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She was, um, let's say. Alluring? From the very start.
Any less prickly, any more willing and Fiyero would have laid her down in the soft hay and taken her apart, inch by inch and step by haphazard step, at the first available opportunity. In fact, he had tested the waters, just in case, just for maybes, winking suggestively when she caught his eye in class, staring too long at the swish of her curves when she moved through the dining hall.
And what had that effort won him?
Eye drops from Dr. Whatsagoose, and a peculiar fizzy sensation in his chest, when she leaned in close to plop them on his desk in a very mild huff.
(The bottle was still warm from her pocket when he wrapped his hands around it and dropped it into his own. As close to a touch as he was likely to get.)
*
The thing was he had to be smart about being dumb.
*
Galinda was a perfect match. Truly. She was pretty and bubbly and bright, and like a semi-benevolent dictator, ruled every room she entered.
(All save her own.
That was Elphaba's domain, somehow, her stacks of books, sensible coats and well-worn shoes pronounced among the pastel fluff, commanding and solid and real, as few things were.)
*
The best part about Galinda was this:
She was so busy contriving her own artifice, she had no mind of his.
*
He dreamed, and in such a dream found himself home, in the Vinkus. Not at the glittering mansion where his family currently resided (along with their finer fineries), but at the Arjiki ancestral seat where he'd spent his childhood prior to foreign incursion: Kiamo Ko.
It was a menacing sight at the outset, dark and cavernous, mysterious and cold. But Fiyero walked the halls as a native son and he saw the castle for its true self. Slip into the keep and the sharp exterior gave way to soft light, warm furs, libraries; a kitchen where a boy could sneak for pastries; a throne room where a chieftain might relax his heavy shoulders, the crown just decoration on his knee.
"It's beautiful," Elphaba said, quietly, somewhere behind him and oh, was she here, too?
He knew himself well enough to be unsurprised by that.
He turned to find her. She was bright and green and shining, backlit by the sun, like an emerald held up to a flame. It was hard to look at her straight on. It was harder to look away, so he stared, and swallowed and reached out a tentative hand. And then he knew it was a dream, because she met him halfway, her palm slipping into his.
"Where are we?"
"I used to live here," he explained to her, brushing his thumb across her knuckles. Her skin was soft and warm against his own.
"Oh! It's..." She bit at her lip and examined the tapestries hung on the walls. "Intricate. I don't remember reading about this. I'm not sure why my subconscious would construct such an elaborate setting."
He laughed.
"Of course, even in my dream you think you're controlling everything."
"Of course, even in my dream you think everything is left to chance."
He'd give her this, his dream girl, the pretense that this was hers (and since this was all fantasy, he'd give her more, too, if only she'd take it).
"I notice," he teased, "My presence here isn't questioned. Dare I say it feels welcome?"
She studied where their hands were joined.
"I wouldn't go that far."
"Miss Elphaba." He dropped his voice low and serious. "I encourage you to go all the way."
That earned him a small shove as she wrenched her hand away, and he laughed again, sorry to lose her touch, but, well, not that sorry. Her subsequent glare did things to him.
"I like you," he confessed, feeling open and free in the halls of his youth.
"No, you don't."
She corrected him sternly and he liked that too, even if she was wrong, wrong, wrong.
"Go on then," he beckoned her. "Educate me. Tell me how I really feel."
"That's not what I-" she sighed. "I know I'm abrasive, even when I don't try."
"Which supposes there are times you do try."
She huffed. "You room with Galinda, and see how that goes."
"No, thank you."
"Aha!" She tapped his chest with one pointed finger. "And that's how I know this is my dream. The real Fiyero would never-"
He caught her hand and kissed the tip of her finger, because he could. Because, despite her protestations, it was actually his dream and he didn't want to spend it all talking about someone else. He had daylight for that. He had reality for that. Entire waking days for Galinda and her pageantry.
He only had Elphaba, and Kiamo Ko, for this hazy interlude, and he could not waste it.
She froze under his lips, statue still, a peach blush blooming across her cheeks, highlighting the freckles there.
"Why did you do that?"
"I am a figment of your imagination, remember," he said, hoping to coax a confession. "You tell me."
She spun around, so that she faced the long hall, and the hand he held curled into a tight fist. Tension held her taut for a long moment.
