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North led him back inside and up the sweeping white stairs.

Adam had never seen this part of the house but was unsurprised to find it as uninviting as the rest. There were delicate, long-necked vases that looked like they were carved from ice, and blue-leafed plants whose musical whispers sounded shrill and spiteful.

North opened a door and led Adam into a room that looked far too large for one boy. The giant bed would have fit three or four adults. Like the rest of the house, it was all stuffy and very 1700s, though perhaps there were subtler shades in the blues and whites that Adam’s eyes couldn’t see.

All stood perfectly tidy, perfectly ordered. The thick blankets atop the bed showed no crease. Adam knew without being told that North made it himself, each day, to the knight’s exacting, militant standards.

“It’s, um . . .” Adam trailed off, unable to say anything nice.

North looked around as if to ensure they were alone.

“Can you keep a secret?”

“Sure.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” Adam hoped he wasn’t about to enter into some blood pact or be shown anything that would freak the knight out.

North waved Adam over to a wardrobe.

With another confirmation that no one else was present, he opened a drawer.

Inside was garbage, or what looked like it. A really old magazine, a few pieces of paper, ski lift tickets written in German, and a single wallet. Its contents had been carefully laid out like they occupied a case in a museum. There were a few stray earbuds, none of them matching, two pairs of sunglasses, one of which was very high-end, and a slightly outmoded cellphone.

“Where did you get all of this?”

“People leave things on the mountain sometimes. They can’t see the house or come near it. Mother has glamours to keep them away, but I sneak out, usually at night, to see what I can find.”

North beamed at his contraband from the mortal world, and Adam’s heart sank.

This was his only glimpse into a whole side of himself, a heritage he couldn’t hope to understand with only this for insight. How weird it had to be for cross-country skiers to be his only examples of humankind.

And even then, he had to hide this little bit away, lest his mother discover it.

It reminded Adam a little of his own tween years, before he’d had a cell phone or easy access to the internet. His mother would not allow him to have anything to do with what she called “the occult.”

Information about magic or his Sight was scarce. He’d hide articles or books, mostly fiction that later proved to be wildly inaccurate, in the vents at the trailer the way he’d later hide dirty magazines. He didn’t tell anyone, not even Bobby, who wouldn’t approve and would likely rat him out to Tilla Mae, earning Adam a sermon at best and a trip to her church for a bunch of deacons and pastors to lay hands on him and pray loudly in tongues at worst.

This collection was like that for North. He had no television, no internet, no phone. It was just him and his mother, who wasn’t always here. His only window to the outside was this, bits of mismatched garbage.

“Do you want to know about the human world?” Adam asked.

North’s eyes got very wide.

“Could I? I mean, would you tell me about it?”

Adam smiled, though he wasn’t sure where to begin.

“Is it very different?” North asked.

“Very. We don’t have magic, at least most of us don’t, and those that do, well, we’re not like the elves at all.”

He wasn’t sure how long he rambled on, trying to explain cars and streets. North perked up when Adam told him about airplanes.

“Yes. I’ve seen those in the sky.”

Adam tried to explain about forests and oceans, that the world beneath his mountains wasn’t only rock and ice. This confounded and delighted him.