Clockwork
"Well?" she said.
"Well what?" he answered.
"Where's the end of the play?"
He stuck his head out of the trapdoor and winked at her.
"Who said the end was written yet?"
Wicked, p. 480
"You're never going to catch me! You're never going to catch me!"
"No fair!" cried Temen as he tripped over a log. "You got a head start!"
She laughed as she ran through the thick forest undergrowth, turning every so often to see if he was gaining on her. Temen could run faster than she could, but he was also being careless in his haste to catch up to her.
"I'm almost there!" she shouted gaily when she heard him charging from behind. It was just another bend past the willow, then straight out into the clearing. She pushed through the leafy sycamore bramble and rushed past the old broken gate.
"I win!" she yelled, nearly out of breath. "I win, Temen, I win!"
"Only because I let you," he sulked, staggering up close behind. Galinda knew that wasn't true, but she didn't contradict him. If Temen had let her win, like he so often did, he wouldn't have said anything about it. It made her victory all the more satisfying.
"Oh, don't be so mad. Look, I've brought you some cakes from our kitchen pantry." She reached into the pockets of her apron and pulled them out, handing them to him with a smile. "Cinnamon and short cream— they're my mother's favorite."
He returned her smile with one of his own and took them out of her hand. "Your Ama's gonna be mad at you."
"Not if I blame it on the cat."
While messily devouring their sugary repast, they turned and looked at the splintering old wood-mill, lit up under the sun. They had discovered the building only three days before, and were eager to unearth all its mysteries. "What do you suppose is up in that tower?" said Galinda, wiping her hands on her dress.
Temen squinted up at the turret while shading his eyes from the sun. "It's probably haunted by the ghosts of old saw millers. Towers always have ghosts."
"Ghosts?" she asked with fear in her voice. "I won't stay in a place that's haunted!"
"You're such a sissy," he said, laughing. "If there's anything up there, it's just spiders and mice. We'll fix it up when we're done building our ramparts and gun emplacements." He climbed atop the ramshackle fence and looked out over the forest. "We need to shore up our meager defenses in case of an attack. This country is full of cowardly bandits and foul, merciless tyrants."
"What about our dragons?" she eagerly asked, tying her ribbon on the gate.
"They'll be at the back— probably next to the lake. At least the flying ones. Here," he said while grabbing a stick and dragging it through the dirt. "This is where the moat will go. We'll fill it with eels and poison sharks to prevent anyone from invading."
"Temen!" she gasped as her eyes went wide. "What if I fell in?"
"They're our creatures, Galinda; they won't hurt us. Besides," he said as he smiled down at her, "I would jump in and save you."
Galinda blushed at his daring bravery, though she was still concerned. "Silly boy— what if you drown? You don't even know how to swim."
Temen grabbed her hand and squeezed it. "Well...then I'm going to learn."
Blinding light flashes into view with a ray from the crimson dawn. A childhood memory is lost in a fog that alters the fabric of time.
Glinda watches as forests transform into streets of an emerald city. Faint recollections wash the scene in imprecise shapes and buildings. She is standing at the edge of a bustling platform, waiting at a carriage crossing. Ghosts pass before and around her in a mist of translucent memory. A sense of restlessness pervades her body, though she doesn't comprehend its source. Is weary impatience its inspiration, or does fear plague her emotions?
Elphaba is there in the press of phantoms, carefully walking towards her. She strikes the scene with her razor-sharp verdancy and tall arresting presence. Glinda is overly anxious to see her and reaches to take her hands. But the edges of Elphaba are becoming fainter as skin and sinew begin to blend with the moving shapes of the crowd. Her eyes take on the lackluster porcelain of a mechanical green automaton.
They stand and speak with mumbled words; Elphaba remains out of reach. She kisses Glinda once, then twice, but her expression is grim and unyielding. Before Glinda has time to act, Elphaba is fading into the crowds. They slowly begin to engulf her figure as green becomes grey in the blur.
Glinda is crying. Where is Elphaba going?
She is walking away forever.
