Chapter 18

Eighteen

The Summer Solstoz had done what it promised to do, smothering out Nick's Curse and giving him the relief he only felt once a year.

It was a crying shame that he couldn't share that relief with Dorothy. And he could, in fact, cry at that moment if he had wanted to. But his disappointment at seeing her disappear, not knowing if she was gone forever, or destined to return with the arrival of night and the shadow of his Curse, made the thought of tears seem inadequate.

Lional's Curse had broken at the same time, giving Nick the fright of his life. A giant of a man had stumbled through the hunting lodge door, where Nick had retreated after Dorothy's vanishment: an auburn-haired stranger with a bushy ginger beard, dressed in a ragged white shirt and somewhat familiar purple trousers, who immediately made Nick think he was about to be robbed.

"Vegetables!" the man had cried. "Give me all the vegetables! Where is everyone? Let us have a feast of greens! Oh, and fruit—how I have missed fruit!"

Nick had realized who actually burst into the hunting lodge at his words. The prince, excited to share in the joy with his companions, only to find the mood more in line with the Winter Solstoz.

With a sigh, Nick had explained the situation.

"Chin up, Nicholas," the lionman said softly, resting a hand—a human hand, though almost as large as his paws had been—on Nick's shoulder. "Think of her aunt and uncle's delight, seeing her again. And, no doubt, her delight, being able to inform them that she is well and not deceased. I imagine they will have been worrying terribly for the mademoiselle."

Nick couldn't see past his dismay. "I don't know what you mean. I'm fine." He put on a smile, the hinges of his mouth still somehow rusty. "Happy for her. I'm just confused about how it happened when those shoes were on her feet. Unexpected—you know?"

Lional nodded. "Very unexpected, but I am certain there is a rational explanation." He paused. "Let us not forget, the shoes did belong to a Wicked Witch. Perhaps that confused the Blessing. Or perhaps her return to Kansas, Earth was part of the Blessing—a gift of visitation, before Mademoiselle Dorothy is returned to us, to continue in our endeavor. Everyone deserves a respite, Nicholas. We have ours, let us consider that our companion has hers."

Nick hadn't thought of it like that. It didn't make it easier, but he wished Glinda had said something, so he could've prepared himself. That way, he could've forced out the words he wanted to say, borne the broken-glass pain and seizing metal, knowing it would all release when the sun's light touched him. The temporary agony would've been worth it.

"Hello, friends!" Straw danced into the hunting lodge, more energetic than ever. Which made sense considering his life was created by the Blessing of Goodness as opposed to the Wicked Curses that burdened Nick and Lional.

The scarecrow glided toward the bedrooms, knocking on the door he'd swept for Dorothy. "It's Solstoz morning, sleepyheads! Wake up! Greet the day!" When no one answered, he knocked again. "I'll count to five before I come in. One… Two…"

"They are not here, Straw," Lional said, and Nick didn't interrupt as the lionman explained.

Straw slumped for a moment before shrugging and going back to whirling about the room, whistling a song. "No matter. They'll come back tonight, and we'll have so many stories to tell! I can't wait to hear of her adventures. It's not the same when you're on the adventure with someone, since you already know the story." He clapped his hands together. "How exciting!"

Nick wished he could feel the same way, but it was beginning to feel like every other Summer Solstoz he'd had since his Curse began. Like any other day, just with less pain. Physical, anyway.

"Let us go to the village and dine," Lional suggested, practically frothing at the mouth. "My treat."

Nick shrugged. "Sure." He managed a twitch of the mouth. "Actually, I wouldn't mind a sun bun."

"Nor would I!" Lional bellowed, sweeping Nick around the shoulders with an obscenely muscular arm that would reject any protest. "I think I shall have ten!"

"I will watch every bite!" Straw said, hurrying after them.

Lional had paused, turning back. "Wait here. I shall be no more than four minutes. I must change my attire—shed everything for this glorious day!"

When he reappeared, he wore a clean white shirt, a loose green waistcoat with the buttons open, and a pair of golden-yellow hunting pants. Not regal, necessarily, but comfortable. And over his eyes, he wore his emerald sunglasses, confidence thrumming out of his mighty form.

"Now, we can go," he said, sweeping Straw and Nick up in his current.

