The pain in Shade’s foot subsided, and she began to calm down. I’ll find a place to stay first, she decided. What did that brownie say? The Jerkin? The Boar’s something? I’ll find one of those and get situated and—
Her thoughts were interrupted by a cry of “In-a here!” followed by two small figures crashing into her, sending all three tumbling to the ground.
“Hey!” Shade cried as she disentangled herself from the other two. “Watch where you’re going. You’re—”
“’Ey! It’s-a the little country sproot!” cried one of the two as he stood up and brushed off his too-tight brown suit. Suddenly he snapped his fingers. “Professor, you still got-a the sproot wings from the job we pull-a in Upper Swinetoe?”
The other figure sprang up on his two very long legs (which, in spite of the baggy pants, Shade could see bent the opposite way of her own, like the legs of a grasshopper) and nodded vigorously. His pale, pinkish-white skin and blond curls almost glowed in the moonlight as he rummaged deep in a pocket inside his oversized jacket before pulling out a battered and bent pair of fake butterfly wings that seemed far too big to fit in the pocket they had just come from. The brownie grabbed them and strapped them to his back. “That’s-a fine! And the wig?”
The pixie reached back into his jacket and pulled out a shoulder-length red wig and plopped it on the brownie’s head. “Okay, now you!” the brownie said.
The pixie made a frenzied search of the many pockets in his jacket and pants before shaking his head.
“You no got-a the other disguise?”
The pixie shook his head.
“Okay . . . you put-a you jacket over you head and look-a sad. You’ll-a be the sick old granmama.”
The pixie nodded then threw his jacket over his head and made a sad, sick face. It was very similar to the one you tried to use to stay home to avoid that spelling quiz that you forgot to study for, but the pixie’s was much more convincing.
“Great! Now the three of us will—”
“What the dingle-dangle donkle is going on here?” Shade demanded.
The pixie opened his mouth wide and covered it with a hand and pointed at Shade with the other. “’Ey, you kiss-a you mother with that—” the brownie began.
“What’s going on? And what do you mean ‘the three of us’?”
“Well, it’s-a like this,” the brownie explained. “My partner and I, we play-a the cards with those Sluagh red caps back at the Rook—”
“What’s a ‘red cap’?” Shade asked.
“What’s-a the red cap?” The brownie looked at her incredulously. “Ha-ha! Boy, you really are-a the little country sproot! After the last war, a lotta the Sluagh run-a around in the red caps to look-a tough and let-a everybody know they the big, tough Sluagh. So like I say, we play-a with the red caps and there was-a the little misunderstanding and now they wanna kill us.”
“What misunderstanding?”
“They think-a we cheat! I no know why. You know, Professor?”
The pixie shrugged and about twenty cards fell out of his sleeve, all of them the Ace of Hearts.
“He no know either. I think-a they just the sore losers. Anyway, you’re-a gonna help us sneak away from ’em.”
“And why would I do that?” Shade asked, crossing her arms.
“You wanna be responsible for somebody getting murdered?” the brownie asked.
“Of course not.”
“Well, they gonna kill us if you no help,” he replied before he and the pixie each grabbed one of her arms and started pulling her out of the alley with them.
“Wait! No! I never said I’d—Oof!”
Shade’s objections were cut short as she bumped into the legs of the gigantic human she’d seen at the bar. He growled and put his hand on the handle of an immense knife strapped to his belt.
“Excuse me,” Shade squeaked.
“Yeah, ’scuse her,” the brownie said, pushing her gently back behind him. “She’s-a the clumsy—always she’s-a bumpin’ and-a boompin’ and-a—”
“What have we here?” asked a bat-faced hobgoblin who walked beside the human. He was soon joined by another hobgoblin, weasel-faced and equally hairless (but then, since I’m sure you know that hobgoblins look just like goblins but shorter and hairless, the “hairless” part really doesn’t deserve any mention, does it?), and a short, leathery fairy with large feet and hands, spindly arms and legs from which its skin hung slack and wrinkled, crooked teeth, and rocks adorning his clothes. All of them wore dark red caps on their heads.
“Just the three country sproots come-a to the town for the market,” the brownie said offhandedly.
“That so?” the hobgoblin asked, eyeing him closely. “Well, you look an awful lot like a cardsharpin’ brownie we’re lookin’ for.”
“I get-a that a lot. I just got-a one of those faces.”
The hobgoblin pointed at the pixie, who frowned sadly. “And this looks an awful lot like his silent pixie partner.”
