“Really? What did the moot ever do for you?”
“That’s not the point. A lot of people are going to die if we don’t do something.”
“Hur. We’re going to die if we don’t do something.”
Caewen walked tentatively to the tent opening. The dull-eyed, blank-faced mob was still gathered about the tent. She thought about lifting the canvas at the back of the tent, but was pretty sure that Fafmuir was not an idiot. He would have arrayed his spell-slaved crowd all around the circumference. “Now what?”
“Yeah. Hurm. Good question. Now what?”
“Well, if we could get out, maybe we could get hold of the emerald plate, and take it away from the moot, right?”
“The drawback with that plan being that a massive angry dragon will home in on us like a wasp circling a tub of blackberry jam.”
“That being the drawback.”
Dapple twitched his tail. “How do we steal one of the gifts given to Old Night and Chaos anyway? The tent is guarded. And it might have been claimed by now, anyway. A lord or king might well have taken it as their own personal gift. That’s how it works, after all. Hur. The gifts are chosen in turn of rank.”
“Only it’s not a very impressive bit of treasure, all considered. It probably won’t be picked first. It might not be taken until the very end, when the lowest ranking lords and ladies of night get a look in? Someone of lowish rank could claim it. If it is not already claimed.”
“Who do we know that is of a royal line out of the night-lands?”
They looked at each other, and said, more or less at the same time. “Sgeirr.”
“M’m,” mused Caewen. “She is daughter of the King of the Modsarie. She is owed a trinket. And her kingdom is not very powerful in the great scheme of things. She probably hasn’t picked a treasure yet.”
“And she is definitely going to believe us when we explain that she must pick that particular treasure, and give it to us so that we can give it back to an angry dragon.”
“Maybe we could offer something in return. Something of value?”
“What exactly?”
Caewen looked at the tent corner. “I think Fafmuir has given up his rights to own that thing.”
Dapplegrim looked at the brazen head. “Oh, oh. Sometimes, Caewen, I really like your devious mind. Hurm. The oracle radiates magic. She’d have to know it was real. Even assuming we tip the coals out. Which we’d need to, also. If we want to move it, I mean. We’re, not carrying a red-hot bowl of fire around.”
So Caewen walked over to the brazen head. She wrapped a hand in a woollen sleeve, though had to be careful how she wrapped her fingers, given that all her woollens were so riddled with moth-holes. “Alright,” she tipped the stand over. Coals spewed over the ground like a river of flame and black searing heat. The grass had long since been trampled to bare dirt, and with nothing to burn the coals just simmered and smoked. She dragged the brazen head, along with its bowl, away from the embers and left it to cool near the door. Dusting the soot from her hands, she said, “That’s done. Now what? How do we escape the tent?”
“Now, that is something I may be able to help you with.”
They both turned to stare. A shape detached itself from the shadows and shuffled towards them, seeming to grow larger and more solid as it neared where they stood. Her eyes gleaming wetly, she gave them a gap-toothed smile. The lines of her face were cracked webs of age, dusty seeming and clay-like in all their muted soft tones. Though her right arm moved animatedly as she walked towards them, her left hung limp, like a dead, useless thing, covered in hair and so long that it nearly dragged a knuckle or two against the ground.
“Moggie,” said Caewen. “How did you get here?”
Dapplegrim’s voice was drawn and wary. “Caewen… why are you talking to a Faer creature. Don’t talk to the Faer creature. They are dangerous and full of lies.”
“Ha, goodness me. Says the son of the old shadows and the mossy forests. Call me dangerous and full of lies? That is rich.” As she turned to look at the toppled brass oracle, her hairy tail came into view, dragging behind her. “I came into the tent when you came into the tent. I’ve been following you. Only the flesh of the Faer is not so manifestly solid as mortalkind. We are more changeful and more inclined to come and go like fog on a morning.”
“Was that true? What you just said: that you could help us escape the tent?”
“Well, of course, missy. Of course I could. I could do many things. I could dance a jig. I could sing twelve notes of a song that has not been sung on this green earth in a thousand years. But, yet, also, this here weave against the charms and arts does not affect me.” She indicated the whole of the tent by waving around her right hand. “Faer magic is not mortal magic. Faer magic is of a different order entirely, born out of a wholly different afterbirth of creation, as they say, as they say.”
“So…” Caewen tried, “Will you?”
She considered this. “No. It is not permitted to me to cast my magics and interfere in the politics of sorcerers.”
