Shadows of the Emerald City (25 page)

“
How many lives fill your ledger, wicked king? How many debts to repay?” He worked the sharp piece of china between his fingers and snapped the cords, then leapt free and ran to the mechanical man.

“
What do I do? How can I stop it?”

“
Self-destruct has been initiated. It is not within the realm of possibility to stop. Escape is necessary.
”

“
But the others…”

“
Death is inevitable if you do not exit the blast zone immediately
.” Its voice was a rough melody. “Trewis, if you don’t leave now, if you don’t abandon us, you’ll die and the Tyrant will win.”

The Munchkin’s legs were unsteady beneath him.

“
I’m sorry,” he whispered. He scrambled down the Ticktock’s dismembered body and away through the plaza and through a winding street. A roar turned the world to chaos. A gust of singed wind made the ends of his jacket dance. He glimpsed behind him and saw the sky had filled with fire. Chunks of brick fell clattering to the ground and he dodged behind an obsidian crypt, waiting for the sound of smashing stones to silence.

When the air was clear he headed back, this time slow and stalking, moving from one shadow to the next. His only hope was to take the witchling unaware, find a weapon and stab true. Or bash his head in with a brick.

He grit his teeth; never in all his life had he wished more for a gun.

Everything around him lay coated in ruble and dust. There was nothing there he could use. He almost lost hope, but he saw it then- a glimmering silhouette against the shadows- a clock hand from the Ticktock’s heartworks, sharp and slender, trails of heat still oiling off it. His hand tingled as he wrapped his fingers around it and pulled it from the ground.

He crept on to the hazy square. The smoke from the explosion breezed lazily away like a dirty curtain, revealing destruction at its center.

And there stood Ozymandias, peering over the side.

Twenty yards separated them. Twenty yards and Ozymandias was dead. The thought clamored in his brain like a battle. He braced himself to charge and then…

“
You
do
have dozen tricks, don’t you Little Father? Thou art more wily than I gave thee credit. And to leave your friends like that…almost something I would do.”

The Munchkin scowled.

“
I’m
nothing
like you.”

“
That’s right,” Ozymandias replied, “You keep a Code written in lists you didn’t know were burning. And how
could
you? You hardly know you’re burning either. You’re only a dream, after all.”

“
If I’m a dream, you’re going to die in your sleep.”

The green man laughed.

“
You don’t understand,” he said, sweeping his arms wide in both directions “You really
are
a dream. I’ve been dreaming you—this place, the world, and all that’s in it— every night since I was young. And quite frankly, I’m surprised as anyone that I’m here. When they strapped me down in that electric chair I could already smell the brimstone I was going roast in for an eternity or two. But when the guard flipped the switch, here I was, smack dab in the land of my fancy. I
am
favored above all my fellows, aren’t I? So, now you see why I am thy Liege and Sovereign?”

A snarl erupted from Trewis’ throat.

“
We were fine before you came, and real enough. Kingship we had until you killed him. Ozymandias Usurper—that’s who you are! The Pretender, the Fake, the Lunatic Who Ruled A Moment. They’ll write mocking songs about you to make children laugh, until the blessed day when you’re forgotten altogether.”

The witchling turned his head, his expression full of a carnivore’s merciless joy. “Do you think Easter and Westerly were amused? Or that they’ll ever forget the bliss of their adoption?”

Every muscle in the Munchkin’s body tensed. His head swam with the of lust of the righteous to recompense evil eye for eye; somewhere in the depths of him a thousand murdered souls demanded him do justice.
No more waiting
, he told himself,
No more choking on the ash of the fires this monster sets
.

The battle cry of his youth soared like a comet on his lips. In moments he flitted across the distance as fast as if his tiny feet had been graced with wings. He swung his makeshift sword, but Ozymandias twisted away, his body a blur of unnatural speed. The blade struck against the cobblestones, ringing with the brutal clang of a falling bell. Sparks exploded up in haze of dust, a thundercloud in embryo, as if it was in violence that storms were born.

“
You can’t kill what’s already dead,” Ozymandias whispered as he rose up from behind. His voice was filled with last breaths and the smell of dank things decaying. He snatched Trewis by the neck and leaned him over the edge. “Behold the blessing of Onyx, Little Father. Let me give you a little sneak peek through the Door. See what every monarch in the march of war desires—power illimitable, strength unmastered. And now I am the Lord of it, the Lord of all I see.”

It was brilliant beyond speech. Vertigo sucked a gasp from the Munchkin’s mouth. Below them, stars blinked thicker than any midnight sky Trewis had ever seen, each dancing with mysterious geometry, each one blazing, conflagring, lapping the void around them with a million flaring tongues.

How do I stop him
? the Munchkin asked himself, racking his brain,
How do I stop him before he becomes too powerful to stop?

As if in response, the scene below them shifted, rippled like his thoughts had gone out and stirred it up like a riverbed. The stars dissolved, and the darkness reassembled slowly into a grey brick wall of a depression era church.

The pews were ripped out and replaced by planks nailed to the tops of apple crates. Farmers filled them end to end, surrounded by wives in faded dresses cradling sleepy children. Eyes unused to crying shed tears that washed their field dirty cheeks white. But none wept more than the man that faced them, dressed for mourning, his head haloed by a clock soon to strike the hour.

“
In a few minutes the Penal System of Wichita, Kansas will force Osborn Mantis to pay for his crimes with his life. As a minister, I pray he finds salvation. As a father…As a…” He paused, choking on the words. He was ragged, worked so hard by grief he stood like an old house about to fall. He pulled a thread-worn cloth from his pocket and wiped his brow. “As a father, I wish he’d died years ago, before he became the monster that took my daughter.” The far away look of a martyr crossed his eyes, a bittersweet glance that utterly submits to horrors. “Sometimes lambs die…are sacrificed, laying down their lives to break against the waves. And it is this complete and total sacrifice made for the benefit of others that evil can never understand, nor ever overcome…”

Suddenly the clock chimed. Stars flamed again, passing swiftly below them as if there was a race to win.

