Chapter 5
Day two hundred thirty-two. Elphaba carefully carved a notch into the wall just under her windowsill. If asked, she couldn't quite explain the significance of the habit. Yet every day since Pierory she had carved a notch in the wall. Like a pathetic monument, not worthy of its subject, the marks seemed somehow symbolic. It was a small testimony of sorts, for even after all Pierory had stolen, she could not be kept down. For two hundred and thirty-two days she had gotten up again. She had faced another day. Sometimes, the promise of another notch was all she had pulling her out of bed, but sometimes that was all she needed. She had removed the emotion from it, reduced it to math. Survive. More notches. Do another task for the Resistance. More notches. Deliver a vile, mail a letter. More notches. Each one was not necessarily important on its own, but as a collection they made a statement.
Except for day two hundred thirty-two.
Elphaba rose quickly this morning. She had a rather complicated assignment, and she would be working hard today. She pinned her hair back tightly, fastidiously straightened her clothes and hurried down the stairs. There had been no male visitor last night, which had afforded her a little more sleep. She found herself grateful, though to whom she wasn't sure.
"I see having a night off helps you work faster in the mornings," Hadrick mused, half smirking as she poured his usual cup of black coffee. "Although, I suppose all the extra cash you're bringing to the household compensates from a little morning laziness."
"It's interesting that someone who never prepared his own breakfast should refer to anyone as lazy," Elphaba spat. She couldn't stop herself. Her tongue let loose on its own sometimes, reaping heaps of trouble upon her head. But sometimes there was no holding it back.
Hadrick met her eyes, his glare cold and unflinching. She stared back, her dark eyes strong despite his efforts to break her.
"I suppose the one thing I will never tame is your tongue, Miss Fae," He drawled, "but it's an acceptable flaw," He continued, "as the young men do seem to be drawn to your feistiness."
"I believe only animals can be tamed," Her meaning was not lost on Hadrick.
He approached her, holding her eyes with his. He wrapped an arm around her neck and pulled her close to him, so close she could feel his hot breath on her face. "Put up a good fight tonight," He whispered, his coarse fur brushing her cheek, "The men pay extra when you give them a good fight."
As the door shut behind him, Elphaba seized a statue, some archaic Unionist thing, and hurled it at the door. It shattered easily, sending shards exploding out across the room like stardust after the birth of a sun. Yet it was a hollow rebuttal. Somehow, he always found the upper hand. Hadrick had a talent, if torture is a talent, for turning her rebellion against her. She could not even have the satisfaction of a good rebellion, of making things more difficult, because making things more difficult only made her a better whore.
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She stood there for a few clock ticks, feeling like a deflated balloon. Then, with a heaving sigh, she retrieved her broom and began to clean up the shattered statue. After a thorough sweeping, it was on to the laundry and the kitchen floors. As she scrubbed today, she kept an eye on the clock. She could not be late.
Sweet Oz, She thought as she gave the floor a final drying, You could eat off these floors the way he has me constantly scrubbing. A part of her thought of doing it, just to make the point. She could see Hadrick striding through the door to find her slurping stew off a newly polished kitchen floor. The thought of it almost made her smile. Almost.
Her momentary daydream was shattered by the clanging of the clock. She stowed her cleaning supplies and hurried soundlessly out the back door. Today was critical. Today she could not be late, could not be distracted. She stood in the alley behind Hadrick's home for a few moments, carefully studying a worn piece of paper. It had been tucked in the door jam of the pub a few blocks over yesterday, just as her instructions had stated. It was a map, and she committed it to memory. She could not risk opening it once she left this spot. She carefully slipped a vile from an empty flowerpot outside the door and tucked it into her pocket. She then set off.
Elphaba wrapped her rail-thin arms around herself as she scurried down one street and then another. The wind was biting this afternoon, finding its way through every rip and tear in her clothes. She was sure she looked out of place without a winter coat or cape, like someone seeking punishment from the cold, but a coat was a luxury she could not afford.
By now, she'd entered a part of the city she had not before encountered. She had most certainly left the seventh ward behind, as there were no Animals to be seen. Here and there she spotted the propaganda posters the Wizard had ordered be displayed in all storefronts.
Animals should be seen and not heard.
The words made Elphaba's blood boil, but she could not stop to rip them down today. Today was about something greater.