Making it down to the village of Scwarf on legs that didn't ache or complain, Nick's heart soared and sagged at the sight of the festivities already underway. Children ran about, munching on the bright, yellow-glazed sun buns, wearing flower wreaths on their heads. Men and women were up on ladders, hanging vine-like decorations with little metal cups hanging down. When night fell, they'd put tiny candles inside—it was supposed to Bless the house against the return of Wickedness. Nick could imagine Dorothy asking a million questions.

Delicious aromas drifted from the houses, where Solstoz feasts were in the midst of being prepared. Like the dinner they'd shared in the poppy harvesters' village, everyone would come out to a designated place in the settlement, bringing a dish or some kind of beverage. The feasting would begin around four o'clock in the afternoon, continuing on until the sunset, when everyone would go around the houses as a crowd, lighting the candles around every door.

It had been the same in Nick's hometown, and like every year before, he wondered how his own family was doing. If they thought of him at all. What they'd make of Dorothy if he took her home one Summer Solstoz. His mother would adore her and spoil her rotten; he knew that much. And his father would make some teasing remark like "Leave it to you to have to plumb a different world to find a lass who'll have you."

Stop daydreaming, he chided himself. Now he'd never get the chance to tell Dorothy how he felt, and if he couldn't do that, he didn't deserve to hope for future Solstoz gatherings where she was standing at his side. Heck, he didn't even know if there was any hope that she felt the same.

By the timethey'd finished breakfast, and Lional had eaten the inn out of house and home on the fruits and vegetables front, it was lunchtime. And with a couple of sun buns in his belly, and nursing his fourth cup of brimbleberry juice, Nick finally mustered the enthusiasm to tell Straw and Lional his story.

He told them of his history with Zolesha and the Curse that prohibited him from showing emotion, or even discussing what the Curse was doing to him. Even Straw remained focused, neither companion interrupting until Nick was done.

"It'll come as no surprise—or maybe it will—that I wanted to tell Dorothy, but you'll have to be my messengers," Nick concluded. "Promise you'll explain what I can't if she comes back."

Lional reached over with one of his freckled, meaty hands and wrestled Nick's fingers into a tight grip. "Upon my life, we will do what you cannot. And I am sorry that you are unable to enjoy this day the way you hoped to. If a man—or anyone—cannot eat sun buns with a smile, it is a travesty."

Straw nodded, lifting one of the buns. On the yellow glaze, someone had piped two eyes and a smile. "This one is smiling. Maybe you should eat it, and it'll make you smile."

"I'll be sick if eat another," Nick admitted, feeling a little more grateful that he wasn't quite as alone as he'd been in previous years.

Just then, music began to drift through the inn's soot-stained windows, the jaunty sound of strings and drums, pipes and flutes. Lional wiggled in his seat, though Nick doubted that a man so huge could be any good at dancing. Still, he wasn't going to stop anyone from making a fool of themselves if it made them happy.

"Go on," he said to Lional. "These are your people—go dance, make merry, etcetera."

Lional hesitated. "I do not feel like I should leave you by yourself."

"You've got 'til sunset in that body, Lional. Make the most of it," Nick insisted. "I think I'm going to head back to the lodge and sleep off the brimbleberry juice. Maybe take a swim in the mountain stream while I'm a little more buoyant. I'll be fine."

Lional was already up on his feet. "Well, if you are sure…"

"I am." Nick looked to Straw, knowing that the scarecrow would try to cheer him up. Not wanting to have his friend fail at the task, he added, "You too, Straw. You've got the bones to be a very good dancer. Lional can teach you. And I want you to come back to the lodge later and show me all the dances you've learned, so you can teach Dorothy when she returns."

Straw laughed. "I don't have bones, silly. But I will learn all the dances, and I will teach Dot so well, and we can dance together! We can have our own Summer Solstoz party when she comes home!"

She is home, Nick refrained from saying, unwilling to infect anyone else's mood with his own.

He followed the other two outside before parting ways; Lional and Straw heading toward the music, Nick heading as far from it as possible. The only plan he now had for Summer Solstoz was to sleep away the day, hoping it would make the night come in quicker. The very opposite of what was expected.

As the afternoon rolled into the evening, Nick slept in a comfortable bed, ate a good meal from what was left in the basket, without the aches and pains of accidentally showing the enjoyment of it, and eventually found the tears that had been hiding from him.

In the end, he wished he could have said that the tears actually helped.

