Author's note: Just a little well warning I guess, if you tilt this chapter sideways you might see some Elphaba/OC pairingness. If this offends you, don’t tilt it sideways.

After seven days of staying in one room, except for trips to the necessary and to get food from the kitchen, Elphaba thought she was going to go mad if she didn’t get outside soon, she couldn’t believe that it was taking so long for her superiors in the resistance hierarchy to think of a solution to her report that she was being spied upon. To her it seemed like the most obvious thing in the world that she should be sent away from the Emerald City to somewhere where she could do some good without being recognised.

Finally, two weeks after her report was made, Mrs Erevan came to tell her that she had a ‘gentleman caller’ and asked if she would like to meet him upstairs or in the sitting room.

“What does he look like?” questioned Elphaba. She didn’t think there was any way Fiyero could have found her but better safe than sorry.

“Well he’s…” the woman frowned, unable to pinpoint any specifics of the man’s appearance. “His hair was definitely…I’m sorry, Miss, I can’t for the life of me think what he looks like – isn’t that silly?”

“Is he a Winkie?” asked Elphaba, risking being specific in order to be safer in the long run.

“Now that I can answer, Miss, I am sure he was not a foreigner. Definitely of Gillikinese or Munchkinlander stock.”

“In that case, show him upstairs,” replied Elphaba, she was certain enough of the woman to know that she would have exchanged passwords with the man. Cautiously she opened the window enough for her to fit through and chose the chair nearest to it.

There was no way Elphaba, formerly known as Fae, could know that the resistance member making contact with her was the leader himself. Her first glimpse of him was his bare hands through a gap in the door, to show that he was unarmed, followed by the rest of him. A tall muscular man with nondescript brown hair, eyes, and clothing.

“Good evening,” he said politely and Elphaba noted that even his voice was completely ordinary.

“Good evening,” she responded, saying nothing else that he could use to infer any information from.

“I am here about what you told the priest about the Cat. The company have discussed you and they sent me to tell you their decision.”

“How do I know you weren’t just listening outside the door when I spoke to the priest,” challenged Elphaba.

“Well for one thing, it was the good Father’s night off and I was on the other side of that grating.”

“It was not your voice I heard.”

“A simple enough trick. If you accept the offer I will teach it to you.”

“Then will you tell me what muck filled backwater they intend to send me to?”

“They were considering Quadling country but I spoke to the one your cell reports to and decided that your talents could be put to better use as my apprentice.”

To his surprise her first response was not to ask what she’d be apprenticed as.

“How do you know you can trust me? This could all be an elaborate trap involving me turning double agent for the other side.”

“A double agent wouldn’t ask me that.”

“Oh that happens often does it?”

“Often enough. Besides I would know if you’d approached the other side with an offer.”

“Oh I see,” said Elphaba, making a guess and choosing boldness as the way to deal with this quietly confident man. “You are a double agent aren’t you.”

“If I answer that question,” he replied, his hand sliding almost imperceptibly towards his pocket. “I shall have to kill you.”

Five years in the Emerald City had not left Elphaba without the ability to defend herself and she was confidant that she would be able to defend herself.

“You would certainly have to try,” she replied, her knife clearing the sheath on her forearm before she finished answering. “The way I see it, if I kill you and you are a double agent working against us I’m doing everyone a favour. So I suggest you tell me the truth or else leave and I’ll take myself to Quadling country.”

“If I tell you who I am you might kill me before I finish,” protested the man whose true name no one knew, he was certain she wouldn’t succeed but if she tried he’d have to kill her and she had the potential to be far too useful for him to want to do that if he could avoid it.

“Keep your hands where I can see them and I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt,” suggested Elphaba graciously.

“I am the Wizard’s Minister for Intelligence, I hold a similar position within the resistance. Between the two positions I know just about everything of significance that is happening in Oz. Unfortunately in this case knowledge does not provide quite enough power to achieve our goals but the time is drawing nearer.”

“You’re being very open with someone you just met,” remarked Elphaba, wondering if he intended to kill her after all - maybe he was working for the government after all. “I haven’t been with the resistance for that long and I haven’t done a lot, compared to others, to prove that you can trust me.”

“Mattias trusted you with his life, that’s good enough for me.”

“Oh yes,” hissed Elphaba. She was reacting rather than thinking or it might have occurred to her to wonder how this man knew who she was and she was associated with the man who should have been known to the resistance only as ‘Fox’. “Mattias trusted me, for all the good it did him!”

Even as he watched, wondering if he should make some conciliatory remark, she took a deep breath and regained control of herself.

“So that explains why you’re trusting me with this and you’re telling me that you want me to be your apprentice in what exactly? Intelligence gathering? What use could you possibly have for an apprentice?”

