They Mostly Come Out At Night

by Benedict Patrick

  Adahy shook his head. "Not really, and the same can be said for her of me. Tradition dictates we must greet each other in our ceremonial garb, so instead of a potential husband, she was greeted today by the Magpie King." He smiled at his friend. "Can you imagine any woman who would fancy a lifetime of that?"

  Maedoc sneered at him. "You'd be surprised. Late at night, after a bit of wine, the kitchen staff would often debate about what your father would be capable of in the bedroom. Probably thinking of you like that now."

  Adahy turned red. "Any lady then. She must have been terrified."

  "You worried she's a hag then?"

  Adahy shrugged off his friend's crudeness. "No, she was comely enough, from what I could tell. Dressed in white, soft feathers. Her headdress showed her mouth and her chin. They seemed ... delicate? Firm? I don't know. I certainly get the impression she is attractive."

  "What's your problem then? Fair play to you - most men go through a lifetime not getting to touch anything like that, let alone play with it every night. With a face like this, I'll have to content myself with waiting for the scullery maids to get drunk and lonely."

  Adahy shuffled uneasily. What is my problem with the match? She is clearly attractive, that much is certain, so why was that not enough? The meeting had been so… formal. Andromeda's father had done all the speaking for her, and so very few words passed between the two of us at all.

  "I want to know what she's like. What kind of person she is. If she's really interested in this marriage at all. You could help me with that, if you would sort yourself out and pull yourself out of this state."

  At this, Maedoc began a low, manic laugh. Adahy rolled his eyes. He was clearly going to get nowhere with the man - when he started like this the laughing could go on for hours at a time.

  "Forget it," he whispered, and got up to leave.

  "No," Maedoc waved at him, gesturing for him to sit back down again. "Tell me how I could help. I’d very much like to hear this."

  Adahy sat again and leaned forward to get closer to his friend. "She has not seen me yet. There is a feast tonight. If I was to wait at her table and serve her, I might be able to get what I want."

  "And I?"

  "The Magpie King must be there. Her father would not approve if I spoke to her unchaperoned before our marriage. Only you could pull off wearing the garb. You wouldn't really even have to speak, I will make it brief, and we could arrange for you to be given an urgent message needing your skills. Give a little show of your abilities as you leave and nobody will be the wiser."

  Maedoc dropped the meat, looking seriously at the king. "You want me to be the Magpie King?"

  Adahy smiled. "I hadn't really thought of it like that, but-"

  "Yes." Maedoc was intense now, eyes narrow. "I'll do it."

  Maedoc's clear hunger for this made Adahy regret his decision, but it would be worth it if it would return his friend to the world and give Adahy more information about his bride.

  "Well then, let's find something to put you into for the feast. Do you fancy something in black?"

  A few hours later and the feast was in full flow. The Tytonidae were keeping to themselves, choosing to sit at separate tables from the Corvae. Normally on an occasion such as this there would be a head table consisting of a mix between the two families, but relations remained strained between the two peoples. There was a small head table, but this mainly consisted of the Magpie King, the chief of the Owls and his spouse. Andromeda was seated separately, which suited Adahy just fine. His serving people were informed by Maedoc masquerading as the Magpie King that Adahy was to wait on the princess. Adahy himself was dressed in a simple serving tunic, liberated from Maedoc's own wardrobe. As Adahy navigated the busy aisles, he cast a glance over to the head table. The Magpie King was sitting stoically beside the chief of the Owls, giving very little in the way of conversation.

  As planned.

  Adahy focused his attention on his own task.

  Funny how nervous I feel at approaching her. The last female in my life I had no problems approaching. And had no issues ripping her to pieces in front of her bloodthirsty offspring. But this simple girl has me quivering like a wreck.

  He looked at her, sitting alone in a sea of people. The individuals who should be close to her were sitting at a different table, doing their best to engage Maedoc in everyday chat. Andromeda sat between servants and noble ladies uninterested in her thoughts or feelings. Adahy leaned over to speak to her.

  "Carrots?"

