Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
They tied up their horses in front of a small, two-story building built from white stones and dark-wooded beams. Warm light flickered in the tiny square windows, and Draven was struck with wonder if this place even had running water.
He slid his eyes to his mother, frowning. “Just because we’re in hiding doesn’t mean we must take up residence in a stable.”
His mother clicked her tongue at him. “Spoken like a child who has been far too spoiled for all his life.”
Draven beamed—her sharpness was already returning, too.
He never thought he would miss the edge of a blade so much.
“Besides,” his mother continued, reaching for her hood and pulling it back from her face. “Never judge a book by its cover.”
Draven fought against the retort he felt grumbling in his chest and instead opted to wordlessly follow his mother inside the creaky building.
To his surprise, his mother had been right, and despite the incredibly weathered appearance of the inn on the outside, the inside was rather quaint.
A stone hearth crawled up to the wooden beams of the ceiling, and there were exactly two tables and two sets of chairs spaced around it.
A large settee was placed in the middle of the room atop of a rug stitched from red and gold threads, and the smell of stew drifted in the air.
To their right was a worn innkeeper desk, and Draven was surprised when he glimpsed an older woman hobbling toward it, her white hair tucked tightly into a bun.
“Welcome to the Strigthorpe Inn.”
Draven scrunched his nose. “Strigthorpe?”
“Yes, dear. Strigthorpe. Do you have some quarrel with the name?”
Draven glanced at his mother, who was watching him through the sides of her eyes, a subtle smirk curving her lip.
Draven sighed, the action hunching his shoulders. “No, madam. No quarrel.”
“That’s good, seeing as it was the name specially chosen by my great, great, great-grandfather.”
“That’s a lot of greats,” Draven grumbled.
“He was a very great man,” the old lady countered. She turned her keen-eyed gaze to his mother, and she smiled. “A room for one or two?”
“One will be fine, if you have room.”
The old lady swatted a hand at her. “Please, I have plenty of room. More rooms than I know what to do with, in fact.” She disappeared behind the desk as she bent down and started rummaging around for something.
When she rose, she had a small box filled with brass keys, each one looped with its own red ribbon, a small number tag attached to each.
“Now, with that being said” —she picked up a key, turned it over, then set it back down— “the reason I have plenty of room is because we receive so few travelers who wish to stay in Príth. Most are just passing through.”
Draven’s heart quickened in his chest. He wasn’t sure he liked where this was going.
The old lady inspected another key, again setting it back down on the pile after.
“Now, do not mistake me—sometimes merchants or wanderers do rest here for the night. I wouldn’t be able to keep my inn if that weren’t the case.
But to have a woman and a child from Talderine stay in my inn for—” She stopped suddenly, glancing up from the keys and tilting her head at Draven’s mother.
“How long do you plan to stay here, dear?”
“However long we’re welcome,” she replied.
The old lady hummed and returned to her search. “I presume you’re both aware you have bruises on your faces?”
Draven felt the blood leech from his skin.
He wasn’t.
Well, he had been, at one point, but the bruises were fading, and so he thought nobody would notice.
Something else struck Draven. He furrowed his brows at the old lady. “How did you know we were from Talderine?”
The old lady just glanced at him, a curve lifting her brow.
She snorted. “Dear boy, look at the quality of your cloaks. Pay attention to how flawless the stitching of your trousers and the fabrics composing your tunic are. Nobody in Príth—no, nobody in Erandor dresses like that unless they come from the capital.”
Draven’s cheeks heated, and he hated himself for it. With a sudden worry clogging his throat, Draven glanced at his mother. To his surprise, her face remained calm. In fact, she almost looked amused.
The old lady finally settled on a key, and she clutched it between her fingers.
“Príth is a very special place. We look after our people here. My advice? If you want to blend in, there is a clothier shop right near the market where you may be able to find some pre-sewn clothes. Purchase a pair of trousers and a tunic or two you don’t mind wearing while a seamstress sews you up a new wardrobe.
” A pointed smirk tugged at the old lady’s lips as she addressed Draven’s mother. “I assume price is no concern?”
