Author's Note: I apologise for the lack of updates, but they have now finished because my exams are over! Thank whoever you want for that (I'm thanking myself!), but it should now be ever wednesday or more because I have very little else to do.

This chapter is partly filler but there are some important things there nevetheless and I do actually quite like this one! I hope to upload the next one in the following few days so keep a look-out.

Enjoy! xx

It was cosy in the Vinkus for Lurlinemas . . . and loud! Fiyero had forgotten how mad the house became when the holidays descended on the family and everyone returned home. His mother coddled them all from her eldest to youngest and their father struggled not to be similarly sentimental. Fiyero's favourite moment was when his older brother joined them and they went game-hunting with the tribe. Evard was almost thirty and his younger brother's hero, though no one would ever have voiced such a thing, male bravado being what it is. He spent the majority of the year with the various tribes that made up the Vinkus People as part of his study in preparation for his ascension to his father's throne. Evard had two postgraduate degrees from Shiz University and the University of Emerald City in Economics and Politics respectively and was an excellent social climber. Elphaba had noted almost immediately that Fiyero held his brother in high esteem, and he was itching to introduce them.

Evard and Fiyero were the pride of their tribe. The latter glad that many of them brushed aside his social tendencies and his inability to hold any academic place. Their younger siblings were the pride of their parents, and kept them on their toes. Sacho was their ten year old boy; cute as a button and sweet as sugar. He reminded Fiyero of a male Galinda in some respects. When Nellary was born three years following and then Aure when her elder sister was five, the King and Queen of the Vinkus began to draw the parenting line. With three boys and two daughters, their legacy seemed perfect. Then ten months ago, Nanda gave birth to their youngest boy yet, Kip.

A large family, but he would not have it any other way.

"Good to have you home, son. You and your fantastically improving grades." Minas chortled as only a well set middle-aged man could and smacked Fiyero's shoulder.

"Grades are supplementary at Lurlinemas, Pap! We want to know about Elphaba . . ." Evard winked at his father and nudged his brother. "Tell us!" He urged. Nanda suddenly swept into the room with the baby and demanded they not speak about Elphaba until she was there. "You see, Fiyero? She has been the main topic of conversation since you sent that letter! What's she like?"

"She's great." He said simply, thoroughly disappointing everyone in the room. "Alright, alright! She is brilliant, she's smart . . . insanely intelligent and aware and she's being coveted by The Wizard of Oz."

Nanda's eyebrows hit the ceiling. "Sweetness really?"

"Well, it's not surprising that it took such a woman to turn his head as well as his heart, eh?" Evard laughed and swung little Aure into his arms, her sister jumping up next to her mother to watch the baby. "Eh, Aure, Nellary, what has Elphaba done to our brother?"

"Gabb-ed his ha-art!" Aure chimed.

Nellary twisted her face. "Speak properly, Aure! She's grabbed his heart! Except I think it's that she's actually very carefully holding his heart and taking care of it, right, Fiyero? Otherwise it wouldn't be nice to be in love!"

Minas eyed his son. "You're in love?"

Eyes were bearing down upon Fiyero as he recalled the last moment he and Elphaba had shared. She was right at the time; he had not thought properly about what he was saying. Nevertheless, his instinct had been right and he stood by it. He had already decided to tell her so, and wondered why it had taken him so long to come to such a conclusion. He nodded in no particularly direction. "Course."

Nanda listened to the words of congratulations from her family and laughed along with Evard's teasing. But she had known. From the first mention of Elphaba in his letters, she had known.

Galinda simply adored the holiday season in Gillikin. The Pertha Hills were blanketed in the softest and whitest snows and her home was divinely adorned with exquisite ornaments. Much like her suite at Shiz. Granted, she allowed herself to cry into her mother's shoulder for the first two nights after she explained her ending her relationship with Fiyero. Margolette Upland was a fair woman, and though she did not tolerate her daughter's original treatment of Miss Thropp, she commended her allowing her best friend to be with the man she loved.

