Title: The Grand Vizier of Oz
Author: Sedri
Rating: PG-13 / T
Summary: "Please come back - you're my daughter, I'd do anything -!" She stopped, hand half-raised and ready to cast a spell. "Anything?" AU, Fiyero/Elphaba. Complete.

Disclaimer: Neither Wicked nor the world of Oz are mine in any way.

Chapter Seventeen
The Things We Do For Love

Year 24
Autumn

A tired sigh. "Well, they can't just be gone."

A rustle of papers. "I know I put them around here somewhere..."

More rustling. The thump of toppled objects. "You're sure they're not in the other pile?"

"I checked twice." A sigh. "Chistery, can you see my notes on locomotion spells anywhere? There's about five sheets tied together."

Sheepishly, Chistery lifted his head to glance over the top of the five sheets he'd snitched earlier that morning. Beyond his cosy little chair, Glinda and Elphaba were stalking around their workshop, lifting books and shuffling papers, digging through the small mountain that had been building up on the tables for weeks. Nearby was a life-sized rag doll which stood awkwardly upright in a pair of heavily-enchanted linen trousers.

"What notes, Miss Glinda?"

Knowing that innocent tone all too well, both women turned to him, and then Elphaba frowned and stepped forward, holding her hand out expectantly. Chistery grudgingly gave her the papers, muttering, "Was just curious."

"We said you're welcome to watch," chided Glinda gently, re-stacking the books. "You promised not to get in the way."

"Am sorry." He waited for a moment, watching as Elphaba smoothed out some creases and read over the notes, but having never had much patience he soon asked, "Yous really think this will work? Will Miss Nessrose be able to walk?"

"Hopefully," sighed Elphaba, flipping the page to look for any writing on the reverse. "Okay, Glinda? You were right; it has 'pah' affixed to all sorts of nouns here, so I think we can just weave it into the second line without having to inflect anything around it."

Glinda nodded, writing that down, and Chistery asked, "What's 'pah' mean?"

"'Strong', basically," Elphaba told him, picking up some chalk and walking to the large and dusty blackboard they had hanging on one wall. "Nessa's legs aren't able to hold her body up, so we need to make sure the spell we put on those clothes gives her strength as well as control of her movements."

Pausing, she considered the large chalk sketch they had drawn up months ago. It depicted a leg – human, naturally – with every muscle carefully outlined and arrows pointing along the bones. It was surrounded on each side by a pair of thick lines that were meant to represent the fabric of the trousers they were using for this experiment. The rest of the board was covered in a multitude of foreign words, some half erased or written on top of each other, detailing the spell's incantation. Elphaba was re-drawing some lines around the knee, making little alterations to the words on her paper and muttering about joints and angles. At last she dusted off her hands and turned back to the doll.

"All right, let's try this. Chistery, you might want to stand back," she warned. The Monkey scuttled over to stand behind Glinda, and then Elphaba began her chant.

First there was a glow; the doll didn't react, but the spell made the plain linen trousers brighten with a reddish sort of light. Elphaba's brow furrowed, but she couldn't stop halfway. Glinda, on the other hand, scowled and looked at the paper, quietly muttering, "Oh, it's 'calda' again... stupid... only word for 'restore'... just has to mean 'colour', too..."

Chistery paid little attention, more interested in the results than the cause. As Elphaba spoke, moving her hands over the fabric of the trousers as though moulding her magic to fit them, the doll shuddered, and as the last words were spoken, one stuffed leg shot forward, sticking out horizontally and forcing a startled Elphaba to jump back.

The doll's leg stayed suspended for a moment, then crashed down to the floor and bent at the knee, just as it was meant to. The girls held their breath, waiting, waiting...

The doll took another step, but this time when it hit the ground, the fabric knee bent backwards. Had it been Nessa and not a rag imitation wearing those trousers, they would have broken her bones.

Elphaba sighed, stepping back and dropping onto a bench as the doll continued to walk clumsily around, one knee bending forward, the other back. "Damn it."

Glinda patted her shoulder, murmuring the counter-spell that would stop their rag zombie from walking out a window. "It was worth a try, Elphie. At least you found a way to make it bend."

"That's useless if we can't direct the angle," she muttered sourly. "We just don't have the words to give instructions that specific. I really, really wish we had a complete language; bits and pieces aren't good enough."

