Dorothy Must Die Novella #7 (6 page)

“Yeah,” Lanadel agreed, pretending she hadn't noticed Melindra's hurt was real.

And then Melindra grinned, all trace of sadness gone. “I'm working on him,” she said confidently. “He really buys all that Wicked stuff. Mombi's filled his head with nonsense. You ask me, it's not that complicated. Dorothy's the problem? We take out Dorothy.” She made a slashing motion with one hand. “End of problem.”

“What if there's another problem after Dorothy?” Lanadel asked.

Melindra shrugged. “Well, then we're probably screwed.” She grinned again, and Lanadel started to laugh once more. It was impossible to stay focused on her problems when Melindra was around. Melindra was right. Action was way better than
sitting around. Who cared if there was some secret Lanadel she'd hidden away inside? She was almost ready to learn magic. She was already learning to fight. Nox and Mombi couldn't keep her in these caves forever.

And when they sent her out to do the job they were teaching her—well, she wasn't going to run away from any of Dorothy's soldiers, that much she knew for sure.

“What is their
deal
?” she asked Melindra one night after dinner.

“Whose deal?” Melindra asked, distracted. Nox had been noticeably absent from the dining hall. Melindra had ignored the empty seat at the table, but the melancholy note was back in her voice, and she'd been a million miles away all through their meal.

“Holly and Larkin. Why do they hate me?” Even though Lanadel had been improving in her training in the last few weeks, they continued to treat her as if she was completely incompetent.

“Oh,
them
,” Melindra said with a snort. “You can't take them personally. I think they hate everyone, to be honest.”

“They don't hate you,” Lanadel pointed out.

“Sure they do. They're just scared of me,” Melindra said.

“Oh.”

Melindra realized she'd hurt Lanadel's feelings, and softened. “Sorry, I didn't mean it like the way it came out. I've kicked both
their asses more than once in training, and they know if they mess with me, I'll beat the crap out of them somewhere Nox and Mombi can't find us. That was your only mistake—doing it in front of Mombi. She doesn't go for us fighting among ourselves, even if it's impossible to resist half the time. Holly was trying to get you to hit her in front of the grown-ups,” Melindra added with a laugh. “She thinks getting people in trouble is fun. And Larkin's her little lapdog. But don't mind them, really. They're just—well, they're orphans, too, you know. But if you're a brat before your parents die, losing your family doesn't necessarily turn you into a ray of sunshine. Larkin was studying to be some kind of fancy-pants warlock, and thinks he's Lurline's gift to the universe. Holly's family was some kind of Munchkin royalty.” Lanadel remembered what Holly had said in the training cave. Right before Lanadel had almost succeeded in beating the crap out of her.
That
was a happy memory.

“I didn't know the Munchkins had royalty.”

“They have dynasties, or something,” Melindra said, waving a hand. “Important bloodlines. Whatever, she thinks she's important. It was a shock for both of them to turn up here and realize they had to learn just like everyone else—and fight next to dirty commoners like us.” She snorted. “They tried all that stuff with me, too. Nox doesn't even notice. His head's so far up his—” She stopped short.

“Is something going on with you and Nox?”

Melindra rolled her eyes. “There is no me and Nox. He's a selfish little toad, that's all. I'm totally done with him.” But for
the first time since Lanadel had met the wiry, irrepressible warrior, something in Melindra's voice rang false, and her eyes were sad. She cared about Nox, Lanadel realized. Cared a lot. But she didn't want anyone to see it. She'd built her whole image around being tough and impossible to defeat.

It was like everyone in the Order had created another personality that could protect them from the world they had to live in. Gert's overbearing sweetness, Glamora's illusions, Mombi's gruff bossiness. Nox's remoteness, Holly and Larkin's meanness, and Melindra's tough-chick bravado. And Lanadel herself was just using her anger and her pain to build up walls no one else could climb. But how much was it costing them all to keep fighting all the time—not just Dorothy, but their own natures? What if they'd all done such a good job of inventing new people to be, they'd completely forgotten who they really were?