Then finally:
"You know what you look like," this was mostly an accusation, and her shoulders sagged here in surrender, as if he'd pulled these words out by a hook and maybe some of her insides, too, "You know what you sound like. How you pretend-"
"-actually, the pretense is all very genuine-"
"-to see me."
And... ah.
Fiyero swallowed, a little unsettled himself, to hear that. Because it was one thing to admit to his dream girl that he liked her, to touch her the way he only could here, and another entirely to consider that there were roots below it all, a creeping tendril of something more.
He didn't have room for more. His dance card was full, as it were, being a prince (in name, primarily), failing school, ignoring the disappointed sighs of his parents, pretending he wasn't disappointed too as the Arijiki flags came down and a green Oz symbol ran up. He was stuffed, as it were, barely contained in his own skin. There was no room for a beautiful girl with a frown that made his heart stutter to crawl in, too.
Fiyero lingered there too long, holding her hand, near the banner with his family's crest, his heartbeat in his ears and in his throat, and he-
shoved it all so far down, it landed in his stomach with a lurch.
-smiled in that dazzling way, finally tucking her arm into his, enjoying the way she smelled floral and woodsy and sweet, like an exotic tea. "Let's call a truce."
She blinked. "What are your terms?"
"Well, each of us knows exactly who's real here and who's-"
"A fake?"
"Ephemeral," he corrected, because it sounded prettier, "So let's set the issue aside and pretend-"
"Oh, maybe you are Fiyero."
"-that for the time being we are both truly here. We could just... have fun."
He didn't tell her that skepticism looked good on her, that the way she narrowed her eyes and pinned him in place made him feel too hot in his uniform. But it did, and it did, and he tugged at the neck of his coat in a bid to better breathe.
After a moment, though, she relented, shrugging in a way that brushed her body against his and was he really, actually sure it wasn't that kind of dream? It'd be a shame to miss the chance.
"What do you have in mind?" She asked.
Obviously, you.
He grinned. "Something incredibly reckless."
-
He led Elphaba to the tippest, toppest, pointiest point of Kiamo Ko: the lookout perch at the citadel.
The air there was thinner; the fog, thicker. He'd been away so long, Fiyero had almost forgotten what it was like to open his mouth and drink in the clouds. It was cold, too, possibly too cold for a Munchkin girl, and consciously or not, she kept close to him. He willed himself into a furnace, for her benefit. Her hand brushing against his thigh helped the cause.
"The view here is phenomenal," she gasped.
"Isn't it, though," he agreed, though he wasn't looking at the mountains.
(He loved a good cliche.)
"I haven't traveled much. I didn't know this kind of place could exist."
"No, you, the Munchkin Governor's daughter, untravelled? I don't believe it."
She shifted. "He doesn't like me to be seen."
"Well, that's stupid. He's stupid."
Maybe that was too honest, because it gave her a start. Her mouth gaped. He almost took it back, or at least rephrased, but then her alarmed eyes softened, and he knew he'd insult every dignitary from here to Ix and beyond for the sake of watching that happen again.
"I thought a Winkie prince would be more diplomatic."
"Tsh." He nudged her with his shoulder. "When have you ever known me to take my responsibilities seriously. Insulting your father is right on brand, I should think."
She hummed, as if to say, of course. Of course.
The perch wasn't wide. There was just enough space for the two of them to manage, and their feet dangled a little off the ledge. She was so tiny at his side, burrowed up against him, the tip of her nose going peach from the cold.
He felt-
He felt-
Content. At home, in more ways than the literal.
"You know," she said, slowly, in a voice that teased, "I thought your reckless would be more reckless. Maybe I'm not capable of imaging more."
"Careful," he chided, "don't upset the truce."
"Oh, right."
"Besides," he cleared his throat. "We haven't gotten to the thrilling part yet."
They had, actually. He was thrilled.
But there was more to the experience. He'd give her more (and more, here, if she'd take it).
He gestured past some stone, to a carved channel running southward, a rainwater chute currently sitting dry. Wide enough for two, if one was very small and the other willing to tuck in tightly against her. He found himself willing.
"Miss Elphaba. May I present your ride?"
"Fiyero." She pressed a hand against his chest, firm, like she could hold him back from his own lunacy. "No. That's not a slide."
He stared down at the hand.
