Shoestring Theory

EPILOGUE

Just a month later, the pair of them had headed out into the woods. Cyril, in all his manias and stresses, had found that gardening soothed him and had gotten just a bit too into husbandry. He wanted to go out foraging, looking for wild mushrooms for potions and recipes. Eufrates had come along to make sure he did not step into a ditch and perish searching for a redcap in the wrong part of the forest.

Tigris’s birthday was coming up, and they were debating what she would like more: a jewelled dagger or a pair of mother-of-pearl earrings. Both sides of the debate were Cyril, because his useless, unhelpful husband thought that she was the queen and she had enough material goods (and because he had written her a song like he did every single year).

Cyril did not think this was fair. They were a unit now, the least Eufrates could do was say the song was from both of them so he did not feel like a fool when he was outshone.

Eufrates was just on the verge of using his golden tongue to convince him that if he showed up to court with a basket of homegrown vegetables, Tigris would genuinely adore it. This was a ludicrous effort to undermine his authority with her and to get Cyril dismissed from his post and finally all to Eufrates.

He was about to point out the dastardly nature of this plan when he heard it.

It was faint and when Cyril asked Eufrates – who had a keen musician’s ear – about it, he said he had not noticed it at all. But it did make sense. The sound was meant for Cyril . He knew it intimately and unmistakably.

Cyril shoved his wicker basket into his confused husband’s arms and ran towards the noise. As it grew louder, he was more and more certain of what it was, because he had heard it so many times before. A grin, tentative and hopeful, pulled at his lips.

He was right, though. When he got close enough that even Eufrates could hear it, he knew what was waiting for him.

Cyril was hearing the smallest, most strangled and pathetic mewl imaginable.