Chistery came over and gave her a hug. "Miss Nessrose will be happy you tried anyway. Tell her you is getting closer."

Elphaba smiled at him and returned the gesture, but shook her head. "Actually, I haven't told her anything yet. I don't want to get her hopes up. But thanks, Chistery."

He grinned.

A few steps away, Glinda was examining the doll, arms folded and one finger tapping against her elbow. "Elphie," she said at last, sighing, "I don't think bracing her legs this way is going to work at all."

"Why not?" asked Elphaba, puzzled. "We need to make sure her body is supported by something, and like you said, she can wear these under a dress much more easily than a metal frame. And they're more comfortable."

"But look at the feet," said Glinda, pointing. Elphaba leaned forward in her chair to see around the table, then winced. The enchanted trousers were stiff and tight and straight, with all the consistency of stone-cold tin. The floppy doll feet, only marginally more fragile than human tissue, were being split in two by hemlines that would normally bunch up around the ankle. It looked painful.

"Couldn't we try enchanting her socks, too? Or get her some strong boots?"

"I don't know. It might clash with the trouser spell. We could enchant her stockings, but then there would be no way to give her ankles the flexibility they'll need." Glinda sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Maybe we should just go back to modifying the auto-mobility spell..." she trailed off as Elphaba began shaking her head. "Why not?"

"Because putting the magic into an object is always going to be a hundred times safer than casting it directly on her – I'm not going to risk making her grow an extra pair of legs. It will work. We just haven't found the right spell yet."

Glinda bit her tongue. She wanted to say that she thought they might never succeed, that maybe they should try something a little more conventional for a while, but knew better than to suggest it. Elphaba had been trying to make this spell work for Nessa since the day she'd come back from settling that fight about Boq, and when pressed, would only say that if she could use her magic to help strangers, then she owed her sister the same. She had repeatedly refused to settle for half a solution, so Glinda shook her head and said nothing, and just went back to re-reading their notebooks.

About ten minutes later, when the two of them were wiping off the chalkboard and Chistery, bored, had flittered out the window to join the birds, there was the sudden, muffled sound of running footsteps out in the corridor. The girls paused to listen, and when someone rapped hard on the door of their workshop, they exchanged a puzzled glance; it was rare for anyone to disturb them in here, and they'd made it very clear that they were taking the entire morning off from work.

Glinda went to answer. Standing stiffly behind the door was a young man, one of the Wizard's junior assistants. He was breathing hard. "Lady Glinda," he said as properly as he could, "His Ozness has urgent business to discuss with you. He is waiting in his study."

This provoked no reaction from Elphaba beyond a small huff of irritation, but Glinda's lips pressed into a thin, worried line. Given that her back was turned to the room, Elphaba didn't see it, so when Glinda said, "I'll be there as soon as I can," the other woman turned around in surprise.

"You're leaving?" she asked. "We still have at least another hour free."

Scurrying around trying to find her discarded heels and appointments folder, Glinda shook her head. "I think I know what this is, Elphie, and if so, it really can't wait. I'll see you at the cabinet meeting at three." She hesitated, buckling one shoe, and added, "Don't... don't try any new spells without me, okay?"

Elphaba raised both eyebrows; that was an odd thing to ask. Still, no reason to refuse. "I don't think I'm going to get that far today anyway."

"Good. Well, not good, but... you know what I mean," said Glinda, hobbling around on one heel as she snatched up the other shoe, cursing herself for kicking them off in the first place. Comfort had its price.

"Remind Oscar that our meeting with the Quadling Chief was moved to one o'clock, will you?" asked Elphaba, offering a hand to help her friend balance as she forced her foot into the narrow shoe. Glinda nodded, looking distracted, and only a few moments later, had hurried out the door.

Her friends had done stranger things before, so Elphaba just shrugged and turned back to her work, mentally juggling the virtues of using "ambulan" versus "adney" as the 'movement' command in her spell.

She stayed quietly in the workshop for another two hours, after which she reluctantly packed up and went to meet her assistants, gather updates on a handful of minor problems, and make final preparations for discussing some touchy land rights issues with the Quadlings. Oscar was supposed to join her in her office about ten minutes beforehand so they could compare notes one last time, make sure they were agreed on the limits and negotiable areas of their offer, and then formally arrive together at this very important meeting.

