Chapter Thirty-Three Fia
Chapter Thirty-Three
Fia
Finan’s hooves clopped loudly on the rain-washed cobblestones as we moved swiftly but carefully through the village.
The houses and shops were shuttered against the storm—only a few bobbing lanterns illuminated the street in the falling dusk.
Irian and I drew our hoods far over our faces, but there was no one to watch us pass.
A faint strain of music steered us toward the village green, where a single rangy-looking goat grazed amid the downpour.
The inn was dilapidated and small, but well lit.
The smells of roasted meat and woodsmoke wafted from the open door; the stable block had a sturdy roof to keep the rain off Finan’s back.
The faded sign creaking to and fro above the door said The Stone and Clover.
I sighed. “I don’t like this idea.”
“I like it more with each passing moment.” Irian gave the air a speculative sniff, even as his lips slid sideways. “What now? Do we call out for the proprietor to invite us in?”
I stared askance at the formidable Gentry warrior. “Irian, do they not have inns in Tír na nóg?”
“Certainly not.” I couldn’t tell whether he was teasing me. “The laws of hospitality demand any home be open to any traveler or guest, no matter how mean or grand, provided they abide by the rules of the house.”
“You just… let strangers stay in your home whenever they ask?”
“Provided they ask.” Irian’s smile took on a wolfish glint. “Don’t worry, mo chroí. Few strangers have lasted out the night in my home. And fewer still have wheedled their way into my bed.”
A hint of warmth touched my rain-chilled cheeks. “I did warn you I was a horrendous houseguest.” I stuck out my tongue at him, then shivered. “Gods, Irian, it’s too cold to flirt. If we’re going inside, let’s go.”
I looped Finan’s reins around the gatepost and loped up the path to the entryway.
Only to find the door blocked by a stout, imposing woman in middle age, with frizzing ginger hair and a round face etched with laugh lines and frown lines alike.
She eyed Finan—he was far too fine an animal to grace this rural village—before glowering at me and Irian, hidden beneath our hoods, and crossing her brawny arms over her chest.
Fortunately, I’d discovered a little cache of silver coins in Finan’s saddlebags—a gift through time from an obnoxiously rich and forgetful golden-haired princeling.
I drew out three coins and hoped this woman spoke the language humans loved best: money.
I flashed the first piece of silver in the lamplight.
“For the horse. Rub him down, water him, and feed him grain if you have it.” I held up the second coin. “For a room and a meal and two cups of ale.” I brandished the third and saw the woman’s eyes gleam with greed. “For you. For your trouble. And your silence.”
The innkeeper hesitated a bare second longer before scooping the coins from my glove and stepping aside.
The inn was dim and smoky. A rough-hewn bar sat along one wall, stacked with tankards and barrels and ringed with wobbly looking stools.
A few patrons—mostly men—nursed cups and chatted with the barman, a ruddy youth who looked to be the innkeeper’s son.
Tables for two and four were crammed close together, though few were occupied.
Beside a generous hearth on the other wall, a single elderly fiddler picked out a simple tune.
No one seemed to be listening, let alone dancing.
A cold finger of unease trailed my already frigid back.
On a cold, damp evening a place like this ought to be packed.
Patrons should have been clamoring for ale at the bar; children playing games beneath the tables; food and drink circulating as pipers and fiddlers made music. This place was all but deserted.
I pointed Irian to a table in the shadow of a beam in the farthest corner of the tavern, where we’d be able to keep an eye on the door but no one could get a good eyeful of us.
“Go sit down,” I commanded, stern. “And don’t talk to anyone. I’ll go order us some drinks.”
He cut me an ironic little bow. “Lady wife.”
He prowled toward the back of the tavern, and every single eye in the establishment followed his progress, watching as he lowered his towering height onto a bench, settled back against the shadowed wall, and propped his impossibly long legs on a neighboring chair.
The hilt of the Sky-Sword poking from beneath his cloak did not go unnoticed.
You could have heard a pin drop.
I cleared my throat and let my fist fall onto the bar. The red-cheeked young man jumped, spinning toward me with only slightly less trepidation than he’d been watching Irian with.
“M-madam?” His throat bobbed. The wispy red beard barely fuzzing over his cheeks told me he couldn’t have been older than sixteen or seventeen. “Help you?”
“Two cups of ale.” The boy busied himself with fetching tankards and pouring the frothing brown liquid. When he set them before me, I dared to ask, “Can you tell me why the pub is so empty? Is aught amiss in the village?”
