Chapter Twenty-Three. Dorothy
TWENTY-THREE
Dorothy
Before visiting the fortune teller, I check on Toto and find him in the exact same spot I left him. He seems content to sleep the day away, so I leave him be.
Rook is waiting for me outside the inn. He’s leaning against the building, one leg crossed over the other at the ankle. He’s devouring a fresh peach.
“We just ate,” I say. “Are you still hungry?”
“I’ve been ravenous since you found me. I can’t seem to get enough.” He takes another bite and a bead of juice runs down his chin. He swipes it away with the pad of his thumb and sucks it into his mouth.
I need to stop looking at him. Everything he does is ridiculously sexy. Who would have thought eating fruit could be so damn hot?
We walk in the direction of the wizard statue.
It stands out over the city skyline like a beacon.
It doesn’t take us long to reach it. People are already gathered around the altar, lighting candles, sending up silent prayers.
I recall Ana telling me about the Cardinal Gods and their disappearance and can’t help but wonder if this altar might have once been dedicated to them.
On the opposite corner, a man stands beside a handcart calling out to the people passing by. “Get your Wizard of Oz wand here. An exact replica of the magical tool carried by the great and powerful man.”
I glance up at the wizard as we pass beneath his statue.
“Do you remember anything about this Wizard of Oz?”
Rook takes his last bite from the peach. “I seem to know him like I know childhood fairy tales.” He tosses the refuse from the fruit into a nearby trash can.
“More myth than man?”
“Precisely.”
We turn left down the next street, heading south on Olligan Lane, as instructed.
There are several shops and restaurants here and the street is busy. Was Glimming Hollow always this full of energy, or did the witch’s presence make them more subdued and only now do they feel free to roam and revel?
“Are you nervous at all?” I ask Rook as the sign for Henrietta’s Looking Glass comes into view.
“Not particularly. Should I be?”
“I don’t know. Maybe? What if you find out you’re a bad guy?”
His laughter bounces off the buildings surrounding us. “Do I seem like a bad guy, Kansas?”
“No. But then again, I haven’t known you long.” I look up at him, feeling small beside him even though he’s close to the same height and size of Edward.
“We have that in common. I haven’t known me long either.”
Now it’s my turn to laugh. And my laughter seems to amuse him.
We stop at the door to Henrietta’s shop. A hand-painted sign swings on an iron hook above us, the metal creaking.
“Ready?”
“Yes.” Rook grabs the brass door handle and twists.
The front of the shop is small and partitioned off from the back with a gauzy purple curtain that shimmers as it moves.
Our footsteps are silent on the thick handwoven rug.
Music plays through an old gramophone on a banquet table to our left.
Above it is hand-painted art that says HENRIETTA’S LOOKING GLASS in decorative letter work that reminds me of a circus.
Rook spots a brass bell on the banquet table and taps it with his index finger.
The bell chimes out.
“Coming!” a voice says from the back.
A few seconds later, the curtain pulls open and a woman appears. She’s wearing denim overalls over a ruffled burgundy blouse. Two long braids hang over each shoulder. Her hair is the color of summer corn with subtle streaks of gray.
Edward and I once visited a fortune teller at the harvest festival a few years back. I didn’t really believe in it and neither did Edward, but it was fun to entertain the idea that someone might shed light on our future when all of it felt so impossibly open.
I can’t remember the woman’s name, but she wore a billowy shawl embroidered with crystal balls. Giant topaz earrings hung from her ears, and she wore three gold necklaces layered one on top of another.
She was much older with crow’s-feet wrinkles and hands that were spotted with sun damage.
She told Edward he was meant to be a successful businessman and me that I was meant to have five children.
It didn’t escape me that Edward got a career and I got a domestic role, as if any woman’s highest aspiration was to be a mother.
I had plenty of friends who did want that, and I didn’t fault them for it. But deep down, I doubted that path was right for me. And the thought of admitting to anyone that I didn’t want children made me feel guilty and maybe even ashamed. As if being childless was somehow a betrayal.
Edward had been the true skeptic when we walked into that tent, but he was a believer when we walked out. Of course he was, he was getting everything he wanted.
I chose not to believe that fortune teller.
Will I believe this one?
She’s unassuming in her appearance, as if she’s not trying very hard to be believed, leaving it up to the customer to make the judgment.
And somehow that makes me trust her more.