He never turned up.

BANG.

Two guards, under the painfully false impression that manning a corridor would be easy work, jumped and barely braced themselves in time to keep from being hit by the two large, heavy wooden doors that were flung open by the magic of their livid Grand Vizier.

"Where is he?" she demanded, storming out into the hall. "WHERE IS HE?"

The men wisely kept quiet. She didn't seem to be asking them, which was a profound relief, and upon seeing the mostly-empty hall she hesitated only a moment before striding onwards, dark green skirts swishing around her ankles.

However, her voice had carried farther than her sight, and from around another corner Glinda suddenly appeared, stumbling a little and looking flustered, trying to gesture for quiet. Elphaba did not care. "Where IS he, Glinda? I spent weeks setting this up and you're the one who says it's so bad for diplomacy if–"

"He's sick," hissed Glinda, dragging her aside. Caught off-guard, Elphaba did not resist.

"He's what?"

"Sick, Elphie, he's really, really sick." Glinda looked worried, she noticed, and very upset. She pulled her friend under the shelter of a large pillar up against a wall, looking around to make sure no one could overhear. "I'm sorry, Elphie, but that's why they called me away earlier; he needed my help. I promised I wouldn't tell you, but, well... after what's happened, I think you have to know."

Elphaba frowned, brow furrowing as she looked at her friend. "When you say 'sick'... You're not just talking about a head cold, are you?"

"No," she said quietly. "I mean, he's not dying, but it's bad." Reluctantly, she added, "He sort of... poisoned himself. By accident – he didn't mean to, of course! – but..." Another sigh; she really didn't want to say this. "Elphie, you know that green elixir your mother had, right? It has a lot of alcohol in it and–"

"You mean he's been drinking?"

A white hand clapped over her mouth and Glinda's eyes flashed. In a low growl she said, "Don't you dare get angry! He's been trying to degreenify you!"

She blinked. "What?"

Looking around at the handful of people scattered around the corridor, Glinda shook her head. "Not here," she said, still whispering. "Come with me."

Elphaba followed somewhat distractedly, letting herself be dragged by the wrist into one of the smaller conference rooms. Waiting only long enough to make sure it was empty, Glinda shut the door and turned on her friend, arms folded and letting out a tight breath. "He's been trying to degreenify you," she repeated. "He's been at it for months now, but today, it went wrong."

Shaking her head, Elphaba took a seat in one of the nearest chairs. "How could he be trying that without me? Why would it hurt him?"

Glinda sat down tiredly on the table, her off-white knitted wrap lumping messily behind her. "Elphie, you and I both know that there isn't a hope of reversing whatever made your skin green without knowing exactly what was in the mixture your mother drank," she said, looking at her friend, who nodded. "Oscar's been trying to re-create it so we can work backwards from the recipe, but the only way to know if he's got it right is to drink some of each and see if the tastes and effects match."

Elphaba gaped at her, incredulous, her jaw actually starting to drop. "He's been taste-testing? With a mix of potions and spirits? That's not just stupid, that's suicidal!"

"I know," snapped Glinda suddenly, flinging herself off the table and starting to pace. She took a deep breath, trying to stay calm. It didn't work. "I know, and that's what I told him, but he wouldn't listen. I've spent three months turning our potion theory books inside-out trying to make sure that nothing he made was dangerous, but when none of them worked he started trying stranger and stranger things, and now look what's happened! How do you think this makes me feel?"

Her friend stared. "You've been helping him?"

"What choice did I have? He would have done it with or without my help, but without could have killed him." She snorted, running a hand through her blonde curls as she stalked around the room. "It almost did."

For a long moment Elphaba was quiet, watching the carpeted floor as Glinda continued to pace over it, the dark reds and whites of her dress seeming obscenely cheery. This was... unexpected. She wasn't sure what to do. At last she just asked, "Is he all right?"

Shoulders slumping, Glinda nodded, coming back to sit in a proper chair. "Fiyero was with him and we've always made sure to have an... oh, I forget the word. One of those medicines that make you throw up everything in your stomach – emetic, that's it; an emetic. The poison's all out now. He's in bed."

Elphaba nodded quietly, leaning forward, hands clasped and elbows on her knees. "Do you know what went wrong?"

