Chapter Text
The surface of the lake rippled as she knelt at its edge in nothing but her slip, her hands submerged in the cool water as she washed her dress. She moved the dark fabric back and forth carefully, watching as the dirt and dust that had gotten caught up in it the past couple of days came away. The setting sun in the distance painted the sky in the most beautiful shades of orange and pink – colours that reminded her so much of Glinda even after all this time – but she did her best not to think too much about that. Glinda was her past. Friendships were her past. She had made her choice after her confrontation with the Wizard that fateful day, and now she had to live with that choice.
She had settled on this place for its isolation. The dense woodland provided the cover she needed and the Animals surrounding her little hideout had become her early warning system. They were quick to alert her to any potential threat, meaning she had time to prepare her defences or go into hiding, and she was grateful to them not only for their support but also for the companionship that they offered her. They were the closest things she had to actual friends out here in exile. The only beings in the world that she was certain she could trust.
Once she was certain that her dress was clean, she wrung out the fabric before laying it out across one of the sun-warmed rocks to dry. She sat back on her heels then, giving herself a moment to just sit and look out across the surface of the water. It was so much quieter here. Quiter than it had been back at Shiz and in the Emerald City, but that was one of the things she loved so much about her home. Everything in her life had always been so loud. She had always been involved in some kind of chaos. Once, she had told Fiyero that she didn’t cause commotions, she was one, and she’d meant it. It was just nice that, way out here, things were quiet for once. Peaceful.
Moments later though, for the first time since she’d come out here, that peace was broken.
It was the rabbits nearby she noticed first.
They way they had paused mid-chew, their ears up and their bodies tense and alert.
She noticed the sparrows in the trees next.
The way the songs they had been singing all day suddenly cut off, replaced instead by sharp warning calls.
When she looked around, it seemed that every Animal in her vicinity was looking in the exact same direction. Toward the thicket of trees.
She felt her heart begin to race as she rose to her feet, her hand reaching for her hat next to her on the grass as though it would offer her some kind of protection. Deep down, she knew that if the Gale Force had succeeded in tracking her down then it would be over for her. They would have her surrounded and her broom was back inside, so it wasn’t as though she would be able to fly away from them to avoid capture. She would be taken back to the Emerald City by force, and there was no doubt in her mind that they would kill her immediately.
She took a tentative step forward, her eyes flitting back and forth as they scanned the shadows between the thick trunks.
That was when she heard it.
A voice that – even after all these years – she still knew so well.
“Hey, it’s alright. It’s just…just me.”
It was in that moment, as he stepped out from behind one of the trees with his hands raised, that she released the breath she hadn’t even realized she had been holding. It was Fiyero. He looked different from the last time she’d seen him. Slightly more aged, tired, his hair unkempt as though he’d raked his fingers through it more times than he could count. His eyes though…they were the same. She’d know them anywhere. They still held the exact same intensity that’d given her butterflies in their Shiz days. That had made her feel seen.
“Fiyero.” His name came out softer than intended. Part of her wanted to run to him, but her feet refused to let her move from her spot.
“I’ve been looking for you,” He told her, his hands still raised as he took another step towards her. “Every waking minute since you left.”
Suddenly remembering her state of undress, she wrapped her arms around herself – self-conscious – as a crease formed in-between her brows. “You have?” She asked him, keeping her gaze fixed on him as he lowered his hands and continued to advance toward her. “Why?”
He scoffed. “Why do you think? I had to make sure that you were alright. That you were safe. We all heard it back at Shiz. What Morrible said about you. I didn’t believe it for a clock-tick, of course, it was a load of…well, it was nonsense. I started searching for you that night and I didn’t stop. I’ll be honest, I didn’t think it would take this long to track you down, but that’s on me for underestimating you.”
Despite herself, she chuckled softly, dropping his gaze for a moment as she shifted on her feet. “You know you can’t stay. It’s not safe.”
