(AN: The times have not been good to me, it seemed. Five days without an update!)

(Needed a longer chapter. I know most of my chapters have been very long, but I decided that I've been dallying around too much and need to get back to the main event. So I've rushed things along in this chapter. Hope you enjoy it)

(Also, I have a little bit of a timeline of Wicked events. May 17th is important because that was when The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was first published in 1900. I don't own LotR, those belong to Tolkien. I've tried to shy away from having dozens of references to my other works in this Ozian Adventures series, but it's a bit inevitable. A few loose ends get tied up and I hope you like my explanation for things.)

(Now enjoy our new chapter)

Remorse

Elphaba suddenly appeared back in her own room.

She made her way to Fiyero's room as fast as she could. Throwing all caution to the wind, she ran through the hallways, heedless if she passed any guards while she ran. Fortunately the only person she passed was an old servant who was looking the other way, and deaf at that. She threw open the door and almost tackled Fiyero down with a hug. She didn't care if she could not talk about their 'little meeting', and it didn't matter if Koiyo would make good on her promise and turn her into a fish. This threatened their lives and, after all, they were the strangers in this past.

"Overthrow the Ozma?" Fiyero replied incredulously. Elphaba quickly threw her hand over his mouth.

"Shh!" she hissed. "We're still not safe to speak."

A muffled "Sorry" came from beneath Elphaba's hand, and she released her grip.

"Well," he continued. "What are we going to do? We can't get stuck in a political revolution, especially since we don't belong here in the first place!"

"I know, I know!" Elphaba returned. "I'll have to look through the Grimmerie and try to find the spell to get us back to our time." She began frantically searching the room, hoping that they hadn't taken the Grimmerie from Glinda by this time. After several minutes of searching, she breathed a sigh of relief, the huge tome in her hands.

"Are you sure we can trust that?" Fiyero asked. "I mean, after all, the last time you used that, I ended up as a scarecrow."

"It's our only chance!" Even though hormonal to a great degree, Elphaba was under control, if only for this very minute. She was doing something, she was ready to get them home. It felt good to be in control again.

"But what about Glinda?"

"I'll fill her in the next time I see her." was Elphaba's reply.

But neither Elphaba nor Fiyero saw much more of Glinda after that night. The two lovers parted, and Fiyero fell asleep slowly. In the morning, he was alone again. He desired to go looking for Elphaba, but she had the map. Even more so, though he knew Ozma Towers, he did not know where in this palace she was being kept. So he remained in his room, annoyed that he could be with her. Late that evening, Glinda finally showed up, dragging her feet into the room and looking very worn out. As soon as she touched the bed, she fell asleep.

Fiyero never got to tell her about their plan.

This sudden and lengthy absence of Glinda happened periodically over the next week or two. Eventually, Fiyero and Elphaba now had more time to themselves. She showed him the map, despite his protests that he knew his way around Ozma Towers blind-folded. He was now spending more and more time with Elphaba in her room, since his room was so often empty and Glinda only showed up to fall asleep there, dead tired.

One night, however, while Fiyero emerged from the tunnel into their room, there was a knock at the door.

"Who is it?" he asked.

"It's me." Glinda's voice came from the other end. "Can I come in?"

He walked over to the door and opened it. He leaned on one foot, flashing his oh-so-scandalacious smile at her. She was wearing a new dress, one that looked almost like the bubble dress she wore that day at Center Munch, when he swung in to save Elphaba from the Gale Force.

"Well, hello there, stranger." he said with a smile.

"Very funny, Fifi." she returned, walking past him into the room.

"You still insist on calling me that?"

"You still insist on wearing that hideoucious beard?"

"What's wrong with the beard?"

"You look so old! I like the young you, Fiyero. And I will keep calling you Fifi until you shave it off."

He rolled his eyes.

"What exactly have you been busy with?" he asked.

"Oh, Ozma made me her personal minister of propagandament." she said, sighing. "It's the Wizard all over again."

"You need to stand up for yourself."

"That's easy for you to say, Fifi, when you're a nobody in their eyes. But Ozma can still do whatever she wants to us..."

