15. Chapter 15
fifteen
Pae made another circle of light within the tight stone chamber, this one vertical and oval. It hung in midair like another mirror.
This one glowed the same vibrant violet as the last circle he’d cast. Unlike the one from the courtyard, this one showed a portal very much like how the mirror in the dining hall had. Instead of leading to Kansas, though, this one opened to rocky night-drenched terrain. Bright moonlight cast the smooth silver rocks in a slick and almost liquid shine. While the walls of rocks that girded a wide path shone like mercury, they reflected a slight iridescence, too, the way a slick of oil gleams in rainbow tones.
Dorothy, who had entrusted Toto to Nick, stood at the ready with a pair of guards flanking her.
Tucked under one of Nick’s arms, the dog continued to growl and snarl at Pae.
I stood to one side, not liking the idea of Dorothy going with Pae through the portal, either. When I’d offered to go with her, though, Nick had protested, citing how I could not go for the same reason he could not. He didn’t elaborate on that, but his wording sent me into myself, where my thoughts went on freefall.
Because what could he mean? Then again, what else could he mean?
Nick accepted the thought I could be Ozma. Or maybe he even knew I was. Perhaps he’d seen some evidence the way Morella had. The way Rye had. Or perhaps all Nick had needed to believe was Rye’s assurance.
He could not go through the portal because he could not leave Oz more vulnerable than the land already was. I could not go because, well… Questions and ruminations for another time.
“Do not take your eyes off of Dorothy,” Nick instructed the two guards he had summoned. Each nodded. Then the first of the pair stepped through Pae’s open portal. Turning back, the guard held a gauntleted hand out to Dorothy, which she took. Then she was through the portal. The second guard followed. After Pae bounded through, the portal snapped shut.
Panic lurched to life inside me with the suddenness of everyone’s departure and our helplessness to do anything should something go awry. Would we even know if it did?
I glanced to Nick. “You have a lot of faith in that cap.”
“My faith,” he replied, his voice again tense like before, “is in Dorothy.”
After that, there wasn’t much for the two of us to do. So, returning to Rye’s side, I traced his still and stitched features with my fingers, pausing to straighten his collar and smooth a wrinkle in his coat. Silly, superfluous gestures since, so long as everything went according to plan, he would soon be moved.
Nick paced, petting Toto with his free hand as he did, his metal steps creating a steady tromp. The dog, in response, reverted to whimpering and whining, giving voice to the nerves Nick and I were trying to hold under the surface.
Nearly an hour passed before the portal reopened and Pae leaped through.
“Ready for the stiff,” he said.
I swung away from Rye to face the demon. “She found the spring.”
“She found a glowing hole in the rocks,” Pae replied with a shrug. “But it reeks of Fairy magic, and I can’t go in so, I’d say it’s the spring.”
“You can’t go in because of the magic?” I pressed while Nick handed a reluctant and squirming Toto off to another guard.
“I can’t go into sacred spaces,” admitted the demon.
And what, I wanted to ask next, made the spring sacred, but Nick called to me.
“Tip.”
Carefully, Nick gathered Rye into his arms the same way he had collected his friend from the horse on that freezing and snowy day when the king and I arrived at his castle. I frowned at the sight. It was difficult to see Rye this way when, before, he’d always been so strong and self-assured. But, if we were lucky, if Nick was right about the spring, moments from now, Rye would be opening his eyes to Dorothy. And returning to his former self.
“Take his ring, would you?” asked Nick. “He would not want to lose it.”
I stepped forward and, finding Rye’s left hand, I located the ring—a bulkier match to mine. I slipped it from his finger. After that, there wasn’t much else I could do but stand by as Nick handed Rye through the portal—into the waiting arms of the two guards who then carried him toward where Dorothy waited at the small and glowing mouth of a cave.
The radiance ebbing from within the opening, which spanned only as wide as half a doorway, matched the phosphorescent glow of the Emerald City Palace, and that of Rye’s ring. The ring he’d had made for me also…
But then Pae darted out of the bell tower and through the portal again, which shut with a zip.
I clenched my fist around Rye’s ring and cursed in my mind at having the view ripped away from me. Because now both Dorothy and Rye were gone. Far, far away. Weeks away, Nick had said.
And the only thread holding either of them to us was a shifty, power-hungry demon—Morella’s former lover.
That adage Nick had alluded to—the one about desperate times—resurfaced in my mind as the seconds ticked by, growing long into minutes. And then those multiplied.
Just when the crushing fist of doubt squeezed my heart to the point of bursting, the portal snapped wide yet again. This time, instead of Pae, who stood waiting to one side, Dorothy filled its oval frame. Her simple cream dress, drenched from the waist down, clung to her curves. Tears streaked her face.
“What has happened?” demanded Nick.
“It’s not working,” she said. “He’s in the water, but…nothing’s happening.”
“The wound on his shoulder—”
“It won’t mend,” replied Dorothy, cutting Nick off. And that bit of information meant she must have uncovered the spot. And still, the waters were not doing their part.