“Which only makes me want to stay more,” He replied as he closed the remaining distance between them, coming to stand in front of her. He waited for her to lift her gaze back to his before continuing. “You don’t need protecting. I know that. You’ve proven that - being alone out here all this time. But I…I want to protect you. Elphaba, the Gale Force is increasing in number. They’re covering more ground every day, and soon enough? They are going to find this place. I don’t want you here alone when that time comes, and I don’t want you moving on again. It was difficult enough for me to find you as it was,” He fell silent for moment then before, after hesitating for a time, bringing his hand up and hooking his finger beneath her chin. “I can’t lose you a second time. I can’t turn my back on you now and go back to…”
“Back to the city,” She finished for him, letting her arms fall to her sides as she looked up at him. “Back to Glinda. How is she?”
He exhaled deeply through his nose. “You know what she’s like. As long as she’s adored by everyone? She’s fabulotious…”
“They have her under their thumbs, don’t they? Morrible and the Wizard?” She asked him. “There’s no way they’re letting her get away with knowing the truth about what happened at the palace. They’re keeping her silent, aren’t they? How? With status? Gifts? What is it?”
“She has her own headquarters,” He explained. “And the Wizard officially made her Glinda the Good.”
She nodded slowly. “So she’s working alongside him now. I know why she’s doing it…I mean, I can understand it…I just don’t-”
“Hey…” He directed her attention back to him. “You don’t need to worry about what she’s doing. About what any of them are doing.”
“But nothing’s changing!” She huffed, frustrated. “It’s been almost a year and nothing is any different for the Animals now than it was then!”
Without him even thinking too much about it, his hand moved to the side of her neck and he sighed gently as he ran his thumb along the underside of her jaw. “I’ve missed that,” He murmured, his eyes never leaving hers. “That fire in you. Your constant need to better things for everyone. Oz, it’s refreshing after so many months of…well…that. It’s probably one of the things I love the most about you, honestly.”
Her breath hitched in her throat at his words and she reached up, covering his hand with hers on the side of her neck. “Don’t say that.”
“Why not?” He frowned. “It’s the truth. It’s the first truthful thing I’ve said or done since this whole thing started.”
She shook her head. “You can’t. You can’t love me. You’re supposed to be in love with her. You chose her, Fiyero, remember?”
“Yeah, when I was young and stupid and thought that looks were all that mattered,” He retorted, stepping further into her so that the two of them were almost chest-to-chest. “I’m a different man now than I was back then. I look at the world differently, and you’re the reason for that. That day with the lion cub, I knew I’d chosen the wrong girl. I kept telling myself to just come out with it and tell you, but there was never a good time and then you left for the Emerald City and I didn’t want to do or say anything to hold you back from that. Then you disappeared, and I thought I would never get the chance to tell you. Now that I have, you’re not going to tell me not to say it.”
She had no idea what to say to that and – for the next few minutes – the two of them just stood there staring at each other in silence, the only sound to be heard being the sparrows in the trees and the rippling of the river. The next thing she knew though, he was leaning in and she wasn’t stopping him. The hand covering his at the side of her neck tightened its hold when she felt his warm breath against her face, and her eyes were barely closed a moment before he captured her lips with his. It was something of a foreign feeling for her at first. She’d never been kissed before – not once – and so she wasn’t quite sure what she was meant to do. Before long though, instinct began to take over, and she found herself kissing him back as her hand moved from above his and found its way to his waist through his shirt.
His arms moved to wrap around her as the two of them sank into the kiss, one hand coming to settle upon the small of her back through her slip while the other came up to tangle in her hair. The kiss remained soft and slow for quite some time, but then he flicked his tongue against her bottom lip in a silent request for entry and she granted it without fully knowing what she was doing. The sound that he made when his tongue found hers made warmth pool low in her belly, and she let out the quietest little gasp that he swallowed instantly with another kiss. The longer it went on, the more confident she found herself becoming, and she pressed herself against him a little more as both her hands made their way up his front and into his hair. Her fingers threaded through the strands with ease, pulling ever so gently.
“Yero…” She panted between kisses. “I don’t-”
“I know.” Was his only reply as he nipped at her bottom lip before capturing her mouth with his once more.
