“You will have a place here if you stay,” Oz tells him. “Come to me tomorrow and I shall give you a place here that will be here for you whenever you might take it.”
“What about Dorothy?” asks Nick, “How is she to get back to Kansas?”
“We shall have to think about that,” replies the little man. “Give me two or three days to consider the matter and I’ll try to carry you there. In the meantime, I shall treat you as my guests, and while you live in the palace, my people will wait upon you and obey your slightest wish. There is only one thing I ask—you must keep my secret and tell no one I am a fraud.”
We agree not to tell anyone of what we’ve learned and return to our rooms, and all I can think of is how relieved I am. As of now, leaving is not an option. That old con man can’t get me back to Kansas any better than I can. I’m staying, and I couldn’t be happier. It feels like a weight is lifting and an entire realm of new possibilities are opening to me. I can imagine a life here with Nick, and yes, we have a war to fight, but I’ve already killed two Vampire Witches and a zombie army, a ton of vampires, while Nick has killed so many evil night creatures I bet he couldn’t even count. With an army behind us, we can win.
“Dorothy,” Nick says, “if he cannot send you across the great desert, I want you to return to Winkie Land with me.”
“I would love it.”
“Before that, perhaps we should venture to finding the Witch of the South. She may help us find a way back for you,” he says.
“No, Nick, I want to stay,” I say.
“I may not survive. We’ve been over this.”
“If you die…” I say and stop, terrified of this prospect. It breaks my heart. But I am happy to know I may have no choice but to stay with him.
“If I die and you cannot return to Kansas after we have exhausted every possibility, then I want you to return here and stay with Ardie in the Emerald City. It is still the safest place in all of Oz at the moment.”
“All right,” I sigh.
“Promise me,” he says.
“I promise,” I say.
“Call the Vampire Bat Monkeys to you again using the cap and have them carry you here,” he says.
“I will,” I promise.
“If Oz and the witch of the South cannot help us return you to your realm, and you return with me, I want you to marry me. I am not asking you yet—I will do that more formally if the time comes, but I want you to know…” he stops and sighs, “I hope that you can travel home, but if you cannot, I want us to live together honorably,” he says.
“We are together honorably now, aren’t we?”
There is nothing dishonorable in what we have. We’re still young and just being with him is enough for me. But maybe it’s a difference in our societies. No one expects to get married at seventeen. It’s usually out of necessity when that happens. But he’s already been engaged once and he’s only nineteen, so I guess it is different here. And if I’m honest with myself, I’d love to be his fiancé.
“I do not want you to think I wouldn’t marry you because I would, gladly. First though, I want to make sure there is no way back to your realm. I believe there will be. I do not want to get my hopes up that you will be my wife. Above all, I want your safety and it would be selfish of me to ask you now. Do you understand?”
“I do,” I tell him, and he kisses me, and I kiss him right back.
We spend the night the way we have spent every night we have been here together, but this time I have hope it won’t be our last. Maybe it will even be the beginning for us, of a life together as soulmates. By my society’s standards, I’m young to get married, but with him it feels right. In my soul I know we are each other’s destiny, so even though this realm is monstrous, even though we both could die at any moment, I still don’t want to leave.
Now we know Oz is a fraud, we know he has no way back for me, but in exchange, a happy future awaits me on the horizon. I can see it clearly—I will be his wife, his queen, and we will lead the Winkies into a battle to rid this realm of the bloodsucking pestilence that plagues it. When we’re done, together we will build a life here in Oz, and I couldn’t think of a finer fate.
25
The Emerald Balloon
The next morning, we meet for breakfast in the palace gardens. Members of the court eat breakfast out here every day at little emerald tables in gazebos. Nick and I watch them from our balcony and make fun of their trivial drama—it’s like the Real Housewives of Emerald City out here.
There’s so much spectacle amongst these people. Constant gossip and jealousy and affairs, everyone trying to outdo each other. My boots give me super hearing and listening to their conversations is like watching reality TV—everyone gets worked up about nothing at all in particular and they somehow make trivial crap so high stakes you have to laugh. Jellia was right when she said they have nothing better to do all day than to talk to each other. High society in Emerald City exists, and it comprises shifters and zombies and humans all trying to be the best. At what though, I’m not quite sure.
Unlike everyone else around here, no one talks at our table—they’re all too disappointed to carry on a conversation. Although I’m as silent as they are, I am thrilled I have to stay. Part of me wondered why Gayelette’s hat told me to come here, but I think I needed this journey to realize coming to Oz was a blessing in disguise.
If I hadn’t ventured here, I’d never have met Ardie or Werelion or Nick, and each of them are one of the three biggest reasons I want to stay. Not to mention, Toto has never been this happy before—the hunting and constant socializing is so unlike our life in Kansas—Toto is far happier here than there, just like me. With these boots, I’m not that scared of monsters anymore. Maybe that’s naïve of me, but I feel confident about it. I’m happy to stay here, but Nick doesn’t seem thrilled to have me stay, and I can admit it hurts.
A palace soldier approaches our table. “The Great and Terrifying Wizard of Oz will see the zombie and the shifter in four minutes in the Hall of Mirrors,” he says, turns, and walks away.