“Well, that’s-a my granmama. I get-a my face from her, so we look a lot alike other people.”
The hobgoblin leaned forward and sniffed. “I think you two are the brownie and the pixie we’re lookin’ for.”
The brownie waved his hand dismissively. “Aw, that’s-a crazy! We’re-a sproots! See-a the wings? Plus, you say-a the pixie, he no talk?”
“Yeah?”
“Hey, granmama, can-a you talk?”
The pixie nodded.
“See, she can-a talk, so she no can-a be the pixie!”
The leathery fairy, a spriggan, began to grow and swell, making the noise a balloon makes when it’s being inflated, until finally it towered over even the human. It pointed a filthy, cracked fingernail at the pixie. “If that’s a sproit, where’s ’er wings, eh?”
“Yuh!” the human grunted. He drew his large, iron knife and held it close to the brownie’s face. The brownie leaned away as if it were red-hot, which is exactly how it would have felt if the iron had touched him. “Whure?”
“Well . . uh . . . the thing is. . . eh . . .” the brownie stammered.
This whole time, Shade, terrified of the Sluagh goons, had considered telling the red-capped gang the truth about the situation to save herself, but said nothing for fear of what they might do to the brownie and the pixie, who seemed dishonest but harmless enough. Plus, she wasn’t sure they would let her go even if she did give them the other two. Seeing the brownie finally at a loss for words, she leapt into action, crying her most convincing fake tears. “No, please don’t hurt us!” she wailed. “Ever since mama was devoured by a screech owl and grandmama’s wings were shredded by that badger, we’ve been ever so heartbroken. We thought that the goblin market would be a rare treat that might lift our woeful spirits, but now we’re going to be killed because my father looks like some crooked, ugly brownie—”
“I no think-a anyone say he was-a ugly,” the brownie said.
“He was,” the hobgoblin replied.
“Yuh,” agreed the human.
“—and because my poor, wingless grandmama looks like some smelly pixie!”
The pixie raised an arm, gave his armpit a sniff, and shrugged.
“I’d try to fly away,” Shade continued, extending and giving her wings a half-hearted flap to show they were real, “but I’m sure I’d have no chance of escaping such fast, strong, and clever fairies—and human—as yourselves!”
“Darn roight we is!” the spriggan growled.
“Yuh,” the human agreed.
“O woe is me! If only we could have been as quick and as lucky as that blabbermouthed brownie in the tight clothes and the mute pixie in the baggy green outfit who ran past just a little while ago!”
The fairies and human looked at each other. “Which way did they go?” the bat-faced hobgoblin barked.
Shade pointed past the Crooked Rook. “That way. Into the country where we just came from.”
“Come on, boys!” the hobgoblin cried, waving his bronze sword in the air. “Let’s get ’em!”
The rest, brandishing their weapons and shouting, ran off into the darkness of the country. The brownie laughed, and the pixie clapped his hands. “Ha-ha! That’s-a the good one!” the brownie said, putting his arm around her shoulders. “You know, you’re-a the pretty clever little sproot!”
“I know,” Shade said, shrugging off his arm.
“I tell-a you what,” the brownie declared. “You help-a us out, so now we help-a you out. We show-a you around the town, give-a you the hand—”
At that, the pixie reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a wooden hand that he held out to Shade.
“Not that kinda hand, partner,” the brownie said. The pixie put it back in his pocket. “I’m-a Ginch—Rigoletto Ginch—and this is-a my partner, the Professor.”
Shade arched an eyebrow at this. “He’s a professor?”
“Well, he no talk, so I no know his name, so I call-a him the Professor. Doesn’t he look-a like a professor?” Rigoletto Ginch asked.
Shade looked at the pixie. The pink tip of his tongue stuck out slightly from the goofy grin on his face. “No.”
“Yeah, I no think-a so either,” Ginch agreed. “So like I say, you help-a us, so we take-a you under our wing.”
The Professor pulled out the waistband of his pants, and a white bird fluttered into the air. He flapped his arms as it flew away, then pointed at Shade.
Shade looked from Ginch to the Professor and then back to Ginch. “I’ll pass. I think you’ve gotten me into enough trouble already.”
“But you no know how the gooblin market work,” Ginch objected.
“I’ve read all about them. I know how they work,” Shade said.
“Oh, you read-a the book so you the expert!” Ginch threw up his hands.
Shade turned her back on the two and walked toward the town center. “No, but I’m sure I know more than enough to take care of myself,” she said with the exact sort of confidence that usually gets people into profoundly deep trouble.