Magpie smiled. “Aye, sure! It can be my thanks for the use of her room!” She ate her own corner of the sweet and insisted on all the crows having a nibble. Then, catching a longing look from Batch, she flicked him a little piece too. The remainder she wrapped back up in the paper to save for Nettle, then sank back with a groan. “Thanks for the food, birds and mannies,” she said sleepily, then, as if remembering something, turned to Talon. “That was a fine phantasm you made before.”

“You saw it?” he asked. “What, can you see through fences too?”

“Neh, but when it jumped out of the tree and near landed on the cat’s head.”

Talon laughed. “That? No doubt it looked a fine phantasm—that was me.”

“You, you?” She lifted her head. “I thought you were doing a spell.”

“Sure, but first I had to get him to follow me, neh? Once he came through the fence he caught sight of the phantasm and chased it off.”

Magpie shook her head at him. “You tetched?” she asked. “Pouncing on that meat? I wouldn’t have let you.”

“And who are you to let or not let me?” he asked, amused.

She shrugged. “It’s your first journey beyond, neh? I feel responsible for you.”

“Well, you’re not.”

Calypso cut in, “We’re all responsible for each other and that’s how it is, lad. When ye’re with us that goes for ye too, be ye a prince or neh.”

Talon flushed at the scolding. “I didn’t mean—” he started to say, but Magpie cut in.

“Piff! You should’ve seen him jump on that cat, birds. Like a lunatic!” It sounded like a criticism, but Talon saw the same wondering smile at the corners of her lips as when she’d called his skin “uncommon,” and he found himself blushing just the same too. “I want to see a phantasm, though,” she went on. “You too tired to make one?”

“I can muster one up,” he said, pushing himself up on his elbows. He squinted a little in concentration, and while Magpie and the crows looked on, a ghost of himself seemed to stand up and step out of his body. It flickered a little, looked around, and suddenly leapt up onto the edge of the trunk between Calypso and Bertram, where it performed a silly dance before backflipping off the side and blinking out in - mid-air.

The crows squawked and laughed and Talon collapsed back onto his back, grinning. “Sharp!” Magpie cried, clapping.

Within his fort of books the hobgoblin had come to a smooching scene and shouted for them to pipe down.

“How’d you do it?” Magpie asked Talon.