“Congratulate me. I will get my meal card,” Ardie says and huffs, dissatisfied with the lack of a cure as he rises from his seat at the table.
“I like you as you are now,” I tell him.
“You will like me more when I am living again. I will find a cure. Until then I will eat brains here at the restaurants throughout the Emerald City. Off to the Hall of Mirrors,” he says and goes.
“And I must go to collect my courage!” Werelion says before he gets up and charges out after him.
After a few more minutes of eating a slow breakfast in silence, I say, “Are we just going to sit here and mope or what?”
“What?” Nick asks with his brows drawn together in confusion.
“Are you that miserable to have me stay?”
“What? No. Well…” he says and sighs.
“Gee, thanks,” I say and snort.
“I need you to be safe, that’s all.”
“Right,” I sigh and continue to eat my breakfast in silence while he stares at his plate, distraught.
About fifteen minutes later Ardie returns looking pensive and I can’t help but eye him with curiosity.
“Are you all right?” I ask.
“Yes. Along with the meal card, the Wizard gave me a brain to consume, said it belonged to the wisest man in all of Oz. The man passed away fast, from a fall, and they put his brain on ice, frozen for later to feed to a worthy zombie, and he felt I was that zombie. Before today I had never eaten a human brain and I do not know why it surprised me to discover how much it differs from eating the brain of a baser animal. Although I hate to say it, human brains are far more satisfying. For the first time in a long while, I am not hungry, but I will not start consuming human brains now—do not worry. The man whose brain I consumed was a true wizard—not like Waldy—and I feel wise indeed, smarter, as if I know everything.”
Werelion returns, bounding into the garden, scaring the courtiers.
<
br /> “Hello!” he says with so much joy it makes Nick and I chuckle.
“What happened to you?” Nick asks with a light laugh.
“The Wizard gave me a drink of what he called liquid courage. It tasted something awful at first, but by the second bottle, I grew to like it. Now, I feel very courageous and without fear!” he says, and I laugh to myself. I wonder what it was. Whiskey? Vodka? Something strong I’m sure. Nick looks to me with a knowing smirk.
“Congratulations, Werelion,” I say, and he beams with joy.
“Ardie, let us go find that werecougar. I should like to try out my newfound courage on her,” he says, and I giggle.
“May we bring Toto along, Dorothy?” Ardie asks and Toto jumps up, excited to go.
“Yes, you may,” I say, and they all go out into the city together leaving Nick and I behind to mope at the table and stare at our plates.
“Would you like to go out, Dorothy?” Nick asks.
“Would you?”
“Only if you do.”
“The only thing I want to do is spend time with you,” I admit.
“As do I, but I would like to discuss our plan.”
“What plan?”
“For what we will do from here.”
“All right.”
Maybe it’s good to think ahead, but I’m enjoying the possibility of being with him forever. Although he insists I leave even when there’s no way back because it appears the thought of me staying makes him miserable, and I can’t help but question what’s real between us. All I want is to be with him while all he seems to want is for me to leave and never return.
“After we hear from the Fraudulent Wizard, if there is no way for him to transport you back to your realm, we must journey to the South. It will be another long trek, but I believe the Witch of the South should have a solution for how to return you to your realm.”
“So, on a lark, you want to go on another crazy long journey for how long while you leave Winkie Land unattended for Quelala to just come in and take it back over?”
“Not on a lark—it is most certain if anyone can help, it will be Glinda.”
“How can you know that?” These people seem to be full of it. If they could travel from realm to realm they would, wouldn’t they? Why stay here with so many murderous creatures roaming about?
“Unlike the Wizard, she is not a fraud.”
“When I met Gayelette, she didn’t know how to get me back home. Instead of directions or any kind of information that might transport me to another universe for a second time, her hat turned into a tablet that told me to come here to see the Wizard—a wizard that isn’t even a real wizard. That hat said the answer would lie here, and it was wrong.”
“Well…” he starts and thinks on it for a moment, then says, “Perhaps then Waldy will have a solution, but if he does not, we will travel to see Glinda, the Witch of the South. Glinda is clever and kind whereas Gayelette is a Slayer Witch is far fiercer. Gayelette’s goodness is also questionable, considering she is to blame for the plague, in part.”
“How so?”
“Gayelette did not handle Quelala’s turning well and his ambition began this plague. She raised him to be ambitious. He was seven years of age when she found him, and she raised him to be her husband and her king.”
“Seven? The King of the Vampire Bat Monkeys said he was fifteen. Not that it’s much better but at least he’d gone into puberty. Seven? Talk about a pedophile,” I say disgusted.
“What is that?”
“A person who is attracted to children,” I explain.
“Ah, yes. Well, it would seem that is what she was. Although she did not act on her attraction until he was older, and when he came into manhood, she prepared him to marry her.”
“That would mean she’s a sick psycho. Are you sure it’s not just rumors?”
“Quite sure.”
“How can you be?” I ask and silence follows.
“Because she told me.”
“Gayelette?”
“Yes.”
Huh.
“Well, she’s beautiful,” I say, sure he had a thing with her.
