Master Tom Oldshoe was heralded by that same strange smell I’d first discovered outside his house on the first floor. I’d not thought it related, but it had reminded me of him, and then there he was.

  Tom was dressed once more in his cardinal red motley, including a hat with dangling ends. He doffed this hat and held it against his chest as he spoke to me, “Master Tom Oldshoe if it pleases you, Sirs. At your service.”

  Two articles of treasure lay at his feet. A slender branch or wand of wood, and a silver-white ring of confounding beauty. It was not electrum. I’d seen the white-gold before, and this was not gold. It was purer. Richer. More crystal than a mere mortal metal, but clearly still metal.

  He was taller, and there was something cherubic about his eyes. And his face was now handsome rather than ugly. Darker, too.

  “We know you Master. I am Oswic, Magi of the Sacred Order, Wise Man of Blackbridge, The Starcaller of Dawn, Master of Twilight, Voice of the Storm, Speaker on the Wind, and Five Time Hoopstone Champion of Ravenhold, Darkswallower of Bleakfort, and this is Attar, Necromancer of the Bronze Coast. You look different, Master.”

  Attar and Tom eyed each other warily. They’d shared one body, and one soul, yet in some ways, neither had met.

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  “So we do Sir, so we do, and yet, I have never met you before. But a friend of the free folk is a friend of mine, and none are freer than a pixie.”

  The pixie doffed his own hat at the compliment, “An honour, Master. Never have I seen a dobby before so grand.”

  Tom placed his hat back on his head, “Neither have I, good sir, neither have I. I feel as though I have never before known myself. I’ve been adrift for days. Weeks? A lifetime. But you, Sirs and sir, I know, yet I know nothing. Nothing but my name and my mother.”

  And yet, he’d hardly said his own name. Was this truly Tom?

  “We had a bargain, Master Tom, do you remember it?”

  A flash of recognition crossed the hob’s face, “You were to clean my mother’s house. It is no wonder you remind me of her.”

  Seeing as I was invisible, I assumed he saw something about my soul. Though invisibility was not an obstacle to many of the elves when they chose for it not to be.

  “And that bargain is ended?”

  “It is. It is and as are all others. I end them to be born anew. To be like myself.”

  Attar sagged at the announcement, as though relieved of some burden.

  I frowned, “Does my oath to Attart no longer bind us?” I asked him.

  Attar pulled himself upright as a man waking from a dream, “There are no oaths between us save our friendship.”

  Free.

  I had no animosity towards the exchange I’d made with Attart, but the burden of every bargain I’d made still weighed on me. It was more limitations, more to remember, more which wasn’t my oaths to myself and my loves. I’d loved Attart, even, after a fashion, but I’d had no love for the bondage between us.

  Tom noticed the change in my mind.

  “Where will you go, Sir?” he asked kindly.

  I shivered. Smiled briefly.

  “Wherever I want, Master Tom.”

  Master Tom Oldshoe bowed, one arm outstretched, and the door to his right swung open.

  “Please do.”