As she rounded another corner, she found herself on a narrow street lined with vendors hawking cheap and overpriced merchandise of questionable origins. She brushed past them without a cursory glance, her hawk-like eyes darting back and forth until she caught site of her target.
She stopped in front of a small storefront. It was rather unassuming in its appearance. The door was badly in need of a fresh coat of paint and didn't quite close all the way. The window was plastered from the inside with papers. Everything from front pages of newspapers to small posters adorned the glass. At first, it all seemed harmless enough, but upon closer examination, they were all anti-Animal propaganda. The window told a piece-meal story of the unfolding tragedy befalling the Animals. From the first restrictions on jobs, to the current herding of all Animals into the seventh ward, the window was an advertisement in atrocity.
We're just a few pages shy of full-scale extermination, Elphaba thought with a shudder. She grit her teeth together, her determination surging.
I hate you! She mentally spat towards the storefront and its owners. It was the one emotion she seemed to have left, the one thing she could truly feel. Hatred. Unadulterated hatred towards these oppressors and all they stood for.
She scanned the street. The vendors were engrossed in potential customers. There were no other passersby. Elphaba slipped inside, using great caution not to let the door squeak its disapproval as she closed it behind her. The small front room was empty, as was expected. Just as she had been told, the sound of printing presses hammering away could be heard from the back rooms. The employees were hard at work, churning out the next installment of the Wizard's deprecating word vomit.
She moved quickly, whipping the vile from her pocket. It seemed in most ways like a very ordinary medicine vile, but this one had two chambers, separated by a thin piece of glass. With nimble fingers, she pulled the dividing glass out as far as was possible and shook the vile to mix the chemicals. With her natural hunger for knowledge, Elphaba would love to have explored the reaction that was going on in the vile, but today it was not her job to understand. She was simply to do. She gently laid the vile amidst a large pile of back issues of the Wizard's newspaper. She dropped the map in the pile and then slithered soundlessly out the door.
She was just slipping around the corner when she heard a small crackle, like gunfire. It could easily have been mistaken for military action against an unruly Animal, which often occurred in these parts of the city. She did not look back. Not even once. To look back was to implicate oneself. By the time she met Frederick in the market a few blocks from Hadrick's walkup, she could already see a plum of dark smoke rising into the afternoon sky.
"You did it," Was Frederick's greeting.
"Did you doubt me?" Elphaba asked, slightly taken aback.
"I was only kidding. Have you never kidded anyone?"
"I think it might be outside my nature," She replied, her tone hollow.
Frederick studied her for a moment. They knew very little of each other, but he seemed hurt just the same. "I thought we'd become friends…" He started.
For a moment her thoughts wandered back to Shiz. The charmed circle. Glinda. It had been another lifetime, when trust came more easily.
"I have no friends," Her retort was quick and final. "I burned the map as instructed. I'll meet you here in three days for more instructions."
Frederick looked slightly wounded as she stormed away from him. In another time, when things were more black and white, she might have given him a chance. In a time before Pierory. Before men had all become shades of gray in their moral ambiguity. The endless parade of men who paid to spend a little time between her legs had taught her that no one was exempt from sin. Drunk, stinking bums and high profile bankers were all the same with their pants around their ankles. Frederick, by fault of his gender, was all the same to her.
She hustled back to the walkup, realizing she was barely making it back before Hadrick's usual evening return. She closed the back door soundlessly behind her and leaned against it for a moment. The door was cool against her forehead and seemed to calm her, to slow her pounding heart. Elphaba realized her veins were pulsing with pure adrenaline at what she'd accomplished. She knew her fire would burn hot and spread quickly. It would easily engulf half the block before any fire squadron could extinguish it.
I have done something this time, something of significance. She felt just a little pride rise up in her.
She had burned it to the ground. The main printing presses for the Wizard's propaganda. She was a jam in his well-oiled machine of persecution. A silent, nameless jam, but a jam all the same. It almost made the loss of so many other things worth it. Almost.
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She worked quickly preparing dinner, taking a little extra time in simmering the vegetables tonight. Working quickly was as close as Elphaba ever came to enthusiasm. Happiness was an emotion outside her realm. Yet tonight she was at least eager, urged on by a successful mission and the promise of more. The idea of leaving Hadrick behind was a notion she did not allow herself to consider, lest some measure of hope begin to rise up in her. Hope was dangerous. Hope was easily dashed. Tonight she allowed herself simply to feel eager.
