Chapter Text
Elphaba barely saw Glinda for the next two days. In their shared classes Glinda always arrived right before the bell rang, slipping into a seat at the back of the class near the window—as far away from Elphaba as she could get. It was like she knew that Elphaba couldn’t sit in the back of the classroom because she couldn’t see the blackboard without her glasses, and she was determined to put as much space between them as possible. She hurried out of class the moment the bell rang, so that Elphaba couldn’t come up and talk to her. She didn’t study in the library and Elphaba never saw her in the dining hall. She knocked on her door a couple of times, but there was no answer. It was like Glinda was intentionally making herself into a ghost, existing at the margins of their lives. Elphaba knew she should let it go, since Glinda clearly didn’t want her help. But Elphaba also knew how lonely and isolating it felt to exist on the edge of things. She was determined to make sure that no one else felt that way, ever.
Except for, perhaps, Galinda. Not that Galinda needed her support. On the contrary, she was surrounded by an entourage everywhere she went. She’d probably never really been alone in her life. She’d had her parents and nurses and Amas and a twin sister that she clearly couldn’t care less about. It was infuriating. Her sister had had some kind of episode in Madame Morrible’s office and Galinda hadn’t seemed bothered. She’d let herself into her bedroom and taken a seat at her desk and pulled out her Biology textbook as though nothing strange had happened at all.
For a moment Elphaba just stared at her in disbelief. “What are you doing?”
Galinda looked up at her, batting her eyes innocently. She had the longest eyelashes that Elphaba had ever seen. “Homework. How can you possibly have a problem with that? You practically live in the library.”
“I don’t have a problem with homework—”
“Good.” Galinda looked back down at the page.
“I just don’t understand how you can focus on it at a time like this.”
Galinda’s brow furrowed. “Like what?”
“Your sister nearly fainted in Madame Morrible’s office!”
Galinda shrugged. She didn’t look up. “Glinda is a terrible drama queen. Momsie has always said so.”
Elphaba was almost positive that Larena Upland had said nothing of the kind. Amaryllis had never had an unkind thing to say about her sister-in-law. “But she was so frightened! She could barely even talk.” Elphaba wasn’t sure what exactly had triggered the episode, if it was Madame Morrible or that water allergy that Glinda had thought Elphaba had. It was strange; Elphaba had never heard of anyone in Oz having a water allergy before. Why would Glinda assume that she, of all people, had an allergy that was so bad it might kill her? “So you’re not even a little bit concerned?”
“I didn’t say I’m not concerned at all. I just don’t think that there’s much I can do for her at this point. I’m not very close with my sister. Believe me, she doesn’t want to see me right now.” Her voice hesitated, just for a moment, before she said the word ‘sister’.
Elphaba wondered how Galinda could know someone for her entire life, from the moment they first formed in their mother’s womb, and not feel a kind of innate closeness. Oz, she and Nessa were close and no one would ever say they looked alike. “Does that…reaction happen often?”
“I don’t know,” Galinda said. “If it does, she doesn’t tell me.” Elphaba almost asked why she thought Glinda would tell her anything, when she was so clearly disparaging of her feelings. But there was a tone to Galinda’s voice that hadn’t been there earlier, something akin to disappointment, or regret. Elphaba didn’t comment on it because she was sure that Galinda would deny that she’d felt any compassion at all.
Maybe she was one of those people who thought showing emotion was a weakness. Elphaba’s father had certainly thought so. He’d gotten angry with Elphaba every time her magic flared up unexpectedly because she was afraid or angry or sad. “Did the Unknown God create you simply to torment me?” he’d snapped once, his eyes hard. Elphaba had taken a step backwards like his words were a physical blow, landing hard in her solar plexus. She had wanted to tell him that she was trying her best and she didn’t want to have these powers any more than he wanted her to, but the words died in her throat. She’d never been able to talk back to Father.
Elphaba had lost control of her powers three months after the rescue. She couldn’t remember now what had set her off—some comment from Nessa, perhaps—but before she knew it all of their silverware and drinking glasses had begun to drift towards the ceiling. The Arduenna manor’s dining room had an arched ceiling, painted a light blue and studded with stars to replicate the night sky. Elphaba could pick out the constellations that were visible from the balcony outside of Amaryllis’s room. But now some wine sloshed out of Amaryllis’s glass, staining the paint like an outpouring of blood, scattering across one of the constellations. Elphaba gasped and everything fell to the ground with a deafening clatter. Nessa clapped her hands over her ears as all of their glasses shattered, little pieces of glass falling into what remained of their dinner.
For a moment, Elphaba couldn’t move. She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t think. Each breath shuddered in and out of her chest, sounding scraped and raw. Her hands shook as she waited for Amaryllis to get angry. Amaryllis had every right to, of course. She’d gone to such lengths to make a nice meal for them—farfalle pasta for the main course (Nessa’s favorite) and chocolate cake for dessert (Elphaba’s favorite). But it was more than that. She had answered Elphaba’s letter. She had taken them into her beautiful home. She’d dismissed all of the staff so that no one else would see that Elphaba and Nessa were there, in case word got back to Father. She’d taken a step back in her family’s company so that nobody would care that she was no longer attending the weekly meetings. She’d put her entire life on hold for them. And Elphaba had ruined dinner, just like she ruined everything else.
But Amaryllis didn’t scream at her. “Is everyone all right?” she asked, looking at their hands and faces. Elphaba couldn’t meet her eyes. “Did anyone get nicked by the glass?”
