He was freaking adorable.
But he was also still hunched over somewhat, despite the impression I had that he was standing straight, or as straight as he could. Claire had put him in one of her old hippie shirts, loose and flowy and painter’s-smock-y, which was enormous on him, so all I could see was a head and some teal-colored toes. I supposed it was a miracle that he was getting around at all, but the posture looked uncomfortable. I wondered why— Oh.
That was why.
The big eyes moved to my bedside table, and mine followed. And showed me that I’d had an earlier visitor in the form of my roommate, who knew a little about dhampir metabolism and liked to feed people. She’d loaded me up, probably because food had a tendency to disappear if left in the kitchen.
As a result, I had three whole sandwiches waiting for me. I slowly reached out a hand and took one, a nice fat BLT, because Claire understands that the B is the most important part. Thick-cut, peppery B, complemented by her own homemade bread and vine-ripened tomatoes and bacon jam and— I heard my stomach grumble. And be echoed a second later by a similar sound from under Claire’s smock of a shirt. My visitor was hungry, too.
I held out the sandwich. “It’s okay,” I said. “You can have it.”
The little troll didn’t move.
But he didn’t run away, either, although his eyes kept flicking from the sandwich to me to the door. Over and over. He was obviously frightened, but also hungry, but also frightened. . . . It was an impasse.
I decided to help him out and put the sandwich platter on the foot of the bed, pushing it as close to him as I could without getting up, which I somehow knew would spook him.
Then I sat back against the headboard and ate my own sandwich, because it smelled like heaven.
He watched me for a moment, eyes huge.
And then, faster than I would have expected—almost faster than I could see—he grabbed the remaining two sandwiches and fled, practically knocking Claire over in the process.
She’d been coming in the door with some laundry, and had to do an acrobatic maneuver to avoid getting mowed down. “What the—Hey! What are you—”
But the kid and his loot were already gone.
Claire stared after him for a moment, and then turned to me, astonishment on her features. “He’s walking!”
“He’s running around, stealing sandwiches,” I corrected. “Good ones, too.” I licked bacon grease off my fingers.
“He’s supposed to be in bed!”
“Put a platter of sandwiches beside it. He’ll never leave.”
Claire blinked, considering that. Then she put down the laundry basket and went out again. I heard her talking to Gessa, and I guess they sorted it out, because she was back a moment later. She started putting towels away while I hauled my stiff-as-fuck body out of bed.
“I’m surprised Bulsi risked coming in here,” she told me, from the bathroom. “He’s really skittish.”
“Bulsi? Is that his name?”
Claire nodded. “He woke up briefly yesterday. I managed to get some soup down him, and a little medicine, before he passed out again. He and Olga talked while I fed him.”
“Did he remember anything about those mystery words?”
Claire looked confused for a moment, and then shook her head. “He was barely conscious. They did a number on him, Dory!”
Yeah, I remembered. And felt my face flush in anger, which was stupid. The slavers didn’t care about wiping out whole villages of fey; how much less would they care about a single child?
“I don’t think he trusts anyone right now,” Claire said. “She was lucky to get his name. Although she isn’t too happy about it.”
“Olga isn’t?”
She nodded.
“Why not? What’s wrong with . . . What was it again?”
“Bulsi. It means wart.”
“What?”
Claire came out of the bathroom, having loaded me up with fresh-smelling towels. “Or lump or bump or protrusion. It’s what his owner called him. Anyway, it doesn’t matter; we’re not keeping it.”
“The name or the kid?”
“Don’t look at me like that,” she told me severely.
I’d hobbled over to the dresser for something to wear, so hadn’t been looking like anything. I glanced over my shoulder. “Like what?”
“I’m not adopting him! We can’t have any more houseguests, or this place is going to pop.”
Couldn’t argue with that.
“Anyway, Olga is trying to find his people, but it’s not easy. She said his dialect is really strange. He might be from one of the mountain tribes. With all the fighting, a lot of groups went to the hills over the centuries and some never came down again.”
“So how do we find them?”
Claire didn’t immediately answer, being busy staring at my rumpled mess of a bed. And a few bloodstains here and there, from where I guess I’d bled through my dressing. I felt around under it now, and found a ridge of puckered skin, but no bullet hole.
Sometimes I love dhampir metabolism.
“I can do that,” I said, as Claire started stripping sheets, but she just shook her head. Housework is how Claire works off excess energy. She sometimes complains about it, but if you try to take over, as I have plenty of times, she gets upset.
Unless she gets to boss you doing it, of course.
“Pillowcases,” she instructed.
I blinked at her.
“They’re in the bathroom closet, third shelf.”
Really? Who knew? I put down some old jeans and moved to oblige.
“I’m not sure,” she told me, answering my previous question. “Olga has been talking to the other slaves, trying to find out about her nephew. And she’s also been asking about the boy—” She stopped abruptly. “What do you think about Kjeld?”
“Kjeld?”
“As a name.”
I handed over pillowcases. “It’s . . . all right. Why?”
“Well, Bulsi needs a new one, and there’s not a lot to choose from. Most of the fey names, boys’ ones anyway, are all about war. It’s all ‘Fighter with Helmet’ or ‘Warrior in Armor’ or ‘Spear of God.’ And Olga says he’ll probably never be a fighter, so a name like that would just make people laugh at him.”
“There’s other things in life than fighting,” I pointed out.
And got an incredulous look from Claire.
“I do other things!”
“Name one.”
“I paint. I play a mean hand of poker.” I thought about it. “I know how to tango.”
“Well, maybe you should teach the fey,” Claire said, dumping my rumpled sheets into her now-empty basket and putting on new ones. “They’re obsessed. Even the stuff that isn’t war related is usually designed to strike fear into their enemies by reminding them of scary stuff. I like Calder, for example, but it means harsh and cold waters. Who would want to be called that?”
I agreed that Calder was a no go.
“And then there’s nicknames, although they aren’t any better.”
“Nicknames?”
“You know how the fey are; everybody has a dozen different names. But, apparently, other people are supposed to give them to you. You aren’t allowed to just name yourself.”
I shrugged. “So name him.”
“I would, but there’s all these rules. Even nicknames are supposed to say something about you. I asked the guards for recommendations, and you know what they came up with?”
“No idea.”
“Inn magri: the thin one. Or ótveginn: the unwashed.” Claire looked indignant. “He’s not unwashed! I bathed him just yesterday! Or—even worse—rotinn, the broken. I mean, can you imagine?”
“Some of the guards are pricks,” I agreed.
Claire gave me a sideways look. “They have one for you, too, you know.”
“A nickname?”
She nodded. “They’re calling you ambh?fei. It means two-headed. I guess because of you and . . . you know.”
I blinked. I wasn’t sure how to feel about that.
“They say it’s an honor. That all warriors have a string of nicknames, telling their story.” She sighed. “They’re probably going to give you more.”
“Good,” I decided.
“Good?”