Disclaimer: …Trying to think of something funny…trying to think of something funny…oh screw it, don't own Tin Man or the song I altered.
Author's Note: Well, I am trying to get muse back to our usual writing frequency, but am currently hobbled by the fact that I need her for one of my school projects – am writing a children's book. Would you believe that I actually had to do some convincing for my group to choose doing a book over, say a workshop or a business plan? I mean, really. People are so strange – though it probably helped in my argument that I could basically hand them a plot on the spot as soon as the deciding vote was cast. Hurrah for the Evil Smurf, she has some uses after all. How cool would it be if we could actually get it published?
PS Some of you may notice a certain...omission...yes, I did it on purpose. I have my reasons.
...
The majestic Queen of the O.Z…
She had promised herself one thing, back before the beginning of it all…
Had two lovely daughters she…
…before Lilo brushed her hand that first time, the sudden knowledge in his eyes…
One to darkness she be drawn…
…before the Othersider had slipped into her heart…
One to light she be shown…
…before she had the power to change anything at all…
Double eclipse it is foreseen…
…she'd promised herself…
Light meets dark in the stillness between…
…her children would not be used, would not be bartered, would not be owned…
But only one and one alone…
…her daughters would not be sacrificed…
Shall hold the emerald and take the throne…
…not even for the O.Z…
The majestic Queen of the O.Z…
…she'd promised herself…
Had two lovely daughters she…
…she'd promised them…
She had been very young when she had made that promise, naïve and innocent, but so very earnest. Watching the nobles marry their children off for political gain, watching her own cousins bartered for alliances, shipped across the Shifting Sands for the sake of the O.Z…and away from any thoughts of succession to the throne. The then Crown Princess of the O.Z. had sworn to herself that would not be her fate, nor the fate of her children. Born responsible for the safety of the Realm they may be, but it could not steal their happiness, could not be allowed to take their choices from them, this she had sworn.
And had been forsworn.
Perhaps for Azkadellia there had been no choice, her fate carved in moritanium from the moment she followed her little sister into that cave. The Queen would that she could know this was so, that she hadn't abandoned her child to fifteen annuals of enslavement and darkness because she'd been too weak, too blind to find the way to save her. She'd like to think that there were no other options, even though she can't help but look for them annuals after they could do nothing else than break her heart with what might have been. Even though the thought that she might have prevented it all was like poison in her heart…
…but there hadn't been a viable alternative – although she could think of one person who might think to disagree – and the delay to search for one had proven fatal…
…and then DG's fate had been sealed as well.
The decision had been the Queen's to make, from the moment she'd sacrificed her light – not for the O.Z., but for her daughter – there'd been but a few paths along the brick road for her to choose from. She could have sent her into hiding with her father, trusting in the anonymity of Realm of the Unwanted to mask her presence – but how could a child like DG not betray her existence, so dangerously close to home? Ahamo would have given anything to have been able to keep even one of his girls with him, but she could not allow it. Nor could she have smuggled the youngest princess across the Shifting Sands to be shielded by their supposed allies. What a lovely bargaining chip to hand them: a royal hostage, or still worse, a coveted gift for them to hand right back to that witch the moment the Sorceress gained control of the Realm.
If there was one thing the Queen would not do, she would not force her eldest daughter to murder her sister twice. She could protect Az from that at least.
And so she had used the last of her light – so little remained to her, so little would ever remain – used the very essence of her soul to rip from her child the memories of her family, of her life, to seal away her light, to steal away her very identity and cast her into exile. DG was the key, the O.Z.'s one hope, and so the majestic Queen of the O.Z. had sacrificed her angel to the Realm, binding her mind in magic, blocking from the knowledge of her past, keeping her in ignorance, keeping her safe, until the time was right to send her into danger once more. Like a pawn on a board game, just as she'd vowed she'd never let her daughters be.
