“Lotta dudes are bashful about that,” Stefan said, and no one thought he was talking about himself because Stefan was incapable of bashfulness.
“It’s not about being shy,” Mack said with a sigh. “He’s made out of mud. That much water …”
“Kind of busy here,” Frank interrupted impatiently. “Anyway, it’s best not to coddle golems. They just get needy.”
“I’ll just take a minute to …” His words faded out as he thumbed in a response:
* * *
You have got to handle these things yourself. You have got to be a big boy now.
* * *
“Sorry,” Mack said of the interruption. “You were saying?”
“We were saying you’re looking for someone who’s been gone a long time.”
“Let’s say we are,” Mack conceded. In the back of his mind he was wondering whether he’d been too harsh with the golem.
“Well, the someone you’re looking for is hidden by fairy enchantment. Been hidden for more than a thousand years.”
“Are we talking about the same man?” Jarrah asked.
“If it’s William Blisterthöng MacGuffin, then we are talking about the same man,” Frank confirmed. His eyes narrowed and his sharp little fairy teeth showed behind tightened lips. “And you’ll never find him. Never! Never … without our help.”
“Why would you help us?” Mack asked.
Frank shrugged. “A friend of ours wants something in return. Something you might be able to get for her. One hand washes the other. I scratch your back, you scratch mine. Tit for tat.”
“Can we stop being cryptic, please, and get to the point?” Xiao asked politely. “My friend is not happy as a flower.”
Dietmar was unhappy with good reason—a pair of crows came swooping down and lit on Dietmar’s huge petals and began to pick at the seeds.
“Hey, hey, get out of here!” Jarrah waved them off, but they retreated only as far as a low tree branch and from there kept a close eye on Dietmar’s sunflower seeds.
“You tell the tale, Connie—you tell it best.” Frank indicated one of the female fairies, a dark-haired, dark-eyed, tiny little beauty in a deep-green formfitting outfit.
“How do you suppose MacGuffin came to be called Blisterthöng?” Connie asked rhetorically in an enchanting fairy voice. She kind of writhed or danced as she spoke. It was a sort of dramatic interpretation: she used sweeping hand gestures, and sometimes lowered her head in sadness, or threw open her arms to show joy. “For many long years after the Romans left, and after the druids faded, and as the new faith was coming to Scotland, the fairies lived in peace. We are a peaceable folk. No fairy has ever raised a hand in violence against another!” She made a very dramatic upraised-fist move on that last line.
Mack nodded thoughtfully because that seemed like the thing to do.
“Except for the Seventeen Year War,” Pete the fairy interjected.
“And the War of the Sweltering Cave,” Julia added helpfully. “And the Rabid Peace of Kilcannon’s Bluff.”
“With those few exceptions, no fairy had ever raised a hand
in violence against another,” Connie reiterated, again with the upraised fist of forcefulness. “Unless you’re going to count the Battle of the Pretenders.”
“Or the Flaming Disagreement,” Frank said.
“Or the Pantsing of Fain’s Firth.”
“Or the Castle-Whacking Unpleasantness.”
“Or O’Toole’s Tools of Terror.”
“Or the War of the Noses.”