“He must really love her.”
“I think he does. Aye, he does, though I think he mistakes he can, with love and indulgence, temper the edges of her. There, they set your hair off, they do, and go very well indeed with the dress.”
“Thanks. I’d never have figured out how to do it myself. I lean on Marco for this sort of thing.”
“Do you think he’s ready? I’ll take you both down to the banquet hall.”
“We’ll find out. And it’s really okay if Bollocks comes?”
“He’s an honored guest, and another love in my life.” In her dress of shimmering copper, Minga bent down to him. “You knew my Kiara needed help, and saw she got it. You are a hero to me.” Minga smiled as they started out. “I would so like to read the book you wrote about him.”
“Sure. It’s not going to be published until next summer, but I’ll send you a copy.”
Marco opened the door before the knock. “I was just coming over to see if you were ready. And, girl, are you ever! That dress is snatched. Minga, you look fierce!”
“That’s a compliment,” Breen explained.
“And so I took it. You are fierce as well, Marco.”
“Look here, Bollocks, we got ourselves two gorgeous women. I got two arms, ladies.”
He cocked them both out.
* * *
Music piped and poured from the balcony above the banquet hall. Candles blazed in tall iron stands and from iron wheels hung by chains from the soaring ceiling. Their light added a sheen to the long tables and benches arranged on either side of the room to face another at its head. Behind it, the dragon banner flew over a huge roaring fire.
Voices echoed, bouncing off the wide-planked floors, off the walls where colorful tapestries hung between arched windows of leaded glass.
People milled about or gathered in groups. Some already sat, drinking wine or ale while they talked.
“Ah, I see some I know are waiting to see you again.”
Minga led the way to a table where three men and three women talked, nearly all at once and with elaborate gestures.
One of the men, older than the other two, glanced over. And his eyes fixed on Breen’s face.
She thought she’d seen him sitting with the council at the Judgment, but there’d been so many people.
He rose, a tall man with hair the color of roasted chestnuts, a warrior’s braid tucked behind his ear, a trim beard.
A fist squeezed Breen’s heart as he looked at her. He hadn’t had the beard before, but she knew him. She recognized him as one of the three with her father in the photograph taken when they’d played in a pub in Doolin. On the other side.
As he watched her come, he laid a hand on the shoulder of the woman who sat beside him and waved his hand in the air as she talked to the others.
Still talking, she glanced up, then over. Breen saw her eyes fill as she scrambled to her feet. And not stopping there, rushed over to fold Breen into a hug.
“Ah, sweet Mother of all, here she is. There’s the girl.” She drew back, tears sliding out of eyes of soft, dreamy green. “Would you look at her, Flynn, a woman grown, and so lovely! Have you forgotten me, darling? Well, that’s no matter, no matter at all, for I’ve not forgotten you.”
“You’re … Morena’s mother. You’re…” It was all swimming up to the surface of her memory. “You’re Sinead, and you used to make us sugar biscuits shaped like flowers.”
“That’s right, that’s right, so I did. And you liked the cornflowers best of all.”
“I— Morena said to tell you she’d come visit soon.”
“I hope she will, as we miss her, but we know she’s no liking for the Capital.” She brushed a tear from Breen’s cheek. “Would you look at the two of us. Why, we’ll have splotchy faces if we don’t stop. Isn’t she a sight to see, Flynn?”
“She is, aye, she’s all of that. And how are you then, little red rabbit?”
With a half laugh, half sob, she went into his arms. “You called me that because I was always running, and you’d sneak us all gumdrops when our mothers weren’t looking.”
“And here, after all these years, she’s telling on me.”
“I have a picture of you with my father and Keegan’s and another—Brian—taken in a pub in Doolin.”
“So my mother’s told me. Those were days, fine days indeed.” He cupped her face in his big hands to kiss her. “Your da was my brother in all but blood, and as dear a friend as ever I’ve had.”