Emily Wilde wakes rested in her cold cottage when Finn arrives with breakfast. He teaches Emily how to bank the fire, asks about her plans, and listens as Emily explains scholarly distinctions between common fae and courtly fae. Finn shares local caution about naming the "tall ones" and encourages Emily to settle in, meet the villagers, and come to the tavern that evening, where Aud the goi and her husband Ulfar may be useful sources of stories.

When Finn asks about Emily 0s origins, Emily gives a guarded account of herself. She explains that Cambridge has been her true home since she began studying there at fifteen, and she reflects privately that her parents never understood her fascination with folklore. Emily recalls finding companionship in her grandfather 0s books and becoming drawn not to faerie glamour but to the ordered mystery of the Folk and their separate world.

After Finn leaves, Emily finishes unpacking, prepares her field equipment, and tries again to destroy Wendell Bambleby 0s letter. The letter remains unharmed in the fire, which prompts Emily to lay out the evidence behind her long-standing suspicion that Bambleby is not human: his avoidance of metal, hints of the Folk 0s speech in his voice, and the possibility that he is an exiled faerie of high rank. Unable to burn it, Emily tears the letter into pieces, sets the matter aside, and heads out with Shadow.

Emily is revived by the beauty of the landscape and the promise of real fieldwork. She spends the morning surveying the edge of Karrarskogur, recording fairy-signs such as mushroom rings, unusual moss growth, strange trees, and a hot spring with wooden figurines and candy offerings nearby. When Emily senses that she and Shadow are being watched, she avoids startling the observer, pretends to rest by the spring, and chooses gifts carefully: Turkish delights and a diamond. Emily then sings a formal song in Faie and leaves, having made a cautious first overture to the unseen local Folk.