The scene shifts to a softly lit room that is stunning and unfamiliar. Candlewood fixtures and crystal chandeliers offset the lush velvet curtains. Glinda stands waiting near a four-poster bed that is covered in a dozen silk pillows. Her dress is white, tailored to perfection, and it tapers down to her breast. A necklace studded with diamonds and rubies highlights the skin at her throat. Her hair is twisted in an elegant knot, and a tiara accentuates its luster.
A body presses against her back in a suggestive, intimate manner. There's a sharp, spicy musk of cologne that quickly envelops her senses. Hot breath sears the slope of her neck and whiskers graze her skin. A large pair of hands begins to caress her in a suave, possessive fashion. They reach around to the curve of her stomach and slowly begin inching upward. Her breath is unsteady as they fumble roughly with the diamond clasp of her gown.
The hands are invasive. Horrible. Incorrect. Their texture is coarse and leathery. Each touch is more insidious, more unbearable than the last.
She endures them without complaint.
A turn of the clock shifts the setting to a hall in the spacious expanse of a mansion. A dinner is being served for a considerable gathering of the city's most fashionable patrons. The tinkling of glasses mingles together with the trill of coquettish laughter. The dinner guests smirk and make-love to each other while the servants quietly attend them. Their faces are gross and unsettling to behold as each are deformed or distorted. Eyes roll and sag; mouths twist and fall as if they were wax on a candle. They are all seated at a large dining table bedecked in crystal and porcelain. White linen cloth covers the mahogany where silver platters are set down.
A shrewd looking man is at the head of the table, watching them all with amusement. His beard is white, his jacket is emerald, and his eyes are the color of jaundice. He raises his hand and the lids are pulled back to reveal mounds of Animal corpses. The guests applaud the necrotized servings that are offered so succulently before them. They tear into the feast with knives and forks in a messy, frenzied fashion. Goblets are filled to the brim with blood, occasionally spilling all over them. The guests take their glasses and make bawdy toasts with the thick, clotted fluid. It runs down their chins and over their hands as they drunkenly guzzle it down.
Standing at the side, in a blue sequined gown, is an ivory statue of Glinda. But is it a statue? The arms are flesh. A pulse trills faintly beneath the skin. But the face is lifeless and artificially rendered by the skill of a painter's brush. The smile is eternal. The eyes see nothing.
She is a beautiful sculpture of ignorance.
A wind-swept plane of grass and hill forms above the assembly. Silver becomes stone and corpses become coriander in a swift and winding motion.
Glinda is bent under layers of color that bind her in heavy bereavement. The sky is cloudy and pressing on top of her like the lid of a stifling coffin. She sees the figure of Elphaba once more, though her friend is darkly altered. She's thinner. Older. Her features are twisted into crazed and bitter anger. She raises an accusing finger and points it in Glinda's face. Glinda is at a loss. She doesn't understand her. But Elphaba is already walking away.
The distance is further than she can manage bound in the confines of her dress. She calls out to Elphaba, but her friend says nothing. She's walking faster now.
On the horizon, her Frottican wood-mill crashes and splinters to the ground. Elphaba is heading straight for the door, and Glinda is unable to stop her. She shrieks with fear at her failed inability to halt Elphaba's approach. A trick of the light turns the mill to a castle— and then weirdly— to Crage Hall.
The door swallows Elphaba into its frame and shuts Glinda out forever. The form of a dragon breaks through the ground and flies to the top of the tower. It cocks its head, it draws in a breath, then heaves out a lungful of flames. The building burns and smolders in front of her with the dying cries of her friend. Glinda watches it raze to the ground, red with ash and flame. The smoke turns the day into the blackest of nights.
She cannot even scream.
Glinda started from the horrifying vision in a cold and captured sweat. She jerked up roughly from beneath the covers with a stiff inhalation of air. Her skin prickled with an impression of pain like the fine points of needles. It felt as though she had been pulled by cords hooked jaggedly beneath her flesh.
