“Andthat isn’t a scary notion?”

“I am going to find myself here,” declared the Tin Woodman.

“I’m going to lose myself,” said the Lion.

“Just try to blend in,” said Dorothy. “Act natural.”

“Now thatwould be acting,” said the Tin Woodman, and barked one calf percussively against the other to underscore his point.

“Come on,” said the Scarecrow, “we’re in luck.” He indicated a motley crew of traveling players advertising a silly new show done mostly with puppets. They were amusing the guards, and in the commotion the Yellow Brick Road Irregulars and Liir managed to sidle undetected through the City’s west portal. They debouched into a broad square.

Judging from the stink of skark manure, the space served as a holding pen for beasts of transport while cargos were being unloaded and bills of lading composed. Plain granite storehouses faced the yard, and bears—or possibly even Bears, talking beasts, though they weren’t talking now—were hauling sacks of grain and crates of produce. “Ho,” yelled the overseers. Some were Munchkins, a third the height of their laborers. Their landing whips loosed splatters as of red rain.

“We’re meat here, meat,” groaned the Lion. “Not that it’s all about me, but I feel soexposed .”

“The Lion’s right. Come, let’s duck down this alley,” said Liir.

“I’d expected a bit more fuss,” said Dorothy. “I mean, like it or not, the Witch is dead, and you’d think the word would have gotten out.” She held her own nose with one hand and Toto’s nose with the other. “Kansas boasts henhouses sweeter than this.” They wandered through commercial districts, crossing wide boulevards lined with dying cypress trees. Some were splintered in half, pulled down for such tinder as they might provide. Many open spaces, around fountains memorializing successful military campaigns, were filled in with makeshift homes, some cardboard, or oilcloth stretched over chicken wire. Cooking pots stank of dinner. The broken spout from a fountain still trickled a little: a common toilet. “Ugh,” said Dorothy. “My earlier visit didn’t take me through this neighborhood.”

“You had civic guides,” guessed Liir. She nodded.

The people of the boulevards ducked behind the shawls tacked up as curtain-doors, or hid their faces in sheets of old newsprint when the travelers passed. “You’d think we were leprous,” said Liir.

“Perhaps we’re too clean,” said Dorothy. “We shame them.” Liir didn’t think Dorothy was as clean as all that, but her eyes were bright and her step sure, and perhaps that counted more than cleanliness. “Maybe they’re used to police action against them, and they just don’t know which side we represent,” said Liir.

“Oh, really,” said the Tin Woodman. “Look at us: a man of straw, a man of tin, a Lion with a bow in his hair like a lapdog! A girl, a boy, a surly little dog. How could we possibly be authorities? We’re too—”

“Unique?” asked Dorothy.

“Lacking in camouflage?” asked the Lion.

“Fabulous?” proposed the Tin Woodman.

“Ridiculous?” asked Liir.

“All of the above,” decided the Scarecrow. But the indigent seemed not to be convinced and avoided the peculiar travelers.