Draven’s mother huffed a quiet laugh. “No,” she answered. “It is not.”
The old lady nodded and hobbled from around the desk. She placed the key in his mother’s hand and guided her fingers into a closed fist around it. “Then the beauty of Príth is entirely at your fingertips, and I hope you bleed every last ounce of happiness you can from this place.”
Draven’s awe-filled eyes drank in everything with unchecked thirst.
The streets were buzzing with a life entirely different than anything he had ever experienced.
People shouted over the cobblestone streets, addressing others by name and asking how their families were doing.
There was so much smiling and head nodding and ‘how do you do?’s.
The air here was rich and savory, yet intoxicatingly sweet—like the smell of fresh bread was being pulled through the city on a string.
It didn’t smell like lavish perfumes or oils like Talderine.
It smelled homey. The buildings, with roofs varying from terracotta to green and brown shingles, were filled with personality, and Draven decided he liked the way some of them were overgrown with ivy.
The old lady at the inn was right, and the clothier did have some pre-sewn clothes available.
Fortunately, Draven was able to fit into a pair of trousers and two tunics, and there was something particularly liberating about throwing his expensive clothes in the bin and walking out in his new ones—even if they were a tad itchy.
His mother found a dress, trousers, and a breezy tunic.
The seamstress’s shop was only a few blocks down the street, where she then commissioned enough clothes to last them a decade.
The day was fading, and Draven felt this foreign feeling swelling in his chest. A feeling that painted the world in gold and sang the promises of something beautiful.
He hoped his mother felt the same. She had been uncharacteristically silent for most of the day, but during the quiet moments in between, Draven heard the nearly-forgotten sound of her humming to herself.
The sound of it was breathtaking.
As they were walking back to the inn—Draven’s stomach beginning to growl with hunger—they passed by a shop with a large, rectangular window comprising most of the shop’s front.
Overhead, there was a small wooden sign hanging above the door, and Draven was surprised when his mother stopped to read it.
She glanced down at Draven and pointed up. “Look,” she said. “It’s a bookstore.”
Draven stepped around his mother and squinted to read the words. The Polished Bookery.
“Do you want to go in?” he asked.
“Yes,” she murmured, as if the question was more layered than it seemed. “I think I do.”
A small bell cried when they swung the creaky door open, and Draven was instantly met by the smell of old pages and ink.
The bookshop was nothing more than a large, square room decorated with shelves upon shelves of colorful books, a large table encased by a few chairs resting in the center.
Draven glimpsed a small staircase near the back, and he wondered if the second-story loft was filled with this many books as well.
Draven turned and found his mother walking mindlessly in front of the shelves, an idle finger trailing behind her like a shadow, gliding across the book spines.
He watched as her eyes swept across the room, something awakening behind them.
He was convinced he could have watched his mother slowly return to herself for a while longer, but the sound of stairs groaning and a squeaky voice had him snapping his eyes forward.
A small girl with hair so black it almost appeared blue-tinted came racing toward him. Draven, being the logical being he was, assumed surely she would stop herself before plummeting into him.
He was wrong.
He was sent hurtling backwards, not prepared to swallow the force of the girl’s impact.
When he squinted his eyes open, he saw blue eyes—richly saturated like a lapis lazuli stone—hovering over his face, blinking with curiosity.
Her face was framed by two distinctly silver pieces of hair, colored in the sort of unsure way one feels when staring at the moon, debating whether it should be labeled silver or white.
The girl leaned even closer, and Draven felt his cheeks beginning to flush from embarrassment.
“I’ve never seen you before,” she decided. She pulled back, her head cocked as she swept her angular, yet softly-rounded gaze over Draven. Her nose scrunched. “Your eyes don’t match.”
“And neither does your hair,” he pointed out through a grunt, attempting to sit upright. “Do you tackle every customer you don’t recognize?”
“Only sometimes.”
Draven arched his brow. “And what does that mean?”
“Easy,” the small girl began, remaining on Draven even as he tried to politely wiggle her off of him. “It means—”