She giggled, clapped, and hopped, delighted with herself. “I saw you was going to fight that straw-haired bloke and you didn’t look up to the task.”
“Well, I was murdered at lunchtime, so I’m not at my best.”
“Where’s your big friend?” She picked up my dagger and handed it to me. When she bent before me I got a good look at her right ear, which tapered to a gentle point, like the Puck’s. So.
“Taken by the watch,” I said, sheathing the dagger. “And the blackguard captain who killed me. I reckon I am doomed to walk among the living until I rescue the great ninny, and only then will I find eternal rest.”
Cobweb tilted her head as if examining a spot between my eyes, like a cat might consider a dragonfly before dashing it to bits with a quick claw. “You’re daft and you stink of rotting fish. You didn’t wash your clothes in the stream like I told you, did you?”
“It was on the agenda, but then I was murdered.”
“No you weren’t. Now shed your shabby husks and I’ll give them a slosh while you eat.” She turned and marched to the edge of the clearing.
My stomach lurched at the mention of eating. “Where are you going?”
“To build you a nest to lie in so you don’t fall against the rock and dash out what’s left of your brains. Now off with your kit, fool.”
“I’m fine,” I said, standing up to show I was, but stumbled a bit to catch my balance. “Bit dead, but for a ghost, fine.”
“Pocket!” she said, using my name for the first time, wheeling on a heel. She strode back across the clearing and stepped up to me until her nose near touched my chin. “You are not dead. You may be a bloody loon, but you are not dead.”
“I am. Slain this very day by Blacktooth.”
“Are you hungry?” she inquired, stepping again so close she might have rung the bells on my toes if the pirates had not stolen them.
“Yes,” I replied.
“Are you thirsty?”
“Well, yes.”
“Does this hurt?” And at that she viciously pinched and twisted my starboard nipple.
“Ouch!” I pushed her away, resisting the urge to return a twist of the tit, as I am a fucking gentleman. “That is no proof—”
“Does it hurt?” she snapped.
“Yes! Yes it hurts, thou venomous mouse.”
“Then you’re not bloody dead, are you?”
I rubbed my offended man-pap and considered her thesis. The eternal sleep did seem rather uncomfortable, itchy even, although not so much as to constitute hellish torment. “Well, I was dead. Blacktooth and the guard could not see me, even as I passed not an arm’s length before them. Explain that.”
“Trickery,” said the puppet Jones. “Or more likely you’re bloody barking and you imagined the whole thing.”
“That’s quite clever,” said Cobweb, looking at Jones, who leaned against the stone. “I didn’t even see your mouth move.”
“I didn’t do it. Since I died this wooden-headed ninny has been babbling away on his own.”
“Then I’d have to agree with him,” said Cobweb. “You’re barking.”
She skipped to the edge of the clearing, where she began collecting leaves and branches and arranging them in a circle with practiced alacrity. She gamboled in the forest like a purposeful butterfly, barely stirring a stem or making a sound. In no time she had constructed a nest of soft ferns with pine boughs woven over it. “Here you go,” she said, patting a bed of silvery leaves. “Hop in and get your kit off. I’ll fetch some nuts and berries.”
I thought to argue, but it was an excellent nest, so I climbed defiantly under the entry boughs, plopped down, and removed my boots without another word. Cobweb was laying a fire not six feet away from the nest. I got a good glimpse of her ears again as she struck steel on flint. I rolled up one of my stockings and tossed it so it passed in front of her.
“What’s that?” she said, looking at me as if I might be daft.
“Nothing,” said I. “Thought you wanted my clothes. For washing.”
“Right,” she said.
I rolled up the other stocking and tossed it by her.
“No elves,” she said, without looking from her labors.
“Sorry?”
“There are no bloody elves here, so stop throwing your socks at me.”
“‘The stockings of the dead run far,’ we say in England.” I stripped off the rest of my kit and handed it through the arch of branches, keeping my sheath of daggers in my lap to cover my man bits, and I settled into the nest. The leaves lining the floor were as soft as lambs’ ears against my bare bottom.
“I’ll wager no one in England or anywhere else has ever said that. And you’re not bloody dead. Do I have to prove that again?” She made a pincher movement with her fingers and grinned malevolently.
“Translated from the French,” I added for flavor. “Smashing nest though.”
“They’re usually built up a tree, out of reach of bear
s, but I can’t have you falling on your head again, can I?” She gathered my kit into a bundle.
“Bears?” I inquired.
“I’m off to wash these and gather some food.” She unslung a water skin from her shoulder and tossed it into the nest. Drool had been arrested with the previous one she’d given me. “Do try not to be eaten while I’m gone.”
“Bears?” I inquired further.
“No, the fire will keep bears away.” And with that she was gone into the night.
“Bloody elfs,” said the puppet Jones.
I sat, I drank water, and being again among the quick, I had a wee at the edge of the firelight and contemplated my resurrection and responsibility. At some point I curled into a ball on the leaves and dozed off.
* * *
I awoke to a wet whisper in my ear and a warm body pressed to my back.
“There’s food, when it suits you,” she said.
I moaned, stubborn to stay drifting among my dreams. “In the morning,” I said.
She snuggled against me, her fingertips danced over my brow, down my back, over my ribs, as soft as a sigh. I felt I might melt into the touch, so long had it been since I’d been touched without anger or utility. A delicate hand slid over my hip and down over my manhood.
I rolled away, wide awake. Her eyes were black with orange specters in the dim firelight, surprised but not alarmed. “Friends?” she said, with a bit of a pout.
“Knackered,” I replied. “Perhaps just a cuddle, for warmth. And put your frock back on, love. A fresh young thing like yourself, defenseless before my wisdom and charm, well, I would not take advantage, it would be unseemly.”
“I am nine hundred years old, sprout.”
“You are not.”
“I am.”
“Elf!” cried the puppet Jones.
“You said there were no elves here,” said I.
“There are no elves,” she said.
“Liar!” said the puppet Jones.
“Fuckload of fairies,” she said, “but no elves.”
“You’re a fairy?”
“Aye, since the blossom first opened to reveal me curled inside it.”
“A fucking fairy?”