A/N: I'm back! Hopefully back to posting on a regular basis - at least per month instead of per decade!
Thanks to all who viewed, reviewed, favourited and followed!
And without further ado, the latest chapter: read, review, and above all, enjoy!
Disclaimer: Wicked is not mine. Try not to be surprised.
It was the screaming that woke Elphaba.
She'd no idea when it had started, but she could recognize the voice easily enough: she'd only heard Nessa scream once in her entire life, back when Elphaba had made the Ruby Slippers for her, but that was all she needed to hear to recognize the earsplitting caterwaul tearing down the corridor towards her. True, the last time she heard it had been more out of shock than anything else, but the same principle applied.
Somewhere, Nessa was in distress. Somewhere in this vast, mysterious house, she was screaming. She'd no idea how anyone could have managed to harm her, given the power she wielded as the Mistress of Mirrors, but frankly, she didn't much care to think about the hows or whys of the problem at this moment: all that mattered was that Nessa was in danger and desperately needed Elphaba's help.
Lurching out of bed, Elphaba only just managed to stop herself from toppling over: her legs had healed considerably in the last few hours, but she was still pretty wobbly on her knees, and she had to brace herself against one of the nearby bookshelf for a few seconds before she could recover her balance. Thankfully, she didn't need the wheelchair anymore… but then again, even if she had, even if she'd been forced back into the governor's old throne, Elphaba would have gladly risked a wheelchair-bound tumble down the stairs if it meant getting to Nessa. Pushing free of the bookshelves, she limped out of the bedroom and began a fast-paced hobble down the corridor towards the source of the screams.
Less than ten feet along the hall, she once again found herself face to face with the mirror golem. "The Mistress of Mirrors has requested that you rest, Elphaba Thropp," it intoned.
"You mistress is screaming, in case you hadn't noticed!"
"The Mistress of Mirrors is extremely busy with matters that do not concern me."
"And the fact that you can hear her from the other side of the damn house doesn't bother you in the slightest?" Elphaba roared. "The fact that she might be in danger isn't ringing any alarm bells in there?!"
"The Mistress is in no danger. Please relax."
"Oh, go to hell!"
Pushing the golem aside, Elphaba hobbled on at high speed down the corridor, closing in on the source of the screams. For several hundred yards, she staggered onwards through the twisting corridors, barely managing to navigate the mad, contradictory layout of the strange mansion – and only growing more and more frantic for every second Nessa wasn't in view. Somewhere in the back of her head, a cold and distinctly heartless part of her psyche was telling her that there was no point in panicking, that the Mistress of Mirrors wasn't the Nessa she'd known back in Oz: her sister had died a long time ago, this ice-hearted voice sneeringly whispered, and latching onto this stranger wasn't going to bring her back from the dead. But for once, Elphaba wasn't willing to listen to anything those nagging little voices told her.
Somehow she managed to make it down the last flight of stairs without tripping over and breaking her neck, and at last the screams were directly ahead of her – just behind a pair of double doors. And now those howls sounded all the more desperate than ever.
By now frantic, she flung herself at the doors, propelling it open with a blast of magic and all but catapulting herself into the room beyond, shouting at the top of her voice.
"NESSA, I- WHOA!"
Abruptly, the screaming stopped and was replaced by the sound of bedclothes being launched in all directions and two pairs of startled gasps. Amidst the chaos, she caught a brief glimpse of several dozen limbs flailing in positions meant to cover nudity, followed by a vague, pallid figure diving for cover. A moment later, the confusion subsided and left Elphaba standing before a large four-poster bed, on which sat a very startled and extremely naked Nessarose.
"Gods almighty, Elphaba!" she exclaimed, hastily drawing the bedsheets over her body. "I knew you were a protective big sister when we were at school, but I never thought you'd start again so quickly!"
There was a long and distinctly embarrassed pause, as Elphaba belatedly realized what had actually been happening. Very slowly, she felt the blood rising to her cheeks, precursor to a rich avocado-coloured blush spreading across her face. "I… I heard screaming," she said limply, suddenly unable to meet Nessa's eyes. "Uh… sorry."
"No, no, it's okay," Nessa soothed. "I'd forgotten that you were a little… actually that's not fair: we were both naïve in those days. Let's face it, I'd have probably called for an ambulance if I heard you screeching the way I was a moment ago. Besides, this house does sometimes tend to amplify and exaggerate certain sounds – side effect of the magic I practice: I should have taken your time in the military into account, should have realized you'd think the worst if you heard screams."
"Well, Glinda's had plenty to say about how I fly off the handle when I should be thinking things through. I suppose I should be grateful that this time, the only damage I ended up doing was spoiling a happy evening for you. Or morning. Or… whatever the time of day is right now."
"It's morning. And don't worry: I'm the Mistress of Mirrors, remember? If I want a romantic encounter, I can just step through a mirror or walk through a shadow, and I'll be there in my lover's arms before he even knows what's happening. We do enjoy our little get-togethers, but I don't begrudge anyone for interrupting them. After all, we both have very unusual lives and very unusual schedules."