But there was a reason that might be the case.
“Nick,” I said, “you told me the poison spread via the blood. The lack of circulation must be what stopped it. Rye bled when you extracted the arrow, but still, the poison obviously never dispersed—not any more than it already had before he became a scarecrow again. It can’t.”
“I think you’re right.” The thoughtful cadence in his voice told me his mind had leaped ahead of my words, arriving quickly at the conclusion I had. Which he spoke aloud in the next instant. “Tip has to go in.”
“She was the reason he got hurt,” Dorothy blurted.
The words landed true, finding their mark, and sliding between my ribs better than any knife.
The truth… Wasn’t it always sharper than any weapon?
I approached the portal.
“Stop,” ordered Nick. “I can’t have you both there. Dorothy, come back through.”
Dorothy hesitated, and then she obeyed, slipping back into the bell tower. I didn’t meet her gaze, and I didn’t wait for anyone’s say before I passed through to the other side of the portal, which Pae wasted no time in shutting.
“Let me guess,” said the demon through a surly grin, “she’s on your nerves now, too.”
I frowned. Though I couldn’t deny this, I didn’t want to give voice to that. Pae had already borne witness to so much. He also liked to show up when and where he wanted. And hadn’t he proven he could be invisible if he chose? He was an ally, technically speaking, but no matter what Nick had promised him, the arrangement was temporary. What would it take for the demon to sway to Langwidere’s side? Likely not much…
Nick had the golden cap, that was true. But surely Nick understood how allegiance—true allegiance—wasn’t something that could be coerced or bought. No matter the leverage. No matter the price.
I walked past Pae to where the two guards stood flanking the opening to the cave. They offered each other a quick glance, but neither tried to stop me as I ducked into the glowing opening and entered the cave.
More of the same rocks the Emerald City Palace had been built from jutted from the craggy walls, illuminating the space within in that now familiar and eerie green. With Rye’s ring still clutched in my hand, I climbed over more of the silvery, rainbow-slicked rocks, nearing the edge of a glowing pool.
Within the center of the pool floated Rye, his garments open at the collar, his eyes still shut, his expression as serene as it had been in the bell tower.
I climbed down from the short natural stoop of stones that separated the opening of the cave from the pool. And then, heedless to my own dress becoming soaked, I waded through the waist-deep water to Rye.
“Rye,” I said, because maybe I needed someone to talk to. “I need you to help me.”
My voice echoed against the stone walls as I rounded him slowly, coming to stand behind his shoulders, the water lapping with my movements.
“I need you to think about Oz,” I whispered as I tucked his ring into the neckline of my bodice. Next, I hooked my hands under his arms. My eyes went to that gash in his shoulder, and the sight of the wound, which still festered even though Nick had cleaned it, made me pause.
Because if I did this, what Nick fully expected me to do, what only I could do, and what seemed to be the only thing to do, the results could still be disastrous. Fatal.
If I returned Rye to his human form, the waters could sweep over the wound and extract the poison from his body. Or the waters could continue to be useless and, in returning Rye to his human form, I could doom him to a horrific death by helping the poison to spread.
But then, I couldn’t pretend I hadn’t already made up my mind.
I waded backward, drawing Rye along with me as I went, and the water deepened to just under my ribs. I lowered my face to Rye’s and whispered, “I need you back.”
Closing my eyes, I concentrated.
This time, perhaps because this desire—to have Rye back—was the strongest of all within me, the magic didn’t take long. In currents, it flowed through me. Maybe the catalyst for this ease was even the cavern—its ties to Fairy magic and its sacredness.
Rye grew heavy in my grip and, when he sank into me, I opened my eyes.
His face morphed, becoming human, those stitches unfurling into scars. His coarse black hair softened, clinging to his brow and face where wet. The exposed flesh of his collar and chest retained their gray hue since Rye happened to be a member of Morella’s race, a native of Winkie Country.
I waited, my gaze going from his eyes to his form and back again as I anticipated some kind of movement. Rye remained unconscious. So, I studied his wound, my heart pounding hard as I willed this to work—for Rye to open his eyes, for him to live.
The wound, blood-clotted and garish, ripped itself open, the coagulated infection disintegrating as though being eaten away by acid instead of water. Blood, dull crimson, oozed from the opening, the liquid thick with streaks of gray violet until it began to thin and go scarlet.
The poison… Had it left his system?
I stroked Rye’s cheek, but he refused to stir.
“Rye,” I called to him. “Rye, wake up.”
The wound started to close. Not only that, but the tissue surrounding the sore lost its darker and bruised charcoal hue. The area pinkened as the blood began to taper off. Then his skin knit back together and, smoothing, lost all trace of puncture. Not even a scar remained…
This time, when I checked Rye’s eyes, I found them open.
But instead of cold blue, they shone that sightless milky white—just as they had in my dream.
“Ry—”
I had no time to utter the entire syllable of his name. Not before Rye rose to his full height, seized me by the throat, and with strong arms, thrust me beneath the surface of the water.