I clasped Star to my chest.
“Is there something wrong with my disguise?” I asked. It was something I’d been worried about since my run-in with Ozma, and if Pete could see through it, what was to stop someone like Dorothy or Glinda from realizing I wasn’t who I said I was?
“That’s not it,” Pete said. “Whoever cast the spell knew what they were doing. It will fool them all. Everyone except me.”
I suddenly remembered what they’d told me before I left the Order—that I’d have a handler in the palace, another one of the Order’s agents who would be keeping an eye on me. Someone to watch my back and, eventually, give me instructions.
I wondered if that someone could be Pete. It would make a lot of sense—he could have been the one who had led Mombi to me in the first place, when I was back in the dungeon.
But I knew that I wasn’t supposed to have any contact with my handler at all. Not unless it was totally necessary. I wasn’t even supposed to know who it was. If it was Pete, I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be risking the plan by sneaking into my room.
“I asked some of the other maids about you,” I said. “They’d never heard of a gardener with green eyes.”
“Yeah, they don’t really know me around here,” Pete replied. He sat back down on the edge of my bed.
I stayed standing. “You told me before that you worked here.”
“I do. It’s complicated.”
Complicated. The word thudded between us. It was my least favorite word. Dad had used it just before he left me and Mom and never came back. I felt myself getting angry again.
“How am I supposed to trust you when you won’t tell me the first thing about you?” I asked, my voice rising. I’d used up all my subtlety in my conversation with the Wizard. I was done with all this coy crap. “‘It’s complicated, Amy. I can’t tell you, Amy.’ It’s a bunch of bullshit! You need to start explaining.”
As I raged, I felt my palm open. Magic tingled my fingertips like they were itching, and I knew it was my knife. It wanted to come to me. Whether or not I trusted Pete, my knife didn’t. It was trying to tell me something—that he was dangerous. For now, though, I willed it to stay out of sight. I’d already slipped with my magic once today, it couldn’t happen again.
Pete sighed and looked up at me with apologetic eyes. “Look,” he said. “I don’t work in the palace, exactly. Not inside, at least. I’m not really even supposed to be in here. I work on the grounds—in the greenhouse.”
The greenhouse. I’d seen it from the window when I’d been cleaning.
I sat down next to him on the bed. It made sense—sort of. At the very least, it explained why he always smelled vaguely of flowers.
It didn’t explain everything, though. I knew in my gut that there was more to his story.
But wasn’t there always more to everyone’s story around here? To survive in Dorothy’s Oz, a person had to have their secrets. I would let Pete keep his.
For now.
“How did you get back here?” he asked me. “Why are you back here, after what almost happened? Who disguised you? Who are you working for?”
He took my hand in his and clasped it tight, but I looked away. If Pete could have his secrets, I could have mine, too.
“Long story,” I said.
Pete frowned, but I didn’t care. I was just giving him a taste of his own medicine.
“I have time,” he said.
“Good. That means you have time to tell me about the Wizard,” I replied, reminding myself to stay focused on my mission.
Pete bit his lip. “Okay,” he said, disappointment in his voice. “If that’s what you want to talk about.”
“Spill it,” I commanded.
“There’s not a lot to tell,” he said, averting his eyes. “I don’t know a lot about the Wizard. No one does.”
I pulled my hand away and placed it in my lap. Star was racing around the room, sniffing everything. “Tell me what you do know, then. Why is he here? What happened? What’s his deal?”
Pete paused like he was trying to decide how much was safe to say, and then nodded. “There are different theories. The Wizard left in his balloon just before Dorothy used magic to go home. You know that part of the story.”
I nodded.
“For a while he was gone. And then he wasn’t. That’s where it gets a little hazy.”
“Someone brought him back?”
“Maybe. Or maybe the balloon never took him home at all. No one really knows. What we do know is that somewhere along the way, he spent some time with the witches. That’s how he became a real wizard instead of a fake one.”
I jerked my face toward him in surprise. “What witches?”
“The ones who are left—the ones Dorothy didn’t kill. Not counting Glinda, obviously, though her twin sister is one of them. Their leader’s a witch named Mombi. Anyway, between the time the Wizard left and the time he showed up back at the palace, she and the Wizard became allies. They aren’t anymore, though. He came back to the palace pretty soon after Dorothy returned. Apparently he and Mombi had a falling out.”
Now this was getting interesting. Still, I kept my face expressionless. I didn’t want him to know that I knew Mombi or any of the other witches.
“I talked to the Wizard today,” I said. “He was weird. He caught me doing . . . something, but I don’t think he cared. I think he might know who I am.”
Pete’s eyebrows raised. “It’s possible,” he said. “The Wizard always seems to know more than everyone else. It has something to do with the kind of magic he uses. It’s different from the usual Oz magic. He’s a real wizard now. The question is what kind of wizard he is.”
Exactly. The usual question: Good or Wicked?
“Dorothy doesn’t trust him,” Pete continued. “But she thinks she can use him. I don’t even know if the Wizard himself knows whose side he’s on.”
“What if he’s figured me out?” I asked. “What if he tells Dorothy what he saw?”
Pete twisted his mouth in thought. “I don’t think he’d do that,” he said. “But I’d stay away from him if I were you.”
I nodded, but I wasn’t so sure. What if the Wizard was supposed to be my contact here in the palace? His arrival pretty much synchronized with mine, and if everyone believed he’d had a falling out with Mombi that could make for good cover. There was still so much I didn’t know.
“What about Ozma?” I asked. “I saw her, too. I think it was the real Ozma, not one of her holograms.”
Pete’s face twitched, just barely, but enough for me to notice. “She’s around. I’ve never met her. She’s not herself—Dorothy did something to her. Listen, just ignore her. That’s what everyone else does.”
“She kissed me,” I said.
“That sounds like Ozma,” he said. “She’s in her own little world. It’s kind of sad.”
Suddenly his eyes glazed over. His hands trembled at his sides. He tried to shove them in his pockets.
“Pete?” He began to flicker.
“I have to go.”
Before I could stop him, Pete slipped out the door and into the hallway. He didn’t even say good-bye.
At my feet, Star tittered and scratched. I picked her up and snuggled her against my chest, sighing.
“Well,” I said to my loyal pet rat, “at least I have one ally here I can trust.”
Chapter Thirty-One
“How about you carry a poison capsule in your little jaws and drop it into her mint julep? Think you could pull that off?”