Elphaba hesitated. "Speaking of which… uh, who is that?"
"Who's who?"
"Look, don't pretend I can't see him, Nessa: he's clearly hiding under the bed. So who is he?"
"Absolutely no-one," said a muffled voice from somewhere around floor level.
"Look, it's got to be uncomfortable down there. I promise not to hurt you okay? I may be a little overprotective, but I'm pretty sure that Nessarose is way too old for me to start vetting her dates. So just get out from there and we can talk sensibly without having to worry about me dragging you out by your feet. Okay?"
There was a sigh, and slowly the pallid figure rose from beneath the mattress and rose slowly into view, hastily absorbing extraneous limbs back into his body as he went… and this time, Elphaba could only boggle in confusion.
There, with a look of mild terror stamped on his face and a pillow held over his groin, was none other than Dr Kiln, formerly known as Mr Heart, formerly-formerly known as Boq.
"Um, hi," he said sheepishly. "Good to see you alive and well again."
For ten bewildered seconds, Elphaba could only stare in silence. "You have got to be kidding me," she said at last. "After all the commotion and confusion and downright lies, you're in a relationship with Nessarose… for real this time?"
"I know," said Nessa, a dreamy smile on her face. "Incredible, isn't it?"
"But how did it happen? How are you two… together?"
"Perhaps you'll be able to ask Boq about it when you get back to Greenspectre," Kiln suggested. "He has my memories, so no doubt he'll be able to provide a much more intimate perspective on events. In fact, for all I know, he's dreaming of those days even as we speak… but if you want to hear it from me, it all started back in the days just before Oz erupted into civil war…"
Mr Heart didn't think he was the sort to be invited to masquerades: after all, anything that required dancing usually ended with him falling flat on his face, with the exception of his once moment of happiness at the Ozdust. But with the biggest experts of the Pottery being slowly but surely incorporated into respectable Ozian society, Dr Coil is now among the guests for tonight's masked ball, and as Dr Coil's apprentice, Mr Heart has been officially enlisted to serve as his plus one.
So, while his tutor magically adorns his face with a glittering pattern of red and black scales, Mr Heart rents the best suit he can possibly find at short notice, borrows a porcelain mask decorated with harlequin-like markings and a jester's hat, and then obediently follows Dr Coil to the ball.
In the end, of course, he spends most of his time doing what he usually does at what parties he has the good fortune to being invited to: holding up the wall and eroding the wine cellar… except this time, Dr Coil insists on introducing him to people, so he quickly finds himself being dragged through the crowd and paraded in front of whatever dignitaries the boss feels like presenting him to. This is arduous enough on its own, but the fact that everyone involved is wearing masks somehow makes it just the tiniest bit more irksome than he can reasonably deal with.
Eventually, Dr Coil gives him a break from networking and allows him to enjoy the festivities. Gods only know how he's supposed to achieve this: everything about tonight's party is about work, from the introduction of the experts to the politicking between guests. The dancing is a game of social one-upmanship, a dominance game used by the newly-promoted to lord it over those who once looked down on them. The music is white noise built to accentuate the competition. Even the masks are just window-dressing, status symbols to prove just how rich the wearer is: there's no fun in the disguises, no mystery, no guessing; the midnight unmasking is just a formality, for everyone worth knowing is already recognized no matter what they wear, and anyone else is just a cipher – someone's assistant, someone's subordinate, someone's puppet.
The specifics are even more depressing. Dr Coil, now that he has a place in respectable society, is now hobnobbing with people who don't understand the first thing about mage-surgery and networking officials who would have gladly had him caged five years ago. From his post by the door, Heart can pick out no less than twenty ambassadors from across Oz and beyond lining up to pay homage to Elphaba – or as she's now formally known, the High Overseer. Later tonight, there's going to be an exhibition of the latest efforts to cure the Plague, the process that Elphaba calls Purification, and the fully-cured victims now ready to show their shiny new faces to the world.
This isn't a masquerade: it's a business conference with the serial numbers filed off.
And then, just as Mr Heart is about ready to look for something stronger than wine, he notices a figure on the other side of the room, almost lost amidst the hurly-burly of the dancers. Even from here, there's no mistaking Nessarose Thropp.
Like him, she's masked – though given that everyone in the room can recognize her by the wheelchair, she's decided not to bother with a full face covering and has settled for a domino mask of silver. And like him, she's sitting alone against the wall with nothing to do and nobody to talk to. In fact, she appears to be reading a book. Perhaps realizing that nobody's paying attention to her, she's even doffed her mask and propped it up in her hair so she can get a better look at her reading material.
