Elphaba and Fiyero reappeared in the thick of a cornfield some distance from the governor's mansion. The sun was high in the sky by now, and it was dangerous for the two of them to be out in the open. Wasting no time, Elphaba pulled Fiyero onto her broomstick and they shot off into the sky. If any unsuspecting Munchkinlanders caught sight of them, the pair was already long gone by the time their presence had registered.
They dismounted once they'd reached the cover of the forest once more. Elphaba seemed more skittish than usual at having to travel in daylight. They were a good way off from the Emerald City, so Gale Force presence was less likely, but it was still possible that the Wizard had sent scouting parties out to search for them.
"We should find cover until nightfall," Elphaba said, glancing around nervously. Fiyero knew she must be feeling terribly exposed. Her all-black attire did little to hide her without the cover of darkness.
He followed obediently as Elphaba led him to a small hollow cut into the side of a cliff face. It wasn't completely secluded but would at least serve to keep them out of sight of anyone traveling on the main road. Elphaba removed her hat and cloak as the two of them settled in to wait until nightfall.
"So, I thought that went well," Fiyero said casually, placing his hands behind his head as he reclined back against the stone wall behind him.
"It…actually did," Elphaba conceded with a small amount of disbelief. She glanced over at Fiyero and said, "Thank you for talking me into it. I don't know that I would have ever had the courage to do that on my own."
"That's what I'm here for," he said with a cheeky grin, relishing the fact that he'd been able to make himself useful. "What did you think of your brother-in-law?" he asked a moment later with a hint of laughter in his voice.
Elphaba huffed immediately and said, "I don't think he's good enough for Nessa." At Fiyero's knowing look she relented and said, "But it's just important that she's happy. Though I doubt he'll agree to have me over for family dinner any time soon. He kept looking at me like I was about to reach across the room and rip his still-beating heart from his chest."
Fiyero let out a laugh at that and said, "Well you can be a bit…" the words died in his throat at the look on Elphaba's face. He cleared his throat and finished, "intimidating."
She gave him a pointed look, but there was a hint of a smile on her face. "So where are we going from here?" she asked after a pause. "You're going to have to point me in the right direction."
"My family's main castle is a bit further into the Vinkus than the one at Kiamo Ko," he said thoughtfully, "but that shouldn't make much of a difference on broomstick. If we fly southwest from here, we should make the journey in roughly the same amount of time."
Elphaba fidgeted, looking nervous all of a sudden. "Are you sure this is the best idea?" she asked. "It was one thing to stay at Kiamo Ko with your mother, but to be at your family stronghold with your parents…with all of their guards and household staff…"
"Hey," he said, scooting closer to her. "I know you're worried, but I wouldn't suggest it if I didn't think it was safe. I may not have always had the best relationship with my parents, but they're still good people. They'll hear us out."
"Us," Elphaba repeated faintly, still looking down at her hands.
"That's right," Fiyero said with a nod. "If anyone wants to get to you, they'll have to go through me as well."
Elphaba raised her head at his declaration, looking perturbed. "And what is 'us'?" she asked, her tone slightly accusatory.
Fiyero was caught off guard by the sudden shift in her demeanor. "What do you mean?" he asked. "I already told you that we're in this together."
"Right," Elphaba said slowly, "but to what extent? What are you planning to tell your parents about the nature of our…relationship," she said. He didn't miss the catch in her voice as she said the last word.
Fiyero grew silent as he took in her meaning. In the whirlwind of their dealings in Munchkinland and their meeting with the governor, he supposed they still hadn't found the time to properly discuss all that had happened between them. "I thought I'd made it clear what my intentions were, but if there's any ambiguity then let me state it plainly now" he said carefully, taking a deep breath. It seemed suddenly more difficult to discuss his feelings freely in the light of day than it had that night by the campfire. "I love you. If you'll allow it, I want us to be…" he searched for a word that wouldn't alarm her, "partners."
She was already shaking her head as he finished his sentence. "You don't know what you're getting yourself into."
"Really?" Fiyero scoffed. "I'm fairly sure I've got a pretty good snapshot after the past few weeks."
"Then you know that my life is incredibly dangerous," she said. "By even associating yourself with me, you're putting yourself in danger."
"And we've been through this before," Fiyero said, his stubbornness matching her own. "That's the point of all of this, to get more of Oz on your side. On our side."
"And what happens when you come to your senses and grow tired of this, hm?" she demanded. "When the novelty of all of this wears off and you realize there's just…me."
