Last chapter, it wasn't a week before the wedding. It was the night before. Forgive me.
By the end of the night, their carriage had arrived at Kaimo Ko. Nanny walked her to the front doors of the castle, carrying most of the luggage, and telling her that everything would be alright. Elphaba looked up and down the large wooden, brown doors that stood before her. If she were getting a first impression, the overly large, empowering doors were a big enough impression on her than anything else on the castle did.
She jumped when the right wooden door started opening, revealing a small maid.
"Please come in, Miss Elphaba." stated the young maid. The maid certainly must be new to being a maid, for she pretty much demanded that Elphaba come in at once. Regardless, Elphaba walked into the large hall and looked upon the traditional Arjiki tapestries that hung from the window sills of the large stained-glass windows. She marveled at the beauty of the castle, thinking in the back of her head that she would have the opportunity of living in such a beatiful castle in a few years.
She saw a fairly middle-aged woman approach her.
"Are you Miss Elphaba Thropp?" she asked. Elphaba had no idea who this woman was or even what she was doing asking her name.
"Yes ma'am. Who might you be, if you don't mind me asking?" she asked back. She did have a reason to know who this stranger was.
"Oh don't tell me you weren't told. I am Fiyero's mother. You can call me Elana, mother, or just Mrs. Tiggular if you want." she said sweetly. She seemed very nice, but as soon as their small chat finished, a rather bulky, surly man started walking down the steps. This was the part where Elphaba starts thinking 'PLEASE DON'T BE FIYERO! PLEASE, OH PLEASE DON'T BE FIYERO!' And just to her luck, it was Fiyero's father.
"I assume you are Miss Elphaba Thropp?" he chided while bowing and kissing her hand. She blushed, she wasn't used to such formalities. She usually got the cold shoulder, or the formal 'hello,' but never a kiss on the hand and a bow.
"Yes, I am sir." she nodded, bowing back in her usual black frock.
"Please dear, there's no need for the formalities. Call me Nearek." they continued with some simple idle chat until they offered to go to the study and wait for Fiyero to join them. Nearek got the servants to take all of Elphaba's things up to her and Fiyero's new room.
They approached the study and sat down on the squarely aligned furniture, the furniture all gathered around the medium-sized fireplace, and the study was filled with four columns of books on each side of the walls. Elphaba was fascinated with the room. She considered staying in this room and the library for most of the time that she was going to spend here. She started rummaging through some books on Arjiki tradition, religion, physics, science, and even pulled out a romance novel for later.
"Well Elphaba, we're going to head out for about the night. When Fiyero comes down you may go ahead and eat dinner." said Nearek. Elana rushed over to Elphaba giving her a quick hug before leaving.
"My Elphaba, you're such a dear. I'm very happy about the woman you turned out to be. I know you'll just love Fiyero." Elphaba smiled at her comment and hugged her back before waving good-bye to both of them.
She took the few books she had in her arms and walked over to the love-seat couch that was parallel to the fireplace. First she took the book on Arjiki tradition & religion and read a few chapters about what they believed in. Seeing how they believed in the unnamed god and such and such. She though she heard the door to the study open, but when she went to look she saw nothing there. She shook her head and then began to read a chapter out of the science and physics book she had pulled down. Seeing how Ozian Physics didn't agree with Sebastian Adorag's theory on space she began to get a little tired at the boring excerpts. She thought she heard something again and stood up to walk around and examine the room.
She walked up the steps to the second story part of the room to find an ochre skinned man climbing one of the ladders to reach a book.
"Oh hello, I say you reading and I didn't want to disturb." said the ochre man. "I just wanted to come in and grab my book before I head back upstairs. Please forgive my intrusion."
"Oh no, you were fine. I just wanted to know who else had come in to the room. By the way, what is your name?" she asked gently. For the way the man acted, he seemed like a humble servant.
"Oh me. Well, I don't know how to say this, but I am Fiyero." he said kindly. He didn't want to frighten her, maybe this girl was a new maid in the house. "But please forgive me for interrupting your reading. If I may, what is your name, miss?"
"Elphaba. Elphaba Thropp." she whispered, knowing now, that this ochre skinned man, reaching for an obviously high-level book was going to be wed to her tomorrow. This was going to be the guy that she'd have to give herself to.
"Oh...I see. You're Elphaba." he whispered back, letting his eyes fall upon her silent form. "You have to understand, Elphaba, I mean you no harm. It's just, I'm not too sure what I'm going to do with the situation tomorrow. I would really appreciate if you'd take a walk with me, perhaps we can discuss the events that will take place tomorrow."
She nodded her head. He climbed down the ladder and led her out to the back gardens. They walked through a small opening and into a large open area. It had a few bushels of greenery, flowers, and a large tree with a bench underneath it, with a small pond residing next to it. She immediately went over to the bench and sat down. He followed her over and sat next to her, trying to give her as much space as possible.