"Even so," Fiyero began. "Elphaba's thinking that we've been here too long. We need to get moving."

"Moving where?" Glinda asked. "We don't know how to get back to our own world!"

"Elphaba's trying to find the right spell in that book of hers," he stated. "I guess its only a matter of time until she finds something."

"What do you want me to do?" she asked.

"Wait until she finds something." was all that Fiyero could answer.

Waiting seemed about all they could do. As usual, it seemed as though the Grimmerie had a mind of its own and tried to keep Elphaba from discovering its full secrets. The weeks lagged on, and Glinda's frequent disappearances to work for the Ozma meant that Elphaba and Fiyero had much more time to themselves together. Though, obviously, this time was spent with Fiyero studying the map and Elphaba studying the Grimmerie.

And so a week turned into two weeks, and then two weeks became three, and before long, they were nearing the end of two months. Elphaba went about her research of the Grimmerie with renewed vigor, refusing to leave her room - though her condition made leaving quite a trial - and spending hours, sometimes long into the night, reading the book and making as many notes as she could.

One such night, Elphaba was up again, the light of a small candle giving her small illumination for her research. Though the white words on the pages of the Grimmerie glowed, the candle was still welcome.

"Any luck?" Fiyero asked, for what must have been the hundredth time.

"If there were any, Yero," Elphaba returned, not even lifting her eyes from the pages. "I would have told you."

"Well, you've been at that book for two months." he said. "You must have found something!"

"It's not like that!" she replied with annoyance in her voice. "As soon as something clears up, it becomes hazy again. And-And if I write it down, the same phrase might not even be on the same page, or might not mean the same thing! It could rearrange itself into gibberish or make something even worse!"

Fiyero sighed. Not again! He had said something wrong and he was going to pay for it, so it seemed.

"What about you?" she returned, with just a hint of spite in her voice. "Any luck with the map?"

Might as well oblige her, Fiyero thought. Wouldn't hurt.

"A little," he returned aloud. "It's definitely Ozma Towers, though there's a lot on this map that I don't remember from Shiz. I don't know, it was a while ago. How long ago was it?"

"I don't remember much about dates, Yero." Elphaba said. "I wasn't exactly checking in at the Clock of the Time Dragon every two seconds while I was on the run." There was a moment of pause, as Elphaba shoved her notes into the pages of the Grimmerie before closing it. "I wonder just how much time has passed."

"I think," Fiyero said. "I remember it was the 13th of May when Glinda proposed to me." He chuckled. "That 'surprise' engagement party."

"I wonder how long it took for the news to reach Munchkinland." Elphaba said. "I recall Boq saying something about a ball announcing your engagement."

"I remember four days on the Yellow Brick Road with..." He stopped in mid-sentence, not wishing to continue and speak the name of Dorothy.

"You know," Elphaba said. "You should really tell me what happened when we parted."

"Maybe later," Fiyero brushed off. "So then it was the 17th when we met again?"

"Yes," Elphaba returned. "I came to Colwen Grounds early that day, looking for Nessarose." She sighed, looking with her eyes downcast.

"What's wrong, Fae?"

"Do you ever have regret, Yero?"

"Oh, all the time." he returned. "I just try not to talk about it."

"What kind of regret?"

"I regret wasting time that should have been spent with you." Fiyero answered. A blue-purple shade of embarrassment fell upon Elphaba's face. "I regret not telling Glinda straight off about us. I regret making you wait for me, for wasting my youth being such a stupid little...uh, fool." Elphaba nodded.

"What about you?"

"I regret having never known my mother." she returned. "She died when I was three. It was my worst memory."

"What was?"

"My first memory was of someone screaming." Elphaba began. "I remember running towards the sound, around servants who were very afraid of me, though I didn't know why. I ran into this room, everyone was too busy with something that they didn't see me. There was a woman, beautiful, with long red-brown hair: she was in pain.

