The title for chapter twenty-four is from…The Pirate Queen. Congrats to RECblue8 and Yank2324.

Last angsty chapter. Although I didn't think it was that angsty. We'll see.

Chapter 25: There Will Be a Miracle

She wasn't sure her eyes were open. It was so dark that if they were, Elphaba wouldn't be able to see through the blackness. The darkness consumed her, grinding any feasible excuse for a sense of where and who she was into nothing. Therefore, she tried to open her eyes, wondering defiantly if there was something through the obscurity.

A blurred shape appeared when she did so. Closing her eyes again, Elphaba listened to the sounds surrounding her, which slowly formed into words as she focused."…week… live… conscious…" These words, though recognizable, meant nothing to the green woman, and she quickly fell into unconsciousness once more.

The next time she opened her eyes, they felt heavy, with her eyeballs completely dry. Everything she saw was immensely bright, a whiteness so overwhelming that she had to squeeze her eyelids together to be rid of the sting. She winced as pressure built on her forehead. "No, no," she mumbled, becoming distressed and wanting to move away from whatever it was. "Stop. No more."

The old nurse's heart broke at hearing Elphaba beg. Elphaba was usually a resilient, sturdy young woman, almost jaded to the chaotic way of the world. Madame Pomphrey dropped her work and went to take control of the situation before Elphaba suffered damage through a panic attack. She held down weak limbs and spoke clearly to her.

"Calm down, Thropp!" Pomphrey snapped when the green woman wouldn't give up her fight. "You'll reopen your wounds and destroy all our hard work!"

Elphaba didn't seem to register what Madame Pomphrey was saying, nor the implications of it. Her pupils were dilated and she couldn't see properly. She broke out of the nurse's grip, dashed out of bed, and darted about the room, a primal response to escape danger. However, Elphaba quickly fell in a heap from misusing her neglected legs. Sighing, Pomphrey gathered a needle and plunged a calming draught into Elphaba's bloodstream, who remained indifferent during the process.

"Thropp. Listen to me." She meant to be stern, looking the green witch in the eyes, which had finally focused. "You're at Hogwarts, in the Hospital Wing. You are safe."

Safe, safe, safe. The word sunk into Elphaba and reminded her to act politely. It didn't feel to her that it was Pomphrey telling her this, though. It was someone else far away- perhaps a memory.

"Hogwarts," Elphaba croaked, her throat burning with misuse. Her own voice sounded unfamiliar, as though an elderly smoking stranger was manipulating her body. "H-how did I get here?"

"Don't talk now; your vocal cords are raw. They were damaged and still need time to heal completely. Harry, Severus, and Hermione brought you back a week ago."

Elphaba opened her mouth to speak, but Pomphrey quickly interrupted by grabbing a quill and a piece of parchment. "Here." She offered it to Elphaba. "Use it."

Elphaba grasped the quill and discovered that it was more than just her throat that ached. The very recesses of her skeleton seemed to wince in pain, with surging roots of throbbing extending into fresh sores. Biting her lip to suppress the surprise, she scrawled with her left arm instead of her broken right. It proved useful to be ambidextrous.

"What happened?" The handwriting border lined illegible, too loopy for her own liking.

"That story would be yours." Pomphrey visibly relaxed now that Elphaba calmed. "To tell us, that is. You were severely tortured by Death Eaters during your two week ordeal. It wasn't even certain if you would survive. We thought you a dead woman, Thropp."

"We?"

"Hermione, Glinda, and I. Not to mention Dumbledore, Potter, and Fiyero. They've been checking up on you continuously. Honestly! You just woke up, why must you question me so quickly?" huffed the nurse, used to the quiet.

"Glinda was here? Where is she?" The length of time it took to write down her questions increased Elphaba's annoyance at this rule Madame Pomphrey imposed on her. She wanted to speak, but her throat was warning against it.

"Sleeping," Pomphrey answered simply, shrugging somewhat. "She wanted to follow in your footsteps and faint from exhaustion. So, I slipped her a sleeping draught yesterday. She's out like a light. The two of you deserve each other. Neither of you know your own limits."

Elphaba made to write something when Pomphrey suddenly snatched the writing utensils away. The green witch looked up with anger and glared steadily at the nurse. "The chatting comes later, Thropp. You need to sleep as well."

"No, I just slept for a week," Elphaba protested, her throat doing its own resistance. Pain settled in a blistering sensation. "I want to know what's happened-"

"Shush," the nurse barked. "You sound like you've been through the meat grinder. Unless you want to permanently damage that voice of yours, be quiet! And get some sleep!"

"But-" Elphaba began to protest, but sighed with dejection. She would eliminate the weariness in her bones if she slept, and Pomphrey would most likely go away. With assistance, she crawled back under the bed sheets, rolled her eyes, and accepted the open arms Morpheus always offered.

