Page 177 of Out of Oz (The Wicked Years 4)

“Who called him? Who gets to place that call?”

“Now you’re being snarky. He called himself, of course. Are we done?”

The Lion walked away. He didn’t mind sashaying this time. So God talks to himself. Just like the rest of us do.

All the vendors had taken off during the first of the attacks and by now were either dead on the road amidst shreds of their favorite paintings or were lingering in some summer home waiting to hear news from the capital. The Aestheticum was boarded up. After some pounding and a couple of roars the Lion managed to raise attention at the loading dock. The thrice-bolted door was opened by that clubfooted society hostess from Shiz, Piarsody Scallop, with whom, however inanely, the Lion had once been paired in the press.

“I haven’t got room for another postage stamp,” said Piarsody, but when she recognized the Lion, she added, “especially from you,” and tried to close the door. Her clubfoot got in the way somehow, and Brrr barreled past.

“I’m not negotiating art, either purchase or sale,” he growled.

“You’re the only one in the city who’s not.”

He saw what she meant. The Aestheticum was jammed to the ceilings of the mezzanine with furniture, bibelots, treasured artworks, bolts of better tapestry, carpets. “It’s a madhouse warehouse,” said Piarsody. “People know high-end decoratives will come back, and they stash their valuables here until the first collector sniffs that the war is truly over and moves in for the firesale bargain. But we’re stuffed to the gills. I can’t move, I can’t do inventory, I can’t even see well enough to be able to tell what is good and what is better used to build a fire to cook my lunch.”

“I don’t care if you burn it all and have a really big lunch,” said the Lion. “I want the center of the hall cleared out by noon tomorrow.”

“You’ve lost your mind. I always knew you would,” said Miss Scallop. “A bit too high-strung. Back in Shiz they whispered that to me when you were in the Gents’. They will say it here, too.”

“I’ll help you. I can get others to help. We’ll shift everything to the motherhouse of Saint Glinda across the square, assuming it’s still standing. The war with Munchkinland is over, Miss Scallop, and the little buggers won.”

“Don’t they always?” said Piarsody Scallop.

All afternoon they sorted out antiquities. The better paintings could be hung over the railing of the mezzanine to grace the event. Some of the furniture could be packed drawer against door along the outside walls, under the balconies, slotted so thickly in place as to make a six-foot wooden henge. The rest of the stuff had to go.

Brrr roared himself into the cloisters across the square and commandeered them. The motherhouse had long been under the thumb of the Emperor, unlike the cenobitic mauntery in the Shale Shallows, and the women scurried to oblige, driven nearly mad with delight at having a part to play. The mauntery afforded plenty of space along the arcades to stash a museum’s worth of antique fussiness in home decor.

When the job was almost done, Brrr happened to back into an oak chest standing on its end. The lock sprung open and the lid popped, spilling the contents on the tiles of the mauntery floor. Included were no fewer than seven sets of jeweled shoes modeled after the famous set that Lady Glinda had given to Dorothy Gale once upon a time. The Lion threw all the shoes into the well in the center of the cloister garden. Any splash they had, they’d made a long time ago.

2.

For his work helping Avaric bon Tenmeadows to set up the council for peace, Sir Brrr, Lord Low Plenipotentiary of Traum, Gillikin, was invited to sit in attendance.

“I’ve come up in the world,” he told the meagres under the bridge. “I’m still small fry, but I could probably sneak a few of you in if you want to get a peek at history.”

“Busy. Sorry,” said Rain, in her new iron-hard voice.

“We have to do something useful,” explained Candle to the Lion. “With Liir’s death—we have no choice. It’s that or die.” The Goose, under the obligations of family loyalty, bobbed his head in agreement. He had never liked either Candle or Rain, but was now something of a retainer in their broken circle.

“As for me, I wouldn’t come within a mile of Mombey,” said Dorothy. “It was her court that convicted me of murder, remember. And even if I wanted to brandish that stupid testimonial of my character, it’s probably null and void under the new regime. By the way, Brrr, you risk being imprisoned for aiding and abetting a psychopathic criminal in her notorious escape from justice.” She batted her eyelashes.

But the Lion had lost too much, and gained too much, to be prey to the same worries that had bewitched him most of his life. Nor gone first, and now Liir. What else could they do to him? Really?

It was left to Avaric to plead the terms of the truce with His Sacredness who, rumor had it, was keeping comfortable in a bare cell in the prison of Southstairs. Living on water and celery, and approaching the mercy of a deeper aestheticism.

Avaric had to work to get the Emperor’s attention. Either poor Shell’s mind had snapped or he’d ventured further toward divinity than he may have intended. “It’s a bit of a nonstarter, some conversations,” Avaric said to Brrr. “But we’ll get there. Those creepy Ozmists are lifting little by little—even the dead can’t be bothered to haunt you forever, it appears that they have other things to do—and the dragons are camped on the Plains of Kistinga

me outside of the Emerald City to the north. Mombey can call them in again to move matters along if the Emperor proves unwilling to focus. On some level he knows this. He and his ministers are doing what they can to set matters right.”

“What are the preconditions of surrender?” asked Brrr.

“That’s confidential,” said Avaric, but when the Lion pinned him down and threatened to rip off his arms with a novel dental technique, Avaric changed his mind about confidentiality.

“No, no,” said Brrr. “I’m not interested in what the Emperor is giving up. I know what he’s giving up, and what was never really his to yield, either. What I want to know is what demands he is making of Mombey.”

“The niceties of military surrender are new to me, but it’s my understanding His Sacredness is not in a position to make demands.”

“Of course he is. He can refuse to yield unless Mombey offers something. And if you refuse to yield—”

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