Nessa shook her head. Elphaba felt hot tears streak down her cheeks. The skin of her face felt hot and tight. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.
“Oh, darling.” Amaryllis hurried to Elphaba’s side of the table, wrapping her arms around her. She laid her head on top of Elphaba’s. Her skin smelled like violets. “You have nothing to be sorry for. Nothing at all.”
“But I ruined dinner—”
“No, you didn’t. Well, perhaps you ruined the pasta. But pasta is very easy to make. And I have plenty of other glasses. You’ve done me a favor, really. Now I don’t have to figure out where I’m going to put them all.” Amaryllis squeezed her tight, like she thought she could squeeze all of the sadness right out of her. “Please don’t say things like that. Lurline gave you those powers for a reason, Elphaba. Never forget that.”
“But why? It seems like all I do is make things worse.”
Amaryllis shook her head; Elphaba could feel her hair brushing against the top of her head. “No, darling. That’s what your father thought. You’re going to find that there are many things that your father and I don’t see eye to eye on. And I will never, ever blame you for something that you can’t control. Now, why don’t you and Nessa get the chocolate cake and I’ll clean this up?”
“Let me help. Please.” Elphaba was slowly realizing that she wasn’t going to be yelled at or punished. She could feel some of the tension leaving her shoulders, the knot in her stomach slowly unclenching.
Amaryllis hesitated for a moment, but then she must have seen the desperation in Elphaba’s eyes because she said “All right,” and then moved aside. “Just be careful not to prick yourself. Some of the glass shards are very small.”
They worked in silence, while Nessa went into the kitchen and cut up the cake. They had worked together to make it that afternoon, combining the wet and dry ingredients and stirring until the mixture looked like the mud puddles that sometimes appeared around the lake after it rained. Amaryllis had let them sample the batter, the sweetness exploding on their tongues. Father would never have let them into the kitchen, much less allowed them to help the chef, but Amaryllis didn’t have a choice because there weren’t any servants.
Amaryllis grabbed a horsehair brush and swept all of the broken glass into the center of the table, while Elphaba mopped up the spilled glass and wine. She started to hum something under her breath. “What’s that song?” Elphaba asked. The sun was beginning to set over the mountains outside, filling the room with a soft golden light. The geography of Gillikin was so different from Munchkinland that they felt like different worlds; Munchkinland was flat as a pancake, filled with farmland and flower fields, while Gillikin was mountainous and chilly, the seasons changing rapidly from one day to the next: the temperature dropping, the leaves turning brilliant colors and then falling from the trees, rain sheeting down with almost no advance warning. Amaryllis said it snowed in the winter; once it got cold enough, she would buy them puffy coats so they could go out and play in it.
Amaryllis’s cheeks heated slightly. “It’s just a song my mother used to sing to my brother and me when we were younger. Oz, I’m surprised I still remember it.” She turned back to the glass and Elphaba listened to the rise and fall of her voice, the subtle lilt threaded in between her words: Lavender’s blue dilly dilly, lavender’s green. When you are king dilly dilly, I will be queen. Elphaba wondered if her own mother had ever sung to her. She wondered how Mother would have reacted to her outbursts of magic. Would she have been offended, like Father, or understanding like Amaryllis? Or would she try to absent herself from the situation entirely, like Nessa did?
There was something about the way Glinda had flinched back from Madame Morrible, the way she had stared right through Elphaba like she couldn’t see her at all, that reminded Elphaba of the frightened girl that she used to be. And as Nessa always said (lovingly), Elphaba couldn’t resist trying to fix broken things.
She was still thinking about Glinda when the weekend came and she went into the town of Shiz with Amaryllis to get a proper bed. The university was separated from the town by the canal; there was a pretty stone bridge to walk across, but most of the university students took boats. Shiz was a very old city, one of the oldest in Oz, so the streets were long and winding and kept twisting in on themselves. Alleyways let out in unexpected places, the cobblestones beneath their feet worn smooth by time. The old stone buildings towered above them, cutting the sunlight into pieces. The streets were filled with students. They were easy to spot even out of uniform because they carried themselves with the same kind of pride, even entitlement. They laughed too loudly, their voices slipping under the doors of coffeeshops and floating up from sidewalk balconies. A few of them waved to Elphaba. Elphaba waved back, though she suspected they were only paying attention to her because she was with Amaryllis. The entire student body was fascinated by Amaryllis. At least half of them had a crush on her. They liked to gossip about her too, speculating on what might have possessed her to kidnap the Thropps. Conversations often cut off when Elphaba walked by, eyes sheepishly turning downwards to focus on a notebook or a plate of food. No one had been rude enough—or brave enough—to say anything to her face.
“What about this one?” Amaryllis asked. They were in a department store, standing in a showroom filled with different types of mattresses and bed frames. She sat down on the mattress in question, letting out an almost childish squeal as it folded underneath her.
“Maybe not that one,” Elphaba laughed. “It’s far too soft.” Through the store window she watched Galinda pass by on the other side of the street, walking between Pfannee and ShenShen. They all appeared to be trying to talk over each other. The sun glittered off of Galinda’s hair, gilding it the color of straw. Their eyes met, just for a moment, and Elphaba made an exaggerated show of rolling her eyes. Galinda’s pretty brow furrowed.