“Then why come here? Just to taunt us?”
“It’s just as I said. Hurm.” Dapplegrim snorted and raked a hoof on the ground. “All just lies and nastiness.”
“Your talking horsey is a little bit right, and a little bit wrong, and whole lot mostly just confused.” A gap-toothed smile broke over her ragged teeth. “Now, I am nasty, goodness yes. And I am not permitted to interfere directly… but I am permitted to tell you some secrets.”
“Oh no.” Moving immediately between them, Dapplegrim blocked Caewen’s view of the little hunched up woman. “No. No. No. You are not whispering in Caewen’s ear. Do you hear me? I will bite you head off and then I’ll… well I don’t know what I’ll do after that but it will be really disgusting. Hurm. You hear me?”
“Let the lady decide.”
“What do you mean?” asked Caewen. “I don’t understand.”
“Don’t consent to let her speak secrets to you.” Dapplegrim seemed genuinely worried. “Faer magic changes a person. It’ll make you grey, and without joy, just to start with, and in time you will become one of them. That is all the Faer are. Dead souls, all scrunched up, and made bitter by the eternal torture of being Faer. They are the ghosts of the heathen dead, made flesh with magic that was not meant for mortalkind.”
Moggie Moulach said nothing, but smiled a thin, ugly-lipped smile.
“Well?” said Caewen. “Is that true?”
“The horse is right. Too much Faer magic will make you into one of us. But a little… well, a little does no harm, and a little can go a long way.”
“What do you want in exchange?”
“Ah. That is the clever question of a very astute young enchantress-to-be. However, I want nothing but that you remember me when you come into your power and your inheritance. Otherwise? Otherwise?” She seemed to considering this herself. “The courtly intrigues of the Faer Folk move to their own mysterious dances. You will learn in time, perhaps. If you live that long. In the meantime, rest assured I do not want your life’s blood, nor heart’s desire, nor capacity to love, nor firstborn child, nor the colour of your eyes, nor your voice, nor the tone of your song, nor your whistle, nor your true love. None of those work-a-day trades. No. But you will remember me and my two brothers, when the time comes.”
“I see,” said Caewen, though she didn’t at all. “And what do I need to do?”
“Just lean down to my height and bend an ear, my lass.”
She looked at Dapplegrim, and he looked back at her. “Don’t,” he said.
“We’ll burn in this tent then.”
“Oh, it’ll be worse than just burning,” said Moggie. “Dragonfire is a terrible way to die. You know why they lie themselves down on beds of gold, don’t you? Them draconic things?”
Caewen shook her head.
“Dragonfire isn’t just fire. Dragonfire is destruction itself.” Her gleaming wet eyes seemed to tremble a little in her eye sockets. “Flesh burns. Iron rusts. Stone crumbles. All that a dragon touches… all that a dragon breaths on… it all crumbles and withers and is destroyed. But gold is eternal. This is why dragons must have a bed of gold for their slumber. Gold alone never tarnishes or fades. Silver turns black against the very touch of a dragon, but at least it does not corrode and crumble like bronze or iron, so that yes, it will also do in a pinch. A bed of stone or earth simply turns to dust and ash over time. Gets up the nose.” She sniffled. “So I’m told. So gold, is by far the most comfortable of beds.”
“Wonderful lesson in the natural philosophies,” said Dapplegrim, “but we are not interested. Tell her, Caewen. Tell her you are not interested.”
“I don’t think we’ve a choice, Dapplegrim. We keep getting backed into narrow alleys and corners. We have to act. We have to take a step forward. If this is a way out of Fafmuir’s tent… and then to the tent of gifts, to find the little gold plate.”
“Well?” purred Moggie, warmly. “I’ve not all day. I for one do not want to be here when the dragon comes. It will be terribly unpleasant. Even for one such as she who died in the sea cave, and had her head cut away and placed in darkness under the earth.”
“Alight, then. Fine. Alright. Yes. I assent.”
“Caewen–“
“No, Dapple. No. This is the way. I will do what needs to be done.” She skirted Dapplegrim’s bulk, but trailed a hand over his muzzle and gave him a faint, worried smile. Then, she walked up to Moggie, bent down low until her face was level with Moggie’s mouth. The strange, wrinkled creature with the mass of hair like heather, squirmed her fat ugly lips into a smile. “Lean a little closer, lass,” she said. “Just a touch, so as I don’t have to get up on tippy-toes.”