Glinda Upland was dually upset and enraged that Madame Pomphrey would slip her a sleeping draught. The old cow knew the importance of staying at Elphaba's bedside. She also experienced the scare of Hermione being poisoned a few weeks earlier. What if something terrible were to occur and she and Pomphrey were absent, resulting in either damage or death to the elegant green woman lying vulnerable in her bed?

There had to be steam shooting out of the blonde's ears. She took deep breaths on her way to the Hospital Wing, hoping to get rid of the anger rising inside of her like bile. Opening the door, she peered in, as if expecting to frighten someone entering. Elphaba lay on the bed, where she'd always been.

"Oh, Glinda. You've woken." Madame Pomphrey was stationed a few paces from Elphaba, welcoming the blonde without expression. "How are you feeling?"

"Like someone I trusted just tricked me. How could you?" Glinda hissed, advancing like a pink, fluffy snake. "How could you put me to sleep? I am awake to take care of Elphie – are you that opposed to the idea?"

"In order to care for Thropp, you need to take care of yourself first," Pomphrey instructed, sighing as if all her wisdom went unappreciated by the youth of the building. "If you're falling over exhausted, you very well can't restart someone else's pulse."

Glinda bit her tongue, aware of Pomphrey's correctness. She didn't want to admit defeat, so she put away her irritation for the time being and turned toward Elphaba. "Has she changed at all?" she asked, sounding a little more desperate than intended. "It's been a whole week. Surely something's changed."

"Well," the nurse smiled knowingly, like she was boasting over a prize, "Thropp did wake earlier, but went back to sleep shortly."

"She woke up without me? Why didn't you wake me?" Glinda hurried to collect Elphaba's hand in her own. Her stomach bubbled boiling anger, disappointed that she spent an entire week waiting for a lost moment. " How was she? Is she in pain? Did she say anything? Did she mention me? What-"

"The questions!" Madame Pomphrey threw her hands up in frustration. "Always with the questions: first her and now you! I can't answer them all at once, you know." Pomphrey grinned, amused at how eager the blonde grew with each passing second. "She went back to sleep not five minutes after waking. That's hardly enough time to get anything out of her, like she'd tell me, anyway. She's the kind of woman who bottles up feelings and casts them out into her own sea."

Glinda nodded. Of all the people she could analyze, Elphaba was one she knew better than herself. Madame Pomphrey had a way of looking down at the blonde and creating a shift of aggravation at how much she pretended Glinda didn't know of the green witch.

"How long ago did she get up?"

"Maybe three hours ago-" the nurse waved her head about, thinking. She was interrupted by a low moan, shrouded by sleep. She grunted, "Oh, and we spoke too loudly."

Glinda screamed with glee. "Elphie!" She carefully stroked Elphaba's face, forehead to cheekbone as she anticipated open eyes.

Elphaba tried to register her surroundings, preferring sleep to the wakeful world. The nothingness of sleep was so tempting that some days, she wondered why she even bothered to open her eyes. Someone touched her face again, this time more tenderly, but she flinched all the same.

"Elphie?" Glinda hesitated, worry etched into her features when she felt Elphaba recoil. "Elphie, it's just me. It's Glinda."

"Glinda?" Elphaba rasped, still deciding whether she was awake or not. "You're here?"

"I'll always be here," the blonde emphasized her words. She pulled up a chair and nimbly sat at the bedside. "I promise."

Elphaba looked over at the blonde, her eyes focusing on soft features that were directed at her. She looked at Glinda almost dreamily and smiled as she remembered how beautiful the blonde really was. "How are you? Are you alright?"

"Well, of course I'm alright!" Glinda burst out, bemused, but smiling as well. "That's backwards. How are you feeling?"

"Alright," the green witch shrugged, but a pain rattled through her ribcage, playing like a ghastly xylophone. Elphaba shut her eyes in hopes of wishing away that pain.

"You're not alright, Elphie. Just tell me how you really feel. It's okay." The blonde leaned in, pity written all over her face.

"You should be truthful, Thropp," the nurse interjected as she walked into the conversation. "It'll help with the healing process. If you tell us where you're sore, we'll focus on abolishing it."

Elphaba turned her head away from them, a simple gesture. "I…can't." She was never prepared to be thrust into a subdominant position. Her entire life was scheduled around being the strong side to Nessarose, or the pride of anarchy. The dwelling question, like a meal that settled improperly, remained as to how she couldn't defend herself against Weasley and the other Death Eaters. Why did she freeze with fear and succumb to the torturous methods of information extraction? She had almost allowed herself to become just another casualty of this war. What little dignity survived was focused into concealing the Order's secrets.