Elphaba would be lying if she’d said that she didn’t like winding up her roommate sometimes. Sometimes when she was particularly annoyed about something, Galinda’s nose scrunched up. It was almost adorable—
No, adorable was the wrong word, Elphaba thought quickly. There was nothing adorable about Galinda Upland. She was insufferable.
Elphaba turned her back to the window and moved on to the next mattress, relieved when Amaryllis followed. She tested it with her fingertips. “Did Larena ever tell you anything about Glinda’s health?”
Amaryllis examined the carved wooden detailing on the headboard. It was far too fancy a headboard for a student dormitory, Elphaba thought, but perhaps it would at least make Galinda jealous. “Not as far as I’m aware. I know she had some kind of illness as a child and had to spend some time recovering in the country, but I didn’t hear anything more about it so I assumed there were no lasting ill effects. Why? Did she say something to you?”
Elphaba wasn’t sure how to describe what had happened in sparring class and she wasn’t sure that Glinda would want her to tell Amaryllis about it even if she could. “No. I was just…curious, I guess.” For once, Amaryllis didn’t push her. Elphaba reminded herself that she was busy too, with all of her new classes and her new duties as a professor. She didn’t deserve to be burdened with too many of Elphaba’s complaints about her insipid roommate. Elphaba had dealt with many things in her life. She could most certainly deal with Galinda Upland. Galinda might be irritating and obnoxious and have the most profound lack of self awareness that Elphaba had ever seen, but she was ultimately harmless. “Now, let’s look at the duvets.”
Elphaba was walking around the quad the next morning, pretending she wasn’t searching for Glinda, when Pfannee and ShenShen bolted towards her across the grass. “Can we talk to you?” Pfannee asked. ShenShen, who was holding a box camera, looked at her expectantly.
“I’m really busy right now. Can it wait?” Elphaba lied, glancing at the doors to the library as if Glinda might walk through them. She felt a flicker of annoyance. Had Galinda sent her friends to argue with Elphaba on her behalf? She certainly hadn’t seemed happy when the two workers from Housing and Accommodation had arrived to set up Elphaba’s bed, with its wooden headboard carved with garlands of flowers and its ice blue duvet. Galinda had had to press two racks of her dresses up against each other so that the bed would fit (the horror!) and she’d glared at Elphaba as she moved them, her lips pinched together until the color leached from them. Elphaba knew she should be the bigger person, but she couldn’t help smiling smugly at her. If they were both stuck sharing a room, she should at least have a bed that wasn’t shoved in the corner like an afterthought—even if the bed was a little big, a little ostentatious. Amaryllis had taught Elphaba that she was allowed to want beautiful things.
Pfannee and ShenShen exchanged a look like they thought that Elphaba was acting intentionally obtuse but they were too polite to say so. “We need to take your picture now if you want to make it into tomorrow’s issue,” ShenShen replied.
Elphaba raised an eyebrow. “Tomorrow’s issue of…?” Was this some kind of elaborate prank? She wouldn’t put it past Galinda. Honestly, if Galinda applied half as much thought to her studies as she did to her appearance and needlessly intricate social rituals, she could be rivaling Elphaba for top of the class.
Pfannee and ShenShen exchanged another look. “Shiz Daily,” Pfannee replied. “It’s only the highest circulated daily periodical in Shiz.”
“And the only daily periodical in Shiz,” ShenShen whispered, almost apologetically. “Everyone who’s anyone will see it.”
“But why would you want me on the cover of your newspaper?” Or any newspaper? Unless it was a subtle way of disparaging her skin tone. “Did Galinda put you up to this?”
ShenShen tossed her over her shoulder. “No, of course not. Galinda doesn’t work for the newspaper.”
“I didn’t know that either of you worked for the newspaper.”
She hadn’t intended for it to be a joke, but Pfannee and ShenShen both laughed loudly—so loudly that Elphaba looked around the quad, sure that someone would overhear them. “You’re funny, Elphaba,” Pfannee said, slapping his knee.
Elphaba was about to say that she didn’t know what was funny about any part of this, but ShenShen was already talking again. “Of course we work for Shiz Daily! We’re writing an article about your heroical actions rescuing Madame Morrible on the first day of term.”
Elphaba felt her cheeks heat. “I wouldn’t really say they were heroical. I just did what anyone else would do.”
“That’s exactly what a hero would say,” Pfannee said. “You’re so good, Elphaba.” Elphaba didn’t know what to say to that. She tried smiling, but she suspected she looked constipated. She’d never been good at accepting people’s praise. “I hear Miss Coddle is planning on giving you an award for Outstanding Services to the School.”
Elphaba was sure her cheeks were turning purple now. “I’m sure any rumors have been greatly exaggerated.”
“Such braverism. And so modest too,” ShenShen chimed in, as she raised her camera. “Smile, Elphaba!” Elphaba tried to smile normally. She thought about the Arduenna manor house, with its shell pink walls and the long green lawn that sloped down to the lake and the hedge maze where she and Nessa had spent hours when they were younger, until they knew every twist and turn by heart. She thought about the blackberry bushes on the crest of the hill that ripened without fail every spring and how they would eat berries until their fingertips were sticky and stained with juice. They had been so happy there, for so many years. But Elphaba suspected that all children, sooner or later, wanted to fly outside of the nest.
“Perfect!” ShenShen said. “See you tomorrow morning!” Elphaba wanted to tell her that wouldn’t be necessary, but she and Pfannee were already strutting away. Elphaba let them leave, letting out a soft sigh of relief as soon as they disappeared around the corner and were no longer in earshot.