Darkness. Darkness was everywhere. A waltz of black upon black with every mutilated Animal dangling within her mind's eye. She was disoriented. Sick. The air in her lungs came closer to choking her than offering any relief. Was she in hell? Had pain transformed her into the darkness itself? Hot tears stained the flush on her cheeks, and her muscles were violently shaking. Sweat-soaked covers hugged her body, though the heat couldn't stop her from quivering. A dull ache lingered at the base of her groin that confused and even shamed her. Everything felt so foreign and raw in the haze of her awakening.
What had she seen? Where had she been? Why were there voices still screaming?
Sparkling gowns and bloody goblets. A ghastly congregation of corpses. Temen's body smoldering in the corner, forming the same words over and over with his red, lipless mouth. Wicked… Wicked… Wicked…
Her hand slid up the plane of her neck and tightened around her throat.
There was no cure. No science or solution to cleanse the stains of her guilt. Glinda was evil in its most cunning form, shaping the horrors of the world. The dream had shown her for what she was—a gross distortion of goodness and light masking the will of hell. Death dripped from her ivory fingertips, honeyed lies from her tongue. She had willed Temen's death. She had murdered Dr. Dillamond. Ama Clutch had been consigned to madness, all by her silent command.
And Elphaba…
Elphaba…
God in heaven…
Glinda slowly looked down.
Elphaba was sleeping on the bed beside her, a swath of green tangled within the sheets of grey and mauve. Her face was hidden beneath a veil of hair that fanned across the pillow. Telltale marks along her neck and breast spoke of carnalities they'd explored hours earlier. Glinda stared at her in absolute horror, as if Elphaba's body had been torn and brutalized within the sheets of their bed.
Look at her, the voices began faintly in the back of her mind. Here, too, is your evil 've taken the girl by force.
Glinda slowly shook her head as her eyes grew wider still. No. No… It wasn't possible. What on earth had she done?
You wanted her, you tawdry whore. Haven't you always craved this? Murderer… rapist… look at your work. You've violated her against her will…
Her fingers raked across her hair, digging into her scalp. Elphaba… Elphaba…
By the Unnamed God. What on earth had she done?
An image of Elphaba pressed beneath her came unbidden to her mind. The wordless fear that touched her countenance; the panicked and tempting way she clutched at the skin on Glinda's shoulders. What was it all but helpless submission? A consent to be taken by the boundless passions of an ungovernable, insatiable will? Elphaba had touched her, held her and surrendered as easily as Temen burned.
Glinda tried to stifle the cry that rose up in her chest. She bit down on the knuckle of her hand and drew blood to the surface.
She'd wanted Elphaba, and so she took her.
What becomes is thus fulfilled.
The cavernous jaws of the night opened up to her, beckoning Glinda to hell.
She untangled beneath the covers of the bed, careless in her haste. Her discarded nightgown waited on the floor, the slip of a robe on a chair. How she managed to dress in her fear was quite literally beyond her. She was out the door and down the halls as fast her legs would carry her.
Glinda was fleeing—running—flying—escaping all that she couldn't. Out into the wilds… out into the unknown… seeking a doomed salvation. The crack of thunder sounded overhead as she fled from out of the building. The wind tore past her, the night bound her throat, but still she ran and ran. The gates of Crage Hall couldn't seal her in, or the scraping thorns on the walls.
Elphaba… Elphaba…forgive me for hurting you, because I never will.
Lightening rent the slate black heavens and flooded the interior of the room. Elphaba awoke in the flash of its temper, focusing and unfocusing with sleep-weary vision. The presence of a storm could always unsettle her in the deepest hours of sleep, yet there was an instinctive realization here that all was not correct. It was a reflection of feelings too deep to identify; too ingrained in the fibers of her skin. Something spoke to her, or intuition suggested that Glinda was not in the room.
She raised herself on one of her elbows and scrutinized the space beside her. While her senses were heavily fatigued from exhaustion, her mind and heart were hammering. She slowly recalled a draft of medicine… sighs and skin that warmed beneath her touch. The elements were far too vivid to be a dream, yet their source was nowhere to be found.