She still couldn’t be completely sure that they were making the right decision here, but – at the same time – she was sure of one thing.
Right this second?
She didn’t care one bit.
Inside her hideout a short while later, she poured some of the herbal tea she’d just made into a wooden cup and handed it to him before pouring one for herself and sitting down on the cushion opposite him. She said nothing for a few seconds, choosing instead to just sip at her tea as they shared little glances, but then she rested her cup on her knee through her dress and cleared her throat before speaking.
“You know, more and more Animals are leaving Oz every day,” She told him, her voice soft. “I try to stop them. I try to tell them that they need to stay and that there’s strength in numbers, but they’re scared and I don’t blame them. They know that the longer they stay here, the higher the risk. I just…I know what’s out there. Nothing. Nothing is out there for them in the Land Beyond Oz, and that worries me.”
He nodded, taking a sip of his own tea and running his thumb around the rim of his cup. “They don’t have quality of life either way.”
“Exactly,” She replied. “That’s why I need to do something. I need to try to make the people of the Emerald City realize that they’re being fed lies. They think he’s some saviour, but he has no real power. He doesn’t care about them. He doesn’t care about the Animals. The only thing he cares about is himself, and he’ll hurt and step on whoever he has to just to keep his little charade going as long as possible. I need to go back there. If I can make even one person listen to me, then that’s better than nothing. It’ll begin to create doubt, Fiyero.”
He shook his head. “No. If you go back there and they catch you-”
“They won’t catch me,” She assured him. “They couldn’t catch me at the palace, and they haven’t found and caught me in all this time. I know these woods like the back of my hand. Even if they did follow me, they wouldn’t get far before they got disoriented and had to go back. I know I can do this. I know I have what it takes to pull something like this off, but I need to time it properly for it to really work.”
“I think you’re being reckless…” He began, taking another sip of his tea. “But I know you well enough now to know you never listen to a word I say and no one can stop you once you have your mind set on something. If you really want to make a statement? I’m not meant to know this, but there are plans to announce my engagement to Glinda in a matter of weeks. I had no part in it – like I said, I’m not even meant to know that it’s in the works – and I was going to come forward and say I wanted no part in it, but if you need me to pretend then I will. I’ll go along with it, let the announcement draw a crowd, and then that gives you the perfect opportunity to put the message out.”
She felt her heart swell at his words. “You’d do that for me?”
“I’d do anything for you,” He chuckled, reaching out to stroke a strand of hair back behind her ear. “I just don’t want you putting yourself in danger. I already told you, the Gale Force is stronger now than ever and they’re out for blood. All they care about is capturing you, and when they see you at the celebration they’re not just going to let you get away. They’re going to come straight after you, you know that.”
“Of course, I know that,” She told him. “But I’m not worried.”
He sat there in silence for a moment, letting his thumb continue to run around the rim of his cup as he looked down into the liquid before turning his attention back to her. “What if I were to speak with Morrible and the Wizard? I could request to be made Captain of the Gale Force. All I have to say is that I’m as desperate to locate you as they are, and with my status? They’re not going to refuse me. If I’m there leading the charge, then I give the orders. It means that I can protect you without it being obvious to anyone that that’s what I’m doing.”
“And…and if you get found out?” She worried her bottom lip with her teeth. “If they figure out that you’re on my side, not theirs?”
“Then I’ll deal with whatever comes,” He shrugged before shuffling across the dirt floor towards her, coming to sit by her side as his arm went easily around her and he leaned in. “But I promise you this. No one will touch you. No one will hurt you. You’ll be safe. Always.”
On instinct, she leaned into him, letting her head find his shoulder. “I don’t like the idea of you putting your life on the line for me.”
“And I don’t like the idea of you putting your life on the line to make a point,” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “And yet, here we are.”
She smiled for a moment at that before it fell again as a thought crossed her mind. “What about Glinda? I…I don’t want to hurt her.”
“I know…” He murmured. “Me neither, but I can’t see another way for us to do this.”