“They can be a little…much, can’t they?” Elphaba nearly jumped out of her skin. She hadn’t even noticed Glinda come up to her, but there she was—dressed in a pale purple blouse and a matching blazer, her schoolbag hoisted over one shoulder. That was purple too, embroidered with a golden curlicue G. Glinda’s face fell. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you—”
She turned to leave, but Elphaba reached out and grabbed her hand before she could. “Wait!” A shiver passed through their fingertips, like a tiny electric shock. Glinda gasped and pulled her hand away. “I’m sorry. I just didn’t mean that you had to leave.” Please don’t run away.
Glinda smiled softly. “Look at us both apologizing to each other.” Something twisted in the pit of Elphaba’s stomach. “You have nothing to apologize for.”
“How are you doing? I wanted to check on you, after…” Elphaba’s voice trailed off when she realized she didn’t know how to describe what had happened to Glinda in Madame Morrible’s office. “But I haven’t seen you around campus lately.”
Glinda’s smile, inexplicably, seemed to soften further. “That’s very kind of you, Elphaba. Truly. But I’m fine. I’ve had these…attacks since I was a child. They’re not fun in the moment, but there’s no lasting harm done.”
“Since you were a child?” Elphaba gasped, outraged on Glinda’s behalf.
“Yes, unfortunately.” Glinda sounded so serene, so utterly unlike how she had sounded in Sparring class, when that invisible force had wrenched Elphaba away from the water’s edge. It should have been a violent motion, but Elphaba had never once felt like she was in any danger. The magic had cradled her, like a pair of gentle hands. Elphaba understood how ridiculous the words would sound to anyone she might have shared them with, but she couldn’t think of a more apt comparison. She had felt protected, safe within Glinda’s magic. “They’re an inherited trait. Popsicle—my father—has had them too, ever since he was a child. There’s a special breathing pattern I’m supposed to use to help me calm down, but I’m afraid that in all the commotion it completely slipped my mind. I’m sorry you had to see that—”
“Hey.” Elphaba almost reached for her hand but thought better of it when she remembered the shiver that had passed through their skin and the way that Glinda had pulled away from her. “You don’t have anything to apologize for. I was happy to help you.” She realized how those words must have sounded and her cheeks heated. “I mean, it’s not that I’m happy this happened to you. I’m not, of course. I’m just…glad that I could be there to help.”
“I know what you meant,” Glinda said. She reached up to straighten Elphaba’s collar, her fingertips brushing against Elphaba’s skin. Elphaba found herself standing up a little straighter, almost instinctively. “I’m glad that you were there too.”
“Well someone had to help you, since your sister clearly wasn’t interested.”
A shadow passed over Glinda’s face, her brow furrowing slightly. Elphaba had the odd urge to rub that crease away. She imagined how soft Glinda’s skin would feel under her fingertips. “Don’t be too hard on her. My sister isn’t a bad person. She can be selfish, certainly. She can be obnoxious. But she has…potential. She can be better than this. She just needs to decide that she wants to change.”
“I don’t see that happening any time soon.” Perhaps it was only natural that Glinda would give her sister more grace than Elphaba would.. It was easier to give more grace to family, Elphaba supposed.
Glinda sighed. “Yes, she still has a lot of growing up to do.” She checked her watch. “We should head to Linguification if we don’t want to be late.”
They walked along the quad in silence until Elphaba’s curiosity got the better of her. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course,” Glinda said, adjusting her book bag on her other shoulder. “What would you like to know?”
“Why did you think I had a water allergy?”
Glinda flinched almost imperceptibly. Elphaba doubted she would have seen it if she hadn’t been looking for it: just the faintest clenching of her body, the faintest widening of her eyes. Elphaba was about to apologize for prying, but Glinda spoke before she could. “It’s silly, really. For a moment you reminded me of someone I used to know. She had an allergy like that. But she…wasn’t so fortunate.” Glinda’s next inhale was shaky, sticking in the back of her throat. “She died.”
“I’m so sorry.” Elphaba could have kicked herself. Oz, she shouldn’t have pried.
“It’s all right,” Glinda murmured, even though it clearly wasn’t. “It happened a very long time ago.”
And then Elphaba pried again, because she couldn’t seem to stop herself. “How did she die?”
“A bucket of water to the face. It was a…prank, of sorts. It went horribly wrong.” Glinda stopped abruptly and twisted her hands together. They were shaking slightly and the little color that remained in her face was slowly leaching away from it.
“We don’t need to talk about it if you don’t want to,” Elphaba said quickly, but she wasn’t sure Glinda heard her. She steered them over to a bench at the side of the hallway and Glinda slumped down, holding her head in her hands. Shivers wracked her body. “Glinda?” Glinda turned away from her, shoulders folding inwards. “Hey.” Before she could think better of it, Elphaba cradled Glinda’s face in her hands. The pain in Glinda’s eyes made her gasp. She looked at Elphaba like she’d just lost everything she’d ever loved. “You’re all right,” Elphaba murmured, even though she didn’t know if it was true. She stroked the pad of her thumb down the side of Glinda’s face. “I’m here.”
Glinda’s eyes fluttered shut. They remained silent and for a moment Elphaba thought she would finally reach out to her for comfort.
But instead Glinda stood. Elphaba’s hands fluttered to her lap. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I’m afraid I’m not feeling well.” She wiped tears from her eyes, angling her face away slightly, and then she hurried down the corridor before Elphaba could call her back. Elphaba could only stare after her, riveted in place by the memory of the pain in her eyes.