She climbed out of bed and reached for a robe that was hanging beside her dresser. To panic at this stage might have seemed unreasonable had her instincts been warning her otherwise. As she tied the cord quickly around her frame, her eyes hunted the darkness for signs of her roommate's whereabouts. She mentally noted that Glinda's robe and thin blue nightgown were gone.
Elphaba quickly stalked over to the washroom, which was dark and maddeningly vacant. She returned to the room with restless anxiety and wrung her hands together. Where was Glinda? Why had she left without waking Elphaba up?
Her pulse gave a leap when she glanced at the door and found it partially open.
Stay calm she mentally chided herself while slipping out into the corridor. It was entirely possible that Glinda had made an impromptu visit to the lavatories down the hall. Elphaba sprinted up the narrow passage and into the communal room. The lights were off, the stalls were empty. Still no sign of Glinda.
To say that Elphaba was growing more and more terrified would have be making light of the situation. She dashed back out into the silent corridor and began a frantic search of the building. Empty rooms. Empty beds. It was almost like Glinda had vanished. She flew up and down a dozen flights of stairs, but there wasn't any trace of her companion.
When she reached the foyer that led out of the building, she was horrified to find the doors unlocked. She pushed them open with cold desperation and peered out into the night. Sheets of rain poured down in front of her, forcing her back in the building. By the Unnamed God, why was it raining? The sky had been virtually cloudless.
"Glinda!" she cried with a slip of hysteria right at the edge of her voice. She didn't know why or how she had reasoned it, but she was certain that Glinda was out there. Her shouting was bound to alarm nearby residents, but Elphaba was beyond caring. The hammering water drowned out her cries on top of the rumbling thunder.
There was no way in hell that Glinda would hear her, if Glinda was nearby at all. She turned and bounded hurriedly up the stairs towards Nanny and Nessa's room.
Was this some horrific reaction to the draft? Was there was more in the substance than Yackle had promised? The thought was beyond terrifying to her, as terrified as he already was.
Elphaba stormed into Nessa's room without as much as a courtesy knock. She fumbled with the lights on the nearby wall while Nanny snorted and stirred.
"Nanny," she howled as the lights sparked on and illuminated the sleeping pair. "Nanny… Nanny… I need you to wake up..."
But Nanny seemed opposed to the idea, and smothered her head with a pillow. "Merciful Lurline and all of her saints, what in blazes is going on?" Nessa was already shifting beneath her covers and blinking tiredly at Elphaba.
"Glinda," said Elphaba in a gasp of breath as she leaned against the door. "Nanny… she's gone! Outside in the rain... She's out there… Someone has to go after her!"
Nanny twisted on top of the mattress and misjudged the width of her bed. She crashed to the floor with an inglorious thud and let out a groan of frustration. "Bother and piss— what are you on about? Glinda out in the rain?"
"Out of our room and out of the building. Get dressed… we have to find her."
Nanny wriggled beneath the covers and sat up groggily on the floor. "Oh hell and Oz. Fetch me my cloak and those rust-colored boots in the corner." After some grunting and a few mumbled curses, she climbed back up on her bed. "What on earth is that girl thinking? Just listen to the storm outside! Did she have the sense to take an umbrella at least? How can it even be raining?"
"I don't know," said Elphaba, impatient. "I don't know how long she's been gone for. Hurry up with your boots, Nanny. She's going to get sick in this weather." Elphaba moved to hover near the window and looked out over the grounds.
Nanny dressed as speedily as a woman of her age and bearing could manage. "You're sure she's not tiddling in one of the bathrooms or snacking down in the kitchens?"
"I've searched this building from top to bottom… I'm telling you Nanny, she isn't here! "
"That naugty thing; she's probably off on some late-night rendezvous. You stay here and look after Nessie while I go and fetch the boarding officials. It's all lunacy tonight!"
