‘You see? You hear?’ said Puck. ‘Nobody answers. Grey Shepherd is gone. Feet-in-the-Night has run off. There are no more wolves.’
‘Wonderful!’ The man wiped his forehead as though he were hot. ‘Who drove him away? You?’
‘Many men through many years, each working in his own country. Were you one of them?’ Puck answered.
The man slid his sheepskin cloak to his waist, and without a word pointed to his side, which was all seamed and blotched with scars. His arms too were dimpled from shoulder to elbow with horrible white dimples.
‘I see,’ said Puck. ‘It is The Beast’s mark. What did you use against him?’
‘Hand, hammer, and spear, as our fathers did before us.’
‘So? Then how’—Puck twitched aside the man’s dark-brown cloak—‘how did a Flint-worker come by that? Show, man, show!’ He held out his little hand.
The man slipped a long dark iron knife, almost a short sword, from his belt, and after breathing on it, handed it hilt-first to Puck, who took it with his head on one side, as you should when you look at the works of a watch, squinted down the dark blade, and very delicately rubbed his forefinger from the point to the hilt.
‘Good!’ said he, in a surprised tone.
‘It should be. The Children of the Night made it,’ the man answered.