"Elphaba, what're you-"
Her expression hardened and she continued over his protests, "I don't do love. I don't do partners. All I do is try to stay alive and not destroy every single thing I touch. You're a prince, Fiyero, you could have any woman you want. Sooner or later, you're going to realize that you can do a lot better than me."
"You think I don't already know that?" Fiyero said irritably. Elphaba seemed to have been momentarily stunned by the declaration. Realizing how it had sounded, Fiyero amended, "That came out wrong. What I meant is that women have been throwing themselves at me for as long as I can remember. Before my engagement to Glinda, I'd probably already been with more women than most men are in their entire lives."
"You're really making a case for yourself here," Elphaba deadpanned beside him.
"So do you really think I can't tell the difference?" he asked, exasperated. At Elphaba's clear look of confusion, he went on, "I've tried my hand at relationships. Hell, I was ready to marry Glinda just because I thought it was what I was supposed to do. I'd given up on ever finding a deeper connection, on falling in love. If anything, I should be the one who's worried. You're brilliant, possibly the most powerful person in Oz. What if being with me only convinces you that you can do better."
Elphaba rolled her eyes at this and said, "Don't be preposterous, Fiyero. As if anyone else in Oz is lining up to court me."
"Well, you forget that I'm a fugitive now too," he responded. "Maybe we need to accept that we've become each other's only option."
Elphaba still seemed troubled, so Fiyero reached out from where he was still reclining against the wall and pulled her towards him to settle her against his chest. Elphaba stiffened slightly but didn't protest. He tilted his head into hers and said, "Let's just focus on making it back alive for now. We can figure out the rest later."
The light was already beginning to drain from the sky when Fiyero blinked his eyes open hours later, roused by the sudden sounds of approaching voices and twigs snapping underfoot. As he awoke, he realized with a start that they had, in an uncharacteristic lapse in judgement, fallen asleep together. Fiyero leapt to his feet immediately, jostling Elphaba awake beside him, and swept his eyes around their immediate vicinity. The sounds seemed to be growing ever closer to their partially concealed hiding place.
"Wait here and stay out of sight," Fiyero whispered. Before Elphaba could argue, he darted around the cliff face and into the path of a couple of Munchkin travelers.
His sudden appearance seemed to startle them, and they broke from their conversation as they turned to face him. They appeared to be a young husband and wife, each sporting a large travel pack. They were clearly cutting through the forest in hopes of making it to the nearest village by sundown.
"Oh, hello there," the husband said cheerily. "Are you alright?"
Fiyero was relieved that his appearance was not entirely disheveled. His hair was messy, and his clothes slightly rumpled from sleeping on the ground, but nothing out of the ordinary for a perfectly normal traveler. Flashing one of his winning smiles, he said, "Yes, thank you. I just seem to have been turned around. Which direction is the Emerald City from here?" He shuffled his position slightly as he spoke, placing himself between the Munchkin couple and where Elphaba was hiding.
The woman spoke this time. "The Emerald City? That's a long way off from here," she said with some concern. "You'd want to head back the way we came and then take the Yellow Brick Road the whole way. But it's a few days' journey at least."
"Oh, is that so?" Fiyero said, attempting to keep his voice casual. "In that case I suppose I'll have to…" he trailed off as he realized the husband was suddenly staring at him very intently.
"Don't I know you from somewhere?" he asked suspiciously, looking Fiyero up and down.
"Oh, no I doubt it," he said, waving his hand dismissively. "I'm nobody important. Just have one of those faces."
The Munchkin didn't seem to be buying it. He took a step away from Fiyero and said, with dawning certainty, "Wait, aren't you that Winkie prince who was working with the Wicked Witch of the West?"
Fiyero was floundering now. He hadn't realized the extent of the infamy he'd acquired in his brief time on the run, or that he could be recognized easily by random travelers. Upon seeing Fiyero's rather suspicious reaction to the question, the couple had very clearly begun to panic. The man dropped a hand to his waist, clearly reaching for a concealed weapon.
"Now let's wait just a minute," Fiyero said nervously, holding his hands up in front of him in surrender. "Let's not do anything-"
His sentence was cut short as a loud and ominous cackle sounded from the forest behind him. "Rash," Fiyero mumbled to himself as Elphaba burst onto the scene in a flurry of wild hair and billowing cloaks. At the sight of her, the Munchkin couple seemed to forget Fiyero entirely. Without so much as a pause, they turned tail and fled screaming down the path from whence they'd come.
Fiyero watched their rapidly retreating backs and then turned to Elphaba with a sigh. "I had that under control," he said irritably.
"Really? Because from where I'm standing it looked like you were about to get yourself shot," she said calmly, readjusting her pointed hat.
