Page 139 of Witch Queens: Tales from Oz

The Unicorners shuffled back as if they had been struck. Tails whipped angrily, and there were several snorts of indignation, but not one of them disputed Scarecrow’s demands.

I turned to my sister, “You and Steele gather the monkeys, we need to be on our way to Mount Munch.”

“You will ride with me, Indy,” Scarecrow demanded, in that dark voice.

“Aw, hell no!” Steele cursed, “I will be the only idiot to have to be carried by the damn monkeys!”

El smirked, “What’s wrong, Tin Man? Everyone deserves a chance to fly, don’t think of yourself as limited.”

Steele grabbed her and planted a rather heated kiss that had me looking anywhere but at them. By the time he sat her back down, she was swaying slightly.

“Together we are unlimited,” he growled and then stopped off in the direction of the monkey’s.

El turned to me with swollen lips and a gleeful smile, “I can’t help teasing him sometimes.”

“You are wicked,” I said grinning.

“So are you!” El laughed and ran after Steele.

I turned to Scarecrow. His back seemed impossibly high off the ground. How in the hell was I supposed to get up there?

As if reading my mind, Scarecrow bent his front knees and lowered his head.

“Climb on, Indy, time is getting late, we must move.”

I struggled to climb on and grabbed his mane to steady myself. I am pretty sure his eyes flashed, and I heard more than one curse.

Finally, I slipped into place just above where his wings folded in.

“You must hold tight, Indy,” Scarecrow was giving sound advice, but what he didn’t realize was that I was holding on for dear life.

I wrapped my hands into his mane, and my knees clutched his massive body. Leaning low I whispered, “Don’t drop me.”

He laughed, it was unusual, but it warmed me to my toes.

“Nothing and no one will harm you, Indy.”

“How can you be so confident?” I asked.

“The pool, it told me things,” was his cryptic reply.

“I hope that it told you how to defeat Dorothy and what we need to do to get you walking about on two feet again.”

That laugh again, “Perhaps it did.”

It damn well better have.

"I am sorry about your father."

I know that I could have waited until a better moment to tell him that, but it needed saying.

His back muscles tightened underneath my thighs, and I felt him stiffen.

"Do not be sorry," he rumbled, "I had figured that it was something of that sort. And if my plan goes as I want it to, he may have provided me the way for us to be together."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Indy, he gave his horn to be mortal. Maybe I can do the same, and we will live a normal life together. Have children and grow old, that is my dream. I want to be with you."

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