“
What’s this now?” Ozymandias asked, his fingers clamping hard enough around Trewis’ neck to squeeze bruises into his the skin. “Tell me, how did you do that? How did you summon that old fool out of nothing? Tell me quick or I’ll pluck out your heart.”

But Trewis was beyond pain, beyond fear. In the deepest chamber of his heart he knew the minister was right. Fate had made him for this moment. He was a razor, a dissecting scalpel, a knife sharpened to cut malignance from the world.

He jabbed backward with the heartworks sword, driving through Ozymandias’ sternum, through the cavity of his chest, piercing the jacket on the other side. He twisted the blade, anchoring it into bone, sending a sludge of marrow and dark blood sluicing from the wound. With all his strength he swung the sword forward.

The surprised witchling let out a strangled cry before sliding down the rocky edge of the chasm. He scrambled for a handhold, but the explosion had turned everything a chalky ash, and he fell like sands in Fate’s hourglass. He screamed. He wailed. He cursed until his vocal cords snapped, leaving a dry, crusty groan to fill the air before he disappeared into the darkness below.

Trewis sighed the weight of worlds and collapsed, his wounds too much for an old body to bear. A tear slid down the contour of his cheek.

“
O Celizabeth,” he mouthed silently, “Will I meet you again somewhere between the stars?”

He closed his eyes. The Land spread out before his mind as it had been- as it would be. War and peace rose up like the peaks and valleys of a mountain range, long but not endless. Rivers ran with joys and sorrows. Fields grew with feast and famine. And in all the tiny homes and great castles his name was forgotten, and war he’d fought a distant memory.

And he was glad.

Then somewhere in another world, a distant place where the winds sing songs to wake the day…he built a cottage, and waited for the coming of his Love.

The End.

by David Steffen

The house landed with a crunch and a crash, and a moment later the recoiling bedsprings threw Dorothy halfway to the ceiling. Toto, who had been curled up at her side, awoke in mid fall and landed in her arms snarling and snapping. She tried to grab him, but he was just a writhing ball of fur and teeth.

“
Toto, ouch!”

In his panic he tore open a gash on her arm and she let go. He charged out of the bedroom. She jumped up from the bed and ran after him.

The hallway was a wreck. Floorboards were torn up in a huge circle to make way for a giant metal statue, as if it had been standing on the ground where the house had landed. Only its head and shoulders extended above the floorboards, but even that was taller than Uncle Henry. Its bucket-shaped head was ringed all around with little black nubs. If they were all eyes, the thing would be able to look in every direction at once. It had no other facial features.

She rubbed her eyes, looked again. Itwas still there. What in the world was this thing? A statue?

Toto dashed back and forth, throwing himself against every bit of the giant within its reach, snarling like a mad dog all the while.

“
Toto, no!” she shouted. “Toto, stop it! You’re going to hurt yourself!”

Toto didn’t even pause.

The statue moved. Dorothy screamed as it scooped Toto up between its hands and peered at him between its fingers. The long, slender digits encased Toto like a cage.

Her fear for Toto’s safety gave her the courage to shout.

“
Let him go! He doesn’t mean to be mean, he’s just scared.”

The metal man turned its head toward her.

“
Did the animal injure you?” the giant asked in a deep voice.

She couldn’t stop herself from imagining that metal hand contracting, spraying blood everywhere.

“
Yes, but he didn’t mean to. He’s very gentle.”

The giant raised Toto up to head level as Toto continued to hurl himself against his confinements.

“
This is gentle?”

“
He’s
normally
very gentle. He was just scared by the fall.”

The giant said nothing, merely watching the dog silently.

“
Will you put Toto down, please?”

The giant complied and Dorothy breathed a sigh of relief. Toto began to hurl himself at the giant’s chest again. Dorothy wanted to pick him up but she was afraid he would bite her again. In any case, he wasn’t doing any damage and the giant was ignoring him now.

“
I’m Dorothy.”

The giant stood immobile. Dorothy, who’d been raised to be polite, tried to keep from bursting with questions. She pressed her dress against the dog bite until it stopped bleeding. She waited as long as she could, until the curiosity overwhelmed her politeness.

“
What are you? You look like you’re made of tin. What’s your name? What are you doing here?”

“
My outer shell is made of a titanium alloy. I have no name, but you may call me Tin Man if you wish. Tell me, what is the purpose of Toto?”

“
Purpose? He’s my friend. I love him and he loves me.”

“
Violence without provocation. This is love?”

“
He’s afraid you want to hurt me, so he’s trying to protect me.”

“
Love: an urge that drives the need for sexual intercourse in humans, in order to produce offspring. Interspecies copulation cannot produce offspring, and you are sexually immature.”

“
I don’t understand.”

The Tin Man paused for a long moment, his clockwork whirring.

“
Making babies.
”

Her ears burned. She knew about baby-making. She’d heard all about it from Susie Parker who had walked in on her dad making a baby with Miss Morris, the school librarian. But she wasn’t sure what love had to do with baby recipes.

“
There are different kinds of love.”

“
If your love with Toto is not to reproduce, then what is it for?”

“
It’s not
for
anything. Love is for itself.”

“
You speak nonsense. Love must have utility, or you wouldn’t seek love.”

She tried to look into the black nubs she assumed were his eyes.

“
You really don’t know about love?”