I wouldn’t realize it until later, but it was that moment that had changed me forever. Killing the Wicked Witch of the West had unlocked the secret potential that had always lived inside me—the potential to be great. After that, it had just taken a little bit of living—not to mention a second trip to Oz—to realize exactly what that potential meant.

It meant that I was special. It meant that I was a queen.

I had the decisiveness and power it took to govern a country. To be truly great. Because what had all those hours in my history class back in Kansas taught me, if not that the most effective rulers are also the most ruthless ones? I was proud to be like them in that way, and grateful to the witches for sacrificing themselves (the poor things!) so that I could become the girl—no, the woman—who I was truly meant to be.

The Nome King and I were approaching the ballroom now. I wondered what my guests were doing. This was going to be the grandest event they’d ever witness in their miserable, mildewy little lives.

“You promised me an entrance, my darling,” I said, turning to him.

“Indeed I did,” he replied, with a smirk that was almost romantic.

My beau, I noticed just then, was wearing a wicked-looking silver blade strapped to his belt. Rubies studded its hilt. I felt the unmistakable throb of magic pulsing down the length of the knife and I understood immediately: this was how he was going to try to kill me. It was how he was planning to unleash the blood that would allow the shoes to return to him.

Let him try, I thought. Soon, at long last, I’d be going home—back to Oz, where I belonged. Back to the throne that was rightfully mine.

Home. For just a second, I faltered as that word echoed uncomfortably in the back of my head. It made me shiver, reminding me of something that I couldn’t put my finger on. Something someone had said to me once.

A sliver of doubt festered in me where there had only been certainty before. I pushed it aside. The Nome King was just trying to get into my head.

Of course Oz was home.

Now the Nome King led me down a twisting hallway I hadn’t noticed before, away from the main entrance to his ballroom.

“Nothing makes an entrance grander than a secret doorway,” he said with a smile, pointing to a cleft in the rock wall. Hmmm, I thought, filing this away. For all I knew, it was too late for this information to be of any use, but I’d save it just in case. I shimmied through it. The cleft ended in a heavy red curtain. I peeked around it and saw a raised dais, and beyond it, the ballroom.

The place was packed. Absolutely packed. For a moment, I felt a wild glee. These people were all here for me! They’d dressed up in costumes, just as I’d told them to. The ruby light played over hundreds of faces.

But despite the massive crowd, the servants and Diggers and attendants and cooks and guests and hangers-on, the entire cavern was silent. Deathly silent. As if all of them were terrified to draw the Nome King’s attention. They knew from experience that whenever he called for a crowd, something awful was bound to happen. They were all wondering which one of them it was going to be.

I felt Amy before I saw her. Her boots were calling to me, and I knew exactly where she was, pressed close to the stage, surrounded by bodies.

Silly girl. She thought her ridiculous getup was enough to disguise her. In those boots, I’d have known her even if she’d been wrapped in a fully body cast. They were calling to me so loudly that it almost made me wince.

Everything was working even better than I’d planned.

The Nome King gestured to the Diggers, and another group of them carried forward an enormous, glittering red throne. He settled himself into it with a yawn.

“Where’s my throne?” I asked.

He smiled. “I thought we could share, my love. For now why don’t you enter the room behind me?”

Bupu sniffled quietly at my feet. I reached down and patted her head comfortingly through the branches of her costume.

Well, like Aunt Em always used to say, make lemonade when the sun shines. I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, and adjusted my mask.

It was showtime.

The Diggers carried the Nome King onto the dais. Bupu and I followed him like lackeys, but I just smiled, knowing that I’d have plenty of time later to make him regret the insult if I felt like it.

I sighed, and he glanced over at me, I suppose expecting to see the glum face of a prisoner. Instead, I threw him a radiant smile. He smiled back, but there was something uncertain about it this time.

What a waste killing him would be. But it’s like they say—you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Even Toto refused to change his ways when he got older. The Nome King, I was sure, wouldn’t be any better at it.

At any rate, he must have taken to heart what I’d said to him about weddings being a festive occasion. As the guests gaped up at him like sheep, he invited them to dance. And to my delight, they did. The musicians played a wonderful waltz. The guests danced in beautiful patterns, their faces glowing with joy and exertion.

I clapped my hands in delight, transported briefly from my more immediate problems. The dance was a little ungraceful, but perhaps that was just the local custom. I snatched a glass of something silver and sparkling off a passing waiter’s tray and surreptitiously chugged it down in one gulp. I’d already sampled some of the Nome King’s most bracing liquor to soothe my nerves before my big moment, but one more sip never hurts, does it?

I’m sure the guests would have danced all night if he’d let them, but the Nome King had more important business to take care of. It was sad, really. I would have so loved to find the man who was a perfect match for my abilities and beauty.

Of course, it was likely that that person didn’t exist. If he was out there, I certainly would have met him by now.

Suddenly another memory flashed through my mind, unbidden and unwelcome.

The Other Place. Aunt Em had had a hired hand for a while who was as handsome as the day is long and who always paid me extra attention. He’d leave little gifts on my windowsill—a pretty hair ribbon, a robin’s egg he’d found in the long grass, a pie still warm out of the oven—and sometimes when I caught him looking at me he’d turn bright red and look away. I’d been wildly in love with him, of course, but much too shy in those days to do anything about it.

Why was I thinking of him? At this moment? It made absolutely no sense. And yet the more I tried to swat the memory away, the stronger it became.

Tommy. He’d been called Tommy.

I wondered where he was now. Then I realized he was long dead. Time moved differently there. But before that—if he’d found some other farm girl to fall in love with and marry. If he’d ever had a family. A farm of his own. Maybe he’d moved to the big city. He had been so handsome—maybe he’d become a movie star. As the Nome King droned on, I remembered Tommy’s smell—new hay and clean sweat—and the transparent blue of his eyes. I remembered how he’d always called me “Miss Dorothy” and tipped his hat when he saw me, even though I told him a thousand times that just plain Dorothy would do. I remembered—

No. I didn’t want to remember. That life was over.

Tommy was beautiful and charming, but when I came back from Oz, he had joined the others in shunning me. “Miss Dorothy, you seem changed,” he’d said. He’d preferred the old me, the one who had not an ounce of magic or courage. I didn’t belong with him any more than I belonged with my current homicidal fiancé. At least he recognized I was royalty.