The title for chapter twenty-eight is from…Man of La Mancha. Congrats to Yank2324, Miss Elphie, Easterly Winds, and maureen is me.

Four chapters to go! Thank GothPhantom for –hem-forcing-hem…I mean, asking nicely for me to post this one today instead of tomorrow.

Chapter 29: With a Little Bit of Luck

The physical state was nothing in the face of what unbeatable connection Glinda and Elphaba had developed for themselves. It went without saying that time and dimensions were meek and unimportant when they were together. If Elphaba was dead, then Glinda didn't have ownership of her insides. Instead, they'd be dead along with the green woman. The implications of such were too hurtful to dwell on for more than a minute, and stigmatizing for at least another half hour. But this- this made Glinda want to die, too.

"Glinda?" Harry bent down to the blonde's level anxiously. "Say something." Beside them, Hermione laid a hand on the shoulder of a distraught Fiyero in sympathy. The rest of the Order was half-listening, miffed at the implications of two fallen major Order members. Elphaba's demise was salt thrown onto the wounds of Dumbledore's.

"What am I supposed to say?" Glinda's words were about indecipherable as she held her hands to her mouth because she was wracked with tears. Her knees felt weak, like she might fall over, but she was already sitting and she was scared of what that exactly meant. "Elphie, Elphie, Elphie," she chanted like a mantra, breathing the name. The sarcasm, the incredulous looks, the cunning, the sweet words and even sweeter embraces. If Elphaba was gone, what was left for Glinda to find optimistic or safe?

"But we don't know for sure," Hermione blurted quickly. "There's no body yet-" Glinda choked on what could have been a sob, if she wasn't already tight-throated, "so there could be a small prospect that she's alive..."

"Always the foolish optimist, Granger," Snape groaned on cue, looking vaguely out of his skin with a dishelved expression. "Fae is – was – strong, yes, but not invincible. Wealsey and Malfoy are more powerful than we'd like to accept, and Fae is one person. The best we could hope for was something quick, but even that's hard to believe."

"Snape!" Harry whirled around. "You've a special talent in making people feel better, you know that?"

"It's the truth, Potter, and it's not accepting it that's kept either side from winning this war. It's time we start to recognize that." There was a slight twitching at his mouth: the only sign of grief on a cold face was most likely cool to the touch. "Fae's been lucky as a cat many times before, but that's an unreliable source. It's bound to run out, and it has."

"Stop!" Glinda gasped, bringing her hands up to her forehead more forcefully than intended. "Just… just stop talking, Snape!" There was a moment where silence befell the great hall, any moans of pain or whispers of anger absent throughout the air thin, in commiseration to the fallen Order members.

Madame Pomphrey gave a grunt, not willing to unveil herself in the midst of a battle, even if it was at a deadlock. "Now what, Potter?" she asked expectantly. Harry looked at her confusedly, intermingled in sadness and wear. She reiterated, "Now, what is your course of action? You can't cast that spell anymore-"

"I could," the dark haired man admitted. "The trouble is that energy would be scattered everywhere, without someone to ground me. If I try it alone, likelihood of success is meager."

"But it's worth a try, Potter. With Albus and Fae dead and no back up strategies or choices, we've no other option." Snape teetered on his heels. "I suppose I could use a normal Wizarding spell to keep you in order, but I don't know how effective it will be."

Harry mulled it over and nodded slowly. "We could try," he said solemnly. "It's better than nothing."

The doors, old and regal, burst open again with a ferocity claiming higher importance than a Light fighter scampering in and out. The idea that Death Eaters had come to invade from the inside, as unfairly and predictable a predicament, was terrifying. The weary Order members tensed in preparation for another battle, though weary from the first, falling to quiet reserve.

"Harry," Hermione fingered her wand nervously, voice dropping to a breathy whisper, "I thought we put up wards all over the Entrance Hall."

"We did," Harry confirmed just as quietly, wand drawn and ready, his tired eyes bugged and panicking despite his determined posture. "It keeps anyone with ill intentions towards the school and us out. The Death Eaters couldn't have broken them, could they?"

"Be quiet!" Snape whispered harshly, like a dog barking in its sleep: livid, but bound. "Do you want them to find us in here?" Harry opened his mouth to retort, but fell quiet when Snape sent him a fierce glare.

In came Ron, red hair messed and face covered in dirt. He wore a rotten expression, half-horrified, stumbling along due to an unseen force from behind. "What the hell, Weasley?" Snape roared, voice echoing off the listening walls. "Ours is a plight to stop your murdering, not to take a mocking to Fae's death." He pointed his wand to shoot but halted at a voice too relieving to be overlooked.

