Gertriss shook her head. “She’s tiny and maybe she’s not entirely human, Mr. Markhat, but I think she knows what a house and a bath is, from somewhere, even if it was a long time ago.”
“You’re the one with Sight, Miss. I’ll take your word for it.”
Gertriss sorted through her stack and pulled out a pair of dark pants and a plain white blouse and a few unmentionables. She put them on my couch.
“I’ll need those when I’m done,” she said. She shot a look toward the closed bedroom door. “Is the bath ready?”
“Ready and waiting. You sure you don’t want me there? Or maybe Serris, one of the female staff?”
She shook her head. “They’d gawk and stare and treat her like a monster or an Elf. She may be wild, boss, but she’s not stupid. She’d sense it. And I don’t think she’d like it.”
I rose. “Look. Modesty is well and good. But we don’t know what she’s capable of. So if she wakes up, and trouble starts, you yell, you understand? I’ll fight with one eye closed and the other pointed at the ceiling.”
She grinned. “I will. Here goes.”
“Good luck. Don’t look her in the eye.”
“It’s a bath, boss. How hard can this be?”
A quarter of an hour passed. I changed my filthy clothes for fresh ones and wiped off the worst of the filth with a wet face cloth. Gertriss assured me through the door that all was well.
I wasted a few minutes trying to peer outside through the thick window glass. I could tell it was daylight, and see smudges of green, but an army flanked by parades of leaping clowns could be down there and I’d not have seen a thing.
The windows were meant to swing inward so archers could open them and fire through them. These windows would swing no more, though-the hinges were gone, replaced with a solid and thoroughly immobile peacetime window-frame.
Which left us with no way to lob unpleasantness down on miscreants in the yard. Or to even see miscreants. The thick glass would stop the bolt from all but a siege piece, but now that none of them would open we were half-blind and helpless.
I heard a splash. Gertriss murmured, her voice soft and soothing. I knocked gently on the door.
“She stirred a bit, boss, that’s all. Still asleep.”
“You almost done?”
“Getting there. You’ll be able to raise tulips in this bathwater. Her dirt has dirt.”
I didn’t reply. I’d hoped Buttercup would sleep through being bathed and dressed. Now I was beginning to wonder if the little creature would ever wake up.
Had she caught the edge of a spell I couldn’t see, out there in the woods? I had no idea what else that wand-waver’s globe could do, other than emit sticky blue light. Had he had time to rattle of a spell before his head met the first of many tree-trunks?
I didn’t think so. But with wand-wavers, it was never safe to make assumptions.
More splashing. Gertriss assured me again all was well.
And why was Buttercup here, anyway?
Was she really a banshee?
Sure, she was able to do those strange little hop-skips and howl. But she’d howled when Serris had tried to jump, and Serris was alive.
She’d not howled when the wand-waver died. That seemed a bit un-banshee-ish. The legends claimed banshees could sense death, and the lore was adamant that when a banshee howled, death was at hand.
Maybe all those old legends were exactly the sort of bunk I’d thought from the beginning.
Which, if true, meant I knew exactly nothing about banshees or Buttercup.
Music started up downstairs. Music and hooting and stomping. The artists were at it again, right after breakfast, while the woods ran thick with hidden soldiers bent on errands which might include mayhem and slaughter.
I shook my head, more envious than angry.
I heard another splash, from behind the door.
And then tiny Buttercup awoke.
The banshee howled. She didn’t give it her usual slow buildup-no, she went from silence to ear-splitting shriek all at once.
I went deaf. I clamped my hands over my ears.
And then the cry went silent. My ears rang, but I could still hear a sort of burbling whistle, muffled and lent a gurgling quality as though it were being issued from under a body of water.
Gertriss cried out. I hit the door.
Gertriss had Buttercup’s face submerged in the tub. The tiny banshee clawed at her with arms and legs alike. Gertriss held on, but was clearly losing her grip on the tiny creature’s wet, slippery body.
I rushed to the tub. “Blanket blanket blanket,” shouted Gertriss. I saw a nice thick blanket laid out on a vanity and grabbed it, and had almost managed to fling it over Buttercup when she freed herself from Gertriss’s grasp and launched herself from the tub in a wide, tall fountain of hot soapy water.
“Buttercup!” I called out, hoping she would respond to my voice. Instead she fled, darting away from me, her tiny hands rubbing at her eyes beneath her tangle of dripping hair.
I lunged. Gertriss lunged. We caught the banshee between us, held her for an instant.
But only for an instant. The effort cost me my shirt. Gertriss’ already brief night-gown was ripped from one shoulder. I felt Buttercup tense, felt her start one of her magical banshee side-steps. I managed to grab her left forearm and go with her, slowing her down and preventing her from traveling more than a few steps toward the door.
“Buttercup! It’s me. Corn bread man. Slayer of wand-wavers. Calm down. We’re not here to hurt you.”
She turned toward me, one hand still rubbing her eyes. I thought perhaps she recognized my voice, thought she was calming down. She even stopped trying to twist her arm away from my grasp.
So when she stepped close to my waist and then head-butted me right below my belt-buckle, I wasn’t prepared to dodge.
I didn’t. I sank to my knees. Gertriss made a grab, but the banshee made a faster little dancing step and she was gone.
Gone. Out of the room. Gertriss went wide-eyed.
“Where-?” she began.
“Other. Side. Of door.”
We both heard crashings and thuds and footfalls from my front room. Gertriss snatched up the blanket and charged through the door.
I followed with somewhat less energy and verve.
Buttercup was frantic. She was running into walls, knocking over furniture, tearing cushions off the couch, looking anywhere, everywhere, for a way out. She wasn’t howling anymore. It took me a moment to realize that mewling sound she was making was crying.
I struggled to stand upright. I forced my voice to some semblance of normalcy.
“You know me,” I said. The banshee hurled a lamp at the wall, started clawing at the wood. “Buttercup. Listen to me. I am not going to let anyone hurt you.”
She began to strike the oak panels with her fists. Her back was to me. I walked slowly toward her, and when I was close enough I laid a hand on her shoulder.
“You know me,” I said. “Remember? Corn bread? The woods?”
She whirled.
I tried to smile. I managed not to step back.
I reached forward, pushed her hair out of her face. She managed to open her eyes. It was only then I realized they been stinging from the soapy water. “See? It’s me. You’re not afraid of me, are you?”
Gertriss wisely stood very still, and remained very quiet. Buttercup’s eyes darted toward her, and her mouth turned down in a tiny pout.
“That’s Aunt Gertriss,” I said. “She’s nice too. She was just giving you a bath. She has clothes for you too. Pretty clothes.”
Buttercups’ gaze turned back toward me, and she smiled, and took my hand.
“Good,” I said. “Now then-let’s put this gown on you. Gertriss? Very slowly?”
Gertriss took a small, slow step.
Buttercup snatched my left shoe off the floor and managed to fling it right toward Gertriss’s face. Gertriss deflected the shoe with the blanket, which she then flung at Buttercup, and Buttercup managed to move herself and me right behind Gertriss, where the banshee grabbed Gertriss’s dressing gown at the neck and gave it a good furious banshee yank.