When they spun around, the girls found a stout Munchkin with a red face and a long beard, which he repeatedly tripped over as he rushed in their direction. When he finally reached them, he bent over to catch his breath and handed Daphne the silver slippers that were previously on the Witch’s feet.
“You forgot these,” he gasped. “They’re a big part of this story, you know.”
“Thanks,” Daphne said sheepishly.
“Oh, and do yourself a favor—stay inside the margins,” he said.
“The margins?”
“Yes, you know, stay in the story. Don’t wander around in parts that weren’t written down.”
“Why?” Sabrina said.
“Because . . . it’s dangerous!” the little man shouted. “Do you need an explanation for everything? Stay inside the story and you’ll be safe.”
Before Daphne could thank him for his advice, he turned and stomped back to the village, muttering insults.
“He’s so pleasant,” Sabrina said.
“C’mon, Toto,” Daphne said with a wink. “We’ve got a bad guy to catch and a little brother to rescue. Be a good dog and I’ll scratch your belly later.”
“Keep it up and I swear I’ll dig a hole and bury you in it,” Sabrina grumbled.
Daphne grinned. “Bad dog. I might have to swat you with a rolled-up newspaper.”
The countryside of Oz was both spectacular and strange. Ancient trees lined the roads, each with burly knots and cracks that gave them the appearance of faces. Wild birds of unusual colors flew overhead. One bird’s plumage had a black-and-white checkered pattern. It landed on the path and eyed them curiously, as if they were the peculiar ones. Each bend in the road brought a new strange animal or freckling of unfamiliar flowers. Sabrina enjoyed the light breeze—it was the cleanest she had ever smelled. It had a calm, warm flavor like fresh oatmeal cookies and vanilla, and it swept across fields lush with wild grasses.
The scenery helped pass the time, though its strange colors and somewhat unreal appearance started to give Sabrina a headache. They walked on for the better part of a day, keeping careful eyes on the Yellow Brick Road for signs that Mirror had passed ahead of them. Their former friend left nothing obvious, which made Sabrina quietly fret that he had taken their little brother off the path to hide inside the ancient woods that lined the road. She didn’t know much about Oz, but she sensed it was big. Mirror and the baby could be anywhere.
By dusk, their first sign of intelligent life came into view—a family of Munchkins living in one of the now-familiar circular houses. The man of the house was a short, shiny-faced fellow named Boq. He invited them to dinner. Though the two girls were famished, they declined. Daphne tried to explain their need to find Mirror, but like the others they had met, he was intent on keeping to the story. After much arguing, he informed the girls that Dorothy and Toto were supposed to eat and stay the night. When they refused, again, he chased them down the road for a mile and a half, begging them to return. Eventually, he gave up and walked back the way he had come with a defeated and worried expression.
“They’re all freaked out about this Editor dude,” Daphne said. Sabrina didn’t recall a character named the Editor in any of L. Frank Baum’s famous accounts of the Land of Oz, but then again, she barely knew the first book, and there were thirteen more she had just flipped through.
Soon the setting sun turned the sky into a canvas of crimsons, rusts, and tangerines. The girls found a clear space beneath a fruit tree. Ravenous, they shook at its limbs and collected the plump and curious fruits that fell. There were apples and oranges, but also many bizarre fruits Sabrina had never seen. Daphne happily munched on them all, but Sabrina turned her nose up at the most strange.
“I wasn’t sure we could eat these,” Daphne said between bites. “I thought maybe they weren’t real.”
“It’s funny what’s real and what’s not. These taste just like fruit from Granny’s kitchen. But look around. It’s like we’re walking through a painting or the illustrations in a book.”
“Like someone else’s memory,” Daphne said.
Sabrina agreed. That was exactly the best way to explain how everything looked. It was like strolling around in someone’s distant memory. Perhaps that’s why everything felt strange and a little incomplete.
The girls ate until their bellies were full. Then they lay down under the tree and looked up at the unfamiliar constellations in Oz’s sky, another reminder of their strange environment.
“I’m worried about Puck,” Daphne said.
Sabrina grunted, not wanting her sister to suspect her concern about the boy fairy.
“I keep having this terrible thought,” Daphne continued. “If the Book has turned me into Dorothy and you’re Toto, what if that dead witch back in Munchkinland was him?”
“That wasn’t him. We would have recognized his stink. Even a dead witch’s corpse smells better than Puck. If we’re lucky, that was Pinocchio sticking out from under that house.”