I lifted my hands dripping from the suds, took the herbal cigarette out of the corner of my mouth, and said, “Excuse me?”

“Well, in a manner of speaking,” said the Ticker placidly. She stalked in, the picture of elven self-possession, and picked a saucer out of the dishpan with thumb and forefinger. “Mab’s grace. So low as you’ve fallen, my precious boy.”

“I’m out of cups. Nothing else would have driven me to it.” The water had killed my cigarette. I sighed and flicked it out the window.

She dropped into my upholstered chair and swung her long legs over the arm. Her concession to summer’s heat, I noticed, was to tear the sleeves off her favorite pair of gray mechanic’s coveralls and roll the legs up to mid-calf. And still she did look rather like a queen’s daughter; but the elves usually look like royalty. When they’re trying not to, they only look like royalty in a cheap plastic disguise. Tick-Tick had a face like the bust of Nefertiti, only more daunting, and her eyes were huge and long and the gray of January ice.

“Is it still overcast?” I asked.

“Oh, yes. Nice summer thunderstorm tonight. Ah, of course, my condolences. Your tan isn’t finished.”

“You don’t exactly finish a tan.”

“I wouldn’t know. But I’m trying to share your sentiments on the thing, really.”

The skin on her face, her arms, her ankles, was smooth and almost buttermilk-colored. As far as I know, elves don’t sunburn, either.

“So have you come to help me wash dishes?”

“Earth defend me. No, I’ve come to take you away from all this. I’ve work for you to do.”

I raised my head like a cat hearing a can opener.

“Road trip?” Tick-Tick and I had a pleasant and profitable line of work established, guiding foragers, explorers, merchants, and whoever through the less-charted areas of the Borderlands, the Nevernever. There the magic boiling out of the Elflands makes Alice’s looking-glass garden, where you have to walk away from your destination to get there, seem like a trivial navigation problem.

“No, sorry. Not work for us, just for you. It’s probably only the work of fifteen minutes, but I’ll pay you in dinner. And it’s an excuse to stop what you’re doing.”

“You’re my partner, you ass. You don’t have to pay for it.”

“All right.” She grinned, and commanded, “You may find my torque wrench and do me the favor of joining me for dinner.”

I laughed as the last glass slid from my fingers back into the water. Then—”Ah,” I said. “That was quick.”