When the steepslant of sunlight through the branches and the leaves announced the sun's syrup-slow plunge to the horizon, Nick strolled out onto the porch and collapsed his over-rested bones into a bent-branch rocker—one of the wicker creations that this corner of Winkie Country was known for, according to Lional, whose castle bore the name. Used to, anyway.

He rocked back and forth, and back and forth, counting off each second with the creaking of the wood rails against the slat-board porch.

He wondered if this was what Toto felt when Dorothy would leave somewhere, not least because dogs seemed to have a muddled perception of object permanence. Would she ever return? Would he be abandoned forever? Was that her jasmine scent he still smelled on the breeze?

"May the sun ever shine 'pon thee! May your Blessings outweigh… hmm… what was the next bit?" The voice of a drunkard disturbed Nick's peace. "Oh, hello, fireflies! You're up early."

As it turned out, a completely sober drunkard. Straw came waddling up the path, bent over from carrying the weight of an enormous pack strapped to his back.

"The villagers were very generous," Straw said, heaving the pack onto the porch. "I tried to explain that I don't eat, but I didn't want to be rude. You and Lional and Dot and Toto will have enough to eat for weeks!"

Lional appeared next, stalking up the mountain path as if his Curse had already settled across him again. There was no joy on his rugged, more-blacksmith-than-princely face despite his earlier enthusiasm for the festivities.

Nick understood like no one else could. This was the first day Lional had been freed, for even a little time, from being the lionman. He might have found some joy throughout the celebrations, when the sunlight showed no signs of declining, but the dreadful return of the coming night was its own black shroud that arrived even before the true darkness came.

They nodded to each other, and Lional disappeared inside for a moment. Nick was on his twelfth back and forth on the rocker when the prince came back out again, the rest of his road-dusty royal-violet outfit draped over his shoulder. He excused himself and headed to the stables, obviously wanting privacy for his transformation back to the beast he was Cursed to become.

Nick wondered if Lional was carrying the same hope he foolishly prayed for every year since Zolesha had given him the metal-making curse. Would the magic flounder, just this once? Would he be different, an exception? Would he stay normal once the sun finished its daily journey? Or would the coming darkness bring the Curse back with it?

It would be the latter, Nick was certain. Eight years certain, in fact.

What he wasn't certain of was Dorothy. The shoes hadn't done what they were meant to when the sun rose. What if they continued to ignore the rules when it sank? What if she was the exception? What if the shoes had already come off, in Kansas? What if East's death and Dorothy's part in it had messed with the order of things, diminishing the power of the Curse that conjured the storm and brought Dorothy to Oz? What if there wasn't enough Wicked power left, even with the darkness, for another trip from Earth to Oz? It was hard to say what rules of magic would apply across the great barriers between the worlds.

Nick rose up from the rocking chair, went inside, and helped Straw lay out the supplies he had gathered. There were fresh eggs, golden rolls, blue corn, rosy loaves, a fully plucked chicken, and a smattering of vegetables.

"Should we start cooking the chicken now?" the scarecrow asked. "I made sure it was big enough for both you and Dorothy. She'll be hungry when she comes home."

"Better leave it for now, until we know how many are eating," Nick replied.

Straw seemed confused. "Lional won't have any. It's too dead for him. He'll probably chase one down later."

"Dorothy might not be coming back," Nick emphasized. "And this isn't her home. We've been trying to get her back to Kansas, her actual home, remember? That's where she is. So, if she doesn't come back, we did it and we can all pat ourselves on the back." Those last words were rubble in his mouth. He wouldn't be patting himself on the back—he'd be kicking himself.

"Oh… I think I forgot." Straw tapped his fingertips together, suddenly awkward. "Is it bad of me if I say I want her to come back despite how hard we were trying to get her home?"

"No, buddy, I don't think that's bad at all." Nick sighed. "To tell the truth, I'm feeling the same way. It's because we… care, and we didn't get to say goodbye."

"I'm sorry," Straw said.

Nick eyed him. "What for?"

"You looked like you needed comforting. So, I'm sorry."

Nick understood, smiling. "Thank you, Straw."

"Do you need a bit of something for now?" the scarecrow asked. He took a handful of yellow apples out of a canvas bag and began wiping them off with a rag he had washed and hung up the night before. Nick took one and bounced it off his elbow, popping it in the air like he used to do when he was a kid. It felt great to not come back with silver-smashed applesauce.