"Let by gones be by gones now, Galinda, my love. I am very proud of you and I want to see you smile for the remainder of this holiday!"

Surrounded by her older cousins and Aunts and Uncles and soon Galinda found herself easily distracted. She happily wallowed in the bosom of her family and noted religiously everytime Elphaba sent a word or two of her time in Colwen Grounds. She scheduled society parties and shopping sprees and thoroughly soaked up all that Gillikin had to offer, carefully marking off the days until she could see Elphaba again. She spent less time with her sharp and silly society girls, noticing how little pleasure she could now derive from their company. She recognised that in order to enjoy herself in such situations she was required to change her mindset, something she was incredibly reluctant to do. Galinda began to hate that she would so severely judge others and she criticised herself for being without the courage to remain true to her newly developed maturity. She figured a few more months with Elphaba would ensure her loyalty to goodness. Though she aimed to be slightly less cruel in her assessment of others, for she saw that Elphaba could certainly be - perhaps not cruel - but certainly tactless and inappropriate in her openly expressed judgements. That was where her breeding proved itself.

Elphaba wallowed in self-pity during the Lurlinemas celebrations - if one could call them that. Nessarose and her father wholly disapproved of the rejoicifying hymns and drunken crowds of the tiktok religion. They promoted the solemn kyries of the church of the Unnamed God and set to heavy prayers and quiet reflection, although Frexspar Thropp adopted his violently aggressive method of preaching, as he always did, in order to convert the unconverted and reassure the believers. It disturbed her deeply and she holed herself away with manuscripts and any kind of empirical object that could occupy her mind for hours on end and ensure she would not have to insult her family by appearing before them. Though perhaps this final thought was too cruel, she corrected herself.

Nevertheless, Elphaba did hide away and one morning roughly seven days after her uneventful and unprosperous visit to her mother's graveside, she was sat razor-like in a crawl space in the attic with some manifesto or other. She read the words like poetry and allowed herself to forget their meaning and purpose. It soothed her somewhat. She had bundled a thick woollen cape around her body that buried her nicely and cut off the biting cold. Importantly, it also afforded her an uninterrupted view of the drive, the courtyard and the porch.

At the train station, Fiyero stepped onto the platform, attracting sideways glances and winks from women who must have recognised him from some spread or other. He smiled kindly and walked past the women who tried to catch his eye, not noticing anything about them.

"Master Tiggular!"

Fiyero stopped at the shrill voice, but upon recognising the throat to whom it belonged, immediately wished he had ignored it. Turning, he took in the grandoise figure of Madame Morrible. She was as fish-like and unpleasant as ever. And yet, her presence here utterly intriuged him; there was only one student in such a region who would bring Morrible careening from Shiz.

"Madame? What a surprise."

"I might say the same. I never expected to meet a familiar face here, excepting perhaps those whom I have come expressly to see."

"And whom have you come expressly to see?" He replied, with only a little curiosity and an irritation that was approaching like the nine o'clock train from the Emerald City.

"I might ask the same." Fiyero rolled his eyes and looked as though he were to move off, bored with her. There were no sense of authority from Morrible in this setting; Fiyero felt it was Elphaba's place when he had arrived. The air seemed filled with her descriptions and he could immediately understand why she had been so eager to leave and so reluctant to return. The people there seemed thick and judgemental and projected an impression of their own superiority in comparison. Of course, Fiyero did not feel inferior to them (perhaps because he was a prince) but he could almost feel the frown that would fall over his girlfriend's face as a result of the years of ignorance that produced the wariness of her beautiful skin. Morrible quickly carped about her purpose, bringing Fiyero's curiosity to the fore. "I am here to see Miss Thropp." She reached into a pocket tucked away in the extravagent folds of her broccaded skirt. "I am here on the business of the Emerald City. The Wizard of Oz sent me."

"What?"