What in Oz had happened to Glinda Upland to cause her to break like that?
Unfortunately, Elphaba suspected there was only one person at Shiz who knew the answer
//
Everyone was in a good mood as History class started, discussing their plans for the upcoming weekend. It was a beautiful day, the air outside suffused with the last heat of summer. Dr. Dillamond had left a window open slightly to tempt a breeze. He had to call for order twice, but he was smiling. Clearly, he understood the pull of the outdoors as well as everyone else did. “Settle down, class.” Silent assistants began to hand back their essays. Elphaba received nearly perfect marks. Her heart rose a little higher with each of Dr. Dillamond’s comments: supporting evidence used shows a masterful use of material covered, insightful argumentation, impeccable paragraph structure. The only thing that blunted the edge of her happiness was Glinda’s empty seat near the back of the classroom.
“I’m pleased to note some progress,” Dr. Dillamond said, pressing a button under his desk to flip the blackboard over. “Although some of us still tend to favor form over content—isn’t that right, Miss Gli-i-inda?”
In the seat across the room from Elphaba, Galinda flushed. Elphaba saw her fingertips curl around the edge of her desk. “As I’ve told you numerous times before, Professor, it’s Galinda. With a guh.”
“Yes, Miss Gli-inda.” There was a chorus of titters throughout the room, though Elphaba couldn’t tell if they were laughing at Galinda or Dr. Dillamond.
Galinda shook her head. “No. It’s Galinda.” She gave the same derisive sigh Elphaba’s father used to give when Elphaba said the wrong thing at a public function, like he’d expected very little from her and he was still disappointed. “No other professor at Shiz has a problem pronouncifying my name.”
Elphaba could practically feel her teeth grind together. “Maybe Dr. Dillamond has other things on his mind than pronouncifying your precious name. And besides, maybe he isn’t like all of the other professors. Maybe some of us are different..” Like me.
“It seems the artichoke is steamed,” Galinda said, flipping a sheet of blonde hair over her shoulder. Next to her Pfannee and ShenShen tried to hide their laughter. But when she looked at Elphaba, her eyes had lost a little bit of their hard edge. She inclined her head slightly, as if conceding defeat—or at least a point in a match. Elphaba almost felt the corners of her mouth twitch up into a smile.
“Miss Elphaba is right,” Dr. Dillamond said, giving her a quick nod of thanks. “Goats lack upper front teeth. And, as may be apparent, I am indeed one of the last Animal professors here at Shiz. However, not so long ago, Shiz was a very different place.” He fired up his projector and began to show a series of slides: Animal professors teaching, Animals students studying in the library and sitting out on the quad side by side with human students. Elphaba didn’t think she’d seen any Animal students at Shiz at all, and the number of Animal professors was vanishingly small. “You couldn’t go very far at all without seeing a leopard solving an equation, or an antelope explicating a sonnet! But now, of course, things are different. Does anyone know why exactly things changed?”
Elphaba’s hand shot into the air. “From what I’ve read, it was the Great Drought?”
“Very good, Miss Elphaba.” Dr. Dillamond flipped the slide, showing a group of people leaving their homes with nothing but the clothes on their back and a pair of worn suitcases. “Crops failed. Food grew scarce. People grew restless, and then angry. They searched for someone to blame, and that blame landed on the Animals. They convinced themselves that Animals were hoarding the food or, even worse, causing the drought. They didn’t consider that the Animals might be just as hungry as they were, just as desperate for answers. But people fear what they don’t understand and Animals have never exactly been popular in Oz.”
And even after the drought was over, prejudice against the Animals had only solidified. In Munchkinland, they had generally been relegated to servants’ roles—and even then, her father had only employed a couple of them. Most of the Animal servants—like Dulcibear—had been working at Colwen Grounds since her mother was a child.
Dr. Dillamond turned back to the whiteboard. “Now, if you’ll examine this timeline—” He pressed the button under the desk again and the second board flipped, but instead of a timeline covered in Dr. Dillamond’s neat handwriting, angry red letters stared out at them. Animals Should Be Seen And Not Heard. The paint was such a dark red that it almost looked like blood, dripping down the side of the whiteboard and pooling in the chalk tray. For a moment, the room was entirely silent. No one talked. No one laughed. When Elphaba glanced around the room, all of the other students seemed just as confused and just as horrified as she was.
Dr. Dillamond took one step back and then two, his eyes never leaving the tall red letters. He knocked into his desk and a bouquet of flowers fell to the ground; the glass vase broke with a loud crack that made them all jump. “Who is responsible for this?” he asked, his voice shaking slightly. No one said anything. He raised his voice. “I said, who is responsible for this?” The silence deepened. No one opened their textbooks. No one took any notes. They just stayed silent, staring at the words on the board and then at each other. “Very well. Class dismissed,” Dr. Dillamond finally said. He wouldn’t look at any of them.
Most of her classmates packed up their things and left quickly. Nessa glanced at Elphaba, waiting for her to fall in step beside her, but Elphaba motioned for her to go ahead. Surprisingly, Galinda was one of the last people to leave. Elphaba would have thought that she would be one of the first people out, eager to avoid anything that might have been potentially distressifying, but she packed up her things slowly. She glanced at Elphaba every so often, the expression in her eyes inscrutable.
