The Wicked Will Rise

TWENTY-FOUR


“You were right,” Lulu told me as she approached. The rest of her monkey guard was hanging back, watching silently. “You told me we couldn’t just sit up there in the trees, waiting for bad things to come to us. We’d been ignoring the rest of Oz for too long—and now look what happened. When I heard there was trouble afoot in the city, this seemed like the best place to come. I had a feeling you’d turn up sooner or later. I guess you chose later.”

“What happened to Mombi?” Nox cut in. “Is she here, too?”

“Nope,” Lulu said. “She disappeared from her quarters last night. Don’t know where she got herself to, but there’s no time to worry about that.”

“What happened to the city?” I asked. “Where is everyone?”

Lulu let out a cackle. “Everyone? Everyone left, I figure. Or at least, everyone who hadn’t left when you and yours attacked the place. With Dorothy gone, and the city ruined, wasn’t much reason to stick around. And it’s not safe here. Doesn’t feel right. There’s something going on in the palace—something rottener than week-old herring.”

“I can see that,” I said.

“I don’t know what it’s all about, but I’ve sent in three separate patrols to check it out. Last I’ve seen any of them. But we have seen a few signs of life.”

My ears perked up. “Who?” I asked. “Who’s been through here?”

“Dorothy and Glinda passed through a few hours ago—zipped right over the top of the yellow brick wall in a pink soap bubble. Not quite as impressive as blowing the whole thing to smithereens of course.”

My stomach dropped as I looked around for signs of them. “Where did they go?” I asked. “We have to find them. Now.”

Lulu bared her teeth and narrowed her eyes. “Honey, don’t I know it,” she said. “But we monkeys haven’t just been sitting around on our heinies. The sorceress has been . . . dealt with. For now.” She gave an oblique glance toward her pistol. “Dorothy got away. Took Ozma with her and headed straight for her old haunt. The palace.”

“Did she say what she wanted?” I asked.

“What, you think we were making small talk? If you want to know what she’s up to, you’d better find out for yourself. You have a job to do, sweetheart. My people and I will protect the city. You’d better hop to.”

I clenched my jaw, with no idea where all this was heading.

“It’s that way,” Lulu said, stating the obvious as she pointed toward it. “Wish I had more time to catch up, but if you want my opinion, time’s already wasting. Good luck.”

I looked at Nox, who nodded back at me. The crowd of monkeys parted to let us pass, and we began to move on our way.

“If I were you, I’d head for the maze!” Lulu shouted after us. We were already gone.

“Now, I ask you,” Nox said. “What the hell is going on?”

I was pretty sure the question was rhetorical. Even if it wasn’t, I didn’t know the answer. All I knew was that something had brought us here, and that whatever was going on, the palace was at the center of it.

As we rushed through the abandoned city streets, the feeling of dread that was emanating from the center became more and more palpable. When I looked over at Nox, he looked almost sick.

“There’s something evil in there,” he said. “I can feel it.” He didn’t say it aloud, but he was staggering a little, slowing down, and I could tell that he was fighting with everything he had just to keep going. “It’s like it wants me to turn back,” he said.

I could feel it, too. And I could tell that it was evil. But instead of repelling me, that same feeling was pulling me closer, like there was a party going on somewhere nearby, and I was following the music. Like someone was cooking a delicious roast and I was a starving woman following the scent.

I didn’t mention that.

Nox put his head down and kept on moving.

Soon, we were there, and I saw exactly how grotesque the palace had become. It was covered in a slimy, filthy moss, and in place of the ornate, golden doors that had once served as the entrance, there was a kind of horrible sculpture: a gigantic, monstrous creature in bas-relief. Itlooked kind of like an octopus, but with more arms, and with a nasty, crowded mouthful of sharp, gritted teeth.

“What the hell is that?” Nox asked in disbelief.

I didn’t answer, because I had just noticed something even more disturbing.

Lying on the steps like a broken, discarded rag doll, his arms and legs splayed out in every direction, was the Scarecrow. His head was hanging limply, lolling off to the side. He didn’t look like himself.

“Shit,” I said. “It’s showtime.”