When she left in a flurry of irritable protests, it was well past two o'clock. Elphaba began to frantically pace the room, worrying her hands together while occasionally glancing out of the window. She failed to notice that Nessa had managed to push herself up into a sitting position, or the careful way she had been scrutinizing Elphaba since she'd entered the room.
"How nice to see you looking so well," said Nessa with dark intention. "Quite the miraculous recovery, Elphie, what with you being so sick."
Elphaba tossed her a narrowish look as she continued to pace the floor. "Don't waste your breath with sarcasm, Nessa. I'm painfully not in the mood for it."
"Oh, tell me Elphaba," she blithely continued while shakily getting to her feet. "Tell me what you are in the mood for, because judging by the state of your appearance, it clearly hasn't been sleep."
The words were scathing and full of implications that were impossible for Elphaba to ignore. She turned towards her sister with a confined, cautious stare and took a guarded step forward. "Do I sense an accusation on that pious tongue of yours? I can't rightly tell; perhaps a little more boldness is required. Insinuations are like prayers, Nessarose—the Unnamed God wants them open and honest for ever sinner to hear."
"You want me to be open?" she said with a laugh devoid of any humor. "Shall I speak candidly of your recent indiscretions? Why should I pervert our surroundings with the grotesqueness of it all? The marks on your neck and your obvious nakedness should be damning enough for us both."
Elphaba regarded her sister carefully, then immediately started laughing. It was a sinister cackle so pointed and vicious that it drowned out the thunder outside. "Well look at you," she said, moving closer, "such a clever little girl. Have you made my pleasures a matter of study, or is this something they advise you to learn and perfect in your common unionist prayer books?"
"By all that is sacred," said Nessa with disgust, "I would slap you if I had hands to do it. Debasing yourself is one thing, Elphaba… but with Glinda? Of all people?"
Elphaba turned away from Nessa with an ugly sneer on her lips. "I don't need this," she acidly replied. "And we won't be discussing it further." The window reflected her image in the rain, disheveled and diaphanously altered.
"Oh, you need it… and you're going to hear it. You've crossed a line in decency! Was this your grand idea for helping her? Your brilliant master plan? You invite Glinda into your bed so you can screw the madness out of her?"
"Enough!" Elphaba all but snarled while rounding back on her sister. "Don't you dare lecture me on anything I've done. You're not too saintly to be smarted on your mouth, and Oz only knows I have good reason to do it."
"Strike me," she taunted while staggering closer to where Elphaba stood. "I'd say after this it's perfectly clear that you're capable of anything! What's one more offense to be borne? But someone is going to have to stand up to you, Elphaba, and it looks like it has to be me."
"How gracious," sneered Elphaba while peering down at her. "A victim through and through. You play the part with such stunning eloquence; one would think you were bred for it."
"That girl is insane," Nessa insisted while refusing to be intimidated. "This whole wretched school is aware of it, Elphaba— everyone can see it!"
"Since when have you ever cared what anyone else thinks?" Elphaba spat in a rage. "You've spent your entire self-righteous existence rejecting the wisdom of the world in favor of your worthless, nameless god! I've taken you for many things, Nessa, but I would never have taken you for a hypocrite."
"I don't need to listen to the scandal of others to see that Glinda is a lunatic!" She spoke with conviction, though it was clear that Elphaba had actually offended her. "If you weren't so blinded by your own salacious appetites, you would have noticed it yourself! This dissolute behavior is going to cost you, and its going to cost Glinda as well. The only thing that can save that girl now is the padded cells of an asylum."
The two of them stood there breathing heavily, balanced like hissing pythons. Elphaba stepped menacingly closer to Nessa, and her mouth turned up in a smirk. "Let's not mince words with foolish drivel over insanity or sex. Let's get to the heart of this matter, Nessarose—what's really eating you up?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Nessa, reluctantly leaning back.
"Don't polish that lie with me, little one; you were never any good at it. If you want to talk, let's talk about you and your saintly little desires to keep me shackled to your person."
"Ha," said Nessa with thickening malice. "As if I had any influence over what you choose to do."
