No Place Like Oz: A Dorothy Must Die Prequel Novella(38)

My spell had done the trick—she had no recollection of our fight by the fountain, or of the controversy over my magic shoes. As far as she knew, we were just friends.

In fact, Ozma was starting to feel like the closest I had to a best friend. It had been so long since I’d had a friend like that. Of course, the Lion and the Tin Woodman and the Scarecrow were my loyal friends and the most wonderful companions anyone could hope to have, but they were different. It wasn’t like having a girlfriend my own age.

All the Scarecrow ever wanted to talk about was his magnificent brains, which made me wonder what good was it to be the greatest mind in all the kingdom if you never actually thought about anything except your own intelligence.

The Tin Woodman spent most of his time in the palace’s musty old library with his nose in boring old books of love poetry. When I agreed to let him read one aloud to me, I was so mortified at how romantic it was that I could barely stand to look at him afterward.

As for the Lion—well, he was usually off in the woods, hunting or whatever it is lions do in their alone time. When he did deign to set foot on the palace grounds, he could barely go ten minutes before his newfound courage got the best of him and he tried to pick a fight with the first palace servant who crossed his path.

With the three of them as my only other choices for company, who could blame me for preferring to spend my days dreaming and party planning with Oz’s sweet little despot? At least she was capable of carrying on a real conversation. And she seemed to actually want to spend time with me. I just had to be careful not to do any magic around her.

I knew now that I could subdue her, if necessary—just wash her brain clear of any tension between us. But to be honest, I felt a little uneasy about having to do it again. Why go to the trouble?



“Can I ask you a question?” Ozma asked one afternoon, just a few days before my ball when we were in her closet trying on party outfits for the umpteenth time. I nodded absently, trying to decide between slinky silk or dramatic tulle and chiffon—I was leaning toward slinky.

I must admit, it felt like such a sweet victory to think that I’d be celebrating my sixteenth birthday again, like this, after the disaster of the first party.

Ozma turned and fixed me with a penetrating look. “Why do you live with your aunt and uncle?” she asked, out of nowhere. “What happened to your mother and father?”

I paused in surprise. “Oh,” I said quietly. It wasn’t the kind of question I was expecting.

“I’m sorry—I shouldn’t have . . . it must be such a sad story. You don’t have to talk about it.”

I shrugged. “No,” I said. “It’s all right. I don’t even remember them. My mother died when she gave birth to me, and my father was killed just a few months later. There was an accident with a plow. I know I should miss them, but it’s hard to be sad about people you never even knew.”

Ozma smiled in sympathy.

“What about you?” I asked. “You’ve never mentioned your parents at all, I don’t think. Just Lur-whoozit.”

Ozma passed her hand down the length of her body and her emerald-green dress turned to bloodred.

“Maybe add a train?” I suggested.

“Perhaps. No, they’re so easy to trip over. Think of how embarrassing that would be.”

“You can have a team of Munchkins on hand just to hold it up,” I said, and we both laughed over the absurdity of the idea.

“The truth is,” Ozma said, when we had recovered. “I don’t have parents. I never did.”

“You must have at some point. Everyone has parents.”

“Everyone except fairies,” she said. “I was born from the pool in the center of the maze. Remember that little red flower, floating in the pool?”

“Yes,” I said, vaguely remembering.

“That’s where I came from. The next princess is somewhere in there, biding her time. When the flower is big and full and about to shed its petals, it means she’s close to being born, and I’ll know that it’s time for me to go rejoin Lurline and my people. I’ll go off to find them, and my successor will rise up out of that flower to take my place. Of course, it takes a very long time, and after she’s born she’ll be a baby for a bit—that’s when Oz is most vulnerable. That’s how the Wizard managed to do away with me the first time.”

“How strange,” I said. “But where did he send you? I’ve been wondering.”

“Does it matter?” Ozma asked.

“Why wouldn’t it?”

“Does it matter that you’re from Kansas? You’re here now. The past is gone. Especially in Oz—that’s the way time works. In Oz, it’s always right now.”

I thought about it for a moment. It did matter. I didn’t necessarily like to think about where I was from, and I certainly didn’t want to go back there, but it had made me who I was, just as much as my trip to Oz had made me who I was.

Wherever Ozma had been had made her who she was, too. How could it not have?

And who was she, really? Was she the sweet, charming new friend I’d made—a girl who wanted nothing more than to try on dresses and plan parties—or was she the regal, majestic, fairy princess I’d seen that day in the hedge maze?

Was she the girl who would do anything to be a good ruler to a kingdom she didn’t even really want, or was she so desperate for power that she had banished Glinda to some terrible, faraway place to get her out of the way, just the same way the Wizard, once upon a time, had done to Ozma herself?