She pulled one fork free of her shoulder. The one that had scraped her chin had fallen free and disappeared amid snow.
Half the tines had been broken off, giving it more penetrative power.
She held it out, threatening, her wounded leg nearly buckling as she put weight on it.
The goblins approached.
Half had scraps of her clothing. They wore them as trophies or clothing, or had desecrated the items with filth, or largely destroyed them.
If Padraic had been done this to make her feel more violated, it worked.
They weren’t approaching any further.
A sneak attack?
She half-turned.
A hand settled on her shoulder.
The girl in the checkered scarf looked up at Sandra Duchamp.
Her relief was powerful enough to wipe out the brief surge of strength adrenaline had given her. Her leg did buckle.
Sandra helped keep her from falling, two hands catching her around the middle to prevent both knees from cracking against frozen-over sidewalk.
“Sanctuary,” the girl in the checkered scarf said, her voice low, eyes on the ground. She was close enough to kneeling for it to count.
“She’s our quarry,” Buttsack growled.
“I could ask for concessions,” Sandra said. “Blake Thorburn-”
“I’ll make-”
“Shh,” Sandra cut her off, the sound surprisingly sharp. “I could, but I won’t.”
“Because you’re leaving her for us?” one goblin asked.
“No,” Sandra said. “I’ll grant sanctuary to this stupid little girl. You goblins will either disappear promptly or you’ll become troll food.”
Her weasely familiar unwound itself from around her neck, darting along one arm, stepping on the kneeling girl’s back-
“Oof,” the girl in the checkered scarf grunted.
The familiar hopped down to the ground, and the resulting sound resembled a falling sack of potatoes more than a large rodent dropping to the ground.
“I’ll be looking for you,” Buttsack said.
That was answer enough.
The goblins disappeared.
For long moments, the scene was still. Sandra bent down and collected her familiar from the ground before helping her supplicant stand.
“I don’t have to swear anything?” the girl asked, wavering on her feet.
“No,” Sandra said.
The girl nodded slowly. “I… I didn’t know where to go. I thought about asking Laird, but-”
“Laird is gone.”
“Then it’s an extra good thing I didn’t go to his place. Ow, frick- fuck, hurts. Would’ve died.”
Sandra put one hand on the girl’s chin and used the leverage to turn the girl’s head, peering at the wound at the corner of her chin. “Oh my. What did you do to yourself?”
“I got forked.”
“Not what I was talking about, but yes, we’ll need to clean that promptly. Goblins like to taint their weapons. We’ll hope it’s only feces.”
The statement only got a weary nod by way of response.
“Rest your weight on me. My house isn’t far. Just over there. The smaller house.”
They limped on for several seconds, spending more time working out a rhythm and figuring out how to progress than they did covering any ground.
“You know who I am?”
“I can put the pieces together.”
“Oh. Well yeah. Doesn’t look pretty, does it?”
“When I was teaching my nieces to drive, I told them they won’t learn proper respect for the road until they had an accident of some sort. Maybe that’s silly, but I think the notion applies to the practice, too.”
“‘Accident’ sounds like it’s too mild for this degree of fuck up. Oh god, ow, shit, my leg hurts.”
Sandra offered a look of surprise. “I didn’t think you could swear.”
“I can now. Silver fucking linings.”
“I’d strongly suggest you keep to old deals and promises. Negative or not, you’ll want to hold on to what you can. You’re coming apart at the seams.”
“Okay.”
They made their way to the front door.
“Lean more heavily on me there,” Sandra said, “I need one hand free for the key… here.”
The door opened, and they made their way inside.
“Why help me?”
“You might call it an urge to express a frustrated maternal instinct,” Sandra said. “Have a seat in the armchair there. I don’t have a couch for you to sleep on. This is my refuge, so to speak, from incessant company, and couches only invite company to stay.”
“I didn’t take you for a loner.”
“Not a loner, exactly. I revel in politics, in family business. Dwell too long on such things, however, and I risk losing perspective. I have to step away from it all. The only company I would comfortably invite here is temporary company, like yourself, and one man who is presently in Toronto.”
“Blake’s in-” the girl started, before she stopped herself.
“I know exactly where he is, not to worry. Not the man I speak of.”
The house was smaller than most on the block, and there was a kind of elegance to the setup. Everything was narrow, everything had a place. An old fashioned cornucopia took up space between sets of books that were pressed to either side of the shelf by bookends.
Books on herbs, cookbooks, wine guides, Tantric sex guidebooks, books on weaving and threads.
Spellbooks. Two matching tomes, one in some Nordic language, the other apparently a translation, reading ‘Trollkind’.
A small glass of wine and a plate of bread and cheese were placed on the stand by the armchair, eliciting a look of surprise.
“While you’re present, you have my promise of safety. You may take of my food, water and wine with no expectation of repayment,” Sandra said.
“I don’t know the proper response. But… I won’t betray this hospitality.”
“One night, for the time being. Faerie are dangerous business. A bad kind of accident to decide to have. If I give you more shelter than this, I risk getting on the bad side of their plots.”
“He’s gone too. With my name and a glamour that makes him look like me.”
“He’ll return. When the court gets wind of this… escapade, they’ll step in.”
“Could I reach out to the courts? Get their help? If I turned him in, I could f- mess with him. Throw a wrench in the works.”
“Oh,” Sandra said. It sounded like pity distilled. With one hand, she brushed at the girl’s hair.
The girl stared down at the ornate rug in the middle of the living room. “Yeah, frying pans and fires. That was a stupid idea.”
“You have a hard road to travel, and it’s one I can’t and won’t help with, except for what I’m offering tonight. Most individuals strong enough to help know well enough not to. The exceptions to the rule… well, you’ll find out.”
“I imagine I will.”
“Let me get the first aid kit, and you can explain what happened tonight.”
“Oh, I can explain right now.”
Sandra raised an eyebrow.
“I earned my bragging rights.”