Page 51 of A City of Emeralds and Envy
I settle the red goggles over my face and try to close one eye—but I can’t. Both my eyes are pinned open somehow—by magic, I suppose.
Terror stabs through my gut as a bone-chilling laugh unfurls from the cat, echoing through the infinite hollows of the hall as his form changes. His catlike limbs vanish, sucked into a single dancing orb, a blazing star a thousand times brighter than the sun. It sears my eyeballs and stabs blades of white light deep into my eyes, into my brain. I scream, agonized. I scream and scream, while my world blackens, until the only thing I can see is that malevolent white star burning and burning in my mind.
“Enough!” Alice’s voice explodes through my screams.
The star winks out, leaving me in darkness.
I try to recall images, colors. A scarlet poppy. West’s wicked green face. The pages of the Tama Olc.
But there is nothing. I can remember the names of things, but I can’t form mental images to match them. The god-star didn’t just steal my sight—he stole my memories of sight as well.
“You chose wrong,” whispers a velvet voice at my ear. “Use your wish. Ask me to return what I took from you.”
Tears race hot down my cheeks, pouring from my sightless eyes. I don’t want to use the wish for this. But I have no choice.
I open my mouth to speak the words—Return what you took from me—but Alice cries out, “Think first! Choose your words carefully.”
Heart racing, I form the wish, and then I speak it aloud. “I beg you to return my sight and my memories, just as they were before I saw your glory.”
“Clever woman.” The voice sounds disappointed. “Very well.”
My sight flashes back, revealing the throne room with all its colors, contours, and edges.
The Green Wizard stands directly before me, tall and sharp-faced and green from head to toe, dressed in a suit with a long tailcoat. He tosses and catches a small, thick book—the Tama Olc.
He took it from my pocket while I was blind. If I’d wished for him to return what he took from me, he’d have given the book back instead of my sight.
I glance at Alice. She’s pale as death, and her right eye is pink with strain, laced with broken blood vessels, but she seems to have her sight in both eyes. With her timely warning, she saved my sight as well.
I owe her for that.
“The Tama Olc cannot belong to you,” I tell the Wizard, “unless—” I can’t quite remember the conditions, so I turn to Alice.
“Unless you steal it and keep it for a night and a day without the owner’s knowledge, or unless it is freely given, or unless the owner dies, in which last case you must wait a year before using it,” Alice says.
“A human who knows every condition of use for this arcane spellbook.” The Wizard examines her with interest. “A human who chose correctly from the chest, and witnessed my true form without blindness. Most intriguing.” He tosses the Tama Olc carelessly back to me, and I tuck it into my pocket again as he nods to Alice. “You have two wishes, human. Make them quickly, before I change my mind.”
“I wish for my friends, Caer and Riordan, to be returned to their former selves, alive and whole as they were on the day before they came to you and made their wishes—with all their memories from before that day and since then.”
The Wizard tuts. “That’s a very complex wish. And since it involves two individuals, it counts as two wishes.”
“That’s not fair,” I interject—but the Wizard whirls, his gaze swerving to me, and it’s a force more ancient and terrifying than I can bear. A compulsion to worship him overcomes me, and I nearly crumple; but Alice catches my hand again and moves closer, supporting me.
“Very well,” she says. “My wish stands, and I agree that it shall count as two wishes since two Fae are involved.”
“I will restore your friends to their previous forms.” The Wizard traces his lips with a gleaming emerald nail. “But since you did not specify how long you wanted them to remain as their former selves, the restoration shall be temporary, lasting for only four days.”
“You wretched motherfucker” is what I intend to say, but the sense of awe in my mind reverses the words, and they leave my lips as, “Most glorious and generous lord.”
“Why thank you.” The Green Wizard turns away from us, and his body begins to dissolve, to disappear. “I believe our business is concluded.”
Alice is weakening—I can feel her body trembling. But she pulls herself upright. “There must be something I can do for you,” she says calmly. “Something you want, as payment for making their restoration permanent.”
“Something I want?” The Wizard turns back around, solidifying again. “As a matter of fact, there is. Something I can’t retrieve myself, due to—unfortunate circumstances. But you could get it for me. Yes… yes, I think we have a bargain. Complete two tasks for me within the next four days, and your wish shall be permanent.”
“What are the tasks?”
“Kill the Wicked Witch of the West, and bring me his scrying stone.”
