Yellow Brick War (Dorothy Must Die, #3)(56)

“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?”