"But isn't that it?" said Elphaba more keenly. "Aren't you simply beside yourself that you're incapable of governing my actions? If you can't have me simpering and praying to your god, then you fetter me to you with guilt. So what is this time, Nessa? What transgression have I bruised you with now? Lecture me on how I'm failing you... tortured little saint that you are."
Her sister's nostrils flared and fumed. Elphaba had struck a chord. "I wasn't meant for this!" she cried in a fury. "I wasn't meant to sit and play minder to a silly, self-centered girl! I'm crippled, Elphaba— or have you forgotten that in all your rapacious lust? You've forced me thanklessly into this role and you've left me to stand by myself! I'm not fit for it; do you hear me, Elphaba? I'm not fit for this at all!"
"YOU'RE STANDING!" cried Elphaba with thunderous volume. "By the Unnamed God, Nessa, you're standing alone! Can't you see how freeing it is to stop being so damned dependent on everyone else? Shouldn't that mean anything to you at all? Look beyond your own misfortunes and see this from my eyes. Do you really think that I've ignored you? Despised you? Traded your affections for another? I've given you the opportunity to grow and to feel beyond your own self-centered interests! So you have no arms! Why should that stop you from strengthening everything that's left? Your faith will carry you for a time, Nessarose, but life requires more than just our prayers. Here you are now—standing before me—yet you still refuse to accept it!"
Nessa was slowly shaking her head, staring at Elphaba in denial. "Father—"
"Hang father! He's every bit as guilty for crippling you as mother was! They've nurtured you into a whining invalid and crushed your ability to live. Do you take no thought to what lies on the horizon once Oz is consigned to dust? Think about your future, Nessarose, and every possibility you can picture for it. Do you think that Nanny will live forever? Will Frex always be there to bless his little girl with a pair of jeweled slippers? Or better yet, do you think I'll wipe and coddle you for the rest of my natural life? I'd sooner toss myself in Kellswater before I consigned myself to that fate! You're fooling yourself if you think that this world will offer you timeless deliverance. If there is a God, Unnamed or not, they expect more from you than that."
Nessa was openly weeping now, from rage or wounded pain. "I hate you," she cried in a strangled whimper. "I hate you with every fiber of my being. I wish to the Unnamed God that neither of us had ever been born in the first place!"
"Wish it…" said Elphaba, taking hold of her sister with quaking, grasping hands. "Damn us both to hell, Nessarose, as only you could do it. But if you think the failing lies on our part, then you are sorely mistaken. I've spent my life in the chains of oppression, convinced that this cursed skin of mine was proof of some moral aberration. I believed that this world was the greater ideal, and I was its deformity. Here in this state of living and breathing, I was the most unnatural of all natural beings. But then one day my eyes were opened to a truth that was far more unsettling. We are not the ones who are deformed, Nessarose... it's this world—this life that is the aberration. It changes us all every day; it turns us into fiends. We live in its chaos with eyes wide open, drowned in the blood of murderers and innocents who pave our way to damnation.
"But do you know the greatest tragedy of all? The thing that destroys me completely? Even in spite of this mortal coil— this malformation of an existence— even now… I am capable of love. My heart practically bleeds with it. So tell me, sister… tell me truly… what is the greater failing?"
She slid her hands off of Nessa's shoulders, letting them fall to her sides. They stood there watching with ambiguous emotion as everything holding them weakly together unraveled like a spool. The spatter of rain on the pavement outside was the adagio to ill-spoken anger. Elphaba turned and quietly left the room, leaving Nessa to weep and fester.
The hallway was empty and still quite dark. She knelt by the door and settled against it. If this was what life had left to promise her, Elphaba would gladly be rid of it. She rested her elbows against her knees and cradled her head in her hands.
Glinda… Glinda… forgive me for failing you, because I never will.
The night was a chorus of fading thunder and the moaning whispers of trees. The rain had subsided from a steady downpour into a fine, clouded mist. It whipped and shimmered along the meadow, spraying each leaf and hanging tendril with a soft, silvery sheen.