  She had not realised that she was being spoken to.

  "My lady, carrots?"

  As if a spell was being broken, she slowly turned her head to regard him. "I'm sorry?"

  "Would you like some carrots? On your plate, my lady?"

  She waved her acceptance to him and returned to her rigid position. She was going to be more difficult to crack than Adahy had imagined.

  He returned with a bottle of wine. "How does my lady feel about Rutherweave?"

  Annoyed confusion crossed her face as she was distracted from her brooding. "Again, I am sorry. I do not understand what you are talking about."

  So, she has little time for servants then. Not exactly the attitude I am looking for in a future bride.

  "Rutherweave, my lady. The Corvae vineyard. The only village around here that produces anything worth drinking at the Eyrie, or so they say. I thought we supplied some to the Tytonidae regularly?"

  "Hmm?" she responded, distracted. "Yes, fine, yes."

  "I think a sample is in order. They do say that someone not accustomed to its bitterness should not drink an entire glass."

  "Hmm, yes." She had not made eye contact with him since he started this conversation. Adahy had almost made up his mind about his future wife by this point.

  She took a sip of the drop in her glass. "Oh, good gods." She looked at Adahy in disgust. "Just what in the name of the Spirit have you given me?" Her violent reaction got the attention of the nobles sitting close to her. Adahy suspected it would not be long before he was vacated from his own feast hall. It did not matter - he had got what he had come for.

  "My lady, is something bothering you? We shall remove this boy at once."

  "No, no," she commanded, and for the first time she smiled. "That was my own fault, I suppose. This fine young gentleman had given me plenty of warning, but I was too wrapped up in my own thoughts to pay attention to good advice."

  Adahy shrugged. "It was just wine I was talking about, m'lady. Important to me, in my job, but I can't expect a fine noble lady like yourself to put the same importance on such things."

  She smiled again, and whispered conspiratorially to him, "My grandmother had always told me that only a fool did not take care of what was going on under her nose first before thinking about future hopes and dreams. Fool I am today, it seems."

  She held the glass to her face to have a look at the remains at the bottom of it. "Yes, too bitter for me, I'm afraid. So, my dear expert, what should your future queen sample instead?"

  "My queen?" Adahy feigned wide eyed ignorance. "Oh, my lady, I did not know. My apologies, I should not be talking-"

  "Nonsense. Send away the one friendly face I've seen since I arrived here? My grandmother didn't have a saying about that one, but I don't need her advice to recognise foolishness when I contemplate it. Another vintage, my dear-heart expert. Nothing too strong, if you please. One must at least keep up the pretence of decorum."

  This shift in attitude changed things considerably. "Just a pretence, my lady?" he queried whilst pouring a glass from the Eyrie's own vineyards.

  She looked at him from the corners of her eyes. "Well, one does have natural reactions at being brought to marry a monster."

  "Sorry, my lady?"

  She nodded towards the main table. "Over there. Your monster. Your protector." She was indicating the Magpie King.

  It was Adahy's turn for his brow to crumple. "He - he is just a man, my lady. Like me."

  She laug
hed at this. Not a mean laugh, at a servant's expense. More, Adahy realised, because he had probably just echoed what she had been repeating to herself since he got here.

  "Fine, a man then. But a man unlike any I have ever seen."

  Adahy looked over to Maedoc, the Magpie King. Perched upon his throne, his metal helm watching them all like a dark gargoyle standing in judgement. Maedoc turned his head slightly to hear what Andromeda's father was saying to him, and even that brief movement seemed alien.

  "I... have met him, my lady. When he is not dressed like that. He is a man, nothing more, and he does not seem too bad, at that."

  She smiled again. "I appreciate the words of comfort. I hope you understand, however, my heart will not fully believe them until I discover that for myself, and that journey will be terrifying for me, I feel."

  As if on cue, Maedoc's arm thumped to the table. Adahy rose his head sharply to see a messenger at the Magpie King's ear. The dark figure overturned the table he was sitting at, and in one leap thrust himself to the windows high above the audience, disappearing into the night.