Melindra was in love with Nox. It was obvious. But it wasn't clear if Nox returned the feelings. Not that that was her problem. But Melindra was the closest thing she'd ever had to a friend. Melindra
was
her friend. And it was hard to watch such a strong, capable—and beautiful—warrior made to feel small because of a guy. Especially a guy like Nox.

That night, Lanadel tossed and turned in her narrow bed, trying to process everything. After a while, she gave up trying to sleep. There was no point. She lay awake until the familiar little winged image of Gert roused her for another day of training, her thoughts still a muddled mess.

Now that Mombi and Nox had decided she was capable of
learning magic, her training got even more intense. But she loved her magic lessons—not just because, more often than not, Mombi whisked her away again to Sky Island, but because Melindra often trained with her. And she learned much more from Melindra than she did from Mombi. It was Melindra who taught her how to summon up a fireball big enough to blow the dilapidated old Sky Island hotel to smithereens—and then put it back together, piece by piece, so that it was even stronger than before, while Mombi clucked in approval.

Drinking lemonade from Sky Island's sparkling river, closing her eyes in the hot sun after a long training session, with Melindra laughing next to her . . . For just a second, she could pretend this was all there was in the world, and that she was happy. And then Mombi would yell at them to get up again, dragging her back to reality. The old witch was relentless, and so was Nox. It was as if they were pushing her toward something.

One night, she almost found out what it was. She was walking a route she didn't usually take back to her sleeping chamber and heard Nox's voice echoing from an unused training cave.

“. . . can't possibly think she's ready,” he was saying. Her senses spiking to alert, she pressed herself against the tunnel wall, straining to hear more.

“We don't have the luxury of waiting until she's ready.” It wasn't Mombi he was talking to. It was Gert. The sweet, grandmotherly old witch. But now her voice was hard as stone.

“Do you have actual information to act on, or is this just some wild hunch?” Nox sounded impatient. Almost angry. Somehow,
Lanadel knew they were talking about her. And if they were, he was trying to protect her. Nox? Protect
her
?

“There were reports before Dorothy returned,” Gert said. “He's wanted Oz for centuries. It's the perfect time for him to strike.”

“He can't come to Oz,” Nox said.

He?
Lanadel wondered. Who were they talking about? The Wizard? But that didn't make sense. The Wizard had already been to Oz.

“We don't think he can come to Oz,” Gert corrected. “But we don't know anything about how powerful he is now. We need an agent. The girl is perfect. You've seen the way she hides what she's feeling. She'll make a good liar, and that's what we need. She doesn't even know her own true self, and that makes her unreadable. Like someone else I know,” Gert added, and Nox snorted. “We don't have time to coddle people, Nox. This is a war.”

“So you keep saying,” Nox said quietly. “I don't agree with this, Gert. I won't support you.”

“You don't have a choice.” Gert's voice was sharp. “About this, or about Melindra.”

“Melindra can make her own decisions,” Nox said, “but not if she doesn't know what's going on.”

“You can't protect her, Nox. Just because you have feelings for—”

“I'm not trying to protect her!” Nox exploded. “I'm trying to tell you to stop lying to these girls!”

“We're not lying, and you know it,” Gert said. “We give people the information they need—when they need it.”

“When will I
need
all the information, Gert? When are you going to tell me the rest of what's going on here?”

“That's enough, Nox. Go to sleep. You'll have to . . .”

But Lanadel didn't wait to hear the rest of her sentence. She heard a rustle as Nox turned to leave the cavern, and she ducked down the corridor before Nox found her eavesdropping. But she knew what she'd just heard was something huge.

What decision did Melindra have to make?

And as for Lanadel, where were they sending her?

Lanadel wanted more than anything to talk to Melindra about what she'd overheard. She could hardly wait to corner the other girl, but it was nearly impossible to get her alone. Mombi was always there when they trained on Sky Island. Everyone else was always there when they trained in the caves. And she didn't want to ask Melindra to meet her in secret in case Gert, Nox, or Mombi overheard and grew suspicious.