Glinda was walking (or in truth, limping) through a field of winter wheat. The bending boughs were nearly waist high and drenched from the heavy rain. Her feet were bleeding from tears in the skin, and her ankle was painfully sprained. The freezing ground beneath her feet had numbed the pain considerably, though it was possible that Glinda was beyond recognition of her own physical suffering. The silk material of her robe and nightgown was sodden with rain and mud. The thorns and branches of wild florae had made a mess of her skin. Shallow cuts crossed over her arms, as well as her legs and hands. Her eyes, however, were dead to all but the fixture hidden in the field.
What remained of the moonlight had emerged through the clouds, creating a path before her. It illuminated a contraption both massive and ominous with an ornamental Dragon up top. The turrets and timers were sleek and suggestive—a clockwork spectacle to behold. The device was mysterious and wholly troubling; it was like nothing she had seen before.
A dwarf sat idly on top of a cart beside the massive timepiece. He seemed oblivious to the freezing weather as he scraped the ash from his pipe. There was nothing overly remarkable about him, apart from a spryness of age. He didn't bother to look up at her approach, but remained in hanging profile.
"It's past the hour of fortunes and favors," he said while continuing to ignore her.
Glinda regarded him with only passing interest, though admittedly, it was getting harder for her to focus on any given thing. She tilted her head towards the large clockwork Dragon, a glossy vision searing under the white light of the moon. For a tick-tock machine, it was incredibly life-like with its brandished claws, leather wings and large movable joints. She briefly wondered if there could be a dragon inside, locked somewhere beneath the iron shell, waiting to come out. The thought was curious, if not unbearable, and her hand quivered as she reached out to touch the base of the large mechanism.
The metal stirred— creaked and twisted; the Dragon's eyes went red. Its gears whined and churned into movement with a tick-tick-ticking of the cogs. The plates of the neck folded within themselves as the Dragon lowered its massive head below the face of the clock. Glinda watched with interest and apprehension as it turned in a snakelike loop above her, stopping only inches away from her pale, trembling form. Its nostrils smoked with red-hot fire, and its eyes mechanically observed her.
By now, the dwarf had turned his attentions towards the startling, extraordinary pair. He chewed on his pipe, now fresh with tobacco, and let out an indelicate snort.
"Well, well, well," he said with a sigh, "such a state is this. Even clocks are shamelessly manipulated by the wiles of a pretty face."
Glinda was unsure if the comment was meant to be taken as a joke or a glaring insult. Her gaze flickered over to the Dwarf, who struck a match on the end of his boot in order to light his pipe.
"You have a look of guilt about you," he remarked with casual interest. "A look of death as well."
She stared back up at the smoldering Time Dragon, and caught something of her own reflection within its metal skin.
"I'm half-dragon," she spoke with softness. "I'll burn you to the ground."
The dwarf chuckled very loudly at that and shifted his pipe in his mouth. "Oh you can't do that, love; this body doesn't burn. It's the sinews of devils and men. But if you'd like to imagine yourself as a dragon, well… that's your own business, honey."
She paid no notice to his odd sense of humor or the unsettling way that he laughed. Her hand reached up to the tip of the Dragon's nose in an almost loving caress. The Dragon stirred beneath her touch with a faint mechanical purr. It flexed its claws and dug into the board with an almost orgasmic sensibility.
"I want to know," she said blankly.
"You want to know what?" he asked.
"How the story ends."
The dwarf shrugged. "An end is often a beginning, and a beginning is often an end. It's all in myth's unsavory appetite; no one cares how it's satiated. Give the spectators the show they paid for: emeralds, wizards, witches and deaths in high forgotten towers. But it's a tired tale, if you pardon my saying so; who knows why they still love to hear it? Don't ask how it ends, young pretty Miss Nutcase; just decide what it is that you're here for."
"Truth," Glinda stammered as if looking inward. "I'm out here to find it."
The dwarf roughly clapped his hand on his thigh and took his pipe out of his mouth. "We can fix that, oh yes we can. You'll get an exclusive performance." He hopped off the cart and opened a trap door that led inside the clock. "You'd best take note," he said with a grin. "It should be a spectacle tonight."
