“There he is,” she cried, pitching up a small slope.

The clueless creature was finishing his evacuation at the base of what looked like an ancient traveler’s shrine to Lurline. A weathered statue of the pagan goddess gazed blindly out into the storm. The statue was life-size, if you accepted that goddesses have the same stature as humans. Little more than a lean-to for protecting the statue from the elements, the structure could afford no room for the travelers to crawl in out of the downpour. After a while, though, Liir thought of standing on the shoulders of the Lion and slinging the big black cape out over the shrine’s roof. Using the scorched remains of the Witch’s broom as a pole, he rigged up a black tent under which they could huddle.

The Lion’s mane reeked, but at least the travelers were protected from the worst of the rain.

“This cape is larger than it looks,” said Dorothy. “And the water isn’t soaking through.”

“Maybe she hexed it waterproof. She didn’t like water,” said Liir.

“So I’ve learned,” said Dorothy.

“Who does?” added the Tin Woodman, squeaking his joints.

“Tell me more about her,” continued Dorothy.

Liir didn’t oblige. He found Dorothy congenial enough—but it had been so long since he’d had anything like friends his own age! At Kiamo Ko, when he’d first arrived with Elphaba, Fiyero’s three children had allowed him into their small society, but slackly, without much interest. The girl, Nor, had been the only one ever really to play with him.

Though he had been little more to Nor than that dog was to Dorothy, a presence to boss around, Norhad been kind. That first Lurlinemas, she’d given him the tail of her gingerbread mouse, because no one had thought to make him a gingerbread mouse of his own.

And besides her? No one else to play with, once she and Irji and the rest of the ruling family—Fiyero’s survivors—had been kidnapped by the Wizard’s forces garrisoned at Red Windmill. Yes, he’d bravely followed, but fecklessly. They’d given him the slip. He had had to return to Kiamo Ko and face the screeching. Then the Witch had prohibited Liir from fraternizing any longer with Commander Cherrystone of the Gale Forcers or from making new friends among the lice-ridden urchins of Red Windmill.

So Liir had lived a lonely life. It could have been worse; he was fed and he was clothed more or less warmly. He had his chores, and the winged monkeys, largely inarticulate, at least didn’t go out of their way to move if he sat down nearby. Was there supposed to be more to a childhood? Rehearsing it to tell Dorothy, it seemed a spare, botched thing, and he suppressed most of it.

Of late, the Witch had become more irritable than usual, complaining of sleeping problems. Nanny—her nanny, at one point, and her mother’s nanny before that—was well into her eighties and good for little by way of coherent discussion. Liir had been left to talk to himself, and he’d found himself less than stimulating as a conversationalist.