The Wicked Will Rise

TWELVE


“Well, someone’s a sleepyhead,” Glinda said brightly. For a split second, I wondered if it could be Glamora, Glinda’s twin sister. But no: I’d spent enough time with Glamora when I’d been training with the Order to know that this wasn’t her. The differences were subtle and obvious at the same time. The tightness of her chignon, the shade of her lipstick, the way her eyebrows were overplucked until they were barely there. The hardness in her gaze and the muscles twitching in her clenched jaw.

But it was also the fact that she had a thick, jagged scar stretching from her chin to the bridge of her nose—the chunk that Mombi had talked about taking out of her face had been stitched up, but the evidence was there to stay.

I jolted straight up, and felt my knife materialize in my hand, which was under the covers and out of sight.

My head was spinning, still numb and heavy from sleep. Was it too much to ask to wait until after I’d had my first cup of coffee in ages to tangle with a psychotic sorceress? I inched backward in bed as I tried to size up the situation.

“Oh, darling, relax,” she said. “I come in peace. Really.” She raised her perfectly manicured hands in the air as if to say See?

In a pale pink linen pantsuit with a large diamond pendant dangling at her just-this-side-of-tasteful décolletage, she looked fresh, perky, and utterly nonchalant, the perfect picture of kindness, poise, and sophistication. Other than the scar. I hoped she was embarrassed about it.

Even now, after everything I knew about her, I had to remind myself that this Glinda was nothing like the kind, generous sorceress I’d grown up reading about. This Glinda was a cold, calculating psychopath who probably ate babies for dinner. The only thing the one had in common with the other was a true passion for all things pink.

It was tempting to try to rush her right there—to jump up and take her out once and for all. But I had to play this carefully. With someone like the Lion, you could stab first and ask questions later. Glinda was too smart for that. She wouldn’t just waltz in here and expect me not to attack her, and as casual and vulnerable as she appeared, she had to be ready for a fight.

Oh, she would get a fight all right. But I wasn’t going to play straight into her hands. I had to be sneaky. I decided to bide my time until I had a real plan.

Unless she attacked first. Then I would fight her with everything I had.

“I hope I didn’t wake you,” she said airily. “You looked so peaceful sleeping. The beds are glorious, aren’t they? I had them special ordered from a group of Nomes in Ev who’ve been making them for centuries. Best sleep you’ll ever get outside of the Emerald City. Even Dorothy’s jealous. I daresay you must have been tired, though—you slept all morning, afternoon, and then clear past the night again. Not that I blame you after all you’ve been through.”

I looked her straight in her luminous blue eyes. “What do you want?” I asked coldly.

“Oh, I just wanted to check in and see how you were doing. Maybe clear a few things up. You and I got off on the wrong foot, and I’ve been hoping you, Her Royal Highness, and I could all try a do-over. There’s really no point in fighting, is there?”

Shit, I thought. Ozma. I’d been so startled at the sorceress’s sudden, unexpected appearance that I’d forgotten all about the princess. I glanced over to her bed, hoping she was safe, and saw that it was empty. Double-shit.

Glinda shook her head with a smile, reading my mind. I mean, maybe she really was reading my mind. If Gert could do it, why not Glinda?

“Don’t worry about her, she’s been up for hours,” Glinda said, gesturing to the far corner, where Ozma was standing with her back pressed to the wall, half hidden by a large potted fern. She was white-faced and silent, watching us. “We had a nice long chat. Of course, I was doing most of the talking. She is a quiet one, isn’t she? A shame, really—she used to have such spirit! All Dorothy’s fault, of course.” She sighed. “I don’t know what I was thinking, bringing that spoiled little brat back here from Kansas. What can I say?” She shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. Who knew that a simple farm girl could go and make such a hash of things?”

I barely heard what she was saying—I was too busy calculating my options. I couldn’t help being annoyed that I had been put in charge of protecting a fairy princess who probably had more raw magical power in her pinkie finger than I would ever be able to wield, even with years of practice, but didn’t know how to use it. Ozma should have been a valuable ally, but she was really no use in her current state. Even Pete—who couldn’t use magic at all—would have been of some help.

As soon as his name entered my mind, an idea came to me. Pete. I hoped that wherever he was, he was paying attention right now. I hoped he was ready to think on his feet.

I let my knife vanish from my hand and stood up, just to see how Glinda would react. I felt her eyes following me, sizing me up as I walked casually to the breakfast table. She didn’t move from her seat.

I took my time as I poured myself a cup of coffee and took a sip. I won’t lie: even under these circumstances, it tasted pretty incredible.

“See?” Glinda said, registering my obvious pleasure. “Don’t you feel better now? Finest coffee in all of Oz.”

How dumb did this witch think I was? Did she really think that she was going to win me over with some coffee and this Little Miss Sunshine routine? Was she trying to win me over, or was she just messing with me? As crazy as it sounded, I actually got the feeling that she thought she was a lot slicker than she was—that she was so used to people falling for her bullshit that she seriously thought I would fall for it, too.

I filed that away as a potential weak point I might be able to use against her someday.

For now, I just had to keep her talking. “How’d you find me?” I asked. I had already figured out the answer to that question, but I figured she didn’t know that.

Glinda gave a lilting, melodic laugh.

“Oh, Amy,” she said. “This tent belongs to me. I may not know exactly where it is, even now, but I can tell when it’s being used. That silly monkey who stole it from me has no idea that I can see everything that goes on inside it. And, my word, she does have some horrifying personal habits. Still, I try to check up when I see that someone’s in here, and as soon as I sensed that you and Little Miss Ozma had set up camp, I figured it was high time I pay you both a visit. It seemed like it might be good for us to talk woman-to-woman without Dorothy listening in. She can be so meddlesome, you know.”

