“Flannan and I are good friends. Having him survive, salvaging something worthwhile from that terrible time . . . I knew he’d be moving on at some point. That’s his life now. Coming here instead of staying at court—it means I can spend a bit longer in his company, yes.”

“Mm-hm. So you turn your back on another friend and go off to fight a monster. Something nobody else has managed to get near.”

“What do you mean, another friend? Are you talking about Flidais? She gave me permission to go. Don’t make more out of this than it merits, Grim. We’re here now, we have a job to do and we’ll do it. And . . .” I couldn’t say, Then we’ll go home. “And don’t say Mm-hm again or I’ll scream and wake up half the household.”

Instead, he said nothing.

“A brew would be good,” I said after a while. “Tomorrow I’ll ask that steward for a pot and a couple of cups. And I’ll gather a bit of this and that in the woods. We can head out after breakfast and have a look around.”

“Something I forgot,” Grim said. “Something I was going to tell you. Saw a little person, when we stopped by that lake. One of them, you know. Only not like Conmael’s folk. Even stranger than them. Tiny. With a basket. Scurrying away across a field. Thought it was a squirrel, but no. Wearing a cloak with a hood. Like something out of an old tale.”

“Not a child?”

“Not a human child. All wrong for that.”

“Why didn’t you say?”

He twisted his fingers together, not looking at me. “Didn’t feel right to speak up, when all of them could hear. Not as if they know about us and Conmael, is it? Didn’t get a chance to tell you on your own.” After a little he added, “Sounds as if Flannan doesn’t believe in the fey, anyway. He’d have thought I was crazy.”

“Perhaps not. Nobody could visit this place without feeling the—the strangeness. That touch of the Other. And that’s even without the monster wailing. Little folk with baskets might be the least of the surprises.” I glanced at him. “You must be feeling it. The same as at Dreamer’s Pool, only more so. Magic everywhere, and I can’t tell if it’s good or bad.”

“Both, maybe,” said Grim, who was a lot wiser than folk gave him credit for. “Could be what a body makes of it. One thing I know. That crying makes a man sadder than an old house with the roof half gone and the rain coming in.”

“Mm.” He was right, of course. And it wasn’t as if Geiléis hadn’t warned us. Could be my churning stomach and warring thoughts owed as much to the monster’s influence as to anything else. “Sadder than a dog watching over its dead master,” I said.

“Sadder than a pot of porridge with nobody to eat it.”

“Sadder than a sausage left to go cold in the pan.”