Deep down, she knew that he was right. The celebration was the safest way for her to return to the Emerald City and get her message to the people there. With everyone so focussed on him and Glinda, she could fly in undetected and send her message before anyone really noticed she was there. By the time the Gale Force began to pursue her? She’d already be a safe enough distance away from the gathering.
“No, me neither,” She admitted. “This really is the only way, isn’t it?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I think so.”
“Then we’ll do it,” She told him. “It’s a plan…”
“You should go back.”
“I already told you; they’re not going to miss me for a night. I’ve been gone days before now, looking for you, and no-one’s noticed.”
Settling down beneath the blanket, she sighed as she brushed her hair back behind her ear and watched him get himself ready for bed. He walked around her hideout with such casualness – as though he truly belonged there – and there was just something about it that made her smile. She couldn’t take her eyes off him as he stood there near the entrance, the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to his elbows and his suspenders loosened and the top few buttons of his shirt undone. He was gorgeous, he really was, and now? He was all hers.
Once he’d removed his shirt completely, she watched him make his way over to her little desk area and watched as he picked up one of the many propaganda posters that had been made about her and she’d collected. His expression darkened almost instantly and it didn’t go unnoticed by her, not even with the space between them as his eyes moved over the horrid words written on the paper.
“I will kill them for this, you know that, don’t you?” His voice was low and dangerous when he looked her way again. “They can’t get away w-”
“Don’t worry about it tonight,” She shook her head, bringing an arm out from beneath the blanket and extended a hand in his direction. “You look like you haven’t slept in days. Come here. Come and lie down, and then you can be as furious about it as you like tomorrow.”
He rolled his eyes good-naturedly at her, but he did as she’d said and set the poster back down before turning and starting to make his way over to her. It wasn’t long before he was getting beneath the blanket with her, his arms wrapping easily around her and pulling her close as he made himself comfortable. His fingers ran lazily up and down the outside of her arm as she settled into his embrace, his lips resting against her temple as he allowed himself to just bask in the moment for a while. He’d never been so comfortable, he was certain.
“I meant it, you know,” He broke the silence eventually, his lips grazing her skin as he spoke. “When I told you I loved you earlier on.”
Tilting her head back against his shoulder to look at him, she let her hand come to rest upon his chest and her fingers stroked tenderly against the thatch of hair there. “I know you did,” She almost whispered, a lazy smile playing at her lips. “And I love you too. I really do.”
“I know I have to go back tomorrow, but Oz if I don’t want to…” He groaned a little over-exaggeratedly, tightening his hold of her and snuggling further down beneath the blanket with her. “I’ll just have to slip away whenever opportunity knocks and come and see you.”
She laughed quietly. “You’ll hear no arguments from me.”
“I’ll keep you informed about any and all goings-on,” His tone became a little more serious as he ran his hand up and down her back in a tender caress. “And you should be able to worry less about the Gale Force once I’m at the helm. I’ll steer them away from you. This place.”
“The only thing I worry about in regard to the Gale Force is what they’ll do to you if they find out the truth,” She reminded him. “Promise me you’ll be careful? I don’t want anything happening to you. Not now, after all this time, and not because of me. Promise me, Fiyero…”
He silenced her worrying with a soft kiss, his hand coming up to cup her cheek in its palm. “I promise. I promise I’ll be careful. Alright?”
She nodded, tangling her leg with his beneath the blanket and nestling deeper into his embrace. Once she was comfortable, she tucked her head beneath his chin and felt all the tension in her body slowly melt away when he pressed his lips against the crown of her head.
“Get some sleep,” He mumbled into her hair, keeping her in place against him with the hand resting on her hip through her nightdress while he tucked his other arm beneath his head. “I’ll still be here when you wake up. You can make me breakfast before my trip back.”
“Mmm…” She hummed; eyes closed as a smirk tugged at the corner of her mouth. “Keep dreaming, Tigelaar.”
Unable to keep from smiling at the sleepiness in her voice, he gave her a little squeeze.
“Night, Fae.”
“G’night, Yero.”
And, with that, the two of them fell into the first proper sleep they’d had in a long while.