"Elphie-" Glinda began, settling for humorlessness.

"Just don't, Glinda." Elphaba cut into the blonde's words, head still turned. Glinda shrunk back at Elphaba's tone, which wasn't sharp, but it wasn't kind either. She had never heard Elphaba sound defeated like that before. "I-I just want to sleep. Can we talk later?"

"Of course, Thropp," Pomphrey answered, infuriating Glinda further. "I'm glad you finally accepted the concept of sleep."

She grabbed the unsettled blonde and dragged her away. Elphaba closed her eyes, listening to the hushed tones of their conversation without interest. She didn't intend to sleep, but rather, wanted to avoid displaying what vulnerability looked like plastered on green. The patronizing tones of her girlfriend and the Hogwarts nurse were too much for her- a reminder of defeat and human necessity to treatment.

"Why's Elphie acting like this?" Elphaba heard Glinda ask in a small voice, mousy, if not frightened. "I don't understand why she won't let us help her. Is it that bad?"

Madame Pomphrey let out air and clasped her hands together with a ringing sound. "I think Thropp wants to spare us from seeing her weak. We're going through a war, and not just out here in England. Think about it from her perspective, dear. She's been locked away and brutalized for a great deal of time, probably ashamed, pained, and angry with her captors. Moreover, she doesn't want to be perceived as pathetic and unable to defend herself."

"But…but there's nothing wrong with that," Glinda protested, in the girlish, foolish way she always did. "I would be more worried if she didn't break down. She's been hurt before, but not like this. I just want her to be alright."

"I know," Pomphrey replied, "but she's a bitter thing. In her heart, she probably knows it's okay to act realistically, but there's someone or something in there warding her against it. How she's feeling… well, she wants to conceal it all."

"Well, I'm going to let her know that it's okay," Glinda said determinedly. Elphaba imagined her striking a pose, more unconsciously than out of fortitude. "I don't know how, but I will."

However, doing so proved a rougher task than Glinda anticipated. Elphaba grew defensive with offers of assistance, shrugging off any aids. She built a fortress around herself and turned from a film of avoidance into a brick wall of separation. The blonde felt as frustrated trying to help Elphaba as the green girl did rejecting it. Not only did the green witch's body hurt, but her mental state suffered too; the aches of her skin caused her concealing power to grow. Once again, Glinda felt unable to do anything relevant, useless as she did before.

A few nights later, Elphaba was startled awake by another nightmare. It was familiar to the others, with visions of chains and flails, her own blood littering the floor, and her face being ground into it. Taunts flew like colorful curses and she shivered at the thought. She pulled the blanket up to her chin, but chills flew up her arms and legs as the sheets proved useless.

Harry was in possession of her wand- he had told her so during one of his visits, as sparse as she forced them to be. She couldn't summon a blanket. Sure that Glinda, who was sleeping peacefully in a chair and drooling somewhat, could feel the breeze as well, Elphaba decided to get a blanket herself. She skimmed the Hospital Wing and found a pile of bed linens across the room. Stabilizing herself with the bedside table, she held on until the dizziness of rising passed.

As she let go, sharp stings shot up from her toes to her brain, activating a voice in Elphaba's head. It said that this was a stupid idea, but she ignored all of it. She wasn't completely useless and was more than capable of performing this small task, at least in her mind. Slowly, on shaking legs, she attempted her descent across the room.

The vertigo was immediate, coming in a tidal of disorder and helplessness. Her legs gave way and she tried to grab something, anything, to break the fall. However, she could only feel herself grabbing desperately at the air. Elphaba collapsed on the cold floor in a pile of tangled limbs, literally hissing from the pain of various wounds inside and out. Her vision was spinning like a wheel, and when she grabbed hold of something to hoist her body up, she accidentally pulled a small table from under it's legs. A loud clang echoed through the empty floor, fallen contents bouncing away as if in protest against the green witch. She swore bitterly at the night.

Glinda shot up at the noise, her head still screwed up from slumber. On instinct, she checked Elphaba's bed, which was empty, instilling dread in the blonde. Her heartbeat sped up at the thought of sleeping through something horrible happening to Elphaba. She rubbed her eyes out of habit and looked at the source of the noise, finding the missing patient on the ground, which was littered with the fallen bedside table and the articles it once housed.

"Elphie?" Glinda gasped as she hurried to her knees to accommodate the fallen woman. "Are you alright?" She rushed to bring Elphaba to her feet and on the bed again.

"I'm fine," Elphaba grumbled, a dark shade of her unripe colour settling on her cheeks and thoroughly embarrassed that she still couldn't walk a few steps without support after so many days.

Glinda didn't push Elphaba, but rather, kept a hand at her back. "What in the name of Oz were you doing?"