  The audience was silent for a brief moment, and then erupted into conversation. Andromeda sat alone in the bustle - she had turned a pale white. Instinctively, Adahy took her hands.

  "You dare?" she began, but he interrupted her.

  "My princess, allow me to speak. I know you feel fear at the thought of this union, and looking from the outside now, I can understand it fully. However, let me make you a promise. You can find love with this man. And safety. He is the kind of man who will put his people first, and his wife. He may be able to leap across the forest as if on wings, but he carries a heavy load and looks for a soul to share it with him as an equal. He is also not the sort of man to send an ordinary servant to wait on his future bride."

  Her face first displayed shock, then confusion, and then, just before Adahy was escorted out of the feast hall for laying his hands on the royal consort, she gave him a curiously cheeky smile.

  That is the woman for me. Adahy grinned as he made his way to find Maedoc.

  A tale from the fireplaces of the Low Corvae.

  It was after the great battle between the Magpies, the Lions, and the Serpents of whom we speak no longer. The Corvae and Leone had been victorious, and the Magpie King himself had cast down the Serpent's chief from the mountains to the forest floor, snapping the betrayer's spine in seven different places.

  But the Serpent's fangs had found their mark just before that final fall, and the toll it had taken on the Magpie King was great. Venom scurried through his veins, turning his breath purple and his tears the colour of fire. While the Lions raised their cups in celebration, the Corvae turned to their leader and could not find him. He was lost.

  Long did our King wander alone in the forest, fevered and mad. We do not know much of this time. Some say that he visited the trees, taking pains to ensure he touched every tall trunk in his domain. Others claim to have come across a dark, bearded man who said he was a mushroom, ordering all who came close to depart else he turn them into a dandelion. What we do know is that his powers allowed his body to survive an ordeal that would have broken lesser men. And that when he awoke from his madness, he was hungry.

  We cannot fathom how a being such as the Magpie King perceives the world. It is known he can sense a mouse move from half way across the forest. He knows when a man is lying by the irregular beating of the deceiver's heart, and by the stench of distrust from the sinner's sweat. Who knows exactly what his heightened senses were experiencing when he arose from the dirt, mind finally free of the Serpent's poison, but we do know that the overriding smell which assaulted him was that of pies.

  Free from the Serpent's madness, but with hunger threatening to serve as a replacement for the poison, the Magpie King scrambled across the forest floor, his usual grace and strength replaced by the desperation in his gut. Finally, he came to a ledge that overlooked a small Corvae village, and he caught sight of the source of his desire - a small cottage, removed from the rest of the settlement, had its shutters open, and resting upon the windowsill to cool were three blueberry pies.

  With a hunger we cannot comprehend tearing at his insides the Magpie King half-ran, half-tumbled down the slope to the cottage window. Hand now shaking, he reached out to grab one of the pastries.

  "Shoo, shoo," came the cries of the cottage's sole resident as she ran out of the front door, wooden broom in hand, and proceeded to beat her king about his head with it. For you see, those weeks or months lost in the forest had stolen much of the Magpie King's majesty. His cloak and cowl were gone, leaving only the rags that remained of his underclothing. His normally clean-shaven features were now covered in a bushy, unkempt beard.

  "Away with you," she ordered her king, shaking her broom at him. "I did not slave all day over these pies to have them eaten by the likes of you. One is for myself, a bit of sweetness to stave off the end of days. Another is for my son, a reward for him taking the time to visit me if he bothers to. The final one I shall barter to find someone to do some tasks about my home." She stood stern between the Magpie King and the food.

  Now, weakened as he was, it was still well within the Magpie King's power to push the old woman aside and claim her pies for himself. But the Magpie King was good and just in all things, and he did not want to see one of his people suffer just to sate his own hunger.

  "Goodwife, your pies are the most glorious foods that I have ever smelt, and I would perform any tasks you request to have one. I am strong, and can work hard - what must I do to earn my prize?"