"Anything is a slide, if you believe hard enough."
"You have to be out of your mind."
"If you recall, that has been your argument all along."
"I don't think-"
"Good," he said, reaching out to wrap his arms around her. For a fraction of a second, the moment crystalized: the air, his chin brushing the braids of her hair, the weight of her body, her soft exhale. For a moment, there was only this.
But moments pass, and so did this, as he helped her into the stone pathway. He guided her carefully along the correct route which was not nearly as dangerous, as ridiculous, as it felt.
At the top of the chute, he gathered her between his legs, his arms wrapped around her waist. He didn't mention that she looked excited. He folded the thought up and tucked it away into a metaphorical pocket instead, along with a sketch of her features. For later.
"If I become a flat cake," she warned-
"I'll still eat you," he whispered against her ear.
"Stop it," she cried, but there was laughter on the edges.
With a shout, he launched them down the chute and the world dissolved at once into pure sensation:
The scrape of stone as they slid along, the rustle of their uniforms, the roar of the wind, the pressure of her spine against his chest as he tucked her in tighter. Not because he had to, not because he feared loosening his grip, just-
-because, because, because.
Near its end, fast approaching, the channel pulled up sharply and-
The ride ended with a sudden, violent catapult that threw them off onto a small, stone balcony built into the keep's interior wall. All momentum, they spun together, tumbling several times over before coming to a hard stop.
Elphaba landed on top of him, her body tangled with his, her hair a fantastic mess. She was laughing hard, they both were, breathless and heaving.
"I can't believe that just happened."
"We can do it again, it doesn't get old."
"It felt like we were flying," she cried, her eyes crinkling in the corners for how hard she smiled. And then she thrust her arms wide in simulation of a bird and it was all Fiyero could do to hold onto her hips and not die beneath her.
Moments pass, and this one too.
She came back to herself. He watched it happen, tracked its timing with the rise of color through her cheeks and around the curve of her ears, and she rolled off of him and pulled at her collar, like it was suddenly ill-fitted. Like she could hide in its threads.
"Well, um," she said.
He hummed.
"That was satisfactorily reckless."
"Oh, good," he grinned.
"Considering," she added.
"Considering!"
He balked at the qualifier.
"I mean, you've obviously done this before. You knew where the chute would end. Isn't there a degree of comfort in that? Of safety?"
He stared. "It was too safe for you?"
She shrugged, deliberately cool, and he saw it for the goad it was, but still. It worked.
"You want something dangerous?" He felt wild. "Some path where I can't see the end?"
He tugged her back down and kissed her-
-and it wasn't real, but it felt real, her mouth on his, the taste of her kiss like honey and spice, the fast beat of her heart as she pressed into him. He wrapped one hand at the nape of her neck, the other at her waist and she fit around him, warm and soft and just so right.
-it wasn't real, but she sighed directly into his mouth and an unseen tendril stretched, roots tearing through basement floors, making way, making room.
-it wasn't real, but the way she looked back at him when he let her up for air, when he brushed the crease from her brow with a thumb, and she caught it with the edge of her lips, the way she looked...
"It's not pretend," he said, taking her hand in his own. "I'm not pretending."
Something sad broke out between them, spilling forth like a cracked egg.
"That's what I'd want you to say," she said.
-it wasn't real.
Fiyero woke up abruptly to damp sheets and a dark room. The Shiz dormitory. He sat up and scrubbed his face, once, twice, thrice.
*
He found Elphaba, the flesh and blood girl, later in the day, in the library, her head in a book.
When he tapped his knuckles against her table, she shot up, all dark alarm.
"Hello," he said, with the waggle of his fingers. What he hoped to achieve, Oz only knew.
Her eyes flickered and her jaw set.
"I can't do this today."
She ran off, leaving him there.
Right.
Of course.
For the best, though.
He slumped into her vacated chair and absently spun a few circles.
"Fiyero! In a library" Someone called out in disbelief, so he took a breath and let the easy smile find his face.
"Oh, you know me," he started, loudly, and then stopped abruptly as he realized what book she'd been buried in.
Functional Architecture: a Guide to Western Castles.
...Odd, though.
*
Lurline save him, he needed a distraction. From everything, really.
"Galinda," he said, brightly. "Have you heard of the Oz Dust?"