"I think so," said Glinda, rubbing her forehead. "If I'm right, then the proportions of the potion ingredients he used this time tripled the effect of the alcohol, which would explain why it was so much stronger than we predicted. But either way, he's been using some very potent things in those brews, so it might just be that the toxins have been piling up in his blood. I know this is the worst thing to say to you right now, Elphie, but I don't think we can let him try it again. It's just too risky."

Again, she nodded, trying not to think too much about what that meant. "Why didn't he tell me, Glinda?" she asked quietly. "I know you're better at potions than me, but I could have helped somehow. If he's only been doing this for me..."

Glinda leaned back in the chair, wearing a sad, almost ironic little smile. "Hope is cruel, Elphie," she said. "He didn't want to get your hopes up, and neither did I. Or Fiyero. We knew it would hurt you if we failed."

They were right, it did, and Elphaba didn't bother trying to deny it. She had thought, and would have liked to think, that she was over this particular disappointment, and had been ever since the day she'd learned that the Wonderful Wizard was a fraud, but hope was ever irrational, and she'd forgotten about it for so long that losing it again had an extra sting she was entirely unprepared for.

But, because she was Elphaba, and because she was an adult who had long since learned that there were some dreams that would never come true, she took a deep breath, swallowed, and let that sting fade into the background.

"You said three months?" she asked at last. "He's been at it for that long?"

Glinda nodded. "That's when he asked for my help. It was only a few days after Baron Appleton made that 'coloured' comment about you in a cabinet meeting, and it was obvious to all of us how much it bothered you. He hates himself for doing that to you, even accidentally." She gave another odd little smile. "It's funny, you know; he sounds just like you do when you talk about trying to help Nessa. You're more alike than you realise."

There was nothing Elphaba could say to that, so she stayed quiet, thinking. Part of her – the harsher, colder part – wanted to slap Oscar for what he'd done, both for taking stupid chances and for inadvertently hurting her with hope, but the rest of her – the softer, more daughterly part that was much too vulnerable to expose – was touched, and grateful.

She looked up at Glinda, knowing she owed her friend a great many thanks, but knowing, also, that there was someone else who deserved it more. "Can I see him?" she asked.

Glinda smiled faintly. "Sure."

A few minutes later, after evading some persistent assistants and a reporter who'd heard about the snubbing of the Quadling Chief, Elphaba found herself feeling oddly hesitant as she raised a hand to knock on one of the most ornate doors in the palace.

It was a moment before a muffled voice said, "Come in." She turned the handle.

This part of the Wizard's suite had always been totally private; she'd never before set foot inside. The adjoining rooms, yes – the informal dining room was practically a lounge for the four of them – but his bedroom had always been treated with the same respect as her own apartments, and really, there had never been a reason. Apparently only a few select servants were allowed to clean this place, and while elitist, it was fair enough, since Oscar needed at least one place where he could risk being his flawed human self.

It showed. The first thing Elphaba noticed was the amount of stuff he'd collected on shelves that were, if not crammed, then certainly too full to hold anything else. Most of the objects weren't familiar to her – worn, tired-looking things presumably from his homeland – but others were painfully so; nearly half the items on display were photographs or little trinkets that related either to Elphaba herself or to her mother. A whole array of images were lined up in neat frames along the top of the mantle and every bookshelf, some from Oscar's first trip to Munchkinland, others gathered from Melena's school days or official portraits. A dozen or so showed mother and daughter playing with face paint – copies of the pictures she kept in her own room, which he'd asked for and she'd long since forgotten about – while others showed Elphaba as an adult; at her graduation, her presentation as Grand Vizier, school pictures, and what looked like the original shots of images taken for newspaper articles. Only a few were unfamiliar, posed and brownish images of people in strange clothes whom she assumed were Oscar's long-lost friends and family. All these were arranged in no logical order, mixed together comfortably, almost haphazardly, wherever he had place to put them. It looked cosy, normal.

But it wasn't. Yes, at first glance it seemed to be simply one man's proud and sentimental display of memories, but it just wasn't real. He hadn't known Melena Thropp – he'd said so himself. They'd had a fling and parted ways, and he seemed to have forgotten all about her until the day he realised he had a daughter – yet here were her pictures, shown off the way a widower would remember his wife. As Elphaba looked again, it seemed so artificial, and in a way, pathetic. He was pretending he still had a family.

