“Do other faeries now craft skins?”

Magpie answered, “None I ever heard of.”

He reached out his hand but stopped and curled his fume fingers into a fist, knowing his touch would burn it. “Won’t you put it on?” he asked.

“Oh—aye, sure!” Talon answered, flustered. He shook out the skin and stepped into it, and Magpie had to reach out to steady him as he caught his foot in his haste. He shrugged it on, visioned it awake, and turned falcon in an instant.

The Magruwen exhaled curls of smoke and stared at him. “Remarkable . . . ,” he breathed. “Does it fly?”

Talon spread his wings and lifted himself into the air, where he wheeled among the stalactites for a moment before landing and peeling the head back from his skin. He was grinning. “It’s not as good as flying on real wings,” he said, “but it beats staying on the ground.”

The Magruwen moved in close, his eyes reading Talon’s skin like a page in a book and pausing only briefly at the flaw in the throat. “Barbules from falcon feathers interknit with glyphs for flight and phantom . . . ,” he said. “Very cleverly done. Did you think of using the glyph for floating as well, so you need expend no energy in staying aloft?”

“I thought of that after I started flying in it,” Talon admitted. “It is some work. But I have another idea, Lord Magruwen. . . . I thought of a way of joining the twelve glyphs for flight into one. I thought I’d try that in my next skin.”

At his side, Magpie’s eyes popped wide open, and she turned to look at him in surprise.

“Join all twelve?” asked the Djinn.

“Aye. Do you think that would work?”

“Can you show it to me? Hold it clear in your mind.”

“Oh, aye.” The new pattern was still turning in Talon’s mind, clear as when he’d dreamt it.

The Magruwen closed his eyes and Talon held very still, hoping the Djinn wouldn’t have to touch his forehead as Magpie had, but he felt only a slight prickle on the back of his neck, and then the Djinn blinked his eyes open again. “Lad,” he said, “have you tried this yet?”

“Neh, I only dreamt it last night.”

“It is a very complex spell.”

Magpie cut in, “I never even heard of a spell that fuses twelve glyphs! The most I ever saw was seven, and even that was only the one time.”

“Truly?” asked Talon, shamefaced. “I didn’t know. . . . I reckon it won’t work.”

“It will work,” said the Magruwen. “It is extraordinary. You dreamt it, did you?”

“Aye, after I tasted that cordial.”

“Indeed.”

“The cordial was made by a faerie too, Lord Magruwen,” said Magpie. “You see, we are more than butterflies.”

“I begin to see.”