Glinda prattled on while I was busy attuning my consciousness to the magical web that glimmered just under the surface of reality. It came easily now, and I realized that, in this state, I didn’t even need to be facing Ozma to see her. I just had to shift my mental perspective until I found where she was standing, behind the plant.

When I looked carefully, I could see Pete’s energy-form, too, hovering somewhere just behind her. I had an idea of what to do.

“Can you even fathom the nerve of her?” Glinda was babbling, enchanted by the sound of her own voice. “I said, ‘My dear, you simply must have an audience with the Nome King. It’s only proper.’ But does she listen to me? Of course not. She”—oh, shut up, I thought, tuning her out and focusing back on the web of magic around me.

Without wasting any more time, I reached out toward Ozma with a magical hand and yanked hard, and in one quick burst, Pete emerged from the princess’s body like a snake shedding its skin. I was getting good at this.

Glinda’s neck snapped toward him like an owl’s, seemingly disconnected from her body. Her eyebrows shot up into a confused arch; her lips formed a tiny O. Pete didn’t miss a beat. He handled it as perfectly as if we’d planned it out together ahead of time, and I knew that I’d gotten lucky—while Ozma had been standing there half catatonic, he must have been paying attention. He knew exactly what he had to do.

Without even the slightest hesitation, he dove forward and grabbed a glass bottle of water from the breakfast spread, then slammed it against the edge of the table with a crack. The bottle shattered, water spilling everywhere, and Pete spun around with more hatred in his eyes than I was prepared for. He leapt for Glinda, who hadn’t moved in her chair.

I only had a split second to act while he had her distracted. I called my knife back to my hand, blinked myself behind her, and as Pete came dashing forward brandishing a giant shard of jagged glass, I drew my blade—now slick with the darkest magic—across her throat.

Instead of slitting her throat open, all I did was ruin the upholstery of the chair. My knife slipped past the witch like she wasn’t there at all.

A look of surprise crossed Pete’s face, and he hurled the broken glass across the room. It whipped neatly through the air toward Glinda’s face in what should have been a perfect shot to take out her left eye.

No dice. The glass bounced easily off the back of the chair while she just sat there, completely unharmed.

“Oh, you two,” she said in a chiding tone. “There’s really no need to get so hot under the collar. Amy, I have to say I’m surprised at you. All that time at that little witch academy Mombi runs, and they didn’t even teach you to recognize astral projection when you see it?”

I moved slowly back around to face her. She raised an eyebrow and pressed her hand to her cheek in mock surprise. “You do know what astral projection is, don’t you?”

I didn’t answer the question. I felt dumb for not knowing what she was talking about and double-dumb that I had given her the opportunity to lecture me like a disappointing pupil rather than treating me as her most-feared enemy.

“My word. Well, I just don’t know where to begin. No, my physical body is not with you right now. Currently, my corporeal form is comfortably back in Quadling Country, deep in a mystical trance in my own lovely four-poster bed, where I am being carefully protected by my most trusted bodyguard. You, on the other hand, are speaking to my spirit form. In other words”—she gave me a look of incredulous disapproval as she swiped her hand back and forth to demonstrate that her fingers could pass right through her skull—“put the knife away, Amy. It’s not going to do you a lick of good.”

I was pretty sure she was telling the truth, for once, but I kept the knife out anyway, just to get on her nerves.

Glinda rolled her eyes. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Amy, don’t be a child. I came here to give you a simple message. A nice message. I don’t want to be your enemy. I’m done with Dorothy. I believe your goals and mine are more similar than you might think, and that we can work together. If nothing else, perhaps I might be able to teach you some actual sorcery rather than the bargain basement hoodoo that Mombi’s apparently been tutoring you in.”

“She was busy teaching me other things. Like how to kill witches,” I said.

“Well, how perfectly violent! As for you—” She pointed to Pete. “Remind me of your name again?”

“None of your business,” I said at the same time that Pete replied, “Pete.”

“Yes, of course. Pete. Imagine my surprise when I saw the Wizard transform you the other night. I spent a good several hours puzzling that out. A real head scratcher! I had a good laugh when I untangled it all. How could I have forgotten that I’d met you before, when you were an enchanted little boy with a little princess inside just bursting to get out. Of course, I thought I’d gotten rid of you when I disenchanted you all those years ago—didn’t imagine that you would hang around like this.” She tossed her hair. “No one’s perfect, even me. I think we can all agree on one thing at least: mistakes were made.”

“Get to the point, Glinda,” I said. She paid me no attention.

“And now, Pete, take a look at yourself. A handsome, virile young man with all the promise in the world, forced to live out his days trapped inside the thick skull of a nincompoop princess, while with every passing moment the delicate flower of your youth is losing its petals one by one. It’s just plain tragic. To grow old without ever getting to live?

“Rest assured now that Amy’s witch friends have been reminded of your existence, they won’t let it continue for much longer. Trust me. They’ll be looking to do away with you lickety-split, and won’t that be a disappointment for everyone?”

“The witches would never hurt Pete,” I said. “Mombi raised him.”

“You go ahead and think that, Amy,” Glinda said. “It’s sweet, really, the way you trust them. Never lose that sense of innocence, dear, it is so charming.” She stood and smoothed out her suit. “At any rate, I can see I’m getting absolutely nowhere with you two at the moment. My offer of peace stands, though. If either of you would ever have a yen to speak to me in the future—even if you just find yourself with a hankering for some company and a fine cup of coffee—you know where to find me.”

Her body—her “astral form,” I guess—flickered into transparency and then she was gone.

Pete and I just stood there. We looked at each other. It was obvious we were both thinking the same thing: what the hell was that about?