Page 26 of Son of a Witch (The Wicked Years 2)

“SHE’LL BE THERE,” said Liir.

“Who? Where? Are you talking about Elphaba?” said the Scarecrow.

“Of course not. I’m talking about Nor. The girl I knew. Maybe my half-sister, if the Witch really was my mother and Fiyero my father, as some have guessed.”

“In Southstairs? A girl?”

“Can you tell me why not?”

The Scarecrow didn’t answer. Liir thought: Maybe he imagines that someone as insignificant to the mighty Wizard of Oz—a mere girl, no less—hardly merited imprisonment. Maybe he thinks she might as easily have been murdered, or tossed onto the streets to drift and starve. How long had it been anyway since she had been taken from Kiamo Ko? Two years? Three? But then Princess Nastoya had implied that Nor might have survived…

They had circled the canals a bit longer and found a place to berth underneath some rotting trees by the side of a pub. “I can’t stay with you for much longer, you know,” said the Scarecrow. “I only came to give you the Witch’s broom, and to wish you well, and to protect you from the clearing of Dirt Boulevard. I have my own path to follow. I would see you safely to the other side of the gates of this troubled city if I could. If you would let me.”

“I’m not going,” said Liir. “Not without Nor. Or not without finding out what has happened to her.”

At a crossroads, unwilling to move, they sat disconsolate.

“Look,” said Liir, at graffiti dashed sharply and sloppily on the pub’s side wall. It said HAPPY ENDINGS ARE STILL ENDINGS. “You’ve done your work, you’ve kept your word to Dorothy. I have the broom. But I won’t be ushered out of harm’s way. What’s the point? I have no happy ending—cripes, I’ve had no happy beginning, either. The Witch is dead, and Dorothy is gone, and that old Princess Nastoya has asked us for help. As if I could! Just because Elphaba would have!”

“You needn’t fulfill some promise Elphaba made. If you’re not her son, you have no obligation there.”

“Well, there’s Nor, too. Call it a promise to myself.”

The Scarecrow held his head in his hands. “The Tin Woodman has left to cultivate the art of caring. He has his work cut out for him, poor sod. The Lion is suffering severe depression; his cowardice was his sole identifying trait, and now he’s pitiably normal. Neither of them can help you much, I’m afraid. You should get yourself out of here while you can. Start over.”

“Start over? I never started the first time. Besides, it’s not getting out that I need to do. It’s getting in.”

The Scarecrow pushed a hand against his heart and shook his head.

“Into Southstairs,” said Liir.

“I know what you meant,” said the Scarecrow. “I’m not stupid. Now.”

“You’re the one I need to keep on my side—”

The Scarecrow interrupted with a brusqueness that might have been meant kindly. “Don’t bother to look for me. You won’t find me. Save yourself for someone you might recognize. I’m not in your story, Liir. Not after this.”

So they took their leave, with little fanfare or fuss. The friendship between them was no larger or more hopeful than the shape of a scorched broom, which Liir waved halfheartedly as the Scarecrow loped out of sight, once and for all.

The boy sat in the bobbing blunt-boat and listened to the sound of laughter spilling out

the open windows of the pub. The smell was of beer and vomit, and old urine splashed against the wall. The moon was invisible behind the clouds. The sound of a tentative waltz, beguiling and minor, hung over the stinking waters of the canal and the desolate boy there.

THE NEXT MORNING, Liir presented himself at the servants’ entrance of the town house he’d passed the night before.

“We don’t give handouts and we don’t need another coal shoveler, so get yourself out of here before I assist you with a boot in your behind,” said the houseboy.

“If you please, I’m not looking for food or work. Sir.”

The houseboy smirked. “Toadying bastard. Call me sir again, and I’ll beat the crap out of you.”

Liir couldn’t follow. “I meant no disrespect. I just want to know how I can get an audience with Lady Glinda.”

The houseboy’s sneer needed rearranging with a good swift kick, Liir decided, but when the houseboy guffawed, his voice was less hostile. “Oh, a simpleton. Pardon me, I didn’t realize. Listen, the very Margreave of Tenmeadows, Lord Avaric himself, hasn’t been able to get her ladyship’s attention. She’s got her hands full, what with the goings-on in the Wizard’s Palace. The people’s Palace now. Or should be. Or will be. What, you want to fling yourself in her lap and call her mother? More urchins have tried that already than you could fit on a barge and drown in Kellswater. Now get off with you.”

“Whatever mother I don’t have, it certainly isn’t her.” He held up the broom and shook it in the houseboy’s face.

“What’s that then?”

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