Page 138 of Gilded

Nothing was said while Meadowsweet dutifully found two more bugs, and the rest of the maidens who had led Serilda to this place fanned out and claimed stones around the circle, leaving Serilda standing in the middle.

Once they were settled, Pusch-Grohla sniffed and sat up straight again. She never took her gaze from Serilda.

When she spoke, her voice was thin as watered-down milk. “This is the girl who stuffed you into an onion cellar?”

Serilda frowned. To say it that way made her sound like a villain, rather than the hero.

“She is,” said Meadowsweet.

Pusch-Grohla sucked on her front teeth for a moment, and when she spoke again, Serilda noticed that a few of those teeth were missing, and the ones she did have didn’t quite fit her mouth, or each other. As though they’d been borrowed and repurposed from a helpful mule. “Is there a debt owed?”

“No, Grandmother,” said Meadowsweet. “We were happy to show our gratitude, although”—Meadowsweet glanced at Serilda’s throat, then down to her hand—“you do not wear our gifts?”

“I have hidden them away for safekeeping,” she said, keeping her tone even.

It wasn’t entirely a lie. Behind the veil, they were most securely hidden, and she knew Gild would keep them safe.

Pusch-Grohla leaned forward, staring straight through Serilda in a way that reminded her of a hawk watching the skittering path of a mouse across the fields.

Then she smiled. The effect was not so much jolly as disconcerting.

It was followed by a loud, wheezing laugh, as she pointed a crooked finger with swollen knuckles toward Serilda. “You honor the god of lies with that clever mouth. But, child”—her countenance dissolved into sternness—“do not think to lie tome.”

“I would not dare …,” said Serilda. She hesitated, not sure what to call her. “Grandmother?”

The woman sucked her teeth again, and if she cared one way or the other what Serilda called her, it did not show. “My granddaughters gave gifts worthy of your assistance. A ring and a necklace. Very old. Very fine. You had them with you when Erlkönig summoned you on the Hunger Moon, and you have them with you no longer.” Her gaze turned sharp, almost hostile. “What did the Alder King give to you in exchange for these trinkets?”

“The Alder King?” Serilda shook her head. “I didn’t give them tohim.”

“No? Then how is it you have spent three moons in his care, and yet you remain alive?”

She looked briefly at Meadowsweet and the gathered maidens. There was not a friendly face among them, but she could not blame them for being mistrustful, especially knowing that the dark ones made a game of hunting them for sport.

“The Erlking believes that I can spin straw into gold,” she started. “A blessing from Hulda. That was the lie I told him when I was hiding Meadowsweet and Parsley, yes, in an onion cellar. Three times now, he has summoned me to the castle in Adalheid and asked me to do just that, and threatened to kill me if I failed. But there is a … a ghost in the castle. A boy who is a true gold-spinner. In exchange for that magic, and for saving my life, I gave him the necklace and the ring.”

Pusch-Grohla was silent a long time, while Serilda shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot.

“And what did you give as payment on the third moon?”

She stilled, holding the old woman’s gaze.

Memories flashed in her thoughts. Searing kisses and caresses.

But no. That wasn’t what she was asking, and it certainly hadn’t been payment for anything.

“A promise,” she answered.

“God-magic does not work on promises.”

“Evidently it does.”

Testy surprise flashed through Pusch-Grohla’s eyes, and Serilda shrank back a bit.

“It was a promise for … for something very valuable,” she added, embarrassed to say more. She didn’t think she could adequately explain what had led to such a deal being struck, and she didn’t want Pusch-Grohla to see her as the sort of person who would carelessly bargain away her firstborn child.

Even if she was. Evidently.

She turned her attention to Meadowsweet. “I am sorry, though, if the necklace held special meaning for you. May I ask, who was the girl in the portrait?”