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He was so sweet and eager, even back then. And back then Glinda was a mess, barely able to parent him. She considered Gabriel’s father the love of her life and then one day he was just a pile of ash in the forest.

She blamed the gods. She thinks they have a vendetta against her, and if her stories are true, I can’t really deny that there is some validity to her claims.

The gods killed Silas’s father. My father abandoned her. And apparently the gods killed Gabriel’s father too.

I know why they supposedly killed Silas’s father, but I’m unclear on their motives behind killing Gabriel’s.

I’m not sure that he’s ever known our mother not to be grieving or seeking revenge. She often told him that he was a balm on a wound that never healed. I know what she meant by that, but the burden that she put on Gabriel is one he didn’t deserve.

“Messed up how?” I ask him now.

“I can’t seem to get comfortable on a feather-stuffed mattress.”

I laugh. “Really?”

He looks up at me, wounded. “Yes.”

“Sorry. I thought you were joking about my extravagance.”

“Why? Do you feel guilty about your extravagance, O Great and Powerful Wizard of Oz?”

I give him a shove. A smile appears on his face.

“Never. But I can have a different mattress delivered to your room. Perhaps one made of stone?”

Now he laughs. “No. I’ll manage.”

Toto is watching me again.

“I went outside like you suggested,” Gabriel says after a moment. “I started wandering, but somehow I found myself back here.”

Toto lifts his head.

“He seems like a harmless creature.” Gabriel scoots over to the cell and Toto hops off his pillow to meet Gabriel’s fingers. My little brother gives the dog a scratch and Toto is happy for the attention.

He would never let me get that close.

“I failed you,” Gabriel says.

I sigh. “No, little brother. I think you ended up exactly where you meant to go.”

TWENTY-TWODorothy

The walk from Basil’s cottage to the west gate in Glimming Hollow only takes us about fifteen minutes. He leads us through the streets with the confidence of a man who is not being hunted and I keep checking Tin to take his temperature on the situation. Should we be ducking and dodging and walking in shadow? But he doesn’t seem bothered.

When we approach the gate, the guards push away from their stations, hands on the hilts of their swords.

Basil lets out a whistle with several trilling notes. Clearly a call sign.

The guards give a return whistle.

“It’s me, Ty,” Basil calls.

Ty comes into a ray of light from one of the larger gate lamps. He’s donned full leather armor with a long sword at his waist and a crossbow strapped to his back. As he turns, trying to get a better view of Tin and me behind Basil, several of his short curls fall over his eyes.

“Who do you have with you, Bas?”

“Friends,” Basil answers. He steps aside as if he’s a magician revealing a trick at a magic show, but both Tin and I are taller than he is, so I’m sure Ty has already caught sight of us.