“Yes, she is.”
“Just spit it out,” I say, tired of his clipped answers.
“Fine, she… likes me.”
“I can’t imagine you haven’t taken advantage of that,” I say with a knowing smirk.
“Yes, I have slept with her.”
“Okay,” I say, wanting more information. Just leaving it at, ‘I’ve slept with her,’ doesn’t cut it.
“Gayelette may look young on the outside, but she is tens of thousands of years old, and I did not want to continue with her, so she tried to spell me to love her, but it didn’t work,” he admits.
“What?” I say, quietly fuming.
“Glinda, who I have also met once, charmed me so she could not. Glinda did me a favor. She is kind, and wise, and is not a fan of Gayelette’s ways. Because I was only fourteen, she pitied me.”
“Wow, she’s gross.”
“Gayelette wanted me to… take Quelala’s place. It was an appealing offer, with all of her riches and strength, but she did not love me. I am attractive to her, and she would have continued to take other men. I did not want that kind of relationship even when I was only fourteen. And my mother was still alive at the time and very much against it. She was the one who contacted Glinda, suspecting Gayelette may try to enchant me.”
“Your mother was a smart woman,” I say, peeved by that sick witch. “Gayelette was strange when I met her—I noticed something off about her straightaway—and I find it curious she got so pissed I got the boots and she didn’t.”
“Quelala learned it somewhere.”
“Yeah, we will not go to Gayelette for help. Although she gave me all those weapons,” I say.
“Of which you did not need and did not use.”
“I used the flamethrower and the holy water, but the boots do it all. And I used some swords and stakes, and the rope. The rope was the most useful thing in that bag other than the flame thrower, but as far as weapons go, the boots have it all built in,” I shrug.
“That they do,” he smiles.
“Nick, I am so sorry she did that to you. You were so young.”
“Well, I wasn’t sorry then,” he smirks.
“Was she your first?”
“No. Nimmee was. I was very young. Thirteen. Nimmee was older than I was, and she let me,” he says and shrugs.
“Can’t blame you for that,” I giggle.
“Gayelette was a woman, and it was very… exciting for me. She was a powerful witch, beautiful, but up close her age is plain.”
“I saw that. Her eyes—”
“Yes, her eyes are old, severe, but her body is also… mature,” he says with a raised brow.
“Dusty snatch?” I say and his eyes widen before he guffaws.
“Oh, Dorothy, I love you so. You are unlike any woman in the entire realm. I will miss you something terrible when you go,” he says.
“Maybe I won’t go. Maybe I’ll stay,” I say and shrug, and he smiles but with a warning in his eyes.
“It is far better for you to go. You know it is true.”
“Do I?”
“You do,” he insists. “If I am gone, will you want to be here?”
“No,” I admit.
“Right—no, you would not—so you must return which means we will exhaust every prospect before we consider you staying as a possibility.”
“No marriage plans just yet?” I tease.
“I cannot entertain it—I will already be heartbroken enough when you go,” he says and my heart hurts at the thought.
When I caress his cheek, he presses his beautiful face into my palm.
“If we can find a way to be together, and safe, can we take it? Please?” I ask brimming with hope and he smiles at me.
“It would be a dream come true. Unrealistic, but a dream come true.”
The same palace soldier approac
hes our table.
“The Wizard requests to see you both in the Hall of Mirrors,” he says.
“Now?” I don’t want to leave just yet. Maybe never.
“Yes,” the soldier says and Nick nods to me. We rise and head out, following the soldier through the palace to the Hall of Mirrors.
We enter, the massive doors close behind us, and Oswald is there.
“Although I don’t have the faintest notion which way Kansas lies, I think the first thing to do is cross the desert and then it should be easy to find your way home.”
“How can I cross the desert?”
“When I came to this country, it was in a balloon. Since you also came through the air, carried by a cyclone, I believe the best way to get back will be through the air. Now, it is beyond my capabilities to make a cyclone, but I’ve been thinking the matter over, and I believe I can make a balloon.”
Yikes.
“How?”
“With silk that we will coat in glue to keep the gas in. There is plenty of silk in the palace, so it will be no trouble to make the balloon. In all this country, there is no gas to fill the balloon with though.”
“If it won’t float, it won’t do us any good.”
“True, but there is another way to make it float. Fill it with hot air! Hot air isn’t as good as gas, for if the air should get cold the balloon would come down in the desert, and our demise would soon follow.”
“We? Are you going with me?”
“Yes, I am tired of being a fraud. If I should go out of this palace, my people would soon discover I am not a Wizard, and then they would hate me for having deceived them, so I stay shut up in these rooms all day and it gets tiresome. I’d much rather go back to Kansas with you and be in a carnival again.”
“Well, considering I can’t fly a hot-air balloon at all, having you there would help.”
“I figured,” he says with a smile. “Now, if you will help me sew the silk together, we will begin work on our balloon.”
“Uh, I can’t sew,” I say with a light laugh “Maybe I can do a basic stitch, but not well enough to pull off what you’re talking about. We’d go down in the desert for sure.”
Dorothy In the Land of Monsters Page 41
