Rain started up again in a blowsy mist. My teeth began to chatter. “We need to find shelter and decide what to do.”

“I have to speak to the headmaster, Cat. I think we should go there first.”

Rory hunched his shoulders. “He’s a dragon. You can’t trust him. He will eat you.”

“He won’t eat me, Rory.” Bee poked him in the arm. “He might eat you, though, and there are moments when you are so annoying that I must say I expect I would encourage him to do so.”

Rory drew himself straight, lips pulled back. “I shall have you know, Beatrice, that I am never annoying. That you find me so is a reflection on your character, not mine.”

“We need to scout out our ground first,” I temporized, for I sensed Rory trembling at the edge of rebellion. Also, I desperately wanted to dry out and get warm. “Let’s go first to the law offices of Godwik and Clutch. It’s a long walk across the city, I know. But if there’s anyone I trust, it’s the trolls… the feathered people, I mean. The Taino always use the more polite phrase.”

“We need not imitate the Taino in everything just because they believe themselves to be superior to us!” remarked Bee in a frosty tone. “But I suppose it is wisest to go to the law offices first. Wait here.”

She left Rory and me huddled with the chest under the eaves of a decrepit warehouse. Wagons lined up to offload their glistening catch into the baskets and crates of middlemen, merchants, cooks, and men guarding wheelbarrows. No one paid us any mind, for we looked exactly like an impoverished brother and sister who had no home and no means of buying our next meal, but I felt exposed and vulnerable.

“Rory, what did you tell the wagoner about our sire? You ought to have been silent.”

“It was while you were howling. I said our sire was the Master of the Wild Hunt. The benefit of telling the truth is that so few people believe you.”

I laughed. “When did you get to be so wise?”

“There was this woman I petted in the palace of the prince of Tarrant that time I got trapped there after eating the pug dog and the peahen…”

He regaled me with a story that made me laugh more than once, even if there were particulars I had to command him to skip over because I did not want to hear them. Having no shame, he had no idea there were private things a person did not tell other people. Just as he finished, Bee reappeared carrying three leather peddlers’ sacks and a wrapped paper bundle.

Rory took the wrapped paper from her, brushed his cheek against hers, then held the paper to his nose and inhaled. “Fish! You brought me food.”

“How did you manage that?” I demanded.