Years ago, the sight of Nessa sitting alone would have filled him with pity – with a little help from Glinda, of course. Tonight, though…
Somehow, the sight of her fills him with a terrible sense of loneliness. He's no idea why, of course: he has friends at the Pottery, he has colleagues who respect his opinions, and thanks to a few of the strange parties thrown by Dr Calenture, he's even enjoyed the occasional romantic encounter – though he can't remember much about them apart from the sex. But looking at Nessarose, he can't help but feel as though he's genuinely missed her in all the months they've been apart.
Looking at her now, he wants to be with her. Maybe it's the wine; maybe it's work-fuelled lust; maybe it's time and separation; maybe it's the fact that he's gotten used to thinking of himself and Boq as different people. Or maybe it's just because he's looking at her not as a fellow student or an employee or a prisoner, but as a complete stranger. Whatever the case, Nessa is no longer the tragically beautiful lunatic who imprisoned him for gods only knew how many years: tonight, she's just a pretty girl at a party… and somehow, he can't resist her.
All of a sudden, Mr Heart finds himself stepping away from the wall and drifting through the crowd towards her. He's not entirely sure what he's doing at the moment, though he's dimly aware that he's doing something deeply stupid. As one of the "dead" citizens recruited into the Pottery, he's been excused from the usual midnight unmasking, and he's been specifically warned to be careful about interacting with Nessa… but in that moment, he doesn't care. The party's boring, he's tipsy, and Elphaba isn't looking in his direction.
Halting in front of Nessa, he bows low and asks, "Care for a dance?"
Nessa barely favours him with a raised eyebrow. "Did my sister put you up to this to keep me company?" she asks wearily. "Or is this because you're feeling sorry for poor little Miss Tragically Beautiful?"
"Nope," said Mr Heart. "I'm doing this because you're just so beautiful."
For a moment, Nessa looks as though she's seen a ghost. Then, she starts eagerly wheeling herself towards him.
What happens next is an almost perfect replica of the night at the Ozdust, except this time his eyes aren't fixed on Glinda. Right now, Glinda is latched firmly to Fiyero's side and her pregnancy is beginning to show; even if he still longed for her the way he once had, even if Elphaba hadn't opened his eyes to the truth, the signs are there and plain to see – the woman Boq had once obsessed over for fruitless years on end is out of reach at last. Here and now, Boq is dead and Mr Heart is all that's left: in this moment he only has eyes for Nessa.
He's not stupid enough to take off his mask and kiss her – not with so much of his old face still there – but somehow, they end up in each other's arms. It lasts only for a moment, before Dr Coil draws him away to talk to some diplomatic representative from gods only know where, and the two part with a distinct air of anti-climax…
But somehow, in the night meant for networking, a night where he's supposed to be introduced as one of the minor prodigies of the New Oz, this was the only moment that made him feel special.
"And then you kept seeing her after that," Elphaba concluded. "You made up some excuse, you changed your face or made a mask to that end, and you introduced yourself: you started dating, and eventually you revealed you used to be Boq. You had a fight, you didn't speak to each other for a long while, and eventually, war drove you back into each other's arms, and before long the two of you were united by the need to keep a secret: your sympathies with Glinda's faction, and Nessa's growing business as the Mistress of Mirrors. Am I right or am I correct?"
"Actually, I chickened out at first," said Kiln.
"Really?"
"Oh, I was infatuated – in my own furtive, stumbling way… but I was too scared to act on it after that night. Without a few glasses of wine, I'd never have had the courage to ask her to dance at all, and once I sobered up, I was terrified of what Alphaba might do to me if she ever found out I'd been seeing her again. So, I kept my head down and pretended it hadn't happened."
"Then how did the two of you meet again? If you didn't initiate things, then how would you have come into contact?"
"Because I went looking for him," said Nessa, smugly.
Kiln offered a rueful smile. "Turns out I wasn't as subtle as I thought. Once Dr Coil and I were considered respectable enough to start teaching at universities, she knew where to find me. And even though I'd given myself a new face by then and I'd started enhancing my height, she could definitely guess at the truth. That might very well have been the most awkward conversation of my entire life…"
"Your name's Mr Heart?"
"That's right, ma'am."
"Just 'Heart'? No last name?"
"Um… yes, ma'am."
"You know, you remind me of a medical examiner I met once upon a time."
"Er?"
"Have you ever worked at the Asylum? Down in the morgue, by any chance?"
"I-I… I don't recall precisely, it was a very busy time during the plague…"
"I didn't say it was during the plague."
"Um…"
"Tell me a little bit about yourself, Heart. Where are you from? Are you Emerald City born and bred?"
"No, no, I'm… errr…"
"I mean, you strike me as pretty urban, at home in a big city like this, so maybe you started out in Gillikin country. Or were you raised out on the fringes, someplace like Quadling country… or Muchkinland, perhaps?"
"Munchkinland?! What would have given you that impression?"
"Nothing. I'm just guessing, really."
"Oh… that's fair enough. Uh… can we talk about something else?"
"I hear mage-surgery can do all kinds of amazing things, believe it or not. It can even change your appearance, or so I've been told. That's apparently the basis for this new Purification procedure."
