The Ferret raise up on it's hind legs and surveyed Fiyero. He pulled a biscuit from his satchel and offered it to her. She took it in her delicate paws and began to nibble at it, watching him like he was a snake that may strike at any time. A second Ferret joined them, a male this time, possibly her mate. They shared their treat.

The female warmed up to him, addressing herself as Kodo. The male said nothing and continued to watch him with suspicion. She spoke of the rak that had come tearing through, disrupting their lives and how they had escaped it's notice, being to small to draw it's notice.

"Where did it come from," he asked. "Whatever Yackle says, I know that they have to be summoned to Oz, otherwise they stay in the desert where they live."

"A terrible menace. I can hardly speak of it," Kodo said, covering her eyes with her tiny paws. "A six headed beast. They call it Blinkie, although that is hardly fitting considering the horror it unleashes."

"A six-headed beast named Blinkie," he repeated.

Kodo took this for disbelief at the absurdity of the name. She nodded her head gravely. "Terrible monster it is." She gave her companion Ferret a wistful look. "I call him Podo, after my first husband. But this one is just a ferret." She sighed to herself. "Still, one does what one must in these times."

He nodded, in complete understanding. "One does. Myself for example. I was travelling with a small company. But then came the time to leave so I did. And I can't stand to be on my own for long periods of time."

"Then why do it?"

"I've not been myself lately," he confessed.

"Are any of us truly ourselves at any time," she mused.

He arched an eyebrow. "Philosophy?"

"My grandda knew a thing or two about the meaning of things. Back before that horrid wizard swept in and mucked things up for everyone."

"Times are changing again. Hopefully for the better."

"One can only pray," she said, with a touch of regret.

Kodo and the ferret disappeared back into the bush.

"I might have known," Fiyero said, as he reflected on the brief but illuminating conversation. A six-headed beast called Blinkie. That was just typical of his luck. As a young child, Sarima had carried the nickname of Blinkie. And with her five sisters...he let out an irritated sound. Nothing like an angry dead wife to ruin his afternoon.

"Honey, I'm home," Fiyero announced. His voice rang through the nearly empty halls. Sarima whirled on him, looking furious. "You've lost weight," he told her, knowing it would incense her further.

She shrieked and threw a vase at him. He ducked and it smashed against the wall behind him.

"You're angry, I can tell."

She gave him a withering look and paused long enough to say, "Oh you think so? I can't imagine why. You just have no sense of loyalty."

He burst into laughter at her remark. "Oh, that's rich, coming from the woman who tried to bed me with her younger sisters."

Her eyes blazed and he nearly smiled. Oh, she was working herself up into a nice fury.

"It's hardly the same thing," she screeched. "You abandoned us, ME! For that green bitch."

"You behave like a child. You're doing it right now! All over you're wounded pride."

"How dare you turn me into the bad guy here?"

"And you're not? No, you've just been plaguing us with demons."

"No one told you to go gallavanting around with-with...her!"

"If you wouldn't act like this maybe I wouldn't have had the affair in the first place."

"Oh that's right! My fault again." Another flying vase. Where was she getting them from, he wondered.

"Dispatching monsters and demons is not the way to solve things. There are others travelling with me, people that have nothing to do with you and me."

"How else was I supposed to get your attention?"

"What? This whole thing was about attention? Oh, you really are a child," he said, amazed by her callowness.

"Whatever, I don't know what you're so worked up about. My Rak is wasting precious time and the Chiss hardly had the guts to face all of you."

"It must really irk you that your coup failed...again. Just like you tried to trap me, you and your wonderful sisters."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Of course you don't," he retorted, with considerable exasperation. "I'm leaving now. I don't want to see you ever again. And if you know what's best, you'll leave this place too." And then he was gone.

Sarima wandered in the lonely halls for long afterward, singing a soft, sad song to herself, "Don't wish, don't start..."

Her voice echoed in the empty wings. "Wishing only wounds the heart."

She paused at a stained glass window, the image of Lurline etched into the glass. "There's a girl I know…He loves her so."

She gazed through a pale section looking out into the world beyond. "I'm not that girl."

And so Sarima resigned herself to her fate. If any had been there to watch they would have seen her vanish into nothing, as if she had not even existed.

Note: What else would I call two ferrets, but Kodo and Podo?