“You are way kookier than me, man,” I said, turning into an alley. “And I talk to pizza.”
I laid out the four pizza boxes on top of four adjacent trash cans, and glanced around to be sure no one was nearby. It was getting near to lunch break, and it wasn’t the best time for what I was about to do, but it ought to work. I turned to look up and down the alley as best I could, drew a breath, and then remembered something.
“Hey, Sanya. Stick your fingers in your ears?”
The big Russian stared at me. “What?”
“Your fingers,” I said, wiggling all of mine, “in your ears.” I pointed to mine.
“I understand the words, obviously, as I am someone who has been practicing his English. Why?”
“Because I’m going to say something to the pizza and I don’t want you to hear it.”
Sanya gave the sky a single, long-suffering glance. Then he sighed and put his fingers in his ears.
I gave him a thumbs-up, turned away, cupped my hands around my mouth so that no one could lip-read, and began to murmur a name, over and over again, each utterance infused with my will.
I had to repeat the name only a dozen times or so before a shadow flickered overhead, and something the size of a hunting falcon dropped out of the sky, blurred wings humming, and hovered about two feet in front of me.
“Bozhe moi!” Sanya sputtered, and Esperacchius was halfway from its sheath by the time he finished speaking.
I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “There’s some real irony in your using that expression, O Knight of Maybe.”
“Go ahead!” piped a shrill voice, like a Shakespearean actor on helium. “Draw your sword, knave, and we will see who bleeds to death from a thousand tiny cuts!”
Sanya stood there with his mouth open and his sword still partly in its sheath. “It is . . .” He shook his head as if someone had popped him in the nose. “It is . . . a domovoi, da?”
The little faerie in question stood nearly fifteen full inches in height, appearing as a slender, athletic youth with the blurring wings of a dragonfly standing out from his shoulders and a tuft of hair like lavender dandelion fluff. He was dressed in garments that looked like they’d been thugged from someone’s old-school G.I. Joe doll, an olive-drab jump-suit with the sleeves removed and holes cut through it for his wings. He wore a number of weapons about his person, most of them on nylon straps that looked like they’d been lifted from convention badges. He was carrying one letter opener shaped like a long sword at his side and two more, crossed over each other, on his back. I’d given him the letter opener set last Christmas, advising him to keep half of them stashed somewhere safe, as backup weapons.
“Domovoi?” the little faerie shrilled, furious. “Oh, no, you didn’t!”
“Easy there, Major General,” I said. “Sanya, this is Major General Toot-toot Minimus, the captain of my house guard. Toot, this is my boon companion Sanya, Knight of the Cross, who has faced danger at my side. He’s okay.”
The faerie quivered with outrage. “He’s Russian! And he doesn’t even know the difference between a domovoi and a polevoi when he sees one two feet away!” Toot-toot let out a blistering string of words in Russian, shaking a finger at the towering Knight.
Sanya listened in bemusement at first, but then blinked, slid his sword away, and held up both hands. He said something that sounded somber and very formal, and only then did Toot’s ire seem to abate. He said one or two more harsh-sounding words toward Sanya, added a flick of his chin that screamed, So there, and turned back to me.
“Toot,” I said. “How is it that you speak Russian?”
He blinked at me. “Harry,” he said, as if the question made no sense at all, “you just speak it, don’t you. I mean, come on.” He gave me a formal bow and said, “How may I serve you, my liege?”
I peered at him a bit more closely. “Why is half your face painted blue?”
“Because we’re Winter now, my liege!” Toot said. His eyes darted to the side and down several times. “And . . . say, that doesn’t mean we have to eat the pizza cold, does it?”
“Of course not,” I said.
Toot looked relieved. “Oh. Good. Um. What were we talking about?”
“I have a job for you,” I said, “and for everyone you