Hadrick came thumping in shortly thereafter, grumbling to himself and seeming to be in an overly foul mood. Elphaba stood rigidly by the stove, awaiting her lashing for breaking the vase this morning. Yet he didn't seem to notice.
"Take your food upstairs," He barked at her after slumping into his chair, "I am in no mood to listen to your tongue tonight. Since you find so much time to think of hateful commentary, I've arranged to occupy your time this evening."
It was clear she had been dismissed.
Elphaba took her portion in a bowl and climbed the stairs wearily, her body crying out against the long treks around the city. Yet as she ate, her mind was still filled with ideas. She would use these thoughts to get her through another night, with another man. It was always easier when she could occupy her mind, and tonight she was determined not to let her eagerness for her cause be dampened.
She had finished her meager dinner and was lost in thought by the window when she heard slumping footsteps approaching her room. She felt herself harden inside, like a shield being raised to protect what was left of her. The footsteps no longer invoked fear, just hardness, a cold, pervasive hardness that was growing more and more difficult to remove. Yet when the door swung open, her throat constricted and she thought she'd lost the ability to breathe. It had been two hundred and thirty-two days, and yet here he stood, again.
"You are not welcome here!" She spat, like venom from a striking snake.
"I am a paying customer," Pierory sneered, his face contorting into an even uglier version of itself.
"Get out!" She demanded, feeling anger welling up inside of her. The sight of him had caused something to snap. Like the mixing of two toxic chemicals earlier in the day, a reaction had been started. All the others she had soundlessly endured, willing herself to some other place. They had become nameless, faceless visitors to her cold and unresponsive body, but Pierory had made her a whore. With an indifferent callousness he had ripped away her dignity and dashed hopes she couldn't even name.
And now, as he seized her by the arms, rage filled her entire being. She remembered the broom. She allowed the emotion to pour from her, to overtake her and leap from her to possess the broom. She had not felt this power since he had last visited, and yet the familiarity of it allowed her a measure of control. The broom leapt from its place in the corner and flew to strike Pierory squarely across the face. His nose swelled instantly and began to bleed in rivulets over his lips.
He screamed obscenities and clutched the end of his ragged sleeve over his face. Elphaba cowered, panting, like a cat ready to pounce.
"You bloody whore!" Pierory screamed through his sleeve, "That's how I remember you, bloody and screwed!" As he stemmed the flow of blood, he started toward her again, his hands working his belt buckle.
Elphaba stood, felt the swell of anger again, and sent a book flying in his direction. He ducked, barely.
"What are you?!" He roared, "Some freak of nature? Did nature intend you to be a vegetable and make some horrid mistake?! Or are you more Animal than human?" He stared at her, studying her as he sniffled through his bloody nose.
Elphaba suddenly felt herself weaken, as if her two great acts of sorcery had drained her very core. She met Pierory's stare, disgust in her eyes.
"Perhaps you are an Animal," He continued, "magicked into an almost-human form by whatever powers of sorcery you possess." To him, it seemed to be a revelation. "And do you know what we do to Animals who won't be tamed?"
She stared, unblinking, at him.
"We dispose of them," He hissed, seizing her by the arm.
Suddenly, Elphaba saw something new in him. For all his unkempt grunginess, she saw more than a lazy drunkard who paid for sex. She saw the potential for true hatred, for malice and violence. She realized his marking her was only a spring from an undercurrent that ran deep. Pierory had killed Animals, somehow she knew it. He was more than she realized.
Swiftly, he whipped her arms behind her back and pinned her against the unforgiving stone wall. "I'll get what I came for," He whispered gruffly into her hair, "and be rid of you this time."
He released her and seized the wooden bar used for securing the door. He struck her squarely across the back, knocking the breath from her chest and sending her sprawling across the floor. The pain was dizzying, and she lay unable to move. She dug her fingernails into the floor, desperately willing her body to move, but it was to no avail. Pierory slapped her, undid his trousers and raped her, enjoying her pain in his perverse and twisted soul.
Elphaba struggled to clear her head, willing herself not to faint, wanting some measure of control. If she could just find the rage again, if she could move him the way she'd moved her broom…
But then he was done.
He spat on her. That was the last thing she remembered before he swung the heavy washbasin towards her head and all went black.