  A sly smile crept across the old woman's face. "Yes, I have need of a strong back. The thatch of my cottage has worn away, and it leaks in the spring rains. Head up there and patch it together to earn my thanks."

  "Without delay, Goodwife," the Magpie King replied. "Beforehand, might I impose on your kind nature to let me sample some of your wares before I begin?" he suggested, reaching a hand out yet again towards his prize.

  "No," she barked in response, rewarding her king with a slap on his arm. "Do not misplace my age for stupidity - there shall be no rewards until your task is complete."

  So the Magpie King spent all of that morning on the roof of the woman's cottage, skin and eyes pricked by the thorny straw of her roof, the emptiness of his belly weighing on him like an illness.

  "The task is complete," he finally announced as the sun was at the highest point in the sky. "That roof shall not leak again in your lifetime. Now, my pie please," he requested, hand outstretched.

  The sly grin appeared again. "Pie? I do not believe we had agreed on the pie as payment," the crafty woman smirked. "In fact, I clearly remember offering you my thanks for thatching my roof, and my thanks you have earned - you have made a fine job."

  The Magpie King was annoyed, but could not argue with the old woman's logic, and was amused by her cunning. He nodded in agreement. "That was well done, and I fit the role of fool well. But I am reaching desperation and the smell of that pie is making a madness within my mind. What must I do to earn the pie?"

  "Last winter, the apple tree in my garden died," the old woman explained. "I wish it removed so I may plant cabbages instead, as they agree much more with my innards than the bitter fruit that the tree once gave. Do this for me."

  "I shall, in return for one of those blueberry pies," the Magpie King stated clearly, and the woman nodded in response, sealing the deal.

  The apple tree had been old, and the roots had burrowed deep. The sun was beginning to set by the time he had removed all trace of it from the woman's garden.

  "It is done," he stated with exhaustion, entering the cottage again to report his success. "My pie, please."

  "Well now," the woman began, the sly smile appearing yet again, "the task is done, but I am not sure the price is at all fair. This is, apparently, the most glorious pie ever produced, and you have made it very clear how desperate you are. I believe that changes the price I must ask."

  The Magpie
King grew angry. "We had a clear deal," he stated, with menace, "and you have already cheated me once. Surely you shall not do so again?"

  The woman simply gave him that sly smile in response.

  Now, weakened as he was after his day of toil, it was still well within the Magpie King's power to beat the hag for her insolence and to take all three of her pies, yet he did not believe any of these actions were worthy of a king.

  "What must I do for one of your pies?" he questioned through gritted teeth. "Do not cheat me again."

  "My pigs," she said. "They need mucking out. I hate the task."

  The Magpie King spent his evening shovelling the shit from the small pigsty attached to the cottage, his bare feet squelching through the swine’s waste as he worked to gather it all up.

  It was dark when his task was finally complete. Wordlessly, he entered the cottage, took his cold pie from the windowsill and shovelled it into his empty belly. The bitterness of his ordeal melted away as his hunger was finally sated. The woman's son did not come to visit, so the old woman graciously split the remaining pie between the two of them and they ate it silently in front of the fire. Both of them drifted off, she on her chair and he on the cold floor. When she woke in the morning, the Magpie King was already gone.

  Weeks passed, and the woman was eventually disturbed by a knocking at her door. She answered it to find two black-cloaked guards who took her roughly from her home and brought her to a fine tent pitched in the middle of the village green. There she came face-to-face with the Magpie King, and immediately recognised him as the raggedy man she had cheated. With a wail, she threw herself at his feet, begging forgiveness.

  At this sight, the Magpie King's stern face gave way to a kind smile. "I have not come here to punish you, Goodwife, although you were indeed wicked to me," he explained. "Since I have sampled your wares, I have been haunted by their taste. I have come to demand that you bake me another pie."

  This time, no service was asked of the king, and the old woman silently worked at her stove to recreate the blueberry pie that had helped his strength to return. Upon presenting it to him with shaking hands, the old woman was thankful to hear it met the expectations of the king's memory.