(AN: Finally got some more from this story published!)

(Since there's no 'official' story behind the history of Oz, I'm going into new waters here. L. Frank Baum never went too far back with Ozian past, since his tales focused on the current adventures of Dorothy and her many friends. Maguire added a little more to the story, but he only listed a short three-hundred-years worth of Ozma's [not in full, just a few]. I'm thinking that Oz was around for a while longer than three hundred years. As such, if I refer to any years, it will be based on deeplyshallow's "Horrible: The Life and Times of Madame Morrible." I liked that story too.)

(In regards, though, to that, since she stated that Ozma Tippetarius [the Ozma from the Oz-series] is Ozma XXXIX, I'm not sure where this puts this story or what number the Ozma from this tale will be [yep, letting the cat out of the bag. I'm a sucker for that]. But if you haven't guessed that an Ozma will appear in this story by now, you should re-read. Suffice to say that this is one of the 'older' Ozmas, from ancient Oz [about nine hundred years before Wicked].)

(Now on with the show!)

Blessed Ancient Shiz

The small party rode through the streets of a town that was both very familiar and yet completely different. In their time, this town was known as a university town, with almost all of the buildings serving the purposes of the college. Here, however, Elphaba Thropp saw no familiar hallowed halls that jogged her memory of her days here. Even the statue, where Fiyero ran into her all those years ago, was nowhere to be seen.

"Where are we?" Glinda asked.

"The Blessed City of Shiz, the crown jewel of Oz!" Tenmeadows announced.

It was still nothing like any of them had remembered it from their days. All the buildings that had once dominated the landscape were gone. A high wall surrounded the town, with many towers and armed battlements upon the walls. The train station, also, where Elphaba and Glinda had departed to the Emerald City, was also gone. They noticed that almost from the beginning as they entered this snow-covered town: the sound of trains were not there anymore.

At last they saw a building that looked familiar. The namesake of the boys dormitory, Ozma Towers, rose before them. The sides of the great structure were not covered in green ivy, or even the violet-leaved snakesap, native to Gilikin. It was very austere, capped in snow, looking like an old dwarf sitting down with a beard in three forks on his face. It looked much less like a dormitory and much more like a modest palace.

And a palace it indeed was.

Tenmeadows and his company marched Elphaba, Glinda and the wounded Fiyero through the gate, in the center-most pillar. They entered a long hallway with many cutaway clefts in the sides. There were no paintings, but beautiful tapestries filled the wall and a great rug was upon the floor, embroidered with some kind of image. Looking carefully, they saw someone sitting upon a hill, dressed as Glinda might have been. From where she sat, a great flood of water was flowing down upon the lands below.

The three turned their attention to the throne before them. Around it were many distinguished and, sometimes, silly-looking gentlemen who were obviously advisers, and ladies-in-waiting. Upon the throne sat something that was perhaps even more disturbing than a mural of Lurline releaving herself. A short woman, extremely fat, sat upon a gold cushioned throne like a great pale frog. She was robed in various bright, shining clothes and bedecked with jewelry. Her hair, a deep shade of dark brown, was tied into two buns on either side of her head, while the main mass of it hung down behind her back. A golden tiara was upon her head, with the O-within-the-Z emblem sat directly upon the middle, above her face.

"Hail, Ozma the Great, ruler of our beloved Oz!" Tenmeadows greeted, bowing before the huge person upon the throne. A hideous, sickeningly-sweet titter escaped that monstrous body, and even Glinda was hard-pressed to stifle a grin. Captain Tenmeadows turn to his 'prisoners' and ordered them to bow. Glinda did, and Fiyero, though wounded, got to one knee.

Elphaba did not bow.

"Captain," Ozma said to the captain. "Why does that ugly green thing refuse to bow? Are not all the people of Oz duty-bound to show respect to their ruler?"

Tenmeadows turned to Elphaba and struck her down to her feet with his hand. Fiyero feebly tried to attack him, but Glinda held him back: a rather easy thing to do for someone who, for the last three days, had been bleeding from the wound of a crossbow.

"That's better!" Ozma sang. Glinda was starting to feel that she did not like this Ozma at all. "Now, give me your names."

"If it pleases, Your Oz-ma-ship-ness-ry..." Glinda stumbled.

"Your Majesty will do." Ozma returned.

"If it pleases, Your Majesty," Glinda said. "I am Glinda o..." She suddenly bit down on her tongue, remembering what they had talked about before the Mammoth stampede.

"Yes?"

"Just Glinda, your Majesty."

"And where are you from, Just Glinda?"

"It's Glinda," she returned. "And I'm from the Arduenna Clan, native to the Upper Uplands of Gilikin."

"Ah!" Ozma's expression changed to something that made Elphaba think of a large, wide-mouthed toad smiling. "In that case, I shall have to send word to your clan that one of their number has been..." She turned to Tenmeadows. "Where exactly did you say you found these strange people?"

"They were at the northern exit of the Southkell Pass."

"You mean Kumbrica's Pass," Glinda added.

"Who?" the Ozma inquired.

Glinda saw Elphaba shake her head at her, then turned back to Ozma.

"Uh, nothing, Your Majesty. Southkell Pass it is, then."

Ozma nodded, then picked up her golden scepter - also topped with the O-within-the-Z symbol of Oz, and pointed at Elphaba.