Only, it wasn't all a lie. He still had a daughter. Sort of.

The man himself was lying still in bed, small and shaded from the afternoon sun by heavy green curtains that weren't quite enough to keep the light out; large squares of bright jade shone in, heating the room and tinting everything the same thin colour. Elphaba approached, uncertain, and then Oscar rolled over to face her.

He looked old. Not the cheery sort of grey-haired and laugh-lined 'old' she was used to, but papery thin and frail, with skin so pale it was almost transparent and a clammy sheen of sweat that could never be good. It was, she knew, just the effect of heaving up all the contents of his stomach, and he would be fine once the emetic wore off and he was able to keep some food down, but looking at him, she felt a sharp and not wholly unwelcome pang of worry.

Even after learning just how un-wonderful a wizard he was, Elphaba had never entirely registered the fact that he was human, and therefore, perfectly capable of dying. It seemed all too melodramatic to be thinking like that, but since getting to know him, and choosing to let go of her hate for what he'd done, Elphaba had slowly come to realise that she would be very sorry to lose him.

Not that she would ever admit it.

He smiled at her, and it looked like it took too much effort. "Elphaba," he said happily. "I thought that was you. Come in, sit–" he lost his breath a moment, trying to move and talk at the same time "–sit down."

She did so, taking a chair that had been left right beside the bed – probably by Fiyero, judging by the playing cards and gambling chips left stacked on the bedside cabinet. Oscar hauled himself upright, pulling some loose blankets with him and wrapping them back around his shoulders before leaning into the pillows. "So," he said brightly. "What brings you here?"

For a moment, she just looked at him, half exasperated, half... well, not. Then in a flat voice she said, "I can't believe you did that."

His smile faltered. "Ah," he said. "Glinda told you."

"Did you really think she wouldn't?"

He shrugged. "All she said was that she'd find an excuse to satisfy the Quadlings for me. I am sorry I missed that, you know."

She waved it off, not letting him distract her; they could deal with Chief Tiger Claw later. "What were you thinking?" she demanded. "Why take such a stupid risk? You had to know how dangerous it could be."

"Well, yes," he admitted in a tone far too nonchalant for the subject. "But I thought it was worth a try. For a noble cause and all."

"Getting yourself killed isn't noble, and it wouldn't have helped anyway." He winced and, admitting that she was being unnecessarily harsh, she added, "I wouldn't want anyone to die for something as stupid as my vanity."

"Even me?" he asked cheekily, trying to tease her, but Elphaba replied very seriously

"Especially you. Don't do it again."

He was taken aback, surprised that she was willing to say something that showed such open concern. He opened his mouth, then closed it, then smiled. "Well, I wasn't planning to," he said in the light, casual manner that always made their conversations easier. "We weren't really getting anywhere anyway; the storeroom Queen Ozma let me use had all sorts of strange things in it that I never did find back. Chances are I used at least one of them in the elixir. I'm sorry, Elphaba."

She shook her head, but couldn't quite keep her eyes from drifting to the floor. "It's all right," she said softly. "Realistically, I gave up on any real hope a long time ago. Even if we did know what was in the mix, it's not as though there's any potion or spell that's known to undo this kind of transformation, and... I really just have to accept it. This is what I am. Green. Other people have worse problems."

By this point she was more or less speaking to herself, saying out loud the things she'd repeated in her head year after year, so it took her by surprise when Oscar reacted. He reached out with a hand that was still slightly unsteady to take hers, and she looked up to see him smiling warmly at her, blue eyes bright with a hint of sadness, and looking really proud.

"You are so good, Elphaba," he said gently. "Inside, where it counts, you are a truly good person. I wish so much that I could help you, and that the rest of Oz wasn't so... so fixated on exteriors. You deserve better."

"You've given me a lot already," she replied, uncomfortable with this much sentimentality. "I appreciate it."

"The debt I owe you can never be repaid," he replied, squeezing her fingers as he looked at the skin of her hands. "This was the only chance. I at least had to try."

Left unsaid were other things, things they both knew perfectly well because they'd been said so many times before – not in words, save for a few rare occasions, but in gestures, almost constantly. "I'm your father," he wanted to say, "even if you'll never want me, I'm your father, and I love you. The day we met I said I'd do anything for you, and I meant it."

