"This wouldn't be part of the slavery process, would it?"

"I mean, not more than everything else about this conversation, except the kicking you, which was helpful and yet you objected."

"Fancy that."

"And the bell," he adds thoughtfully. "I just took the bell because it seemed neat."

"Enjoy."

"That doesn't make it worth more, but okay."

"Or don't, whatever."

The other faeries come back. They have a cage. "We can take him to court in this," one of them says cheerfully. "If he doesn't want to eat anything."

"I'd rather you ate something," his summoner says earnestly. "It's kind of heavy and a pain to carry."

"Should I assume that unless I unlock a hidden secret faery ettiquette code we are going to find out how thoroughly this circle prevents me from preventing you guys from sticking me in the cage?"

It seems to take him a couple seconds to puzzle through that. "You can't fight us," he says when he has. "We already talked about this, hurting people you're indebted to is wrong."

"I mean, that wouldn't be the first thing I'd try but I can't read this binding and you can't either."

"Look, I thought you wanted to come see our court and meet our mortal."

"It sounds interesting! I'd prefer to skip the slavery."

"And your strategy to do that is to threaten to attack us?"

"Do you have a substitute idea?"

"Come back to court. Don't tell lies. Make them a feast. Then offer to make them more nice things in exchange for safe passage home."

"Are there any more charming rules I should know about besides the lying one?"

"Don't lie. Don't hurt anyone. Don't break any agreements. Don't - swear to things falsely? I really think this is pretty obvious."

"Why the actual fuck do you think that?"

"They're just very obvious."

"Wow. Is there someone less stupid I can talk to about the options here? It'd be really great if they could read the circle but I'll settle for a three digit IQ."

"Yep! At court."

"- isn't that technically a lie since my question included the word 'here'?"

"Oh, I thought you were referring to "my options here", like your options in this situation. Of the people here, I don't think they're supposed to talk to you. It makes the debts less manageable. They're here to get you in the cage if you can't be persuaded to work with us here."

"Well, maybe you could go get someone who is prepared to talk to me, and I will... make bells or whatever... if that is called for? Or whatever turns out to make sense after someone who isn't you has explained matters to me."