The Witches of Oz

Elphaba, when she wasn’t exhausted by out of the ordinary events, had been waking up at dawn for as long as she could remember – a useful habit when she was in the west because dawn came later and it was still dark. She pushed the blankets on her side of the bed away and started to slide out of the bed only to have Fiyero protest that it was too early to get up.

“The sooner we’re up the sooner we’ll get there,” countered Elphaba.

“Or we could just stay here until this time tomorrow,” suggested Fiyero.

“As good as that sounds,” replied Elphaba. “I think it will have to wait until a day when we don’t have anywhere urgent to be, don’t you?”

“Promise?”

“Promise what?”

“That we’ll spend a day together when we have nothing urgent to do,” clarified Fiyero.

“I promise,” agreed Elphaba, shaking her head slightly. “But only if you get up right now.”

“Contrary to popular rumour I am capable of being up before the sun,” grumbled Fiyero. “I just don’t like doing it if I can avoid it.”

“That explains a lot,” said Elphaba. Even though it was pitch black Fiyero had a strong feeling like he could see her raising her eyebrows sceptically.

While Fiyero was waking up Elphaba got up and lit the lamps so they could see what they were doing. She put on her most practical clothes, a second set of trousers and shirt, and as an afterthought decided to put her spare dress in the bag just in case. The decision reminded her that she was going to repack her bag and leave some of the nonessential items in Kiamo Ko.

Fiyero watched her with interest as she took an eclectic array of items out of her bag. First the Grimmerie was carefully set down on the dressing table, followed by a pair of silvery coloured jewel covered shoes that he recognised as belonging to Nessarose, then the artificial flowers he’d given her at the train station so long ago, a pair of the green tinted glasses they used to give out to tourists in the Emerald City, a small green bottle, a wooden comb, and finally a pink flower on a clip that he remembered her wearing the day he said she had been ‘Galindafied’.

“What are all these things?” he asked curiously as Elphaba packed a dress and spare socks into the bag.

“The important memories,” replied Elphaba in a wistful tone that turned sharper as she added. “Are you ready yet?”

“Nearly!” Fiyero assured her with a grin. “I just have to get something out of my bag before I get dressed properly.”

Elphaba nodded and picked up the comb to fix her hair while she waited for him.

“I don’t know if you know about Gillikinese customs but they have one that involves giving the girl, or woman as it may be, who is the object of your affections a stuffed animal – often in an unnaturally bright colour – to decorate her room with. While I was in my old room at the other castle I saw something that reminded me of that custom and made me think of you.”

He held out a nondescript item, made of material that was possibly grey, that might have been an animal if one squinted and held it sideways.

“I think it used to be a horse but it’s been in our family for years. From what you’ve said, and not said, about your family I figured you’d never had anything like this and… are you crying?”

If it had been anyone else Elphaba would have been offended by the fact that a stuffed blob of grey fabric reminded them of her. She was just about to tell Fiyero so when she offered it to her with the explanation that he didn’t think she’d ever had anything like that (which she hadn’t) and the thoughtfulness of the gesture made her start crying silently. She tipped her head forward so her hair would cover her face and shook her head in response to Fiyero’s question.

“You are!” he said, not believing her denial. “I’m sorry.”

To his surprise she chuckled through the tears and shook her head again.

“You don’t need to apologise,” she told him, wiping her eyes with the side of her hand. “And I certainly don’t mean to sound ungrateful! I was just surprised. Presents aren’t exactly something I’ve had a lot of experience with, except for my hat they’re all on that dressing table – my mother gave me the bottle and the comb, the glasses are from the day Glinda and I spent in the Emerald City a lifetime or so ago.”

“Tell me when your birthday is and I’ll give you a dozen presents,” promised Fiyero. “Only give me a hint about what they should be so I don’t make you cry again!”

“You don’t need to give me presents, Fiyero!” protested Elphaba, with a sniffling laugh. “Just being with you and knowing how you feel is the greatest gift I can imagine. Now stop stalling and finish packing!”

With a laugh of his own at her sudden switch from emotion to briskness Fiyero nodded and did as he was told while Elphaba finished tying up her hair then picked up her bag and the broom.

“Ready?” she asked him quietly.