Fiyero couldn't really argue with that, but it didn't make him any less annoyed at the situation. "You know, if we're going to work on rebranding you, we're going to have to really tone down all of this," he gestured wildly in her general direction, "witchiness."
"Rebranding me?" Elphaba asked, sounding genuinely confused.
"Yeah, of course," he said. "That's part of this entire plan. If we can unite enough of Oz against the Wizard, we can also convince them that all of the Wicked Witch of the West business was a lie."
"That is astoundingly optimistic," Elphaba said. "There's no rebranding me, Fiyero. People would hate me even if I wasn't a wicked witch. They always have."
"I don't believe that," Fiyero said. "Not if they really got to know you. If we had the support of the Vinkus, Munchkinland and the Emerald City behind us, we could show them that you can be a force for good. That you can be rehabilitated."
"Rehabilitated?" Elphaba repeated doubtfully.
"I think you underestimate how influenced people can be by public opinion, and how quickly they forget. It wouldn't be all at once, but over time I'm confident we can at least achieve acceptance. But it will require a lot less traumatizing of random civilians," he said pointedly.
"That wouldn't have been necessary if we hadn't fallen asleep without keeping watch," she grumbled. She rubbed the bridge of her nose and said, "That was careless. I've gotten careless."
"All the more reason to get back to the Vinkus as soon as possible," Fiyero said, kicking himself for the oversight as well. He knew that his own lack of survival instinct was likely dragging Elphaba down.
Without further argument, Elphaba retrieved her cloak and broom, and then they resumed their journey by air. The rest of their travels remained mercifully uneventful. They stopped to make camp once more the following day, taking care not to let themselves be distracted from sleeping in shifts. After that they flew on until dawn, when the imposing silhouette of Fiyero's family castle had just begun to appear on the horizon.
"Maybe we should approach the castle on foot," Fiyero shouted over the roar of wind in his ears. He knew that his mother had said she would warn the castle's residents of their arrival, but a more inconspicuous approach couldn't hurt their cause. Even if the guards knew to expect them, they might still get skittish at the sight of two figures on a broomstick barreling towards the ramparts.
Elphaba didn't make any verbal acknowledgement that she'd heard him, but a few seconds later they began to lose altitude as she brought them into a controlled descent. They dismounted far enough away that the guards would have plenty of time to notice their approach and then began their slow ascent up the slope to the castle's entrance.
Elphaba had pulled the brim of her hat low to hide her face, but she was hardly anonymous in her billowing cloak and pointed hat. Fiyero could see the guards at the door grow nervous at her approach even from a fair distance away.
"Who goes there?" one of them called out reluctantly. It was clearly a matter of protocol, as Fiyero was quite certain they already knew.
"Prince Fiyero Tigelaar and a guest, Miss Elphaba Thropp," he called back confidently. They crossed the short remainder of the distance up to the castle and both men on duty banged their heavy spears against the ground twice in recognition.
"Welcome home, your Highness," one of them said, keeping his gaze focused ahead. "The king and queen have been awaiting your safe return."
"Have they now?" Fiyero asked, one eyebrow raised. "Well, I suppose we musn't keep them waiting." If the guards found his flippant response odd, they gave into sign as they turned and opened the doors to grant Fiyero and Elphaba entrance.
If Fiyero thought the nostalgia of his visit to Kiamo Ko had hit him hard, it was nothing compared to the feeling that washed over him as he stepped into the entryway of his childhood home. He hadn't been back to the castle since just before his college graduation two years prior. His parents had made their displeasure at his choice to move to the Emerald City plainly known, and Fiyero hadn't wanted to deal with the barbed comments and thinly veiled criticism that a visit would have invited. Now the mingling scents of stone and wood and the lilacs that his mother favored hit him so powerfully that he paused in place as he stepped over the threshold.
The foyer looked much as he remembered it. Portraits of kings and queens past lined the walls and a plush, deep blue carpet ran from the entrance and continued into the hallway ahead of them. Two more guards stood at the base of an ornate staircase on the left side of the room, and they nodded respectfully as Fiyero and Elphaba stepped further inside.
Before Fiyero could attempt to make a break for one of the castle's many guest chambers, both of his parents appeared at the top of the staircase. They practically floated down the steps together, the picture of regality as their practiced steps somehow fell completely in sync with each other. Fiyero hated it when they did that.
"Fiyero, Miss Elphaba," Allina said as she and her husband glided to a halt in front of them. She stepped forward to press a kiss to Fiyero's cheek, then nodded towards Elphaba before returning to take her place at her husband's side.
"Mother," Fiyero acknowledged, finding that he was happy to see her again despite himself.