"I could hear a Munchkin-woman cry 'It's too soon!' while another voice was begging, praying, saying something. They finally pulled something out, covered in blood, with a pair of twisted...malformed legs." She sniffed back a sob, wiping her face with her fingers. "It was my sister. But the woman didn't move, she didn't scream, she never woke up. Then I heard the other voice - father's voice - crying out in sadness, frustration. Then he looked at me and it was anger. He blamed me for it, struck me, then beat me all the way back to the broom closet."

Fiyero walked over to Elphaba's side, placing his arm around her shoulder.

"Oh, Fae." Fiyero said sympathetically. "I didn't know. I-I'm so sorry."

"I told Glinda about it once," Elphaba said, turning to Fiyero. "But you deserve to know. There'll be no more secrets between us, Yero. I love you, and I want this baby..." She placed her hand on her stomach. "...to live in a better family than I did."

"Hey, don't worry, Fae." Fiyero said, placing his hand under her chin. "Boy or girl, I'll still love it."

"Even if it's green?" Elphaba asked.

That thought had never crossed his mind. Could their child be green?

"Yes," he added. "Even if it's green."

A single tear fell down Elphaba's face as she threw her arms around Fiyero's shoulders.

"Oh, Yero!" she sobbed happily. "You don't know how that makes me feel."

"Whoa, steady on." Fiyero said. "I've never seen you like this before."

She sighed, wiping her eyes and releasing Fiyero.

"I don't know," she said. "Maybe its this whole being pregnant thing. I don't know, I've never been pregnant before."

Fiyero nodded. That was one thing they would need help from, when the time came. Hopefully it would not be too soon, though seven months, it seemed, had flown by so fast. And speaking of time...

"So, back to the time thing," Fiyero said. "Where were we again?"

"Oh, yes." she said. "One other thing is that I regret not having done more for Nessa. I got to Colwen Grounds on what you say was the 17th of May."

"Yes," he continued. "That was when the ball was held."

"Going by broom is a lot faster than walking," Elphaba stated. "So I was there, then you and I...well, we uh..."

"Made out?"

"I guess, that night. Then on the morning...Nessa was dead. I left her all alone, and that damn Dorothy killed her with her house!"

"I'm sorry."

"No, it's nothing. I just should have been there."

"Well," Fiyero continued. "When I got there, to Center Munch, the Gale Force had already reached it first. They must have gone on all through the night."

"Like I did."

"And like I did when I was following you."

"Then what?" Elphaba asked. "I lost all sense of time after you 'died.'"

"Well," Fiyero said. "Dorothy said something about staying the night with a Munchkin before she found me. So a day, at the least, had passed since she arrived. Uh, I remember Boq and I stood guard around her and the dog the night after you showed up." He then looked at her. "Did you really have to throw fire at me?"

"What? When?"

"You don't remember?" he said. "You popped on top of that house and threw fire at me."

"Oh, that." Elphaba laughed a little awkwardly. "I don't remember much of what happened. I must have been going insane, just lashing out at everything. I didn't mean to hurt you, I was just so angry, so sad, so fed up with everything!"

Fiyero mumbled something, then returned. "Once we got the Lion, we spent all day crossing the river, then had to rest from the rain in a farm-house."

"I was watching you then." Elphaba said mischievously.

"Okay," Fiyero returned. "After that, it was a more or less straight shot to the Emerald City...right through a field of poppies."

Elphaba cackled. "Poppies."

"You know," Fiyero said. "Boq said that it was your doing."

"Me?" she cackled again, though out of amusement than a desire to scare Fiyero. "Well, I recall flying over the Pine Barrens dozens of times, and I definitely remember the poppy-field before Dorothy showed up. I think those are a special kind of poppies native only to Oz, they're rather poisonous if eaten, and their smell can put you to sleep."

"Well," Fiyero said. "Luckily Boq and I weren't 'human' anymore, so we weren't harmed by it." He chuckled, and Elphaba joined in with him. It was fun, reminiscing about 'the old times.' "Then once we reached the Emerald City, we spent the rest of the day there, then went out into the Vinkus, looking for you."

"Four days after Nessa died." Elphaba commented.

