"Go back to your bar," said Orian Thornapple. "The little fellow is going to tell us a story, that's all. No harm to him. That's what a real goblin does, isn't that right?" He squeezed Button's arm companionably. "Tells true stories?"
The goblin turned his yellow eyes up to her. There was something in his look that went deeper than his words, but it was a far more complicated emotion than simple fear. "Do not worry for me, Madam Alewife."
Mary stood, tangled by indecision. She ought to throw them all out, the whole smirking table. But who would do it, with Shortspan out sick? And even if she managed, then what? The thing of it was, if the youth wanted, he could probably get her license taken away. Then she would find out how accurate her earlier musings about a life without The Forcing Shed had actually been.
She hated her own cowardice, but she was at least brave enough to recognize it for what it was. "You let go of his arm," she said at last. "Just let him go. Then if he wants to talk to you, he can." She stood in place until the handsome young man released his grip, then did her best to make her retreat to the bar look like the walk of someone who'd just defused a problem. When she got there, she half thought about pulling out the gun, but knew that would only make the situation worse — she certainly wasn't willing to shoot Orian Thornapple or one of his friends. That wouldn't just lose her a license, it would cost Mary Mosspink her precious freedom as well. At the least. Still, she stayed close to the register and the hidden package, certain now that her intuition had been right, that if there had been a wind on this sticky-hot night, it would carry disaster.
Some of the other patrons seemed to think that the disagreement was over and resumed their conversations, but the room was still tense. Mary watched as a couple of Thornapple's companions got up and went to the six-hazard table behind the goblin. They picked up cues and began to stroke the balls across the baize in a desultory fashion, but they were really just preventing a quick retreat by their leader's chosen victim.
"Now," said Orian Thornapple, "You did say you were going to tell us a story, didn't you? A real old goblin-type story? A true one?" He leaned forward unsteadily; for the first time Mary saw how drunk he was and felt a cold wash of terror. She should never have walked away. She looked for Juniper to ask him to call the constables, but couldn't see him.
"Tell me a story about fathers," said young Thornapple.
"But, young master, why do you want a goblin story?" Button seemed less frightened than Mary would have expected, or else he was hiding it well. "The tales that goblins make, they are well-known, and not very satisfying to folk like yourself. All goblin stories have a hole in the middle of them."
"Don't talk rubbish. Tell me a true story. About fathers who live too long."
By the Trees! Mary thought. He is drunk — either that or he's mad. He's asking the little fellow to tell his fortune… or his father's fortune, which is a lot worse. It was an article of folk wisdom, much-believed but never definitively proved, that goblins could sometimes foretell the future. But whether it could truly be done or not, it was certainly not allowed to try to spy into the fortunes of one of the High Council, and Thornapple's father was one of the Council's leaders.
Even some of young Thornapple's companions were looking a bit nervous now, but whatever expansive strangeness was upon the Flower lordling seemed to make him oblivious. Mary Mosspink wondered how much he had drunk. Or maybe it was something else — ghostweed, or even dust. "Talk, goblin" he said. "I don't give a rap about any hole in the middle. Tell me a tale."
Button bowed his head toward Orian Thornapple. "Be it so, then." He took a breath, held it for a moment in silence. The patrons sitting nearby, who had been pretending not to listen, now gave up all pretense.
"Once," the goblin said, "in a time when things that went around still went around, there was a very old fellow — a pinchpenny was he, who had little love for, hem, anything except gold. In his youth he had briefly taken a consort, and from this union a child had been born, a son. After she had left him the boy's mother had died in hunger and want, unhelped by the child's father.
"As he grew older he grew less capable of the working of his own land and keeping of his own house, but remained reluctant to spend any of his money, so the old fellow decided that he would bring his son back to live with him. He did this not out of love, but in the desire to have a servant he need not pay. Many people of the village saw this, and many whispered that the sooner the old man went to feed the Trees, the better it would be for all whose lives he touched."
Orian Thornapple seemed to like the goblin's story so far: he was smiling broadly, sitting back in his chair. He was alone at the table, now. His friends had moved to the six-hazard table, where they were talking quietly and a bit worriedly among themselves. "Better indeed," Thornapple said, and chuckled.
"Now the young one had a son of his own — yes, a very little boy — and they both came to live at the house, and the little one's father made him do many of the harder tasks his own father gave him to do, so that the small boy had scarcely any rest from sunrise to sunset. So there were three living together then in that house, the old fellow, his son, and the child who was the old man's grandson.
"One day the child discovered that there was, hem, a goblin living in a hole near the house, and because he had not yet grown cold to the world as had his father and grandfather, he shared what little he had to eat with the goblin, often leaving a crust of bread or a boiled root at the mouth of the hole. One day, he came back and discovered that the goblin had left him something in return — a toy of sorts, a bird made all of gold.
"When he showed this bird to his father and grandfather, both were consumed with greed. The grandfather insisted the bird should be his, since it was his house and grounds where the goblin lived. The younger man insisted just as strongly that since it was his own son who had tricked the goblin — as he saw it — into giving gold in return for crusts of bread, the bird belonged to him. They argued and argued until the younger fellow, in a rage, killed his own aged father. He then told the little boy that his grandfather had gone away, that they would have to work even harder now, and sent the child to bed.
"He had decided to make the goblin produce more gold, so he crept out beneath the moon's light to the goblin hole with a sack of flax seeds in his hands, then scattered a handful of the seeds all around it and laid a trail of them back to the house, where he flung the rest of the sack of seeds over the floor, knowing that the goblin was properly bound by the Laws of Things and so would have to, hem, count them all, and that since he would not be able to do so before the sun came up, the goblin would then be bound to the house and forced to do his bidding.
"He hid and watched the goblin walk past, nose close to the ground, eyes squinted as he counted the flax seeds. He waited outside the house until dawn's light began to shine in the belly of the sky, then he went in.
"He found the boy and the goblin sitting on the hearth rug together, drinking betony tea.
"Later, the little boy sold the house. With what it earned him, he was able to become a rich merchant, and never needed to sell either of his two golden birds."
The goblin, whose voice had become very singsong, suddenly stopped talking. He blinked slowly, once, twice, as if awakening from a dream. "That is the end of my story," he said.
A few of the patrons at other tables began to whisper. A woman laughed. Mary realized that despite her nervousness, even she had drifted into in a sort of half-sleep.