Elphaba waited until she was gone too before she went to Dr. Dillamond’s side. He had grabbed a rag and started to rub it across the painted letters. She knelt in front of his desk and set what remained of the shattered vase on top of it. Then she began to pick up the small pieces of glass. “Miss Elphaba, you don’t need to help me,” Dr. Dillamond said. “I assure you that I am quite capable of cleaning this up myself. It’s only paint, after all.” His voice trembled slightly. “You should go back to your friends.”
“That’s all right,” Elphaba said, picking up the largest pieces of glass and throwing them into the trash can. “I don’t have any friends.”
“Well, maybe just one.” Dr. Dillamond held out a hoof to shake. She took it.
The classroom door opened and Galinda walked inside. She carried a bucket of water and a couple of wet towels from the bathroom. Without a word she came to stand next to Dr. Dillamond and started to wipe away the letters on the other side of the board, beginning with the D in heard.
Elphaba didn’t think she would have been more surprised if the ceiling caved in. “What are you doing here?” she asked.
Galinda glared at her, which was strangely reassuring. Otherwise she might have been tempted to think that this wasn’t her roommate at all. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m helping.”
“Thank you, Miss Gli-inda,” Dr. Dillamond said. Galinda didn’t say anything, but Elphaba noticed that she didn’t correct his pronunciation.
They worked in silence, until the chalkboard had been washed clean and then cleaned again for good measure, and Elphaba had found a pushbroom to remove the last bits of broken glass from the floor. She hadn’t been able to find another vase, so she put the flowers in Galinda’s bucket until Dr. Dillamond could find some place more suitable. “Thank you girls,” Dr. Dillamond said as he placed the bucket on top of his desk. Elphaba noticed that the bucket was filled with poppies. “They’re my favorites,” he said, following her line of sight. “Poppies always make me feel cheerful, even in these trying times.”
“Me too,” Elphaba replied. Galinda didn’t say anything as she piled the dirty towels in one corner for the maintenance team to dispose of. “Are you sure you’ll be all right, Dr. Dillamond?”
“Yes, Miss Elphaba. It will take a lot more than a few words on a chalkboard to make me stop working at Shiz,” Dr. Dillamond replied, giving her the smallest of smiles. “You both should go now if you don’t want to be late for your other classes.”
Elphaba and Galinda walked back down the hallway in silence. Galinda’s book bag hit against her side with every step she took. “Why did you come back?” Elphaba asked, once she gauged that they were far enough out of earshot that Dr. Dillamond wouldn’t be able to overhear them.
Galinda’s hands clenched into fists at her side and then released. “I’m not a bad person, Elphaba.”
Elphaba nearly stopped in her tracks. Whatever she’d expected Galinda to say, it wasn’t that. “I never said you were.”
“You were thinking it. I know you were.” Elphaba didn’t say anything else, because she had in fact thought that. “I wanted to show you that I’m not.”
Elphaba still didn’t know what to say. “I didn’t think you would care.” Galinda certainly hadn’t seemed to care what Elphaba thought about her before.
Galinda crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t care if you think that I’m vain or selfish or self centered. But I’m not a bad person.”
“All right,” Elphaba said, because she didn’t know what else to say. She didn’t know how to square Galinda’s words with the girl she had spent the last month living with.
A minute passed. Two. Galinda glanced at the clock on the other side of the hallway. “You should get going if you don’t want to be late for Sorcery Seminar,” she said.
Elphaba couldn’t help smiling almost ruefully. Of course Galinda would know when she had Sorcery Seminar. There was another moment of silence. But even though she knew that Galinda was right and that she was most likely going to be late for class, Elphaba found she didn’t want to leave right away. There was still some tension between them, a sense of something unfinished. She hesitated for a moment before she said “I’m going to visit Dr. Dillamond after Sorcery Seminar, to make sure that he’s all right. Would you like to come?”
Galinda was quiet for a moment. Elphaba hoped she saw the olive branch that the words were intended to be. “Okay,” she said. “Where should I meet you?”
“In front of the school at 4:30?”
Galinda nodded solemnly. “I’ll see you then.” She turned on her heel and left, her blonde hair fluttering out behind her, and Elphaba found herself wondering what in Oz had just happened—and what she might have just signed herself up for.
The man in the seat across from her kept smiling at her.
Sarima studiously avoided him, but she could practically feel his eyes on the back of her neck as she looked down at the letter from Shiz. She already knew what it said, of course. She’d read it so many times that she’d committed every word to memory. She was the first recipient of the Emerald City Scholarship for Access to Higher Education. The Wizard himself would be paying for her room and board for all four years at Shiz and all of the books she would need for her classes, along with a monthly stipend for incidental expenses. All she had to do was keep her grades up. Sarima traced the two signatures at the bottom of the piece of paper: Amira Coddle, HeadShizstress; and Elizabeth Cartwright, Press Secretary to the Wizard of Oz.
“Are you headed to Shiz too?” the man asked her, resting his feet on the seat across from him. He was rich, clearly; his blue jacket was made of expensive fabric and his boots were shiny and new, although clods of mud currently clung to them. He was handsome too, with his artlessly tousled dark blonde hair and blue eyes that reminded Sarima of the sky on a summer’s day, when it arched high above the valley so there was nothing but blue in every direction. His light shirt did very little to hide the definition of his chest. Sarima looked away, but not before the man’s smile widened. He’d caught her staring. She felt her cheeks heat with anger at her own stupidity. She knew about men like him, the sons and cousins and nephews of the chieftains who made sport of seducing girls like her, showering them with gifts and promises and then abandoning them just as quickly, leaving the girls’ reputations in tatters. Of course, their own reputations were never damaged.