“As I’ll ever be,” replied Fiyero, trying not to betray his nervousness at the impending broom ride and hoping that he wouldn’t disgrace himself by getting airsick.

As they left the room to go to the roof neither of them noticed that Elphaba had left the Grimmerie on the dressing table.

“We’ll land at the border,” Elphaba informed Fiyero some time later, he had no idea how close they were because he’d closed his eyes on the first turbulence they hit and refused to look again. “I’ll tell you when to open your eyes.”

“Why not in the forest?” queried Fiyero. “Wouldn’t that be safer?”

“I’ve read about the Quadling forest, there’s a sort of canopy of vines and branches just below treetop level, it would take longer to find a way through than it would to just land on some deserted section of the border between the forest and the rest of Oz,” explained Elphaba.

“Should have known better than to question the expert,” replied Fiyero cheerfully. He felt a sudden dropping sensation in his stomach and heard Elphaba tell him to open his eyes, which he did – just in time to see the ground rushing towards him at a speed that made it seem impossible that they would slow down in time. He was about say...well yell...something to that effect when suddenly they had landed, and in one piece too!

“Still in one piece, love?” asked Elphaba, entirely too cheerfully for Fiyero's liking. “That was exhilarating wasn't it?”

“Nauseating is the word I'd choose,” muttered Fiyero, stumbling slightly as he straightened up. “Flying should be left to birds and Witches in my opinion!”

“You’re quite welcome to walk home when we’re done here,” suggested Elphaba with just a hint of acidity in her tone.

“And be deprived of your company, what an idea!” declared Fiyero, instinctively diffusing a possible argument with humour. “Where do we go now?”

“I saw a house near the border as we came down,” replied Elphaba, ignoring his other comment. “I thought we could ask for directions.”

“Aren’t you worried about being... I mean you are rather...”

“Green?” offered Elphaba acerbically.

“Well I was going to say ‘recognisable’ but it amounts to the same thing.”

“We’re in Quadling country now and too far from what passes for civilisation here to come across anyone who cares enough for the Wizard’s laws to care who I am.”

Thinking back to the not too distant days when he was one of the Wizard's Guards Fiyero remembered that the Quadlings did show a great disinterest in anything that happened beyond their borders. Correctly presuming the conversation to be finished Elphaba set off in the direction of the house she had seen.

It was a rather rundown shack with an old man sitting on a bench in front of it.

“Good day to you, sir,” said Elphaba, in the widely used Ozian language as the man was very obviously not a Quadling – he had more of the look of a Gillikinese about him.

“Melena Hadar?” exclaimed the man, standing up to peer at her and widening his eyes as if it would clear them of the blindness that kept him from seeing more than shadows. “Is that you?”

“I am not Melena Hadar, sir, but I did know her. May I ask how you knew her?”

“Everyone around here knows about my Melena,” grumbled the old man irritably.

“I am not from around here, sir,” replied Elphaba, anxiously reaching out for Fiyero's hand and squeezing it tightly. “And I do wish, very much, to know how you were acquainted with her.”

“Acquainted she calls it? Ha! Young woman, I do not know who you think I am but I was ‘acquainted’ with her some forty-seven years ago when my wife, her mother, put her in my arms on the day she was born!”

“Oh!” gasped Elphaba, a single syllable of pure shock, as she stared at the relative she never dreamed was still alive. Fiyero was certain for a moment that she was going to faint, he’d never seen her look so pale before, that he moved behind her to support her.

Her mother’s father, he realised, catching the connection at last. She obviously did not expect to meet him here.

“Well what are you staring at girly?” snapped Kerrin Hadar, misinterpreting her shock. “Never seen a man who married a Quadling before?”

“No... I... well yes I have actually... but that’s not... I mean...”

“By the Unnamed God and the Blessed Ancestors girl! If you cannot speak a straight sentence kindly spare my ears your babble and remain silent!”

“Babble!” repeated Elphaba angrily. “I’ll have you know, Kerrin Hadar, I have never ‘babbled’ at anyone in my life and you are hardly imposing enough to make me start!”

“Who are you, girl, to speak to your elders that way?” demanded Kerrin, the thought of how she knew his name without being introduced not occurring to him. “Did your mother not teach you respect?”