"I hope these aren't from the servants in the castle," Nick joked, enjoying the grin he was allowed to have. And then realized it might not actually be a joke. He took the apple and held it away from him.

"My goodness, I didn't think to ask," Straw said after a moment's hesitation. "I don't really know." His painted face looked horrified as he stared at the yellow fruit.

Nick put it back in the bag, just in case.

"Did you have a good day?" Straw immediately asked, as if the whole thing hadn't even happened.

"I didn't really have the chance to enjoy it," Nick replied.

"You did," Straw countered. "Lional invited you to come dancing, but you didn't want to."

Nick pulled a chagrined face. "I mean, there wasn't much happening up here, where I was."

"Is it because you were hungry?" Straw smacked his forehead, the impact puffing hay dust out of his ears. "I knew I should have come with you and cooked food for you."

"No, it's not that. It's a lot more complicated."

"Math complicated or… other complicated?" Straw asked.

"Just complicated. Emotionally, I guess."

"That's too bad. I could have helped if it had been math."

Nick barked out a laugh, and it startled the scarecrow into dropping the lemontato he was polishing.

"Oh my!" the scarecrow blurted out. "I think that's the first time I've heard you laugh. You ought to practice more. Practice makes good!"

"Well, don't get used to it," Nick sighed, his amusement ebbing. "It looks like the sun's going to go down in a couple of minutes, and I won't be able to laugh at anything."

Straw nodded. "If Dorothy doesn't come back, I don't think I'll find anything funny either. She's always funny. Toto, too. How does he walk on four legs? I'd be kissing bricks if I had to walk on four."

Nick chuckled and nodded at his strange friend, patting him on the back, the wooden frame that made up the scarecrow's skeleton hard against his very human hand.

"Oh…" Straw's shoulders sagged. "That means she's staying, doesn't it?"

"What?" Nick realized his mistake. "No, I was just… offering comfort. I'm sorry."

Straw brightened, said "I'm sorry, too," and skipped off to the kitchen basin to wash fruit, leaving the apples together in a sack, just in case.

Meanwhile, Nick stepped away from the old, wooden butcher-block table in the center of the kitchen and meandered outside into the orange and violet evening air, checking the sun as the top curve sank into the distant horizon in broken patches of burning orange, glancing through the gaps between the swaying trees.

Though it was the height of summer, the Wicked Witch's magical influence was slowly corrupting the peaks underneath the castle mountain. The trees here were as yet untouched, but higher up, they'd begun to shed their midsummer leaves and were curling their branches in gray anger against the Wicked magic blanketing the area. Nick wrestled with a guilty joy in being able to let a deep shiver of sorrow roll through his body, goose-pimpling his no-longer-silver skin. He wondered if it would be one of the last sensations he would ever feel until next Summer Solstoz.

High-altitude chill settled in with the waning light. The skinny branches shifted in a steady breeze, and Nick hugged himself in a different shiver.

But then the wind picked up, branches lashing and thrashing, the lodge shutters slamming against the windows. It was soon a gusting blow that rattled the door and shrieked through the porch, fighting the tree boughs, spinning the leaf-litter of the forest into a twister of dead nature.

Seconds later, the wind stopped as if it had never happened and standing silhouetted in the last bronzed glare of sunset, amidst a downpour of falling brown leaves, was Dorothy. A familiar yap sounded Toto's return, as he wriggled in Dorothy's arms. She set him down, and he bounded happily toward Nick.

Nick raced down the porch steps, scooping Toto up on the way and hugging him to his side as he rushed to meet Dorothy.

"The day isn't done yet," Nick gasped, beaming from ear to ear. "How can you be back so soon?"

"Well, hello to you too. I can just pop back off to Kansas if I'm interrupting?" Dorothy smiled at him.

"No!" he blurted out. "I mean—hello. Yes, hello. Welcome back."

Nick leaned forward, desperate to give her a smothering hug, and then paused, knowing that might be going too far. What if she didn't want to be touched? What if they were still just on handshake terms?

Dorothy dispelled his nerves as she practically leaped forward, closing the gap between them, throwing her own arms around him and hugging him tightly. He shifted Toto, careful not to smash the poor guy in the embrace, and returned her hug as if she was the last lifeline before the ocean bottom. In fact, he had to be careful not to squeeze the life right out of her.

