Sister Apothecaire, whose eyes had adjusted more quickly to the gloom, pinched Sister Doctor’s elbow and indicated a massive mound of reeking laundry on a low table. It was rolling on its side and opening its eyes.

“Your Highness, may I present Sisters Lowly and Lower-even-than-that,” said Lord Ottokos, before he remembered to speak in his own tongue. “Ladies, the Princess Nastoya acknowledges your presence.”

She had done nothing of the sort. She had not spoken nor even so much as blinked.

Lord Ottokos continued. “The Princess enquires after your health, assumes it is sufficiently robust or you wouldn’t be here, and compliments you on your courage. Have you news of Liir?”

The maunts turned to each other, but in the darkness of the pavilion they could scarcely read each other’s expressions. “Liir?” said Sister Apothecaire faintly. She was beginning to need her sleeve, as had been proposed.

“The boy who denied he was Elphaba’s son. Is that not why you came to us? To tell us of him? Where is Liir?”

Sister Apothecaire began, “Why, that’s uncanny, I never—” But Sister Doctor cut her off, saying “We came to discover why the Scrow are scraping the faces of unarmed travelers.”

Lord Ottokos made his mouth into a pucker—amused, distressed, it was hard to tell. “I repeat, have you news of Liir?” he said.

“If you’re not interpreting our comments to your senior, need we have this conversation here?” said Sister Doctor.

“My good Sister,” said Lord Ottokos, closing his eyes briefly, as if experiencing a spasm, “the Princess Nastoya entertains visitors only once every several weeks. Do not waste her time. She is waiting to learn what you have to say.”

“Wehave seen Liir, we have!” said Sister Apothecaire, unable to govern herself any longer. “He was found not all that far from here some days ago, and brought to our mauntery for recovery, if he can be recovered.”

“Sister!” barked Sister Doctor.

Sister Apothecaire shot her colleague a look that seemed, vaguely, to imply:Give it a rest

.

Lord Ottokos turned and spoke to Princess Nastoya. For the first time, she stirred; that is, her face stirred. Beneath its greasy robes her body had kept up a constant slow stretching, twitching, creaking. Her eyes widened, and globes of ink-colored tears collected in the folds beside her nose. She was a woman in mighty distress. When she spoke, the voice was deep and plain, a laundry mistress’s voice, no sonority to it. She said only a few syllables, but the language of the Scrow must have allowed for much meaning in enunciation and pronunciation.

“Forgive my not getting up,” began Lord Ottokos’s translation. “I am stricken, a creature severed unnaturally in two by decisions made long ago, when the Wizard of Oz set public policy against thinking Animals. Now, one part of my nature is nearly dead and the other clings to life waiting help.”

“I have training in surgery, and my colleague in applications—” Lord Ottokos spoke over Sister Doctor. “I have entrusted the boy Liir with a task, and I have been waiting his return these ten years. Ten years is a decade to a woman, marking the difference between maiden and matron, matron and crone, crone and harpy—but to an Elephant it is only a breath. A long, foul breath, but only a breath. I know the loyalty of Animals, I know the fickle allegiances of men. Because Liir was possibly a flitch of Elphaba, I had placed my trust in him all these years. I have hoped he might discover or invent a solution for my dilemma. And I have been patient—an Elephant is patient. And you come to tell me you have found him. Bless you, my daughters. Is he coming back to me at last?”