Iago woke up with a splitting hangover the following morning. He struggled over to Jafar's bed to moan and demand a hair of fire-breathing minotaur that bit him, but was annoyed to find the bed was empty.

Further investigating, hampered by the parrot's violent desire to decorate the room with his supper, proved that the bed had not been slept in at all. Iago shifted uneasily, wondering where Jafar had gone. It was unlike the Vizier to not share in his fiendish plans, especially since the two had the same warped sense of humour and could cackle insanely at the really nasty bits. He tried to think but pain blocked him at every neurone, flourishing callous sensations that made Iago whimper. In the end he decided to give up and flap wearily to Suzuki's bedroom.

(It was fortunate for the wasir, the secretary and the bird that Jafar had risen early whilst Suzuki was still sleeping. He had watched her slumber with some interest, for she slept with her misshapen mouth wide open and had left a damp circular patch on the pillow.)

Suzuki was fully dressed, a little edgy and rather sore. She started when Iago scrabbled feebly at the door, and hurriedly started to boil a kettle. She took the horrible herbs out of her teachest then opened the door to admit the parrot, who just about had enough strength to hop onto her slippered foot and wail.

"Are my feathers green? Are my feathers green? Oh Allah, I'll never touch another drop of alcohol for as long as I live!" he groaned. "Just put me in a nice cool tomb somewhere, Suzie, and I can die in peace. Oh Allah, have mercy on this innocent little bird!"

"Innocent my foot," Suzuki retorted, scooping Iago off it. "You're about as innocent as the mistress of my teahouse back in Kyoto. Do you want a hangover cure, my little stupid beau?"

"I'll ignore that last part and wail, 'Yes,' in a plaintive manner, shall I?" Iago said sourly. He lay on his back on her tea table and watched her slowly pour out a syrupy liquid from her mysterious medicine cupboard. She was also making a uniquely foul-smelling cup of tea, which Iago looked at with disgust and edged away from as best he could. "What's in that poison you're giving me?"

"Tiger bone, among other things," the secretary said mildly, and tipped a sake cup full of the stuff into Iago's beak.

"HCK HCK HCK," Iago remarked, choking, then, "ERGH! ACK!" then, "Pity it wasn't Rajah minced up in there. Ooh Allah, that burns. Oooh!" He rose up and smiled slightly- the pain was already dissipating. "Good stuff, though," he added grudgingly. "You wouldn't happen to know where our pal Jafar is, would you?"

Suzuki's cup rattled as she put it down, but apart from that she remained inscrutable. "Probably up and bringing terror wherever he goes already," she said. "It is almost midday, Iago. You've been asleep a while- we were starting to think you would never awaken. Why do you have to drink so much, naughty parrot?"

Iago twinkled at her with incongruous charm. "Aha, you forget something about me. I may be handsome, strong, intelligent, witty, adorable and modest, but I am also... an animal."

Suzuki stared at the foot-high red and blue squawking apparition on her tea table. "Oh yes," she said woodenly, "I was forgetting, naturally."

"So, whether or not you know it, sister, I have an animal instinct." Iago sparkled triumphantly. "What d'you think of that, eh? No, don't answer! For the Great Iago Mood Barometer will now tell lowly human scum that He feels there is... tension in the air."

"Oh?"

"And He is also here to chide the lovely geisha- the tart with a heart, if you will- for being callous to our sensitive, soft-hearted friend Jafar."

Suzuki raised one of her eyebrows. She was prepared to let 'tart with a heart' go in the light of the scheming, power-crazed Vizier being described as sensitive and soft-hearted. "What grievous crime have I committed that so wounds honourable master, my moulting flapping conscience?"

"It's not so much what you have done," Iago replied, "as what you haven't done." Suzuki let out a snort of laughter, then indicated quickly that she was thinking of something else. Iago gave her a hard done by look, before continuing, "Jafar is squishier than he'd have all those blokes hanging upside down in his torture chambers know. If you poke him in the guts, will he not go 'squelch'? If you tickle him, will he not giggle like a harem girl then order you to be beheaded? Surely you must have noticed the way he looks at you sometimes?" Suzuki shook her head in silent wonder. "What the hell did they teach you at geisha school, flower arranging!"

"Yes," Suzuki said absently. "What do you mean, the way he looks at me? How long has this been going on?"

"He stares at you with this weird expression, like you're the most entertaining thing in this city," Iago replied scornfully. "That expression where his eyes are half hooded and his mouth is half parted and he's smiling a little half smile. You know what I'm talking about. I've seen you catch his eye and look away. I've seen you both turn away from the prettier slave girls and watch one another like teenage sweethearts!" He stopped to grin at Suzuki's furious flush. "For about three years- three years!- I've had to put up with it. And you two, being human and therefore bloody idiots, can't even notice your own emotions properly." He smirked evilly. "I think it's getting to Jay at last though, that or the heat, because he's started mumbling your name in his sleep."

As Iago was saying this, Suzuki was lifting the cup of foul tea to her lips. On the last sentence, however, she hesitated, then slowly lowered it before a drop passed down her throat.

"I see," she said.

It came to her in a sudden flash, akin to a knife being swiftly buried in her back before she could react to the pain, that she had been consciously avoiding an area of her mind for almost three years of the five years she'd known Jafar. Now it opened out like a wound and bled softly into the forefront of her mind.

"I see," she repeated, and got up to pour the tea down the drain.