Page 13 of Son of a Witch (The Wicked Years 2)

“Shhh, I said!”

They shhhushed.

The downpour made a symphony. An undertone of susurrus—rain at mid-distance—accompanied the solo vocalists rounding vowels of rainwater—plopp—plopp—or, as Liir thought, of Auntie Witch, Elphaba Thropp—Thropp—Thropp.

“Did you ever notice how rain sounds like a domingon?” asked the Scarecrow.

The Lion put his paw to his mouth: Shhhh. His grimace was anything but fearsome; he looked like an overgrown child in lion pajamas.

Then they heard what he was hearing, and before they could do anything about it, a stone at the base of the statue of Lurlina was shifted to one side. Up from the earth poked the paw of a creature. A badger, a beaver? Something brown, whiskered, and sensible. A slope grite of some sort, larger than its valley cousin.

“You’ve some nerve, besmirching the memory of Lurlina with your prattle,” said the Mountain Grite. His jowls made a saddlebag flapping noise as he spoke.

“Nerve,” said the Lion. “I wish.”

“We’re merely sheltering from the storm,” said Dorothy. “May we have your blessing to stay here?”

The Grite bared an impressive collection of incisors and canines.

“What business is it of yours?” said Liir. “We’re not bothering you.”

The Grite looked around, as if assessing whether he might take them on all at once and get the better of them. Apparently not. “My digs, if you want to call it that,” he said at last, “are directly below. You’re a big heavy lot, and you’re going to collapse the walls of my lodging.”

“A bad place to build,” said the Tin Man, for whom the teeth of a Mountain Grite weren’t much of a threat. “An insult to Lurlina, actually.”

“Maybe, but I dig deep, and if the whole thing gives and you tumble in, you’ll starve to death down there. And the stink of your rotting corpses won’t appeal to the spirit of Lurlina, however beloved of the natural world she is said to be.”

“The storm can’t last forever,” said Dorothy.

The Grite came forward a little. “Quite possibly I have rabies, you know. Fair warning. I bite first and I don’t ask questions.”

The Lion sighed and removed himself from the makeshift tent. Out there, the deluge sloped on him like a fountain coursing over a sculptured lion.

“We’re not going to let some overgrown rodent chase us into the storm,” said Liir. “If you bite me, I’ll bite you back, and return your own rabies to you. Go away.”

“That’s a capable awning you have.” The Grite wrinkled his face. “My eyes aren’t what they used to be. What is it?”

“It’s a cape,” said Liir. “What business is it of yours?”

“That’s the Witch’s cape,” said the Grite. “I don’t believe it. Where did you get it?”

“I took it,” said Liir.

“More fool you. She’ll have your head before nightfall.”

“She’s dead,” said Dorothy. Smugly.

The Grite’s eyes bulged, and he pushed his face nearer to Dorothy, who flinched and drew back from him: He wasn’t an especially handsome specimen of his family. “The Witch is dead? Can it be true?”

They nodded, each one of them.

“Oh, the shock of it.” The Grite clutched his paws and worried them back and forth. “The shock of it! The Witch is dead?”

The wind itself answered in a kind of obbligato descant: The Witch is dead!

“Get out of here,” said the Grite in a colder voice. “Go on.”

“I thought you’d be glad,” said Dorothy.

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