"That's nice… um… if you'll excuse me, I have nonspecific business elsewhere…"
"…But of course, she wouldn't be so easily dissuaded," said Kiln with a fond smile. "Funny thing is, I could have stopped it easily: all I'd have had to do was schedule a meeting with Alphaba and tell her that Nessa was starting to sniff out the truth; she'd have packed off into the bowels of the Pottery or sent me to some far-flung lab out on the edge of the Deadly Desert, and Nessarose would never have seen me again. But in spite of my fear… I didn't want it to end. So… I let her catch up with me. I let her get close. She found secret places for us to meet – empty lecture halls, deserted operating theatres, abandoned offices, places where we could sit and eat lunch and talk."
"I was never as forward as was on the first day, of course," Nessa admitted. "I think I wanted it to remain unspoken, because even though I could almost recognize him just by those nervous tics, I wanted to get to know him again. So we just talked about… well, everyday things: books and plays and irritations over train timetables, favourite meals and work-related frustrations and how the weather was getting colder… just the sort of things friends talk about."
"Somehow, we managed to keep it secret from Alphaba. By then, I think she was too absorbed in her plans to realize what we were up to. But then again, she wasn't the only one who was having trouble seeing the truth: I'd almost managed to fool myself into thinking that Nessa had given up trying to unearth my secrets… and after a couple of weeks of this, I decided it was time to confess." Kiln shook his head in bemusement. "And there I was, thinking I'd been such a good actor…"
"What do you mean, you already knew?"
Nessa gives him a look that can best be described as 'exasperated.' "I'm not an idiot, Mr Heart. That night at the masquerade told me everything I needed to know about you long before I started digging up information. The rest… well, if it wasn't that first little chat that clued me it, was the day you joined my sister's think-tank."
"You know that? How could you possibly know that?"
"Experimental magic has its advantages, especially when you have access to the places family connections can take you: the paperwork I found in Elphaba's office says you were recruited into the think-tank exactly around the time you supposedly went into intensive care at the Asylum. And the day you passed your exams and achieved the rank of kiln? The very day Boq died. And then you turn up in the morgue, wearing a different face but the same glasses you're wearing right now. I don't know why you decided to fake your death, but I'm guessing it's because Elphaba ordered you to, probably so I to break me of my obsession with you." Nessa hesitates for a moment, and then adds, "Though that does raise the question of why you joined the Pottery instead of trying to propose to Glinda."
"Elphaba broke me of my obsession with her, too," Heart admits.
"Really, how?"
"She showed me conclusive proof that she wouldn't love me. Glinda and Fieyero having sex, in other words."
In spite of herself, Nessa winces. "Ouch. Yes, I imagine that would do the trick."
"Plus, she's pregnant now, so…" Mr Heart hesitates. "Please tell me you're not going to re-hire me."
"Boq – Mr Heart, whatever you want to call yourself… I'm not the acting Governor of Munchkinland anymore: my father's returned to the role, and I'm just an ordinary citizen. Technically, I'm a student all over again. Right now don't have the legal rights to hire anyone, least of all you, especially now that the amendments I made to the laws have been repealed. And as angry as I am with you, I have to admit that the last few months of magical study have actually been pretty good at working the old insecurities out of my head."
"Good grief, it worked for you, too?"
"I still missed you, though. And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't happy to see you, Boq."
"Please, call me Heart. Boq was… well, I'm really not proud of the man I once was, suffice to say."
"Whatever you want to call yourself, I'm happy to see you. And I think you are too. I mean, why else would you have approached me that night at the masquerade."
"And… you'd be right. I mean, I certainly wasn't told to do it this time around."
"Judging by those ugly looks Elphaba was throwing your direction, I didn't think so."
"I... I may have gotten a tad carried away that night. I'm so sorry about that, by the way – I shouldn't have just barged back into your life like that without thinking of the-"
"No, it's okay. I'm genuinely glad to see you again. It's been… a little lonely with only my studies to keep me company. I think that masquerade was the first time I've been out of the archives in weeks."
"Same here: I spend most of my time underground, dissecting corpses. But seriously, if there's anything I can do to make up for what I did…"
And at long last, Nessa smiles. "You don't have to make amends for anything, Mr Heart. I think we've both made mistakes: you lied to me in the hopes of getting a kiss from Glinda, I did extremely questionable things trying to keep you with me, and we both said things we probably regret about now. I want us to put all this insanity behind us once and for all. And if you want to help me clear the air, there's one thing we can both do: see, I need your help with something – something very important."
"Is this anything to do with unearthing any more of Elphaba's secrets?"
"No, no, you can relax; you don't have to try your hand at espionage. This one fits your new skillset perfectly: over the last few months, I've been researching magical rituals that can allow me to walk again, and after a great deal of practice and experimentation, I think I've found the perfect candidate. Trouble is, there's one tiny problem: in order for the spell to work, large incisions have to be made to the areas I want to correct – enough to expose my spine and the bones of my legs to the air. For that, I'll need someone to perform the initial incisions, prevent any infection from setting in, and to make sure I don't lose consciousness while I'm reciting the words of the spell."