"He's done nothing to me that hasn't been done before, right, Weasley?" A green-skinned woman appeared in the doorway behind her captive, wand pointed at his head from the back. She nudged him roughly and he flinched, causing blood that leaked steadily from her temple to jerk towards the ground. It was the only cut that appeared on her from the far angle, but it was nasty and rimmed with pink, swollen tissue. Nevertheless, Elphaba Thropp was alive and well with a smug smirk plastered on her face. "And what do you mean by my death?"

Glinda was the first to react, launching out of her chair. "Elphie!" She screamed, pulling the witch away as Snape and Kingsley took Ron into custody accordingly. "Oh, Lurline, Elphie!" she kept calling, pushing Elphaba into the seat she once occupied. The blonde desperately touched her hands to Elphaba's face, arms, chest, and hair, to approve of the tangible state that told her Elphaba wasn't a ghost or illusion. All the tension that developed inside her- the building, unbearable grief- evaporated.

"Hey now, what's wrong with you?" Elphaba asked, grabbing a nearby towel and pressing it to the wound on her forehead while lightly touching the blonde with her free hand. "Are you alright?"

Glinda could only make a gurgling noise in her throat, unable to speak for a moment at the sight of kind eyes. "I-I thought you were-"

"I was what? Dead? Why?" Elphaba frowned. "I promised you before, didn't I?"

"I'm sorry, Fae," Harry deliberately avoided eye contact or even gazing upon the man who was once his best friend. "I sort of told her the worst. When you didn't come out of the Forbidden Forest, and with Dumbledore dead, I assumed-"

"When you assume, you make an ass out of you and me," Elphaba quipped, grinning despite their bleak atmosphere. The vastness of the Great Hall was gray with the aftermath, people wounded and shaken. What was once an endless magical sky was now a high ceiling of confinement, boxing in opportunity, but cradling prosperity.

"Ever the eloquent one, you are," Snape muttered, but his eyes radiated an appreciation of Elphaba's presence. The impatience and nastiness he possessed in the belief of the green witch's death was gone, replaced by a healthy, gruff demeanor.

"Oh Elphie, you're hurt." Glinda frantically inspected the wound on Elphaba's forehead, wrestling the towel from the green witch's hands and applying pressure on the cut herself.

"It's fine, I'm right as rain," Elphaba shrugged. "It's insignificant. One of the many side effects of being thrown into a tree, but I expect I'll survive."

"No survival jokes right now. I'm still trying to forget the last ten minutes." Glinda smiled, seeming to forget there was an entire world that existed outside of who sat on the chair. Suddenly, she started from realization and handed Elphaba the towel, turning towards the captured Death Eater like a slow, creeping fire.

"It was you," the blonde began in a shriek, her voice reaching a dangerous, raspy low. She was ready to immerse Ron in a display of pain. "You were the one who hurt her. She's done nothing to you!" It came out in an uncharacteristic growl, sounding nothing like her usual, sunny self.

Ron cast a mocking look of malice at the blonde. "She exists," he explained, as though it were the simplest, most logical of statements, "and I'd do it again in a heartbeat."

Glinda couldn't help but house anger in her tiny frame, supporting it with might, nurturing the red she saw. It was bloody, and told her to lunge at Ron with long fingernails, despite the consequential aspect to that plan.

"Glinda, don't," Elphaba ordered forcefully, holding the blonde's shoulder in support, but mostly to hold her back. Glinda tried not to melt into the touch as she turned towards her girlfriend.

"What? But Elphie, after what he did to you-"

"I know. But he's not worth lowering yourself like that," Elphaba said as something flickered in her eyes, although it could have been a glint of light.

"You had your chance, Thropp," Ron spat, constrained with his hands tied behind him, "but you chickened out. Why didn't you kill me?"

Elphaba glared at the Death Eater. "Because I'm not like you, Weasley. I don't kill."

"What about that Avada Kedevra you shot at me earlier?" Ron raised an eyebrow, becoming haughty when Elphaba didn't deny it, but rather, stayed silent. "You see? You hypocritical bitch!"

Glinda strode forward calmly, but her face emanated hate. She kneed Ron where it would hurt most. He doubled over in pain while being held up by an Order member. "That was for insulting Elphie!" She proceeded to let out a growl and kick the side of his head, effectively knocking him out, and he hung limply from his restrains. "And that was for hurting her."