He quickly closed the lid behind him, and the Dragon began to clank and whirr as it slowly righted itself up. Gears and pendulums shifted into motion with the clicking of cogs and catches. A stage slid forward on a set of rollers from one of the jutting balconies.
"A play in three acts," came the voice of the dwarf from somewhere within the clock. The lights switched on and lit up the scaffold.
"Act I: 'The Death of Innocence."
A scenic backdrop of a forest scrolled into view, painted the color of midnight. Hidden beneath the small gravel stage, a puppet dragon was slumbering. It twitched its ears and comically snored with a loud, snarled sound. Cardboard bubbles sprung out of its head as if framing the thoughts of its dreaming.
Within the largest bubble up top, a miniature model of her Frottican wood-mill appeared from a rotating turntable. Glinda's breath quickened when she saw a pair of marionettes bouncing eagerly towards it. A little boy and a little girl. Their likenesses were uncanny. They chased each other up into the mill and disappeared behind the partition.
Abruptly, the lights turned red and orange as the dragon lazily shifted. A spark of flint ignited the model, and it lit up like a tinder box. The flames devoured the small wooden mill and looked ready to burn down the clock. The sleeping dragon snuffed in its sleep, and the flames were extinguished in an instant.
She watched tentatively as the smoke dimly cleared and revealed a pile of ashes. From out of the ruins the small girl popped up. The puppet of Galinda was unscathed.
The stage rapidly collapsed upon itself and rolled back into the clock. The doors shut with a forceful clack as if all had been said on the matter.
"Act II," said the dwarf with booming vibrato: "The Death of Reason."
A separate partition wheeled into view beneath the previous display. The curtains parted and a Goat-shaped puppet resembling Dr. Dillamond came into view. He was mixing bottles of bright colored substances in a tiny make-shift laboratory. He was also oblivious to the stealthy approach of a miniature tick-tock machine. It brandished a knife and slit Dillamond's jugular in an exaggerated spray of blood. It spurted out of his puppet neck with gushing, gruesome delight. The blood even flecked across Glinda's face, but she didn't seem to notice. The Grommetick character continued its stabbing until Dillamond's puppet was mutilated.
From behind the curtain, a flustered marionette hobbled in severe agitation. It looked like Ama Clutch, though greatly exaggerated, and she flailed about hysterically. Glinda's heart caught in her throat to see her captured so ludicrously. But it froze when the lights quickly dimmed red again and another puppet emerged. Shaped like a carpe, or a human version, it was undoubtedly Madame Morrible. She produced a bat four-sizes too large and thwacked Ama Clutch across the head with it. The puppet toppled onto the ground in a loopy, spinning motion. Morrible then produced a vial from her ample and heavily accentuated bosom. She tipped its contents down Ama Clutch's throat, and her eyes rolled white from the effects. Glinda clutched the material of her gown in a pale, trembling fist.
Suddenly, all of the lights went out, and the stage retreated into the clock.
"Act III: The Death of the Witch."
But nothing seemed to be happening.
Glinda looked up at the large metal Dragon, wondering if the mechanics were failing. But then a window slowly creaked open at the lowest base of the clock. Glinda peered down into the small dark hole, and her eyes narrowed in adjustment.
"I don't understand," she said in confusion. "Where is the death of the witch?"
"Closer," came the ominous voice of the dwarf. "You'll have to get closer than that."
Glinda balked at the dwarf's suggestion until she caught sight of a tiny figure hidden within the darkness. It was so hard to see; she couldn't be sure if her eyes were playing tricks. It could have been Elphaba, or it could have been her. Glinda had to get closer.
She cautiously knelt down to better see inside as the rest of the story unfolded. And there, shard by shard, the entertainment completed its caricature creation of truth.
Glinda watched it with glassy eyes, finally comprehending.
A clockwork turn.
The death of a witch.
And the dragon's silent dreaming.