For a moment, Mr Heart's mind goes blank with fear: by this point, he's performed several operations on live test subjects, but always under supervision and never on such a patient as this; what if he makes a mistake? What if he ends up killing Nessa? What would Elphaba do to him if she finds out?
Then, the logical implications of everything Nessa has said so far begin to trickle into place: she trusts him. In spite of everything they've been through, all the times they hurt each other and stretched their relationship past the breaking point, she still trusts him. And in spite of all the years he'd spent resenting her, the thought of her having such confidence in him somehow makes his heart twist in unusual directions. He hasn't felt this way since Glinda smiled at him on their first day at Shiz.
"You think I can do that?" he asks, trying not to let his voice crack.
"I know you can. You wouldn't have gotten this far through the ranks if you didn't know what you were doing, and I wouldn't be asking you to do this if you weren't the most trustworthy man I've ever met."
"Considering how long I lied to you, that might be setting the bar a little low."
"Oh shut up."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Heart, you didn't have to reintroduce yourself to me. You didn't have to make yourself a part of my life again, and you didn't have to put up with all those lunches we spent together. You definitely didn't have to confess. We wouldn't be having this conversation right now if we weren't friends… and that's why, as your friend, I can trust you to help me."
Two days later, in a secluded operating theatre, the ritual is enacted. For almost half an hour, Nessa lies face-down on a table, chanting an incantation that can repair her torn nerves and ruined legs, and reinvigorate the atrophied muscles of her lower body. Through it all, Mr Heart maintains the incisions on her back and legs, shields her from infection with antibacterial spells, keeps her conscious, and ensures that nobody interrupts the procedure – or disrupts Nessa's concentration.
Despite the crippling sense of anxiety bearing down on him prior to the operation, he finds himself entirely without fear during it: in fact, he has no emotion at all. His mind is blank except for the instructions he must follow, the details to watch out for. All he can think of is the work, the clamping of blood vessels, the shielding of vital organs, the lock maintained on the door, and all the other things that must be kept in place in order for the mission to be completed.
Eventually, Nessa's incantations come to a close and the spell is complete… and even from here, Mr Heart can already tell that their work has been successful. His surgical training means the signs are all but impossible to miss: he's seen enough bodies to recognize healthy bones and muscles; performing diagnostic spells to check the state of the nerves is just a formality.
Time passes, as Mr Heart seals the incisions in Nessa's back and allows her time to recover. Perhaps an hour of rest later, she awakens, eyes opening wide in astonishment.
"How do you feel?" he asks softly.
"Alive," Nessa whispers, almost quivering with excitement. "I… I can barely even describe these sensations: I have feeling in my legs! After all this time, I can feel my legs!" She wiggles her left foot. "I did that," she murmurs tremulously. "I did that."
Very slowly, she sits up. Then, dressed in nothing but a backless surgical gown, she swings her legs over the side of the table, and very gently lowers herself to the floor. Her feet settle slowly upon the sterile white tiles, and she immediately shivers at the cold; for a moment, she can only hover there, holding herself up by the edge the table and trembling with delight at the sensation of cold tile against bare skin. Then, with a deep breath, she carefully pushes herself away from the table.
For the first time in her entire life, Nessarose Thropp stands upright.
A beatific smile materializes on her face.
Very slowly, she takes a step forward, loses balance, and almost topples over – right before Mr Heart sprints forward and catches her.
For a moment, the two can only stare at each other, not knowing what to say or do next.
Then, with Mr Heart supporting her by the arms, Nessa takes her next step. Then the next after that, then another, and another, until Heart slowly draws away and allows her to take her sixth step on her own. In seconds, she is walking unassisted, no longer reaching out for the table to steady her, no longer wobbling on every third step, no longer losing balance.
"We did it," Nessa breathes, too overwhelmed to speak louder than a whisper. "I can walk."
Slowly, she begins to laugh. "I CAN WALK!" she shrieks.
A moment later, she has flung herself into Mr Heart's arms and is showering him with kisses.
It isn't until much later, when the two of them have just returned to their civilian clothes – and in Nessa's case, laughing over how much easier dressing herself has become – that something belatedly occurs to Mr Heart.
"Did you really need me at all?" he asks, hesitantly.
"Sorry?"
"I'm not exactly an expert on all fields of magic, but I can recognize that the incantation you used took a lot of power, dedication and skill. If you've learned enough to get that to work without a single stammer, wouldn't you have been able to make the incisions, neutralize infections and keep yourself conscious on your own – you know, with another set of spells performed in advance?"
"I probably would have… but I didn't want to."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't need any more validation at this point: the events of the last few months have already given me enough self-esteem to haul me out of the pit I'd landed in – particularly saving those lives on the final night of the Plague; completing this spell and walking again was the only victory I needed."