Finally, she decided to find Melindra in her sleeping cave after dinner, even though it felt like an invasion. She'd never visited another member of the Order in their own rooms. No one did—it was almost as though there was an unspoken rule against it. In a place where everyone saw each other every day, privacy was a precious resource. But what she'd heard was too important to keep to herself.

Melindra was sitting cross-legged on the floor of her sleeping cave—which, Lanadel noticed, was just as small and sparsely
furnished as her own. She opened her eyes as Lanadel cleared her throat hesitantly at the threshold. If she was startled to see Lanadel there, she didn't show it.

“What's up?” she asked. “You need something?”

“I need to talk to you,” Lanadel said. “But if you're busy . . .”

“Nah, I was just meditating. Come on in,” Melindra said, patting the sleeping mat next to her. Despite the seriousness of what she had to say, Lanadel smiled. It was hard to imagine Melindra sitting still long enough to meditate. But if there was one thing for sure she was learning in the Order, it was that anyone could surprise you.

“It's about the Order,” Lanadel said, sinking down next to Melindra on her mat. This close, she could smell the other girl's scent—wild and clean, not unlike Nox's sandalwood smell. Lanadel told her everything she'd overheard. When she finished, Melindra was quiet for a long time.

“Are you sure they were talking about you?” she asked finally.

“No,” Lanadel admitted. “I guess they could have meant Holly. But I just had a feeling. And Gert wants to send you somewhere, too.”

“Oh, that part's easy,” Melindra said. “She wants to send me to the Emerald Palace, to find out what happened to Annabel.”

“Annabel?”

“One of us,” Melindra said. “I'm not supposed to tell you, obviously. Only what people need to know and all that crap.” She shrugged. “Annabel was my friend,” she said. “
Is
my friend.
But she was supposed to come back from her mission to the Emerald City weeks ago, and . . .” She trailed off. “We need her information, of course,” Melindra said bitterly. “They don't care about
her
. Just what she found out.”

“Do you think she's . . .” Lanadel couldn't bring herself to say it.

“Probably. Wouldn't be the first friend I've lost here.” Melindra smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. “It's easier with the ones like Holly and Larkin. I don't miss them as much. But as for where they want to send you, I don't know.”

“Do you think they meant the Wizard?”

Melindra shook her head. “No way. Not if they were talking about centuries of power. I've heard that time moves differently in the Other Place, where the Wizard is from, but he wasn't in Oz for that long. I don't know who they mean, but I don't like it.”

“Nox seemed like he really cares about you,” Lanadel said. “Or at least . . .” She didn't know what to say. Nox and Melindra's relationship was so complicated. She wished there was something she could do to help her friend. But she couldn't make Nox into a different person. The real Nox, the one that Melindra saw when it was just the two of them. She couldn't even be herself around Melindra. She didn't know how. She felt sometimes as though she was just wearing a dozen different masks, depending on the time of day. That must have been what Gert meant about her making a good spy. But spy for what?

“If he's trying to make decisions for me behind my back, that's not caring,” Melindra said, her voice hard.

“It didn't seem like that. It seemed like he was trying to—to protect you,” Lanadel said.

“That's even worse.” Suddenly Melindra looked away. “Can you—do you mind leaving me alone for a while?”

Lanadel stared. Was Melindra
crying
?

“I don't know what to tell you about what you heard,” Melindra said, her voice muffled. “I just need to think right now. Can we talk in the morning? Please?”

“Of course,” Lanadel said quickly, jumping to her feet. She wanted to reach out to Melindra. To comfort her. But she had no idea how. She backed silently out of Melindra's room, but not fast enough to miss a single, heartrending sob.

Back in her own sleeping cave, she stared up at the ceiling. Even Melindra had no idea what Gert and Nox had meant about sending her somewhere else. And why was Melindra so ready to risk her life on a mission that had already probably killed another member of the Order?