"Your Majesty," Elphaba said, her head held high as she returned the Queen's greeting.
Fiyero chanced a glance at his father, who was watching the proceedings with a stony expression. He wished he had any insight into what the man was thinking, but King Rothian Tigelaar had always been impossible to read.
After a few moments of tense silence, the King inclined his head to Fiyero and said, "Son." He did not make any move to acknowledge Elphaba's presence, to Fiyero's annoyance. He continued, "I trust your journey was worth its while."
The question seemed innocent enough, but Fiyero didn't miss the edge of doubt hidden beneath his father's words. Electing to ignore it, Fiyero squared his shoulders and replied, "Yes, in fact, we were able to secure an alliance with Munchkinland. I can draw up a more official agreement to send along to the governor for review, if you require more than verbal proof."
Rothian's only response was a slight raise of the eyebrows, but on the stoic King it was akin to a verbal exclamation of shock. Fiyero held his father's gaze with a pointed glare, daring him to say something to belittle his efforts. Allina, sensing the tensing between her husband and son, took it upon herself to step forward and say, "Well, that's wonderful, dear.". Then, casting a pointed look at her husband, she said, "Isn't it, Rothian?"
While Fiyero appreciated his mother's efforts, he felt rather like a child being praised for a finger painting. When Rothian remained stoically silent beside his wife, Fiyero said irritably, "We've had a long journey and we've been traveling most of the night. Allow me to get Elphaba settled and then we can discuss the matter further."
"Of course, dear. Feel free to use any of the guest quarters," his mother said. It sounded genteel enough, but Fiyero didn't miss the pointed look that went with it. Fiyero resisted to the urge to roll his eyes. It wasn't as though he was some teenager trying to sneak his girlfriend into his bedroom. At least not on the first day.
"Thank you, Mother, Father," he said, bowing politely.
With that he turned and strode from the foyer into the hallway beyond, Elphaba right on his heels. He motioned her into a furnished bedroom towards the end of the hallway, then closed the door behind him and promptly slid down against it and onto the floor.
Elphaba raised an eyebrow at him as she unfastened her cloak. "I see I don't carry the exclusive rights to family dysfunction then."
Fiyero looked up at her from his place on the floor and asked, "Was that not already painfully obvious from the time you've spent with my mother?"
Elphaba crossed the room and offered him her hand, which he took. "I don't know, your mother seemed almost pleasant just now," she said, helping to hoist Fiyero back to his feet.
"She did, didn't she?" he mused. It was a bit odd. He was so used to his parents being a unified front in their blatant disappointment with him. It was strange to see his mother playing mediator.
His train of thought fizzled as he realized he and Elphaba were now standing quite close together, her hand still gripping his own from when she'd helped him up. As tempting as he found their proximity, he didn't want to give his parents, particularly his father, any more fuel to use against him. Reluctantly, he extracted his hand from hers and took a step backwards.
"Right," he said awkwardly. "Well, you must be tired. Feel free to rest up here for now. My room is right upstairs if you need me."
Fiyero could tell that she was anxious about being on her own in a new place but, in classic Elphaba fashion, she didn't voice these concerns. Fiyero, sensing this, gestured across the room and said, "The windows aren't locked."
"Should I expect that I'll need to flee through them at some point?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
Fiyero backpedaled. "No, I just thought you might feel less cooped up knowing that you're not trapped in here."
Elphaba smiled ruefully and responded, "Well, I suppose you're already a better host than I am. I certainly didn't extend you the same courtesy."
Fiyero, deciding that enough time had passed since his imprisonment to make light of it, put a hand over his heart and said fondly, "Our first date."
Though she seemed to be trying to suppress it, Elphaba gave him a small smile. Fiyero hoped that she was finally beginning to believe him that he no longer held anything against her. After a moment she said, "Do you think it would be an issue if I took a trip over to Kiamo Ko after it gets dark? I want to make sure the Monkeys are doing well and see if Glinda has written back yet."
Fiyero supposed he shouldn't be surprised that she had no intention of taking a break. "Did you want me to come with you?" he asked, ignoring the way his stomach churned at the thought of getting back on the broomstick so soon.
Elphaba must have sensed his reluctance and responded "No that's fine, I can go myself. Do you think it will be an issue for the guards if I show up without you?"
Fiyero thought it over and then said, "Let me write up some official orders so they don't give you any trouble. I just have to find a wax seal."
"And your parents won't mind?" she asked a bit nervously.
"My parents don't have to know," he responded.
With that he turned and grasped the doorknob. He cast one last fleeting look in Elphaba's direction, and then he opened the door and slipped out into the hall.