One such gesture was the silver necklace he'd given her for her twentieth birthday. At that moment it was sitting on a shelf in her room and, if not for the cleaning staff, would probably have long since been covered in a layer of dust. Realising that suddenly made Elphaba feel guilty; she liked that necklace, with its little starburst pendant. She promised herself she would wear it more often.

There was a long silence.

The problem Oscar and Elphaba had with these sorts of emotional moments was not that they weren't sincere, but that neither of them ever had a clue what to say next. Aside from abruptly changing the subject, there was really no easy way to end that kind of conversation, and so the few times such a thing actually occurred, they usually just let it fade awkwardly away.

Silence was welcome, though. When Elphaba was uncomfortable, she would either clam up entirely or stammer, and when Oscar was uncomfortable, he chattered to fill the space, so being able to sit together in an easy silence was one of the few things that really showed how much peace had grown between them. Given that Oscar was really in no condition to exert a lot of energy, and that Elphaba didn't want to leave him alone again, just in case, it was as good a way as any to spend the afternoon. It gave them time to think.

After about half an hour there was a knock, and Fiyero called a polite warning through the door just a second or two before he opened it.

"Got you something," he said to Oscar. "Hi, Elphaba. How'd things go with Chief Tiger Claw?" Walking up to the old man who had spent a solid ten minutes vomiting up everything in his system that morning, he handed over an apple and a bowl of porridge – plain, uncomplicated foods would go easy on his stomach.

"Nowhere," Elphaba replied with a sigh, turning a little in her chair. "They refuse to negotiate with anyone but the Wizard. I should probably get back out there soon and find some excuse to postpone until tomorrow."

Fiyero waved her down, putting a hand on her shoulder to keep her in the chair. "I'll take care of it," he said. "I promised Glinda I'd take over with the day's petitioners anyway – there's about thirty of them lined up and she's got a date tonight. Besides, I'm a better liar than you are."

Dryly, she replied, "I'm not sure whether to thank you for that or write to your mother."

Oscar chuckled at them both. "Thank you, Fiyero," he said. "I trust we're still on for a game of Mobra-ka tonight?"

"Only if you're desperate to lose all your money again," he replied, straight-faced. Then he leaned down over Elphaba to briefly kiss her before straightening and backing off towards the door. "I'll be here at eight."

Elphaba touched her mouth self-consciously – she was still shy of making any sort of display in public – and nodded goodbye. Oscar watched him go with a fond smile that soon turned thoughtful, and after the door shut, he looked back at his daughter. "I'm very glad you found him."

She shook her head, sitting back in the chair and still at ease, though marginally less so than before. "He found me. Or, if you want to be technical, Glinda found us both."

"You know what I meant," Oscar chided lightly, cutting the apple with a small knife. "I'm glad you found each other. He's good for you – brings out your best side." A trace of sadness crossed his face again, and despite himself he added, "It's good to know he'll be there for you after I'm gone."

"Please don't talk about dying," said Elphaba. "You came very close today."

"Call it 'retirement' then. Really, have any of us have given a moment's thought to what will happen to Oz when I'm gone? Something bad could happen to me tomorrow and you'd need to have something to tell the press. I wouldn't be surprised if most people expect me to live forever, and we both know I won't."

She sighed, resigned to discussing the subject, and sat back as he bit a piece of his apple. "I guess I vaguely assumed you'd leave behind some sort of aristocratic government. Maybe spread power a bit more evenly between the four corners of Oz, or put together a council like the Vinkun tribes have."

"Well, that's always possible," he agreed, "but to be honest, I was thinking more of leaving the autocracy as it is and making you my legal heir." When her head snapped up with fierce reproach in her eyes, he held up his hands and added, "You're the only person I really trust to do what's best for our country, and besides, you come from noble roots. With your mother's blood and my blessing, you could be the next queen of Oz."

"I don't want that," she said flatly. "I don't want that and I won't accept it. Thank you," she added belatedly, "but please don't ever bring it up again."

He arranged his expression to look surprised, but to be honest, he'd expected as much. "All right," he said lightly, scooping up a large bite of porridge, "no 'Queen Elphaba' then." Suddenly he laughed and muttered, "Lord, how far we've come."

