And they weren’t Assistant Principal Strachan’s angry eyes. They were the silvery-pale eyes of the Nome King. I gasped. He smiled at me and put one hand on my mom’s shoulder and the other on Madison’s as they turned the pages of Dorothy’s journal.
Do not forget, Miss Gumm, how much you have to lose.
His voice slid into my thoughts and I flinched.
Remove our little friend Dorothy or do not; it is no matter to me either way. But I will come for you very soon. And then, Miss Gumm, what you do will matter very much to me indeed.
I gasped aloud as his thoughts pushed into my mind as if he was just trying to show off how easy it would be to control me. No! I thought fiercely. The boots sent a warm pulse of magic through my body and the Nome King’s grip loosened.
Do not think your shoes are enough to keep me at bay for long, Miss Gumm, he hissed. As suddenly as it had come, his hold on my mind was gone. The vision of my mom’s living room burst like a bubble popping and the puddle evaporated with a steaming hiss, knocking me back to the ground.
“Amy?” Nox was shaking me. “What happened? What did you see?” I was groggy and my thoughts were sluggish as if I’d just woken up from a long, bad dream.
“The Nome King,” I said thickly. “He’s with my mom. He said he’s coming for me.”
Nox breathed in sharply. “Coming for you to do what?”
“I don’t know. He doesn’t care if we kill Dorothy. He’s got something else in mind.”
Nox was silent, thinking. “I don’t like this,” he said finally.
I laughed. “You think I do? But we have to kill Dorothy, even if it’s part of the Nome King’s plan.”
“I think you should give me the shoes.”
I shook my head fiercely. “So far they’ve protected me. They helped me fight off the Nome King just now. I don’t want to give them up.”
“Don’t want to? Or can’t?”
We both knew what he meant. Dorothy’s red stilettos, fused to her feet, had transformed her into a monster. I had nothing but my intuition to tell me that my boots wouldn’t do the same thing. It was entirely possible they were transforming me already. That giving me a feeling of protection was just a trick. But I couldn’t use magic and stay myself any other way. And there was no way I was going up against Dorothy without the ability to use my power.
“Promise me something,” I said, not taking my eyes off his. “Just in case.”
“Depends on the promise,” he said. He was standing so close to me I could feel the heat from his skin. I had to bite my lip to keep from kissing him.
“These shoes,” I said, gesturing to my feet. “After tomorrow, if they turn me into . . . you know. Her. If I try to take them off and I can’t. I want you to promise me you’ll do whatever you have to to get them off.”
His eyes widened. “It won’t come to that.”
“Nox, don’t lie to me. It can come to that. So promise me. You’ll get the shoes off no matter what. Even if you”—I took a deep breath—“even if you have to cut off my feet. Even if you have to kill me.”
“Amy, that’s crazy.”
“It’s not crazy, and you know it.”
“I never wanted this for you. I’m so sorry that you—that this—” He made a helpless gesture.
“I know. Promise me, Nox,” I said. He opened his eyes and looked deeply into mine, as if he was trying to drink me in.
“I promise,” he said.
“Whatever it takes.”
“Whatever it takes.”
We looked at each other for a long time. “Good luck tomorrow,” he said gruffly, glancing away. I wanted him to say something else. To find just the right words to tell me everything was going to be okay. To tell me that he’d find a way to be with me. That he’d find a way to help me get home. But instead he turned around and walked away from me, back into the Woodman’s palace. I followed, telling myself the pain in my ribs was just exhaustion and not my heart breaking into a million little pieces inside my chest.
THIRTY
The next morning we assembled in the courtyard. Lulu wanted to come with us, but agreed to stay at the Woodman’s palace with her monkeys in case any of Glinda’s army returned. Ozma was too much of a liability in the Emerald City, and Lulu was only too happy to look after her. We were all trying to make up for our pasts in one way or another, I guess. Except for Ozma, who couldn’t remember hers. Suddenly, having your memory wiped seemed more like a blessing than a curse.
So in the end it was just Nox, Gert, Mombi, Glamora, and me who prepared to teleport to Dorothy’s palace in the Emerald City.
The last I’d seen it, it had been a scary place. The city had been leveled as if it was hit with a bomb and the palace itself had seemed to be growing like a living thing, like it had been possessed by some kind of demonic force.
It had been the Wizard’s doing, and he was gone now. But knowing Oz, and knowing what I knew now, I thought it was unlikely that things had improved much, even without him. If there was one thing Oz had taught me, it was to prepare for the worst.
So the five of us joined hands, and Mombi began to mumble the familiar words of the teleportation spell that would take us all there.
I was an old hand at flying by now, but it still didn’t lose its thrill. I felt the familiar jerk of magic lifting me up into the air, and the sensation of the bottom of my stomach dropping out as we rose into the sky, our hands still linked. Far off on the horizon, I could see the pale stripe of the Deadly Desert; in the opposite direction, the tall peaks of the mountains. For just a moment, in that glorious weightless space, I could pretend that I wasn’t going back into battle—just flying over the jewel-bright landscape of Oz with the wind in my hair and the sun on my back. I could see the same joy in Nox’s face. Even Mombi, who hated heights, was smiling as we hurtled toward our destination.
Then Nox’s expression changed. I turned my head to follow his gaze and gasped out loud.
We were flying into a storm. Out of nowhere, dark clouds gathered into a churning inferno before us, looming directly over the ruined Emerald City.
I’d seen the changes in the city on the ground, and that had been bad enough. But from the air, it was terrifying: the bombed-out buildings, the empty streets scattered with broken gems. From here I could see there were bodies in the ruins, too—twisted and broken like the buildings around them. I swallowed hard. At the center of it all, the twisted spires of the Emerald Palace stabbed upward into the dark, oily-looking clouds. The palace seemed to radiate a tangible sense of menace. Dark, serpentine vines twined up its twisted towers, and smoke boiled out of some of its broken windows. What had once been orderly gardens looked more like a jungle, thick with thorny plants I didn’t recognize. The air was filled with a deep ticking noise, like the world’s biggest grandfather clock was somewhere inside the palace. “The Great Clock,” Gert said grimly. “She’s already trying to use it.”
“Hold on!” Mombi yelled, her grip tightening on my hand. As we drew closer to the storm, gusts of wind began to buffet us, hard and insistent as fists. One blast was so strong it almost pulled me out of Mombi’s grip. On my other side, Gert squeezed harder, too. The witches began to chant.
“Don’t let go, Amy!” Gert yelled over the rising wind. She didn’t have to tell me twice. I held on for dear life as Gert and Mombi’s chanting rose in strength to meet the force of the storm. We were almost on top of the palace now. Suddenly, I could make out a teeming mass of figures in the overgrown and tangled gardens surrounding the palace.
“There’s still an army there!” Nox shouted. The ground was rushing toward us at a terrifying speed. The plants in the garden reached up with spiky branches, and a long vine uncoiled from one of the palace’s towers and whipped at us furiously.