"Elphie?" Are you alright?" Glinda turned to look at the green witch, but Elphaba just shrugged. She was grappling with herself over the Unforgivable curse she cast earlier, and was barely listening.

"Fae?" Hermione stepped beside Elphaba quietly. "What happened, exactly? In the forest, I mean."

-Flashback-

Elphaba skidded to a halt when she reached a dark clearing several yards from where she entered the Forbidden Forest. It was roofed with tree branches, spindles of light shining through to illuminate the ground with odd specs. She heard the frantic yelling of Ron and Malfoy catching up, so she scrambled up the nearest tree, transformed back into human form, and dusted herself off. She crouched on a low branch to eavesdrop and promised herself to overlook any logistical thought that didn't involve duel tactics.

"Well?" Malfoy snapped impatiently, snarling. "Where is she?"

"Somewhere not far," Ron growled in a primal manner, peering into the distance of trees and rock. "And when we get her, I'm going to kill her slowly and painfully." His mouth matched the evil grin in his eyes as he moved shrubbery and branches. "Come out, come out, wherever you are, Thropp. You can run, but you can't hide forever."

Elphaba fumbled for her wand and shot a Stunning spell at Malfoy, who was standing and watching Ron with his hands on his hips. The blonde Death Eater was promptly knocked out and crumpled to the ground. The green witch dropped from the tree, cloak billowing around her, ignoring the pain shooting up from the soles of her feet when her body weight landed. Ron was startled, alarmed that his back-up was taken out so efficiently and effortlessly.

"It looks as though it's down to you and me, Weasley." Elphaba grinned despite herself, approaching leisurely. "This is how your scores ought to be settled: fighting your own battle without having to call on the bigger boys."

Ron looked around for a time, either quarrelling or deciding something with himself. He finally took a step forward, staring Elphaba in the eye. "I, Ronald Billus Weasley, challenge Elphaba Thropp to a formal duel."

Elphaba didn't hesitate. "I, Elphaba Thropp, accept. What are your terms?"

"Wands only, all spells, to the death."

"Done," agreed the witch. She was conscious of the consequences to accepting a formal duel, and how it could mean her death and Ron's freedom. If she died, he wouldn't be persecuted for whatever illegal spell he used, not to mention the fact that the battle strategy Elphaba had developed with Harry would become obsolete. But she had to do this.

They began by facing each other and rushing through the formalities. Specs of light fell around them, disappearing and reappearing from rustling branches and wind. Ron didn't waste any time. "Stupify!"

Elphaba paid no attention to the Stunning Spell, deep within her own reveries and conscience. She returned the favor after ducking effectively, but remembered Harry's advice during their duel at the Dueling Club. She slowly decreased her spell output until she was hardly using her wand. She ducked, weaving out of curses and spells and jumping to and fro madly to exhaust her opposition.

Ron grew nervous when he sensed her strategy. He wanted to counter whatever she had planned, or prevent it entirely. However, he was unsure as to what Thropp was actually planning to do. He increased the frequency of his spells although he was tired to the point of staggering, throwing out anything from disarming spells to the dreaded 'Renac Mortis'.

The redheaded Death Eater stumbled only once, catching his footing almost immediately and threw another spell. Elphaba realized her cue. She paused for a millisecond to prepare, but mistook her own strategy. She succumbed to a curse that blasted her into the air and sent her flying into a large, moss covered tree. She slid down the trunk, feeling warm liquid drip down her face and tasting it as it leaked into her mouth. She lay face down, spitting out the blood and listening to the vibrations Ron's footsteps made in the ground as he advanced towards her. As he threw up his wand to deliver the final blow, Elphaba struck.

With lightning speed and the agility of her animagus form, Elphaba pounced like a cougar and struck like a cobra. She rolled onto her feet and caught Ron by the wrists, surprising him enough to lose his wand. The green witch brought his hands behind his back, pulling his smallest finger back with a satisfying crunch. He yelped in pain, and Elphaba mused on how it was easier to resort to physical dueling rather than magical. With a flick of her wand, Ron was bound, but she kept it at his temple and brought them both to their feet.

"How easy it is when your opponent has the intelligence of a doornail. How the tables have turned." Elphaba smirked. Now was the time to avenge Dumbledore's death. The task was so simple, so tempting, and no one would blame her. No one would persecute her.

