She tried to ignore her tooth for as long as she could because of her previous experiences with the dwarves. She forgot about her tooth most of the time but experience had thought her that this ignorance is not bliss and she needed to make her move before the weather got too bad and made travel impossible. A cold swallow, which gave her a sharp pain, first thing that morning, got her thinking in the right direction of taking care of the problem. 

However when she looked out the door, she saw that a few inches of snow had fallen. She had to think twice about going out. Uishneach had been out already and in again and had trailed a bunch of snow all over the place. She felt in a temper about these mud puddles and threw his house slippers at him as she admonished him to not track any more mud into the living space. He was in no mood to remove his shoes for her but her glare changed his mind. She watched him take off one shoe for a few minutes and absently mindedly put it on again.

She wanted to tell him of the latest nerve jumping in her mouth. He wondered how she would be able to get to see the tooth dwarves, seeing as, she was against getting snow on shoes. She said testily that she would use her bat wings. Uishneach though this was funny. She relaxed, as she wondered what she would do now. Uishneach found his potion of clove oil, which she rubbed on her offending tooth.

They usually held the offending weapon behind their backs until she was half out of it and would quietly submit to their method of leverage. Once she fainted when she was young and the dwarf though she was dead but she came quickly around and he sent her home refusing to do anything else with her offending mouth that day. He sent for a pitcher and drank deeply of some strong smelling liquid to calm his nerves.

At lunch time Druid Bernie came in to her turf fire with his feet frozen and wet. She poured some hot water into a tin tub and he pulled up his brown robes, bared his knobby knees and rested into the warmth of the hot water. She gave him some tea and refused her glass of stronger stuff saying he was a little afraid of such stuff while there was a threat of more snow around. After he was suitably heated she mixed some of the clove oil with other oils she kept and a mutton tallow mixture and he rubbed it into his feet and lower legs. His socks and shoes dried out on the hob and he was very pleased to feel warm and toasty again.

She would wait until the afternoon and see if the sun melted the snow enough for a little travel. She would try and find out which tooth dwarf would be available, the father or the daughter, and send word to find out when would be a good time to arrive for some attention. The dwarves had to have their own ways about which method they used. What ever they did she would have to breath deeply, drink a potion and hope it would be over before she figured out which method they would use.

Mariah told Druid Bernie a dream about her teeth. She had a dream that one of her top teeth, toward the front of her mouth, had three diamonds, shining brightly out of her mouth. He hummed and hawed and went off into a speal about teeth being the defense and that if you dream of them all falling out than your defenses are down. No, her teeth are not falling out, except for the one needing to be taken out. Maybe it is connected he said. Mariah was impatient with his connection to defenses. She did not have an “ahah” moment about that.

She said that the diamonds, were three in number and full of light.  He said he once knew a dwarf, who came from Egypt, who had a big diamond in one of his teeth. He thought it was for show. She had though of talking to the dwarf about having a gold bar made to put in her nose, if she could get the gold from Uishneach, to balance up the little lines forming all over her face. The druid laughed. It is the inner golden light of the soul that counts, not the diamond light in her mouth. Besides, he said to her face, that she was inclined to chew over things too much. She was a little grumpy about his smug remarks. She would try and not chew on it too much.

She looked out the door again. The sun was shining and a thaw had set in. She went to find the dwarf of the teeth. He showed her some replacement teeth he had, some shell and bones. Where did that bone come from she wondered, and as if he heard her, he noted it was from one of her ancestors and would probably fit in very well with her other teeth if he stitched it into place. She felt a little disgusted. He looked in her mouth and said he could probably repair her tooth, grind it smooth where it had become bald looking and finish off with some resin he had acquired. It would last a few years, he said.

She asked him about diamonds on her tooth and he said no bother if she had the diamonds and asked her would she like a gold grill as well. She did not have the gold. The dwarf and his assistant held her mouth open, almost dislodged her jaw, scuffed up her lips and generally made her feel smothered. But she forbore all this to have the nerve pain fixed, which it was. She bit the side of her jaw as the numbness wore off.

When she visited her friends that evening, for a surprise birthday party, she complained about her tooth trials. They gave her the pain stick and some mint oils for her neck and jaw. Then they gave her a heated pillow of rice and she placed it on her neck to relieve the remaining pain and she settled into enjoying the party. There was marvelous music and Bart and Melone sang “Love is my religion.” Everyone joined in and a great time was had by all. The end.