It almost makes it worse, sometimes, that they do not blame her in the least. It may have been the only way to keep her alive but DG hardly even seems to have noticed what was done to her, accepting the complete overthrow of all she knew in life with the kind of unflinching optimism that only the happiest of childhoods could provide. And Azkadellia…her Azkadellia who'd faced fifteen annuals of darkness all alone, who'd been freed only to be subjected to the hatred of an entire Realm, who even now could not sleep for the nightmares born of memory…who, with the heart breaking acknowledgement of the monarch she could no longer be allowed to be, agreed with all that her mother had done. The Queen had never thought to feel the pain that was the complete and utter forgiveness of the daughter she'd allowed to be broken…
…if we truly want to honour the struggles and the sacrifice of the people, as well rejoice in their success we should make it something more, something bigger…
…or maybe not completely broken. The smallest of sad smiles quivered at the corner of the Queen's mouth. After an annual and a half of watching Azkadellia shrink and flinch before the people that should have been her subjects, it was the first time the Queen had felt hope that the damage they – she – had done her daughter need not be permanent. That maybe that sacrifice could be rewarded…her smile grew fierce as her thoughts shifted to the battle of the oblivious and the cruel. The nobles had never thought, after an annual and a half of being allowed to throw apples at the eldest princess…
…Don't listen to the mean man, he doesn't intend to be stupid, his education is merely lacking…
…that someone would start throwing them back.
The Queen twirled the metal loop around her finger contemplatively.
Officer Gulch. Such a strange, Otherside name, but then, she'd always known they'd named their children oddly on the other side of the rainbow. All things considered, the policeman got off easy – leastwise no one had felt it necessary to rename him immediately upon his arrival. That or DG wouldn't let them. Her angel was oddly protective of the Othersider…the Othersider, how strange it was to think of the man as thus when for so long…odd in that DG's defence of the cop followed no rules that the long reigning monarch could fathom. It was okay for Cain to abduct the man, it was absolutely fine for the Royal Family to draft him into the Royal Guard, and under no circumstances was he to be told he had a choice about the matter, but if he ever asked to go home he was to be sent back 'on the first tornado out of here, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.'
"I meant it, Y-…Mother, you have to let him go, if he asks to go home. I won't let him be held here against his will, no matter how Az…no matter how much I…no matter how much we need him here. I won't let him be a prisoner; I want you to promise me, if he asks, he goes home."
"But of course, Angel, if you wish we could tell him-"
"NO! You can't tell him!"
"Why ever not?"
"Because if you tell him, you'll force him to decide and Mr. Uber Honest Copitude might decide it's his duty to return or something and I-Az-we don't want him to go. So don't go making think he has to decide."
"How is that any different from keeping here against his will?"
"Of course it's different, because if the Menace actually wanted to go back to Kansas, believe me, we'd know – and I don't mean by the grumbling and the snide comments he thinks nobody hears, Gulch just does that. I mean he will let us KNOW."
The Queen had the fanciful notion, just every once and a while, about whether it would be alright to send a few Alchemists over to the Otherside to borrow a few brains so that she could get a glimpse into their thoughts and figure out what it was about their societal child rearing that so deranged the mind. As Glitch was fond of saying, DG's synapses had certainly been rewired somewhere along the way, and as for the new Othersider, he was a complete and utter mystery. No sooner had one decided he was perfectly harmless than he went and did something like…
"What I've always wondered is who lets young children play in a bear infested forest containing prisons for deranged wicked witches."
…well, like what he'd just done.
She hadn't known quite what to think of him at first. Like Ahamo before him, the Othersider had an utter unconcern for royalty so complete it bordered on contemptuous; her Consort had taken to the political arena like a munchkin to rhyming, whereas Gulch…twirling the metal loops again, the Queen frowned. Practically raised in the council room, she knew better than anyone how a seemingly harmless person could turn into the most dangerous of adversaries. Even the entirely well intentioned and most honest of people could be used as pawns. Azkadellia was so vulnerable right now, in so many ways, and there was Officer Gulch, perfectly positioned should some unscrupulous person seek to turn him to their purpose. There had been many sleepless nights spent pondering the nature of the cop's character, whether he was the simple, straightforward man he seemed, or whether he was playing the deepest game the Queen had yet to witness.
It had taken DG a good twenty minutes to stop laughing at this synopsis of the problem the one time her mother had shared her concerns. Then, when her angel had realized she was serious, the slipper princess had been furious. DG trusted Officer Gulch every bit as much as she trusted Cain. The Queen had been a bit anxious, when the Othersider arrived, that he might upset the delicate balance between her daughter and the Tin Man. In the annual between the Eclipse and her first return to the Otherside, DG had been increasingly reluctant to discuss her life there – the decision to let her 'death' stand had not sat well with her – but all her stories sooner or later had her 'Menace' in them. The relationship between the cop and the youngest princess had been maddeningly impossible for the Queen to define, but if there is one thing she knew, Cain was in no mental territory to take well to the appearance of a rival…
…except that Office Gulch never had any intention of setting himself up as rival for DG's affections. However close they might have been on the Otherside, the policeman seemed quite adept at keeping just enough distance for Cain's comfort – a distance Gulch and DG seemed to adapt instinctively as the Tin Man slowly learned to trust the cop in spite of himself. And while it had been a long time since the Queen had doubted his good intentions, this was exactly the sort of thing that had her, as a person for whom it was imperative to know the motivations of everyone around her, constantly re-evaluating her assessment of the Othersider. It was incredibly frustrating.