"A blanket," Elphaba said, detached. "I was getting one. For you, or for me, I can't remember."

"Why didn't you wake me? You could have re-injured yourself, you know," admonished the blonde. She walked over to the linins and grabbed the blanket Elphaba was talking about. "I would have gotten it for you."

"You were sleeping," Elphaba protested feebly. "What was the use in waking you?"

"Don't be silly, Elphie," Glinda said. Their voices were hushed, as though others were in the room, or someone was eavesdropping. "My heart practically jumped out of my throat when I saw you on the ground. Do you know how scared I was?" Elphaba stayed quiet and turned. "You don't have to be strong all the time," Glinda whispered, placing a hand on Elphaba's shoulder and letting it drag across her arm to the mattress.

"But I do," protested Elphaba stubbornly. She felt like she being torn down the middle. "I-I can't…" She trailed off, biting her lips to ward off tears.

"Not anymore," Glinda reached out and turned Elphaba's face toward her. She mustered a calm smile. "I'll be the strong one now, Elphaba. I'll be strong for you, for once. It's what we do when we're in love."

The words and the gesture was all the incentive Elphaba required. The gestures and the words that were absent throughout her childhood persisted to be foreign as an adult. The tearing was complete and the green witch let out a sob, letting out what she had been hiding in the shrouded Hospital Wing. Glinda pulled her into a hug, offering a shoulder and speechlessly comforting the woman. Words weren't necessary, but the physicality was.

It lasted only a few moments, and then Elphaba pulled away. "Sorry," she said absently.

"Sorry?" reiterated Glinda, brows raised. "You've nothing to be sorry for, Elphie. It's healthy for you to act this way."

"Maybe for other people, but not for me," Elphaba said with conviction, wiping away old tears.

"No!" the blonde scolded in a quiet voice. "Listen to me, Elphaba Thropp. What just happened was completely normal, but you'll want me to forget it. Even if you feel weak right now, you aren't. If you were weak, then I'd say this entire reality is off balance. For Lurline's sake, Elphie, you were captured for two weeks. It should hurt. You're not supposed to be strong right now, but you most definitely aren't weak."

The walls erected to veil the true state of Elphaba's being was demolished in that moment, carefully set aside brick by brick. It gave Glinda an opportunity to see the face behind it, which was worn from the war, defeated by her own body, terrified of the impending, and angry from the fight. The blonde suppressed a sigh and drew Elphaba in for another hug, who accepted it without warming into it. Glinda planted kisses on the top of her head and planned to move southward on the green witch's face.

"You may think that you're weak, but you are not," she repeated. "You're the strongest woman that I know, and I love you, Elphie."

That night opened doors for Elphaba's recovery. The mind was the control box to the entire being, and when Elphaba's was set at ease, her wounds began to heal cleanly, swiftly, and without infection. She still shooed off Glinda, who flitted about her day and night, but with prompting, was honest about herself and what was happening in her heart. Madame Pomphrey was pleased at the ceased complaints during checkups, and the green witch proved to be livelier.

Some afternoons later, Elphaba was thinking nostalgically of the Hogwarts Grounds, and how she wanted to trod on them and ruin the grasses again when she realized something. Her back stiffened and her head shot up, giving Glinda an a look of bewilderment.

"What? Elphie, what is it?" Glinda felt eyes on her and met the glare from her girlfriend.

"It's just that…I just remembered something. It's strange, really." Elphaba frowned, trying to make sense of it through the fog of memory.

"Strange? What's that?" Glinda asked curiously, uncertain whether this was a trick or another moment of truth.

"I can't decipher that, exactly," the green witch spoke slowly, searching for the correct words to express herself. "Something about the Death Eaters that I noticed, in the Riddle House. It might be nothing, but… I think I should tell Albus."

"If you even think about getting out of that bed, Thropp, I'll reinforce your diagnosis." Madame Pomphrey swept out of her office like a ghost, eavesdropping on the conversation for one reason or another.

"Oh, Madame Pomphrey, that's such a nice thing to say!" Glinda stood from her chair, and Elphaba was about to order her down again, but the blonde had different intentions. "I'll go and fetch Albus for you."

"Thanks," Elphaba called after her, but Glinda had retreated from the Wing so fast that Elphaba thought maybe Glinda couldn't stand it there. She sat in bed and waited for the blonde to arrive back with Dumbledore, and hopefully, her intuition would be correct. Hopefully, she carried an imperative clue to unlocking the key to this war. Hopefully, she was just as powerful bedridden as she was on her feet.

Coming up: Voldemort's new weapon unveiled.

I'm going to Ashland on Friday…don't expect any updates until June 23rd at least…assuming that I get the rest of chapter 26 finished by then, that is…

-Wolfie