Nothing made any sense, and it was clear she wasn't going to get any sleep tonight. As she lay there, she remembered the feeling of incredible peace that she'd felt as she looked out across the beautiful, shimmering landscape of Oz, when she'd used her own power to bring them back to the top of Mount Gillikin the first day Mombi had taught her magic. She didn't need Mombi or Melindra around. She was strong enough now to use her power on her own. If she wasn't going to sleep, she might as well enjoy the view.

She closed her eyes, feeling power surging through her like
a huge, wild current. She knew what she was doing was dangerous—not to mention stupid. If she couldn't control the river, she'd be washed away. Mombi had told her explicitly not to so much as move a pebble without supervision. That her anger could take control—and that would be the end of her. But the thought of trying out her new strength was too tempting.
Take me to the top of the mountain,
she thought.

The energy pulsed through her as though every cell in her body was coming alive in a whole new way. And then she wasn't in her stuffy, tiny sleeping chamber anymore. She was outside, breathing in the clean, lavender-scented air. Overhead, the dazzling stars sparkled and turned. She was so high up she could see the slender silver threads from which they hung. Pale wisps of moonlit clouds blew across a velvety, deep-purple sky.

“I don't understand you anymore,” a familiar, raspy voice said behind her, and that was when Lanadel realized she wasn't alone.

The voice was Melindra's. Lanadel knew without looking that she was talking to Nox. Just like she knew she had no business eavesdropping for the second time that day. But neither one of them had seen her, or felt the brush of her magic as she teleported herself to the top of the mountain. And as the power in her body ebbed away as quickly as it had come, she realized that for some reason she wasn't strong enough to teleport herself
back
. She would have to walk back down to her sleeping cave—but Melindra and Nox were standing in front of the caverns' entrance. There was no way to get past them without them seeing her.

She'd been lucky enough to materialize on the far side of a boulder big enough to hide behind, but if she moved or made any noise Melindra and Nox would spot her. She had no choice but to hide. And from where she crouched, she could hear Nox and Melindra's every word.

“You knew what this was going to be like,” Nox was saying. His voice sounded tired. As if he'd been carrying too much weight for far too long. There was something almost vulnerable about him now.

“I knew we were both fighting for the same thing,” Melindra said angrily. “That doesn't mean we have to be fighting each other, Nox. Just once, can you let me in? I know there are things you aren't telling me.”

“I'm doing the best I can,” Nox said. “But there's so much we have to think about, Melindra. We can't afford to take time for each other right now. I'm sorry.”

“With you, there'll never be time,” Melindra said. Lanadel could hear the effort in her voice. It was taking everything she had to keep herself under control. She
was
in love with Nox. There was no other reason she'd be talking to him like this. “I'm not just talking about us, Nox. I'm talking about the Order. About all the secrets you're keeping from me.”

“What secrets?” Nox asked cautiously. “What do you know, Melindra?” Lanadel held her breath. Was Melindra going to reveal what Lanadel had told her? If Gert and Nox knew she'd spied on them, they'd probably kick her out of the Order.

But she should have known better. Melindra wouldn't betray
her. Unlike Nox, Melindra actually seemed to care about her.

“It doesn't matter,” Melindra said. “I just know you've been lying to me. All along, as it turns out. About us, about the Order—about all of it. Do you know where Annabel is, Nox? Are you and Gert and Mombi just tallying up the body count along with all your secrets?”

“No!” Nox said hoarsely. “Melindra, no. I'm trying to protect you.”

It was the worst thing he could have said, even if it was true—and Lanadel knew that it was, from what she'd overheard. Melindra's pride would never let her take it as a gesture of caring. She would only see him as trying to patronize her.

“I don't need
protecting
, Nox,” she spat. “I need
honesty
.”