I summoned my knife, hoping to make this a fast fight, and screamed in horror at what appeared in its place: somehow, from out of nowhere, a black, hissing snake was writhing in my grip. Before I could drop it, it had wrapped itself around my arm, where it pulled its head back and unhinged its jaw, ready to strike me.

Without thinking, I sent it away, the same reflexive way I had learned how to do when I didn’t need my weapon anymore.

Nox was staring at me, his mouth wide open.

But I found that I wasn’t exactly surprised by what had just happened. “It’s this place,” I said. “The evil in here. It’s screwing with everything.”

We didn’t have the luxury to puzzle through it any more than that, because the Scarecrow was now moving. He sat up and looked at me with his painted-on little eyes and gave a weak grimace.

“Hello there,” he said, without any of the sinister menace I was used to from him. Instead, he sounded like someone’s weird, only slightly creepy uncle. “Do I know you?”

I saw immediately that there was something wrong with him, but it took a moment longer to actually see what it was. Then it dawned on me: his head looked misshapen and oddly deflated. Like there was something missing from it.

I was pretty sure I knew what that something was.

Without my knife to rely on, I felt a little bit unprepared, but I had other weapons to work with. At least, I thought I did. But when I tried to fire off a flame dart at him, all that came out of my fingers was a puff of noxious, green smoke that smelled like rotten eggs, and I realized with a sinking feeling that I wasn’t going to be able to rely on my magic at all.

Luckily, for now at least, it didn’t seem that the Scarecrow would be much of a threat. As I ran up the stairs toward him, he made no move to attack me or even get out of the way. Instead, he was just muttering something to himself. A spell, I wondered, reminding myself to keep my wits about me.

No, I realized as I got close enough to hear. It wasn’t a spell at all.

“And so the imp says to the toadstool . . . ,” he was saying. “No, wait. Let me start that again. Two young harlots and a fish walk into a . . .”

When he saw me racing for him, he looked up at me again, as if he was seeing me for the first time. “Did I already tell you this one?” he asked. His eyes rolled back, and his canvas head dropped to the side, where it flopped at his shoulder.

“I used to be very clever, you know! Everyone said so. I was even king, after a fashion. Now look at me.” With that, his painted-on face collapsed in a mask of grief and he began to weep silently to himself.

“Who?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

“Dorothy,” he said. “My dear old friend Dorothy. How could she?”

It was pathetic to see him—the cruelest and most terrifying of Dorothy’s companions—in such a state. But I didn’t feel sorry for him. How could I?

I grabbed him around the throat and picked him up, squeezing tight. His cross-stitched mouth let out a gurgling sound as he gulped for air. I squeezed harder, and then harder as he let out a gurgling noise. He flailed his stuffed arms, but didn’t really resist. If anything, he looked relieved.

Then, finally, his eyes popped open and he gave a final, high-pitched whimper as his stuffed body went completely limp.

However much he had been alive in the first place was a mystery and probably always would be. But whatever it was, that life was gone. I had killed him.

Before I tossed him aside, I grabbed at the loose fabric of his scalp, and yanked his head clean off.

Second beheading in one day. I guess you could call that a record, huh?

When I examined what had been his head, turning it inside out and dumping the stuffing onto the ground, my suspicions were confirmed. All that came tumbling out was some straw, a few cotton balls, and some loose change.

Just as I suspected, the Scarecrow’s brains were gone. Dorothy had already gotten them. Now she had a full set: heart, brains, and courage. But why? What did she want with them?

I tossed the Scarecrow’s head onto the ground like the trash that it was, and stomped on it for good measure.

“Whoa,” Nox said. At first I thought he was reacting to yet another act of brazen cruelty from me, but then he put a finger to his lips and said, “Listen.”

I didn’t hear it at first, but then, in the distance, from deep in the palace, I detected a rumbling sound. The ground beneath my feet began to shake, and as it did, the octopus statue before us came to life; its arms began to wriggle and its eyes began to glow with a nasty green light. Slowly, its mouth slid open, revealing an entryway just big enough to step through.

I glanced sidelong at Nox. I’d never seen him look so terrified.

“I guess we can take that as an invitation,” I said.