“No.” My voice is much shakier this time, but I'm not backing down. Clearly, if she could take the shoes from me, she would have already. She needs me to give them freely to her, and there isn't a chance in this hell they call Oz of that happening.
“Don't you want to please me?” Dorothy asks, reaching out to touch a loose strand of hair that's come free from the fanciful design that the servant girl gave me. “As queen of Central, my favor is the best gift there is. No enchantment or spell could top the things I'd give you, if you were to please me.”
“I said fuck off,” I repeat, my hands curling into fists at my sides. “You kidnapped me, you messed with my dog … err … guardian, and you killed my friend.”
“Oh, Stryker, the Vain and Arrogant, isn't dead,” Dorothy says carefully, her smile twitching at the edges, like she'd truly enjoy socking me as hard as she could in the face. “I keep forgetting that you're like me, from the H.W. You have been told that sorcerers can only be killed through a single means? Stryker's weakness is fire; a gunshot could not kill him.”
“He's alive?” I choke out, trying to imagine how someone could possibly live through what I saw. His blood and brains and bits of skull sprayed out across the clearing like so much mist. My stomach clenches tight, and I put a palm over the front of the bodice to calm myself.
“He is. And I'd be happy to send him to your rooms tonight, if you'd like. He's a powerful wizard, and very handsome. I'd thought, perhaps, about keeping him here, for breeding purposes, but if you want, he could be yours to keep.” Dorothy is smiling at me again, her floor-length hair pooling in green puddles near the hem of her gauzy silk gown. The wings on her back flutter slightly, even though I'm fairly certain they're not real. “Just hand over the shoes, and everything will fall into place as it should.”
Stryker is alive?! I'm momentarily stunned. But my guardian isn't.
She extends her hand again, and Taavi lunges, his teeth clamping down on Dorothy's wrist as Tuala lets out a howl of rage. She lunges forward, shifting into the large form of the faerie dog—the barghest—nails scrambling across the marble floor.
Dorothy does two things at once, backhanding Taavi hard enough to make him yelp and drop his hold on her arm. With the other, she grabs hold of Tuala's green collar, bringing the horse-sized beast to a sudden stop, jowls pulled back, slaver dripping from her jaws. She's inches from my face, her hot breath stirring my hair as she pants heavily, the air sticky with the threat of violence.
Taavi stands between me and the barghest, me and Dorothy, but he's only a hundred pounds of dog. Without his ability to shift, without his ability to think like a human, what can he do for me now?
“Tell me, Ozora,” Dorothy says, surprising me with the use of my full name, her pale green gaze hard as she takes me in from head to toe, pausing with her attention on the silver shoes. “Do you find me beautiful?”
“Beautiful?” I ask, blinking hard, and swallowing down the nervous lump in my throat. I'm grandstanding here; I might look calm on the outside, but I'm fucking terrified. As strange as the land of Oz is, as kooky, as close to the storybook … it's more violent than I ever could've imagined. I could very well die within the walls of Dorothy's palace.
“Am I the magnanimous ruler you expected to meet?” She reaches out and cups the side of my face, sending shivers of revulsion through me. I'm not sure what it is about her, but there's something off, something I can't quite place my finger on.
“I don't know what you think I'm up to, but I promise this: I never asked to come to Oz.” My voice is shaky, threaded through with cold terror. “Send Taavi and me back to the Human World, and you won't have to worry about us.”
Tuala shifts back into her human form, crouching naked on the floor beside Dorothy, her mistress' fingers curled around her collar. The gold skeleton key dangles enticingly between her small breasts.
“She isn't charmed,” Tuala hisses, looking at me accusingly. I'm no Norm—I didn't grow up eating fantasy novels for breakfast—but I'm pretty sure the term charmed means more here than it does at home. Dorothy frowns, and the expression chills my blood.
“It must be the shoes,” Dorothy says, eyes glittering with dark anger as she takes me in with a much less pleasant expression than before. Her gaze snaps to mine, and I take a small step back. “You are one, lucky wizard, Ozora, the Great and Terrible. How did you ever convince a cardinal witch to give you his mark?”