He frowned, tilting his head to peer beneath my hood. I kept my head resolutely angled.
“If ye don’t know, madam… pardon my saying, but ’tisn’t my place to say.”
I sighed and fished out another piece of silver, simultaneously grateful to Rogan for leaving so much money lying around and annoyed with him for never carrying small denominations. The boy’s eyes widened—it had to be a month’s wages for him. He pocketed it swiftly, then leaned closer.
“The high queen is raising a vast army. Bridei’s able sons and daughters wend toward Rath na Mara, for Cairell Mòr has bent the knee, to spare our lands.” He shook his head. “Brighid only knows what good ’twill do us, when there’s no one left to plow or sow.”
Fear and hope played like shadows and light on the backs of my eyelids. Mother was mounting an army? Then she surely meant to stand against Eala. “Does Eithne have an enemy in mind?”
Again, the boy stared at me as if I was from another realm. “Surely ye know—Eithne Uí Mainnín no longer sits the throne.”
My hope burned away in a flash of black smoke. “Who does?”
“The Deathless Queen, of course. The one they name Grave Mother, for she calls the dead from Donn’s dark realm and embraces them as her own living children.
” The boy leaned even closer and dropped his voice to just above a whisper.
“Though I have also heard her called the Rotten Princess, for where she walks, the grass shrivels and the air stinks of decay.”
I jerked away, tasting grave dirt and carrion in the back of my throat. The boy seemed to realize he’d said too much, and guiltily returned to his barkeeping. I carried the tankards toward where Irian lounged threateningly, barely noticing the suds slopping over the rims onto my gloves.
Deathless Queen. Grave Mother. Rotten Princess.
We’d known Eala was already here. But in less than two months she had somehow deposed her mother. Stolen Fódla’s high throne for herself. And was now drafting an army of able-bodied citizens to supplement her horde of the dead.
Fear nearly throttled me. I thumped the cups onto the wooden table and slid in beside Irian, murmuring, “I spoke to the barkeep, and—”
But when I glanced up to his shadowed face, I saw he was not paying a whit of attention to me. His gaze was fixed halfway across the tavern, his lush mouth slightly parted in fascination.
“What,” he asked in disbelief, “is that shriveled human doing?”
I followed his eyes. The elderly fiddler had taken a break from his music and sat before the hearth, puffing contentedly at a long wooden pipe. The tip flared red, and Irian’s eyes smoldered with it.
“He’s smoking.” I fought the urge to roll my eyes toward the heavens. “It’s a common pastime. Or vice. Depending on who you ask.”
“I wish to try it.”
What insane wish fulfillment was this? “We haven’t got a pipe. Nor weed to fill it.”
“Then go bid him give me his.”
“Irian, I cannot march over to that stranger and take his pipe.”
“Then trade it. For one of those shiny tidbits you keep handing out.”
Now I did roll my eyes. “You mean money?”
“Yes, that.” Irian made an impatient gesture. “If you do not wish to barter, then give it to me, and I shall perform the trade.”
Oh, ye gods. I stalked over to the geezer, who saw me coming from halfway across the room and blanched white as a sheet. I plucked one of the last coins from my pocket and held it out between my forefingers, hoping these townsfolk appreciated my forced largesse.
“Grandfather.” I fought to keep the annoyance from my voice. “I beg you sell us your pipe.”
Wordlessly, the old man handed it over. I returned with it to Irian, who wiped the stem on the hem of his damp cloak before unceremoniously popping it into his mouth.
He sucked in a huge lungful of smoke, then blew it out in swirls of vapor that briefly obscured his shadowed face, his stubbled jaw, his armored figure.
I glanced over my shoulder, assured the whole bar was once again observing us.
We were not blending in well at all.
“Gods alive, colleen,” Irian said with immense glee. “But this tastes like a charnel house. Do humans truly inhale ashes for fun?”
I plucked the pipe from his hands and smacked it on the table.
“Keep your voice down,” I hissed, “and listen to me. Not only is Eala already at Rath na Mara, but—”
But Irian was reaching for one of the foaming flagons of ale I’d carried over from the bar. He took a tentative sip, then drained the tankard—nearly as big as his head—in three massive gulps. He wiped his mouth on the back of his gloved hand.
“Why, this, too, is absolutely disgusting! It’s sweet and bitter and smells of piss, and it bubbles all along my throat.” He beamed at me. “Yet already I yearn for another taste.”