He’d tried to temper its heat by braiding the silk with moongrass filament, to no avail. It only burned through the moongrass. He turned to the others helplessly, but especially to Newt, who gave an apologetic shrug of his shoulders.
“I’m sorry,” he said, opening his hands and showing his palms, which gleamed like brass by the light of the campfire. “I guess I’m built for handling hot things and never considered it would be impossible for you to work with.”
“It’s not your fault. You’ve never known any different. I should have been more prepared to work with unconventional materials.”
He thought of the enchanted fingerless gloves he would have loved to craft for nullifying the heat of Mothergoat wool, except for how he never had the chance to actually make them because of Bones’s abrupt abduction.
His eyes flitted momentarily toward Valefour, but he felt guilty for placing the demon at fault. They were here now, deep below the surface in the fiery meadow, and they would just have to deal with the situation.
Augustin snapped his fingers. “What if we asked friend Newt to help string the Heirloom with the cinderling silk? With your permission, of course.”
“Sure, why not? It’s worth a try.”
Newt gathered a length of cinderling silk, gingerly approaching the Heirloom held reverently in Valefour’s hands. The silk would need braiding or strengthening nonetheless, but it was worth the rudimentary attempt.
Would the silk even hold on the Heirloom? He knew the instrument was supposed to be magical, but it was still only made of wood. The cinderling silk could burn right through all of Gregor’s hard work.
Newt laid the cinderling silk along the leftmost grooves on the instrument, the part meant to hold the lightest strings. Braiden held his breath — then breathed in sharply through his nose when the silk began to scorch into the Heirloom. The smell of burning wood filled his nostrils.
Newt yanked the silk off the Heirloom, batting at the last remaining cinders. It hadn’t left any lasting damage — in fact, the burned black line gave the instrument a bit of character.
But what now? Braiden kneaded his temples with the tips of his fingers.
“This was supposed to work,” he muttered.
Elyssandra patted him on the back. “It’s not all bad, is it? We’ll find something to use on the Heirloom.”
Warren nodded. “It may take some time, and certainly a trip to the surface. Didn’t you mention other kinds of magical spiders when we met Gregor in his hut? How long might that take?”
“Who can say?” Augustin said. “We lucked out with the othergoats, but we may not be so lucky this time. It could take days, weeks, perhaps months. Setting expectations realistically, of course.”
It didn’t feel right to have come all this way only to disappoint the demons again. This was the thread of Braiden’s destiny, a length of yarn first unspooled back in Bethilda Beadle’s day.
Valefour handed the Heirloom to Augustin and gave the party a tight smile. “We’ve waited decades to return home. What’s a few months more?”
“Not years, one would hope,” Ophidia said.
“We’ll find a merchant,” Braiden said, his eyes flitting around the clearing as his mind worked for answers. “Travel to another town, even, and buy up whatever delicate magical strings we can find.”
“So we’re not going home yet?” said a small, new voice from the bushes.
A young demon girl had parted the leaves, still half hidden in the foliage. She stood almost at the same height as Newt, but from her features alone Braiden could tell that she was actually a child.
Valefour and Ophidia’s child, it seemed, the way they gazed at her with a mixture of fondness, concern, and parental disapproval.
“Lucie,” Ophidia said. “What did I tell you about staying hidden?”
“That I was supposed to go behind the bushes with the others until we knew the humans wouldn’t hurt us.”
Something sharp and sour twinged in Braiden’s chest. Could he blame them? History and prejudice had shown how humanity had made up its mind about demonkind.
“We wouldn’t dream of hurting you,” Braiden said softly.
“Now,” Ophidia said, fighting to keep the accusing tone out of her voice. “You wouldn’t hurt usnow. Lucie. Come to me.”
Ophidia waited with outstretched arms, embracing her daughter when she burst out from the bushes. She twirled, then passed her child to Valefour, who hugged Lucie tight, squeezing a giggle out of her. He hoisted her up on his shoulder. Lucie perched there comfortably like she’d done this a thousand times, gazing imperiously over Braiden and his party.
“Promise you won’t hurt us?” Lucie asked.
