“Burned,” echoed Dog Mask, and all of them halted. “Burned to nothing?”

“Not quite,” I sobbed. “But he’s dead, he’s all scorched and broken . . . We must stop somewhere so I can . . .” The words bury him stuck in my throat. “So I can lay him to rest,” I whispered. Finbar gave a gurgle, then stuck his fist in his mouth. Soon he would be hungry and there would be nothing to give him.

“Where is he?” Dog Mask’s voice had lost its usual detachment; it was fierce and urgent. “Show us!”

“He’s in my bag,” I said, knowing I did not want to put Finbar down even for the few moments it would take to show them the pitiful remnants of my little one.

“Show us!” A chorus of voices now, all of them muted, for we were not so very far from the clearing with its crowd of gorgeously clad folk. We were only a stone’s throw from Mac Dara’s hall. They gathered around me, chittering, humming, rumbling anxiously. Strange fingers, furred, stony, watery, clawed or feathered, reached out toward the bag on my back.

“Give me your brother,” said Dog Mask.

“No!” I clutched Finbar closer.

Dog Mask sighed. “Pass him to me so I can hold him while you take off your bag.”

“We will help you, Clodagh,” said the watery one, and its voice made each word a little rippling melody.

“Trust us,” the rocky one rumbled. “Kindred aid kindred.”

“And you’re in sore need of help, believe me,” put in Dog Mask. “Come, time is short, and we are not yet in a place of safety.”

“All right,” I said after a moment. “But no tricks, you understand? Stay right there where I can see you.” I passed Finbar into Dog Mask’s arms, realizing how unheroic I must look with my eyes and nose streaming, my clothing spattered with vomit and my chest still heaving with distress. I reached to push my hair back out of my eyes.

“Ohhh,” murmured the being in the feather cape, whose mask gave it the appearance of an owl. “Poor hand, poor hand! Fire hurt you!”

“I tried to save him,” I said. “I really tried. But he . . . he . . .”

“Show us,” said Dog Mask.

I took off my pack gingerly—my burned hands did hurt—and set it on the ground. There had been no time to fasten it after I laid poor Becan inside. The Old Ones clustered around, peering in. I forced myself to look. My baby lay where I had placed him, his solitary pebble eye staring blankly up, his mouth twisted out of shape, the green leaves of his skin scorched to crisp brown. A little shriveled thing that could never have been alive. I reached in and lifted him out.