? Are they his doing as well? Damn it, damn it, damn it…
But things have changed, haven't they? It used to be that the two or three magicians around here took orders only from the Wizard… but now, I've got at least five that take orders from me.
What if I could change things? What if revolution is possible?
But that answer would never arrive, for back in the present, far beneath the mountainous territory of the Nomes, Elphaba was suddenly gripped by the searing pain of history twisting itself back into shape…
The return to consciousness was agonizing, to say the least; the other alterations to history had been painful to say the least, but if it had been bad enough to actually make her black out altogether, this one had to set some kind of record.
Head pounding, Elphaba clambered groggily to her feet, and found herself one again staring into the hovering mirror: once again, she knew what to expect, but that didn't stop her heart from sinking as she saw that her skin had returned to its original shade of green. Her original memories were back in place as well: the same abusive father, the same distant mother, the lonely past with only a few stubborn scraps of the implanted memories left to indicate that anything about it had ever changed at all.
Disappointment blossomed, and before she could stop herself, she found herself demanding, "Why did you change me back?"
"Technically, I didn't," said the King. 'What you experienced was a paradox being eliminated. After all, history can tolerate a few minor additions, so long as they don't seriously distort the course of events; you already saw how altering the texture of your skin wouldn't have changed your past or your future. But giving you the appearance of a normal human being creates problems: you played a very important role in Ozian history, Elphaba, and changing your origins and motives was too much to the time-stream to tolerate. After all, in that version of history, you might have won the battle against the Wizard, and how would you have come to be here if that was so? Thus, a paradox forms and festers, before finally being healed by time's correcting hand, and you are returned to normal; only the full power of the Ruby Slippers can truly subvert causality, give paradoxes dimensions of their own in which to flourish. But then, I think it was appropriate that it ended when it did: I certainly can't think of a better point for you to assume your new life- if you want it that way."
The King took a deep breath, and steepled his fingers on the desk. "And so, we come to the crux of my offer: you stand to lose only your misery, your memories of sorrow and regret, and gain anything you could ever want. That alternate past I showed you just one possibility: you can ask for literally everything and get it; there are no limits to what you can ask for here. All you have to do is in payment is cast a single spell, and more to the point, you've dreamed of casting it a thousand times before on Fiyero; you know the chapter, you know the page- if you had the Grimmerie in front of you, you'd know the words. Just… one… spell. Now, tell me, Elphaba… do you accept?"
"I… I don't want-"
The King waved a hand, and suddenly the memories of her other self were there again: visions of the happy childhood she'd never really had, now coursed through her brain; split-second glimpses of being embraced by her mother and father, of Nessa looking to her for help, of students who'd flocked to her door for help, of her apprentices standing beside her in the throne room and asking her if they could trust the Wizard… but the memories that her mind always instinctively returned to was from her other self's childhood, to all the times where she found herself being hugged and kissed by her parents.
She knew that none of it had ever really happened and she could never experience life as her alternate had, but a more sensible part of her knew that she was lying to herself. Of course it could happen: hadn't the last few minutes proved exactly that?
"Don't you want the chance to be happy? Don't you want to enjoy the triumphs and joys that a new life would offer? Don't you want to experience everything that an ordinary human being would in their life? A loving family; the acceptance of others; acknowledgement of your gifts; the chance for success that you never had- don't you want that?"
At that moment, Elphaba wanted to say that what she wanted wasn't important, that she wasn't interested in what he was suggesting; but she couldn't bring herself to speak, and anything she would have said would have been a pathetically transparent lie. As much as she hated herself for even considering it, but she did want what was being offered; she'd wanted it for almost her entire life in some form or another.
"You're going to have to answer me, Elphaba. I won't punish you for saying no; I won't torture you, I won't punish Glinda and Fiyero for your decision. All I want, here and now ,is your answer: yes, or no. What'll it be?"
There was a silence that sounded like the collapse of mountains to Elphaba's stress-addled ears.
Then Elphaba took a deep breath, and made a decision she would never forgive herself for.
"You're right," she whispered; her tears were flowing freely now, and it took all of her self-control to keep her voice steady. "I do want what you've offered me. I think I've wanted it ever since I was a child…"
The King smiled horribly.
"…but I can't accept it," she finished. "Not because I'd be betraying my principles or because I'd be abandoning anyone left behind in Oz… it's because I don't deserve it."
"After all you've achieved, do you honestly think that?"
"What have I have achieved? Nothing! Everything I've tried to do in my life ended in failure, either because I was too stubborn or too stupid to act when I could have! My attempt to save the Animals? It failed, and was left to Glinda to accomplish. My attempt to overthrow the Wizard? That failed too, and Glinda accomplished it. My attempt to save Nessa didn't even get off the ground! My attempt to save Fiyero left him permanently crippled! And what about these last few days of trying to stop you, of trying to rescue Fiyero and Glinda? You've already made it clear just how badly that went. You may think I've got the potential to be all-powerful… but as far as I'm concerned, I don't have what it takes. I squandered every last drop of my potential years ago."
"Does it matter whether you deserve it or not? You've suffered for every mistake that was made: you deserve everything that you saw in your other self's memories, including that chance at victory-"
"No I don't. She had the same powers as me, the same intelligence; she put both to better use, she thought things through- she actually decided to organise a revolution instead of just flying off the handle like I did. You say she would have been able to defeat the Wizard? She deserved that chance. I'm not that girl… and more importantly, I can't be."
For ten seconds, neither of them said a word.
Then, at last, the King said, "As you wish." There was no disappointment in his voice, no anger or irritation; just acceptance.
"So what happens now?"
"You may return to your room and wait while Glinda finishes translating the Grimmerie. Simple as that. Just remember that your refusal doesn't have to be permanent: you can always change your mind later."
"You're taking my refusal pretty damn well for someone who was banking on me doing all the work up until you saw Glinda in action."
The King smirked. "Truth to be told, I was more concerned that you'd accept the bargain and use it as an opportunity to stab me in the back. But then again, I'm not too troubled: few things ever go entirely to plan. That's why it always helps to have an understudy or two on hand." He winked cheekily. "You can go, now."
Elphaba stood, and realised she was shaking; taking a brief moment to gather her nerves, she began hobbling towards the exit. But as she neared the door, a thought suddenly struck her.
"Why did you need Mombi?"
"Hmmm?"
"This plan of yours, why did you need Mombi for it? If you needed someone to direct me to the Nome Dominions, then why use Mombi? Why use anyone? Painting directions on the side of the palace would have worked better. So why did you need to keep her around at all?"
"That," said the King "would be telling."
"I'll be sure to think on this little mystery once I'm back in my cell."
"Speaking of which, there's something I should probably give you to help pass the time…" The King held up a hand, and his brow furrowed with concentration for a moment as energy slowly gathered in his palm. Over the course of the next second or two, the gathered energies shimmered and glittered and finally solidified into a single glass ball, which the King handed to Elphaba.
"I took the liberty of chronicling your other self's memories. She led quite an interesting life, at least from what I saw; it's only one possible outcome from her decision in the Emerald City, but it's definitely an entertaining one. All you need to do to is look closely at the sphere. I hope you enjoy it…"
Elphaba wasn't fooled.
She knew that she'd been given the memory sphere for the sole purpose of tempting her into changing her mind.
But then, so long as she actually knew that, it wouldn't hurt to look, would it?
Yes, she'd look- just for a little while. Just long enough to take another look at the memories, anyway. Just long enough to satisfy her curiosity.
And she wanted one last look at that wonderful childhood that had never really happened.
After all, she could give it up anytime she wanted, couldn't she?