Dorothy Must Die

Chapter Eleven

After that, I really lost track of time. I slept, I sat, I slept some more and forced down the disgusting bowls of porridge that would now and then, without warning, materialize on the ever-pristine floor of my prison.

I looked out the enchanted, evil window. Sometimes it was night and sometimes it was day. When the moon was out, I tried to judge the passage of time by its phases, but it was no use. It would be full one moment and a thin thumbnail crescent the next, and then—when I turned away and looked for it again—gone entirely.

I wasted about fifteen minutes trying to play hide-and-seek with Star, but it was pointless. There was no place to hide except under the bed, and anyway, only Star was small enough to fit down there.

With nothing to do except think, my mind kept returning to my mother. I was ashamed of myself for how little I’d thought about her since I’d come to Oz, but now I couldn’t stop wondering whether she had made it through the tornado, about whether she was searching for me or whether she was laid up somewhere, drunk or stoned or whatever else.

If there was even a chance she was out there, looking for me or hoping I’d make it home okay, then I couldn’t give up. I’d made a promise to myself that I’d do anything to help Ollie and his family, thinking that my mother was beyond my help—but now I realized that, no matter how far away my mother was, no matter how far gone she might be, I would always feel a sense of obligation to her.

Then again, it’s not like I was in much of a position to help anyone right now. Honestly, I could use a little help myself.

After two or three days—I think, but who knew?—Pete came to me again.

“I don’t have long,” he said, stepping through the door. His voice was strained with uncharacteristic panic. “Your trial is tomorrow,” he said. “The news is all over the palace.”

I sat up in bed with a start. I had been down here so long now that I’d nearly forgotten I had a trial coming up at all. The wild look in Pete’s eyes reminded me that, as bad as things were, they could still get worse.

“What exactly does a trial entail?” I asked, still holding out some irrational hope that maybe I could be exonerated.

He shook his head and looked down at his hands.

“Just tell me,” I said. “Maybe there’s some trick to it. Things like that always work in fairy tales.”

“Do you honestly think this is a fairy tale?” Pete asked.

“Just tell me what to expect.”

He sighed, finally relenting. “Her Royal Highness’s kangaroo court. It’s a total joke,” he said. “I think the only reason she bothers with trials at all is because she likes wearing the big white wig. Once you go to trial, you’re already as good as guilty. I don’t think there’s ever been a not-guilty verdict as long as the court’s been in existence.”

In the face of my impending Fate Worse Than Death sentence, I found that I was surprisingly calm. Maybe it just didn’t seem real.

“So what do I do?” I asked.

Pete looked at his hands. He tousled his hair, and then looked back at me in sheepish apology. “We could make a break for it,” he said. “Maybe with two of us, we could fight our way past the guards.”

We both knew what a dumb idea it was. “That will just get us both killed,” I said. “What’s the point of that?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I know.”

“What about magic? I mean, this is Oz, right? Isn’t there some spell that would work? It doesn’t even have to be a good one.”

He shook his head. “I never learned to do magic,” he said. “I was never good at it, and no one ever thought it was important for a gardener to learn, especially once Dorothy made it illegal for anyone except her and her friends to practice it. I wouldn’t even be able to cast a simple extinguishing spell without it setting off the magical alarms and going on trial myself.”

“What about someone else? Do you know anyone who would give you, like, some kind of mystical trinket or something? I mean, I don’t know . . .”

“I thought of that. I talked to every illegal practitioner I could think of and none of them will help. It’s too risky. Anyway, I doubt anything like that would work down here. There are anti-magic wards everywhere in the dungeons. You’d have to be really powerful to break through them. Like, Glinda powerful.”

“Some magic shoes would really come in handy right about now, huh?” I said.

“Seriously. Maybe . . .” He stopped himself.

“Maybe what?”

“It’s nothing. It’s just—there might be one more person who . . .”

“Who?” I asked eagerly.

“No,” he said. “It would never . . .”

“Who?”

He spoke with finality this time. “No. It won’t ever work.”

“Please,” I said. “Whatever you can do. Please just try.”

Pete nodded. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll ask. But it’s a long shot. It’s the longest shot.”

We were both quiet. I scraped my nails absently along the stone walls next to my bed, trying to make a mark. Any mark. It was like with Indigo’s tattoos. We all had our ways of saying I was here.

“Listen,” Pete said. “Amy.”

I jerked my head up. “Yeah?”

He pulled something out of his pocket and stepped over to me.

“It’s not much. But maybe you can do something with this.” From out of his pocket, he drew a small kitchen knife, and pressed it into my hand.

He was right. It wasn’t much. But it was something, and he was giving it to me.

“Thank you,” I said. I leaned up to his face and kissed him solemnly on the cheek.

“I’m sorry I can’t do more.”

“I will make it,” I said firmly. At this point, I didn’t really feel like I had any choice but to keep believing that. Then I remembered one more thing. Something important. “Wait,” I said. And I ducked under the bed to retrieve Star.

I’d hated her from the moment my mother brought her home. I’d hated the responsibility of taking care of something that I never asked for, and I’d hated the way my mother seemed to care more about a rodent than she did about me. Or, she had cared about her until she’d stopped caring. Star and I were kind of in the same boat that way.

An unexpected well of emotion opened up somewhere behind my ribs. She had been a faithful companion since I’d gotten here. She was the last thing I had left to connect me to where I came from. And she had been a good friend. Even if she couldn’t talk.

I cupped her furry body in my palms and gave her one last kiss on the forehead.

“Take her for me,” I said. “Keep her safe for me.”

I had hated her and now didn’t want to let her go. Star was not so sentimental. She crawled from my hands and into Pete’s without looking back at me.

“Great,” he said. “Just what I’ve always wanted. A rat.”

I smiled. “Just do it.”

He lifted her up to his face and let her lick him. “Fine. I’ll take her,” he said. “But I’m not keeping her forever. Just until you’re safe and you can take her back.” He dropped her into the breast pocket of his shirt and she squealed happily.

“Go,” I said, giving him permission so he wouldn’t have to ask.

“I don’t . . . ,” he said.

“Just go. I’ll be okay. But if you know anyone who owes you a miracle . . .”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Pete said.

He placed his key in the wall. The door opened. I watched him go.