"Just gimme a name," (Patreon)

Burnside insisted after I hesitated. "I'll find her and flay her alive!"

"Didn't you hear me mention she's immortal?" I reminded her.

"Then I'll just have to keep flayin' her forever!"

"She killed Sheila Na Gig," I explained. "She might be more than a match for you. Why are you so upset anyway? I thought massacring villages was something you approved of."

"Not when it upsets my friend," Burnside snarled, gesturing at Rebecca, who still seemed to be in a daze. "And besides, I ain't one to pass up a good chance to take some gruesome vengeance."

"Gruesome vengeance will have to wait," I decided. "We have more pressing matters right now." I knelt beside Rebecca and asked her if she was all right.

"I'll be fine," she muttered, shaking her head. "I just need to lie down and get my thoughts together. We should head back to the lodge. I had hoped to show you what we've put together under better circumstances, but ... well, you're here, so now's the time."

"You can save the tour til you're feeling better," I said, letting Rebecca wrap her arm around my shoulder and lean on me as we stood up. "I don't have to be anywhere. There's a problem in Persoc Tor that I need to deal with eventually, but it's not urgent."

"So, fill me in on what you've been up to," I asked as we walked.

"Last time you seen me, I was chasin' that varmint Ash," Burnside began.

"It's Owter now," I informed her. "He has gone back to his Vulpitanian name."

"Whatever," Burnside scoffed dismissively. "After I caught up to Rebecca and Arse, they both of 'em explained to me how he wasn't a traitor but actually saved Rebecca after the situation at the courthouse went all wrong. So I couldn't kill him, which was more'n a little disappointin."

"Even a devious schemer like Ash, er, did you say Outer? That's a strange name," Rebecca sighed. "Even somebody like him deserves a chance at redemption."

"You see what I've had to put up with?" Burnside grumbled, gesturing vaguely at Rebecca. "First thing she wanted to do after I showed up was build a coven. After a few dozen tries one actually managed to stay together. The first bunch kept gettin' run off by locals who didn't want witches around, and the others mostly split when they realized what a goody two-shoes Rebecca was. Turns out most would-be witches are social outcasts that want revenge on ever'body what was mean to 'em in school, go figure. It took a long dadgum time to get enough people together to make a group big enough to actually call a coven. Rebecca tries to school the more malicious recruits in the ways of Seelieness. Sometimes they even listen."

"It doesn't help that a certain Raccoon Monster is always taking them out into the woods for 'secret lessons' on how to fillet one's enemies with a pocket knife and other such useful Life Hacks," Rebecca muttered.

"That stuff's important to know!" Burnside retorted. "But most of 'em faint afore I can even get halfway into the lesson. I've said it before 'n I'll say it again: You is raisin them gals too soft."

"Rebecca, you were a Changeling," I blurted, trying to change the subject. "Did anyone from Faerie ever come to fetch you?"

"Nope," she replied sadly, shaking her head. "No one."

"That's troubling," I mused. "Owter made it sound like the remnants of Faerie had mostly stabilized now, but things would have been pretty chaotic when you were born... Does that mean there's an entire generation of forgotten Changelings out there that were never brought back to Faerie? They would be wandering alone in the lowfolk world, not knowing what they are..."

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