Kumbricia's Pass

Kumbricia's Pass is the principal mountain corridor through the Great Kells, the formidable range that divides the Vinkus from the rest of Oz. Named after the Kumbric Witch of ancient myth, the pass is a place of profound unease, where the landscape itself seems to conspire against travelers. It is the route the Grasstrail Train must take to reach the Thousand Year Grasslands and the Arjiki stronghold of Kiamo Ko, and its crossing becomes a trial of endurance, marked by eerie silences, unexplained disappearances, and a palpable sense of being watched by forces older than memory.

Geography and Approach

The pass lies south of Kellswater, a dead lake whose waters are so toxic that neither horses nor travelers drink from it. From the eastern approach, the pass appears as a woman lying on her back with her legs spread, an unsettlingly erotic formation that sets the tone for the journey ahead. The caravan enters a forest where pine boughs block the sun, wild pears tangle their branches together, and a sudden dampness creates a private, oppressive climate. The bark runs wet, the air sinks heavily against the skin, and everything smells of ferns and fiddle-greens. On the shores of a small lake within the pass stands a dead tree that harbors a community of bees, which Elphaba, traveling under the name Sister Saint Aelphaba, persuades to join the caravan.

The Crossing and Its Horrors

Once inside the forest, the travelers cannot see the hills. The sunlight that penetrates the canopy is a thin, egg-yolk light that always seems to be off to the side, never illuminating the path ahead. The effect is eerie, as if Kumbricia herself were moving alongside them, hidden, passing from tree to tree, sliding behind rocks, waiting in shadowy depths. The ailing old man Igo wails nasally, praying to emerge from the mystery wood before he dies, lest his spirit never find its way out. The boy Liir weeps like a girl. The cook wrings the neck of a chicken. Even the bees stop humming. In the middle of the night, the cook disappears, and his body is later found at the base of a cliff, swollen with lesions. Some blame the bees, but Elphaba points out that the bees had been asleep and that there would have been screams if they had attacked. The incident deepens the mistrust and fear among the travelers.

Emergence and Aftermath

Toward the evening, the pines begin to thin, and the forest shifts to stag-head oak, whose broader branches let in more of the sky—a pasty yellow sky, but a sky at last. The caravan reaches a cliff edge, having climbed higher than anyone realized. Beneath and beyond stretches the rest of Kumbricia's Pass, a journey of four or five more days, and beyond that lies the beginning of the Thousand Year Grasslands. No one is sorry for the light and room that the sky affords. Even Elphaba feels her heart lift, unexpectedly. The high altitudes at the top of the pass had given the bees a deep sleep, and as they wake up coming down from the heights, Elphaba feels herself more and more awake, too. The pass is left behind, but its legacy of suspicion and the legend of the Kumbric Witch linger, a reminder of the evil that the travelers believe still lurks in the world.