“The train is bound for Shiz, my Lord,” she said, staring fixedly down at her lap.
“It is?” he asked like he hadn’t noticed. “How nice. That’s where I’m supposed to go too.” He fixed her with a smile that might have made her knees go weak, if she had been any other girl and had any less to lose.
She knew that he wanted her to ask him why he was going to Shiz, but she was determined not to give him the satisfaction. “Are you traveling with anyone else, my Lord?” Preferably a wife? Or at the very least a fiancee?
“Call me Fiyero,” he said. “Tigelaar,” he added, when Sarima didn’t say anything.
“As you wish, my Lord.”
When he smiled, one corner of his mouth tugged higher than the other. “I’m traveling with a friend of mine. A Horse. He’s my chaperone, really. He’s traveling in the large Animal car, where he’ll be far more comfortable than he would be on one of these seats. And I thought I told you to call me Fiyero.”
“That would be highly improper, my Lord.”
He made a show of looking around the otherwise empty train car. Most Vinkans went their entire lives without setting foot in Gillikin, or any other part of Oz. “I won’t tell anyone if you won’t.”
Sarima knew what her parents would tell her—don’t make eye contact, excuse yourself, ask the conductor to find you another seat. Whatever you do, don’t listen to him. Societal boundaries exist for a reason.
Instead, she laughed. She certainly didn’t mean to, but it just slipped out because the entire situation was just so ridiculous. Vinkan princes did not, as a rule, go to Shiz. They certainly didn’t ask for anyone to give them anything less than their due. Fiyero’s smile widened. “Is that a yes?”
Sarima shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I won’t call you anything at all.”
He pressed a hand to his chest, raising his eyebrows in an exaggerated expression of hurt. He slid to the edge of his seat, turning until he was facing her with his feet resting in the aisle. “You wound me, Miss…?”
“Sarima. Arquezza. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“And you as well. So, what brings you to Shiz?”
Sarima glanced at her book bag, sitting on the seat beside her. It was a long train ride from Red Windmill, and she’d assumed she would have some time to get a start on her assigned readings. She was already coming in at a disadvantage, starting school nearly a month after everyone else. But Sarima didn’t complain. She knew just how important this opportunity was, and not just for her own future or her family’s. If she excelled at Shiz, perhaps the scholarship program would be extended. Perhaps other people like her, who wanted more than anything to further their education but didn’t come from wealth and couldn’t afford to pay the school entrance fees, would have the chance to achieve their dreams.
But Fiyero didn’t seem inclined to let her sit and read.
“I’m going to be a student,” she said. “It’s my first year.”
His eyes widened, just slightly. “You must be smart.”
She shrugged. “I’d like to think I am.” She could feel her cheeks heating, so she turned the conversation back to him. “What about you?” Maybe he was visiting a friend or relative nearby.
“The same,” he said. “I’m starting at Shiz as a first year.” She couldn’t hide her shock. He laughed. “You don’t have to look quite that surprised, Miss Sarima.”
“I just didn’t…you don’t look…”
He raised one eyebrow. “Eighteen? Nineteen? Twenty? I’m twenty two, I’m afraid. Between the two of us, this isn’t my first school. Or second. Or third. And frankly, I’m not sure I’ll last any longer here than I did at any of the others.”
It wasn’t uncommon to wait a couple of years before entering higher education; most of the incoming class would be nineteen or twenty, like Sarima. But the thought that Fiyero had been kicked out of school after school and yet his parents could still afford to buy his entry into Shiz sat uncomfortably with Sarima. She knew she had no margin for error. This was the only chance at university that she would ever get. She didn’t have the luxury to be careless. The entire exchange reminded her, as if she’d needed a reminder, just how far apart their lives were. By rights, they shouldn’t even be talking to each other—but the services between the Vinkus and Shiz were so infrequent that there was no use for a separate class segregated car.
But rather than telling this selfish, self absorbed princeling exactly what she thought of him, Sarima just said “How nice.” She pulled out her textbook, hoping he would take the hint.
He didn’t.
“What are you going to Shiz to study?” he asked, craning his neck to see the front of her book.
“Medicine,” she replied. “I’m going to be a doctor.” She’d always wanted to go to Shiz, but this was also the only way she could save her family’s apothecary. Her grandmother was a seventh generation natural healer, and she’d passed down her gifts to Sarima and a couple of her sisters. But the Emerald City was cracking down on natural healers now, calling them frauds and quacks. And certainly there were some who were willing to prey on the desperate. But Sarima’s family was different. Their powers were real.
“Good for you,” Fiyero said. She couldn’t tell if he was being sardonic.
“And what are you studying?”
He shrugged. “Not sure yet. I’m more of a student in the school of life, if you know what I mean.” Sarima didn’t, but she could guess. She pulled her coat a little more tightly around her. “I’m just there to have a good time, really.” Sarima gave him a faint smile, swallowing down the urge to scream at him. She knew it wouldn’t help. Life in Oz was unfair for the people who couldn’t afford it. Even the coming of the Wizard hadn’t changed that.
She opened her book and started to read. Fiyero took the hint, for a while. Then he leaned across the aisle and nudged her elbow with his. “Do you want to play cards?” He pulled a worn deck out of his vest pocket.
“I’m afraid I can’t,” she said, tapping the edge of her textbook with her finger.