"They can't use him if they can't figure out what makes him tick," DG had said just three days ago, after what she'd dubbed 'Fastidium's Epic Fail', "and boy do they not know what makes him tick." With a wistful smile she'd added, "Give him a little girl to protect…" her smile turned a mischievous, "whelp, they're in for a surprise. 'Course, even I wasn't expecting the mobat. Really shouldn't have been so hard on him when stuck his foot in his mouth on the way to Central City, but he's so…if he was a knight, he'd be Sir Oblivious of Doesn't Have a Cluesville. Makes you want to shake him until the gears start moving, damn things seem rusted into place sometimes."
Give him a little girl to protect…
Azkadellia was, in so many ways, still that young girl that had followed her little sister into that cave – and in so many ways she wasn't. Which was probably the main reason why the cop was having so much trouble with the O.Z. – well aside from his obvious difficulty with political relations; the Queen could still hear the shouting. How in the Realm had the man managed to enrage so many people in so little time? Poor man, it couldn't be easy being simultaneously the eldest princess' first crush, security blanket, unknowing suitor, guard, first love, first heartbreak, saviour, safe harbour, occasional witless idiot, knight in shining armour, friend, subject, future father of her children, protector, accidental social shield, and love of her life. Especially when no one had told him he was any of these things, or even planned to.
And alas poor Gulch that none of the Royal women had the slightest intention of making it the least bit easier for him. It was a little unfair of them, but then, the Queen considered with another turn of the metal loops, if the men in her daughters' lives insisted on being quite so difficult they deserved to be made to squirm a little. She was more than ready to be positively delighted with her daughters' choice of Consorts if they'd only just cooperate!
The Queen sighed as the sudden uproar produced by her unprecedented presence in the guard's quarters interrupted her thoughts. Men. Then again, it did make her quarry exceedingly easy to find…
"Officer Gulch?" she called, causing the man just emerging from his room to turn in surprise. He looked even more surprised when the metal loops clicked into place – the Queen did feel a bit bad about that, but then, he had just dropped a political furor on her lap. Cleaning it up was going to take all day. "I'm sorry, Mr. Gulch," she continued, as the cop inspected the bindings now attaching him to the conveniently placed wardrobe, "you are a good man but you are a walking, talking, political, economic and domestic disaster. Not to say that what you did in the council chamber wasn't fantastic, much as the truth may hurt, but the rest of the chaos you left in your wake I could do without at the moment. If would do me the favour of staying put for a bit? Thank you. I'll have Az come let you free when we are done. Oh, and I'd stay out of the kitchens for a while if I were you."
She had to agree with Azkadellia, she considered as strode back towards the council chambers, that dumbfounded expression really was cute. The man must have the patience of a…oh what was the word? It was Otherside creation, some sort of deity related martyr or self-sacrificing…masochist? No, that couldn't be it, she was pretty sure it rhymed with taint, except that it meant a really good person – and if there was one thing the Queen no longer doubted, it was that Officer Gulch was a good person. The stories DG could tell – if it weren't for the tic toks' post mission debriefing she'd have long since sent Raw over to the Otherside to cure the women of whatever dread disease it was that had allowed the policeman to remain single this long (DG had about died when she learned that particular bit of interference by the nurture units, then she'd sworn them all to secrecy because if the Menace ever found out that Emily had hobbled his love life, he was going to murder them all, starting with DG – though the Queen assumed she was exaggerating) – not to mention his actions since his arrival in the O.Z. proved that however unfathomable they might be, his thoughts belonged to a good and kind man.
And another thing, she thought as she reached the door of the guard's quarters-
"Hush-a-bye, Kansas,"the gentle voice drifting down the hallway sang, "in the tree top. When the wind blows, the cradle will rock. When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall, and down will fly Kansas, cradle and all."
-Gulch and Azkadellia were going to make the cutest grandbabies!
The majestic Queen of the O.Z. had two lovely daughters she…