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scream. Then the footsteps fade away.
    Oh Gris. Thank all the Old Saints that Hobs aren’t any more magical than a handful of dried beans. I’m about to leave my little piney sanctuary when I hear her voice again, soft and coaxing, and the rattle of the wooden latch to the dogs’ enclosure. The hounds have stopped barking, and while there’s nothing for me to fear from the dogs, I suddenly wish that I had spent less time with them.
    The first comes haring up the pathway, claws clicking on stone. I close my eyes again and tip my head back against the wall in resignation. A few seconds later a cold nose is touching my hand. The bitch whines and licks at my fingers.
    “Go away, Mar,” I whisper. “Shoo!”
    Mar sits down on her haunches and gazes up at me with brown-eyed devotion, her long red tail sweeping the paving.
    “No treats,” I hiss. “Go on! Shoo!” I flap at her with my hands, but the dog is used to getting little tidbits or scraps of meat from me, not being shoved away. She just sits there and whines low.
    “What’s there, girl?” Firell’s voice is nervous. She must have a lantern because a warm orange spill of light is bouncing along the ground, lapping at my hiding place.
    It’s no use. I push my hands against the wall in anger and then step out into the light.
    Firell almost drops the fatcandle lamp. “Miss!” She presses one hand to her mouth and then lets it fall again. Her eyes narrow. “What are you doing out here? You’ll catch your death.”
    “Firell.”
    She stops her solicitations over my health and takes in the clothes I’m wearing. A frown gathers across her face. “I don’t understand,” she whispers.
    “Can you keep a secret?”
    “I-I—”
    “Look,” I snap. “It’s simple. You’re not to say you’ve seen me here tonight, no matter who asks.” I smile at her. “Come now, Firell, sweet. I brought you a gift. Are we not friends?”
    The Hob stares at me, her free hand going automatically to the little bulge in her apron pocket.
    “Please,” I say, resorting to begging. “I just can’t stay here.” I look wildly about me, expecting that any minute now, alerted by the noise, my mother will come trundling down from the house with her clothes in disarray and servants following her like the tide.
    “Miss,” she says again. “Miss, I can’t lie to your mother.” Her face is almost pale in the darkness, ashy with fright. “You know I can’t.”
    “You’re a Hob,” I say. “You lie to her all the time—about how much sugar you put in your tea or how many slices of bread you’ve taken.”
    “That I don’t,” Firell says. “Here.” She pulls the necklace from her pocket and throws it at my feet. “I don’t want none of your gifts.”
    “Firell, please.” I’m desperate now. “I’m sorry, sorry. I didn’t mean it, truly. Keep the necklace, but please just do me this one thing, and I’ll never ask anything more of you.” I hug myself, shivering at the thought of being forced into a future I don’t want. Or of the punishment that waits for me if I don’t do as I’m told. Owen is not a man prone to forgiveness.
    She looks at me with sudden understanding. “When I was just a Hobling,” she says, “my mam told me I’d be coming here to help look after a little girl—a little high-Lammer girl. And I didn’t have no say in the matter.”
    I stay quiet, watching her, my fingers tightening on my coat lapels.
    “I thought you were lucky—no scrubbing nothing, clothes laid out for you every morning, tea in bed. And all I wanted was to go back to being a Hobling in Stilt City, at play. I hated you so much, every day for years.” She kneels and takes Mar by the collar, holding her still. “Go on then,” she says. “I didn’t never see you here tonight.”
    “Thank you.” But the Hob woman has already turned away, dragging the dog with her. On the ground, the little gift still lies. I drop to one knee, scoop it up, and jam it deep into my