“You know I can't tell you everything,” Nox said again helplessly. “I don't even know Gert and Mombi's plan. I've never told you anything different—”

“You've never told me anything!” Melindra hissed. Now her control was slipping. “Look at where we are, Nox! Look around us!” She gestured wildly at the stars, the dusky sky, the moonlight night. “This is the most beautiful place in Oz and we're arguing about whether or not the Order will let us be together! Mombi doesn't control you, and neither does Gert, no matter what you think. You have so much power, so much strength. You're their equal. You don't have to let them push you around. We could be so much stronger together, you and I, than we are on our own, and you can't even see it.”

“I owe Mombi so much. She saved me from—you know what
she saved me from,” Nox said. “I can't just turn my back on her for you, Melindra.”

“You don't have to turn your damn back on anyone!” Melindra's voice was rising now, spiraling upward as she lost her temper fully. Lanadel cowered behind her rock. “So maybe you were raised by witches, but that doesn't mean you can't act like a human being sometimes! Why won't you just let me get
through
to you, Nox?”

Nox was so stubborn, so unable to see what was right in front of his face. Melindra was right. There was no reason they couldn't be together. Nothing that the Order could do to stop them. Gert and Mombi were hiding the truth from everyone. From Lanadel. From Nox. From Melindra. Why was he so loyal to people who didn't even seem to care about what he wanted?

“We'd be so much stronger together than either one of us is on our own,” Melindra said. “We don't have to stop fighting Dorothy just because we—just because I . . .” She stopped short of actually saying it, as if she couldn't bring herself to utter the word “love.” And now it was obvious even to Lanadel that she was crying. She could feel her own heart trying to pull itself apart in her chest. Why was someone like Melindra giving this much of herself to someone like Nox? Couldn't she see that he would never—could never—be the person she wanted?

“Melindra, I can't be what you want me to be,” Nox said, as if he was speaking Lanadel's thoughts out loud. “I can't—I can't feel the way about you that you want me to feel. I only have room for the Order. You know that. You've always known that.”

“You only have room for your own pain, you mean,” Melindra said. Now her voice was low and deadly. “We've all lost something to Dorothy. Even those little fools Holly and Larkin. And none of
us
are acting like the weight of the Order is on our shoulders—”

“The weight of the Order
is
on my shoulders, Melindra!” Nox yelled. “I'm responsible for all of you! Mombi doesn't care in the end what happens to any of you. Neither does Gert. Neither does Glamora. You know that just as well as I do. It's all down to me, Melindra. To
me
. Do you think I like watching the kids I train die? Do you think I like living like this? Do you think I don't know what I'm turning into? Do you think—” And then his own voice broke. Lanadel felt tears running down her cheeks.

“I don't think you think at all,” Melindra said quietly. “I don't think you know how to think for yourself anymore, Nox. I don't think you know who you are.”

The silence was deafening. It stretched out for what felt like forever. Nox looked at Melindra, unblinking, but he didn't say a word. And a sob caught in her throat before she choked it down again.

“So I guess that's it then,” she said quietly. “If I die out there . . .” She didn't finish, and Nox still didn't answer. Her voice was stripped raw. There was so much pain in her eyes that Lanadel wanted to break cover and run for her, but she didn't dare move. Melindra reached one hand out to Nox and then snatched it back before she touched him as if she'd burned herself.

Without another word, she disappeared in a wisp of pale
smoke. Nox stood staring at the place where she'd been, still silent. Lanadel held her breath. And then her cramped leg twitched, sending a pebble skittering across the overlook. Nox whipped around.

“Lanadel?” he asked.

She flushed scarlet and stood up, not daring to meet his eyes.

“How much of that did you hear?”

“Hardly anything,” she lied. Nox snorted softly.

“Right. Well, then you know hardly anything about my personal business, and so you have nothing to tell anyone else. Right?”

“I—I wouldn't dream of telling anyone anything,” she stammered. That much was the truth. Whatever had just happened between Nox and Melindra, it was deep and ugly and painful. Melindra's anger came from a depth of love Lanadel had only ever imagined but never experienced herself. She wondered suddenly if someday someone would be able to hurt her as badly as Nox had just hurt Melindra. She wasn't sure if she wanted to know.