"Only gone half a day," Dorothy said as she leaned back and looked up into his face, "but I missed you like it was ten weeks."

Nick grinned, his mouth remembering how, as if the last eight years had been a dream and he'd woken up at last. "Just me, or was that a more collective ‘you'?"

Dorothy stared at his smile, lifting her hand as if she wanted to touch the curve of it. Instead, she pulled completely out of his arms, an unusual look of confusion on her face as she stepped a few paces backward.

"You were starting to change when the magic swept me away. No silver left now." She scanned around. "The sun hasn't gone completely down. You're right. Why am I back so soon?"

"I don't know," Nick said, nervous about the gap that stood between them again. He was running out of time. "And frankly, I don't care. I just need to tell you something. Something important before anything else happens."

"Alright," she said, taking him seriously despite his panicked, rushed words. She took Toto from his hands and put him down at their feet.

Nick shifted anxiously, trying not to obsess over the sunlight racing down the tree trunks opposite, like a woody hourglass, leaking the seconds he had left. Once that burnished glow reached the roots, his Curse would make the opposite journey, from his feet to the crown of his head.

As soon as she was looking into his eyes again, he rushed his next words out without breath.

"Everything I'm about to tell you, I've already told Lional, and Straw too. They'll know as much as I could think to tell them, so if I miss anything, ask them. Lional seemed to understand it more, so he'll have better details, but I wanted to tell you myself, and I'm ecstatic to get the chance. First thing you need to know is you were right: I'm under a Curse from Zole?—"

Dorothy stopped him with a hand on his chest and looked back over her shoulder at the same setting sun.

"But the Curse you're under," she said, "is going to return in moments. And in some kind of bullshit Fight Club rule, the first part of the Curse is you can't talk about the Curse."

Nick nodded several times, vigorously attempting to speed her up so he could tell her the more important part: how much he wanted to show her affection, how much he wanted to laugh when she told a joke, how much he wanted to smile when he saw her, and how painful it was to hold all that in because of something he couldn't control. Something that had been forced upon him.

But Dorothy took his breath away, as well as any other words that might have come next, when she stepped forward and said, "Then kiss me before you can't."

With the last sliver of the sun tracing golden light between the trees and casting her in a honeyed silhouette, Nick grabbed Dorothy Gale of Kansas around her lower back and pulled her in.

Like his smiles, being near Dorothy made everything easier, awakening the rusty, tarnished parts of his body, his memories that he'd assumed were forever consigned to the scrapheap. Still, it was hard to forget that he still wasn't restrained by the Curse, and as his lips pressed against hers, he waited for the pain, the broken-glass slicing within him, the seizing of bone and muscle and sinew.

Her mouth moved against his, a little shyly, focusing his attention on the here and now, not the soon-to-be. Reminding him to make the most of this.

He slipped his hand up the back of her neck, fingers smoothing through her silky, brunette locks, savoring every texture and sensation, committing a box of keepsakes in the very forefront of his mind, never designated for the scrapheap.

Meanwhile, his other hand pulled her even closer. A soft gasp escaped her lips, whispering onto his own, and everything else fell away as he kissed her deeply. Like the bees, but without so much wiggling, they were speaking their own secret language, every ebb and flow of their mouths bringing tides of promises and things unsaid, before replacing them with lapping waves of hope and possibility, and retreating again to leave just this one moment of euphoria. The greatest feeling in the world, on the best day of the year, his heart soaring into the dusky, dying-light skies as it should've done, might've done, all day, if she had been with him.

He kissed her harder as he became aware of the sunlight almost touching the roots of the trees. Beyond that was the lip of the mountain bluff, and once it dipped below, he feared that would be it.

Urgency spurred him on, his fingertips skimming the curve of her waist, the elegant line of her back, the bare, goosebump skin of her arms, the column of her neck, the blushing roses in her cheeks. Making a map of her, his chest roiling with a peculiar feeling like frustration, akin to realizing they wouldn't make it to Wicker Castle in time for the Summer Solstoz.

She kissed him back with equal desperation, clinging to him, tugging on his shirt collar, touching every spot where his skin was exposed as though the feeling of it was novel to her.

All too soon, he pulled back, realizing that it wouldn't be wise to have his arms around her when the Curse came back. He hated to break off the kiss, even for a second, but with any luck, he'd get out his explanation fast enough to steal another.

