Chapter 44
Forty-Four
Days passed since they’d returned to Wayside, and life resettled into its usual rhythm, although normal now included Thrain loitering in Lira’s kitchen and offering unsolicited advice on baking.
Crumpet had taken to chasing him out with a wooden spoon on no fewer than three occasions, and the dwarf had finally accepted his place in the great room with a tankard of ale and a tale to tell.
Cali did her best not to think too much about The Cruel Mistress, and it helped that she had a project to throw herself into.
After she’d mentioned her fondness for the hammocks on the pirate ship, Korl had strung up one for her beneath one of the towering oaks near the stream.
She’d taken to spending her afternoons there now, swaying gently while the stream gurgled over its smooth stones below and birds traded melodies in the branches overhead.
The blank book Iris had given her now sat open on her knees, its pages already half-filled with her cramped, slanting hand. Her first official author gift, the apothecary had called it.
Cali had found, somewhat to her surprise, that she wrote better outside than she ever had cooped up in her room at the inn.
The spring air helped, warm enough now to coax the last of winter’s chill from her fur.
She even found that the ambient sound of the village—the strike of hammer against iron, the rattle of wagon wheels, and the distant chatter of conversation—was more conducive to storytelling than silence.
She let her quill rest against her bottom lip as she considered the next line, working through the chapter about the troll king fiasco. The memory provoked a smile despite the cold, miserable nights on the run that had resulted from it.
Writing it all down had done something she hadn’t expected.
She’d thought that putting Pirrin and Malek onto the page as they’d once been might reopen wounds and sharpen her sadness.
Instead, the opposite had happened. Every memory she released from the white-knuckled grip inside her, and every line of dialogue they spoke, had lessened her sadness.
The grief hadn’t vanished entirely, but it had found somewhere to go in the narrative of her novel.
She might not have found the settled, easy love that had taken root between Vaskel and Iris, or the sweet adoration Lira shared with Korl, but she had found something that gave her purpose.
Even if she still couldn’t stop her mind from drifting to the dark-haired pirate helming the brilliantly colored ship, she knew those were stories for another day and another book.
“There you are.”
Lira’s voice broke through her thoughts, and Cali looked up to find her friend crossing the grass with a steaming mug wrapped in both hands, her apron smeared with evidence of the morning’s baking.
“I come bearing chai,” Lira announced, holding up the mug.
“You’re a lifesaver.” Cali accepted the chai gratefully, cradling its warmth between her paws.
“A hot drink and a good book make everything better.” Lira gestured to Cali’s notebook. “Speaking of books, how’s yours coming along?”
“I’m working on the troll queen chapter,” Cali said as she blew the steam off her drink.
Lira’s face split into a grin. “Troll king or troll queen?”
“Depends entirely on whose version you believe,” Cali said. “Though I’m inclined to write it the way Pirrin told it after the fact, because his version is significantly more flattering to himself.”
Lira laughed as she settled herself cross-legged on the grass next to the hammock. “He would have loved knowing you’re writing him into a book.” Her forehead bunched. “What’s it like writing about him and Malek and everything that happened?”
“Surprisingly therapeutic.” Cali turned her quill over in her fingers. “And you’re still sure you’re fine with me putting our crew and our quests into a book?”
“We’ve told you a dozen times,” Lira said, swatting lightly at the edge of the hammock.
“We’re more than fine with it. We can’t wait to read it.
” She paused, then added with mock solemnity, “Though I should warn you that Vaskel, Rog, and I have already decided that we fully expect the first book to be dedicated to us.”
Cali laughed. “That’s an easy promise to make.”
A rustle came from the direction of the tavern’s kitchen window, and Bramble scurried out across the grass, his striped tail swishing behind him as he hurried toward the hammock cradling a cloth-wrapped bundle in his paws. He presented it to Cali with a tiny nod.
She leaned down and took it, returning his bow before unwrapping it to find a scone still warm from the oven, its scent unmistakably sea lime and coconut.
“Bramble and Crumpet thought you should enjoy the last of our sea limes,” Lira said. “You’re getting a scone fresh off the rack before anyone else even gets a taste.”
Bramble chattered something, then turned and scampered back toward the kitchen, scrambling up the side of the tavern and darting through the open window.
Cali took a bite of the warm, buttery scone, and was about to say something about how it was a shame sea lime and coconut couldn’t be a regular scone flavor when movement across the bridge caught her eye.
Val was running full out, her blonde ponytail swinging wildly behind her as she hurtled from the direction of Greyhelm Castle and pounded across the wooden bridge toward the tavern.
Lira went still beside her, following Cali’s gaze. “That doesn’t look good.”
“It really doesn’t,” Cali said, already setting her mug down in the grass and swinging her legs out of the hammock.
Lira was on her feet first, cupping her hands around her mouth. “Val! Everything okay?”
Val didn’t slow until she’d nearly reached them, chest heaving, one hand pressed to her side. She shook her head, gasping out the words between breaths. “News from Eldu.” Another gasp. “Pirate war.”
Cali’s fur went cold, every thought of troll kings and sea lime scones evaporating as a single name rose unbidden in her mind.
Bonnie.