Thank you everyone. You're all tremendous. The reviews really are special to me. As promised, here's another update.
Finally, some truths are out.
Fiyero held as still as possible as her deep, dark eyes fell from him to the space between them. Her hesitation was wearing on him and he was sure if he moved at all it would have been to shake her, to show her exactly what right there in front of her.
"What are you waiting for?" he asked in desperation.
She worried at her grayish-green lip, which glistened enticingly as the plumpness slipped from the pearly teeth. "I just…don't want to make a mistake."
He sighed at this, watching as her intelligent gaze flittered around nervously, her mind moving a mile a minute. "The next move is yours. Just know that I want things to be different this time. I've been waiting a long time and I'll keep waiting if I have to, but truthfully, I'm getting tired of playing this game."
Fiyero's stare bore into her and he could see her unraveling. At last, he could see her aggravation finally surface and with a dramatic wave of her arms she finally leaned towards him. He didn't breathe.
Elphaba swept her rook forward and captured one of his pawns.
The prince groaned in disappointment, but not for the reason Elphaba suspected given the smug grin that seemed to be pulling at her mouth. Unhappily, Fiyero took one of his white chess pieces in hand and slid it across the wooden checkered surface, saying without much enthusiasm, "Checkmate."
Her face fell. "Again?"
"Sorry," he consoled coolly.
It was a beautiful day and he thought it had been the greatest idea in the world when he sought out Elphaba to challenge her to a game of chess underneath the wide canopy of his favorite pearlfruit tree near the canal. The problem was it wasn't as much of a challenge as he expected. For someone so incredibly brilliant, she was dreadful at the game.
He traded the large handful of black pieces he had captured from her for the small few she managed to get and let her sulk for a moment. While there was a great deal in life Elphaba didn't understand – Galinda would certainly agree to that – it seemed to be genuinely distressing to her that she'd consistently lose at a pastime popularly reserved for intellectuals. Fiyero was sure the fact that he, being the way he was, was better than her vexed her even further.
Fiyero supposed it wasn't a fair battle to begin with. Aside from his experience as Captain of the Emerald City's Guard, in which he was expected to be well-versed in warfare stratagems, Fiyero grew up in a household in which his father-son activities consisted mainly of games like this. As a child he would hate when his father – a bullheaded but very smart man – would demand that his rebellious son sit for hours at a time to play silly board or card games while fun was to be had outdoors or at dance halls, but now an adult, he saw the value in them. Elphaba, on the other hand, only had her sister to fraternize with as a young girl and Nessarose had no interest in ever playing the kinds of games Elphaba found interesting. Nessarose, according to Elphaba, loved her large collection of dolls and preferred their company to hers.
The sun was lowering in the autumn sky behind the canal, casting the ripples created by the passing crew team to gleam orange. He didn't carry a watch – it was never his style, though this time around at Shiz he was getting pretty good at arriving to his classes almost on time – but he was guessing they had spent close to three hours out here. It was just starting to get cold and while Elphaba had a coat, he didn't and if she were to get too chilly there would be nothing he could reasonably offer to keep her warm. Unreasonably, he could offer himself as a source of heat, but he had a feeling she wouldn't be very keen on the idea.
Fiyero started to pack up his old chess set in its worn case and she fell back onto the grass with a frustrated groan. He smiled to himself, peeking out of the corner of his eye at the way her long, loose hair splayed around under her, creating a black barrier that kept her from fading into the grass.
His contented expression wilted when she closed her eyes and the glimmer of her shimmery gray eye shadow became more noticeable. It seemed with every passing week, Galinda's slow transformation of Elphaba continued—first she risked wearing her beautiful hair down and she stopped wearing her glasses, then lately he started noticing little bits of makeup covering her flawless skin. Galinda seemed to be carefully weaning her into such decisions, slowly changing her in a way that wasn't necessary, and while he couldn't deny how beautiful her eyes looked with the brush of subtle color over her eyelids, he hated it. To him it was a countdown, and he knew he was running out of time. Despite everything he had accomplished with Boq, Galinda, and Nessa, he was terrified that with Elphaba he would watch things repeat themselves. He felt like her downfall was like a brewing storm, building on the horizon with every step she made closer to Morrible and the Wizard. How could he alter the weather? He was no witch. He was just a man.
"Why am I so terrible at this game?" she asked the branches above her. Given that these weren't the sort of trees that would talk back – the sort of enchanted fruit trees that did were rumored to be off in Munchkinland somewhere – he assumed he was supposed to respond.
"My father always said chess is about three things: Foresight, circumspection, and caution," he said, recounting the pieces before he closed the case and looked at her again. "Foresight, to consider the consequences that may attend an action; circumspection, to survey the scene of action and the relation of all the pieces and their situations; and caution, to not be too impulsive and get yourself in a pickle. Well, the last one was a paraphrase, I can't remember his exact words…"
She propped herself up slightly, glaring at him. "What's your point?"
"You have to admit, those aren't your best skills."
She made a noise of dissent and rolled to her feet. "That's not true!"
"It is," he countered, hopping up to follow her as she started storming away, shoving his chess set in his bag hastily. "You don't know how to see two moves ahead. You make decisions based on how you feel."
"It doesn't matter, it's just a game."
"No, it's not!" Fiyero said, and in his anxiety he reached forward and grabbed her elbow. He nearly bowled her over when she whipped around to snap at him but she seemed to lose her words when she saw how close he was. "Life is a game, Elphaba! Just because you don't think you fit in doesn't mean you're not participating. There are people – opponents – who are moving pieces even if you don't notice them! You've got to protect yourself. Every move you make should be deliberate, not just made on moody whims!"
"What does that say about you?" Elphaba asked, her voice soft but steely as she searched his features.
"What do you mean?"
"You know all about strategy, and clearly I don't know as much as I thought I did. For instance, all this time I thought you were hanging around me to get closer to Galinda, but that doesn't seem to be the case." Her words bowled him over and his step back was involuntary. Elphaba's nostrils flared. "Yeah, she told me about what happened at the fountain."
His body felt like the statue outside of Ozma Towers: cold, colorless and rigid. He hadn't experienced her fury quite like this before; not when everything was at stake. He cleared his throat clumsily. "What did she say?"
"She didn't talk much, Fiyero! She was too busy crying her eyes out."
"I didn't mean to hurt her."
"Are you telling me you had no idea how strongly she felt about you?"
"I—I knew, but I tried not to lead her on—"
"She hoped to marry you one day! It's been all she talked about. 'Fiyero this, Fiyero that'! And now you're telling me that all this time you knew and let her make a fool of herself kissing you before you told her you weren't interested?"
"I-I didn't mean—"
"So what's your endgame, Fiyero?" she asked bitterly. His mouth hung open stupidly as he searched himself for anything he could say to her, but no words came out. She shook her head, and for someone who well-comprehended foresight, he could see his carefully planned approach failing miserably as she said stonily, "That's what I thought."
He knew better than to follow her as she fled, her long hair billowing out behind her like the shabby cape of the future he prayed would never envelop her shoulders. It was week's end and thus he wasn't sure if he would see her again until class on Monday to apologize, but for what exactly he wasn't even certain. He just had to make things right and he was running out of time: finals were but a few short weeks away and any day now would be Dr. Dillamond's last.
He ran a frustrated hand through his hair and stomped off to his dorm, hating himself. How had he been so thick as to make her think that she was but a pawn to him? She was so much more: she was the king.