She pauses, and then adds "And also because, I wanted to prove something to myself. Let's just say that after my sister's ingenious emotional manipulation, I'm not as quick to trust as I used to be: I wanted to know I could rely on you to help me… and I wanted final proof that you didn't reintroduce yourself at Elphaba's prompting."
Mr Heart's brow wrinkles. "Well," he says. "I can understand the first half – given that it's pretty much my fault. But what would my part in the surgery prove?"
"Elphaba wanted me to perform the ritual by myself – probably while she kept watch without my knowledge, just for safety sake. If you were really working for my sister, you'd never have taken part in this venture: you'd have gone straight to her and abdicated all responsibility. Taking part would have meant risking my life – and by extension, your own."
"Fair enough."
There is a pause.
"So what happens now?" Mr Heart asked softly.
"Whatever you want. I'm not your employer, and you're not my servant: I'm not forcing you, and you're not lying to me. I'm not fixating on an illusion, and you're not pining after someone who won't return your affections. Now… now we can like each other simply for who we are."
Mr Heart thought about this for a moment. "I doubt your sister would approve of us being friends."
Nessa smiles, and for the first time since he's known her, there's a tiny bit of mischief on that face. "What Elphaba doesn't know won't kill her. Besides, everyone has their secrets: why not us?"
Mr Heart smiles back at her. Maybe it's just the secret they now share, maybe they're both high on success, or maybe Nessa just shares her sister's gloriously impish smirk. Whatever the case, In all the years he's known her, she's never been more beautiful than this moment.
It doesn't take long to find the bottle of celebratory red that Dr Coil keeps stashed here, along with two serviceable glasses.
"To friendship," he toasts. "And maybe more."
Nessa giggles, drinking deep. "And maybe more indeed…"
"So you were the surgical assistance Nessa mentioned?"
"Of course. As I said, it was all superfluous – though not unsatisfying. I can't take credit for the steps we took to disguise what had happened: it was Nessa who came up with the idea of using the wheelchair for a few more days just so nobody would get suspicious about our activities around the teaching hospitals."
"But… does that mean you were the one who sabotaged Nessa's Purification? You were the one who helped her retain free will?"
"Well, I don't like to boast, but-"
"Of course he did," said Nessa, grinning. "As far as Alphaba knew, he was still a loyal member of her little think-tank. Once we'd covered our tracks, and made sure never to be seen in public again, she'd no reason to suspect we were lovers. Granted, it took the news of the first few... suspicious developments in the field before we realized Alphaba's plans and decided Purification wasn't such a good thing."
"Still took me too long to defect," Kiln sighed.
By now, the two of them had dressed – Dr Kiln in his usual white coat and opaque spectacles, Nessa in a glossy black set of robes. Also, for some reason, Kiln appeared to be double-checking his briefcase.
"But you've been seeing each other ever since then?"
"Absolutely."
"But, did you come over just for-"
"A romantic interlude?" Kiln finished. "No, I actually stopped by to chaperone you back to Greenspectre. Nessa sent word of your survival to the Mentor just a few hours ago, and she sent me to pick you up… well, Nessa was so happy to see you in person at last, and I was happy you were alive, we had a few drinks to celebrate, one thing led to another… and we may have gotten a little carried away."
"That's putting it mildly. I'm pretty sure they could hear you in Loamlark, Nessa."
"Call it force of habit: normally I don't have anyone in the house other than the mirror golems. I mean, the things we got up to-"
"I REALLY DON'T NEED TO HEAR ANYMORE, THANKS," Elphaba replied loudly.
Nessa giggled – an almost incongruously girlish habit considering how old she really was beneath the Purification. "What would sisters be without a good old-fashioned instance of unwanted details?" she guffawed.
"Fair enough. Question is, what happens now-"
There was a loud ringing from the general direction of Kiln's briefcase.
"Well, I didn't expect that," he muttered.
"What's wrong?"
"That's my emergency alarm: someone at the palace needs my assistance! You'd best get your things together, Elphaba: we're heading home!"
In the end, once they'd returned Elphaba's hat and newly-repaired clothing, returning to Greenspectre proved to be a simple matter of stepping through one of Nessa's innumerable mirrors: all she had to do was cast a particularly esoteric spell that even Elphaba couldn't recognize, and the surface of it simply parted like a curtain before them. One step later, and they were stepping out of yet another mirror onto the seventh-floor landing of Greenspectre palace's main staircase, surrounded all sides by confused-looking bodyguards, soldiers, Irredeemables, and assorted medical technicians.
As expected, the Mentor herself was waiting for them, looking more haggard than ever.
Against expectation, however, the Mentor was not the source of the medical emergency. Indeed, despite the grim expression, she was as close to perfect health as she could get in her condition. Also, she appeared to have been caught in the middle of an extended conversation with Vara, who looked even grimmer than she did, for some reason.
