Page 37 of The Prince or the Bard?
“Dear Laoise,” Fiadh says as her husband takes both horses to the barn with Ruairí. “Pádraig sends his regrets. He is too busy with training and new duties to get away just now, I’m afraid.”
“What duties does the princeling have that can’t wait?” I ask, one hand on my shawl and the other on my hip. “That’s just silly.”
Fiadh arches one brow in a subtle rebuke of me, even as she reaches out her hands towards mine. “You’ve missed much at Connor Castle, cousin. It’s been too long.”
“Surely not! We were just at court a few months ago.” I squeeze Fiadh’s hands as we lean towards each other, our foreheads meeting since we lack proper muzzles at the moment.
“I’m afraid it’s been longer than that.” She gives my hands one final squeeze as she withdraws. “Nearly a year.”
“It couldn’t have been.”
A whinny from far afield says my own little ones have spotted our guests. Only they aren’t so little now. Gráinne and LittleUnagh are nearly the size of full-grown púcaí as they race down the lane, still gleaming with frigid seawater.
“I’m afraid, my practical cousin, that your work keeps you too busy,” Fiadh says, a hint of amusement in her tone. “Look who brings up the rear, if you don’t believe me.”
I scan the field that separates my and Ruairí’s cottage from my smaller one, only to find Fiadh’s daughters missing. They’ve run off, skirts fisted in their hands, to meet my and Ruairí’s twin girls. Bringing up the rear is a younger, smaller figure, still on horseback.
I do a double take when I realize it is Tadhg and Fiadh’s youngest girl, riding a pony by herself instead of accompanying her mother or older sisters. Maisie hasgrown.
How could Fiadh’s youngest be as big as that already? Pádraig came within two years of Fiadh’s brush with death, to the great celebration of all the court as well as Diarmuid’s Row. Then, unexpectedly, two girls came, one right after the other, when Pádraig was already eight.
Little Maisie was yet another surprise, arriving when Pádraig was already a man—not to mention the crown prince.
My cousin is too young to have such an old babe. It seems only yesterday that Maisie—no one calls her Máighréad—was toddling around the barn on one of their too brief royal visits, and getting into trouble whenever we took our eyes off her for even a second.
I take in Fiadh with fresh eyes. Life within Connor Castle must agree with her, for she shows no signs of age since last we met. Well. No one has ever said life in Diarmuid’s Row was easy.
Besides that, the sea fae have been adding to my usual headaches since the spring, angling for more access to the earthen fae markets and using the celestial courts as leverage. This visit will serve as a welcome respite from my usual duties,though I’m sure my brother-in-law will bring up business at some point.
Fiadh is right. Ihavebeen working too much. How very un-púca-like of me, not to enjoy life more. Even more un-púca-like is that I’ve spent so little of my free time with family. But since the High King made the post of Sea Court Trade Chieftain expressly for me, it wouldn’t be wise to complain.
I don’t dislike it, of course. It’s only that it takes me away from the joys of home—and its residents.
Perhaps it’s time to slow down. The twins will inherit my business, after all. Why not give more of the responsibility to them? Theyarenearly grown, though you wouldn’t know it from the way they dance about in the fields right now, frolicking like foals in springtime.
I expect my nieces could learn a thing or two, lending a hand around here—if the princesses aren’t too busy with courtly duties. And if their parents will let them go.
And if they aren’t already engaged to be married.
My throat constricts, hoping this isn’t the cause of their visit. I received word only two days ago that this little royal party would be arriving, needing no escort but the High King’s own magic.
I take Fiadh by the arm, leading her inside. She does not always need a walking stick now, but there are times when it helps. I am guilty of treating her like the ailing fae she once was.
She’s gracious as always, and does not admonish me, though I see a spark of amused warning in her eyes. She’s dressed for a drafty inland castle, and not for the damp sea air; it’s all I can do to resist sharing my shawl with her.
“Tell me what brings you here on such short notice,” I say, bringing her to sit by the ridiculously large hearth Ruairí designed while I check the kettle already placed on the hook.
The fireplace itself has always been fair-sized and merrily burning peat, but the stone surrounding it has grown to takeup half the wall. When the twins were born, Ruairí got a little overzealous, building out the hearth to place two cradles by it.
That is how I know I annoy Fiadh with my fussing: though Ruairí has seen evidence aplenty that púcaí are just as hearty as High Fae, despite being categorized as low fae, he has always been an overprotective father to them. While Little Unagh and Gráinne have plunged into brisk waters from the moment they could shift into their unseelie púca forms, on land, Ruairí treats them as though the slightest wind will make them catch cold.
He remains a doting husband for me, as well—though he doesn’t dare fuss as much.
“I think our news is best told over tea,” Fiadh says.
Immediately, my brows rise. Is sheletting mecoddle her? The news must be grave indeed.
I sit down on the hearth stones, watching her expectantly.