She hesitated for a moment, wondering if it was a good idea to ask, decided it probably wasn't, then did so anyway. "What do you mean?"

"Sorry, it's just..." He hesitated, looking at her, then pointed sideways at a nearby shelf, at one of the few posed brownish photographs in the room. "See that? Those are my parents."

There was no need to add "your grandparents" – she already knew.

Elphaba nodded and stood up to reach for it, briefly looking it over before handing it to him. The couple standing stiffly in the frame had generic features, nothing that looked distinctly like Oscar, and stood in front of an equally plain building that was too old and shabby for the clean, pressed clothes they were wearing for the occasion. "What about them?" she asked, sitting down again.

It took a moment for him to answer, distracted by whatever memories that image evoked, but when he did it was with a trace of shame. "We, er... we weren't very well off. Dirt poor, to be honest. It just struck me how absurd it is that you and I are practically royalty while they struggled to pay the mortgage on our farm." He shook his head, a smile dawning. "I sometimes imagine what it would be like to show them Oz, or introduce them to you, but if I told my father that you were the queen of anything, he would have either boxed my ears or fainted dead away." He chuckled. "Would've been quite a sight."

Though she had no intention of ever testing the theory, Elphaba was curious enough to ask, "You really think that would happen?"

"Well, we'll never know; they're both dead."

Oh. She hadn't considered that. "I'm sorry," she said, but he was shaking his head, taking another bite.

"Don't be. It was a long time ago." He propped the picture up on his bedside cabinet and gazed at it for a moment. "You would have liked them," he decided. "My father especially – he was always trying to fix things, no matter if he had a chance or not. He wasn't a world-changer like you are, but I can't remember a single night at the dinner table that he didn't spend telling us all about his brilliant new schemes about how we could make a fortune if only we would sell our corn here or buy chickens there." Oscar chuckled. "None of them ever worked."

Elphaba smiled back, finding this oddly interesting. "And your mother?"

"Always said she thought they were worth a try but was too busy keeping the farm running to actually do so." He hesitated, glancing at her cautiously before adding, "She, ah... she died when I was twelve. I don't remember her much. Actually, most of what I really know was told to me by my father or Aunt Jane, but they're odd sorts of things."

Her head tilted sideways. "What sorts of things?"

Oscar looked at the stiff picture again. "You wouldn't believe it, but when she was young, Mother used to climb out her window to sneak off and go dancing." Elphaba's eyebrows raised. "Yes, really. Actually, there was this one time–" he paused to laugh, shaking his head. "I wasn't even there, but... You know the kind of stories that families tell over and over, until you feel like you know them?"

She didn't, but nodded anyway.

"Well, there was this one time when she and Aunt Jane were trying to sneak back in after a dance. It was before dawn, so completely dark – and, you have to remember, they were in their best Sunday dresses – and apparently Mother mistook the step by one of the pig pens for the one under her window." He grinned. "Guess what happened?"

"Pig pen?" repeated Elphaba, eyes bright with mirth. "She fell in?"

"Right into the biggest puddle of mud you have ever seen," Oscar declared with a flourish. "She got a nickname for that, too – Muddy Mandy. Her name was Amanda," he added, to clarify. "Anyway, her father – my grandfather – heard all the squealing and came out with a lantern to investigate."

It was only too easy to imagine. "He was furious?"

"He laughed his head off."

It was almost six o'clock before they ran out of amusing anecdotes about the Diggs family, and by then Oscar was looking better; the food had given him back some colour, though he still elected – encouraged by the glare of his daughter – to stay in bed and rest properly until morning.

Saying goodnight, Elphaba picked up the various photographs and returned each one to its rightful place on the shelves. As she put down the last, looking at the large group of people she could now name as uncles and great-aunts and second cousins and grandparents, she smiled.

Maybe they still had family after all.

Author's Notes: I realise this explanation makes it much harder for Elphaba to have enchanted the slippers in canon. My justification is that in the years she's on the run, she doesn't have time to learn the linguistic details of the Grimmerie's language and so ends up relying much more heavily on instinct, which leads her to find the right words on a page without having to think about it, whereas in my AU she pays less attention to those instincts and so has to work it out the hard (but much more reliable) way.