“Hello,” she says. “What can I do for you?”
I nod at Rook. “He has no memory of who he is.”
The woman scans him. He stands still, hands in his pants pockets as if he’s delighted to be a specimen. “And you wish to find out who you are?”
“I’m open to learning,” he answers. “If you’re able to shed some light.”
“Of course. I charge a hundred cuts per reading.”
I grimace. “Oh. Right. I’m sorry. We don’t have any—”
Rook pulls his hand from his pocket and reveals a roll of coins. The woman takes them.
“Follow me.” She disappears behind the curtain.
“Where did you get that money?” I whisper.
“Do you want to know?” His eyes glint in the diffused light of the shop.
Is that some kind of challenge? Is he suggesting I don’t want to know?
“Maybe?”
“That sounds like a question, Kansas, not an answer.” He winks at me and slips through the curtain.
I huff out in frustration. This man is surprising me around every turn.
Do I hate it?
Edward was easy. I always knew what he was thinking. I always knew what he wanted. I always knew what to expect.
With Rook, everything is unpredictable. I can’t seem to get a concrete read on him at all.
Do I hate it? I don’t think I do.
If this is a challenge, then I aim to take it.
I part the curtain and follow in his footsteps.
There are no windows in the back of Henrietta’s shop. She has lamps dotted around the long, narrow space and string lights hanging overhead. More gauzy fabric is strung through the open rafters. Fabric in purple and emerald green.
“Come have a seat.” Henrietta gestures to the two chairs opposite her.
Rook and I sit.
The table between us is draped in purple silk. There are several snags in the material, causing it to pucker and stretch.
A cone of incense burns in the center, placed on a glazed ceramic tray with a moon stamped into the clay.
How long has it been since the people of Oz saw the moon? And does their moon look like ours? Am I really to believe I’ve traveled to another world?
There is no other explanation for the odd things I’ve witnessed here. The Witch of the East subduing me with her wand. The Witch of the North appearing out of thin air. The slippers disappearing only to reappear in Em’s onion cabinet.
I can’t wrap my head around Oz existing in the same place Kansas does.
“Give me your hand,” Henrietta instructs, and places hers on the table, palm up.
Rook glances at me. I spot the first flicker of hesitation on his face. He’s serious now, his earlier cavalier attitude gone in a flash as he stares down the possibility of the truth.
He reaches across the table and places his much larger hand in Henrietta’s.
The second they touch, Henrietta’s eyes close and she inhales, long and low.
“So how does this work?” I ask.
“Shhh!” Henrietta warns.
I clamp my mouth shut.
Rook gives me a look like we’re two naughty children who were caught stealing apples from the cart.
“You’re a long way from home,” Henrietta finally says, her eyes still closed.
“Am I?” Rook asks.
Henrietta goes quiet again. I fidget in my seat.
“You have an enemy,” she says.
Rook and I share a glance. That goes without saying. I did find him beaten and bloodied and tied to a pole, after all. But I wanted to assume it was the Witch of the East responsible for it. Henrietta said you have. Present. And the witch is dead.
“Who is this enemy?” Rook asks.
The thin, colorless line of Henrietta’s brow sinks, the skin furrowing over the bridge of her nose. “Oh dear,” she says on a breath.
I lean into the table. “What?”
“I see the Tinman.”
I’ve heard that name.
“The Tinman wants you dead, but he’s not searching for you. It’s almost like he … he loves you and hates you. So he does not want to find you, but he’s not far either.”
I glance at Rook. “Do you know him? The mercenary?”
“It would seem so.”
“Are you … together?” I ask.
“No,” Henrietta says. “Not that kind of love. There’s no fire to it.” Her eyes snap open. “This is the kind of love that grates. That chafes. That cuts you open and takes parts out.” She stares at Rook. “Doesn’t it?”
“I’ll have to take your word for it.”
She adjusts in her chair, tightens her grip on him. “You’re on a journey, one you’ve been on for a very long time, but now it’s different.”
“I’m about to go on a journey to the Emerald City,” I say.
Henrietta considers this. “I do see travel, but I’m not sure that’s what this means. This feels more like a spiritual journey. You’re searching for something that has been kept from you, or have you kept it from yourself?”
“His memories?”
“No.” She shakes her head, her gaze faraway as she tries to decode whatever it is she’s seeing and feeling. “A soul.”