"And what are you?" she asked. "Some sort of frog grown into human form?"

"No!" Elphaba shot back.

"Silence!" Tenmeadows struck her again. "How dare you speak to your ruler in such a way!"

"Bring her here, Captain Tenmeadows!" Ozma insisted, pointing to the stone floor directly in front of her. Tenmeadows ordered two of his guards to drag Elphaba before the ruler, which they did - and none to gently - and then threw her down at Ozma's huge, bejeweled feet (not only in that she had jeweled slippers, reminding Elphaba disturbingly of Nessarose, but her toes, which stuck out of the shoes, had diamonds and precious stones embedded into the toe-nails).

"Before you speak, ugly little thing," Ozma began, though how she called Elphaba 'ugly' was almost nauseating, with a kind of playful disregard of the green woman's feelings: like only Ozma's wish mattered. "Let me remind you that I can make your stay here very unpleasant if you do not cooperate, okay?" She shot Elphaba a sickening grin and then spoke aloud.

"Now, frog-thing, tell me your name."

"I'm not a Frog," Elphaba returned, trying hard to keep herself from boiling over. "I do have green skin, but I'm just as human as you are."

One of the guards struck Elphaba across the back with his staff.

"How dare you make yourself equal to Her Majesty!" He rose to strike again, but Ozma held out her scepter.

"I still haven't heard your name, silly little green thing!"

Elphaba rose up, trying hard to look at the huge, bloated figure upon Oz's throne without exploding into fits of laughter. She also had to think up of a name, one that would not draw attention to herself, and one that would not reveal herself before her time, as it were.

"Aelphaba, your Majesty." she answered.

"And why, Aelphaba, are you green?"

"I was born that way, your Majesty."

Laughs erupted from those gathered about Ozma's throne.

"Why? Was your father a fairy?" inquired Ozma.

"No!" Elphaba answered. A little too harshly, maybe, but it reminded her of the hard times she had as a child growing up in Rush Margins, where all the other children were as pink as a peach and spared no expense in teasing her, even unto tears, over her green skin. And that thing about fairies had been just one of the many hurtful things they said about her.

Ozma looked down upon this little green thing before her, ignoring her crass behavior as just a rough exterior. She prided herself on being such a good judge of character, she knew that inside, this green woman was just another one of the stupid people of Oz, content with nothing more than a full belly and knowledge that their Ozma was on the throne, keeping them safe.

How wrong she was about this green woman.

"I like you, Aelphaba." Ozma said. "You're...very bright. It is my will that you remain here at court, in my presence wherever I go."

"But your Majesty..."

"I insist!"

"But what about my husband?"

"Husband?"

"Him," she pointed to Fiyero. "Prince Yero of the Vinkus!"

A loud chortle came from a Cat sitting to the left of the throne.

"Savages with princes!" he mocked.

"Oh, yes, Mr. Fuzzims!" Ozma tittered. She then called the Cat over and he jumped onto her lap, where she babied and babbled to it as if it were a little child.

"Please!" Elphaba continued. "He's hurt! The soldiers refused to help him!"

"But of course!" Ozma returned, and Sir Fuzzims jumped off her lap and back to his seat. "I am Ozma, after all. Don't you know anything?"

This was just too much. Elphaba could understand ignorant Ozians making snide comments about her skin, but insulting her intelligence?

"I'll have you know..."

Ozma held up her fat hand, whose fingers looked like five pink sausages covered in rings.

"I am the Anointed of Lurline, dearie!" she bragged, puffing up her chest with pride. "It is written in the Oziad that while Ozma lives, no creature in Oz shall taste death. So even if your...prince...were horribly mangled, he would still be alive in some form or another."

"But he's in pain!"

"Silence!" Ozma shouted. The whole court ceased their noise-making. "Now, Aelphaba, will you join my court or shall I have you thrown into the dungeon?"

Elphaba nodded her head.

"I'll join your court."

"Good!" Ozma clapped her fat hands together, giggling so much that Glinda put her hand over her mouth and made as if she would vomit. "Now, let's get you cleaned up. No sense in wearing those horrendible black clothes of yours, nope nope nope!"

"But what about Yero?"

"Oh, I'll have someone fix his wound, if that makes you happy." She then turned to Glinda. "You..." She waved her hand, as if trying to recall her name from some great storehouse of knowledge, but to no avail. "...uh, you-you-person, will stay here at court until I've received word from the Arduenna clan."

She then waved her hand at them. She was done speaking with them and any further audience would annoy her beyond belief. So the guards took Glinda and Fiyero away and Elphaba was led into private guest chambers by several of the ladies-in-waiting.

It was definitely not the Shiz that they knew.

(AN: I've based Ozma in this on her portrayal in the Oz-series, obviously. Calling her subjects 'stupid' was something that Ozma Tippetarius did too, and she also kept 'odd' people as friends and 'play-things.' So that's not that far-fetched.)

(I hope you can see where I'm going with this Of Saints and Sinners title, and names like Glinda and Aelphaba [pronounced Eel-faba]. One of the really cool things about going back in time is that you can rewrite history...somewhat. Don't worry, I won't have major rewriting going on. Very subtle, and unnoticeable, such that it won't matter much by 'present' day Oz.)