“It’s a big job,” he replied evasively. “And that is all the explanation I am going to offer for now.”

“May I have some time to consider your offer? And are you aware that people will be looking for me? At least one who means no harm but may cause trouble regardless of intention and another who is a spy for the other side.”

“I set the Cat to spy upon the resistance in the first place, now that you’ve exposed him as a spy he has no reason to continue being employed here. I shall send him to a town in Gillikin, white cats are very popular pets up there and he’ll blend in well. As for the Arjiki boy, even someone as noticeable as you can be disguised – should you accept my offer I will provide such disguises when your work takes you out during the day or to places where he might be. I will also know if he leaves the city and can tell you when it is safe to go out. As to your first question you may have as much time, within reason, as you require to consider my offer. Enough time, if I may presume to guess your intentions, to leave if you decide not to accept.”

“Very good,” agreed Elphaba. “Are you going to tell me more or do I decide based on what you’ve told me so far?”

“That would depend on what else you wanted to know, I suppose.”

“Nothing in particular, I just wondered if you were going to volunteer any further information.”

To her surprise he actually allowed himself to smile, very briefly, at her audacity.

“I will contact you here, when I feel you’ve had sufficient time to consider my offer. I can’t presume to know your thoughts, for a start because women remain a complete mystery to me despite my not inconsiderable skills, but I feel confident enough to say that taking my offer is a far better use for your life than the necessary but essentially insignificant tasks you have performed for us so far.”

“Naturally I shall consider everything you have told me, most carefully,” replied Elphaba.

“Could I prevail upon you to put the knife down as I turn my back to you to leave? I would walk out backwards but one never knows who is lurking outside a door.”

Elphaba raised her eyebrows, obviously suspicious, but relented enough to put the knife on her lap rather than holding it ready in her hand.

“That will suffice I suppose.”

“At some point you have to trust someone,” replied Elphaba, in the tone of one who was quoting someone else.

The man declined to reply but was decidedly relived when he closed the door behind him. Despite the unpromising conversation he felt fairly certain that his offer would be accepted.

Elphaba carefully locked her door behind the man, noting with detached interest that while she was certain she would recognise him when he came here again she could not remember exactly what he looked like.

So now comes the time to make a decision that will probably affect my entire life – for the second time in a week no less. If I believed in the Unnamed God I’d have some serious questions about His sense of humour.

It was a simple question to answer really, simpler than the decision to leave her lover and she’d made that one in a few minutes, all she had to decide was where she could best serve the cause that she still fervently believed in and the answer was definitely here as opposed to the backwaters of Oz so that would be what she told the man when he returned. That just left one more thing to be done, she had to make sure Fiyero wouldn’t be looking for her for a few months. Borrowing paper and ink from the owner of the house she scribbled a quick note. Not trusting a messenger not to be caught and questioned she waited until it was dark and slipped out of the house to deliver it herself.

During the long days that Elphaba spent cooped up in her room Fiyero searched all over the city for her. He couldn’t afford to hire even the cheapest help in his task and dared not ask the favour of any of his acquaintances for fear of drawing attention to Elphaba. He was all too aware of the fact that the last convoy to the west was leaving in only another week and he really couldn’t afford to stay in the Emerald City over the winter when no important business would be taking place.

On the morning of the fifteenth day since Elphaba had left Fiyero went downstairs and the concierge greeted him with a folded piece of paper.

“A message left for you during the night, Your Highness.”

“Thank you,” said Fiyero, his breath catching slightly as he took the note and recognised his name written in familiar handwriting. “Do you know who left it?”

“It was delivered while the night clerk was otherwise occupied, he did not see anyone.”

Fiyero nodded and slipped the note into his pocket then continued on his way to an important business breakfast with a Gillikinese Lord who owned a bank then there was another meeting with a trader interested in coming west and wanting advice on the best way to make it out there alive. After that a lunch meeting he’d put off twice already and couldn’t possibly justify avoiding again. All in all it was midafternoon by the time he was able to retreat to his room and unfold the letter. It began with no salutation or identification of whom it was intended for.

Stop looking for me. My work takes me to Quadling country, I could not tell you before I went because I did not want you to follow me. By the time you receives this letter I will be well on my way to vanishing on to the southern swamps. Go home to your family; your children need you far more than I ever could.

There was no hint of a signature at the bottom, not even an ink spot suggesting she had considered signing it, but he knew exactly who had sent the letter.

Naturally it occurred to him to ignore her directive but it didn’t take much thought to realise that she was only telling him to do what she already knew he would.

Of course he kept looking for her, just in case she’d been lying about going to work with the Quadlings, but when the last trade convoy of the season left he was with them going home to Kiamo Ko and his family.