"That night," Fiyero said. "We were on the outskirts of the Emerald City when a rowdy bunch of peasants followed after us, being goaded on by Boq and Madam Morrible. We didn't sleep the rest of the night or day, so I guess it was the fifth day when we crossed the Vinkus River. That's when you sicked the Monkeys on us."

"That evening," Elphaba added. "Glinda came to me later in Kiamo Ko and told me they were coming for me. I guess that was when I orchestrated my 'death.' I had to stay in one of the dank tunnels all night until they left."

"Chistery and the Monkeys flew us back to the Emerald City." Fiyero said. "Then we found the Wizard out, and it was three days until he left in his balloon. I guess it was another three days after that for me to finally get back to Kiamo Ko. I had to arrange for a successor in my stead."

"For what?"

"The Wizard put me in charge of Oz," Fiyero said. "But I didn't want it, so I spoke to Glinda once Dorothy left. She said that she was in charge of Oz now, and set me free. That's when I went looking for you."

"What did you tell her? Did she suspect?"

"I said that I wasn't the sort to be ruling Oz," Fiyero said. "Just as plain as that. Said that I'd rather use my brains to philosophize with Bo...the Tin Man, about which is better: brains or heart."

Elphaba laughed. "What a silly thing to philosophize over! It's obvious that brains are better."

"That's what I think!" Fiyero stated.

"And she believed that?"

"This is Glinda, dear." Fiyero commented. "She let me go, and then three days later...I found you."

"Eleven days, then." Elphaba said. "Five from Nessa's death to mine, three days until the Wizard left and then three days until we were united again. Oz, no wonder I thought you didn't make it if I had to wait almost a week before I saw you!"

"You got my letter, right?" Fiyero returned. "I kept it on my person, hoping that when the Monkeys took me apart, they'd find it and bring it back to you."

"They did." Elphaba returned.

"So eleven days." Fiyero stated. "That would make it..."

"May 29th." Elphaba said. "That's when we left Oz. But I recall something about October 24th when Frodo woke up in Rivendell."

"So we jumped through time," Fiyero said. "It's quite possible!" He waved his hands about him. True enough, they were far back in time from what they knew.

"I remember the King was crowned on May 1st," she added. "Two months after we, well, you know..."

"Then a month in Midgard, I guess." Fiyero said at last.

"That brings us to three months at Quadling." Elphaba said. "Four months from there to here."

"So...October?"

"Yeah, I guess so." Elphaba said, returning to the book.

"Wow," he said. "Strange how time flies on you."

"Yeah." Elphaba added. She took one look at the Grimmerie, then fell backward onto the bed.

"Hey!" Fiyero turned to his beloved green woman. "You might hurt the baby!"

"I'm fine, Fiyero!" she returned, using his full name.

"Are you? You know, you've been acting a little on edge lately, don't think I haven't noticed."

"Why shouldn't I be?" Elphaba snapped. "We've almost reached the two months and we're nowhere near getting ready!"

"Hey, hey!" Fiyero said, seeing that Elphaba was starting to get hysterical. "Don't worry! I'll talk to Glinda and we'll leave tonight."

"What? But we're not ready!"

"You're stressing over this Chancellor deadline thing," Fiyero stated. "If we can get you out of Shiz for a while, maybe you'll be able to think clearly, huh? Besides, if Shiz is going to hit the ceiling soon, we might as well be out of the thick of it. After all, this isn't our war."

Elphaba had heard those words before. But as much as she knew that to just turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to this war was perhaps the best decision - being that they were in the past and anything they did might have an impact on the future - Elphaba Thropp felt tortured at the thought of sitting idly by and doing nothing while people were about to be hurt.

"But what about Glinda?" she asked.

"I'm gonna go find her right now," Fiyero said, getting up off the bed. "Then we're leaving tonight. I've been sitting here idle for too long also."

"But you don't know where she is!" Elphaba returned. "Not to mention what the guards will do to you! Please, Yero, just stop and think about this first!"