This time, it was her turn to be breathless.

"Well!" she gasped. "For somebody who doesn't get a chance to kiss too often, that was quite the…" Dorothy trailed off with a half-dazed grin, and Nick matched it with a bigger one.

As the sun finally dipped below the bluff, muted darkness quickly wrapping the forest around them, Nick prepared the hurried explanation of the rules of the Curse. He wanted her to hear it from his own mouth, not through a friend, where they might get some important detail wrong. But the shadows that suddenly appeared in her eyes weren't from the coming darkness, or from the worry of what he might tell her. Instead, they were from something reflected above as she glanced over the hunting lodge behind him, tilting her gaze upward. It was something big, and it was coming in fast.

Just as Toto burst into furious barks, Nick turned to see something out of a nightmare.

An ape with crow-like wings, easily the size of a man, swooped down out of the twilight, claws scraping on the roof of the lodge as it pushed off into a forward leap, those enormous wings spreading wide. It rocketed down in a rush of feathers and grinning jaws, snatching at Dorothy. She screamed as those dark talons snatched her shoulders in perfect unison, her arms flailing to try and wrest the beast away.

Nick grabbed for her, trying to pull her out of the creature's clasp, when another monkey slammed into his side, sending him sprawling off his feet. He landed in a sideways heap, ordinary pain pulsing through him.

The new arrival pinned him for a moment, screeching into his face, and he had just enough time to get his arm up in defense before large fangs gnashed at his cheek and jaw. They snapped close by his ear, thankfully not getting a hold of his still-tender flesh.

Toto, barking like mad, used the gnashing creature's back as a platform, leaping from that one toward the one that was trying to steal Dorothy away. The dog managed to get a wing in his mouth, his head ragging the feathers from side to side, but he must've torn too hard. Toto fell to the ground, landing squarely on all four paws, with a chunk of wing feathers in his mouth, but no mistress.

He barked and jumped again, catching the edge of Dorothy's pants in his mouth, and the little terrier tugged for dear life, just as he'd done with the elm.

Nick brought a thunderous fist into the neck of the monkey pinning him down, and it scurried off between him and Dorothy, blocking the way. He almost got to his feet when a third and fourth monkey arrived, screeching. Pinned again, this time by his arms, Nick bucked and pulled for all he was worth, knowing they were about to rip his throat out with a single bite.

But the monkey he had knocked off a second earlier returned long enough to toss something onto Nick's chest. It was a thin black wooden rod, broken in the middle, barely held together by the frayed remains of jagged splinters.

The force of the throw snapped the last of the connected slivers of wood, and the wand parts rolled down his front. With that, the monkeys released his arms, aiming themselves toward Dorothy. Nick's hands instinctively shot out for the shards of wood, snatching them up like daggers to be driven through their beastly throats. The second they were in his grip though, he realized what the wooden pieces actually were.

They weren't the broken halves of just any black wand. They were the remnants of the black wand. The one he had seen time and time again in his nightmares over the last eight years. The wand that Zolesha had Cursed him with.

At that moment, the sunset withdrew its last threads of light from the forest around them. The panic and rage that bristled in every cell of Nick's being sent a shockwave of hardening metal across the surface of his body, like ice instantly freezing across the top of a summer pond.

The agony of his broken heart twisted together with the furious pain of the Curse ravaging its way nearly to his core.

His scream drowned out the screeching monkeys, and even Dorothy's own.

A roar responded to it.

Lional came flying out of the stables, his royal-purple outfit half on his body, the shirt open and flying behind him as he raced forward on all fours.

But it was already too late.

The third and fourth monkey abandoned the slow-moving Nick and flung themselves toward Dorothy.

They snatched at her in tandem, pulling her off her feet. Dorothy bellowed for Toto, still holding on to her pantleg, to let go, and whether out of habit or training or fatigue, he did, dropping to the ground. She'd remembered him, put his safety above her own, even as the creatures stole her away into the nighttime air. And there was nothing anyone could do for her in return.

The final sounds that echoed through the dark-steeped forest were the snaps of the skeletal tree branches on the peaks above, as the pod of monkeys whisked Dorothy to the witch who had sent them.

Nick listened to them disappear into the night as he moved slower than a slumbering heart to his feet, the two wooden parts of his broken life clutched in silver hands.