"I'm back at last!" Dr Kiln proclaimed wearily. "And I've brought our wounded hero back with us. What seems to be the problem?"
There was a worried pause.
"Well? Who's the patient?"
Without saying a word, the Mentor nodded. A split-second later, crowd parted, revealing two grim-faced paramedics carrying a stretcher, on which rested the starved, battered-looking body of the Cowardly Lion.
As one, Elphaba and Kiln surged forward – almost crashing into each other as they hurried over to the Lion's side. As they drew closer, the sight all but savaged Elphaba's heart: he'd lost a great deal of weight in the months since she'd last seen him, and huge patches of hair were missing from his hide, revealing lurid purple bruises. On close examination, the stump of his tail had been crudely bandaged, and was now befouled with dirt and ashes, and his mane with thick with blood and what looked disturbingly like white greasepaint. Thankfully, no wounds could be found on the Lion's head or neck, so the blood presumably belonged to the Hellion.
All that paled in comparison to the one thought that found purchase in Elphaba's head as she checked the poor Animal's pulse: the Lion was alive.
In spite of the Hellion's ultimatum and brutality, somehow he'd escaped and made it back alive. However, he didn't appear to be all that mobile at the moment.
"Is he unconscious or just asleep?" Elphaba asked.
"I think he's been enchanted," Kiln replied. "Probably to keep him from running away. Still, that'll save time on sedating him for the operation."
"Operation? What's wrong with him?"
"Well, I hate to break it to you, Elphaba, but he appears to be missing a tail in case you hadn't noticed."
"And you can fix that? Just that simply?"
"I don't like to boast, but assuming we put the tail on ice quickly enough, it should still be viable. If not, I can just make a new one. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have work to do." For a moment, Kiln paused, and then in a harsh whisper, added, "And no mention of Nessa's name, if you please? I don't think the Mentor's ready for all the revelations just yet."
He cleared his throat. "Alright, gents, it's time we took this poor fellow for medical attention," he called loudly. "To my operating theatre on the double, if you please!"
As the four of them hurried away, Elphaba turned back to the Mentor. "How did he get here?" she demanded.
"Your guess is as good as ours, I'm afraid," went the reply. "He just turned up at the city gates a few hours ago. By rights, it shouldn't have been possible for him to get that far: with that sleep enchantment on him, he wouldn't have been able to walk five feet, much less break out of the Hellion's lair. And even if it had lapsed just long enough for him to sneak out, he probably would have died of infection long before he ever got here."
"So we've got another mystery on our hands."
"On top of an entire fleet destroyed with barely a quarter of the assigned personnel surviving," said the Mentor darkly. "By the way, were you able to divine any information on what attacked you? According to the survivors, you were the target that day."
"It was Frexspar."
For the first time in a long while, the Mentor looked genuinely surprised. "Your father?"
"My foster -father. The Wizard was my biological father, don't forget: if you've been reading my notes, you should know that well enough. Long story short, the Empress somehow has Frexspar Thropp's mind in storage, and she's using his hatred of me as a weapon – don't ask me how she managed it, but it's definitely him. Just this… unreasoning distillation of his anger and loathing, incarnated as this… Hate-Creature."
"And it's somehow powerful enough to tear an entire airfleet out of the sky?"
"Only if it has me included among it."
"Then that begs another question: how did you escape from it?"
"I don't know. One minute I was being swatted out of the sky, the next minute I'm drifting in and out of consciousness at the Mistress of Mirrors' mansion."
"Then she rescued you?"
"No, no: she told me that she couldn't get a lock on the battlefield – not enough shadows or reflections or whatever. According to her, I just turned up on her doorstep, badly wounded and in need of help. From what she told me, I had a compound fracture in my thigh: broken bones would have made it impossible for me to walk, and a ruptured femoral artery would have killed me in a matter of minutes."
The Mentor sighed. "And another mystery: two people who by all rights shouldn't have escaped alive, both of whom suddenly reappear in friendly territory with no explanation and no serious injuries apart from a missing tail and a limp."
"Well, to be fair, the so-serious-injuries part was entirely due to the Mistress of Mirrors. But-"
"ELPHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE!"
No sooner had Elphaba looked up in surprise, the crowd ahead of her parted just quickly enough for Glinda to catapult herself across the room like a spring-legged gazelle and fling her arms around Elphaba.
"Are you okay? You're not hurt are you? What happened? Where were you? What attacked you? Did you see what become of the fleet? Have you heard the news? Who were they carrying off on that stretcher? Did-"
"Good grief, Glinda, take a breath before you pass out!" She patted her soothingly on the shoulder. "I'm fine. Believe me, I've only got a slight limp, and Kiln tells me it'll wear off soon. And also, I missed you, too."
"Of course, that raises another question," the Mentor commented dryly. "I haven't officially revealed your impending return to anyone outside my retinue – and I wasn't going to until Dr Kiln had given you a clean bill of health. So tell me, Glinda, how exactly did you find out about it?"