"Never do!" Fiyero said, with a confident smirk upon his face. He picked up the heavy coat that they had been given by Captain Tenmeadows and threw his over his shoulders. "May as well bring this," he said. "It'll be cold outside these walls."

"Fiyero, wait!"

But he didn't wait. He was already out the door before Elphaba could cry out his name in desperation. Elphaba walked over to the Grimmerie, then realized just how ready she really was. All of her things were back in her room, especially her own coat, and she had to be there before she was missed.

She pulled open the door, walked out into the hallway to follow after Fiyero, and suddenly stopped. Her magic was suddenly at hand. She could sense a powerful fluctuation in the flow of magic - like screams in the midnight air. Nature was being tortured, bent and molded to a will other than its own. Something very terrible was going on even as she sat here idly. The walls of the hall suddenly looked very dark and threatening. Looking this way and that, she saw a haze of light glowing in the direction that the fluctuations were emanating.

Elphaba walked down the hallway as fast as she could, following the ripples of power. She could not go much faster because of her condition, but, to her mind, it seemed that, even as fast as she was going, she was not going fast enough. The hallways around her looked like a shadow of a blur, and nothing that inhabited therein that she passed on her way through could keep her.

She found her world suddenly coming back into focus. She was in front of a huge wall of stone that served as the side of another long hallway.

This couldn't be! There had been a door here, she knew there had been one because Koiyo and her had walked through it. Could it have been walled up so soon between then and now? Yet even so, the golden glow was right in front of her, taunting her, leading her into the wall.

She held her hands together and began to chant the fire-spell. It had been a while and she feared that she had forgotten the words. But the brilliant plume of flame blossomed into her hand easily and she threw it at the wall. Perhaps if she could get her fire hot enough, she could burn through the mortar and make it easier to break down.

But the fire-ball went straight through the wall, leaving no sign of having burned it. It did not look as if it had even touched the wall. What was this sorcery that was raised against her? She walked over to the wall and placed her hand upon it.

And watched with awe as it vanished through the wall. As if the wall were made of nothing.

Fiyero was now running through the hall, looking for Glinda. He had no idea where she would be, nor could she know that he was looking for her. He was now at top speed, not caring who he bumped into. He tripped and fell forward onto a very small person.

Pushing himself up, he saw that it was a Munchkin-woman.

"Oh, I'm sorry." Fiyero said, pushing himself up.

"Watch where you're running, wild man!" she returned. "This ain't the Winkie outback, you know." She looked up and then pushed herself back onto her feet. "You're the wild man who sleeps in the Lady Glinda's room."

"How do you know?" Fiyero returned.

The Munchkin-woman scoffed. "There aren't any other Winkies at court, you know. Besides, did you and Aelphaba really think you were that clever? Sneaking in and out of your rooms like that, and you thought nobody would find out."

"Wait," he lowered his voice. "You-You know?"

"Don't act so surprised," the woman returned. "I'm only assigned to the Lady Aelphaba as her maid, why shouldn't I know?"

"But who else knows?"

"Just the four of us." she returned. "You, Aelphaba, her pretty friend the saint and Daisy, that's me."

"Wait, wait, saint?"

"Oh, Glinda." Daisy continued. "She's a right fine beauty, that one. Now Ozma's got her giving speeches and making public appearances."

"Where is she now?"

"I think she said something about takin' a break." Daisy said.

"Where is she, though?"

"Why do you want to know?"

Fiyero wanted to say that he couldn't tell her, but she knew about them. If she told Ozma, then their entire escape plan would be foiled. Or worse, she might just imprison them for leaving without her word.

He sighed. This would complicate things even more, and he hated when things got complicated.

"We're leaving Shiz," he said. "I have to know where she is."

To Fiyero's surprise, Daisy grabbed his hand.

"This way!" she shouted, running off down the hall with Fiyero's hand still held tightly in her own.

The wall had been fake. She passed her hand through it with ease as if it were nothing, and so found the secret tunnel down into the Tomb of the Ozmas. In the lower-most room, she found one of the crypts had been broken into. The remains of whatever Ozma that had been interred there were now dust, scattered about the floor. But just where there should have been a back wall, Elphaba saw that there was another reason the crypt had been broken into.

