A Hungry Midnight Knock

20251209

Written for Luna Asli Kolcu’s “Myths of Winter - Week 2” event.

Tending the inn’s batchless pottage was Laura’s favourite part of the overnight shift. Admittedly there wasn’t much else positive about being available to help patrons.
Laura hummed tunelessly to herself, her spoon circling the worn bronze pot in time.
The pottage had a clear signatory flavour. She was sure she could pick out their inn’s from any other. Yet no portion was the same, for each morning it was topped up with whatever needed using, a scoop of dried peas, plus enough water to return it to soup, and left to gently simmer aside the hearth. Free for staff to help themselves, and served to guests who showed up after cook had gone to bed.
What’s today? Laura sniffed the steam and licked her lips. A clear hint of rosemary. Did that mean the lamb joint had been deemed too old for pie? She dearly hoped so, for pies were only for paying guests, and any leftover swiftly claimed by the upper staff.
She untied the pewter mug from her belt (a personal treasure) and ladled it full of warm, savoury, stodgy goodness. Exactly what you needed to send you off to bed on a cold winter’s night. Ahh.
Ooh, they had put the lamb in! Minced so small you could barely see the pieces, but the flavour suffused the whole pottage. Delicious! And it’d take days before dilution hid the meaty savour. Mm.
Laura was almost through her second mug, and feeling ready to curl up in her nest of blankets on the floor, when soft tapping broke the night’s hush.
A visitor? But with how they were knocking, Laura felt they had to be a child. And what child would be walking the roadside at midnight, much less on a cold night like this?
When she opened the door the eyes gazing up at her were at about her waist-height. But they were oblong and shone pale blue in a catlike manner. She couldn’t see their face, or indeed anything except the eyes and a pair of pale spindly hands holding out a smooth white bowl.
“…Good eve?” Laura offered. Entirely at a loss.
The eyes blinked, a slow, deliberate motion Laura felt sure was a polite greeting in kind.
“Are you hungry?”
The eyes bobbed in a nod.
“Do… you like pottage? It, um, it’s fine today, it’s got lamb in it…”
This time the eyes danced in vigorous nodding and the bowl was stretched up towards her.
Well… while the pottage was for staff, and guests in a pinch, even Old Elmo never got stingy with it, it being so cheap and all. So she couldn’t think anyone would complain about her giving it away to someone who wasn’t a patron. And it was so cold out! She was already shivering just standing in the doorway.
So she gave her best maid’s smile and accepted the bowl. Which certainly wasn’t porcelain, for it warmed at once against her skin. It… put her in mind of bone. But nobody would eat from such a thing! Besides, no bone could be carved into a dish this size. She was quite certain it had to be something else.
Brushing this aside, as best she could, Laura filled the bowl with pottage, then brought it back to the door, the mysterious visitor not having stepped inside.
“Here you go!”
The eyes swooped in a bow. Then the spindly pale hands reached into the light again and accepted the bowl and-
OH GODS SO MANY TEETH! Sharp and jagged and shimmering like gilded pearls.
Laura jumped back and gawped as the figure slurped down the pottage in three swift gulps.
A dark patch - a tongue?? - passed over the gently glowing teeth, and its eyes scrunched into a smile. It bowed again.
“Y-you’re welcome.”
The bowl was offered once more, the eyes hopeful.
Plenty of pottage left. So Laura carried the bowl to the hearth.
When she peeped back the eyes waited in the doorway. She meekly asked “Would you like a spoon?”
The eyes tilted to one side, then the other. A shrug? She had no idea.
She snagged a small horn spoon and handed it over with the pottage.
The mundane spoon was inspected with great interest. Childlike wonder, even. Then, slowly and uncertainly, the pottage was eaten spoonful by spoonful.
The eyes blinked and squinched at her. She was certain the visitor was pleased.
She smiled back and tentatively asked “Would you like to come in and warm up?”
The eyes looked past her to the hearth. The figure considered. Then the eyes rocked back and forth. A head-shake.
“Alright. But do feel welcome.”
The eyes squinched almost shut. Then they leant over the licked-spotless bowl and…
Laura gawped, confused and alarmed, as shimmering teeth tinkled into the waiting dish, rattling against the spoon. And it was offered to her again.
“What - are you alright??”
A nod. The bowl of teeth held unwavering.
Slowly, steeling herself, Laura accepted the bowl. And the moment she did the visitor bowed and vanished into the night.
“Goodbye!” Laura called before shutting the door against the cold.
Despite what she’d expected (for the whole thing was like a dream), next morning the teeth remained, and turned out to be solid silver. Practically a full penny each! When Old Elmo heard the story he insisted Laura keep half, a veritable fortune for a kitchen maid.
Every night since, Laura filled the dish with pottage and left it outside the door. And every morning it was licked clean and payment left. Not always silver teeth - sometimes it was shiny pebbles or a pretty leaf. But silver was left often enough that Old Elmo started calling her the inn’s little luck charm. And he now insisted the pottage be made up richly, to all the staff’s delight.
Perhaps one day the visitor would knock again, and she could thank them. But for now she always beamed into the darkness and hoped they were there to see.

Prompt was “In your world, every inn must keep one meal warm through the night for whoever arrives after dark. Tonight, something arrives that isn’t quite a traveler. It’s polite. It’s grateful. It asks for seconds.”