“As much as she was able considering she died when I was five years old, sir,” snapped Elphaba, keeping her voice lower than her previous response only by a great effort. “I apologise for intruding on your time, I only wished to seek directions. I am invited here by the Sorceress of the South.”

“Why would Lady Kynahna want to see a hot-tempered girl such as yourself?” wondered Kerrin loudly. “All the manners of a Munchkin you’ve got, and that’s a precious few!”

“I beg your pardon for intruding on your time, Kerrin Hadar, though the meeting has been most enlightening. I will trouble you no longer but leave you to your solitude.”

“Your name before you go, girl,” he took a breath and attempted to moderate his tone. “If you would forgive the brusqueness of an old man who has been too long alone and before that too used to being around those who understand his nature.”

“I have scarcely been polite myself,” conceded Elphaba. “My mother did teach me better before she died and she would be ashamed to hear me speak so impolitely to you. Melena Hadar was my mother.”

“You’re one of Melena’s girls?” repeated the old man, looking so overwhelmed that Elphaba pulled away from Fiyero (who found the way they spoke to each other in a near identical tone quite amusing, easy to see which side of the family her temper came from) and hurried to give Kerrin her arm to help him stay upright.

“Which one?” asked Kerrin, trying to see her clearly and cursing the weakness of age that kept him from doing so.

“Her eldest,” she replied quietly. “Named Elphaba Liana, for your mother and hers.”

“And who is your friend?” asked the old man, seeing Fiyero for the first time.

“Fiyero Tiggular of the Arjiki, honoured sir,” answered Fiyero.

“A name is all very well but who is he to my granddaughter?”

“We’re acquainted for all of ten minutes and you’re using a possessive tone?” remarked Elphaba. “As usual I’ve made an impression very quickly. The answer to you question is...”

Here Elphaba paused hesitantly, not sure of the exact phrasing demanded by Ozian propriety, then she smiled and replied in Quadling.

“Yu adére.”

Fiyero’s heart skipped a beat as he recognised a Quadling phrase that Kh’ya had also used, years ago, it meant ‘My love’.

“Good,” said Kerrin simply, clearly the girl knew the exact connotation of the phrase she used and wouldn’t have said it unless she meant it. “Will you stay for a meal, Fabala, or is your business with the Sorceress too urgent?”

“Fabala?” repeated Fiyero curiously.

“Apologies, I forget which language I’m speaking sometimes,” said Kerrin. “I used to teach them to speak Northern but nowadays I find it easier to speak Southern than to teach.”

When no further explanation of the word was forthcoming Fiyero turned slightly and looked questioningly at Elphaba.

“Fabala is the Quadling variant of my name, as Aelphaba is the western variant.”

“That was my mother’s name,” interjected Kerrin. “Aelphaba. She was a princess of a Western tribe before she married my Gillikinese father, and part Gillikinese herself. But listen to me babble when I’ve offered you a meal.”

“I see your querthi tree has plenty of ripe fruit,” remarked Fiyero. “Why don’t I pick some while you and your grandfather talk?”

“Thank you,” said Elphaba gratefully, Fiyero grinned and set off back along the path while Elphaba and Kerrin went inside. “Typical Northerner attitude,” muttered Kerrin. “My tree indeed, as if a man can own a tree! Still I suppose you had better tell me whatever it was he thought you might not want him here for.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, now I see, haven’t been paired up long enough to notice these things? Well you’ll learn and so will he. Now, how are your sister and that Munchkin fellow your mother married?”

“That’s... a complicated story.”

“We’ve time,” remarked Kerrin with a shrug. “It’s a tall tree.”

“They’re both dead,” said Elphaba, speaking quickly because the pain of Nessa’s death was still an open wound.

“Well that wasn’t too complicated, must be the reasons for it that are the problem hmm?”

“The Governor, well the former Governor, Frex... my sister told me he died of the shame of having such a daughter as me.”

“What?” exclaimed Kerrin. “A clever pretty thing like you? I don’t believe it!”

Elphaba opened her mouth to question his visual acuity then, recalling that he actually was nearly blind or would never have mistaken her for Melena in the first place, asked a question instead.

“Didn’t Mother ever write and tell you about...me?”

“What that you weren’t the Governor’s daughter?”

