And then she stirred. Incredibly, horribly, she was still alive. She groaned, her fingers twitching.
It was time for Dorothy to die. I raised the knife over my head.
THIRTY-FOUR
Take care that you do not walk down the same road that she has chosen. Lurline’s words flashed across my vision like a subtitle from a foreign movie. Suddenly, I remembered my first friend in Oz—Indigo, the goth Munchkin who the Tin Woodman had tortured to death in front of me. That had been my introduction to Oz: loss and murder. And I’d taken those lessons to heart. I’d learned to kill without remorse to protect myself and the people I loved.
But where had it gotten me? What had it done for me? I remembered what it had felt like to kill the Lion, to find myself covered in his blood. The way the monkeys looked at me in fear. Glinda’s dead-eyed girl soldiers. All the life I’d taken wasn’t saving Oz, or even myself. Killing the vulnerable was Dorothy’s way.
But it didn’t have to be mine. I was done with murder. I wouldn’t turn into Dorothy. I wouldn’t let the power of Oz make me into a monster. I was stronger than that.
I threw my knife to the cavern floor and it vanished in a puff of oily smoke.
“Amy?” Nox said, coming up behind me. He was looking at Dorothy in horror.
“She used to be just like me,” I said, walking away from her. Nox followed me to the other side of the cavern. I thought of her aunt Em and uncle Henry. Dead now, like so many other people. “Someone’s niece, someone’s friend. She was just a farm girl from Kansas before Glinda got hold of her.” I looked him in the eye. “I don’t want to become her, Nox. I can’t kill her.”
Saying it out loud almost took my breath away, but suddenly, I felt a huge, incredible sense of relief. I’d admitted it. I didn’t want to kill her. I didn’t want to kill anyone anymore. I was done. Nox’s eyes widened, and then his face softened and he reached forward and took my hand.
“Look at her,” he said quietly. “You don’t have to kill her. Oz’s magic took care of it for you. She’s defenseless and she can’t hurt anyone anymore. It’s over.”
We’d done it. We’d defeated her. I sank to the ground in exhaustion. And then with a deep, terrible groan, the walls of the cavern began to ripple and crack.
Nox reacted instantly. “The palace is coming down!” he shouted, pulling me to my feet. I looked at Dorothy’s motionless, rag doll body. Now that I’d decided not to actually kill her, I didn’t know what to do with her.
“What about her? We can’t just leave her here!” I cried. A section of the roof collapsed with a roar directly in front of us, sending a shower of dust billowing in our faces. Coughing and choking, I looked across the cavern to where Dorothy had fallen—but the floor was covered with towering piles of broken rock.
“We can’t save her!” Nox said, grabbing my arm. “She can’t have survived that, there’s nothing we can do.”
I let Nox pull me out of the room just as a giant piece of ceiling fell right where we’d been standing. In the hallway, I stumbled, almost bringing both of us to the ground.
“You have to keep going!” Nox urged, dragging me along. “We stop, we die.”
“I can’t,” I gasped, tripping again.
“You have to,” Nox said grimly, refusing to let me go. The walls were crumbling around us as we ran down corridor after corridor. Beams crashed to the floor. The Emerald Palace was even bigger than I remembered. But Nox wouldn’t let me stop. He wasn’t going to leave me behind, no matter what—and I wasn’t going to be responsible for his death, too.
Finally, we turned one last corner and I saw daylight. We’d come out into the front hallway of the palace, where big windows let in a view of the crazy sky. It was like all of Oz had gone insane.
A huge storm was raging, like nothing I’d ever seen before. Bolts of red lightning struck the earth with earsplitting cracks. Thunder boomed and orange sparks rained down from the violent yellow-green sky. With one last, desperate push, Nox and I ran for the front door and tumbled out to safety as the ceiling of the main hall fell in with a crash of stone and timber. But Nox didn’t stop.
“Keep going!” he yelled. “The whole thing is coming down! We have to get clear!”
The ground itself was heaving under our feet. Nox still refused to let go of me. I struggled after him, trying to keep my footing, and then made the mistake of looking back.
Towers were swaying back and forth, listing drunkenly as the Emerald Palace collapsed in on itself. Widening cracks radiated outward as the earth around it split apart. All around us Dorothy’s overgrown gardens were wilting and turning gray before dissolving into dust. As I watched in terror, the cracks ran together into a single chasm, impossibly deep. “Nox!” I screamed.
“I see it!” With one final effort, Nox pulled me to safety as the Emerald Palace crumbled into the gaping abyss. The rift shuddered and then sealed itself. The rain of fire dissipated and the lightning stopped. A gentle breeze sprang up, pushing the gray-green clouds across the sky and scrubbing it clear. With a last, almost sheepish clap of thunder, the storm vanished, leaving behind a clear blue sky and a cheerful yellow sun. Behind us, a bird chirped tentatively and then burst into full-fledged song. My knees buckled and finally, mercifully, I collapsed. Nox fell beside me in the grass, still holding my hand.
Groaning, he propped himself up on one elbow and looked down at me. His dark hair was thick with dust, his face smeared with a mask of blood and dirt. His clothes were filthy. He’d never seemed so beautiful. “You know what?” he said. “Never mind the Order. I’m falling in love with you, too.” He leaned in to kiss me.
And that, of course, was when Lulu showed up.
“Well, this is a hell of a bunch of bananas,” groused the monkey’s all-too-familiar voice. “I always said the Emerald Palace could use a good redecorating, but nobody was suggesting razing it to the ground.”
Nox groaned aloud and flopped over on his back. “Hi, Lulu,” I said tiredly, sitting up.
“And what have you done to yourself? You look like a monkey’s hind end,” she continued, looming over me. Ozma was standing behind her, gnawing meditatively on her thumb. Lulu was decked to the nines in true Lulu form, sporting her cat’s-eye rhinestone glasses, a sequined motorcycle jacket, and a leather miniskirt decorated with appliqués of tropical fruits.
“What are you doing here, Lulu?” I asked.
“Helping, obviously. And let me tell you, you need it. I was just twiddling my thumbs in the Woodman’s palace, playing checkers with Ozma and watching Melindra mope around. Nothing restores the spirits like a little action, I tell you what. Grabbed some of my monkeys and flew us all over here while you were sitting around on your heinies, apparently. Or did you actually do anything besides demolish the heart of Oz?”
“Nothing much,” Nox said, still prone on the grass. “Just defeated Dorothy, restored order to Oz, and survived the collapse of the Emerald Palace. How does the city look?”
“Terrible, what do you think?” Lulu snapped. “It’s been in ruins for weeks. There are bodies everywhere.” And then she stopped short. “Did you say you defeated Dorothy?”
“The one and only,” I confirmed.
“The bitch is dead?” Lulu’s jaw was literally hanging open. “Oz is free? You did it? You really did it? You killed her?” She hopped up and down excitedly. “Why, we’re going to have a party to end all parties! The ball of the century! A banquet for the ages!”