Story: Lurline Queen and Kumbric Witch (chapter 2)

Authors: bleeding.blade

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Chapter 2

Title: Chapter 1

Once upon a time in a faraway world, in the northern forests of a pine-treed land, a golden-haired child was born in the Kingdom of Gillikin. She was born on the dawn of Midsummer’s Day, as beautiful and fair and much-awaited as the sun that reigned the summer sky. They named her Galinda and she was nothing like they had ever seen.

She grew up tall for a people already tall, and slender for a people already slim. Her flaxen hair grew straight where others’ curled and her eyes were blue with an amethyst shade. She was kind and gentle but seemed apart–something wise and weary in her solemn gaze. Like the Fairy Queen herself, the older people said, and sighed in memory of times long past.

But she was merry enough, despite her otherworldly gravity, and her people loved her for her gracefulness and light. Yet no one ever knew how lonely she was, not even she herself, though there were times when she was seized by a wild melancholy she could not name. Then she would ride to the Great Gillikin Forest and, in its woods, sing the strange and haunting melodies that came to her in dreams. And when she sang, the river would stop its gurgling and the wind would stop its soughing, only Galinda never noticed for the unsoothed aching in her heart. And she did this often enough in her youth that, years after, local folks would say that the Gillikin Woods were haunted by a sad and solitary sprite.

And Galinda’s childhood years passed well this way, until she turned sixteen and was sent away to be educated in the city. Her people grieved and Galinda grieved (though the wild melancholy in her heart throbbed with a strange and new excitement). And so it was that Galinda of the House of Arduenna of Gillikin left her pine-treed land for the cobbled-stoned city of Shiz.

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Shiz was strange and different and new, and Galinda loved its spires and towers and winding streets. Its people were kind, in a frenzied and frenetic way–though they all slowed down at the sight of the golden-haired girl. In Shiz, Galinda found herself besieged by admiring princes and dukes and earls and barons. Some were arrogant and conceited; others were earnest and sincere, but all of them, without exception, deferred to Galinda, who surpassed their nobility with a queenly grace. And as her circle of admirers grew, so did the throbbing loneliness in her heart.

Her father wrote her, pressing her to entertain suitors. She entertained them to suit her father, but found her heart unmoved.

And then one day, a few weeks before the start of school, she had run into an unruly mob bent pell-mell on tormenting some poor and unseen victim. And Galinda, who brooked no cruelty but disliked attention even more, had yelled that a policeman was coming, and when the crowd had dispersed, went in search of the bullies’ target.

It was a girl around her age, and she was kneeling on the street gathering her scattered belongings. Her face was obscured by her long raven hair, of a blackness that was nearly blue (a color so strange and marvelous to golden-haired Galinda that she longed to touch the stranger’s locks). Then the girl turned around and emerald eyes met Galinda’s amethyst ones, and in that moment Galinda gasped, for mirrored in those eyes was her same wild melancholy only thrown back at her with a greenish tinge.

“Are you alright?” Galinda asked.

The raven-haired girl nodded and when she stood up, she was as tall as Galinda if not slightly taller.

“Thank you,” she told Galinda, and Galinda noted the huskiness of her voice and the dignity of her gaze. She was the most beautiful creature Galinda had ever seen, with her raven hair, her emerald eyes and her pearly skin.

“What did they want from you?” Gazing at the stranger, Galinda could find no reason for the mob’s dislike.

The raven-haired girl shook her head. “I don’t know,” she replied quietly. Then she extended her hand and smiled. “My name’s Elphaba by the way.”

“And mine’s Galinda,” Galinda replied softly, taking the stranger’s hand.

“I’m indebted to you, Galinda.”  Their gazes locked, and for Galinda, it seemed that the world had contracted to those emerald eyes. Then a racing carriage clattered past and both girls jumped and laughed together at their mutual startledness.

“I have to go now,” Galinda spoke, removing her hand a shade reluctantly.

The raven-haired beauty nodded. “Thank you once again for the help.”

“Shall I be seeing you around?” Galinda asked.

“If you’re a student in this city like me, then likely yes.”

“I’ll be seeing you then, Elphaba,” Galinda said, then walked away. If anyone had looked at her carefully then, they would have wondered at her sudden radiance.

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