“No,” replied Elphaba, and if Fiyero had been there he would have been surprised at her lack of response since no one knew that she knew Frex wasn't her father. “That I’m... she told you that?”

“Well of course, it’s nothing to be ashamed of here whatever they think up there. What else was there that she might have told me?”

“I’m not what one would call normal,” explained Elphaba, at first she was trying not to startle him but then she decided the direct approach was quicker. “My skin has been green since the day I was born and I’m a Witch, but she didn’t know that then obviously.”

“Green you say? What like apples or leaves or moss?”

“Like no other colour I've ever seen,” replied Elphaba, not offended by his curiosity because she knew he was trying to visualise what she had described. “And I looked at them all to compare at one time or another.”

“I did wonder what Melena was talking about when she referred to him she married not liking you because of your looks. Here I was thinking all this time that you took after your father.”

“No,” replied Elphaba firmly. “I can assure you I am nothing like my father.”

“Now tell me about your sister, what happened to her?”

“She ruled the Munchkins after Frex died...”

“I say, she wasn’t killed off by that Wicked Witch of East I heard tell of a little while back was she?”

“As a matter of fact I suppose you could say that the Wicked Witch killed Nessarose but the literal fact is something I still find hard to believe myself and I saw it. A house, caught in a twister, landed right where she was standing.”

“A house?” repeated Kerrin incredulously. “You’re pulling my leg, girly.”

“I most certainly am not!” snapped Elphaba. “I've never forgotten anything in my life and I’m hardly about to start with my sister’s death!”

“And you would have me believe that your sister just happened to be standing outside on the very day when a twister just happened to pick up a house and drop it on her head.”

“Grandfather or not, you just wait and see what happens if you continue to patronise me! Since you’re making such a point of disbelieving me I’ll have you know that that house did not ‘just happen’ to fall on my sister, she was murdered!”

“Blessed Unnamed God! Who goes around murdering girls with houses?”

“A rather wicked Witch,” replied Elphaba, quite aware of the irony of that statement. “She goes by the name of Madame Morrible, currently Press Secretary to the Wizard. She's already tried to kill me several times, first by pretending to teach me how to control my magic then with some more direct approaches.”

“Not like in the old days when people knew the government was corrupt but it functioned without all of this Animal hating nonsense that goes on now. Mind you opinions about Quadlings haven't changed, so far as any of us can tell, but some things never do.”

Kerrin stopped speaking and yawned loudly.

“Pardon my bad manners, I’m getting too old to sleep all night so I make up by sleeping during the day. Every time I wake up I’m hoping that I'll see my Liana but at the same time I know I won't. I made a promise to her, you see, before she went. I promised I’d wait and help Melena’s girl, I guess that means you since your poor sister is past mortal help. Don’t rightly know what sort of help she thought I could give you mind but it helps me put off facing the unknown. As I get older I get less sure that there will be anything there after I’m...gone. I was so full of my belief in the Unnamed God when I was younger, I was a missionary when I came here, and then I discovered Quadling ways and they made sense as well – if I think back far enough I can almost remember Liana showing me their ways were just as real as my God was to me but now I wonder if I didn’t just imagine it, maybe everyone was right about it just being an effect of the 'funny fungus' they eat down here.”

“It’s real enough,” Elphaba assured him, when the old man paused to take a breath and yawn loudly again. “I spoke to my mother, who died when I was five, barely a week ago.”

In that simple statement, made so simply but with such conviction, Kerrin Hadar realised why his dying wife had bid him wait – perhaps even then she had stood on the threshold of the place beyond and seen the woman their just born granddaughter would become.

“You’re looking at me so strangely,” remarked Elphaba. “Most people do that straight away...but not exactly like that, if I think about it.”

“I just realised the power you must have, such power for such a little bit of a girl, and I realised why I’ve had so many years – so I could tell you something you need to know. Freith Undahla – that's all it is, two words, but I can't tell you what it means because I don't know exactly myself. You'll have to ask a Quadling, any of them could tell you to some degree. Ancestors and Unnamed One! I am tired. I'm just going to lay my old bones down for a minute, you get some dishes out like a good girl won't you?”