The sarcophagus was empty and broken, and at its bottom was another tunnel that led even deeper into the earth. Elphaba walked over to its mouth and saw, in the dim light of the flickering torches, that it was wide enough for a giant to squeeze through, but more than wide enough for pregnant Elphaba Thropp to climb down without fear of injury.

She was definitely more aware of herself now that she had a seven pound baby in her body to worry about as well. She had to crawl in feet first, leaning back so that, if she fell or tripped, she would fall backwards onto her back rather than forward onto her belly.

There would be no knowing what would befall her, since there was no light in this tunnel. She muttered the words and a ball of fire appeared in her hand.

Having done so, she slid through the tunnel and came to a staggered stand at the bottom. She saw that this tunnel, unlike the other one, was more of a cave that led deep into the heart of the earth. She had heard the legends about Nomes, creatures of the earth that live where no light can be seen and harbor no love for the things of the surface. As a child, those things seemed rather silly, since nobody had really seen a Nome in her time. But now, nine hundred years in the past, and Oz knows how many feet below ground, she feared to find herself surrounded by Nomes, angry at this intrusion from a surface-dweller.

With the fire cupped in her hand, Elphaba began walking down into the cave tunnel. So far it hurried on straight, though she guessed that it turned up ahead, and sloped downward. It wound to the left, making a sharp turn-around back the way it had come, only still going down, before it made another sharp turn to the right, sending her back on the straight path. Only here she began to notice something new in this tunnel.

Light.

There was a glow down at the end of the tunnel. She could now see without the light of her fire and extinguished it. With both hope and dread in her heart, she made the final steps down the tunnel. Just then she noticed another thing that was making her heart race, the hair on the back of her neck stand up on end and sweat to drip down her forehead.

She could feel no magic.

At the bottom of the tunnel, she found a wide room with a high ceiling. The glowing, she saw, came from the armor worn by a very old looking creature that sat with head bowed at the center of the room.

Elphaba gasped, and the sound echoed off every stone, reverberating throughout the whole cavern. There would be no surprise now.

The creature in the middle of the room looked nothing like Okli. The hair on its head was all gone, leaving only the shriveled remains of his beard, now white and scraggly. Upon his head was a helmet of gold, a breastplate of gold was upon his chest, a cape of golden thread upon his shoulders, a belt of gold girt about his loins, and in his hand was a giant sword that gleamed of gold. Despite his shimmering appearance, there was not much threat this giant could cause. If Elphaba thought he looked sickly before, he looked in perfect health then compared to this.

"Chancellor?" she whispered, slowly closing the distance.

The soft, ragged breathing of an old giant hissed as she walked closer.

"P-Please, Elphaba!" he wheezed. "Get away from me! Stand back!"

"What's wrong, Chancellor?" she asked, standing still where she was at.

"I..." he began, but did not finish. Elphaba looked at him and shivered with revulsion. His very face looked raw and eaten away, as if his living flesh was already decomposing like one of the dead.

Okil gasped, as if fighting for air. She ran over to his side and, despite his feeble and vain attempts to push her away, tried to help him. She only touched the armor, for his skin was hideous to behold. But even more so, she felt a great emptiness the closer she got to him.

Like a hole in existence was opening directly where he was sitting.

He turned his weary, gold-helmed face to her, and Elphaba saw that his eyes were now glowing red.

"Forgive me." he whispered. A hideous rattle escaped his lips and he fell forward, onto the stone floor of the room.

Dead.

Elphaba suddenly was assaulted by a sea of color and sound, so mesmerizing and overwhelming that it turned all else around her to darkness. She felt her head spinning. She thought that the magic was coming back to her, but she still felt the emptiness as before. Suddenly she was engulfed in the darkness.

(AN: I need more cliffhangers! Maybe this will keep you coming back for more!)

(So, what did you think of all the stuff I've put herein? Any thoughts, questions, ideas? Please say so in your reviews!)

(Hopefully a new chapter will be forth-coming soon.)