She looked away from him and turned her face to the small pond. Looking at her reflection. She hated looking at herself, she had always been told that she was ugly, could never be loved, and would never be good for anything. Fiyero leaned over her shoulder and looked at her reflection with her.
"Wow. I'm going to be as honest as I can, but really, you're absolutely beautiful." he smiled and blushed. He didn't expect himself to be so open with his already blooming feelings for her. "I think I'm rather lucky to be arranged with someone as gorgously stunning as you, Elphaba."
She smiled at his compliments. "Thank you," she replied "but do you really mean it." she looked at him. Her eyes starting to become glassy, water building at the brims.
"I meant every word..." his voice trailed off. He was leaning close to her now, he didn't want to do something that he'd regret and jumped back almost immediately. "Forgive me. I didn't mean to intrude in your space."
She smiled at his innocence. Her hand reached over and touched his.
"We should talk about tomorrow." she said, reminding him why they had even come out to the garden anyways.
"Oh right. Well I've been thinking about tomorrow. Well we're getting married, but we've never even kissed before. And I probably sound like a horny little twelve year-old, but I think we should at least practice kissing some, so we don't look completely awkward and embarass ourselves completely." he said nervously.
"I think you're right, but I think that if we're going to practice we should practice in our own privacy later tonight. When we go to bed maybe?" she inquired. "And I think I'm going to go back in. I'm starting to feel hungry." And with that last sentence she stood up promptly and started walking back through the small opening that they came through before hand. But before she oculd take any more than two steps, Fiyero had grabbed her arm.
"Wait. About everything I said earlier. I meant all of it. I think...no...I know that you're the most beatiful woman I've ever seen." as he finished his sentence, gently letting go of her arm. She turned and gave him a shadow of a smile and continued to walk out as he stood their watching her back leave his eye sight.
After she finished her meal, she returned to the study to grab the two books she wasn't quite down looking through yet, and then retired to their room. Upon entering the unknown territory she saw that there was a restroom, bed, bath tub, shower, balcony, two closets, and two dressers. It made her happy seeing all the knew things before her. Back in Munchkinland she only had a closet and a very small bed, with one window to her left. She marvelled at how she was so lucky to be able to marry into a family of such generous people.
"Is something wrong?"She jumped at the voice. The room was dark, until she saw a figure enter through the balcony passage.
"Oh no...I was just...looking around." she whispered. She wasn't used to this presence in the same room that she was going to be residing in. But she had to get used to it anyways, so being as confident and determined as she could she went over to the dresser, pulled out a pair of black pajamas, and started to undress in front of him.
"Uh...what are you doing?" he asked nervously. He was trying to force himself to look away, but only found himself stealing glances of her anyways.
"I'm changing. And I would assume you're going to be doing the same. Because I don't plan on sleeping with someone whose wearing filthy clothes." she snorted, while pointing at him in only her bra and underwear.
He simply nodded and began to take off his shirt and pants. As soon as he was putting on his pajama pants she was already in hers and was sitting on the bed with the two books she had picked out. Fiyero walked over and sat down on the bed next to her. Sizing her up again he looked at her face, absolutely serene, her torso, thin and toned, her waist, slender, her legs, long and thin. She seemed almost too good to be true to him, and because of that his hormones started acting before he thought his actions through. The next thing he knew was that his right arm had slipped around her waist and his lips were gently grazing her neck.
She let out a soft moan at the sudden sensation, but she didn't realize why she wasn't stopping him. Sure she was enjoying what he was doing, but this was unreasonable, he had no reason to start kissing her neck. But she still couldn't bring herself to stop him, and then she was facing him, her hands on his chest and his arms rubbing her back. He titled his head to the side and stated leaning in to kiss her, but then he realized what he was doing. He jumped away from her and fell on the floor.
"ouch..." he muttered rubbing his arm. She bent over the edge of the bed and saw him and immediately started to giggle. Soon she couldn't control her laughter and started bawling she was laughing so hard. Seeing her so happy, Fiyero then joined her in laughing at himself.
After they had lost their breath in laughing, Elphaba realized what was going to happen minutes before. She started blushing uncontrollably and turned away from Fiyero. He saw her reaction and joined her on the bed again.
"You don't have anything to be ashamed about. I was the one who started it. Blame my stupid hormones instead of yourself." he chided while touching her right shoulder. She turned her head back and looked at him. They both leaned forward a little bit and just pecked the other. This time they both were blushing madly and trying to at least regain her composure, she laid back down on the bed and got under the covers. He followed her action and ended up looking at her back while he watched her fall asleep, or at least he thought she was.
He sighed at her supposedly sleeping form.
"Oh Elphaba. I don't think you understand how beatiful you are." he whispered. He sat up slightly and inched closer to her back. Gently he reached his face over to her cheek and gave her a small kiss. "Goodnight Elphaba. I hope you have as pleasant dreams as I know I will."
After saying that he smiled and easily went to sleep and later on a small smile crept onto her lips and she had pleasant dreams as well.