“You can’t just...” Elphaba tried to protest his enigmatic hints about power and mysterious words but the old man was true to his word and fell asleep before she even finished the sentence.

“Get some plates out, indeed,” muttered Elphaba. "Typical Gillikinese male attitude for all that he's lived here for nearly fifty years!”

“He knew better, once,” remarked a woman, in the Quadling language. “But you can't trust them to remember anything if you leave them alone for too long.”

Elphaba turned around to see a Quadling woman standing in the doorway – a woman whose hair was a red so dark it was nearly black instead of the brighter red that was common to Quadlings. A woman who, when she moved, seemed strangely familiar yet unfamiliar. Then there was a feeling of certainty; she knew exactly who the woman was and why she was there.

“He's been waiting for you, Liana, you'd best not keep him waiting any longer.”

“You are perceptive, for one so young and untrained.”

“What did it mean? What he said to me, what you made him wait so long to say to me?”

“I can't tell you, I would but there isn't time, there are rules for some of us and I can only be here until...”

“Liana?”

Kerrin, no longer an old man but the young missionary who had first fallen in love with the Quadling and her country, stood up and crossed the room.

“Am I dreaming again or is that you?”

“It is I,” replied Liana. “Come say balhan shu déhe tardell to our granddaughter and let us be away.”

“We will meet again then?” said Elphaba quietly.

“Everyone does, one way or another,” replied Liana cryptically. “When you see Kynahna she will explain and you will understand more than you do now.”

“There's a map, in my kitchen cupboard,” added Kerrin, his voice seeming to come from a great distance to be drowned out by another voice calling her name and someone shaking her shoulder.

“Elphaba?” repeated Fiyero urgently. “Are you hurt? Can you hear me?”

“I’m surprised half the forest can't hear you,” muttered Elphaba. She blinked and the vision of her mother's parents faded away to be replaced by Fiyero who was looking at her from a strange angle. She blinked again and realised she was kneeling on the floor and he was crouching next to her.

“You were sitting so still, I thought you were asleep but your eyes were wide open.”

“Kerrin, he's...”

“Yes, I saw. Should we tell...”

“Someone brings him food, they'll find out soon enough, it can hardly be unexpected. And I think, I think we have to hurry.”

“Weren't we in a hurry before?”

“Well yes, but now I'm sure of it. He said there was a map...”

Elphaba stood up and started rummaged through all of the cupboards, huffed with frustration when she didn't find what she was looking for, then started on the drawers.

What she saw when she finally found and unfolded the map caused her to frown noticeably.

“Is something the matter?” asked Fiyero when he saw her expression.

“Not exactly...” replied Elphaba slowly. “It’s only that we're much, much, closer to the road leading to Qhoyre than I expected us to be – even with the strong wind from the west that hit about halfway here – and I can't help wondering if it was the doing of nature or if Oz's resident weather Witch has somehow found out where we are going.”

“Isn’t that just a little bit paranoid?” said Fiyero gently. “Bad weather can just happen.”

“Yes,” agreed Elphaba, after taking a deep breath and reminding herself that Fiyero meant nothing hurtful by the remark. “It can, but in this case I think it’s best to err on the side of paranoia and keep our eyes open for trouble.”

“It is strange that we ended up right near where we want to go,” agreed Fiyero, though he still thought she was overreacting, she knew Morrible far better than he did after all.

“It’s convenient for now though,” remarked Elphaba, rolling up the map and putting it into her bag.

Following her lead Fiyero left the house without a backward glance and the pair set off towards the nearby, red paved, road, which led into Quadling country.

Re variants of Elphie's name: you'll just have to trust me when I tell you Aelphaba and Elphaba are pronounced differently.

Quadling translations:

Querthi: a type of fruit that only grows in Quadling country. To compare it to Ozian fruits: it looks like an orange and tastes like a cross between a plum and a pear.

Balhan shu déhe tardell: literally “farewell for this moment”. Closest Ozian equivalent: “Goodbye for now”.

Yu adére: The literal translation is 'My love', the connotation is a lifelong partner – basically the Quadling equivalent of a husband or wife (incidentally Fiyero has never heard this explanation so his personal translation is 'the person I am in love with'...who can't wait to see the look on his face when he finds out that Elphaba basically considers them already married? :D)