Qhoyre

Qhoyre is a small, low-lying town in Quadling Country, built on boggy ground where half the streets are canals. The roofs are low, and the windows are grilled or louvered to provide privacy and ventilation. The air is steamy, and the flora is excessive, with huge roundels of palmy leaf that make a sound like "tirrr tirrr, tirrr tirrr" as they beat against each other in the wind. The houses rot gently into the swamp, and the local customs include communal living, ancestor worship, and a harvest of snails and murkweed.

Elphaba's Childhood in Qhoyre

Elphaba lived in Qhoyre for a time when she was about ten years old, during her father Frex's missionary efforts in Quadling Country. The good people of Qhoyre were not very responsive to those efforts. They would invite Frex and Elphaba in, serve them little damp cakelets and lukewarm red mint tea, and all would sit on low, mildewing cushions, scaring geckos and spiders into the deeper shadows. Frex would drone on about the generous nature of the Unnamed God, pointing to Elphaba as proof of his message. She would grin with horrible sweetness and sing a hymn—the only music Frex approved of. She was miserably shy and ashamed of her color, but Frex had convinced her of the value of the work. Invariably, the gentle citizens of Qhoyre would capitulate out of hospitality, allowing themselves to be led in prayers to the Unnamed God, though their hearts were not in it. Elphaba sensed a great deal more than Frex did how ineffectual they really were.

Destruction and Aftermath

Years later, during Fiyero's affair with Elphaba in the Emerald City, he heard gossip at his club that an army division had gone down into Quadling Country as far as Qhoyre on a slash-and-burn mission. Fiyero carefully relayed this news to Elphaba, noting that he did not know how much of Qhoyre was left. Elphaba's response was to recall the details of her childhood there, but she did not express surprise at the destruction, as she had long understood the brutal consequences of the Wizard's exploitation of Quadling Country.