‘“I will marry you,” the woman said, and Dougal’s heart leaped in his chest. “But,” she went on, and his heart sank a bit, “first you must climb to the top of the Perilous Crag, find the Red Giant’s cave, and bring me back his most precious possession.”

‘Now Dougal, being a shepherd, was fleet of foot and good on ledges. He’d fetched more lost sheep back than anyone could count. So he got up the Perilous Crag all right and found the Red Giant’s cave without much trouble. So far, so good, he thought. Maybe the fellow’s out for a walk and I can get this done quick and painless.’

Bardán’s listening. Nodding here and there. I wonder what’s best with this story. Get it wrong and he might come unstuck the way I did when Blackthorn started telling that tale about warring clurichauns. Turned me half-crazy for a while. But make it too bland and he’ll stop listening, and when you stop listening the dark things come back into your head.

‘Next thing,’ I say, ‘the Red Giant came roaring out of the cave. “Who dares come up my crag? Who dares approach my cave? Don’t you know I can snap you in half with my two little fingers?”

‘Dougal was scared. Who wouldn’t be? But he thought of the beautiful fey woman, and he looked the giant in the eye and said, “I do know this: you have something precious in your cave and I need to take it away. My whole future depends on it.”

‘Now you might be wondering why the giant, big as he was, didn’t just reach out a finger and push Dougal over the edge. Easy, it would have been. Only there was a charm over the place, and over the giant’s treasure, that the big man himself couldn’t lift. A fey charm, a bad one. “You can’t have it,” the giant said, planting his big feet apart and folding his big arms. “Unless you can guess what it is. Take as many guesses as you want. Only, if you haven’t got it right before the sun goes down, off the cliff you go, and there won’t be much left of you when you get to the bottom. Who’ll look after your sheep then?”’

When Blackthorn was telling it, she stopped here and passed over the wax tablet, and there were the questions for me to read. So I tell it the same way.

‘“Is it gold?” “It is not gold.”

‘“Is it silver?” “It is not silver.”

‘So it went on; Dougal guessed all kinds of jewels; he guessed bronze or copper or fine glass. He guessed cattle or sheep. He guessed a fine hunting hound, a swift riding horse, a magic sword. To each the answer was no.