“Come on. Just one hand.” He started to shuffle the cards together in his lap. “Take a break.”
She wanted to say that she couldn’t, because some people couldn’t just buy their way into Shiz. But she suspected he would keep needling her until she gave in. Maybe it was better to get things over with now, so that he’d grow bored of her and leave her alone.
He didn’t. They played round after round. Sarima didn’t mind it as much as she thought she would. In another world, a world where she wasn’t worried about someone like Fiyero taking advantage of her, it might even have been fun. Fiyero was a spirited player, but he wasn’t a sore loser (and he lost more often than he won). The rounds certainly made the miles pass faster, speeding them closer and closer to Shiz. Sarima was sure that when they arrived Fiyero would fall in with the other young men (and women) of his class and income and utterly lose interest in her, and that was as it should be. The alternative was far more dangerous.
The train was delayed at the Gillikinese border and by the time they arrived it was fully dark. They were the only two people standing on the platform, apart from a blue Horse who sauntered over to Fiyero. “I hope you behaved yourself,” he said, glancing between the two of them. Sarima’s cheeks burned as she hiked her bookbag higher over her shoulder.
“I was the perfect gentleman,” Fiyero said. “Wasn’t I, Miss Sarima?” Sarima nodded noncommittally. “Miss Sarima, this is Feldspur.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” the Horse said, extending one foot out in front of him and bowing deeply.
“And you as well,” Sarima replied.
“Well, we’ll be on our way to Shiz now,” Fiyero said. The light from the lamp on the platform backlit his hair. “Can we give you a lift, Miss Sarima?”
She was glad it was too dark for him to see the blush on her cheeks. It was a wildly inappropriate thing to even ask an unmarried woman he barely knew—but she wasn’t surprised, because Fiyero didn’t seem the kind of person who cared much about propriety. “That won’t be necessary. The HeadShizstress is sending a carriage for me.”
Fiyero made a show of looking around the darkened platform. “I don’t see it.”
Oz, he was insufferable. “I’m sure it will be here shortly,” Sarima said through gritted teeth.
“All right.” She waited for him to climb up on Feldspur and leave. He didn’t. Five or ten minutes passed. There was no sign of a carriage. It was cold. Sarima started to shiver.
She could feel Fiyero looking at her. “You should start heading to Shiz,” she said. “I’m sure you’re tired.”
“Feldspur and I are happy to wait here with you until your carriage arrives,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. His biceps were toned too—not that Sarima noticed. “Unless you would prefer to come with us.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
He rolled his eyes. “Miss Sarima, what kind of gentleman would I be if I left you standing out here alone in the cold, with no sure promise of rescue?”
“I’m hardly in need of rescue—”
He shucked off his jacket and wrapped it around her. She wanted to immediately hand it back to him, but she was cold and the jacket was warm. The scent of Fiyero’s cologne was suddenly everywhere. She was sure it was sticking to her blouse, sure that this wasn’t the right kind of first impression to make with him…but she was also sure she would start shivering again if he took it away. “So when are we admitting to ourselves that the carriage isn’t coming?”
“The carriage is coming. She said she was sending one.”
“Well, maybe she forgot,” Feldspur said. Fiyero chuckled. Sarima stepped on his foot and pretended it was an accident.
Another ten minutes passed. Fiyero sighed. He eyed Sarima’s battered suitcase. “Will you please come to Shiz with us, before you catch your death in the cold? Feldspur is happy to take both of us. Aren’t you, Feldspur?”
Feldspur nodded. “I haven’t lost anyone yet!”
“I’m afraid I can’t come with you unless you procure another Horse.” The thought of riding in front of Fiyero, his arms wrapped around her waist so that she wouldn’t fall, the heat of his chest against her back…it was too much. Too suggestive. It might give him ideas.
It might give them both ideas.
Fiyero was quiet for a moment. “Fine. You ride him. I’ll walk beside you.”
“Absolutely not. He’s your friend. You can ride. I’ll walk.”
“This is ridiculous. What kind of gentleman would I be if I let you walk?”
Feldspur cleared his throat. “With all due respect, it’s getting late and I for one am looking forward to a dry bed and something to eat. Miss Sarima, please get on my back. The Prince is perfectly capable of walking.” Sarima’s face flamed, but she didn’t protest. Neither did Fiyero. She tried to swing herself onto the Horse’s back, but Feldspur was significantly bigger than the pony her family used to make house calls. Fiyero had to help her up, practically lifting her onto Feldspur’s back. His touch was delicate, almost clinical; he didn’t touch her for a moment longer than necessary, and his hand didn’t stray anywhere it shouldn’t. Sarima knew that many men wouldn’t have been so disciplined. Too late, Sarima realized that she was still wearing his jacket.
They began to walk into the forest in silence. A wooden sign carved with the letters SHIZ marked their path, pointing into the heart of the forest. Torchlight flickered every few feet, but there were deep pockets of darkness in between them. Fiyero kept one hand on Feldspur’s flank to guide him and, Sarima suspected, also to keep her from falling off. She could feel the heat from his hand on the side of her leg, but his fingertips never strayed.
It certainly wasn’t the entrance she’d hoped to make at Shiz. But Sarima reminded herself that at least she was going to Shiz at all. When they got there, Fiyero would stop paying any attention to her at all and everything would be just as it should be. She could even ask Feldspur to let her off closer to the school, so she could walk in alone. All they had to do was get to Shiz without incident.
Surely they could manage that?