Elphaba had let her mind wander. Her head lay back on the upturned collar of the blanket where it functioned as a rough pillow and she thought about Fiyero. Stupidly grinning like a girl, she thought about kissing him. She thought about how wonderfully sinful it would be have him under the blanket with her. She imagined his roaming hands and roaming tongue. She fervantly wished he was here. Actually, she wished she was there, wherever he was.

At the sound of clicking and padding from the courtyard below she screwed her eyes shut. Oh let it be my imagination. Let them not be home. In her mind's eye she matched the sounds with Nessa's flailing skirts being tossed in all directions by her precious little feet and her father waving his arms as though the motion would swing wide the doors removing the required efforts of pulling. Elphaba quickly stopped herself. She listened carefully to the sounds travelling up to her hidden place. There were two people walking on the stones and no wheels. Had her father ever returned before without Nessa for some reason or other, Elphaba would have chalked it up to this: he must have brought a friend, despite his having no friends. The settled and painful familiarity of her life allowed her to quickly surmise that it was not, in fact, her father or her sister. She was the only family member in the house.

Suddenly filled with a strange sense of ownership and pride, she scrambled out of her seat, her sharp bones almost ricocheting off every wall, and swung herself round the banisters and turns until she reached the front door. The bell had not yet been rung and she could not discern the faces of the figures who would experience, first hand, her ability to perfectly represent her family. She thought Galinda would be proud, too.

The bell clanged, and she hesitated a second or two before lifting her hand to the knob. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could have prepared her for what she was about to see. The door swung open. Fiyero saw a romantic impression of the draught from the door blowing ribbons of hair from Elphaba's face and the shadows of the evening accenting the blush that rapidly took hold of her face. Her eyes entirely fixed on him, her mouth fell open in a silent gasp.

"I don't believe it." She had wanted him next to her earlier, but it was the first time she had allowed herself to think much about him. Now that he was standing before her it occured to her just how much she craved him. Yet in the corner of her eye she spyed the barely towering figure of Horrible Morrible. Fiyero had never quite seen as resentful a look from Elphaba as the one she now directed at the old croak. It was fleeting, however, as she recognised that the woman's purpose in Colwen Grounds must have something to do with her and she remembered her resolution to represent her family well. It was hard to achieve the latter, however, especially when Fiyero stepped in and gave her a kiss on her cheek. Still stunned from his appearance, her eyes followed him. What Fiyero saw there frightened him in the scale and depth of its need.

Swallowing and turning her head in a trancelike daze to Morrible, Elphaba smiled softly - more softly than the headshiztress had ever seen from the girl - and invited her in. Like the perfect hostess, she led them through to a lounge area where uniformed couches faced one another framed by dark oak tables and wingback chairs. The room was longer than it was wider and the wall that faced them as they entered was panelled with glass. Fiyero couldn't tell if every panel opened, but two were swung wide and let the still evening air waft in. At either end of the room on the shorter walls were stone hearths and heavy dusty bookcases. There was no doubt that Elphaba had read them all; her Father probably none.

She rang for tea and hoped Nanny wouldn't burst in on them. "I will be candid, for I am utterly confused. What are you two doing here at the same time?"

"My dear," Morrible simpered, "It was entirelycoincidental, of course. We happened upon one another at the station. We are here on entirely seperate business." Elphaba winced at her words; the sugary sweetness of them mixing disonantly with the underlying yet mysteriously unidentifiable evil in her personality. "I do not have long, Miss Thropp. I came to give you this." And she produced a green envelope. An emerald green envelope. Fiyero had seen it and guessed both the contents and the sender immediately. He saw in Elphaba's eyes that the same conclusions had been drawn. "For you. From the Wizard."

"The Wizard? For me." She echoed, taking the papers firmly in her hand. Suddenly, she seemed to come to and tore open the seal devouring the words with the ferocity of an animal on its prey.

Miss Elphaba Thropp of Colwen Grounds,it began . . .

No points for guessing what the letter contains! Please take the time to review if you can! I'll see you in the Vinkus!