Elphaba hesitated, treading back over her thoughts. She didn't recognize herself in this angered state and wondered who she was becoming. To kill Ron was to disrespect Dumbledore's spirit, and the will of goodness for England he had sustained. She wouldn't let herself drown in revenge- she wouldn't go against her convictions for one stupid man, or else Ron would win.

"Please," Ron sputtered, truly frightened. He went from courageous to begging within seconds, his face scrunched as he awaited the worst. "Oh, please, don't kill me. You've won the battle. You've won!"

"Yes, and I gather that this is the trophy I get for my efforts." Elphaba wiped the blood from her face, her wand still concentrated on the Death Eater. "I'm taking you to the Order." She could dump him off on her fellow members so that they could deal with him. If Ron was Dumbledore's murderer, then he'd burrow a special place in all their heats.

Elphaba marched Ron to the castle by way of the forest, careful to avoid other Death Eaters, who cultivated all about the grounds. She entered the Entrance Hall and opened the giant doors to the Great Hall as gently as possible. There were undecipherable voices blending on the other side, so she decided to thrust Ron in first before stalking in herself.

-End flashback-

"That's pretty much all of it," concluded the green witch. Most of the Order was listening to her story and digesting it in silence.

"He killed Dumbledore?" Harry finally asked weakly, his face distraught and distant at the thought. "Ron? Why?"

"He intended to kill me," Elphaba admitted, "but Dumbledore jumped in front of me. I was the target, but he took the curse for me."

"Why didn't he just put up a shield?" Hermione burst, tears running down her cheeks. It was Fiyero's turn to support her, his hand on her shoulder as she had for him. "What curse was it?"

"Renac Mortis," Elphaba replied simply, hoping she wouldn't have to explain. Snape let out a growl next to her, obviously aware of the curse.

"I'm not even going to wait for the Aurors!" Snape declared aloud. "I'm going to kill Weasley myself." He ambled forward, but Harry and Hermione rushed to keep him calm.

"What's 'Renac Mortis'?" Hermione asked between gasps from Snape elbowing her in the stomach as she tried to hold him back from his target. "I've never heard of that before."

"It's fairly new," Harry began solemnly, managing to pull Snape away and sit him down. He started to explain as Elphaba turned away, not wanting to hear it all over again. Ingrained into her memory forever was the explanation from the man who struggled through that very curse to speak.

"Elphie." Glinda stepped forward to touch Elphaba lightly, hoping to be comforting. "Elphaba, look at me." The green witch sighed and faced the blonde.

"I'm alright." She smiled weakly. "I'm alive, aren't I?"

"Thank Lurline for that," Glinda sighed, pulling Elphaba in for another hug. "I truly though I'd lost you. Do you know how helpless I felt?"

"I don't want to know, Glinda." Elphaba shrugged in the embrace, and then pulled away. "It's been a rough day, hasn't it?" She grinned contagiously, though tiredly. "So, how were you today?"

"Fine," Glinda nodded. "I'm alive, aren't I?" she returned Elphaba's words, earning a smile.

"Glinda, this war isn't fair to you," Elphaba said, her forehead concentrated with wrinkles. "It shouldn't be your responsibility to help us. You're not from England."

"You seem to forget so easily, Elphie, that you're not from here, either," Glinda retorted coolly. "Besides, I wanted to help. If you're going through this, than I am as well."

Elphaba's life had been riddled with shortcomings and disappointment from family and authority. She had never found another person who could be devoted to her as she was to other charities, but Glinda was. The blonde was making so many sacrifices for her without being asked that Elphaba couldn't quite comprehend the sentiment.

Glinda peered at Elphaba carefully and hypothesized what wheels were turning in her head. She wanted to say, 'I love you', but refrained. "Come here, you." She held out her arms for an embrace and the green witch sank into it. Glinda smelt like bandages and hydrogen peroxide, but Elphaba inhaled her deeply.

"I will always be by your side, Elphaba," Glinda whispered. "It'll take a hell of a lot more than witch hunters and magical wars to keep us apart."

"Fae." Harry grasped Elphaba's shoulder before she could untangle from the blonde. His eyes were suspiciously red-rimmed, as though he was trying desperately not to cry again. She looked at him sympathetically.

"Are you alright?" she asked with concern.

The Boy-Who-Lived didn't answer, but gave her a look of determination. He nodded, as though to convince himself. "Let's go. Now. Voldemort's long overstayed his welcome."

Coming up: The spell from the Grimmerie is finally put to use.

Well, good thing that was all resolved, then. But now, there's still the matter of the spell…

-Wolfie