"We had an early warning system," said Fiyero, stepping through the crowd.
Now it was Elphaba's turn to fling herself across the room, almost sweeping the Scarecrow off his feet as she wrapped her arms around him. For the next few moments, there was silence, broken only by the sounds of the two kissing – and something papery slipping free from Fiyero's left hand and thudding to the ground.
"You were saying something about an early warning system?" the Mentor whispered icily.
Startled apart, the two of them stepped back and allowed Fiyero to explain. "Just a few minutes ago, we got this package at the front door to our apartment," he said, scooping the fallen parcel off the ground as he did so. "According to the palace staff, nobody delivered it; it just appeared out of thin air-"
"-and it was enchanted to only appear when you arrived back in the palace," Glinda finished with a grin.
"That's what the experts told us, at least once they were finished checking it for explosives and curses."
"It's for you, after all."
There was a pause, as Elphaba cautiously accepted the package from Fiyero: as far as she could tell, it was a perfectly ordinary piece of mail, complete with brown paper, twine and a single card on the front – addressed to her, of course, along with a scrawled proclamation of "TO A VERY SPECIAL GAL." However, apart from the initial opinion of the as-yet-unseen experts, there was no guessing what it could contain apart from a lone cardboard container about the size of a shoebox.
Tentatively, she began opening it, half-expecting to find another severed organ waiting for her. But instead, after slicing though the twine, ripping past the final layer of paper and opening the box beneath it, what awaited her was a wave of near-tangible magical energies that Elphaba hadn't felt in months – accompanied by a vivid glare of deep crimson light erupting from the centre of the package.
The Ruby Slippers.
"She gave them back?" Glinda whispered.
"That's what it looks like," said Elphaba.
"After everything that's happened between the two of you, she just gives them back? Just like that? What about the Lion?"
"He just got back, Glinda: that was who Dr Kiln was taking away on the stretcher."
"Oh."
For the next few seconds, Elphaba surveyed the package, furiously studying the Ruby Slippers for any sign of tampering, fakery, or illusions – anything that might hint at why the Hellion would have simply given them away. For the longest time, she expected the glow to abruptly vanish and leave her holding a pair of tattered leather sandals or some such thing. But in the end, the Slippers remained as real and vivid as ever, and all the diagnostic spells confirmed that these were indeed the genuine article.
A tiny, ice-cold droplet of fear landed in the pit of Elphaba's stomach.
"Where's Dorothy?" she asked quietly.
"That's just what I was talking about when you arrived!" snapped Vara, almost ashen-faced with anxiety. "She hasn't been found since the Lobster Pot incident: she wasn't among the survivors who were rescued from the battle, she didn't turn up at Doorstep like some of the others, and if she's dead, her body hasn't been found. We've been organizing search parties but-"
Elphaba was halfway through turning around to ask more searching questions, when she noticed a slip of paper tucked under the Ruby Slippers. Sliding it out and unfolding it, Elphaba immediately recognized the disorganized scrawl of a child's handwriting, and began reading – heart hammering against her ribs as her eyes swept the page.
Dear Elphaba, it read.
I've only got a short while to write this before I have to go, and I'll probably never be able to get down everything I want to say. I'm hoping you live to read this, though, just so I can say goodbye.
I've decided to give the Hellion what she wants: she's agreed to take you to safety if I hand myself over and let her make me a doll – she knows someone who can heal you; she's even going to give back the Lion and the Ruby Slippers.
I know you and Glinda and Vara would tell me I'm being stupid and throwing my life away and I probably am. But you're not awake and the other two aren't here right now, and I won't forgive myself if you die because of me. I don't want to go back to Kansas and tell Aunt Em that I was hiding while the monster killed you.
I should have done this a long time ago, before the Hellion started killing people because of me. At least this way, maybe I can do some good: maybe she won't hurt anyone else once she has me.
At least you'll have what I stole from you. At least the Lion will be safe.
I'm so sorry for everything that happened back in Oz: I'm sorry about Nessa – she sounds lovely, I wish I could have met her. I'm sorry I let the Wizard use me. I'm sorry I took the Ruby Slippers. I'm sorry I didn't think about your side of things until it was too late.
I'm sorry.
When the Lion gets back, tell him and the Tin Man and the Scarecrow not to go looking for me. Just help him get well. Just look after him; you've done it before, and you can do it a lot better than me.
And if you ever find a way, tell Aunt Em and Uncle Henry what happened to me: tell them I made a lot of stupid mistakes, but in the end, I did the right thing.
I guess this is goodbye.
Love,
Dorothy Gale.
For five terrified seconds, Elphaba stared down at the letter in horror, heart pounding so violently she thought it might burst out of her chest. Then, she launched herself at the giant mirror overlooking the landing.
"Where is she?!" she roared, hammering at the glass with her fists. "She handed me over to you! You know her, Mistress! You know where she is! Where is the Hellion's lair!? Answer me! There's a child's life at stake!"
