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“I’ll make more,” I said grimly. The goats would eat the ruined potful, but scraping it clean would be a chore.

“Do not trouble yourself,” said Jory. “Pass me my pack, brat,” he added, jerking his chin toward Jack.

Jack scowled but did as he was told. “Suppose you’re never going to forgive me,” he muttered as he dropped the pack at his brother’s feet.

“I daresay I shall. After a year or two.”

“Well, I am sorry.”

“Oh, I wager you were very sorry. Probably the first time you went hungry, slept in the rain, and couldn’t start a fire, you were sorry you left me behind with no money and no boots.”

Jack slunk onto my stool. “I have the best camping spot in the world now,” he said.

I held my tongue.

“Here,” said Jory, pulling parcels from the top of his pack. “These came from the market this morning. Good and fresh.” He passed them to Rose.

“You came by some money then,” said Jack, eyeing the packages and the boots on his brother’s feet.

“Didn’t say I bought them,” replied Jory.

“Wheaten bread!” said Rose, eyes wide. “We’ve not tasted soft bread for ever so long. Look, Lily!” She held up the loaf. “And look!” She sniffed a wedge of pale, yellow cheese.

“I’ll toast it,” I said, taking the loaf from her .

“Allow me,” said Jory, rising to pluck it back.

“You don’t trust me not to burn it?”

He smiled, as though to a child.

“I only burnt it because I was distracted by you coming to the door,” I added, nettled.

“I am a master at toasted cheese,” he said.

“Very well.” I left him to it.

Jack gave me a sympathetic look. For the first time I felt a jot of fellowship with the boy, and gave him a look back as though to say, I can see now why you left him behind. But Jack, understanding my look, said quietly, “He’s a good fellow really. He’s the clever one.”

While the bread and cheese toasted to golden perfection, Jory marvelled at our shelf of books.

“History, Faerie lore,” he said, reading the titles slowly. “Mathematicks and physicks and astronomy.” He looked at Mother in amazement. “Where did you get such valuable books? They’re worth a king’s ransom.”

“I was given most of them,” said Mother vaguely.

“By who?”

I was as curious as he was. I waited for her answer.

She only narrowed her eyes, regarding Jory as she said softly, “You do not need to know.”

Her words dulled my curiosity at once, like a mist settling over my mind. Jory blinked and his look of enquiry vanished.

“Do you read them?” he asked some minutes later.

“What else are books for?” said Mother.

“Do you read them?” he asked, turning to me.

“Certainly,” I said. “Is that so wonderful?”

“Why, yes! Only scholars and rich men read such things.”

I hadn’t realised that .

“Your toast will burn if you don’t attend,” I said with some satisfaction.

He hastened back to the hearth.

Jack asked if his brother had seen the band of ruffians who’d passed by earlier. He told him about the one who had come to our door, and how a wall of thorns had driven them off.

“A wall of thorns?” said Jory.

“Magic roses,” Jack whispered. “Enchanted, aren’t they?” he said to Mother.

She nodded. “A gift from the garden of the south queen of Faerie.”

Jory looked doubtful. “I first saw those fellows forty miles back,” he said.

“Kept them in sight while keeping myself out of theirs. Rough band, more brawn than brains. Once they were in their cups of an evening I’d go among them and partake of their supper—the sapskulls didn’t even notice I was a stranger. ” He grinned.

Jack was impressed. “And they never noticed?”

“Not with a hood on and a bit of swagger and bluster. It was dark, and they were full of homebrew.”

I glanced at Mother and Rose to see what they thought. Rose was watching him with curiosity. Mother looked thoughtful.

“You’re a knowing one,” said Jack admiringly.

Jory saw my expression. “What do you say I am, Miss Lily?”

I bristled. He called Rose my lady , while I was Miss .

“A fly-by-night,” I said.

He laughed.

The cheese on toast was delicious. Even Rose licked the last morsel from her fingers and still managed to look ladylike. I made tea and gave up my chair again to our guest without resentment, seeing as he had made such a glorious supper.

Mother stirred up the fire and added a log.

We all sat round comfortably while Jory told us amusing tales of his journey—how he’d taken a wrong turn at a crossroads and been lost in a forest for two days until a woodcutter showed him the way back to the road in exchange for a hare caught with his sling.

And how, one morning, he had sat on what he thought was a misty hillock in a meadow, only to discover it was a sleeping bull.

“The thing chased me half a mile and wouldn’t let me near the field again,” said Jory. “But I had to go back,” he added. “For I’d dropped my pack.”

“How did you get it back?” I asked, still laughing, for he had a humorous way of storytelling.

“A mere slip of a boy came along, demanding to know what I was doing vexing his Buttercup. Turned out Buttercup was the bull. The great hefty brute let the brat pet him like a puppy. I told the boy he could have anything from my pack if he’d just fetch it.

The little runt said if the pack were in his field, it was already his.

I had to empty the coins from my britches to buy it back. ”

“If you cannot outsmart a child or a bull,” said Mother slowly, “how do you think you’ll deal with the fae, if you go over the border? And take a wrong turn in Faerie, and you may never find your way back.”

Jack watched his brother, anxious for his reply.

Jory looked steadily back at Mother, then rummaged in his pack and pulled out a wooden pipe and a pouch of tobacco. “May I?” he asked, offering to fill her pipe. She shook her head, for no one touched her pipe, so Jory gave her the pouch that she might fill her bowl herself.

We sat quietly for some time while Mother and Jory puffed meditatively, and Rose’s knitting needles clicked rhythmically. I gazed into the flames. Jack fidgeted, trying to stay awake.

Then Jory said, as calmly as one might comment on the weather—“I won’t take a wrong turn in Faerie. For I have a map that will take me right to the treasure.”